philosophy

Reasoning work versus Playful rhyme

/ autumncircles / 1 Comment

Ladies and Gentlemen!

Entering the ring, wearing the blue silk, business casual trunks and weighing in at a whopping weight of the world status of four hundred and fifty seven pounds is our challenger!  She’s mean, she’s tough – she stomps on daisies and eats b-u-n-n-y  r-a-b-b-i-t-s for breakfast!! Give it up for the Queen of Restraint, the Bitch of the Boardroom – MS. AFFLICTED!!

[The capacity crowd boos and throws popcorn.]

And now, flying in to reclaim her original title – she’s calm, she’s beautiful – she makes us laugh and cry with her peaceful kind of love and takes her man’s b-r-e-a-t-h  a-w-a-y!!  Wearing tye-dye trunks and weighing in at a compact fighting feather weight as light as air is our people’s choice champion – put your hands together for our Woman of the World, Child of the Universe and the Zen Goddess – HARMONY’S CHILD!!

[The crowd goes wild – screams and cheers echo all the way to the moon.]

The two fighters are poised in their corners.  Ms. Afflicted is snarling and blood is pouring from her mouth as she has just bitten the head off of a baby chick. She is already dripping with a grimy, gray sweat and pounding her fists together. Harmony’s Child hovers above the canvas in the lotus position, eyes closed chanting the love of the ages oblivious to not only Ms. Afflicted, but the millions of eyes and hearts on her every breath. She glows with a light of serenity that secures her place in life.

Let’s get ready to RUMBLE!

The bell sounds.

————————————–

And, by bell, I mean the alarm clock goes off and I start my day which frequently resembles the equivalent of a Rocky Balboa sized prize fight with me battling the demons of responsibility, all cut up and swollen screaming for my family and love much like he did with Adrian.

My reality lies somewhere in between harmony and affliction.  I don’t think I am much different from most folks trying to live their lives amid the human race. And yet, I masterfully convince myself that I am the only one who struggles, who is unable to work an eight hour day, get the kids to/from school, make dinner, clean the kitchen, do the laundry, walk the dog, please the husband and fulfill creative desires without neglecting the ones she loves. My affliction is adept at making sure I feel unworthy to have these children or the true love of a husband or even the talent to write a blog. So, I don’t do any of it and the house becomes a mess, the kids watch TV and a stoic silence erupts between my husband and I. I become brainwashed to believe that my children despise me, that my husband only tolerates me because it would be too difficult to leave, and that no one will ever understand and appreciate my writing much less consider it genius enough to publish.

I read another woman’s blog the other day – clusterfook.com, which I highly recommend – and someone apparently accused her of being depressing.  She has been fighting cancer for over five years (I believe) and is chronicling her journey through a blog. I am fighting having a day job wishing I was at home writing Nobel Laurette poetry and those interminable ten pounds that I cannot seem to get rid of off my ass. My site is depressing – hers is remarkable. And the most remarkable part is that she would probably not compare our two struggles in the way I do.

The truth is that we both receive some sort of relief from writing about our lives and pain and joys and sorrows. We both carry on the tradition of humanity that began in caves thousands and thousands of years ago with simple figures drawn on the rock and grunts around a warming fire that turned into many languages of expression.

My prayers are for Lisa’s voice to delight the fires of her family for many, many more years as well as the rest of us peeking into her world through our brightly lit LCDs and keyboards.

And me?  Well, I’ll keep on-keeping on.  I’ll try new things like a joint writing project with another blogger and maybe playing at photography and work on old ones like accepting and trusting life, each other and the universe.

Why does it have to be?

/ autumncircles / 2 Comments

I heard someone ask on Inauguration Day “why does it always have to be about race?”

Hmm.

Let me think about that for a second.

[At this point, imagine a runner at the starting line with an Olympic-style torch.  The gun goes off and she begins to run very fast towards giant soap box that she is about to set ablaze.]

Deep cleansing breath.

IMHO:

Well, if we ever have forty-three black presidents in a row who won’t stop talking about what it means to be a person of color elected to the highest office in the land, maybe I’ll ask that same question.

Or, if it hadn’t only been a mere few generations ago where one color enslaved another color in our country, I might wonder why the infamous “card” keeps getting played.

If there were not still people alive today who survived being segregated, kept back from a decent education or job, held out of restrooms, bus seats and restaurants, and seen loved ones hanging from a tree, then perhaps I would lean on the side of caution when bringing up my color.

Or, if there wasn’t still discrimination, bias and prejudice that either silently or overtly exists in the hearts of so many – I could possibly be persuaded to think it is inappropriate to discuss the triumph of the “first time in history” type of election.

The tables are not turned where white in this country has had to endure what black has.  The tide has not yet fully receded on hate and bigotry.  And the thought that someone who has not had ancestors kidnapped, sold and enslaved, or parents and grandparents beaten or looked over because of the color of their skin, simply refuses to see yesterday as one of the most historical moments in defining our country’s history – totally baffles me.

It would be like a man saying to a woman, “Look, I know I have never physically given birth to a child but would you stop sharing your bodily trials and triumphs after having one?  Even if it is your first?”

Would parents who only have healthy, living children dare to say to parents who have lost a child that even though they can only imagine what they must be feeling, could they please stop bringing it up because it makes them uncomfortable?

Is that what it is?  Because it makes some people uncomfortable and not want to remember or acknowledge the truth of our not so distant history?  Is there some deeply recessed shame that some feel for knowing what happened was wrong and instead of bringing it into the light of day where we can deal with it and heal, want to squash it deep down where it only comes out in tasteless jokes, inept interactions with others who are different, or worse?  Much worse?

I want to remember.  I want to acknowledge the painful past mistakes our country has committed so that we don’t ever repeat them.  EVER.  Does that mean I want to live in the past and make all of my decisions based on how our country used to be?  No.  I want our country to move forward as one people, one nation, under whatever God (or not) we believe in.

When it came time to pull the now proverbial lever on who I thought best suited for the job as President, I compared beliefs, records and policies.  I did not have skin color or religion or even genitalia in my list of criterion.   My vote was for who I believed to be the right person for the right job at the right time.

And, as it turns out, I am extremely happy with my choice and the opportunities President Obama gives all of us.

[The soap box flames have dwindled to a small smolder now.  The flames are not so hot, but lingering coals and plenty of oxygen promise its rebirth on another day, another topic.]

BTW – would there have been no less mention, discussion or celebration had a WOMAN been inaugurated as President?

I know I will cry just as much, praise just as long and celebrate just as hard the first time we finally, finally elect the next right person for the job of President who also happens to be a woman.

Hot shame and cross blogging

/ autumncircles / 2 Comments

In this new world of blogging and having blogging friends and commenting acquaintances, I, too, felt some flashes of hot shame while reading others comments.

One in particular caught me as I read a friends blog that referred to my blog and the comments posted on it.  It triggered that flash of hot flaming shame I know only too well and struggle daily to keep under wraps.

There buried in the numerous comments from her fans was a remark that flushed me with that same flash of red over my head and down to my toes as if the person screamed it in my face hoping to get me to move.

“..so carefully constructed it was clear the author was taking few risks…”

Had she read my blog entries?  Was she writing about me?  Why does it bother me?  Of course I edit and change and exaggerate to bring my warped sensibilities to the small world I call mine.  From there cascaded a shame attack and run of what I’d written through my head.

I’ll show them, I thought, I’ll just write – unedited for 15 minutes and see where it gets me.

And that is what I am doing right now.  Writing plain and simple from my head to my fingers to my keyboard without hitting the delete key or backstroke – unless I misspell hte wodr.  (hahaha)

I set a timer and promised myself to do this at least once – not go back and sensor myself.  However, in doing so, I find little to write about.  I want so much to take these plain words from my lips and make them unique and flowered like Texas bluebonnet hills beside busy highways.

It’s the writer’s greatest dream, isn’t it?  To achieve absolution from all of the soul searching and human angst with a few strokes of a pen or taps on a keyboard.

6 minutes left.

My brain works much faster than I a can possibly keep up with in reality.  I certainly hope that I can spill out what is inside into a jumbled mess on white paper and then go back like a jigsaw puzzle to make sense out of it, rearrange it, alter it, give it a make over, and make it more enjoyable for someone else to relate to in some fashion.

I find it hard to believe that anyone could actually like the way I write without this added layer of cut and paste.  Maybe that is my old insecurities rearing their not-too-attractive head inside my much too comfortable skin these days.  I still, after all these years, want people to like me.  Like what I do.  Like what I say.

3:45

The other comments referred to Buddha and struggle and joy being one in the same (my paraphrase – remember, I cannot go back and check or fix).  If this is true, me and Buddha are tight.  There are moments when the joy I feel is so intense that a small pain erupts in my chest.  My daughter’s eyes.  Her giant, brown eyes that seem to go on forever.  My son’s smile – the one he lets me see only by chance anymore because he is trying to be so grown up, so tough at nine.

These are joys and they pang my heart.  Can you imagine what I make of my actual struggles?

Only a minute to go now…

I cannot even perform this exercise without trying to do it “correctly” – constantly checking my time to see if I’ve “cheated.”  What the fuck is wrong with my brain that I won’t let this totally go?  Will it be gone when it’s my time in heaven?  What if I don’t believe there is a heaven or hell?

Uh-oh…time’s up…

Will have to leave the rest for another post.

I guess I don’t type as fast at I thought.

(And, yes, these last four lines were typed outside of my self-imposed 15 minute timer…;o)