Hope, enough

I have a friend who is going through some big and scary stuff: life-altering, soul-changing, potentially transformative, and possibly transcendent stuff.   “I don’t know what to do.  I don’t know what will happen.  I feel so alone,” she said.   Her pain was palpable.

God, I know that place-- that sticky, scary, prickly place. Crossroads? I wish it were as simple as that! That place isn't a fork in the road; it's a whole damned service for twelve, all jumbled and junk-drawer worthy, a snake pit of messy choice. It isn't dark. Dark implies the possibility of something not-dark. This is the total absence of light. It is a teetering precipice, the pain of the present licking at your feet, coiling upwards, while the fear of the unknown breathes hot and harsh on your skin and presses you down,

This place is alone.

My friend's words take me back to my early days in recovery.  I spent hours in those meeting rooms, on beat-up couches, drinking horrible coffee, breathing in air that reeked of cigarette smoke and bleach and stale sweat.  Hours upon hours of shiny happy people and their endless chatter, who had miraculously been plucked from the depths of their despair and given new life.   New hope.  And they passed it on to me.  Headier than any wine, more intoxicating than any drink I’d ever guzzled.  Hope.  In the telling of their stories, I found hope.

“I’ve been there,”  they all said, in some iteration or other.

No fanfare, no drama.  Just this quiet moment of intimate connection.  They’d all been there— that same place where I had stood, rooted and lost and broken and alone.  It may have looked different from the outside– some talked of boardrooms on Wall Street, others of a gutter in the slums– those exteriors were facades that hid our utter devastation from public view.  How could I not find healing in these words?  How could I not take hope?  They sat pretty comfortably in their own skins, putting one foot in front of the other.  Moving, acting, choosing, deciding.  Feeling.  Feeling everything.  Not drinking.  Not drinking.  And they shared that all, with me, with each other, every day, endlessly, hour after hour.  It got so I believed I could do all that too.

And after the hours and hours of bad coffee and stale smoke and endless, hopeful chatter, they left. And I went home.  Alone. Home, to an empty apartment that echoed.   Home, to sit and think and climb the walls, to feel the silence pound.  While I didn’t crawl into a bottle, I climbed into my head, taking refuge in that nightmare landscape of my own creation, with this chorus singing hollowly, keeping me company: In the end, I stand here alone. For all their laughter and sharing and connection, I come home alone.  And who will be there to catch me when I fall, when I fail?

I don’t know what to do.  I don’t know what will happen.  I feel so alone.

That place.  That fear.  That place that is absent of light.  I know thåis place all too well.

In the end, we are all of us alone.  But here’s the miracle, that bit of grace within that singular moment of clarity: there are breadcrumbs.  Strewn along that rocky, tortuous, treacherous path, with all its traps and quicksand and trails that go nowhere and the scary monsters who hide behind the poison-spitting trees, there are breadcrumbs.   There are stories and connections and hope left for us by those who’ve gone before.  And if we’re lucky— really, really lucky— there are hands to hold in the darkness, torches placed along the way.

Yes, I take my leaps alone.  Yes, even now, I can stand rooted in the muddy, messy Middle, unable to go back, afraid to move forward.  But there is hope.  Grace.  Hands to hold, torches that shine.  And should I fail, should I fall, I will be caught.  God, or some Higher Power whose name I don’t yet know, will allow me rest and comfort until I’m ready to go it again.

I’m here, I tell my friend.  Feel free to fly, to fall.  To hope.  I’ve been there my friend.  I’ll be waiting for you, breadcrumbs in hand,  and hope enough to share.

Chanukah, Night Two: Power

Long ago (too long for me to comfortably remember exactly how long ago it was), I read Steinbeck's The Short Reign of Pippin the Fourth. I think it was in middle or high school, after we'd read The Pearl. It may have been soon after I discovered Stephen Schwartz's Pippen,  which captiovated and entranced me no end. I read anything that had the name "Pippin" in the title (and even stretched it a bit, reading Great Expectations because the main character's name was "Pip").

What has stayed with me, though, from Steinbeck's brilliant novel - short, riveting and laser-sharp in its satire - was his discussion of power. In Steinbeck's Pippin, France has decided the Republic has failed, and they are looking to reinstate the monarchy. They find one lone direct ancestor to Charlemagne - Pippin, who will be the Fourth of that name. As the modern-day Pippin grapples with the enormity of what confronts him - kingship and history and government and rule - he is reluctant to assume power, fearing (like all wise men) that he will be corrupted by it.

However, he is told by one of his advisers: it is not power that corrupts, nor absolute power that corrupts absolutely. Rather, it is the fear of losing power that corrupts.

What a riveting idea! I think, for myself, how much I am ruled by my fear, how often I base decisions for action (or inaction) on my fear of losing control, giving up my power. And these situations, where it is fear, when I do not sit comfortably in my own skin - in fact, am most likely trying to crawl out of it - these things never end well. They blow up in my face and leave a swath of destruction in a radius of miles. IU spend more time picking up the debris from these ill-fated actions than anyone ever should. 

If I had just done the right thing - even through my fear!

But I don't. I horde my power, clutch at it like Gollum clutches his Ring of Power - only to lose it and then later, teeter at the brink of destruction. I hold my power jealously, refusing to ask for help, denying help that is offered, believing foolishly that help is just another word for weak, or less-than. 

And while I may not have been corrupted by my fear of losing power and control, I have certainly been crippled by it.

Zechariah tells of his dream, and the angel who declares ?Not by might, not by power..." We read this text during Chanukah. Perhaps, we read it - I read it - to remind myself that my "power" is merely illusion to begin with. Or, if not illusion, then certainly immaterial. 

So it is with hope, this Chanukah season, that I remember this lesson beyond the light of the menorah, and carry it into the days and nights ahead of me - not by might, not by power, but by spirit alone...

Perhaps then I will find, not the crippling of corruption, but peace instead.

Chag urim sameach

5780

Fear, Faith, and a Really Big Sea... plus a Miracle or Two

I'm at that damned Sea again. Just when I think I've done it, finally managed to cross the Sea and leave it behind, I find myself staring at its implacable immensity, with the light of heaven mirrored in its unsplit surface. My feet are scarred and just a bit bloody. These reeds can cut like knives, apparently.

I expect to see a throng, or at least a large crowd of people, milling aimlessly about, stymied by the Sea. There is always some crowd, some random group of people waiting to cross, waiting for the Sea to spilt, the Miracle to happen. Waiting to be freed, at last. At the very least, I hope for Nachshon, the first one to get it - the first brave soul who decided that his faith was stronger than his fear, the very first to step into the wind-whipped water even before it split, who walked while the waters almost swallowed him whole, who walked because God had to be with him, because Moshe had to be telling the truth, because what else could he do? And just like that, between one breath and the next - between one hurried gulp of air before the waters covered him completely - the Sea split.

The waters parted, just in the nick of time. Nachshon and all those milling about people and the disordered chaos of all their things, the kids and the goats and the bubbies and zaydes, the aunts and annoying sisters and neighbors, all the knowns and the unknowns and the carts and donkeys and mothers and fathers and bread-that-didn't-have-time-to-rise - all the stuff that they carried, all the crush of people, our distant ancestors who were once slaves were now suddenly, blessedly free - all because of Nachshon's simple walk of faith, allowing that impossible Forever Sea to open enough for them all to cross.

Nes gadol hayah sham. I know, I know - wrong holiday, but the sentiment is the same: a great miracle happened there! Yay God! Yay us! Yay all of us - all the myriad generations that followed, from there to here, and then some. From the Forever Sea of reeds and water to my own Forever Sea. of mirrored surfaces and razor-sharp weeds. 

We are commanded to act as if we. too, had been redeemed from the narrow places, had seen the wonders of Fire and Smoke with our own eyes, had stood at the Sea with fear and doubt, and had found a faith that could carry us across.

I always assume - hope? pray? - that the finding is a one-and-done kinda move. I am naive that way.

Every year, it seems, I find the Sea again, I stand again at its ragged shore, and I wait for the faith to come. Where the hell is Nachshon when I need him? Where the hell is the miracle? Every year, I splash around the edges, getting wet and muddied and loud in my complaints fervent prayer; I feel alone. I feel connected. I need help. I am loved. I am broken. My body is breaking. I am lost. Where are you, God? Why am I here? 

I'm exhausted.

So with all this muddy mess swirling around in my head, i am reminded of a midrash. Not one of my regulars, that feel all warm and comfy and filled with answers that square the circle. This one is different for me. It begins two men; let's call them Shlomo and Ben. They were milling about with all the other lansmen, afraid and unsure. Who is this God we're supposed follow? Where's He been for all these years? (thought Shlomo) What's taken Her so long, if She's so powerful? (thought Ben) And just who is this Moshe guy, claiming to be one of us? This they declared together 

We're supposed to trust them, they thought, shaking their heads as they stared at the water that stretched to the horizon and back. The ground began to shake a little, and in the very far distance, they could just make out the call of a horn. Ben and Shlomo looked around a little, and saw the first line of chariots moving quickly towards them.

Perfect. Rock, meet hard place. 

Ok God - if You're ever gonna save us, now's a good time.

And that's when Nachshon made his move. All those bubbies and zaydes and family and the candle-makers and the brick-layers, all those recently-freed slaves held their collective breath – and the Sea split, and there was dry land. A miracle. Maybe this "God" God is the real deal. And so  all the people ran and celebrated, and sang and danced and were finally free to find the rest of their story.

Shlomo and Ben watched from the sidelines and shallows. They wanted to take their time, to make sure, just in case. They were smart like that. Just as the last family trundled past, donkeys braying and kids laughing and this or that threatening to fall from the over-stuffed, over-loaded wagon, Ben and Shlomo shrugged and followed.

It was a difficult and perilous journey for the two friends. The mud sucked at their feet, trying to claim their sandals. More than once, Ben had to help Shlomo up from the gooey mess. More than once, Shlomo had to do the same in return for Ben. They kept their eyes glued to their muddy, treacherous path, too afraid to do anything else, willing themselves not to fall. Their iron wills failed them, again and again.

We had plenty of mud in Egypt, grumbled Ben. And we used all that mud to make bricks, replied Shlomo. What is this place, they said together. The ground is illusion, seemingly solid until it sucks at our feet, drinking us down. The water seeps into every crack and hollow, and the damp gets into our lungs. What is this if not Egypt?

The day grew darker, the air more damp, and it wasn’t long until they were alone. Still they walked, grumbling and frightened, so sure of the mess they were in. The mess, they knew, was as forever as the Sea that may or may not have been their current escape route. Their wretched journey from one narrow place to another - so they were positive - only proved them right. This was no deliverance. 

When they finally reached that distant shore – they never quite noticed. Sure, the ground wad more solid, and there was certainly green grass mixed in with all that muddy brown, and the air dried out and even smelled sweetly sometimes, and they could hear a little music mixed in with the drone of bees and the soft roar of water. But Shlomo and Ben could only look down, could only see their own feet, their own fear.

They missed the miracle. They missed the play of light against the straining walls of water, and all the fish and sea creatures who swam up to watch them, flaunting their scales and fins and their bright colors before the delighted eyes of the people who walked between the watery walls. They never saw the sun kiss the very top of those walls, looking as if the water were liquid fire. They missed the faces of each one of their fellow ex-enslaved people, who would, each of them, in their own time, look about in wonder and awe and joy and absolute delight at the watery world around them as they danced (as best they could) through that muddy, squelching path to the Beyond – beyond the narrows, beyond the captivity, beyond the pain – and they rejoiced.

Shlomo and Ben? All they got was mud.

I have been here before, at this Forever Sea, I have stared out at it, afraid, alone, immobilized, praying for the faith of Nachshon to finally have courage enough to step into it, even just an inch or two. To walk, and know that I will be carried, that the Sea will split, that I will be able to walk through whatever it is that keeps me tethered to this place of doubt or grief or fear. Please God, release me from my self-imposed bondage, so that I can finally walk on dry land, and leave this Forever Sea.

I have  prayed, year after year after year. And every year – ta da! – a miracle of movement, and the world shifts and the light shines and I am through it, whatever that it may be. Or, if not exactly through, then at least making progress towards. 

And it hits me,  not all at once,  but slowly, building as inexorably as the rolling tide: I may be on the shores of this all roo familiar Sea yet again, but I am different. I am not searching out my annual vision of Nachshon, waiting to find my faith, to jump on the bandwagon of leaping and letting go. This year, I'm looking for the lesson of looking up.

I've spent way too much time looking down at the mud at my feet, hearing the desperate squelching of the ooze. I've become so intent on movement, on doing and fixing and working and changing, I seem to have missed the miracle.

I miss the colors and the wonder and the absolute awe of being carried, not from narrow to narrow, but just carried. I miss the grace of kindness and the intimacy of my vulnerability. Just as I need not wait for Nachshon to begin it all, I don’t need to lurk on the fringes in the back with Shlomo and Ben.

So this year, my prayer as we approach the shores of that Sea, as we prepare for redemption and faith and miracles  is a little different – 

Dear God, who is surely in my doubt as much as in my faith, who creates the waters that carry us and the light that shines – let me learn to be. Let me learn to look up, to see the glory that abounds, even in the darkness and the squelching mud. Let me know that even when the ground becomes suddenly unsteady and the silence becomes too loud that there are hands to hold and shoulders upon which I can lean. Teach me, please, that the Fixer of Broken Things can be, herself, fixed. 

Let me know, finally, that my truest prayer, and most honest, no matter what words I may use, is, ever and always: Dear God, I need help – and let me be brave enough to accept the help that surely comes, every time.

And let us say, amen.


Chag pesach sameach.

5778

Omer. Day 41 (give or take)

This is my favorite question: what do you carry with you, and what do you leave behind? Sometimes I change up the verbs, just a little, to bringing and taking away, respectively. A subtle shift, to be sure, but all part of the grand scheme just who the hell am I,  and just who the hell to I want to become?

I am the sum of all my baggage - carried, dragged, dropped. left behind and taken back.

Sometimes the weight of it all is crushing. And sometimes, when the wind is just right, and the scent of green is in the air, and I am feeling brave and grateful daring and fierce and bold (or any combination thereof; you get the point), there's no weight at all. I freely offer much of my baggage, all the weighted measures of stuff and ideas and hurts and pains; lost loves and lost jobs, missed opportunities and failed connections - all of the stuff that binds me, tethers me to a present I can only see through the funhouse mirror of my past (so not really a present at all) - and I let it all go, leaving it lie in a muddled heap.

This is my altar. I'm pretty sure, when I drop it all in that heap, and I set it on fire, it makes a pleasing odor to God. I'm just as sure, when it's time to move on, every single thing that went up in smoke, that released me from the bondage of my self, and my past, it's all there, ready for me to pick up again, just as bright and shiny and unscathed as it was before my metaphorical sacrifice.

It's mine, to carry it all again until the next holy bonfire.

Of course, there's a whole bunch of other stuff I can choose to pick up and carry away - things like faith, or courage, or joy. And yes, there are infinite variations of despair and anger and sundry slings and arrows of cruel misfortune that can be distracting and enticing. And yes, I have gone that route more often than I care to admit. There are times I swear I didn't do the picking, that these nasty little packages leaped up and stuck themselves to me of their own accord, really they did.

If I'm honest - and now's a good time to cop to honesty - I did the picking and the plucking and the sticking, all by myself. Ugh.

Still, there are times I go against type, and I choose the weightlessness of joy!

Things is - this carrying and leaving and taking away - this is a thing I can do every single day. It knows no season. It is unbounded by time. In every moment, I can choose, again and again and again. These days, the counting-of-the-omer days, it is a mindful trudge, a careful inspection and collection of the junk I lug around with me. I am grateful for the mindfulness. Messy as I am, I like frames, and this is a particularly good one.

So. What is it that I carry with me? What will I leave behind? What will I carry with me as I walk to the next altar, the next mountain? Today - just for this moment, this breath, I will sit for a moment, my treasures laid out before me, a sky of pewter and pearl above me, casting dull shadows on the lot. I will sit, and rest, and hope - hope that when I move on from here, I remember to let slip the boxes of pain and fear, so that I have room for a bit of joy, a bit of beauty, a bit of grace.


PS - I've written a couple of poems in the past, that relate to this post. You may want to check them out here:

What I Brought: https://staceyzrobinson.blogspot.com/2013/05/what-i-brought_13.html
And Fly:L https://staceyzrobinson.blogspot.com/2015/04/and-fly.html
To This Moment: https://staceyzrobinson.blogspot.com/2015/03/to-this-moment.html
Hineini: https://staceyzrobinson.blogspot.com/2014/04/hineini.html

Omer. Days Five and Six

What is it about intimacy that makes my spine stiffen, just a little.

And who am I kidding - there are times when my spine is so stiff that my body would crack in half at a gentle puff of air in my general direction, 

I've been thinking about this since I chanted Torah last week - the part where Moshe stands naked before God, after all the calf and the murderous rage and the towering anger, after the breath of forgiveness and the work of second chances - Moshe stands and pleads: let me know you; let me know I have found grace.

Such power in those simple words. Such intimacy in the cry.

Let me know you.

I once hear that "intimacy" can be read "into me see." Normally, I eschew those trite and sacchariney pronouncements. Trust me - if you stick around a 12 step program long enough, you will hear some kind of anagrammatic saying for just about anything. Most of them are cute, maybe even thought-provoking once. Sadly, they get bandied about far too often, so that they lose their meaning. For me. I'm sure that, for many, they are veritable life preservers, and many cling to them through the storms and rough waters of recovery. I'm sure I've treaded water with one or two of them myself. 

See into me. Know me, warts and all. See me - and don't head for the hills, appalled at what you find. 

So I stand, a little breathless, a little scared, like a deer in the proverbial headlights - so ready to flee, to hide. But for this, for the fragility and openness of these days of counting, I stand before you and ask to know you, to know that I have found grace.

For the omer, days five and six

Strange Fire

The world is on fire.
I feel the flames licking
along the walls
that have all but fallen.
They shelter only shadows now,
and hunger.

They call the bombs friendly,
and the damage collateral;
the deaths unfortunate
and their cause is
holy, holy, holy.

Does God hide in the shadows,
do you think, still
waiting for a pleasing odor
to feed an insatiable hunger?
Or perhaps God has fled,
the altars abandoned to
strange fire, whose only
scent is decay?

I would flee, too,
leave the altars behind,
and the crumbling walls
and this eternal fire
fed by hatred
and your war.

I would flee,
but there is nothing left
except fire.

I would beg,
but the shadows are empty,
and their silence
is a shroud.

I would leave, but
Pharaoh's heart has
turned to stone.

Rude Awakening

Like many people I know, I woke up that Wednesday morning, the day after the election, shocked and unnerved. I was supposed to have awakened elated - finally, a woman president! And hooray - we were joyfully continuing that long march begun a century ago, with the Wobblies and the suffragettes, that led to the union and labor movements, that led to the New Deal, that led to civil rights, that led to gay rights and marriage equality that led to gender equality and... Hell, you get it.

Did I say a century? Ha! Make it two. Let's not forget that whole contretemps with the folks across the pond. Let's not forget Hamilton and that rad hip-hopper Jefferson, and the other Founding Fathers. We have been marching steadily, (with a very painful layover while we straightened out the mix up over just who is a person and just what is property, and fought a war to ensure that everyone in the country got it), towards that bright, shiny future, which was supposed to be my bright, shiny present, of peace, love, equality and justice for all.

And yet, on Wednesday morning, November 9th, I woke up shocked and unnerved. And frightened. I am a woman. I am a Jew. My son is black. I fear for him most of all. On November 9th, while I woke up terrified (literally terrified at the revolution that was seemed to be taking place in my world) there were a whole host of people who woke up with this insane belief that it was ok to haul out the white hoods and disgusting invective and hatred that they had been keeping under wraps for what - a decade? more? a century? And if that weren’t enough, to add insult to injury, the cold water shock of realizing that this notion - that it had all been excised somewhere in the murky past - was merely one more instance of my white privilege. This behavior had always been around; I just had all the proper armor in place to not see it.

A month later, and I continue to be mind-numbingly outraged (sorry for the oxymoron, but I can't think of any other way to explain it), as I watch the (real) news and see, more than the mysogeny and racism and anti-lgbtqa hate speech spewing forth, but the great glee and lightening speed with which that That Man is dismantling 60 years of civil rights and liberties.

And, as I prepare to send my son off to university next fall, my black, liberal, loud and wonderfully vocal son, who has been taught to speak truth to power, I worry about the landscape into which he is stepping, and wonder if it's filled with landmines.

Actually, I don't wonder - there will be plenty of landmines (and some of them are actually good - you know, the ones that blow up youthful preconceptions or the petrified ideologies of the know-it-all teen that need to be softened or changed, that are a part of healthy college life). There are some landmines, though, that have been planted by the sudden normalization of all the other horrible "-isms" that have plagued our society and have been gaining ground at too rapid a pace. These are mines that can hurt. These are mines, I fear, that can kill.

Right about now is the part where I'm supposed to find some grace, some kind of uplift - that light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel that will ease my readers' (and my) mind, right? You know, the part where the dragon may have eaten the princess, but we find out, just in the nick of time, that she was cruel and not the real princess at all, while the real princess grabs the sword to fight the battle... I fear that the light at the end of the tunnel is really the light of the oncoming train.

I just typed "no one is racing to pick up the sword," and deleted it, when I realized that fear is not quite true. Many are sprinting towards the sword in the stone - all of us who are outraged and frightened, we are picking it up. We are speaking out and shouting truth to power. (Ugh. I found the sliver of happy after all. Yay me.)

We will continue the battle. We will face insurmountable odds. We will lose a lot. Not just lose, but scary lose - on the environment, civil rights, education, etc etc etc - but we will slog on. Because that's what we do. We slog. It will not be enough. Not right now; maybe not ever. "Enough" rarely ever is. Right now, though, it is all we have. So we will use this blade until someone - perhaps you, perhaps me, maybe my son one day - forges something more powerful, more permanent.

Until then, we will be afraid. Until then, we will suit up and show up nevertheless. And we will raise our voices to speak truth to power and lose a bunch of battles and fight through the fear and one day, we may actually win the war.

Why I'm With Her (even though I wasn't always)

When I was in graduate school, I had, what I have come to believe, a holy experience: I heard God. OK, maybe not God, and not even God's actual voice. Maybe I just heard the word of God, spoken so clearly, so sparely and with such devotion that I could not help but take them in and know that, at last, there was God.

The events that led to my epiphany were profoundly prosaic: a colleague arranged for some hot shot guy from New York to speak on campus. I’d never heard of Michael Harrington before. Then again, I’d never heard of a lot of things. Who knew? Thankfully, I was a fast study.

So, on a spring day in 1985, in a faculty lounge with large casement windows that spilled soft gold light onto plush carpet and stiff-backed chairs scattered haphazardly around the room, I first heard God speak. As a convenience, God used voice of Michael Harrington to make his message heard aloud. Michael Harrington, speaking the truth of God (I swear) had this to say:

We can create a society that is not rooted in inequality and discrimination and power and wealth. We can create a just society, based on the premise that our Founding Fathers meant rather than wrote: that all of us, men and women who are black and brown and yellow and white, who are gay and straight and anything in between, who believe or don’t as they see fit, we are all of us equal, and we have a voice that, when joined with others, will always speak louder than the tyranny of gross power and grosser injustice.

Michael Harrington, a professor of political science at Queens College, and the co-founder of the Democratic Socialists of America, a writer and radical and sometime Voice of God, spoke my truth to me: money may be power, but the people - together - could be more powerful still.

Well sign me up!

I joined DSA then and there. Not surprising, I left graduate school not long after, PhD be damned. I went to work for a national poor people's organization. I was out to fight the good fight, to rouse the rabble and give people a voice.

No, not give. Give is way too condescending and nobless oblige-y. My job was to remind people that their voices, joined together, were a power to be reckoned with. We had all been silent for far too long. Now was the time to be heard.

For five years I fought that battle. I moved 15 times back and forth across the country; everything I owned fit in the trunk of my car. The cause was my world and I thrived in it. Even when I left to wander the halls of Corporate America, I didn’t lose my ideals. If I no longer fought in the trenches, my feet and my hands and my threadbare wallet strived as best they could to keep up and change the world.

You can imagine my delight the first time I heard Senator Bernie Sanders speak. His gravelly voice, and brusque New York accent was beautiful. In it, I heard the Voice of God, just as I had decades ago. Sanders, too, urged us to defend the poor, care for the needy, work to build a society of justice and equality.

I know, I know: Sanders, and Harrington before him, are not the Voice of God. I am being dramatic and somewhat flip. Still, their words, their ideas, their insistence that we are all responsible for one another, that there is an inextricable link between business and people and money and the earth that must be carefully maintained - these seem to me to be an echo of everything I've been taught about God.

I sent in my $27, and wished I could give more. I volunteered. I cast my vote for Sanders in the Illinois primary with such hope! I watched and wondered and cheered him on, and at some point I knew, in that icy pit that resides in my belly, that some invisible corner had been turned, and that sweet moment of victory was all too short-lived. Sanders would not win the nomination.

Ugh.

What to do? What to do?

You must understand: this was never a question! What to do? In the holy words of Michael and Bernie (and paraphrased by me): defend the poor, care for the needy, build a just society.

Look – Michael Harrington wasn’t perfect, nor is Bernie. They aren’t God. I was lucky enough to have heard the voice of God whisper through their words - words, so I believe, so powerful, they have made their way into the DNC platform. What choice is there – really - but Hillary Clinton?

Is Hillary Bernie? No. She has her own voice. She fumbles around, makes mistakes. Sometimes she even cops to them. She’s a politician – just like Bernie. It just so happens I like Bernie’s message more, hear the whisper of God a little louder, look past his foibles a little easier. I’ll tell you, though – have you ever heard the passion and the fire she can kindle when she stops running for President and just talks? God is there, too, when you listen, and she shines. She’s not Bernie. She’s not Michael. She’s not my first choice. And while I think the path towards that just and equitable society will be a little more layered than I’d like, still, I have no doubt that she will walk this path, too.

For all you “Bernie or Bust” folks still out there, now is the time to remember what matters: joined together, our voices will always speak louder than the tyranny of power and injustice. For all of Hillary’s shortcomings and sins (real or imagined) – to vote for anyone else will destroy that vision of a just society. I stand with Hillary because, I believe that my voice, added to hers, and yours, and millions of others, will always be more powerful than insatiable fear and monstrous hate.

I'm with her.

#I'mwithher #hillaryclinton "thankyoubernie #feelthebern

What grace looks like - a happy new year tale

I could hear the quiet hum of the furnace. It's easy, at 3:00 in the morning, when the house is quiet, and the world seems to sleep.

I could hear the buzz of the highway, that unfolds in its great concrete planes and curves, not too far from my window that holds in the warmth of the furnace that hums in constant susurration at 3:00 in the morning when the house is so quiet and the world seems to sleep.

The cat is unaware of the sleeping, softly humming world . Her only concern is my changed breathing and therefore, my coming awakeness. She cares nothing for traffic or heaters or nighttime quiet. She crawls on my chest, purring her quiet and constant purr that covers the more quiet hum of the furnace, and nudges my fingers with her nose. She's looking for scratches and pets. She is the Empress of Night, Queen of Drowsy sun. She nips my scratching fingers when she's had enough. She rules with an iron fist and sharp, still-kitten teeth.

I lay in my bed, surrounded by warmth and just-below-noticing noise that I hear only in passing and send out a silent prayer of thanks for all that I have in my life, for all the wholeness and brokenness and possibilities that make up the life that I have been given, the life I have chosen. A sigh - six of one, half dozen of the other. I used to stress on the finer points and philosophical distinctions played out in the giving and the having and the choosing. These days, I'm learning to find grace just in the living.

Another reason for thanks.

I find that, in the stillness and quiet of 3:00 am, it's easier to just be, even if for just a moment. I'm grateful for those moments, and for that stillness. For those few minutes, before my head fills with the chatter of voices and relentless noise, I can breathe and be. There's just that moment, a slow inhale and steady exhale. I feel my soul slip in, returned from its dance with angels along the arc of Saturn's rings (or so I imagine), but returned nevertheless. I offer a prayer of thanks, again, for this gift of trust and faith.

Inhale. Exhale. And again - a handful or two of breaths that remind me that I'm alive, that there is a God (whatever That is), that I don't have to have an answer, not in this moment (or even the next). I am here, in this place, and I am so very grateful for all the blessings I've been given, even when I felt those blessings were curses. I have a tendency to find gratitude, and God, only in hindsight.

Funny - but they all seem to stem from the same place, those cursed blessings - or perhaps blessed curses. It surprises me, this place - so well hidden from view (yours and mine both), but I move, with what seems like excruciating slowness - away from the fear that tethers me in place to a moment of quiet stillness, an eternal moment of inhale and exhale. It's a very fragile place.

And from this vantage point, finally unbound, I look back, to count all those gifts of brokenness and grace that have been given me. Here, in the 3:00 am quiet, with the purr of a cat and the drone of distant traffic, with the gentle rhythm of my son's breathing down the hall, I offer a prayer of thanks for the kindness of strangers. And more - for the kindness given me by the people I know.

A decade or two ago, newly sober, still mostly feral, I was in awe of what we called the "fellowship." Drinking had always been such a salve, a slippery balm that maintained an invisible but solid wall between me and the humans. Every drink, every drug, every thing that I used to make me not feel merely bound me tighter, twisted into a tangled mess of fear and loathing - it all kept me safe. Kept me distant, untouchable. Invulnerable. And here were all these people, all these sober drunks with some time: sometimes only an hour or two, sometimes days or weeks or years (Really? Years? What the hell?), some who turned out to be visiting, feeling the need to don the mantle of Scout - those who went back out to test the waters (that were always 80% proof at least), and not all of them found their way back in - all these people, with names I sometimes remembered but mostly didn't, with phone numbers readily given but that I never called, they all of them, mostly, showed up. For each other. For themselves.

For me.

Even when I snarled, or whined, or pushed back as far as I could go. I felt like Harry Beaton, the character in Brigadoon who couldn't bear his grief, who wanted only for others to hurt as much as he did, who ran, as if all the hounds of hell were running through his head, skittering up an down his spine, trying desperately to leave , all the while doomed to stay in the same place. "I'm leaving Brigadoon," he cried, "The miracle is over!" That was me, too: I wanted out, I wanted the miracle - of sobriety, of AA, of something I couldn't even name - I wanted it over for everyone. And still, all those drunks, they showed up. For me.

"Be honest," they said. Be open and willing and vulnerable, a little bit every day. I scoffed at their naivete. "Keep coming back," they smiled, sipping coffee as the smoke from their cigarettes rose in delicate spirals, collecting in a haze just below the ceiling of the meeting room. I went back, again and again. One day, on a whim, or perhaps a dare to myself, I offered a truth or two, exposed the delicate skin of my secrets, just a fraction, and waited for the white hot pokers to come, seeking blood, sensing weakness. They never did, and I lived to tell the tale. I tried it again. And again. I shed my secrets like a shroud, felt their weight shift and dissolve, not all at once, but in time, over time, as I learned to trust.

"It's ok not to know," they said. "It's ok to ask for help." I laughed, I was too smart to fall for that line! I knew it all and needed nothing from anyone. I was the Fixer of Broken Things. I knew, above all else, that I would never be loved, and so decided that to be needed was almost the same. Almost enough. So I found all the broken pieces, all the broken people - and I fixed them all. And in all my fixing, I could find a whispery echo of the humanity I was so sure was just outside my grasp. I knew, without doubt, that only one person remained outside the circle of healing: me.

But those people, those glorious drunks, they showed up and they offered and they loved - freely, without any expectation of return. There were no scoreboards or scales that weighed my worth. With infinite caution and care, I crept away from the curse of people - the burden of their need and want and broken desire and slowly, almost imperceptibly, found grace in fellowship, the blessing of people who fill my life, and my heart.

So here now, a few decades later, looking back at a lifetime of wholeness and brokenness and breathless awe, I find grace - and God - in the kindness of strangers and the people I have gathered along the way, here in the quiet of 3:00 am.

Who am I kidding? "Looking back at a lifetime..." Ha! It's all well and good to talk of lessons learned - difficult, daring, skin-crawling lessons that you learn and then fold up neatly, put it away in a drawer in a locked room that lives down a long and cobwebbed hallway that is dusty with disuse. I like lessons like that, feel a smug humility that I can say, "Ah yes - that was hard, learning how to do that. Not that I'll do it again or anything, but I got that badge, thanks."

This past year has been a never-ending parade of learning that lesson, again and again, the one where I ask for help. I tried. I tried so hard to shoulder all the broken pieces, all on my own. God, I tried. And I couldn't do it. Time and again, I struggled, like Atlas. I carried every load I was handed, felt buried by the weight of it all, until I stood - motionless, breathless, defeated - until the pain of not asking for help was finally greater than the fear of reaching out. And so, skin crawling, face pink with heat and body glistening with flop sweat, I asked for help.

And without fail - without fail - every time, there it was. Offered not as an "if - then" statement, but freely, unstintingly. There were rides and loans and stronger shoulders than mine that could bear the weight of my fear. People showed up, offered their love, sometimes in the form of coffee and a willing ear, once or twice as a job that came as I stood teetering on the brink of financial disaster that threatened to swallow me whole. There was the offer of advice a time or two, but more often, a steady presence and a gentle hand to hold. I needed everything that was given.

I used to say, in the early days of my sobriety, that the only thing worse than not having friends was having them; the only thing worse than depending upon the kindness of strangers was depending upon the kindness of people you know. Now, just about a quarter of a century later, I still hesitate. I still shudder a little. I still stumble, making my solitary way to some desperately high ledge. But with every piece of brokenness that I cling to, I hesitate a little less, don't walk quite so close to the teetering edge. I am learning to shrug a little sooner, so that whatever it is that I think I must carry doesn't crush me under its weight.

A quarter of a century later, after a lifetime of steadfast fear and absolute certainty that my burdens are mine, that I am the fixer who can never be fixed, I have discovered a new conversation topic with God. These days, there's a a lot less "Why me, God?" and a helluva lot more gratitude for all the gifts I have been given. Why me? Sometimes, it's the choices I've made or the actions I've not taken that place me smack dab in the middle of something hard and fierce. Sometimes, there's no reason at all, a thing of fearsome and capricious chance that happens because it does. Even then - a conversation of thanks.

So, as we turn the corner of the year, in the quiet hum of darkening skies and the skitter of ice and sleet against my windows, in the end-of-the-year stillness of three in the afternoon, I offer this, my prayer of thanks, with humble gratitude for the presence of strangers and friends who teach me, every day, what grace looks like.
God of infinite compassion, who fills the world with quiet wonder and endless breath, thank You for the gift of not knowing, the grace of bending and the joy of asking.

Merry new year xoxo

A Startlement of Song

There is a song
Somewhere in me
Buried.
Or maybe just
unnoticed,
while I chase
the louder notes -
all brass and
brash,
a startlement of
little songs
and tinny
grandeur.
But there is a song
that plays
Deep
and Slow,
an exultation.
And I rise to it,
and move in it,
and I am drawn near to it,
nearer than breath
or Time.
And I rise
to its siren call,
and I am filled
past the borders
of my fear
and the edges
of my joy,
and I sing.
And I sing.

Monkey Bars and Faith

I am stuck. Really, really, really stuck. The cemented-in-place kind of stuck. You know – the kind of motionlessness that you used to get when you were a kid, sinking low in your seat when your teacher asked a question, laser eyes searching through the sea of desks, looking past all the waving arms, all the eager faces demanding attention, demanding they be given their chance to show off and shine. And of course, the teacher looked past them, through them, looking for You, the one kid who so did not know the answer, flop sweat soaking through your shirt and making your skin clammy, where you begged silently, “don’t see me, don’t notice me, pass me by, pleasepleaseplease,” knowing that if you even thought about motion, you would be caught, noticed, called on to answer that unanswerable question. So you made yourself small and held yourself still. Unmoving. Willfully stuck.

And you got called on anyway.

I don’t like being in this place, this needy and scary place. I want to be in control, captain of my life, captain of happy. I was talking a friend, who told me that the only thing left for me to do was to ask for help. Not from a person, but from the Universe. God. Whatever I might choose to call that thing that is bigger than me, outside of me. She said it was now a matter of faith.

Too many people are talking about faith to me these days. And it’s not as if these folks are regular faith talkers. In fact, they’re not. I can mostly depend on them to not talk about faith. More, I can mostly depend on them to not remind me to act on my faith. So what gives? Is this God’s little joke on me? Am I getting what I need, even when I want anything but? And where is my faith? I had it just a while ago. I was floating on it, sustained and strengthened by it. It is so much easier to depend on faith when life is good, isn’t it? It is the question I have been asking my Sunday school kids for years – how do you approach God in the face of joy? In the face of despair? And everything in between? I thought I had answered this question, dammit. I thought I had learned this lesson. I could have sworn I had had my long dark night of the soul, years ago.

So my friend said that this was about faith. And asking for help – but asking differently. And she said that it was okay to not know the lesson I could be learning.

But it’s still scary. It still seems so large and consuming.

I hate that she may be right.

I am so used to being alone. I am the strong one, dammit. You learn, cynically, that help doesn’t come, that there is no knight in shining armor and you’re no damsel in distress, but mostly that you are alone in your need and hurt. And then you get stuck, trapped in this endless loop. So you just stop asking, because the pain of being alone is always greater than whatever need you have that’s driving you to ask for help.

I am the Fixer of Broken Things. I do not get healed. I slay the dragons and exorcise the demons and forge paths and light torches. For others. Because I don’t know how to ask for myself. I don’t know how to say I am in need.  I get wrapped up in the story of stuck, of the big and scary stuff. I don’t always leave room for the other stuff – the small stuff, the happy and good stuff. I need to be reminded to talk about the things that are surprising and filled with grace. The things that have made me smile, that took my breath away because of their beauty or their simplicity.

So what is my good stuff? Because I need the reminder that life is not quite as heavy as I make it, I must remember the stuff that awed me or made me laugh. The stuff that got me out of my head, because I can set up camp there, live in a burnt out slum there, where I regularly mug myself. It’s about faith, right? And this is part of that expression: there is good stuff in the universe – there is light and hope.

There is faith, faith enough to carry me, comfort me. Faith greater than my fear. Maybe. Perhaps. I am willing to believe that possibly, my faith is enough. That if I reach out my hand, leap into the chasm, I will be caught and held. Cherished and loved. That this dark and cold place, silent and singular and solitary, this is illusion, smoke and mirrors that are shattered with a single laugh, a kind word. I am reminded, in my faith, that it is enough to go to God and ask for help. My prayer does not change God; rather, it changes me, and my heart.

So tonight, I will act as if. Some people, some cynical people who like to dress all in black and smoke cigarettes off in the corner looking disdainful (not that I know any of those cynical people, at all), they would call it pretending, not acting as if. But they would be wrong, damn them. They would be bitter and unhappy people. They would not wear their hair in pig tails and swing from the monkey bars. They would not know how to laugh; they would merely snicker.

So tonight, I will act as if and laugh and swing from the monkey bars. I will act as if I live in that bright and centered spiritual place. I will act as if I am happy and unafraid. And in my darkness, I am shown, in surety and faith, that my fears, real and scary and looming large and all-consuming, that they are made of cobwebs and dust motes. And I breathe; I move, with infinite slowness and subtle grace. I move, and it’s okay to not know, to ask for help. I am not alone. There is God. There is a light. There is hope.

Ladders

I am terrified of ladders.
It is not the going up--
the ascent,
the rickety step up
on tiny see-through slats,
slats you can see through from here
to next Tuesday,
to Heaven and back.
I am not interested in
the view from Heaven.

I am not interested in the view from Tuesday.
Today is struggle enough.

It is not the up-ended feeling
of ungainly-
ungraceful-
uncertain ascent,
nor the straight-edged precision
of the death-gripped
held-breath
tentative step
Down,
with its trickster promise of
return
and solid ground to come.

Down is done backwards
(done sometimes in heels),
and that last step is more question than answer.

I am terrified of ladders
and their rickety
rattling
restless
motion,
traveling Up,
with no rest before
Down,
A constant struggle
to balance
against the ceaseless flow
of feathers and
Perfection.

Easier--
infinitely easier--
to wrestle with the ground
and Myself.

07 Tishrei 5774: Fear

Fear is a liar.

Fear keeps me rooted in place, unmoving and sheathed in ice. When I listen to its sibilant whispers, I stop. I hide. I avoid. I stay safe.

It is so easy. looking at it from this vantage point-- of a spiritually fit place, where I feel as if I fit comfortably in my own skin and have no need to look over my shoulder to judge the distance between me and the eleventy-seven thousand demons who are hot on my trail and ready to pounce-- it is so easy to say "Fear is a liar. Why should I listen to whispers in the dark?"

Trouble is, I don't always feel comfortable in my own skin. I am not always spiritually fit, confident and breathing easy. Ha! There are times I need to be reminded to breathe at all. And fear-- those lies can be so seductive. When I am feeling prickly and outside and less-than, those lies can flow though me and around me like warm honey. 

Remember Lucy, asking Charlie Brown to kick the football while she holds it steady? Time and again, he winds up flat on his back, caught once again in the web of Lucy's broken promises. My fear is like that. Against my better judgement, regardless of all prior experience, I get sucked in, laid low by my fear.

This is not God-fear. This is not the fear and trembling of standing under Sinai or waiting at the cold and dark waters of an unparted Sea. This is not the fear and awe of standing at the gates, of return and redemption.  This is the fear that robs you of hope, breaks your spirit and keeps you rooted: stuck, unmoving, trapped.

I have heard that fear is the opposite of faith, that is I have faith enough, I will never be afraid. I don't agree. Faith and fear can coexist. Here's the thing of it: my faith will not stop my fears, will not stop the whispered lies-- but enough faith will keep me moving. I don't know that faith can move mountains; I know for a fact that faith can move my feet, allow me to put one foot in front of the other, walk through the fear, so that I can get to the other side, face whatever is in front of me. Every time.

As I prepare to stand before God in a few days (that formal stand-before-God, because I believe, absolutely, that I stand with God, always, just as  God stands with me, always), as I prepare to stand without artifice or design, ready to walk through the gates that are opened for us all, I have to be willing to leave the things that hold me back, hold me in place behind. I have to be willing to leave the fear that feels so safe and comfortable, because it is so familiar, because it is so powerful and all-encompassing, I have to leave the fear behind.

I have to let it go, along with my brokenness, my cynicism, my impatience. I have to be willing to walk away from Lucy and her football and not play the game.

I have to put one foot in front of the other. And later, and again, when fear grips me, when I feel broken and lost and utterly alone, when fear whispers its lies to me in the dark-- I will put my faith in my feet and keep walking.

Boxes enough

It pains me to admit this: I have too much stuff.

There’s a lot of it. I bought most of it over the years—new stuff, antique stuff, little stuff, books (lots of books), kitchen gadgets, furniture, kid stuff, mom stuff, books (there really are a lot of them), clothes, pens (most of them work), shoes, gadgets. That’s the stuff off the top of my head. I haven’t even gotten to the boxes.

Yep. There are boxes, filled with stuff. They are holdovers from my move from the townhouse to the condo (50 miles and a million lifetimes ago). The move came as a result of change. I hate that. This might be the reason for the continued status of the boxes: if I keep the boxes (and their contents) long enough, the change will go away, and my life – and stuff—will revert back to their normal (ie- unchanged) state. I have squirreled so much stuff away: a secret cache that comprises the detritus of my life, odd bits of this and that which seemed important to save and squirrel away at the time.

I’ll be damned if I know what half of the stuff is, let alone why I saved any of it. I feel as if I've stumbled into some weird  and forgotten Dr. Seuss story:

This thing is a little round/ This thing never makes a sound/ This thing used to hold a shape/ This thing used to hang on drapes/ Small things, big things, paper and more/ So many things, all blocking the door...

I ask myself, every so often: What's in all those boxes? Oh yeah: my past. That’s what’s in those damned boxes-- my past.

I say all this by way of getting to the real stuff. I say it to sneak up on the scary stuff, the stuff that keeps me tethered so tightly to my past, the stuff I keep close, that I need so desperately and cling to so tightly, holding on with a death grip made of cardboard and packing tape. 

What's in those boxes? Ha! It's not stuff at all. It’s not paper or old photos or a program from some play I was in back in High School. There are no trophies from half-forgotten competitions. There is nothing dusty or slightly mildewed or faintly discolored shoved into some wrinkled corner. What tangles and overflows and twists inside those boxes is people and fear: all the relationships I have been unwilling – or unable—to let go.

I know, in my head, that it’s time. Life changes. So do needs and expectations. Desires change; as do people and the relationships we forge with them. I get that. I am quite smart, thank you very much. I know so very, very much.

That’s the problem: I know.

 I live in my head with my knowing. I swirl and dance into my knowingness. I skip along the razor-sharp edge of reason and swim in the swift current of fact. And with every dip and dive and pirouette, I continue to hold myself safe. I am separate from my knowing. I can still believe that seductive whisper that tells me that this time it will be different. This time I will have my say. This time I will win your heart. This time—no matter where the relationship wandered or how broken it got, I will not be afraid and you will not leave.

The longest journey I’ve ever made, will ever have to make, is the one from my head to my heart. It is an endless and eternal chasm that separates the two, and the way is dark and lonely. The cold seeps into my bones, freezes my joints. And I know, if I just flit fast enough, dive deeply enough, keep inside my head enough—I will never have to face that desolate road in that trackless desert. And so, for all my knowing, for all my wisdom, I have a boxes of broken relationships and dusty fear tethering me to my past, holding me to you.

And yet…

It is just a box. And maybe, really maybe, this time it will be different-- because I will be different. I will show up differently. Perhaps, this time, I can start unpacking the boxes, and those twisty little tethers, that feel so comfortable, so familiar in my hands—maybe I’m ready, finally, to cut them. Maybe, just maybe, I’m ready to put one foot in front of the other, take that final small step across that endless chasm, and start the journey to my heart.

It is so alluring: to stay, to hope, to believe. To want. Oh God, I want to hang on to the possibilities as I see them. And yes, for me, it is just a matter of time and luck and perfect astral alignment that Everything Goes Back To The Way It Was. My heart is doing little flippy-flops to hold it all together, this little bubble of desire.

But I asked to see what was in the damned box.

And all of my mental gymnastics will not keep those pesky, twisty, lovely, damaged and broklen and wonderful and past relationships, with all that fear and all that doubt in place. That journey, that endless and eternal and lonely journey has begun, whether I am ready for it or not. My feet have found the path, however rocky and dark it may be.

I’m not sure of this path. I hate not being sure. I live for certainty, for deftness and sureness and control. I crave knowing.

But.

But we’re coming to a new year, and I get to start clean and pure. I get to be-- different. I get to unpack the boxes, no matter how slowly or hesitantly. I get to leap, in my faith, and believe that I will be caught, to rest safely in the hand of God. I get to let go, finally, and let be, finally. I get to breathe. Finally, I get to say good bye.

Ten to the Power of One

I found a mystery of ten
or it found me
and will not let me go

Some tens are easy:
Chiseled in stone
carved and cut
commandments of
love
and justice

But this was a different ten,
uncarved and
not so clearly cut

at least not to me

This was a cantillation of ten
a kabbalah of prayer.
This was
a way to get from ten to
One

I thought
I remembered
the why of this ten
I thought
I was taught
that this ten
this minyan of men
-- at first just of men
though later we counted too;
we women could stand
with the best of them
with the least of them
with all of them
all of us
together.
Our voices could carry
could ascend
like sweet smoke rising from
old altars
to reach the ears of God,
but it took at least ten
of all of us

I thought
I was taught
in my own days of old
before ever I reached the heights of ten
that the ten of this assembly
came of one man who thought
he could stay the hand
of God
with a mystery of honest men
of fifty
then forty
no lower than ten

But the righteous had fled
or perhaps had never been
not there

Later I thought
I was taught
that ten comes from twelve
Twelve were sent out
and twelve returned
laden with tales of power
and bounty.
Ten told of giants
and doubt
though two stood firm
in the palm of God's hand

Ten swayed the seventy
who swayed the whole nation
the becoming
and dusty
and ragtag
nation.
Ten swayed the seventy
who stayed the many
the multitude
of men
and women
together they counted
and feared
and doubted
and turned
like Lot's wife,
they turned back
turned to stone

The power of ten
could turn a world
to unmoving stone
cast out
to wander in dust
and there to find hope
in fluid grace
to find one another
from stone to
ten
to One
we call
one to another
and all together
become
a numerology of praise
a cantillation
and kabbalah--
A prayer to the power of ten


And this,
the rabbis tell us,
this is the why of it
the heart and the soul of if it:
the power of ten--
this is the community assembled
this power of ten
was
is
the power to change the world
This I was taught
This I believe

Believed

This I believed in
and rejoiced
in sacred hallelujahs
This I believed

until

Until there was a time
I was filled with
despair
and doubt
my knees bent
and buckled
and I was bowed and
buried
by my grief
And in that moment
when I was lost
I was found
I was lifted
by the hands of strangers
and friends
unknown altogether
unseen through my veil of tears
Lifted by ten
redeemed by ten:
Gentle fingers
on deft hands
Ten
again and again
carried across a
chasm of grief
found by
ten

This mystery of ten--

it was never
bargains with God

nor fear born of freedom and doubt.

It was never that

that could stay God’s hand

or change the hearts of men

and women who counted

together

It was

It is

ever and always

     gentle fingers

     and deft hands

     that reach out

     and lift us

     and redeem us

     this mystery of ten

     this power of ten
ten to the power of One

Yad b’yad

Amen

Permission

“You have my permission,” he said, “to write about the thing that scares you most. Seven hundred fifty words.  Go.”

Yeah, right.  As if I need permission.  Ha.  I can write about anything.  Don’t need anyone to tell me what or when to write.  Anything I want.  Yup.  Even scary stuff.  Even the stuff that knots my stomach and makes my fingertips tingle.  The stuff that I would prefer to avoid— or at least lock up tight in a tiny box buried waaaay deep back in some cobwebbed and little used corner of my head.  I could write about that.  If I wanted.

Permission?  Ha!

And please– pay no attention to that whisper you might hear, skittering and wild between my ears, the one asking why I’m not writing about that scary stuff, why I’m wasting precious time and space typing all this introductory nonsense, instead of the important, vulnerable stuff that I am so cleverly avoiding.

And I would continue to avoid it, because, really— who wants to dredge up that mess, who wants to go slogging through that swamp, lifting up all those slimy rocks to find the things that go bump in my personal night?  Well, at least they go bump in my head, and maybe squeeze my heart in a slightly alarming way.  But the cost of avoidance, I’ve learned (the hard way, of course) is a helluva lot more painful, more breathtaking (and I don’t mean that in a good way), more constricting than the fear itself.

Trust me on this one.

I know all this— know it, and yet my first instinct, every time I come face to face with my personal demons, every time that fear begins to slither around my head and my heart — I want to run and hide and ignore it long enough until it just goes away, disappearing into the neverwhen where all my fears have migrated.   Trust me on this; I know the drill.  

Except.

Except they don’t.  They don’t migrate.  They do not dissipate or fade or diminish, no matter how much I wish it to be so.  Far from scattering into the mist, my fears morph and shift and grow and grow and grow.  The more I run, the more they drive me.  In whatever boxes I’ve buried them, however deeply I’ve hidden them, they begin to fester and ooze and leak— never forthrightly, but sideways and slanted, and suddenly, my world becomes a funhouse mirror, distorted, disjointed, twisted.

For all that I know that the easier, softer way to exorcize my personal demons is to talk, to write, to claim them as my own, I cannot shake the conviction that were I to name them, were I to bring them into the light of day, far from banishing them to the neverwhen, I would, instead, be giving them power and making them real.  There is always the possibility (slight, I’m sure, but more than real nonetheless) that they are not, that the scary stuff is just a figment of my imagination.  Why give those fears form and substance?  Because if they’re real, if that scary stuff is as powerful as I imagine it, it will devour me, swallow me whole, and I will disappear forever into that black hole of neverwhen.

So sometimes, I need permission.   I need to be reminded that I am tilting at windmills, solitary and resolute and fighting the good fight (even if I have imagined my foe so much more powerful than it really is) (even if my foe is me).  I need to know that I am not lying, broken and bested, at the feet of the Knight of Mirrors, that the scary stuff is just that: scary stuff that only has the power over me that I give it.

And so, remembering, I will write the scary stuff.  I will delve into those hidden places.  And my fears, once magnified and threatening and insatiably hungry, will shrink and shrivel and be powerless before me.  For today, I have been given permission, have given myself permission, to brave the scary stuff and come out the other side, unscathed (mostly) and free.