Who can tell me what thing will touch my heart?

The human heart loves to be touched

yet mine is often unmoved-

not of itself guarded,

-I can imagine it reaching-

but by anger

and resentment

and ignorance

and fear.

All mine.

D GS

I spent a fantastic weekend with my partner and a good friend roadtripping to Seattle- It was ostensibly for The Ken to run the RocknRoll 1/2 Marathon, but I also needed to have blood work done, pick up my meds, AND it was Pride week in Seattle. So much to accomplish and so many cool and remarkable things happened on the trip that I found myself wishing- mostly about writing.

“I wish I had a smartphone and could blog on the bus, or update my Facebook.” “I wish I could express exactly how I felt in the moment of seeing Ken’s face as he rounded the last bend to finish the race.” “I wish I had the nerve to describe in detail all the rotten emotions I feel when I see a bunch of carefree half (or 3/4) naked boys running around like life’s one big carefree frickin’ party.” “I wish I hadn’t run into that particular person at the Pride Festival.” “I wish I knew what to say when something goes wrong.” “I wish I had told my family and friends more often how important they are to me.” “I wish I was quicker with my words- that aging hadn’t slowed down my vocabulary.” “I wish I could make everything better all the time for everybody.” “I wish I wasn’t so bad at updating my blog.”

And so it goes.

I am actually quite happy in my life, and I don’t really spend that much time wishing for anything different, but last week, I did. After some thoughtful self-examination and a few walks with Curly, my spiritual director, I came to the conclusion that these wishes weren’t dissatisfaction, really. They were honest hopes and desires to more fully be me. They were conscious efforts to see and experience my life, my world and my people more honestly and accurately.
And it was also a great moral corrective to my sometimes gritty, sometimes cynical and often blunt assessment of reality.

It was a fantastic trip- exhausting, but fantastic. I saw people I loved; I was with Ken for 5 whole days at once (a record); I was useful; I was supportive; I had fun; I took care of myself and most of all, I questioned my perceptions. Not bad for a wisher.

My life is sort of built around simply being available- as a therapist, as a caregiver, as a medical experiment…. As a result, I have a lot of downtime. This provokes a lot of envy from my friends and acquaintances, but I have to say, it’s not all that. I spend a lot of time trying to keep occupied, but there are only so many times I can vacuum the living room and clean the toilets. I’m bound to stay in the house or very nearby because of my caregiving responsibilities, and that makes my life very challenging some days. For a person very used to being active, even hyperactive, who enjoyed travel and constant stimulus, it’s quite a change.

The funny thing about it all is that the adjustment that seems to help most is taking time to be less active.

Explanation:
I am often at my best when I’m busy- my synapses fire more efficiently, I have a certain endorphin-related good feeling about life and myself in general when I’m doing things I find worthwhile and fun. I can find the reverse happening when I’m not finding what I’m doing worthwhile or efficient or fun, which, in my current situation can happen fairly often. Because of some of the little people in my life, I’ve become aware of this great thing parents use for their kids called a “time out”. That’s where the kid gets to spend time thinking about his/her acting out behavior and gives the offending minor (and the parent) time to cool off. Although never having experienced the benefits of such a system in my own childhood, I’m a fan. Seems a much better way to live than frustrating corporal punishment that creates frustrations and resentments (on both sides) that, while ensuring my work as a therapist for years to come, seems a bit excessive.
Anyway, my time out works in the same way.

When I feel overwhelmed or cranky or whiny or frustrated, I go to my time out place, and I just sit, and breathe, and think about three great things in my life right now. It usually only takes a few minutes, and I feel more focused and clear and grateful and renewed.

Whoever popularized this whole time out concept for kids might make a fortune marketing it for adults….
Or, maybe, that’s me….

I’ve been listening to commentators talk about President Obama’s speech in Cairo this morning, and it seems to me there’s a problem.
None of them seem to be able to finesse the distinction of diplomacy and the rhetorical devices of openness with the swaggering tough-guy image the U.S. has across the world.
It’s almost like your Uncle Mike, you know, the Marine, the one that swears and spits and builds his own cars, suddenly wanted to dance for the Bolshoi. Very confusing.
But maybe it’s not Uncle Mike’s fault. Maybe it’s our fault for not getting to know him better. Maybe all those things can live together in the same person. And, if I believe, as I do, that people are constant surprises, my own flexibility makes or breaks my experience of others.
There’s an old saying from somewhere in my memory, perhaps Native American that says something like: The oak is mighty and strong, but the great wind that fells it does no harm to the willow, which knows how to bend.
It’s our perception of the rest of the world that must bend, and vice versa. I believe, as a nation, our perception of what constitutes strength must evolve from guns and clubs to intelligent conversation between adults- from force into true power.
The power that comes from knowing someone better.

One of the most touching and aggravating things I’ve read in months. I wanted to share it with as many people as possible. 

Thanks, Allison…

http://mamanongrata.blogspot.com/2009/05/how-will-i-dance-now.html 

THE PEACE OF WILD THINGS

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
— Wendell Berry

Wendell Berry, “The Peace of Wild Things” from The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry. Copyright © 1998. ( www.perseusbooks.com). All rights reserved.

Source: Collected Poems, 1957-1982 (1985)

“Do you know how pearls are made?” the old man asked me.

“An irritant enters the shell of the oyster, sometimes very small, sometimes not so small. The oyster, aware of its pain, begins to cover the irritant’s jagged edges with a solution created from inside itself. It will continue to cover the invader until what we know as a pearl is formed.

The oyster is not angry, it does not question, it does not hate the irritant, it simply and slowly responds according to its nature and creates, out of pain, a jewel.”

“Creating a pearl takes pain and turns it into trust. No wonder they are so valuable.”

DGS

I was being interviewed last Sunday on Leslie Cunningham’s radio show, when I had a sudden realization.
Well, it wasn’t sudden in the sense of being hit with something, it was more like I finally understood the relationship of a scientific principle to its practical counterpart in nature; pheromones, for instance.
I realized that I was talking freely about myself to God knows how many people and I wasn’t afraid.
I wasn’t thinking about editing myself to protect my own ego or anybody else’s for that matter. I talked openly about growing up gay in rural Montana, leaving the priesthood, having HIV and finding love in a culture that doesn’t recognize me equally under the law. I talked about personal philosophy, about faith, about not fearing the future and about living positively, every day.
Wow.
I remember from childhood always deeply self-editing my comments for shameful content, real, perceived or imagined. I spent so much time being careful, I was confused about my true thoughts and feelings. I mostly grew out of that, especially after the imposed guilt and shame were addressed, but really, I felt the absence of that habit most keenly on Sunday, talking to Leslie. It was an evolutionary step in a life that continues to amaze me.
Here I am. Take it or leave it.

I think I’ll take it.