...in the strangest of places...

i don't have cable. shocker, right? the choice isn't really about being socially aware, etc. it's mostly about being cheap. cable/interweb is about $80 a month, and frankly, when you live in a one-income household, $80 can be a lot of money. consequently, when i do watch tv, it's usually pbs. i also have a terrible habit of watching movies over and over again. the other night, this actually paid off.

i was sitting in the middle of my bedroom floor, in some strange yoga pose, stretching my way through the end credits of "drop dead gorgeous" when this catchy little tune started playing. i must have rewound the dvd thirty times in a row, just to hear this song...not even the whole song, but the line that said, "why does this love always have to come to words?"

i mean, that's probably one of the most profound questions/statements i've ever heard, about anything. think about it...how many times do you find yourself motivated to speech or action out of love? i think we'd all be suprised to find out that we are motivated, activated, and empowered by love more often than any of us would like to admit. granted, that love can often be colored by less-than-honorable intentions...but when love is the primary motivator, incredible things can happen.

i've been re-reading "a brief history of time" by stephen hawking. aside from making me feel slightly learning impaired, this book makes me believe in a G-d that is so big, i almost lose my breath thinking about it. i don't think there's any way to view the space/time continuum, general reltivity, the awesome structure and fuction of dark matter, and the idea of the universe in constant motion without being open to the idea of a higher intelligence behind it.

i'm talking about a G-d that is bigger than any book, idea, word, savior, dogma, battle, war, manifesto, etc. i'm talking about a big G-d...REAL BIG. i'm talking about a G-d who loves out loud, who never lets the love be silent. i'm talking about a G-d so moved by love that the very sound of that love, the exhalation of that word/thought/state/feeling/emotion/action can still be heard from the deepest, furthest, darkest, and most mysterious places in the universe.

i'm talking about a macro love that designs the universe and organizes it in such incredibly small and minute detail that even super-computers can't count all the decimal places. i'm talking about a micro-love that changes our little lives, our businesses, our homes, our families, and our broken and wasted hearts. (and yes, that's a love i understand in the incarnation of G-d in Jesus)...i'm talking about a love that cannot be silent, that screams and hollers and sings at the top of it's lungs for right relationship.

i'm talking about a love that lays down beside us, in the quiet and dark of night, and brushes the hair back from our face, flips the pillow to the cool side, and holds us until we can sleep, again. i'm talking about a love that is compelled to be spoken, whether it's a whisper or a shriek.

"why does this love always have to come to words?"

if it's not out loud, how to do we know what love sounds like?

mil besos,

rmg

flashcards

i gave a talk this weekend, at a retreat. i talked about how G-d talks to me, about how it's almost always in flashcard form, a word or two starkly inked into the material of my heart and my head in something far more indelible, but as recognizeable as sharpie marker. i love sharpie markers, you guys. seriously. i always have one in my purse, and one on my desk. always black. there is nothing more satisfying than writing with a sharpie marker...it's permanent, it's big, it's bold, it means business, even if it's a love letter or a smiley face. sharpie markers are ON PURPOSE. you never accidentally write with a sharpie. so it is with my flashcards from G-d. the flashcards in the deck i've been made privy to say some of these words: *faithful*obedient*encourage*intentional*fully present*window*...and a weird one that's a phrase...*you'll know it when you see it*. and you guys...i have been seeing some things...good things...hopeful things...hard things...and every where, every place i rest my eyes, or my head, or my heart, it's all so full of love and grace and mercy, i can't believe i was ever blind to this. it's never going to be easy, living into this broken and dying world. it will always be a struggle to make peace with the breach between the already and the not-yet of the kingdom of G-d. nothing in this life will be easy, even the things that look or feel easy aren't really...and that's just the beauty and the blessing of it. i think i understand a part of what all those ridiculous bumper stickers and posters from college said about the journey being the destination. and i want to sharpie that all over everything. mil besos, rmg

mix tapes from babylon

i find myself spending more and more time just being grateful, and not for anything specific, these days. i mean, there is specificity to my gratitude, but it's also just an overwhelming feeling i carry with the through my days, not unlike the anxiety and angst that i carried through my late twenties and into being thirty. the difference is that the gratitude is a pleasure to bear. and i find that as i get deeper and deeper into my gratitude, what comes out of that is encouragement. even on days when i cry all the way home (and yes, there are still those days), or days when i am utterly convinced that this is all there is, and it's never going to be enough (and yes, there are still those days), i've started forcing myself to examine all the bits of the day, and find that there is ALWAYS something to be thankful for, ALWAYS someone to encourage ( not berate, or coach, but just love on and tell them how fabulous they are), ALWAYS a Good Friday, followed by an Easter morning. i am amazed at the bounty i find when i am willing to open my eyes. and you know, the more i get in tune with gratitude, encouragement, believing in the truth of the triumph of love, i am reminded that not everyone lives like this. some of the people closest to me seem to be succumbing more and more to negativity, victimhood, believing that we are each on our own in this world. it's hard to be around those people, hard to know how to talk to them, how to hold them, how to share with them. there comes a point at which, after being scolded for my percieved naivete and reminded over and over again that optimists are insane and frankly kind of silly, i just shut up and make the faces people want me to make, responding mostly with non-committal verbalizations. i am the horse that refuses to drink at the rank well, no matter how hard i'm beaten. i'd rather take a thousand lashes than cave in and lose the ability to find G-d in all the strange and hard places, to find gratitude in the tears, and be able to shout encouragement through a mouth full of blood. i'm done with pointing fingers. i'd rather just hold someone's hand, and listen to their story. i'm over correcting people when they get facts wrong, or tell outright lies. i'd rather just listen to why they are angry, and tell them how much i love them, and remind them of all the wonderful, true things about themselves. i'd rather light a candle than lay in my bed, terrified of what might be under my bed. and i'd rather run through the gates of the kingdom of G-d, with my head on fire and my mouth full of praise than go limping through life with nothing but complaints about what i don't have. that dosen't make me better than anyone, or worse than anyone. that just makes me...me. this is what works for me. it's about radical acceptance, careful engagement, and resting in the confidence that there is a G-d who loves all of us more than we can ask or imagine. i refuse to sit in babylon and complain that my songs have been taken from me, my praise can't be heard in this foreign place. i am singing at the top of my lungs. mil besos, rmg

...you guys, i wish i had learned this sh*t along the way...

...how to deal with the loss of about two extra hours of sleep, last night, because i insisted on staying up and watching a movie i had already seen like 40,000 times.

...how to find a really good, really reliable, really affordable person to cut my hair. i seriously have not had a hair cut in a whole calendar year. yikes. AND i'm going gray...which is not all bad, because it kind of feels legit. also, i'm hoping i can go gray like emmylou harris in "the last waltz", and not end up with a streak here and a streak there. if it comes to that, i will definitely stop the attempt to age gracefully, and start being a bottle brunette.

...how to be a bitchy junior high girl. i was fortunate enough to spend the better part of last weekend with a whole herd of the sweet ones, with a few of the sour ones thrown in for good measure. i kept my hands off their throats, and my thumbs out of their eyesockets. and when i met the sour girls' mothers, i understood everything. G-d bless and keep the sweet ones...and G-d bless the sour ones, too.

...how to be in two places at once. that one would be amazing, on several levels, and for several reasons.

...how to not sweat the small stuff. i mean, who really knows how to do this one? maybe tyler durden...

...how to avoid ever going to university hospital for anything, ever ever ever effing ever, again. ever. for any reason. unless it's to pick up my prize money, which will have to be at least two comma's worth of money (that's over a million) to make it worth the sheer hell and torment of being at that facility.

...how to not feel like a terrible person for reinforcing good and normal boundaries at work and at home.

...how to explain to people i love and adore that it's not always about them, that sometimes, in fact, it is about me.

...how to do grown-up relationships when all the feelings i am feeling make me feel like i am fifteen. and how did i miss the part where i was supposed to learn to do this in high school and college? was graduating in three years REALLY that important?

...how to have balls in all the areas of my life, and not just the areas that are easy for me to express myself assertively.

sounds like a reasonable list to ponder for Lent, while i'm giving up sodas, eating out, and doing at least one hour of yoga a day. right? right.

also, i'd like to make an order for rain, and less oak pollen. thanks.

mil besos,
rmg

if i were a betting woman...

...i'd have probably lost a lot of money, by this point in the game.

you know, people kind of amaze me, sometimes, and not always in the best ways. i think there are moments when it's hard for me to cut people slack. it's not that i mind cutting people slack, it's that i mind cutting them slack over things that are their own faults. i don't like paying for other people's mistakes, or greed, or lack of foresight, or lack of respect for themselves. it pisses me off. it's hard to give slack with a full and loving heart, when you are confronted with poor behaviour, bad instructions, etc. but i know that i need grace and mercy because of my own blindness, my own bad behaviour, my mumbled and garbled instructions, my stuff, my head, my heart, blah blah blah. and so i cut slack, and sometimes i have to ask for some to be cut for me. and i have hard conversations. i do this because i need for it to be done for me, from time to time. this is what it means to live in community. this is what Jesus asks us to do, and what He does for us every. single. day. it also means that i have the right to say no, to walk away, to love unhealthy people from a healthy distance. i'm done living in the mess and the drama and the angst, at least as much as i can distance myself from those things. there is an element of mess, drama, and angst that is just part and parcel of living in a broken and dying world...but we can determine, most of the time, the levels at which mess, drama, and angst get to swing us around by the tail...thank G-d...

some of the things i find myself repeating over and over again in my head are the following mantras: big picture; i live here; don't just live intentionally--live deeply; own your own life; it's happening around you, not to you--big difference; i live in this body, but i am not this body; G-d is not fickle; i am on a need-to-know basis with G-d...and there is apparently a whole laundry list of shit i am not supposed to know, right now...

when the mantras don't work, i usually cry and turn the radio up louder and sign along until i can't sing anymore, or i arrive at my back door. and last night, when none of those things worked, i sketched with my charcoal pencils from san francisco for two solid hours. i felt better. i have felt better. i will feel better. this is not a phase. this is just a readjustment.

i live HERE, in my real life, and sometimes that means that i am lonlier than i would like to be. i don't have all the answers...not because i don't want to know them, but because there is no way i can ever think of all the right questions to ask. i do know some things, and i know a lot about the things that i do know. and i know i don't want to go back to being afraid that i was crazy; to believing that i am a bumbler; to believe that my selfworth is in anyway related to the fan- or hate-mail i'm getting; that who i am, at the very center of myself is not in any way related to buzz about me, in any sphere of operations. i came to play, and i brought my best game. and in all honesty, i've worked really hard to get this good, and i know that i am still an amateur, at best. but i'm effing here...i live HERE, into all the corners and weird parts of my life. it's not really mine, anyway. i gave it to Jesus a long time ago. and every day, i just want to have the integrity to live it that way, not in a way that's about me or my ego or what i think i need to be happy in this life. i'm not even guaranteed my next breath. i am totally and completely replaceable. what i have to give is what has been given to me...it's not of my own doing or my own making. i don't know how to say that any differently, and it just sounds so trite and bumper-stickery that i kind of want to barf, just looking at it...

it's funny...the last nine months have been so full and lifechanging, but nothing really has happened. i just woke up one day, and everything was the same, but it was all different, too. and the last two days have been very difficult, out of the blue, in very suprising ways. i've found myself just feeling very irritated and have had to remind myself not to be reactive. you know those moments when the words bubble just behind your lips, and you remember to clip them off before they come flying out? ...thank G-d for those moments. and then there are those moments when you say something, and you try to say it in the best way possible, and it comes out sounding like shit anyway? i mean, those are G-d's moments, too...but they are difficult and heavy.

i just want to be responsible for my own self. i want to own all the things about me, even the things that i actively try to change and do different every single day. in the end, they are mine to own, to own up to, to live up to or try and live down. it's not a shocker to me to look out on my classroom and have to fully acknowledge that i am the only adult in the room. it's another kind of feeling altogether to look out on the room of my life and realize that there are some people who will never act their age, never wield the wisdom they have accrued, never think of other people first, never put on someone else's shoes or see things from another person's point of view...and that feeling is mostly one of sadness. because we are all missing out, when that happens. all of us. and that is worth being a little bothered about.

additionally, it's cold as balls. it's been a weird start to 2011, and i'm hoping that february can convince me not to run for the hills, and hunker down until the weird passes. i can't really do that, anyway. i live here.

if i were going to have a crush, i'd have the perfect playlist for creating sheepish smiles and thoughtful car rides...and today, that needs to feel like an accomplishment, on multiple levels.

mil besos,
rmg

mil besos,
rmg

wintermusic 2011

so, every season, i make a new playlist. i date it, sort it, file it alphabetically, and listen to it over and over. sometimes, i send people i know and love cd's with the seasonal mixes burned onto them...let me know if you want one.

here's the latest one for winter 2011. these are songs that speak to me, that salve my soul...or save it. these are songs that i laugh and cry to, that i meditate to, that i hear G-d singing along with me in the car. there are explosive harmonies, explicit feelings, and some deep and profound thoughts. there also might be some fart jokes, too. there are covers, and covers of covers; there are brand new songs and songs that were written before my grandparents were born.

you'll know it when you hear it...

happy listening.

across the universe--the beatles
all that i want--the weepies
all the old showstoppers--the new pornographers
am i born to die--tim eriksen
angel of the morning--the pretenders
bird on a wire--johnny cash
birds without wings--david gray
cast no shadow--oasis
diamonds on the soles of her shoes (remastered)--paul simon
a dream is a wish your heart makes--michelle shocked
f**k you--cee lo green
falling slowly (live)--the swell season
forever is tomorrow is today--david gray
gimme shelter--the rolling stones
hard times--eastmountainsouth
heart of gold--korby lenker
helpless--neil young with the band/joni mitchell (last waltz)
hold on--sarah mclachlan
into the mystic--van morrison
jesus was a crossmaker--the hollies
long black veil--the band
long time traveller--the wailin jennies
lover's cross--jake newton
maybe i'm amazed--mark cohn
my father's gun--elton john
one man guy--rufus wainwright
only living boy in new york--mark cohn
racing in the street--bruce sprinsteen and the e street band
revolution--the beatles
sam in any language-- i nine
smokey mountain taxi--adam carroll
something in the air--thunderclap newman
stay with me--the faces
we can work it out--the beatles
the weight--the band (music from big pink)

mil besos,
rmg

...well...that was...different...

sometimes, the strangest events all converge in life, and create these moments that sort of conspire to make me laugh and cry and marvel at the life G-d gives me. friends and neighbours...this year is setting up to be one for the record books, if for no other reason than totally bizarre beginnings.

tuesday morning arrived the way most mornings during cedar season do...sticky eyes, lots of throat clearning, some light coughing, making the bed over the lazy cat that gives me daggers when i get up before a time he considers reasonable, crushing the snooze button as many times as possible before going out into the day, and doing my work. but this tuesday was different. see, when i woke up, there was already a text message on my phone from this guy, who we will refer to as "mr. wow". instead of that drop in the stomach that pressages all good crushes (and some of the bad ones), or that giggly giddy girly feeling i've recently gotten back in touch with, when i saw that i had the message on my phone, i just wanted to throw the phone across the room and have it shatter into a thousand pieces. kind of an extreme reation, right? that's what i thought, too.

so i went on a date with mr. wow on sunday night. we'd known each other for a while, but hadn't seen each other in five years, or so. (**as an aside...the devil incarnate must run the codes at eharmony, because this is the second ghost of crushes past that this stupid website has set me up with, and the second time it was so wrong that i almost called dr. neil clark warren and told him exactly what i thought about his twenty-nine dimentions of compatibility. my ass, sir. MY ASS.**) i think we all know my proclivity for giving people one extra chance to act right. i mean, it's the kind of grace and mercy i know i have to have in my day to day...why not extend it, too...right? except this time, it was just a perfect storm.

i'm not hateful and catty enough to write down all the things that made me want to throw my phone across the room, or tell you about all the red flags and WARNING signals that started wailing at top volume. i'm just going to tell you that i spent an hour with therapy mary, sometimes crying so hard that i couldn't talk, trying to explain that the only things i could feel after less than 48 hours of hanging out twice with mr. wow were anxious and overwhelmed. i literally felt like someone had taken a sharpie and written those words on my body, over and over. the upshot is that the last two years of working my nuts off in therapy are paying huge dividends. instead of spending the day sobbing at my desk (ok, so i cried...like twice, but got my shit together, and for the record, one of my favorite old ladies died tuesday morning, too), having explosive stomach issues, or vomiting like a total nutbar, i did a lot of actual work and was able to find words to use to talk about what i was feeling.

**insert cameron crowe movie reference here*
now, i know we all have to get right with our own awesomeness. i also know we all have to get right with people loving us, even when they love us in ways that are hard to look at, accept, understand, or appreciate. we don't get to dictate what that looks like. i get that. i understand that. this is not that, at all. mr. wow is going to make someone a fantastic lloyd dobbler-esque boyfriend, one day. but i am not diane court. and i don't want to date lloyd dobbler. it's not that i don't think mr. wow is a nice guy, or sweet, or any of those other things. but i was real clear...at about hour five...that things were moving in a very different direction for me. and rather than string someone along, or convince myself that i was wrong, i cut my losses and did what i felt like was the kindest thing to do, and just made it clear that i had gone as far as i was willing to go.
**end of cameron crowe movie reference**

see, i have really spent the last six months doing a lot of talking to G-d. and i've tried to listen a lot, too. i have been going out on (for me) lots of dates. not a single dude has gotten past date number two, and some of the dudes haven't even made it to date one. not all of that has been left up to me...just so you don't think i'm eating men instead of breakfast tacos, these days. i was all frustrated and sitting in the floor, trying to do yoga poses, a couple of weeks before christmas. and in the midst of stretching and thinking and praying and listening, this still, small, gentle voice whispered in my heart, "little girl...you will know it when you see it." and my eyes have been wide open, ever since. and i have been utterly unafraid to act, because i know i am where i am supposed to be, doing what i am supposed to be doing. and this feels awesome.

mil besos,
rmg

retrospective

i was one of those people who went to so see "eat, pray, love" in the theatres, and cried through the whole thing. no, i didn't read the book. but, i probably will...it's on the list of books to buy during my next buying spree at half-price books. ryan and i talked about the movie, as did jackie and i, before i saw it. i knew parts of it were going to be smug. i knew parts of it were going to be trite. i knew parts of it were going to be sweet enough to give me a cavity. but i pluncked down my shekels, and watched it.

i watched it after i woke up from that weird dream i told you about, the one with the guy in the hare krisna robes. i'm serious when i tell you that i started crying during the credits. i am embarassed to admit that. i think the whole world is comfortable with me being a crier, except for me. i hate crying. HATE IT. i don't care that it's a normal response, or that crying actually releases endorphins and chemicals that make you feel better. i don't care that my eyes turn a totally different and kind of awesome color after i've cried. i don't even care that i usually feel better after a good cry. i also feel better after i throw up, when i'm sick. and i hate to throw up worse than i hate to cry. also, i almost always cry when i throw up. double hate.

so, there i was, sitting in a theatre, surrounded by other crying assholes, there with boyfriends (most of whom were probably there under protest, hoping that by going to such a femme movie, they would get a little something-something in return), husbands, sisters, mothers, significant others, etc. the overwhelming majority of the audience were female. and the sniffing noises started about five minutes into the picture.

let me be honest...this movie was pretty smug, on lots of levels. if i were being paid to write a book on self-discovery, i'd probably be pretty pleased with myself, as well. but you guys, there was something so familiar about the story, so reassuring about the questions this woman was asking herself and the universe, so encouraging to see her pray, even though she wasn't sure what to pray for, or to.

tangent:

i read a ton of my old blog posts last week. what a head trip...and some of the comments were hilarious. some of them really irritated me, too. i came across this one comment, on a post i wrote in 2005, from an anonymous poster. they asked me how it felt to be a martyr turned philosopher. that seriously pissed me off. and i'm not sure why. part of it felt true, at the time. part of it still feels true, today. but it hurt my feelings, too. a martyr is not something i've ever wanted or aspired to be, not for anything. and i was seriously offended that someone would imagine that what i was writing was anywhere on par with philosophy. this is just some dumb blog, written by a girl trying to figure out what this life looks like, how it feels, all the way out to the edges. and it's an honest expression of my angst, my excitement, my worldview, my theology and cosmology, my memories, my justifications, my experience. it seemed like a cheap shot. it still seems like a cheap shot. i don't like what that person said. and i certainly don't like how what they said effected me. in the final analysis, i don't consider myself a martyr, and i certainly don't pretend to be a philosopher. i'm a student of this life, nothing more.

back on track:
after the movie was over (talk about a totally predictable ending...wtf?), i cried some more in the car. there was a point in the movie, where the main character talks about words, what words describe things, people, etc. this discussion occurs around a dinner table, with beautiful people eating beautiful food, talking about which word most accurately describes themselves, the cities they know and love, etc. i thought and thought and thought about that. i love words. i love what you can do with words. i love the right words at the right times about the right things. there is nothing better than saying exactly what you want to say about something. nothing.

i spent the rest of the night trying to figure out what word describes me best. we each have a collection of words that would describe us down to the molecules in our bodies. some of the words are nice. no doubt, a few of them aren't too nice, though. but what word describes you, encapsulates the essence of who you are? can you really boil it down to one thing? i turned that over and over and over in my head. for days. weeks. months. last week, my word hit me.

distiller. i distill. that's what i do. all i had to do to find it was go back through and read my blogs, my journals, old letters, notes i make in the margins of books, reflect on conversations, write a couple of new songs, retune all the instruments in the house, clean out the cat-box, and get the hell over my own martyrdom/philosophic b.s. to do it. once i gave myself the right word, so many things made so much more sense. distilling takes a long time. distilling is about extracting the most potent and essential parts of something, so that the resulting substance can be shared and distributed and consumed. distilling is an art and a science. it can be deadly, too. it's a big responsibility, and you have to be fully invested in every step along the way, otherwise everything can be ruined, and no product is produced. there are no insignificant steps. nothing is wasted. i love that.

distiller.

mil besos,
rmg

just hear those sleigh bells...

Well, as the words to my favorite secular holiday song go, "And so this is Christmas…and what have you done?"

Are you ready? Are you freaking out? Are you whining?

When I go visit my brother and his family, the older nephew and I get to go out on our own, and do our thing. Our thing consists of going to the "train store", which to normal people is just a regular big-box toy store, with a scary giraffe as the mascot. I'm sure you know the one I'm talking about. Anyway, the five year old nephew could care less about the other toys in the store…he only has eyes for trains, especially blue ones that are named after certain doubting Disciples. He is obsessed. He's had to be escorted out of the store, several times, by his parents…literally kicking and screaming. This kid LOVES, LURVES, LUUUUHUUUUHUVES, trains. He is, hands down, the easiest person in my family for whom to buy gifts.

I remember the first time we went to the train store, on our own, to pick out a new train. My brother pulled me aside and told me to call him if things got ugly. I looked at him like he'd gone crazy…and just nodded my head, remembering that small children are highly volatile and toys to kids are like chum in the water to sharks. I started to feel like I might not want to do this thing, after all. But I had promised. And I refuse to break promises, especially not to small children who look like me.

The nephew actually gave me directions to the store, from his backseat. As I pulled in, parked, and turned off the car, I turned around to look at the blue-eyed cherub. "Bilbo, we are going to go shop for a new train, buddy. I want you to remember something. We are going to share at the play table. And when it's time to leave, we are not going to whine or freak out. Ok? Now, what are we going to remember? " "We are gonna sare at the pway table. And we ah NOT going to whine or fweak out." And so, we got out of the car, and ventured into the gaping maw of the toy store. I felt like I might throw up.

Thirty minutes later, we came out of the store, all smiles, with our new "twain", and no tears. I was amazed. I felt like I must be the kid-whisperer, or something. As the nephew exclaimed over his present in the back seat, telling the new twain about all the other twain fwiends back da the house, I realized something. I was not magic. No, the success of the trip had to do with factors that were beyond my child-charming (bribery). We prepared ourselves for the trip. We knew what we were going to get. We were realistic about what the trip might look like. We hoped for the best, and were willing to be surprised by success.

That's nothing like what Christmas and present buying is like for most of us. At all. We do a lot of freaking out. We do a lot of whining. We forget to be realistic about our expectations for giving and receiving. And sometimes, on our not-so-great days, we have to be lead kicking and screaming away from the experience that should be nothing short of awesome. We are not willing to be surprised, and failure is an excuse for another glass of egg-nog or a bloody Mary.

The nephew and I have made several subsequent visits back to the twain store. There have been no fweak outs, no whining, no kicking and scweaming. There have been good conversations in the car, many questions asked and answered, and the bond between us grows stronger and stronger. I wonder what it would look like if you and I applied the principles of the twain store to Christmas, to time with our families, to giving and receiving gifts? I bet Christmas would be less whiny and freaky for all of us.

My prayer is that you and your families and your friends share a marvelous Advent and Christmas season, without whining or freak –outs, without fights over the train table, and with the full and incredible knowledge that a very small person, born very long ago, loves you, saves you, is coming back for you, and thinks you are the most wonderful gift in the world.

Mistletoe Kisses, and Candy Cane Wishes...

mil besos,

rmg

eureka...

i was driving to the old lady high rise, like i do every other wednesday, to take them the HoCo, thinking about the rant i posted this morning, and convincing myself not to pull it down. i self-edit a lot, publically and privately. the things i don't say about how i'm feeling or what i'm thinking might suprise you, sometimes. then again, when i think about the handful of people who actually read this mess, i realize that none of this really ever suprises you. in fact, there are one or two of you who probably know what i'm going to write about before i actually write it. scary, but true.

anyway, on my way to the HoCo, i realized that the antsy feeling, this feeling of not knowing what the deuce is happening, all the angst and the "what does it all mean" boils down to one thing. i've never been anywhere for this long, in my entire adult life. and it scares the shit out of me. four years...a whole presidential term...four years is substantive. four years is not accidental or incidental. four years is a chunk of serious time. i've never done this before. and while it's nice to feel settled...it's also scary to feel this way. there are so many things i still want to do and see and experience. there are days when i worry that being in one place too long will numb me, will lull me into submission and complacency, will quiet the fire inside my head and heart. and the biggest question of all...when will the bottom fall out, the wheels come off, the shit hit the fan? i'm not saying that the worst always happens, i'm just saying that the pattern in my life is such that i have a hard time with relaxing into the salad days, the days of grace...and i know that is something i will struggle with, trusting G-d in the midst of the good days, not holding so tightly to the good of the now that i squeeze the life right out of it.

it was hard to maintain composure in the car today, on my way to see the old gals. i really just wanted to go back to my office, shut the door, and cry. seriously you guys, i know some of this is stage of life stuff, but the other part of it is hormones. pure and simple. i used to think i was going crazy, and then i started charting my moods, crying jags, etc. it all equated to...you guessed it...the flight of the cardinal. it's hard to argue with the red ink on the calendar. and it's hard to deal with between ten and seven days a month of being pretty sure that the whole world hates you and is conspiring to undo everything in your entire life. and that's why i went on anti-depressants for six months two years ago. the meds did the trick. the sharp edges were gone, i didn't cry on the way home from work, or on the way to work, or at my desk, or in the shower, or at stupid commercials, or at cheesey movies, or over really cute little fat kids in chapel. but i didn't really laugh out loud at silly things, either. after about four months, the absence of the sharp edges started to bother me. so, with the agreement of my therapist, i stopped taking them. i knew that i would have to be careful about that segment of the month when things shift, for me. but the sharp edges were important for me to feel. and they feel pretty sharp, right now. i know this will pass, and in four or five days, i'll feel markedly better. i just hate when life things collide with body things, because sometimes, it's hard to know what's incidental and what needs to be addressed.

there are days when i feel like 32 is much older than i would like to be, right now. there are also days when 32 feels very young and inexperienced. there are days when it feels really heavy to be this age, and not have a family established. i can practically hear my eggs getting older. and it's all well and good for people to tell you not to worry, that G-d has a plan, that the more you think about something, the less you trust G-d to do the work, etc. and that's fine. but this is my life. this is my day to day. and sometimes, that sound of those eggs aging is the loudest sound in the universe. now, go ahead and judge me inside your head. i know, i know, i know. this is something i am dealing with in my prayer life and in my time with my therapist. and now, the whole world knows, or at least the interwebs do.

i was in love with a self-confessed trainwreck of a guy for five years. that's a long time, too. and no matter what i tried to be, or do, or sing, or say, i would never add up to what he wanted. and so, on a no-name day in the middle of the summer, i stopped trying. i stopped dead in my tracks, dug my heels in, and willed myself to just lay down on the floor of my deepest self, and just stopped. i realized, a month ago, when i was driving through falfurrias, on my 32nd birthday, that i didn't love him any more, at least not like i had done. i was finished with that part. i couldn't tell you, in the corresponding tears that fell for about twenty minutes, whether i was crying from relief or sadness. i supposed in the final analysis why we cry isn't nearly as important as what we cry over. it all amounts to the same thing, i suppose.

remember when you were losing your baby teeth, how you would feel around with your tongue to see if the new tooth was growing in yet, or how close it was to being at gum level? i keep doing that emotionally, checking that spot where he used to live, to see if anything is new there.i think i finally learned that you can't out-tomato ketchup. i thought getting out from under that feeling would be freeing, and it has been. but G-d, sometimes life comes knocking, and the absolute wrong song comes on, and i have to look into the void, and scream out that i'm not afraid of it.

mil besos,
rmg

have mercy...

ragweed is making me a lunatic. between the ragweed and the hormone swing that comes once a month, this week is about to kill me. seriously. i've cried four times this week, twice over the same scene in a movie. and yesterday, i came home from work early to dose myself with benedryl and tried to sleep off this allergy attack. i think i was about 45% effective.

i feel like someone transfused a bag of molasses into my bloodstream...all slow and draggy. it's miserable. i know i need to be eating better and working out like i did over the summer. i gained back ten of the thirty five i had dropped...not happy, not happy about that at all. i feel stuck, guys. i mean, i hope that i'm not. but i feel that way. like i'm at a dead-end, and can't for the life of me figure out how to turn around, or back out, or climb over the wall. if i felt better, i'd probably make up some bullshit about how i really feel like this is a great moment in my life, in my development as a grown up, blah blah blah. really, what i really want, is just to be bailed out, swooped up, and rescued. i hate how absolutely true and naked that last statement feels and looks.

it's a really super whiney kind of wednesday. and i am wallowing in the whine, ya'll.

did you know that the average person needs between 10 and 12 personal interactions a day to feel connected to the world around them? it's true. now go give someone a hug.

mil besos,
rmg

several small items...

i was form-tackled by a chubby four-year old, intent on giving me a bear-hug, yesterday. it was awesome. however, my glasses were broken harry potter-style, and i can't find my wand to save my life. i do have to say that being bear-hugged by a chubby four-year old is probably one of the top five ways one can break one's glasses.

i broke my right baby toe, yesterday. i caught it on the edge of a file cabinet, as i was leaving the office for the day. it was this blinding white light of pain that ran up my leg, and back down, and settled in my metatarsals. y'all...it hurt to have a sheet on my foot. of course, this is around the 950th time i've broken this baby toe, so i'm sure this is normal.

i'm turning 32 in four days. i'm excited. and maybe 2% scared. i'm not sure of what i'm scared, but i am, just a little bit. i think being 31 has been so pivotal, that i've done so much work and learned so much this year...i just don't want to lose any ground. i want to do this life well, and to keep feeling the good feelings i've felt about myself in the last year.

i watched a movie about dylan thomas this weekend, once straight through, and once with the commentary track and subtitles on. if i could send him a lettter, back in time, i would tell him that every woman wants to believe that every poem is about her, and some women will be utterly convinced that all the poems are about her, even if none of them are. such is the nature of women. there is a set of fine lines between the maiden, the mother, and the crone...magical and sacramental, and if the poet looks and listens carefully, the poet will know when he has crossed any of those lines. poets love dichotomy...the lines between the whore and the madonna, the kite and the rock, the mountains and the sea. the lines are crooked, switchbacked, as long as the nile, and as volitile as the rubicon, and to the untrained eye, the poet will seem to be a shambling and drunken bufoon as he wends his way along the winding lines of his muses. because there is always more than one muse. or, if one believes bob dylan, there's only one muse, with a thousand faces.

how the poet walks those lines speaks volumes, and often writes them, as well. and sometimes, the walking ceases altogether, and the poet comes crawling on hands and knees, looking to the untrained eye like a mendicant with an empty bowl. the poet knows that whether he seeks suckle at the breast of his mother or his lover, a woman will always be the one to feed him, kindle a fire, wrap him up safe, and fill him with something good. at least, such is the case with the poets i know.

mil besos,
rmg

lay off me, you guys...i was starving...

i had an epic nap on saturday, and i'm not overstating the point to refer to this nap as a game-changer. in fact, i'd be hard pressed to simply refer to this particular incident of day-time sleep as simply a nap. this little three hour jaunt was somewhere between a coma and a revelatory experience. waking up felt like i'd been hit inthe back of the head with a baseball bat by the sandman, who may or may not have been taking the same kind of performance enhancing drugs favored by the likes of barry bonds or mark maguire. all of which is to say that i woke up drenched in sweat, with my comforter in tangled disarray around my legs and feet, sprawled on my back with my mouth wide open, and trying like hell to figure out what was real and what was dream.

i had to lay there for a little while after i woke up, because what i dreamed was so bizarre and strange that i felt compelled to try and pick out what meaning might have been there. i know that sounds weird, because when i tell you what the contents of the dream were, you're really going to think i've finally just gone totally crackers. but something serious and big and looming and lovely and difficult seemed to be buried inside the folds of this dream. i sent a text out to some friends, playing the dream off like a joke. but it was real, it was serious. it was a gamechanger. and sure, it was also just a dream: one of those subconscious brain dumps that happen when the recycle bin in your brain gets too full to see one more four a.m. infomercial for a steamer/rotisserie/fat-reducing/spacesaving piece of shit you just can't live without.

so, here's the dream...

i go to have a mani/pedi, which is something i do in real life about once a quarter. the place i go is really nice, and has kind of an easter feel to it--lots of bamboo, little teak-wood figures, low tables, no chairs, and all the treatment rooms have wall-length transoms over the doors. lots of detail, right? i was blown away at how well decorated this joint was, considering that i also recognized it as a chinese food place i used to frequent in austin. in my dreamy way, i was all excited..."ooo, they turned "snow pea" into a nail place! i wonder if i can still get an egg roll?"... i meet with a receptionist, who looked shockingly like ben stiller's real-life mom, who informed me that the place had gone up on their prices, and i probably would want to look at their menu of services. so, i look at the menu, select my treatments, and am shown to a room.

in the room sits this little skinny dude, who i know as the older brother of kenny powers, from the hbo series "eastbound and down". as an aside: that show is freaking hilarious. i can't stop watching it, and it's only six episodes long. however, i don't immediately recognize that he's that dude. i was mostly just suprised that a skinny white guy was about to do my nails, and the skinny guys that usually do my nails are most frequently vietnamese, or aren't guys, at all. so, he leaves the room to change clothes, which doesn't strike me as odd, at all. and then, i realize that earl and the crab-man from "my name is earl" are in the corner of the room, on a tatami mat, with clip-boards in their hands.

now, i never really watched a whole lot of "my name is earl", but when i did, i thought the show was pretty funny. i think jason lee is hilarious, and have liked him since "mallrats". they come over and start asking me all these questions about my medical history, where i live, etc. i start spilling my information with no problem, at all. i remember thinking, "should i really be telling earl and the crabman all this information? isn't this how your identity gets stolen?" which was followed quickly by the thought that they seemed like nice guys, and i felt very very very safe, for some odd reason. i finished up with earl and the crabman, and they seemed very satisfied with whatever answers i gave them, and they retired back onto their mat, which they had pulled to within about two feet of where i'd been told to sit on the floor.

about this time, the skinny guy who is going to be doing my nails comes back into the room...dressed as a hare krishna. i'm just taking this in stride, y'all. it never even phased me. and he's telling me that we're going to do some yoga poses before he starts working on my feet and hands. so we do some yoga, and earl and the crabman are just hanging out, making notes on their clip-boards, and occasionally giving me corrections on poses. and then, something totally strange and mystical happens.

this skinny guy in his saffron colored robes scootches all the way across the floor, almost into my lap, and i start backing up because i came here to get my toes done, not to be molested by a monk in full drag. all of a sudden, this guy grabs my head very gently, and kisses me behind my right ear...for like fifteen minutes. not making out, not anything overtly sexy or anything. just lays this lovely, warm, intense smooch behind my ear, right on the bony protrustion that i rub when i am anxious or upset. and then, i got the biggest hug i've ever had in my life. i felt like i was being embraced from the top of my head to the bottoms of my feet by this strange man, while earl and the crab man continued their notetaking. periodically, i would struggle or shift and think that we were done with this pose, because seriously...how long can you sit hugging some odd little man in saffron robes while he's kissing you behind your ear, and all you came in for was a mani-pedi and an egg roll? and every time i go to pull away, inside my head i can hear this voice just saying, "rachel...breathe...relax...be here." and i did. and i did. and i was there. it was real, and for the first time in ages, i didn't feel alone or lonely.

at some point, and i'm not sure when, i went from the hug with the monk to my car, which wasn't my real car, and i'm trying to figure out how to read the monk's business card, and trying to figure out if i paid my check, and if really had to pay for the services rendered because i realized that i still didn't have painted nails. and right about the time i was coming back to my house, which wasn't my house, and my dog, who isn't really a dog, and was trying to figure out how to send the monk a text message saying "thank you", i woke myself up.

i honestly didn't know whether to laugh or cry upon waking, and i still don't. all i know is that i had a very strange dream. i think i learned a couple of things, though. give everyone you can a hug, even if you have to ask for permission. we forget the power and profundity of the human touch, and in our loneliest places, those little hugs, pats, kisses, whatever make those moments bearable. and i also learned that G-d comes to you in the strangest of ways, at the strangest of times, in the oddest of garbs to grab you and tell you that you are loved and loved and loved and loved, and it never runs out.

mil besos,
rmg

an open letter to monday

dear monday,

some times, you suck, dude. i mean, seriously. you are sometimes a real buzzkill. especially when the weather is not what i want it to be like, or my hair flips out weird on one side and i don't have time to flat iron it because i hit the snooze bar two extra times, or when regis and kelly have a rerun, or i didn't get all the way to sleep good and proper until like three because it's so effing hot and my room is on the second story and has a wall full of west-facing sliding glass door that i'm too lazy to make drapes for, or because i know i have to eat my oatmeal because chikfila will make me a fatass and the oatmeal is already paid for, or because i think txdot has it in for everyone in my neighborhood because the road construction is ruining my morning commute and i think i'll never have a real exit unless i move, and npr is sometimes depressing as shit on mondays, and the top forty music station doesn't play music that i feel is relevant to my life and sometimes i think that's a good thing and sometimes i think it's totally terrible, and the fried avocado with shrimp was a real disappointment for lunch today, and i probably gave communion to a little old lady for the last time (again, shit man...i know, it's part of the job...but still, i mean, really...it shouldn't ever get easy), and got all hot and sweaty on my way to therapy. sometimes i think you exist on the calendar just to break me.

and sometimes, monday, you know, sometimes, you're also kind of great. because i had a great session, today and talked about all sorts of stuff i've seen and done and felt and thought over the last six weeks, and even though i didn't talk about everything i could have i still feel like i made progress and managed not to go crazy, and i ate fruit for dinner after i did yoga for two hours and held this really challenging pose for three minutes and i felt like a freaking rock star, and the whole time i was doing the second set of poses i was praying praying praying and just being thankful to this amazing G-d for creation and my place in it, and pretty soon i'm taking a long hot bath and reading my favorite book and going to bed. monday, i gotta say, you came through. sometimes i think you exist on the calendar just to break me...into something that can hold more than it did before it was broken.

mil besos,
rmg

goodnight, moon

to take a quote from the apostle paul totally out of context, reverse the intent, and paraphrase, i will simply say that it is a holy experience to fall into the hands of a living G-d.

three hours ago, i was in a nicu room baptizing a baby born at 24 weeks, four days. her name is hope rose. three years ago, her mother had attended church in my parish, and i had given her a ride home one afternoon, after church. after she delivered her daughter at home, around 7am, and was taken to the hospital, stabilized, seen to, etc., she told the chaplain to call us. i got the call RIGHT, and i mean RIGHT as i was exiting onto my street, to come home and pack for my trip to alabama. i was within spitting distance of taking my shoes off, washing my face, doing some yoga, and packing. i had ten thousand things on my mental to do list. i'd had a very productive day at work, but nothing nuts. this, oh boy, man...this was NUTS.

i won't go into detail about specifics, because they aren't really important, and they aren't mine to share. but i can tell you that this little girl and her mother have a long road in front of them, seperately and together.

i'd never seen any person that small, in my life. my nephew addison is growing inside my sister-in-law right this second, and he's a whole week older than this little girl. she weighs 650 grams. my hand looked so giant on her chest. not even my hand, just my finger, inside a blue surgical glove, dripping sterile water on her chest, trying not to shake and making every effor to touch her as lightly as i could, so her skin wouldn't tear. she looked so small. so fragile. i don't even know what the whole top of her face looks like. G-d does. and G-d knows all the things about her that are important and worth knowing. i know tonight, i got to be the one, on behalf all G-d's children, to invite her into a new kind of life. i know G-d had already invited her, and i was just the one saying the words. but it was an experience, a pause, an already-not-yet, and holy moment. i seriously get a little wobbly just thinking about it, now.

i know that she, like all of the rest of us, will live just as long as she is supposed to, and not one minute longer. i keep wishing for this perfect life for her...something out of a novel or a lifetime, television for women drama, because this is TOTALLY THEIR STORY LINE, DUDE. and i'm writing it in my head...no long term health problems, no developmental delays, obscenely high i.q., well adjusted, prom queen, ivy league, faboulous at whatever she decides to do with her life, wife, mother, vestry member, grandmother, tomato grower... mostly, i think, at the bottom of it, i hope she gets to grow up and have a satisfying life, to meet the people of G-d, to see the world around her, to smell the rain, and skin her knees, to make friends, to have koolaide mustaches, to eat an oreo, to learn how to sing "Jesus Loves Me", to do all the things i think little kids and grown up should learn to do. she rests in the mercy of G-d, who knew and her and made her and has a plan for her that is more than even i could ask or imagine.

in your quiet time, whether it's in prayer or yoga or traffic, please remember hope rose, and ask G-d to bless her. mil gras.

mil besos,
rmg

yeah, so...

writing about my dad feels like a lot of different things, some of them are good, some of them are bad, and some of them are really hard. one thing i don't want, from anyone, any time i write about him, is sympathy. i hate that. never feel sorry for us, for me, for him, for the family. everyone gets dealt a rough hand in life, at some juncture, and no one gets to choose what their rough hand is. you just play your cards with grace and dignity. but no pity, please.

i missed him yesterday. i missed him all day long. i can hear him so clearly, on most days. sometimes, i can smell him. sometimes, he is so close, i feel like if i turned around fast enough, i could catch a glimpse of him. there is a part of me, a little girl part of me, that is sure he lives in the moon, and can hear me when i talk out loud to him. i know that's bizarre and ritualistic, and i should know better, blah blah blah, but i do it anyway. he wasn't a perfecet father. but he was mine. i have this list of questions i would just love to have answers to, but, as with so many questions i have for my father, for G-d, for the universe, those are not for this life.

i am proud to be his child, every single day. i hope i make him proud. i could care less about the big questions, any more. i really just crave the comfort, the little piddly things like "goodnight" and "good morning" and " call us when you get there". it's silly, and it's so self-indulgent to weep over them. but it happens, nonetheless.

mil besos,
rmg

song for sarah nan

she was my great-grandmother's last child, and the only one of those eight children to have been born in a hospital. she died yesterday. her name was sarah nan, but when i was little, i thought it was "sarah and anne". of course, i misheard a lot of things when i was little, and was usually too shy to ask for clarification, so i didn't realize her middle name was actually "nan" until i was in my late teens, and looking through photos. i ran across one with "nan" writeen across the back, but it looked just like aunt sarah. i was so confused that i took the photo to my grandmother, who said it was, in fact, aunt sarah, but they'd just written "nan" on the back, since it was her middle name. suddenly, "sarah and anne" made a lot more sense to me. crazy, right?

i wasn't particularly close to my great-aunt sarah, but not especially distant, either. she was a wife, a mother, a grandmother, a sister, an aunt, a daughter, and a friend. she saw elvis presley and jerry lee lewis in a louisiana hayride show at cherry springs dance hall, one night. when she was a teenager, she would ride my uncle's horse, old girl, between the house and the garage at breakneck speeds that apparently would scare the pants off my great-grandmother. by the time i knew her, my aunt sarah was much tamer. in fact, when i first heard that story, about five years ago, i remember looking at my aunt sue (her older sister), and saying "aunt sarah?? sarah sessom did that?" aunt sue got a kick of how suprised i was. time tamed sarah nan in several ways, and none of them were particularly kind, i don't think.

she married the boy that took her to see elvis and jerry lee. and he died in a car wreck not too long after that. she almost died in the same wreck. they didn't have any children. some years later, she married my uncle clayton, who was from a little town, too. they lived in texarkana for all of my life, and raised two girls. we saw them a couple of times a year, mostly at holidays. aunt sarah's birthday was july 4th, and that was one of the holidays we'd usually see them.

when i look at her through my child's eyes, i remember her laughing, or telling stories. i remember that she always had the most fantastically puffy hair. i didn't realize until i was much older that the puffy hair served to cover up scars from the carwreck. i remember the way her eyes would twinkle when she would tease, or tell a joke that was a little bit naughty. i remember the way she would make smoking a cigarette look like the most glamourous and fun thing you could ever do. i remember her hands, and the way that she favored the small, slim watches that my grandmother wore, too. she looked so much like my great-grandmother the last time i saw her. i can't remember a single conversation that we ever had just between the two of us, and i can't tell you what i thought we would have talked about, ever. but she was part of the fabric of my family, and her face is indeliblely marked on the history of who we all are, together.

when i look at sarah through my adult eyes, i see so many things that i wish could have been different for her, for all of us, really. but none of that matters, now. because yesterday, everything became different. sarah now knows as she is fully known, and the fears and percieved failures, the pain and the unanswerable questions were all lifted in a moment of grace that for her, will stretch out into eternity. and one day, we will all be together again, perfected and known and whole in houses made just for us by God and Jesus. that's amazing to me, and such a comfort to know. God bless Sarah Nan. God bless us all.

mil besos,
rmg

perspective

this time last year, i was pretty strung out. i would wake up crying, i would go to sleep crying. dreams were all cobwebby and surreal, and i felt so trapped in my life, and so very alone. this june feels so very starkly different. i wake up ready for the day. i go to sleep tired, but fulfilled. my dreams...well, they seem to be variations on a theme, but they don't scare me, and usually don't make me cry. i feel like this life is something to be celebrated and fully lived, even on days when i don't quite know what that means. and while i am alone much of the time, the weight of the aloneness feels substantive, but not weighty.

i was doing yoga the other day, with my eyes closed, being aware of my breath, focusing my intentions, being present, and in my mind's eye, i could just see Jesus on a yoga mat, right across from me, in full lotus, with a wide grin on His face, telling me that this was the absolute right thing for me at that moment. last week, one of my little old ladies told me "honey, you are in your prime." i woke up in north carolina on monday morning, to the six-toothed grin of a gorgeous eight month old, with her arms held out to me, and in the picture that her momma snapped of us, i saw the woman i want to be, and am in the process of becoming. yes, i'll admit that i loved seeing a picture of myself with a baby in my arms. but in that shot, i looked just how i felt in that moment...enough, maybe even beautiful, happy and contented. it's a strange thing to wake up to the person you are, to stretch out into that, and feel where the corners and edges are, and to feel like it's a wonderful, familiar, and new place to be. i had no idea this is what this would feel like, and i want it to last. so i'm trying to approach it with open hands, and not hold it so tight i squeeze the life out of it. and at the bottom of all of this, i have this intense feeling of gratitude. "thank you" seems like it's too small to express my emotion. and so, i find myself praying at the oddest of times, just letting G-d know how this feels, how happy i am, how aware i've become, and that i am willing to do and go and be and see whatever is next, because that's what it's about.

to realize the unconditionality of love, and of Love is huge. it's so big that sometimes, i just have to weep. to lay down any and all hope, and to walk away from hope, and just love is huge. love without expectation or reservation or reciprocity, but love because you can't help but feel it, from head to toe, inside and outside, that's where i am, that's where i live. to create real and lasting relationships, to continue to carve family out of friends, and to make friends with my family, to open my arms and eyes and heart to the full expression of G-d's love and intent for me and the universe is no small thing. it's sometimes a little scary, but so are rollercoasters, and they almost always are thrilling and wonderful, and on this ride, i'm never worried about the operator falling asleep at the switch. it doesn't have to make sense to me, because it was never about me, anyway. i think that's pretty great.

mil besos,
rmg

wild kingdom

there's a mockingbird that lives in one of the date palms in the front of my condo. i've watched this bird for weeks, and really fell in love the day it impersonated a frog, trying to throw one of the neighborhood cats off it's scent. smart bird, that one. i think about her, nested in the palm, and think about myself, and how it feels to be nested in the palm of someone's hand. i am profoundly grateful for that thought.

may is almost over. thanks be to God.

mil besos,
rmg

ordinary time

the church nerds out there will point out that the season of ordinary time doesn't start until may 23rd. to the church nerds out there, i offer my deepest, most sincere apologies, and best wishes for you to get the hell over it.

ordinary...that word conjures up a lot of feelings inside of me, lately. it's a dangerous kind of word, a middle word, like "better" or phrases like "on the other hand". you have to be careful with words like "ordinary". we are all painfully ordinary in our extrordinary ways. each of us is a bright and shining thing, andare dulled by the lustre of the other. and while what i bring to the relationship table may seem like something rare and unexpected, i can assure you that it feels painfully normal and utterly ordinary to me.

case in point: i am never suprised. i am unflappable. it's damn near impossible to shock me. seriously, i'm not making this up. i say this without a single trace of pride. because, seriously, once people know that about you, it's kind of like open season. and that's ok, and i'm happy to turn this bizarre talent into something that's helpful to people. i mean, it's not like it's some parlor trick i've worked to perfection over the last decade. it's just how things are. i mean, the shocks i incurred as a teenager and young adult, the things i heard and saw, have made it virtually impossible to knock me off my stride. redemptive experiences find us in the oddest of moments. it's just this really totally ordinary thing in my life, not altogether different from the trick i can do where i fit 38 whole grapes in my mouth, at one time.

i've heard and seen some things. the echos and prints of terminal illness and drug addiction, of watching my family spin and struggle, and find it's footing, again...those echos make it almost easy to hear everything that has come after it. and those echos make it easier to carry the things people leave with me, when they tell me their stories. in this life, my lesson is to carry stories, to hold them, to remember them, to protect the sanctity of the stories i get to hear. i didn't understand that about myself until i was 27 or 28...but i understand it, now. and even though some of those stories find their way to me in the most unusual of ways, they are, at the bottom, ordinary stories of ordinary lives. people are just people, and shit happens.

i love stories, even the sad and hard ones. once i've heard someone's story, or part of it (because who ever really knows the whole story of someone, other than G-d?) my perceptions of them rarely change. people are who they are, the details notwithstanding. G-d put something special, unique, beautiful, magic, and world-changing in each and every single one of us, and that can never be taken away, reassigned, or given up. we are born so extraordinarily ordinary. and all the ancilliary things that happen to us along the way shape us, for sure, but for most of us (clearly exempting shit i don't understand at all, like serial killers...or televangelists...), the changes and chances and little lives and deaths inside our big life, they can't touch the absolute beauty that G-d puts inside each of us, nourishes with the milk of human kindness, and the strange and awesome forces of grace and mercy.

the native americans (total badasses...navajo rugs are my new favorite analogy...) used spirals in their sacred art. the entoptic shapes you see behind your eyes, when you close them, or press them tightly, are sometimes spirals, too (and hatchmarks, etc). this life, this ordinary life, sits on a spiral. we will learn the same lesson, over and over, because that's the lesson we have to learn, the lesson G-d asked us to learn as we were put together inside of our mothers' bodies, a lesson about our brokenness, our wholeness, how to tell stories, how to hear them, when to love more deeply, and when to walk away. it looks different for everyone, but it's all the same ordinary lesson. and that's pretty wonderful, i think.

mil besos,
rmg