Beautiful Day

It’s September 11, again.  Another beautiful day.  Here in Texas the breeze is cool on my back porch and I am delighted to sit and feel the soft wind on me, and breathe, breathe and say ‘thank you’. But it is September 11.  I run through my various emails from several writers’ and blog sites, and, inevitably, there are promos to ‘come read my reflections on this anniversary’.  And I scroll down, avoiding the latest memorial.

It is too soon. Eleven years on and it is too soon. The first anniversary I watched the TV memorial held at Ground Zero and cried, really cried.  I listened for the name of my friend, Mary Yolanda Dowling, but she must have been read out during a commercial break.

I looked out on the mourners when the cameras panned the crowd, still raw a year on.  I listened for the accents of my youth, the voices I could not recognize as accents until we moved across the country and were told we were the ones with the funny voices.

But I pass them by now. Pass by the television remembrances, fewer now. I cannot live there. Other tragedies are current. Other outrages take up space in my allotment for mourning. I am filled up.

I watch History Channel shows, so many dedicated to battles and tragedies and outrages against our common humanity.  My family teases me that I am fascinated with ‘murder shows’ and mysteries.  And I am.  I continue to be puzzled at how capable we, people, that is, are of destroying life. I don’t understand.

I don't.

Better Angels of Our Nature

The mystic chords of memory…will yet swell the chorus… when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.  From Lincoln’s First Inaugural Address Good ole Abe Lincoln with his quotable words. One set of words that often runs through my mind is from the last paragraph of his first inaugural address: “the better angels of our nature”.

The progression went something like this--I was praying for people, and naturally, on my list were folks who have died, such as ancestors, friends, family, others I have never met in this life. And that led to thinking about who we are once we have passed from this world to the next (‘cause, well, I don’t know about you, but my life experiences and energy attest to the conclusion that life goes on in some form after we have left this flesh behind).

Do we lose all the nonsense when we die and become our better selves? Do these ‘lesser angels’, our baser inclinations to sin versus our better invitations to holiness, joy and love, get sloughed off in the transition between this world and the next?

Then I wondered, hoped, that once we pass on to the next life, in some process I can barely grasp at, like vapors of a dream, I think we will become our better selves. Ourselves, yes, but better. Shinier, more true, unencumbered by faults and sin. Unencumbered by jealousy and resentment and anger, lust and greed. All the big and little faults that separate us from a more perfect life.

And, “mystic chords of memory” in that same speech. Ah, what a beautiful confluence of words. How brilliant was this American saint, this secular holy man of history? Isn’t it memory and imagination that builds us, feeds us, gives us strength to draw on and reminders of what to avoid? Memory girds us when we feel bereft of comfort; it brings to the foreground those moments when we once felt, whether fleetingly touched by the divine or filled with light in every cell of our being. Thus armed, we can endure, we can hope, we can pray.

And, become, the better angels of our selves.

Brick by Brick

Excuse me: What!!!? Now, really, I didn't plan this juxtaposition of events in the news and at a less public forum I attended, but I sure do intend to expand on it.

We are, by now, all familiar with the Akin comment and ‘legitimate rape’.  Infuriating that people are still that stupid, but there it is.

Last week I attended a speaker’s forum, looking to get my toe in the water of professional speaking, something I have done quite a bit in the past, but have neglected lately.

As a general rule, I would like to think, I don’t keep my mouth shut when I hear something offensive or questionable. But there are exceptions.I have been trying to figure out why I didn't object when I first heard the comment or even afterwards at the Q and A. Here’s what I've come up with: it was my first time with this particular group, the atmosphere was all supportive and positive and a bit ‘rah-rah’ lets listen to the experts who’ve made a ton of money speaking, therefore they know what they’re talking about, and the atmosphere of pleasantries and success. That, and I had to be somewhere else.

The keynote was a charismatic fellow, a former Olympian, smooth, commanding, all the qualities one would want to cultivate in the speaker biz.But, but, there was one comment, almost a throw away line, that in order to be successful as a speaker one must be vulnerable, let the audience know you are one of them, invite them in. And, surprise, those who are better at being vulnerable at the podium are men. Why? Because they are not pre-occupied with whether their shoes and purse match.

I know I furrowed my brow and the side of my mouth pulled up at this, wondering if there would be some brilliant insight to follow. Alas, there was not. There was only some supportive laughter.

Vulnerable? Men are ‘better’ at being vulnerable? Excuse me, what!!!? 

What a crock of shit!! Now, I don’t curse. I am, on principle, against vulgar language. Not only because it is ‘unladylike’ but, because it is, generally, ignorant and brutish and overused.

But, once in a while, it’s the only fit.

I have a daughter, a daughter-in-law and a granddaughter. All girls, all women, must learn, at a very young age, how to protect themselves.We learn how to build walls, and we better learn early.We learn how to read a room, learn how to pick up on facial and body language. You remain innocent of these lessons at your own peril.

This is not optional. It is mandatory. We must develop this sense, this intuition, if you will, of how to read people, how to sense threat, how to step away from danger. But often, too often, that is not enough.

Why? Because we are vulnerable.

It has nothing to do with matching shoes and purses. It’s a fact of life.

Women are vulnerable all over the place: in dark parking lots, in pregnancy, in size and strength (generally), in our willingness to take the little ones of the world into our hearts and bodies. And, listen carefully, we are vulnerable because we so often want to assume the best in people, we want to trust and be empathetic and let people in.

Women have cornered the market on vulnerability, fellas. If that is the key to success in the speaking business, then sign me up.  If I trust you, I’ll let the shields down. If I don’t, then watch out for flying bricks.

PS:  I am available for speaking and readings to your groups on a range of topics.

Be Ye Perfect

It’s a good thing we don't have to be perfect to be loved--we’d all be pretty miserable if that were the case. We have a little dog, medium little, not purse size little. He is our family mascot. He is chief greeter and bringer of smiles. He sits on my lap while I write. He is inexpensive; he earns his keep with affection and an extra dose of irresistible cuteness.

He loves us in his wonderful doggy way. And we love him.

But, he’s not perfect.

Nope. He was a wee one when he first came home, about three and a half pounds of apricot fluff.

He latched onto me, settling comfortably right over my mommy heart, and I was in love. First time in my life that I understood that people could fall in love with a dog. We had dogs before, but they weren't ‘mine’; they fell under the care and affection of husband and kids. But Frankie, oh, he is my little boy.

At first, Gene promised to not get too close to this little fellow. He much preferred real dogs, big, that is. My kids were grown and away, so Frankie was my baby replacement, just like all those silly women who carry accessory pups in a purse.

But Frankie had his way with Gene, who tried to be stern and detached to this little mess of a pup who, in his infancy, greeted him each morning with the rising smell of puppy pooh in his crate.

Not his favorite way to start the day.

But, Frankie was smart. He parked himself in a triangle at the feet of Gene’s desk. Before long I would arise to the sight of my husband, who wanted a real dog, being silly and lovey with this tiny little guy who grabbed hold of Gene’s heart as surely as he did mine.

I made excuses for Frankie’s extended period of house breaking. ‘Well, he’s so little that peeing in grass as tall as his little legs must be uncomfortable.’ Not much of an argument, but I do defend my children.

He did grow to be taller than the grass (not much taller) and still I had to make excuses for his less than stellar performance as a house-broken dog. Along the way I gave up and just accepted the situation. He’s four years old now. He’s gotten better, much better. There are many days when we don’t have to pick anything unsavory from the floor or sop up a puddle.

You see, we love him. We love when he peeks out the front window, moving the curtain for better viewing, to howl like a wolf at a passing dog or the noise of lawn mowers. We love that when we return home, whether after twenty minutes or several hours, he’s wagging and jumping with delight at our homecoming. We love that he knows when its time for ‘Daddy’ to come in from work each day and he sits sentry near the front door until ‘Daddy’ comes back from the salt mines. We love that he snuggles with us and is a funny little guy. We love that he’s a fluffy mess in between haircuts.

We love that he’s not perfect.

And that’s just perfect. For us.

To Bear Witness

This post first appeared on Melissa Embry's blog: nojobforsissies.blogspot.com on July 30  

If you are at a writer’s conference and the first speaker of the weekend shares with you his ‘moment of grace’ where he received his commission in life, you should sit a little straighter, lean forward and tune up your hearing.

Luis Alberto Urrea went on a mission trip as a young man; he came back a writer.

What was this ‘moment of grace’, as he called it? He and his pastor were working among the most forgotten, the world’s cast-offs who lived and died in an actual garbage dump. Young Luis, notebook in hand, was writing his observations, thoughts, scenes, scribbling words on paper that he would turn into story. A resident of the dump asked what he was doing. Writing. About this place? This dump. About me? Yes, about this place and about you. “Tell someone I was here.”

Now, Mr. Urrea did not say that the sky opened and the Holy Spirit descended on him. But novice writer Luis knew that this moment, standing in a cathedral of trash, was his commission, his anointing, his sending forth. He was tuned in to the energy of the moment; he was paying attention. That is what we, as writers, are asked to do. Pay attention, and as my friend, the writer Bill Marvel, likes to say, bear witness.

We are to bear witness to history in its small moments and its large moments. Bear witness to people, to changes in the atmosphere, to changes in attitude. Pay attention to the new and to the ancient that threads through the now. Be an instrument of history, a commentator, a sense maker, a question raiser.

Writers sift through the materials of life and choose a bit of this to expand on, a bit of that to explore. We churn and tumble and wrestle with the stuff of life long after they have moved into silent history and then we snatch them back and give them a place on the page.

“Tell them I was here”’ is our common plea.

It is also our job.