On being drenched

Writing as life taking.

"If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they're happy." -- Dorothy Parker

Writing as life giving. 

"Writing is not only a reflection of what one thinks and feels but a rope one weaves with words that can lower you below or hoist you above the surface of your life, enabling you to go deeper or higher than you would otherwise go. What excites me about this metaphor is that it makes writing more of a lifesaving venture." -- Phyllis Theroux

Which is it?


If you asked my husband it would probably be the former quote by Dorothy Parker, as he bears the load of listening to my endless frustrations regarding the lack of the second choice. It's not that my writing sucks or doesn't suck, that's totally beside the point. It's just that there is no writing. There is working, there is driving, there is living. Working, driving, and living are not all bad. It's just when you get a glimpse at the glorious panorama of all you could do, all the possibilities, and you see what others do, the teaching, the workshops, the publications, the conferences, the travel, the ideas, the performances, the growing, the lifesaving, the incredibly relevant essays on the here and now, the storytelling that makes people care -- it just makes you want something you wouldn't otherwise want had you never learned about it.

I think that's why I cling to David Foster Wallace, even though I've barely scratched the surface of his brilliance. Sure, his vocabulary is stratospheric, his voice complicated, yet only he could go on a cruise and write paragraphs about the sound of the toilet in his cabin. He seemed to long to understand the absolute ordinariness of everyday. And why it makes us all so sad, even though we mostly don't acknowledge it. He did. We're all just quietly frustrated by the working, the driving, and the living. His writing says, basically, screw the big stuff. Embrace the small stuff. Because the small stuff -- aka the working, the driving, the living -- is usually, in actuality, what's most important. (Easy for him to say, I'm tempted to think to myself, because he could write, write, write his hearts desire. Yet, he took his own life. RIP. His torment about the banality of everyday life was real, and tragically unresolved. I'm still sad about his loss, even though I'd never even heard of him when he was alive. He was born the same year as I.)

Tomorrow, though, Saturday morning, the small sanctuary of my time, I will gather up notes from three short interviews that took me a month to conduct, and write an assigned piece for The Lutheran Magazine, thanks to a generous editor. A piece that I hope will maybe, just maybe be relevant, clever, and surprising. It's about LGBTQ Lutherans. No, it's about faith. Really, it's about labels. Hopefully, it's about appreciation.

For now, I invite you to watch this three minute excerpt of David Foster Wallace's most famous writing, his Kenyon College commencement speech in 2005, now referred to as  "This is Water." (Here's the full transcript. Trust me, you won't regret reading it.)

Which of course begs the question, what is my water? Yours?

Tropical Steel benefit concert for Haiti

Today, we all came to church dressed in bright colors and tropical dress (me, and my Kenyan gear) and we worshiped to the Caribbean stylings of Tropical Steel. Our morning included a benefit concert for Haiti's earthquake recovery and I was pleased to be asked to deliver an update. I thought I'd go ahead and post my remarks here, just in case some of you feel moved to further support the effort.  Here goes:

Haiti is a tiny country on the west side of a small Caribbean island called Hispaniola. Haiti holds a rich heritage of culture, a long history of slavery, a hard record of poverty, and an incredible hero in the man of Toussant L'Ouverture, a slave who led an unlikely and successful slave rebellion in the late 1700s, mostly by sheer wit and diplomacy.

In modern times Haiti remains a complicated society and when a magnitude 7.0 earthquake hit in January 2010, it just got worse. The problem with natural disasters is that they always impact the poor countries, the poor neighbors, the poor people the hardest – because the poor usually live in the most vulnerable constructions and risky landscapes.

In that earthquake, nearly 250,000 people died, some 300,000 people were injured and more than 1.5 million people were displaced. Most are still living in camps.

Our Lutheran human service agencies are at work there, and in a big way. Thanks to the support of so many people like you.

Here’s a quick summary of what the ELCA is doing in Haiti:

·     About ten days ago there was a groundbreaking ceremony for a new resettlement village that will provide housing for 1,200 people

·     The village will include the construction of 200 solar-powered homes with indoor plumbing, a "green" sanitation system and community space that includes a children's playground and multipurpose community center.

·     Women-headed households and people living with disabilities will be among the village residents.

Other work includes:

·    Opening a vocational training center that will train in masonry, carpentry, and heavy machine operation and repair

·    The containment of cholera and the care for cholera patients

·     Increasing access to clean water and basic sanitation

·     Providing chickens to some 200 farmers to develop egg production coops

·     And plans are underway to build three schools and to train people to prepare for future disasters

But it’s not just what we’re doing. It’s how we’re doing it. We don’t just go into Haiti, or any county, as if we have all the answers. We’re don’t act like we’re “saving” people. Instead, we work through Haitians and Haitian organizations to bolster what they’re already doing. We work together, as if each other’s survival depends on working together. We work with both immediate and long-term needs. We don’t cut and run after media attention subsides.

I’ll close with a quote from Joseph Livenson Lauvanus, president of the Lutheran Church of Haiti: "We Haitians will not be defined by the rubble, but by restoration, for we are a people of the resurrection."

Thank you.

...

The plate was passed to benefit the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Haiti projects. You can still donate online. 

The boychild and his peace rally

So once, long ago when I worked on the 8th floor of 23rd and Park Avenue South in Manhattan, "in the city" as New Yorker's call it, a colleague went out for lunch and returned with an announcement: "I just saw the Dalai Lama." It was one of those New York moments, so casual, yet so, holy crap. I mean, she just took a short lunch break, maybe 20 minutes. And BAM, there's the Dalai Lama. When you live in a condensed population that is the center of the universe, tongue partially in cheek, you just see stuff like that, and it becomes kind of ho hum. (My bro-in-law has a meeting Mother Teresa story that would have you in stitches.)

I thought of that Dalai Lama lunch break today when my 12-year-old son announced that he'd bumped into a pro-Tibet rally with a friend in downtown Des Moines today after school. I'm like, wow, that's so cool. He's like, yeah, just another rally. I'm like, wow, I didn't even know you'd heard of Tibet. He's like, yeah, so what's the big deal. My son is not much of a talker, but wanted me to know that he was there. He wanted me to know that he's heard of Tibet, and he knows they need to be freed. Apparently he knows that, like, I dig that. (And maybe he's still trying to make up for the paper mache' bazooka he made in 2nd grade arts and crafts.)

If you haven't already heard, it's a big deal around here these days because the future prez of China is touring Iowa and a state dinner was in Des Moines tonight. Hense, the pro-Tibet rally. Des Moines is that kind of place -- big enough to be a city, small enough for a kid to bum around after school with a buddy. The boychild's school and Bob's office are both downtown, so the city has become boychild's playground. He's figuring out the public transit, the best place to get a sandwich, the skyways, the public library amenities, and how to best get from point A to B with the least amount of physical exertion. He's figuring out what it means to be free, to be who you are, to fly your own flag.

Wait, stop, I'm sure you're not thinking provincial thoughts about Iowa and Des Moines. That we're all about corn and quaintness. But if you are, I invite you to watch this short video. (Mom, heads up, there's a little bit of language in it.) That was a short diversion.

Anyway, just wanted to shout out to the free Tibet people -- Welcome to Des Moines! Thanks for coming. Thanks for educating my son.

With love, T

Crash landing pad

There are three ways in which I serve food to my kids. All I ask is that you don't judge me. Anyway, the three ways are the helicopter method, the spaceship method, and the crash landing method. They go something like this:

Girlchild or Boychild: "Mom, will you make me a turkey sandwich?"

Me: "Sure." I make the sandwich. I set it on the kitchen counter top.

Me: "Here's your sandwich."

Girlchild or Boychild, who by the way are probably sitting in front of the TV: "Mom, can you helicopter it in?"

Me: "Sure."

Suddenly the plate arises and makes a fast paced thicking noise and rotates in circles as it makes it's way towards the Subjectchild. All the way across the living room straight to the Saidchild and lands gently onto the lap landing pad.

The spaceship method is pretty much the same thing, except it's called a space ship instead of a helicopter. It kind of rotates like a round flying saucer from Mars. Sometimes the turkey sandwich is served on a platter with other food and drink, napkin and fork. Then, the entire platter rotates across the room, same quick thicking noice.

The crash landing method is a whole other thing. That's when the turkey sandwich, or whatever is being served at that particular request, sets so securely on the plate or tray that it suddenly takes off, runs across the room. It makes a screechy "rrrrrrr" sound like a car that has slammed on it's brakes. And then smashes onto the lap landing pad, still in tact for eating of course.

When crash landings occur, Girlchild and Boychild say: "Mom, that's just weird."

And I take heart in the way that author Mary Karr describes the way her family used to eat meals together in her memoir, "The Liar's Club." They used to all sit on the parent's bed, each facing a different wall, with their backs towards the center of the bed, with their food on their laps, all facing outwards. And it worked for them. I think it sounds kind of peaceful. (Rare moments of quiet in that book, anyway.) The way she writes it, it's hilarious. (Lots of hilarity in this read.)

All for now. Thanks for coming over.

With love, T
.

Busted

I've been busted. The other day my son, who I shall no longer name lest he shows up on a Google search by his middle school friends, requested access to my blog codes so he could go in and take offline all the pictures of him I've posted over the years. The good, the bad, and the super adorable. Of course I obliged this request, although I think there's still work to do.

Apparently he and his friend were Google searching each other, and apparently my son's name turned up as highly searchable, thanks to me and my darn habit of blogging. Welcome to the big bad world of lack of privacy in which I am a perpetrator.

My son said his friend said that my blog title is stupid. What? Now I'm being evaluated by another 7th grade boy? Yet, I don't want to embarrass my son.

"Oh, so do I need to change my blog name? Delete the whole thing?" I asked.

"No, that's OK," he said.

Nice kid.

Its another example of that harsh reality that your kids have their own separate lives and that they belong to you less and less as they get older and wiser. The days of me posting about my son and daughter as if they are my property, my dolls, my babies, my own -- are over. Or at least modified.

Yet, sadly, as we all know, once something is posted on the internet, always posted. Google search doesn't give their codes out, as far as I  know, so you can't go in and delete their material about you and your family. And so I give thanks again that there was no information superhighway when I was younger and dumber. And I caution my kids constantly about what they post. And I caution myself over and over and over again.

It's probably good that I just stick to the liver writing and maybe take up scrap booking.

Wishing you all a lovely weekend.

T