Quote of the day :)

She did not believe that she could ever stop hating Nicky and Lee, until her pastor told her that when God was going to do something wonderful, it started with something hard, and when God was going to do something exquisite, He or She started with an impossibility.

Anne Lamott, Blue Shoe

Making good choices.

I believe that I am the master of my own destiny, that I in fact can determine the course of my life merely by making decisions that point me in the perfect direction. This is flawed logic. See, I can't predict what will end well with 100% certainty. I can guess. I can use past experience. But I can't emphatically know what will make my life as awesome as possible.

Seriously, I don't even know why I keep trying. All it takes is one bad decision to royally fuck it all up anyway, as the protesters at Planned Parenthood remind me every morning on my way to work. Life is not a series of equally significant moments. Life is a series of benign, uninteresting moments, interspersed with crazy important ones that change the entire trajectory of one's life. Yet I continue to believe that I can be more powerful than I am, that I can predict the future, and thus completely avoid pain. And it is these times, when I have set everything up in such a way that absolutely nothing can go wrong, that everything goes wrong, and I am painfully reminded of how small and helpless I am in the face of an infinite universe and unpredictable people.

So I eat more chocolate chip cookies, because I predict that they will be good, and then they are, in fact, very good. Nothing else matters. I have control over nothing else.

Vacation is no party.

1980 - Small Vintage Portrait on Particle Board

A few days off have put me into thinking mode, one of my all-time favorite modes, as it were, and I'm sifting through my brain, trying to decide where to go and what to do next in my life. I wish I knew, truly. Today, I'm thinking about opening a thrift store. As yesterday's thinking revealed, dreams are sometimes only images flashing across our brains, without any structure to hold them together.

I wish I could step confidently into the dreams I've had for so long. But what I've found in my life, over and again, is that dreams are never what you think they will be. You fall in love, only to discover the hollowness of the other person. You buy an old car, only to realize that you aren't the hobby mechanic you'd hoped to become. You take a job you'd only just imagined in college could exist, only to find it radically conflicts with who you are as a person.

So I've become a little scared to dream, hesitant to take another step forward only to see a nubile dream die with a thud. I'm scared to discover that being human is really as difficult as it seems to be, full of failings and hardship, slim glimpses of true beauty, followed by slippery hope in something more, something big enough to hold, something more substantial.

I think I've stopped trying to find someone to fall in love with because I've realized it's impossible to manipulate, that some things cannot be made to happen, that some things really are out of our control.

Peace, friends :)

How babies are made

Ooo. I do want to know where babies are made. Vintage sex book? Yes please!

Fairly innocuous beginning. Talk about eggs. Good times.

We move to fertilization with an example of a flower. Lovely :)

Holy fuck! I was reading this to my child! Close your eyes, honey.

Oh dear lord. It continues. There is no end to this torture.

Ok, phew. You've redeemed yourself, somewhat, Time-Life Books.

I got into the "Express Lane" today (five items or less), basket in hand on the floor, slowly nudged forward with my foot, enjoying the scenery, happily looking forward to sharing this book with all y'all, when I saw a woman with a fake baby. It was one of those crazy reborn dolls where they're supposed to look lifelike, and then people treat them like they're real. The woman is standing beside the stroller, slowly stroking the hand of the doll, discussing the difficulty she has in finding appropriately-sized clothing, and how she came up with the doll's name. The baby was ugly. This cannot be overstated.

The only time I see people with these dolls is in thrift stores. While in line, I tried to figure out why this is, and decided that thrift stores are the hub for all crazy people (including me), and thus cannot help but attract women with fake babies, showing off said babies to the other crazy people. I began to feel more uncertain of my own identity...

All is well :)

Haiti relief: Parte Deux

Stoneware mugs made in Romania - Eastern Europe, hollah!

Sometimes I get a pain in my chest when I wish that I could do something that I cannot do, and it usually has to do with helping someone, or teaching someone something. When I have that special moment of realization that I cannot control other people, or change them, or teach them adequately what no one but Life has taught me, I sit in a pool of sorrow, with the chest pain.

The world can be a horrible, awful place. And in my life, I have seen a lot of that awfulness, and I've had to reconcile with it, look it in the face and acknowledge that it exists. This has made me the awesome person that I am today, but it also makes me like eighty-years-old. And I walk around with this knowledge every day, hoping that I could save people from it, save them from war, and murder, and rape, and incest, and the deep lasting wounds in families and people that last for generations. I wish I could save people from ever knowing, because it's an awful thing, this knowing.

But it is in the knowing (about all the bad awfulness) that true peace and understanding can be found, where that inability to control that we all have, can be accepted and owned, and truly felt deep down in our bones.

When we try to spare others from pain, sometimes it backfires, and our best intentions are like water in a bucket full of holes. Sometimes the best things we can do for one another, are to stand in solidarity, to acknowledge pain, and to comfort those who mourn.

Too abstract? Whatever. Peace out mofos :)

I like to use the word 'freakishly'

I am occasionally overly optimistic, and freakishly committed to people who hurt me. It's an endearing quality in my mind, but it can put me in dangerous situations, situations that truly jeopardize my physical and emotional well-being. And then, on the flip side, is the reality that people we love will inevitably hurt us, and vice-versa!

One moment in my life that I will never forget is this awful fight (years ago) I had with my best friend. She was yelling, calling names. I was crying, begging her to stop. I was hurt, disappointed, and totally confused. She loved me. I loved her. How could something so awful happen (and it was awful)? That was a turning point for me in my ability to forgive, and in my ability to really see people three-dimensionally, and to accept that the people who love us will probably hurt us more than anyone else, and it's up to us to decide what to do about that. Do we throw away relationships after one horrible fight, or do we do the hard work of repairing?

After that fight, I've began to notice that close relationships aren't as perfect as I'd once imagined them to be (or fantasized about them being). For example, a few months ago, I had a total meltdown and yelled at a few friends in a not-so-kind way for trying to do something helpful for me. I had to get a major talking-to, and I had to eat it big time. For whatever reason, it was so difficult to admit that I was wrong. I had a right to be mad! They were wrong! But that wasn't what the situation was really about. It was about protecting relationships that mattered to me. And that was worth more than my ego.

Just something I'm chewing on today. Peace out :)

The full moon :)

Aren't these pictures funny and weird?

Tonight, after yoga, I stood by the bread factory in my short shorts, yoga mat in hand, watching the train go by under a full moon, and cried. And the train kept going, and going, and I knew I needed it to pass before I could cross the tracks to go home anyway, so I just stood there and got out as much as I could.

I'm okay. I can be big and loud sometimes, and that includes being sad, but I'm okay. People always think that I'm worse off than I am. The funny thing is, when it was really bad, several years ago, very few people saw me in my total life-stops-completely grief. Now I just cry and watch the train, then go home and make dinner, and do it all again tomorrow. I'm really doing well, and sometimes I have long, difficult days, but that doesn't change how I feel on the inside about myself.

Anyhow, having a job where you help people makes you have to constantly remind yourself that you are powerless to change other people. Sometimes I just have to say that to myself (I'm always talking to myself), and the fog lifts, my furrowed brows lift, and the world is right again.

Boosting your own ego

Not completely empty, but mostly :)

This week's episode of The Bachelorette made me think about a phenomenon I've seen in heterosexual romantic relationships: Women pressing the man to admit that he is indeed hopelessly in love with her, causing total exposure and emotional nakedness (but only for him). She manipulates the situation because she wants to know that it's a sure thing. She isn't going to go all-in unless she first knows that he's all-in first. It's like, "You show me yours first, then I'll think about whether I'll show you mine."

I call it a phenomenon because I've seen it happen over and over again with my single friends. They agonize over whether or not some guy likes them because they depend upon that knowledge to judge themselves. If he loves them, then they're worthy of being loved. Their worthiness is completely dependent upon that knowledge (Oh man, this drives me crazy).

We use people's vulnerabilities against them in order to make ourselves more powerful! When I make the guy admit his feelings first, then I have the upper hand. I have the power to crush him if I want, and now there's zero chance that I'll get crushed. Self-protection at its worst, my friends. Using other people's vulnerabilities to boost your own ego? Not cool.

But resistance is not an easy task. It means making up your own mind. It means a whole hell of a lot of risk on your part, with the possibility that there is only pain on the other side. But the cool part is, you get to become a whole person in the process, and that's worth every painful moment, and every tear.

Friday morning rant :)

I'm really struck lately by the number of people in the church-at-large, who find complete satisfaction in an individualistic faith that focuses on sin and personal development. Now, don't get me wrong, I am the queen of personal development. Personal development is great! Go get yourself a therapist! But please don't let that be the end. Personal development is for the world, for the needy and the broken. We work towards healing for ourselves so we can pass it on to others.

I'm so tired, just bone-drained tired, of this endless religious craziness in the US. I'm tired of people yelling about "traditional values". The Western church is now completely about my personal relationship with Jesus - my best friend, and how my life was changed, and how great I feel about myself. It's all about what my neighbor is doing wrong, how my neighbor is sinning, or causing me to sin, all about how frightened I am of where my country is going. I just want to scream, "Get a freakin' grip, people!"

I might be single forever (lest you forget that this blog is all about me finding a man), because I'm not willing to put "Jesus is my homeboy" on my eHarmony page. I might be single forever, but I'm not willing to live a life of family devotions and being a submissive invisible wife. I may be single forever, but I'm not going to buy into the idea that women should cover themselves up to keep men from sinning. It's 110 degrees out? Yup, I'm gonna wear shorts. Deal with it. You had a sexual thought about a person other than your spouse? Deal with it, and move on. I want everyone to collectively throw in the "personal sin elimination" card and just accept the fact that they're flawed and are going to do and say and think stupid things. Yup, you are. You're human. Deal with it. You think God agonizes about forgiving you? It's doubtful. There are, after all, seven billion people in the world, and they all need four hugs a day, so...you do the math.

Now go out there and do something that helps people, that doesn't involve a sign. Peace out.

Thrift Share Monday :)

Vintage clip-on earrings - no signature, but aren't they awesome?

I am being really hard on myself right now. I usually assume that everyone thinks as poorly about me as I do about myself. I don't know that this is true. I've been told that it isn't. These moments (and I have them every once in a while) are full of comparisons to other people, and self-flagellation about not being A, B, or C when I reach age thirty less than two months from now.

Laurel Burch "Toucan" earrings - very fun :)

I wish I thought less of myself, as in, thought I was less important. But I was raised to believe that the world's emotional health was entirely dependent upon me, and that's a tough false belief to shake.

I just know that someone out there would love these, just not me.

When we thrift, like as a lifestyle, nothing is ever perfect. We may see it as perfect, but let's face it. Think of all the hands that touched it before you found it. How's that for perfection? I don't know why I allow everything else in my life to be imperfect, yet continue to expect myself to somehow rise above and defy gravity.

I suppose sometimes I imagine that other people need me to be perfect in order to keep loving me, and my love of thrift is my statement to the world that I will, in fact, never be perfect, and everyone just needs to deal with it. Now if only I could get my frontal lobe involved in this operation...

Linking up with Apron Thrift Girl :)

The death of the hybrid dream...for now

I listed this as a political tie :)

I had some not-so-fun talks yesterday about the car situation. I had to be told, first by a friend, then by my dad, that I need to let go of my used hybrid dream. It's not possible in my current financial situation. It hurts to hear the truth. It really does, but it's the only way to move forward. I've been stuck in the dream, and it's kept me stuck in the Rabbit, which I discovered last night is full of black widows, not because it doesn't run, but because the tree in our front yard has an entire ecosystem existing inside of it.

So instead of the $8000 range, I am now looking more at the $2000 range. Hey, moving from 30+ to 20+ years-old is a move in the right direction. I found an '87 Honda Shuttle that I really like, but the owner hasn't responded yet to my query. A very eager man came to look at the Rabbit last night at 9:30, and wanted to take it right there, on-the-spot, cash in hand. But it was late, and I had blood sugar on the lower side, so I wasn't willing to make such a huge decision. Also, it was dark, and everything looks different when the sun comes up.

My dad says I need to get a Honda. I told him that they get stolen more than any other car. He didn't believe me. I told him that it felt ethically wrong to lower my mpg by buying a new car. He quoted Lenin. That made me feel better.

There will always be more garbage.

Remember the last time you got to swim in a clear blue swimming pool, enjoying the cool water, and loving the way the water felt against your body, making your muscles work in a way they can't do on land?

Remember the huge lump of dog hair or garbage or kid urine that suddenly got in your way?

Yeah, that's life. But it doesn't mean you should stop swimming or that you should begin focusing on the garbage. Toss it aside, and move along. There will always be more garbage. You can't control that.

Ack! Lent is coming!

I haven't given anything up for Lent in years. My life is already about deprivation. Not a day goes by that I don't willingly live without something I want. The only reason I'm considering going to weekly Lenten prayers at my church is because everyone goes out for bagels afterwards. I'm tired of living through Lent, listening to people detail their wonderful deprivation skills, their ability to go without. Am I being judgmental? Definitely.

I am often judgmental. As long as this depraved habit doesn't affect my life in too negative a way, I usually just forgive myself and move on. Except then I miss out on what Lent offers for me (ah, perhaps individualism could benefit me in some way in this instance). Maybe Lent offers me a reason to spend less time on the computer. Maybe Lent offers me outside time for gardening, or more yoga and less ice cream, or vice versa. I don't know.

A while back there was a significant other in my life, in that he was significant because he'd seen me naked, and an other, because he wasn't a lady from my gym locker room. He was always looking to be more spiritual. He tried and tried to be monk-like without actually being celibate. We listened to monks-chanting-psalms on tape in the car. We lit candles and read the bible. When he was upset, I read to him from my favorite book of sermons.

This all felt like an act, like a play with meaningful lines, but with actors playing parts, not real people living their real lives. It all felt false, and I felt empty. On the surface, for me, it looked like I was making good decisions-I'd chosen a good Christian man, hadn't I? But being in this relationship made it feel like someone stuck a maple tap into my heart, and blood just dripped out day by day. I needed an infusion, and I was lost.

Sometimes spirituality is empty because it's only on the surface. We can't make something happen in our souls. We can try, but there has to be a response from the other side. Even Mother Theresa felt like God didn't speak to her. Being "spiritual" doesn't always mean what we think it means.

Maybe take some time this Lenten season for your spirit, in whatever way feeds your soul. I will continue to contemplate the ritual, as I do every year.

Part II: Scars and Clumsiness

Define yourself radically as one beloved by God.

-Brennan Manning

So I'm lying on the canal trail, bleeding, with asphalt in my wounds and the terrible bad luck to have twisted one ankle, but fallen on the opposite side. Both sides were inoperable, and even though I lived a quarter mile away, there was no way I could get there on my own. So I figured I'd wait it out, lie on the pavement and wait for a car to drive by. I was close enough to a street lamp that I was covered in a dull yellow light.

Several minutes later, a kind, caring couple stopped in their car. They put me in their Volvo and drove me home (so close, yet so far). We'd never met, and in that delirious moment, I wasn't sure they were real (again, low blood sugar + runner's high + serious injury = delirium).

I ended up being in crutches for a week. I couldn't work because of the terrain of the job, so I lived on my couch with my legs in the air, hoping I hadn't done permanent damage that would lead to a foot amputation (I was an uninsured diabetic with a foot injury; my mind wouldn't stop swirling with worry).

When my wounds healed, which they all eventually did, I had a bright red heart-shaped scar on my knee. And for some reason, I felt like it meant something. I felt loved and protected, and today, that scar reminds me of that feeling. I don't feel foolish for running at night, or for running alone. I don't feel silly for getting hurt at the beginning of a new job. I don't feel those things, because of that little heart, reminding me that I am loved unconditionally, even radically.

Many more times in the next few years, I would experience similar reminders, none of them visible scars, but all of them tattooed on my memory forever.

Scars and clumsiness

This morning I saw this collection of photos on The Huffington Post. Scars are often jarring, disconcerting things when seen from the perspective of onlookers. But by-and-large, people seem to be proud of their scars. This surprised me; I'm not sure why (Obviously, this is not an unbiased sample, though).

I have huge scars on both knees and I don't feel entirely fond of them. They're only a reminder of my clumsiness. In my crazed long-distance running days, I fell a lot, always on asphalt. One of these injuries was particularly bad. I'd just started a new job, and the human resources manager asked me to stay after my shift to work an employment fair with her. At the time, I had even less of an ability to say "No" than I do now, so even though I was exhausted, I went.

By the time I got home, it was dark, and I had to run out my stress. There was a mile-long paved trail right by my house, lit at night, and I ran laps. By the end, I had that runner's high combined with low blood sugar and maybe some dizziness. I tripped, and fell, sprained an ankle and a foot, and busted my knee. I couldn't get up and was bleeding all over myself. It was dark outside and there was no one around.

I'll finish the story tomorrow. Oo! A cliffhanger!

Lots of backbends

Yoga tonight was so intense for me. Backbends, backbends, backbends. A couple hours later, and I'm still kinda shaky. But I look forward to going every week. It's good, and calming, and all of the crap in my body is gone at the end of the class-it's all left on the mat.

I was sweating like crazy (it was hot and the room was packed). I was slipping all over the place, and my clothes weren't spongy enough to soak it up. I had to go to town on my mat when I got home-clean it up, get all the yuck off of it. Then I ate a lot to fill up my empty muscles.

Now I'm watching The Bachelor. My body feels great; sore, but great. I am full of rosemary focaccia, and chocolate, and soy milk. I am content and tired.

You can't control anybody.

 

I have no control over whether or not other people make poor choices, or whether they make good choices. I have no control over other people, period. That is a hard, horse-sized, pill to swallow, and sometimes, I think it takes a lifetime to try to do it right. So much of what we do involves our own imagined need to control other people. It keeps us from admitting our true pain, our unique weaknesses, and ultimately, our humanity. Attempting to control other people is an attempt to deny those things.

So maybe take some time today to think about the person or people that you wish you could control (Hint: They're probably the people you love the most, or your family, or both). Then take a deep breath, blow all of your breath into your closed hands, then lift them to the sky, and blow your troubles away. Blow away your desire to control, when it's an impossible goal. Blow away your defensiveness and blame. And while you're at it, you might as well blow away any shame you have at wanting control or trying to get it. We all do it. We're human.

Bootstraps, anyone?

 

This story kills me.

People offer us love, and we deny it. People offer us help, aid, and we throw it away, saying we'd rather find it ourselves. I have an image of a toddler in my head, practicing the art of independence-"Do it myself!"

There's a TED talk on vulnerability I'd like to watch today and perhaps respond to tomorrow.

Sometimes I say "yes", when I want to say "no", not because "no" is the right answer, but because I know that I am resisting the love of another person, wanting to avoid attachment. Sometimes we need to accept the love that is offered to us, even if it comes in a form that is unpleasant (e.g. I give my neighbors meat even though I don't believe I should; I buy Hershey chocolate because the man that put up my shelves asked for it, even though I believe that they practice slavery). Sometimes I think we need to take more time to make decisions. Sometimes those decisions will end up bringing us closer together.

And we need eachother. Life is tough, remember?

Garbage in, garbage out

 

In yoga tonight, I had thoughts running through my mind throughout the class. That's rare. Usually, I am able to get rid of everything very quickly and focus on how much pain I'm in. Maybe I am feeling stronger, so am therefore able to let my mind wander, but it got me to thinking. How am I getting rid of the negativity in my life? How am I dealing with the garbage that comes in? Am I doing anything?

I am a firm believer that the brain and body carry everything with them. Your brain remembers everything that has happened to you. It is stored in there somewhere, and someday something that you've never remembered before from 3rd grade will pop up suddenly because something in your environment triggered that particular neurotransmitter to fire (or get fired on?).

So that's all well and good when you work at Clouds-R-Us, where everyone is friendly and happy and no one has an unkind word for anyone else, and nothing bad ever happens to anyone. But for the rest of us who have constant good and bad flowing into our lives, I think it's important to stop and think every once in a while, "How much good am I putting into my life? Is there any way that I can replace some of the bad with some good? Is watching Law and Order a good thing or a bad thing for my overall health and well-being?"

Yoga is part of that for me. Yoga gives me a great deal of good and at the same time reminds me to breathe out the bad, and to let go of the things I try so hard to hold on to. Yoga isn't for everyone, but it is a symbol of what each of us needs in our lives-a time and place, set aside, for the purpose of cleansing and renewal.

I hope you find this space for yourself somehow, and if not, I hope you start to look for it.

Thank you Sugar :)

I'm having a difficult moment; it will pass. I have difficult moments sometimes, and they always pass eventually. I made someone sad today on accident, and I got a new job, and I got hit on a lot. It was a busy day.

I talk a lot on my blog about wanting things: the nature of want, the appropriateness of want, etc. And in my mind, I keep coming back to it. I want things that I cannot have. I do not have things that I want. I tell myself, "God will give you everything you need", but that doesn't seem like a very long list. The list gets adjusted all the time. One minute I think I have something because I need it, and then it gets taken away, and I think, "Well, guess I didn't need that after all." I don't want to be the kind of naive person that thanks God for things that God couldn't possibly be concerned with, like my gas tank, but sometimes I wish I were. Today I ran out of gas at the gas station-way better than the freeway during a flash flood, let me tell you.

I wish I could live in the same city as all the people I love. I wish I could see my loved ones more often. I wish that some of my loved ones were healthy enough to have frank and honest conversations with, but that just isn't possible. I want things. I want.

"Most things will be okay eventually, but not everything will be. Sometimes you’ll put up a good fight and lose. Sometimes you’ll hold on really hard and realize there is no choice but to let go. Acceptance is a small, quiet room."

-Dear Sugar (full letter here)