As summer arrives I am finishing my first year as a teacher of middle and high school students. It has not been easy, and I have discovered I have a lot to learn. It is thanks to my connection to United Methodist Women that I took this career risk-knowing that I love learning, children and collaboration.
In our society, especially during the election season when it seems the loudest and most outrageous voices are the ones most frequently heard, how do we value collaboration? How do we cultivate the still, silent voices of consensus and community building? How do we keep our own identities when we collaborate? And what does collaboration mean for us as United Methodist Women members? Read this issue for examples of members of United Methodist Women sharing their true selves, collaborating and adding to the common good.
There is nothing like a picnic in Riverside Park. The green on an early July evening. Central Park is for tourists, but Riverside is for New Yorkers.
For 20 years, my backyard has been the grassy slope in Riverside Park. We used to spend endless hours in the Elephant Playground. Then, the path between 79th and 96th, riding our bikes around that loop and taking in the garden near the Hippo Playground.
Although our recreation spots have changed, our picnicking spot has not. This field.
The girls are at camp. I miss them, but I console myself with friends and family. And picnics in the park.
For picnic recipes and to meet my Nicole, check out My Delicious Blog.
When my kids were little, one of our favorite story collections was Frog and Toad. In one story, Toad receives seeds from Frog and is surprised when they don’t immediately grow.
Frog tells Toad, “Leave them alone for a few days. Let the sun shine on them, let the rain fall on them. Soon your seeds will start to grow.”
But Toad exhausts himself, yelling at the seeds, commanding them “Grow!” Eventually so tired of exerting himself, he dozes off. And, while he sleeps, the seeds poke through the earth.
“And now you will have a nice garden too,” Frog says.
“It was very hard work,” Toad says.
Are we a little like Toad? Working hard? Exhausting ourselves by yelling and encouraging growth and then finding things grow without us, or even in spite of us?
In this month’s issue you’ll find many calls encouraging us to grow. The…
“The map is not the territory.” This quote reminds me that while maps, like the ones in this issue, can be seen, there is more to a place and a person than meets the eye. We use our sense of sight when we follow a map. But the reality of a place is experienced through our wider senses—our senses of touch, taste, smell, sound, intuition—all ways of experiencing places beyond our vision.
If you were to visit the territory described by these maps, you might feel rain on your face, smell baked bread, hear children’s laughter, hug away tears, taste a cool sip of lemonade, feel a soft blanket against your face or experience some unforeseen joy. Don’t get me wrong. I love maps. When I traveled by car in my 20s from college in New York City to my family home outside Chicago, I followed a route outlined by…
I have not written in a while. I have been very down about national and international events. Honestly, I came unhinged with the lack of civility in our nation’s political conversations.
And yes, I’ve been occupied with my own personal business — producing A Christmas Carol to raise money for refugees, finishing my first trimester teaching, churning out articles for response magazine.
But I want to look at 2015 first nationally. And then, personally.
One sadness is the way politicians live in the pocket of gun lobbyists. I thought our representatives were supposed to represent We, the People. Not the Moneyed Interests.
Don’t take my word for it. guns kill people every 16 minutes. Read Nicholas Kristof in the New York Times (August 27)
■ More Americans die in gun homicides and suicides every six months than have died in the last 25 years in every terrorist attack and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq combined.
The Paris shooting and the killing of civilians sickened me. We are to live the Golden Rule, regardless of religion. I will never forget the message from one of the three who died in the Boston marathon bombing in 2013. The message was pretty straight forward.
The racism in society — the killing of innocent black people, children, women is ridiculous. I was especially upset by the killing of Sandy Bland, who seemed to me, someone whom I would have been friends with. She should not have died. Nor a child with a toy gun. WTF is the world coming to? Thank God for advocacy like Black Lives Matter.
If I were president, I would make every police force in the country train every one of its officers in diversity. When I was on jury duty last year — in the voit dire — the two majority opinions from the hundreds of ordinary New Yorkers — who were being grilled to become jurors – “I hate guns. I distrust cops.” It is more than a PR problem. Police departments are not seen as protectors of the people, they are seen as the enemy.
It may be that we are not attracting our best and brightest to the police force or to our political arena. Many of our candidates are not that bright. But Hillary is and so is Bernie. I support Hillary because she has experience in the Senate and as Secretary of State. Hil (and yes, Bernie, too) speaks civilly of and to others.
I met Clinton in ’95 at the Women’s Conference in China, she impressed me then — speaking on women and children’s rights. And she impresses me still.
I would not tolerate the meanness, closed-mindedness and xenophobia of our Republican candidates’ words in my classroom or on the playground. I certainly do not want it from my country’s chief executive.
When I was in Dublin this summer, a chatty Irish gent told me he used to dream about visiting the U.S. but not any more. He said, “Too many guns in the U.S.” We are on the verge of losing our international street cred.
I love when we tear down walls, not build bigger ones. Look at Germany. I love Merkel. Those Germans are amazing in their welcome and hospitality of refugees. Taking in a million. And our vast country, our America the Beautiful? We cannot even take in ten thousand? Please.
On a personal level, this year I have tried to engage in small acts of kindness. And make a positive difference right where I am.
I am proud Chris and I raised $850 for refugees through Rutgers Church and Church World Service at our staged reading of A Christmas Carol with Chris as Scrooge.
Professionally, I accomplished a lot. I am now a high school English teacher. And also managing editor of response magazine. I am blessed to end this year with two part-time jobs I love. I worked hard and put in my time, but career-wise, I was also lucky and at the right place at the right time in 2015.
Another personal achievement – I blogged every single day of October on mindfulness.
I got my first child off to college which has been bittersweet. Overall, I’m proud. Some days, I’m lonely. The family dyanmics shift.
This was a good year for my family and travel. I enjoyed my writing workshop in Dublin. My daughter Char traveled to Costa Rica and Bermuda. Catherine went kayaking in Alaska. Hayden went to Patagonia, Chile. Chris went fishing in Canada.
About Chris
This is often an interesting topic for people. But I am reluctant to share. As if it is not my story to tell. Let me say this.
Chris’s health is declining. Daily tasks, like shaving, are becoming more difficult for him. This is the nature of a chronic disease like Parkinson’s – it is not his fault or our family member’s failing. It is not that he is not loved enough or does not love enough. It is the way this disease unfolds – no one stays the same.
Yes, we all change, slow, grow, decline. We are not in stasis. Unless we die. Then we are done. And we are all dying but we are not all done. And though Chris is having more difficulty in tasks like moving from sitting to standing, he still has a great fighter’s spirit and a raging intellect. He still has much love to give and receive. He is not done. But we are getting to a point in our family where we need more help. (I have to finish this post so I can get to physical therapy for a bad back.)
Asking for help is anathema to me. I started counseling a couple of months ago to work on this.
I started a Caring Bridge blog for Chris (Although neither Chris nor I have updated it.) as a place to update people about Chris’s health in a smaller more private setting than this blog or on Facebook. (If you want me to include you on that, you can send me your email address.)
So honored to work with United Methodist Women. Here is this month’s column in response.
From the Shelter Island Retreat.
I cried in church last week. The song “Here I Am, Lord” moved me. I was coming to terms with worries and sorrows—my children growing up, and my husband’s Parkinson’s Disease.
I felt embarrassed crying in public, worried that my fellow worshipers would think I was weak or in need of help. I know intellectually that church is a safe place for tears—after all, we cry for joy at weddings or with grief at funerals. But I could not shake the feeling that I should not be crying on an ordinary Sunday. At times, I am caught in this trap of caretaking, feeling I should be the one to comfort others and not need comfort.
Then I remember that it is through our tear-filled, vulnerable moments when we discover what truly matters. The next day I read this quote from Brené Brown in her new book Daring Greatly: “Vulnerability isn’t good or bad. … Vulnerability is the core of all emotions and feelings. To feel is to be vulnerable. To believe vulnerability is weakness is to believe that feeling is weakness. To foreclose on our emotional life out of a fear that the costs will be too high is to walk away from the very thing that gives purpose and meaning to living.”
I cry because I am vulnerable and because I care. Perhaps, like me, you have tears for yourself, family, work, church, community, nation or world. After a good cry, we can share our vulnerability. I like to write about my emotions. After expressing feelings, we can then roll up our sleeves and see how to make it better. This can-do attitude, of which United Methodist Women is famous, resonates with me.
Some of the articles in this issue of response offer opportunities to discuss the vulnerable places in our lives and communities. In Rachel Patman’s Bible study, “Holy Nagging: Advocating for Domestic Violence Survivors,” we are led to talk about unequal status and power and control. We can also read one woman’s experience of growing up in an abusive situation and her resolve to not pass on that abuse to her daughter in “Ending the Cycle” by Samantha York.
Take note of “Strengthening the Ties that Bind Us” by Laura Sonnemark for National Justice for Our Neighbors. This story may inspire you to volunteer. Or follow in Dixie Liggett’s footsteps, described in “Having a Heart.” Visit a local community center, send funds to a mission partner on the border or organize a churchwide workshop, providing the facts around the United Methodist policies on immigration. Build a supportive community so that all women feel welcome into United Methodist Women. Notice the times and places where you tear up, be it reading, writing or singing in church on Sunday. Set aside judgment about how women express their vulnerabilities.
After all, emotions are a gift from God, a chance to share our common humanity and show us what really counts. Believe that your prayers and tears are heard. As the first line of the song “Here I Am, Lord” by Daniel Schutte, expresses, “I, the Lord of sea and sky, I have heard my people cry.” Take comfort.
This blogging every day has been a slog. I don’t want to complain. I never complain. I complain to my kids that they aren’t picking up after themselves enough, but that’s not complaining. That’s just speaking the truth. I complain that I work too much or get paid too little. But that’s truth too.
I remember skimming a book once, the Complaint Free World, and I quit complaining. And then there were years I quit gossiping for Lent. And I missed it. I missed complaining and gossiping. There’s a nice groove and camaraderie to negativity in the workplace or among other mothers in the playground. We get each other. We bond.
I’m trying to stay positive. Bond that way. Or through my blog. Here are 7 things I’ve learned writing a blog post every day for the month of October.
Pumpkins from an October retreat on Shelter Island.
People like lists of 7 things
It’s more important to be consistent than brilliant.
It feels so nice when readers tell you in person that they like your online writing
You worry that friends or family will take offense at your writing, but they’ll like it
Only 7 blogs to go until the end of October (*I actually have 8, but 7 sounds better!)
Stick to one topic — although you may have a lot to say about at least 7 topics
As a mother of three and sister of four, I’ve seen my share of bloody noses, broken bones, chicken pox, and far too many hematomas (this is one of my kids’ favorite words — I’m always saying, “Ah, that’s just a hematoma!” In fact H. said he might name his first child Hematoma. If it’s a boy.) Or else I tell my kids, “Ah, that bone is just bruised.” And I’m not sure that’s even a thing — a bruised bone. I should’ve asked our very fun and funny trainer, Andrea Arnold of lifesavingenterprises.com what to do about a bruised bone.
More than laughs in my CPR and First Aid class today, I received the sage advice not to follow the medical advice from movies.
These were our crash test dummies in First Aid CPR class today.
Do not be like Mel Gibson in the Lethal Weapon movies and slam your dislocated shoulder back into place by running at a door. See a doctor.
You do not need to put a tampon up your noses if it gets bloody, even if Rocky Balboa did it. (And you don’t need to ice the bridge of the nose either which is what I always did.)
The frostbite in the new movie Everest is the really bad kind. Because it was not even a picture in our gory manual. (And it’s not the kind that is simply treated by warming.)
You’re lucky if you can pull an antanae out of your belly like Matt Damon did in the Martian. Only remove lodged items in that manner if you are alone and on Mars. Otherwise, call 9-1-1.
I’m sure there are more movie myths I overcame today, but I’m weary from learning.
I will leave you with a few more reminders:
Make sure your carbon dioxide alarms and smoke alarms are working. (Our are not!)
If you need help from a bystander, say specifically, “You in the yellow pants,” (or whatever — be specific about who is going to call help) “Call 911.” And tell them we have an unresponsive adult, child.” Or “Go get the AED.”
And as our trainer said, when class was over, “We hope you never have to use this. But if you do….”
I felt great when my daughter told me her friend’s room was even messier than hers. See, my daughter had asked her friend where to throw a candy wrapper and her friend told her, “Throw it on the floor!”
This was a labyrinth at Ghost Ranch in New Mexico which I visited four years ago. i hope to go back someday.
When my son was a toddler, he was so noisy in church. I felt relieved when a church friend told me her daughter had once thrown a bible at an octogenarian in the front pew.
Why have I always secretly been thrilled with other people’s naughty children? Because these children resemble my own.
They make me feel not so alone; we are part of an imperfect tribe in an imperfect world.
No one is alone. We probably all need to step away from our perfectionism, to share a laugh, a bit of humanity. Realize that our desire to appear perfect keeps us from sharing on a deeper level.
Perfectionism is not the same thing as striving to be our best. Perfectionism is not about healthy achievement and growth; it’s a shield. – Brené Brown
We were having the last weekend of summer at Long Beach Island in New Jersey – me and my b.f.f. Joanne.
We’d become fast friends 17 years ago — when we’d both wheeled newborns through the lobby of our Upper West Side building. We admired each other’s carriages. She was impressed by my antique English pram. I liked hers — sleek and modern. We discovered our husbands had the same name, John, and both were character-type actors. And, of course, we both had newborn babies.
This last day of summer, we sizzled on the beach with our teenagers, gossiping about old neighbors and new careers. Jo has returned to the workforce full tilt as a fashion designer, while my career, freelance writing and teaching, limps along.
From the beach, we watched a parasail glide past us.
Jo adjusted her stylish straw hat and told me, “I’ve been promising Little E for years that she could try it. But, no pressure, we don’t have to do it…. If you think it’s too expensive.” Which I did. And which she did too.
But see, we are two ladies who don’t want life to beat us. And this last year, life has nearly beaten us.
Our tough year is due to our declining marriages. My husband’s Parkinson’s Disease is worsening and her marriage is devolving. But we are resilient. Jo’s daughters called her JSJ, Just Single Joanne.
I reached for my phone in my whicker beach bag and called the number advertised on the parasail.
By now, the girls had perked up on their towels. “Can we do it? Mom? Please!”
“It’s a definite maybe,” I said.
“Oh, like the carriage ride?” See, for my girls’ 8th birthday, I’d promised the twins a carriage ride in Central Park. They are now 14 and still waiting. I’m ambivalent. What about the whole carriage horse and anti-cruelty thing? Besides, it is expensive.
And so, I discovered when I called from the beach, is parasailing.
“$75 a person,” I reported.
“Girls, I don’t know. That’s $225.” Jo said.
“No. That’s practically a trip to Florida in February,” I said.
“The carriage ride!” they said.
I waffled. “Look,” I said “if the conditions are all right, then we can do it. Sunny day, light breeze, calm water. We’ll see.”
One of my daughters said to Jo’s daughter, “We’re never going to do it. She’s been promising us a carriage ride in Central Park for six years.”
“My mom’s the same. She’s been promising me a parasail for so many summers,” Little E. responded.
I ignored them. I turned to Jo, “Wait. You said, $225. But it’s only $150. Two girls at $75 each?”
“Oh, no,” she said. “I’m going to do it too. It looks fun. You and I can do it together.”
“I guess.” I shrugged. I am scared of heights. I don’t like ferris wheels. But it didn’t matter. I’d bought us time. The next day, I knew the forecast was for rain.
***
I woke before everyone else and looked out the window. Not a cloud in the sky. In fact, the conditions were perfect. Sunny day, light breeze, calm water.
Jo made us coffee. “I think we should do it.”
“Okay,” I exhaled. “Yolo. Carpe Diem. All that crap.”
The girls were thrilled.
At the shack on the Barnegat Light dock, I signed waivers on an ipad, not even reading the print. I had to rush to the bathroom.
We boarded the cushy white boat. The guide and the driver were 20-something year olds. Did they know about keeping me safe, synching cords?
We watched the shore get smaller.
When our boat was well out, Sean, the ex-Marine guide, asked, “Who wants to go first?”
“We do,” I said, answering for Jo and me. I wanted the whole thing over with.
“Okay.” He bent to slip one nylon strap over and under our thighs and another around our waists.
I whispered to him, “Basically, Sean, we two are single mothers so you cannot let anything happen to us. I’m not kidding. You have to make sure you bring us down alive.”
“That’s the idea,” he said. “We haven’t lost one yet.”
He sat us on the back of the boat. I looked around for the metal basket. Wouldn’t we be sitting in a metal frame like on a ferris wheel? No, the two straps of nylon were pretty much our whole seat and harness. I don’t know if it was uncomfortable. I had no time to think or feel because, with a whoosh, a gunning of the motor, we were jettisoned from the boat into the sky. We were suddenly miles away, it seemed.
Dreamlike, boats far below us left a trail of foam – V’s no bigger than a letter on a printed page.
“Oh, this is so fun.” Jo laughed, giddy, girlish, giggling. I recall a few moments in the sky where I was not utterly terrified.
I pushed my big sunglasses up my nose, looked at the beach houses, boats. Everything was tiny. Nothing mattered.
So quiet. I turned and looked up at the parasail behind us — full and reliable.
I noticed I was white knuckling it. My hands were clutching the straps. I told myself, Relax. Enjoy this. It will soon be over. I circled my wrists. The boat slowed, lowered us so we dipped our feet in the water. Then, we were raised up into the sky again. We laughed and shouted.
We waved at the girls.
“They’ve probably forgotten us,” Jo said.
But we could make out their tiny waves in the tiny boat.
After about 15 minutes, we were lowered back gently into the white boat. Behind my big sunglasses, I cried. I was so grateful to have survived. I had returned. Safety. I thanked Sean. I told the girls it was fun.
I watched my girls go up, kicking each other, swinging, waving, going no-handed. I felt a similar wide relief when my girls returned to the boat safely.
For a little while, that day, up high in the sky, life was light, someone else was driving. Everything – work, husband, money problems — was far away. I realized I didn’t need to clutch so tightly. I had been scared to let go. But it was okay when I did.
Maybe a carriage ride in Central Park will feel the same way.
Here we are sailing up.
I am part of a variety show this afternoon and I am going to read this essay. I’ve tried to sell it to a couple of magazines, but, sadly, no takers.
100 Days of Poems and Pics 