Category: Personal philosophy

Blessing the Hearth

Celebrating Women’s History Month!

The hearth was the center of the home.

A couple of years ago (pre-pandemic, when one still casually opened the front door to an unanticipated knock or ring of the doorbell by a stranger), I was accosted by a salesperson attempting to convince me to sign up for home insect control. Now, I’m not the sort of woman to simply slam the door in the face of some hapless huckster. I know that door-to-door sales work is a thankless job. So I usually allow them to get in a few (very few) words first before saying the obligatory, “I’m really not interested” and firmly shutting my front door.

But I did have a bit of trouble controlling my mirth when this young man gestured to the porch overhang, talking about all the spiderwebs that gathered at rarely-used front doors as family came and went through their attached garages. He pointed directly to the corners where such webs would be expected to lurk.

There were none. I mean NONE. Nope, those corners were free of spiderwebs, wasps nests, cobwebs, or cottonwood drifts from the blooming trees. It sort of put paid to his little demonstration. I grinned only a little as I told him I wasn’t interested and closed my front door on his bewildered face.

The only time I’d had greater enjoyment from a front porch peddler was the spring afternoon near Easter, when I’d opened the door to a proselytizer trying to drum up customers for a local church. He invited me to join with them on Easter Sunday to “celebrate Jesus’ death”. (Yes, he actually said that! I could not make this stuff up.) Now, it’s been a long while since I practiced organized religion, but even in my dim and distant memories of such Easter services lay the notion that we were joining to celebrate Jesus’ resurrection. For this particular porch peddler occasion, I did not even attempt to stifle my astounded chuckles. But I digress….

You see, there were no webs or cottonwood or nests, or indeed, any detritus of any sort on my tiny front porch or its rafters because I regularly practice blessing the entryway to my home. Stepping out armed with a broom, I sweep away anything on or above or around my porch and walkway while repeating the words, “Bless this home and all who dwell therein. This home is surrounded, enfolded, protected, and watched over by the Divine. Bless this home and all who enter here.”

Performing this personal ceremony, I feel empowered. With each stroke of the bristles, I claim the protection of the Divinity in which I believe. The exterior of my house is both cleansed and wrapped in a mantle of security; warded and protected; cocooned within a shelter of psychic defense that I create as I move from my front porch to my back patio, sweeping and safeguarding both entryways.

There was a time when such household protection rituals were common, especially when every home was both lit and warmed by a fire. The hearth was the center of the home; the place where family gathered for warmth, and where women worked to cook the meals or to sit nearest the light to sew and weave. To bless the hearth was to bless the home, and was the exclusive province of women. For centuries women, denied the right to be priests or ministers, or to even participate in any meaningful way in many, most, religions–those women were, nonetheless, the hearthkeepers; the ones who genuinely “kept the home fires burning”. Women swept away the ashes and laid the fresh fires upon their hearths and kindled the logs. Women spoke their blessings over the flames, weaving a circle of protection about their homes and loved ones; blessings woven of love and belief, and as sturdy as any cloth upon their looms. They swept their front steps and dooryards, presenting a clear path for all who came and went. They polished the brass of door handles to a shining surface, reflecting the faces of those who visited.

And so, sweeping my own path and entryway and porch roof beams, clearing the ashes from my wood-burning fireplace before laying a fresh fire to be kindled on another cold night, I feel the shades and spirits of those centuries of women who came before me. I am following, not in their footsteps, but in the path of their work worn hands, as I perform the same rituals they once did. Performing these homely rituals, I am translated, shifting from my merely human form to become the daughter of all those who went before me, themselves Daughters of Demeter, goddess of hearth and home; tenderly weaving words of beneficent protection about my dwelling, while envisioning all those I love cocooned within the warmth and undying fire of my love.

This post originally appeared on December 15, 2021. If you enjoyed it, you might also find other essays from that year to your taste. You can locate them in the Archives by scrolling down.

“We” Are NOT Pregnant!

Celebrating Women’s History Month!

If “we” are pregnant, then how come he’s not losing his figure? Why is he not throwing up?

I just heard, for the umpteenth time, the statement, “We’re pregnant!” I gnashed my teeth. I wanted to scream.

WE are not pregnant. SHE is pregnant. HE is expecting. THEY are going to have a baby. She is a pregnant mother-to-be. He is an expectant father.

I am reminded of an old episode of Bewitched—the one in which Darrin claimed to know everything Samantha was experiencing in her first pregnancy. Endora took great offense to his remark (well, when didn’t she take great offense to anything Darrin said?) and decided to place a spell on him so that he would, actually, physically, experience what Samantha was going through.

I think of that episode every time I hear the misbegotten phrase, “We’re pregnant”, and heartily wish that there existed an army of Endoras with no job except that of zapping fathers-to-be with just such a spell.

If “we” are pregnant, then how come he’s not losing his figure? Being awakened throughout the night by a kicking fetus? Why is he not throwing up? Unable to roll over in bed or sleep on his stomach? Why is he not having to purchase a new wardrobe to accommodate his increasing abdomen? Why are his feet not swelling to three times their former size (and, by the way, never quite returning to their pre-pregnancy proportions, necessitating a farewell to many a beloved pair of shoes). Why are his back and pelvis not in agony as they struggle to carry the extra 40 or so pounds packed onto his abdomen? Why is he not spending hours in painful labor, or having a doctor’s whole hand shoved up his inner parts to check dilation?

While I understand the concept of wanting one’s partner to share in the wondrous creation of a new human life which is occurring, to be appreciated for a (minor) role in having begun that new life, the whole phrase, “We are pregnant” seems to me just one more instance of patriarchal males trying to lay unwonted claim to a whole lot more than their fair share. Already, most women still relinquish their names, and therefore a part of their personal identity, upon marriage. Their children, even their female children, generally bear the last name of their presumed male parent. (And, let’s talk turkey here: Guys, short of a DNA test, you are always the presumed male parent.)

But, for the love of heaven, do men also have to lay claim to pregnancy, too? And, if they do, should they not have to actually experience labor and birth? Should some tech wiz female not be inventing a sci-fi apparatus that would allow a “We’re pregnant” partner to share in each and every labor pain for eight or ten or twenty hours? To know the exquisitely unpleasant experience of pushing an object the size of a football out of an opening the size of a golf ball? To be torn from the front opening to the back and then stitched together again? Or perhaps males should be hooked up to that sci-fi machine following an emergency C-section, so that they know what it is to have been sliced and diced, had multiple organs moved out of the way, and then to be unable to fold in the middle: to have to clamber out of bed by rolling off the side, kneeling and then pushing oneself up by elbows on the mattress; then to stumble through the house with a gaping wound from hip to hip, and all in an attempt to care for a sobbing, soggy newborn.

No, no matter how popular and fashionable the phrase, I simply cannot reconcile myself to the utterly ridiculous statement, “We are pregnant”, for “we” are not. She is a pregnant; a mother-to-be, someone undergoing the rigors of creating a new human life. He may, perhaps, be a supportive husband or partner (or not), but he is not physically pregnant. Like clueless Darrin, he is physiologically incapable of undergoing or even psychologically comprehending her experience. He is an expectant father. And that’s simply all there is to it.

This post originally appeared on August 10, 2018, and, being a very opinionated person, my feelings about the phrase haven’t changed a bit!  If anything, they are more adamant.

Yes, Ma’am! Yes, Sir!

Celebrating Women’s History Month!

How could this happen?!

Oh, for the love of heaven, God, and little green apples. Yet one more time, while recently reading a book with a female, first-person protagonist, I was subjected to the main character’s whining, moaning, and kvetching about being addressed as “Ma’am”. Oh, the horror of it! How could this happen? Was she really THAT old? How is it that the person speaking to her could not recognize her youth, her with-it attitude and trendy, modish clothes, hairstyle and makeup? How could they possibly address her by courteously using a term of respect?

It was one of those moments when I wished that I were not reading on my Kindle, but on a plain, old-fashioned hardback book. There is very little satisfaction in merely clicking off a Kindle. I always derived far more gratification from slapping shut the covers of an irritating book; hardbacks were even better than paperbacks. The same is true of ending an unsatisfactory conversation on a cell phone. It was a thousand times better when one could slam a receiver into a cradle on a house phone. Stabbing the end call button just doesn’t suffice. (Oops! Getting off the track here!)

Sooo… Here’s my rude and altogether honest response to the hapless heroine’s whinging: Give it up, you pathetic loser! (Well, actually, what I thought was, “Oh, for Chrissake! Grow the hell up and get over yourself, bitch.”)

Yes, times change and so do people, but the simple truth is that I have almost never heard a man complain about being called “Sir”. His own age, or the age of the person addressing him, is not even considered in his response to that title. The word is recognized as precisely what it is: an honorific. Courtesy. A term of respect. (Or, in ex-President Trump’s case, the preface to a bald-faced lie, but we probably shouldn’t even go there.)

Admittedly, I am old. I was raised in an era in which respect was not only expected, but demanded, and not just for one’s elders, but for anyone in a position of authority. As I determined early on in life, not to just protect myself from imminent peril but, cynically, to further my personal agenda, I did not actually have to feel respect for anyone in authority over me–they might very well not have earned it–but I had to behave respectfully.

Teachers, other adults, supervisors, traffic cops, whatever: Anyone in a position of power or influence had to be taken seriously and addressed respectfully, and that respect began with titles. At the very least, one spoke to such individuals using the honorifics Mr., Mrs., Miss, or Ms., or perhaps even Reverend, Rabbi, Your Honor, Officer, Captain, Chief… There were many such titles; “Ma’am” and “Sir” were just further extensions of respectful speech. The titles had nothing to do with the age of the individual being spoken to, but everything to do with both the power they wielded or the courtesy and esteem they should be granted.

At the opposite end of the respect spectrum lay the words used by those both older and excessively conscious of their exalted positions; words used to belittle and to put one in one’s place: the sarcastic “Young lady!” or “Young man!” The word “lady” itself had mutated from a term of respect to just a general and/or slightly rude form of address for any woman of unknown name: “Whaddya think you’re doing there, lady?!” Now, those terms did indeed often call for a response of resentment, or even antipathy. To this day, I clearly recall being addressed as “young lady” by a supervisor at the first job I ever held. That rotund old fart happened to be shaking some file folders (which he’d just had to spend his precious time hunting for because they had been carelessly misfiled) — shaking them right under my nose, as he snarled out the insulting sobriquet. I glanced at him and at the age-browned, misfiled manila folders for which I could not, patently, have been the miscreant responsible, since they’d been locked in a vault since long before my time with the company and probably even before my birth. Then I answered his snarling, “Just how did this happen, young lady?!” with a forced look of concern and a sweetly musical response of, “I’m afraid I really couldn’t say, SIR, since I didn’t work here then.”

But, returning to my primary point in this missive, it is long past time for every woman over the age of 20 to get over this ridiculous concept of, “To be called ma’am means I am old”. In the first place, there is nothing inherently wrong with aging. It happens to all of us, if we’re lucky enough to continue living, and is usually accompanied by wisdom, which is a good thing. But in the second, and far more important place, “ma’am” is an honorific, a term of courtesy, and above all, an expression of respect and regard.

Deal with it, young lady.

Enjoyed this post? Then you might also like the essay, “Pennies, Headlights, and Bubonic Plague”. You can locate it by scrolling to the Archives, below; it was published on August 7, 2018.

You’re Doing WHAT for Lent?

Wild indulgence following deprivation never seemed sensible!

Knowing that I had been raised Roman Catholic, although perhaps not understanding I’d left the church at the tender age of 13, an acquaintance asked me, “But you still give something up for Lent, right?”

Her question startled me. I hadn’t given anything up for Lent since I was 11 years old and still languishing in the prison of parochial elementary school. I’d never forgotten the nun-teacher who’d advised the 40 of us crammed into a single classroom (where, despite the overage ratio of students-to-teacher, we LEARNED–we dared not do otherwise; those nuns could be mean! Oops! Getting off the track here.) Anyway, Nun-Name-Forgotten advised us that sacrifice was good, a noble action, but of absolutely no use if we whined or were resentful. (We did and we were.) If that was the case, she advised us, we’d be far better off—and the world a much finer place—if we made a commitment to doing something: taking some positive action on behalf of ourselves, our friends, our family, or for everyone on the planet, as a Lenten resolution.

Alternately, we could commit to breaking a bad habit or developing a good habit. (Psychological science hadn’t yet, in that era, come up with that “30 days to establish a habit” concept, but at 40 days of Lent, the nun was probably on to something.)

This all came back to me recently as I watched a favorite movie, Chocolat, and recalled the many people I’d known who chose to give up chocolate for Lent. I also recalled one coworker, a darling woman, who nobly resolved to give up chocolate for Lent every single year that I knew her. And every year she broke her resolution in less than a week. Totally free of condemnation, I completely understood her failure. I never even CONSIDERED giving up chocolate. I’d sooner have given up my firstborn.

Of course, the chocolate-denied, both children and adults, indulged wildly on Easter morning, diving into Easter baskets and biting off chocolate bunny heads with all the fierce madness of deprivation. Even at the tender age of 11, this always just seemed to me to be the wrong way to go about things; consequently, my nun-teacher’s remarks were a revelation, and something that I would never forget. I don’t now recall what positive action I resolved to take during that Lenten passage so long ago, but I adopted her suggestion as a maxim and began to use it every year thereafter, even following my break with the Catholic church.

Sadly, though, just as with the sacrifices promised for the duration of Lent, the pledge to do something positive for the season falls into precisely the same category as New Year’s resolutions: noble and commendable, but rarely performed. Follow-through seems to be a gene lacking in the makeup of most human beings. I will say, though, that 40 days is a far more doable commitment than 365. Of the times I’ve resolved to take some positive action during the Lenten period, I’d say I’ve managed to adhere to my resolution at least half of the time. As for the other half, well, does start-stop-start again count? I tell myself that it does. Perhaps self-honesty might be the positive action I need to consider for the Lenten period.

Anyway, I ponder all of this each year as Christian Lent rolls around, even though I’m not precisely what most people would genuinely term Christian any longer, having sauntered down a very blended spiritual path in my lifetime. Still, if I am out and about on Ash Wednesday, I take note of those individuals whose foreheads are speckled with the grey dust that we Roman Catholic school children, chivvied to Mass early in the morning before class on that Holy Day of Obligation, were always warned we must not rub or wash off. (As if the coming season of enforced sacrifice weren’t punishment enough, we had to go about for a whole day looking as if we didn’t know the proper use of a bar of soap.) Now I wonder, glimpsing those ashy foreheads, if these people ever sat in a classroom listening to a wise nun as she explained the greater personal and societal value of positive action as opposed to deprivation and sacrifice. I wonder if it is too late for them to take that lesson to heart.

Regardless of anyone’s belief system, I think as I pass those ash-bespeckled faces, it’s still a truly wise and useful thing to set aside a few days each year trying to make ourselves, or the world, just a little bit better.

If you appreciated this essay, you might also enjoy “Tough Love for the Prodigal Son”, which you can locate by scrolling to the Archives, below. It was published on March 30, 2018.

Speaking Truth to Loss

Stop falling back on trite phrases!

When my oldest and most beloved friend died, another friend (far younger than I but astoundingly wise) spoke the most genuine words of condolence that I received. 

“I know how much she meant to you,” my young friend said, “because you talked about her all the time.”

Then she followed up these compassionate words with concrete action. She sent a memorial gift to a charity in my beloved friend’s name, and gifted me a comforting box of tea.

Looking back on her words and gestures now, I realized that only she and just a very few loving friends reached out to provide me authentic remarks or efforts of sympathy.  From most others, even immediate family, I received only customary, trite and uncomfortable reassurances.

But a precious few people made a sincere effort, through words or gestures, to comfort me, and it is their acts that I remember with deep appreciation. One acquaintance forwarded an e-card from my favorite site—which she sent, hilariously, to the wrong person, another of her friends with the same first name (who wondered uneasily if this was perhaps a premonition!)  Confessing this blunder to me, she gave me the first genuine laugh I’d experienced in weeks, and proved the old axiom: It is, truly, the thought that counts.  On another occasion, when I spiraled into meltdown during what was supposed to be a relaxed gathering of friends, one person took tangible action by handing me a tiny shot of a particularly delicious liquor, while the others present hastened to reassure me that it was all right to cry and that I was safe with them. They also reminded me that there was no particular time frame for the resolution of grief.

All too sadly, though, during most of my time of mourning, I received little response except the trite and vacuous phrase, “I’m sorry for your loss.”   And it is that phrase which I’m now suggesting that you, that everyone, stop using.  Stop saying.  Stop repeating.

You may not be able to provide a memorial gift, or flowers for a funeral, or even a box of tea.  You may not be present to hand a weeping person a tissue or a glass of water; you might not be in the room to hold a hand or wrap someone in your arms.  You might even, heaven forfend, send the sympathy card to the wrong person!  But you can speak truth—truth that comforts, truth that heals—to loss.  You can make the effort of saying something genuine and personal.  You can stop hiding behind the conventional.

Speak to the elephant in the room!  Say their name.  “I’m so very sorry you lost (name).”  Say their title: your friend, your spouse, your husband, wife, daughter, son, mother, father, beloved, fiancé, partner, cat, dog, bird, companion, (god forbid) child.

Speak true concern and care: “I’m sorry that you’re grieving.”  “I wish I could take the pain away.” “He wasn’t ‘just a pet’.  He was a member of your family.”

Reassure the bereaved that their loved one is not forgotten: “I have memories, good memories, wonderful, interesting, even funny stories that you may never have heard of your lost one.  When you’re ready to hear them, just ask me. I’ll share those memories.” 

Ask the grieving person what they need to say, and be there, unflinchingly, to listen.  Listen to the painful stories of bedside vigils.  Listen to their anger—anger with the doctors who could not heal their loved one; anger with their loved one for leaving; anger even with God–and do not diminish it with platitudes.  Tell them, and mean it, “Whatever you need to say, I’m here to listen, without judgment.” 

Find the courage to speak an uncomfortable truth without evasion: “I know your relationship wasn’t easy, so I’m not certain what you’re feeling.  But just know that I care.”  “She was sick for a long time, and in so much pain.  If you are feeling relief, that’s normal.  It doesn’t mean you loved her any less.”

And, finally, if you can, take concrete, definable action.  Help.  Bring food and drink, yes—the oldest form of comfort, so that a grieving person not only need not cook, but can feed those who arrive making sympathy visits, or at least might be tempted to eat when eating is impossible.  Sit with young children so a mother or father can try to sleep—or at least lie, sleepless, on their beds. Lend an outfit, or shoes. (When my grandmother died, I, in financial straits, had no decent black shoes to wear to her funeral.  I’ve never forgotten that distress).  Take children shopping for something appropriate to wear.  Clean the house to make it presentable for guests.  Provide a venue or supply food for the wake.   

“I’m sorry for your loss” means no more than that you haven’t either the time or can’t be bothered to make an effort, or that you are too uncomfortable in facing someone’s grief to show genuine concern. But another’s experience of loss is when our own comfort matters least, and when authentic compassion is needed most.

If you liked this post, you might also enjoy the essay, “Emails to Dad”, which was published May 4, 2022. You can locate it in the Archives, below.

We Need a Gender-Free Pronoun, Part 2

Relearning is challenging for the aging brain!

It is sadly true that, as one ages, the brain become less adaptable. New languages are harder to acquire, for example, but that doesn’t even begin to encompass the difficulties inherent in the aging brain. For instance, years ago I knew how to tie a bow—any bow; ribbons, shoelaces—so that it was always perfectly straight and equal. I could do this without thinking. Now I must stop before tying a bow to intentionally review the technique that prevents it from coming out lopsided and uneven.

So it’s often with trepidation that I approach all the new nuances of language and interaction. I find pronouns (and their accompanying verbs—how does one connect the pronouns formerly of multiple reference, they and them, with their attached verbs? Does one use “is”, for instance? Or “are”? But I digress….) The real problem is, of course, that for upwards of 67 years, I’d used only she/he, him/her. Relearning the use of a pronoun of multiple reference to indicate an individual is essentially to learn a new language, and therefore (as an aging person who can’t always remember what I ate for breakfast today), challenging.

Never was this made plainer to me than when I, in 2021, decided to revisit a church that I’d briefly attended years before.

Unfortunately, the non-denominational churches which I preferred were no longer available to me; the area where one was located had deteriorated badly, and I felt uncomfortable going there alone, while another had closed completely. Of the two Unitarian Universalist churches that I might have chosen, one was distant and almost devoid of parking, while I found the other to be sadly unwelcoming to newcomers.

So I decided to revisit a Christian denomination church I’d briefly attended, recalling it as a place of teaching, rather than preaching, an ecumenical lesson.

The church seemed much as I’d remembered, and I found a lot to appreciate in the “kindness and courtesy” message. The congregation was invited to a reception after the service, and I decided to attend. A welcoming committee noted new faces, and I was handed off to a small group of people of varying ages who fetched me a cup of coffee and kindly invited me to sit with them.

I noted one member of the group whose gender seemed indeterminate. Clothing, hair, face—nothing gave one a clue, and I, confused by a series of quickfire introductions (never my strength, anyway, putting names to faces and remembering them), couldn’t recall having been told the individual’s name. Conversation in the little group flowed easily, though, so I avoided putting my foot in my mouth by the simple expedient of not addressing the individual directly.

But when I went to pour myself another cup of coffee, one of the group members accompanied me and said softly, “I just wanted to mention that we’re all very careful of pronouns for Chell.”

I’d just taken a sip from my fresh cup, but somehow managed not to spit coffee all over myself and my companion. “Chell”, you see, was the slang that all my older Italian relatives used for “penis”. Coughing, I windmilled one hand for my companion to continue while choking out the words, “That’s an unusual name.”

“Their deadname is Chelsea,” he explained. “But here’s the thing: Chell can’t stand to be misgendered. If you use the wrong pronoun, they’ll cut you out entirely—refuse to speak to you or even acknowledge that you exist.”

“I see,” I said slowly. “Well, thank you for warning me. I would not want to upset, uh, Chell.” (Nor chuchee nor ookee, either—and, no, I don’t know how the words are spelled; I just know how to pronounce my family’s Italian slang and the various body parts to which the words refer!)

I returned to the group, but kept to myself the thoughts churning madly in my brain, which had nothing to do with this individual’s unfortunate choice of name. My deliberations went more along the line of, “Well, Chell is obviously too young to comprehend how challenging individuals of my age find it to adapt to this mangling of English grammar as was once beaten into us by ruler-wielding, knuckle-slamming nuns. And, honestly, if Chell wants to cut me dead and loftily ignore me, rather than gently correct any misuse of a personal pronoun, well, I’ve been dumped by better and more important people over the course of a long lifetime. And what was that in today’s message about making the choice to be kind?!”

Not needing such dissonance in my life, I smiled at but didn’t interact with that group again in subsequent after-service coffee hours, and, finding I wasn’t really as happy with the church as I’d hoped, attended only a few more services before quitting entirely.

But, as I’ve said before in these essays: We really need a gender-free pronoun upon which everyone can agree; one which has never been associated with either female, male, or multiple reference.

And, for the love of heaven, if your name is Chell, don’t ever associate with old Italian immigrants!

You might also enjoy “We Need a Gender-Free Pronoun” from June 23, 2021. You can locate it by scrolling to the Archives, below.

The Hatred

I originally wrote this post with the intention of publishing it prior to the anniversary of the January 6 Insurrection. But I found I couldn’t bear to start the year on so sad and awful a note.

A few years back, pre-Pandemic (since that is how we all now date everything in our lives) an acquaintance informed me that we would not fall out over my blog post, “The Benefit of the Doubt”, written concerning his experience with the so-called “Love” booth at an Indy Pride event. As I explained in that earlier essay, it wasn’t entirely clear, from his description, what this “Love” booth was actually all about. I assumed that it promulgated love and acceptance of the LGBTQ community. Or perhaps, I thought a bit wildly, the people manning the booth were there just to give hugs, like the great church-wide hugging plague of the 1980s. Still another possibility was that the stall provided information on ways the community might demonstrate love and acceptance to everyone of every race, creed and gender. My friend’s description of the booth left its purpose unclear, but he’d been very upset by the individuals operating the Love booth.

It seemed that, as he’d listened throughout the day to many very liberal, far-left comments by the people manning the stall (which was positioned right next to his own booth), he’d found himself wondering, was still wondering: Had he strolled over to that stall, wearing his MAGA hat, and explained to them his adamant view that then-President Trump was “our greatest President ever”, what would their reaction have been? Would the people manning the Love booth have considered him loveable, or even likeable? Or would they have reacted with anger? He was extremely doubtful, he said, that love would have been their reaction.

My blog post about that situation explored the idea that my friend assumed their response, rather than put his question to the test. He didn’t engage with the people manning the Love booth, providing them a chance to refute his position without rejecting him personally, or to talk through their differences.

So a few weeks after that event, when my blog post on the subject was published, my friend magnanimously explained to me that we would not fall out over my remarks, because: “You weren’t there. You didn’t hear it—the hatred”.

Unfortunately, once again, he made an unwarranted assumption. Because I was hearing it—hearing and reading and seeing the hatred every day. At the time, restrictions to written news commentary had not been established. Every news story could be commented upon; one rarely even needed to register on most news sites to leave a comment. Those comment pages were filled with sadistic, trolling statements; rife with cruelty that the overwhelmed moderators could not screen out. My highly-political and extremely conservative father constantly forwarded e-mails to me that, remarking viciously upon the viewpoints I held, made me cry. And while I personally eschewed social media, friends told me of the brutal statements that were posted to their pages. I’d even once sat, helpless and cringing, while two acquaintances nearly came to blows over their opposing viewpoints.

Hatred, I discovered, was not confined to any one group or any single position. People from both sides and corners of the fence slung insults and violent verbiage at one another. And all of it was escalating.

Trying to establish a middle-of-the-road position for myself, I read the news from multiple sources, both left and right, and was on each part equally horrified. What had happened to compromise, to the art of listening? How had our constitutional right to free speech fallen so far?

Then we held a free, fair and, yes, honest election, and Trump lost the popular vote for the second time, this time losing the electoral vote, as well. He had paved the way for doubt on the part of his followers by claiming the election to be rigged even before it happened. Having genuinely lost, he then totally refused to accept his failure. He did not even pretend to be anything other than that entity so despised throughout my childhood: a sore loser.

And so January 6th happened. Sitting paralyzed with horror, clutching my toddler grandchild within the protective circle of my arms, I sat watching while tears rained down my face. I watched it: the hatred, and the horrific violence fueled by hatred.

Months later, still engaged in attempting to maintain a fair and balanced vision of all that was happening in my country, I sat watching once more as Fox News pundit Laura Ingraham viciously mocked the PTSD suffered by those who had gallantly struggled to defend our Capitol on that ghastly day. Observing her derisive facial expressions, listening to her contemptuous remarks, I experienced it yet one more time: the hatred.

“You weren’t there. You didn’t hear it—the hatred.”

No, my friend, I did not need to be there on that long ago Indy Pride day to hear, to experience, the hatred. I have seen it a hundred, a thousand times, then and since: In banned books. In violent attacks on minority individuals and elected officials and their families. In defamatory comments toward those who hold differing viewpoints. In incitement to violence. In bigotry and racism from and toward people of every color, creed and gender.

I have seen it everywhere, on every face; heard it in every voice: the hatred.

And I despair.

You may read the original essay, “The Benefit of the Doubt”, by scrolling to the archived blog posts, below. It was published on July 31, 2019

A Missionary Trip to…the Hell You Say!

They went WHERE on their missionary trip?

Several years ago when I was in a long term relationship (that really should have been a quit-by-the-third-date association—I have since realized that I have incredibly bad taste in men, and pretty much sworn off them)…anyway… I was introduced to one of the Sig O’s good friends. We were all together for a local but tediously long journey to Someplace (i.e., immured in the car with no escape for a couple of hours) when the conversation rolled around to the recent homecoming of the friend’s parents, who had just returned from a Christian missionary trip.

Having been tossed the conversational ball, I, who disapprove of missionary trips as a matter of principle—more about that in a moment—asked brightly, “Oh? Where did they go on their mission?”

“To Ireland,” the friend replied.

I was totally bewildered. “Uh, isn’t Ireland a basically Christian country?” I asked.

“Oh, no,” he replied quickly, shaking his head. “It isn’t Christian. It’s Catholic.”

After I’d replaced my jaw, I drew a breath preparatory to saying something along the line that this distinction would have come as very unwelcome news to my late, very devout, Italian Roman Catholic grandparents. Had anyone told PopPop or Grandma that they weren’t Christian, well, that person would have been in for at least a tongue lashing (probably in the very rudest Italian terms, some of which I can, quite proudly, quote), or possibly some very well-known and equally rude Italian hand gestures, or even a straightforward wallop right on the nose. I considered adding the information that, despite having left the church as a teenager, I myself had been raised Roman Catholic and certainly considered myself to be a Christian during those years.

However, my incipient protests were shut down by peremptory hand gestures and warning glares from the Sig O, who did not want to hear anything from the person in the cheap seats (i.e., me). Cautious regarding the Sig O’s easily-triggered temper, I swallowed my protests and subsided into invisibility in my corner of the car, not venturing to engage in the conversation any further. But thereafter I refused to ever spend (waste) time again with Christian Missionary friend. (I should have also refused to ever waste time again with the Sig O, but I’m a slow learner.)

Aside from the whole Catholic-not-Christian controversy, which I don’t to this day understand, I disapprove, as I mentioned, of missionary trips on principle—the principle being that I do not believe there is any one “true” religion, and that whatever people chose to believe (or not) is pretty much fine with me, so long as it doesn’t involve human or animal sacrifice. I’m sort of down on misogyny, burkas, and the summoning of demons, also (that whole “inviting evil in” thing has always pretty much bewildered me). But I’m pretty firmly convinced that most of the world’s major religions have, in their long histories, done one helluva lot more harm than good, what with pogroms and witch burnings, Bloody Mary and the Inquisition, torture and shunning and pious hypocrisy and bloodstained religious wars, and just general “man’s inhumanity to man”—not to even mention man’s inhumanity to all womankind.

My view of most religions is so completely cynical that I am neither shocked nor astonished by the constant sordid revelations of sexual crimes and egregious physical abuse committed by clergy of every faith, especially those that prate of chastity as a preferential state of being. Such hypocrisy is woven into the very patriarchal warp and misogynistic woof of those religions. I wasn’t even slightly surprised when abortion clinic workers recently revealed that they often provided abortions to the very right-to-life protestors manning their stations outside the clinic; women who, having had an abortion, informed the clinic workers that they were doomed to hell and then immediately returned to the picket line in a flagrant display of sanctimonious deceit.

Nope, as I view the whole situation from my admittedly-lofty-and-judgmental perch of contempt, if a person of any faith feels compelled to perform missionary work, then they might just want to consider shucking the agenda to convert others and first try leading by example: demonstrating by a life well and kindly lived that their belief system has genuine merit. They might also want to think about spending time actually working to make the world a better place by, oh, say, feeding the hungry, succoring the poor and homeless, eschewing racism, treating others as they wish to be treated, caring for the environment and the animals which share this planet with us, and simply being (as suggested in Ephesians 4:32) kind to one another–without requiring adherence to a particular set of beliefs as a prerequisite. Any of these actions might better serve both the Divine and humanity than hair-splitting quibbles about who is or is not Christian.

And, of course, initiating any or all of these behaviors in their own neglected backyard might prove to be a far wiser choice than hooting off on a “missionary” vacation to Ireland!

My cockeyed religious viewpoint can also be explored in “Tough Love for the Prodigal Son”, which was published March 30, 2018. You can locate it by scrolling to the Archives, below.

Privilege, In All Its Glory

Shaming people for an accident of birth is divisive and negative

Despite the fact that I recognize and acknowledge having been the unwitting lifelong possessor of various forms of White privilege, as a person of Italian-American heritage, I have walked just a few–a very few, tiny, mincing, tiptoeing steps–on the other side of the street, too. The people of my paternal family were not considered White until 1965 (I was 11 years old), when racist immigration quotas on Italians were overturned. Living in the city of Indianapolis, I never drive past the President Benjamin Harrison home on Delaware Street without recalling that the short-lived President introduced the original Columbus Day celebration as a one-time national holiday in 1892, following the New Orleans lynching of 11 innocent Italian immigrants–an act which brought Italy and the United States nearly to the point of war, as the Italian consul in New Orleans left the city at his government’s direction, and Italy cut off relations with the United States. (And since Taking Umbrage is now a national pastime, let me hasten to assure all readers that I fully celebrate the reinvention of Columbus Day as Indigenous Peoples Day! That does not, however, alter the sad origins of the holiday.) I remember with both laughter and shock the stories told to me about the racism endured by my Italian grandmother and grandfather; the filthy name calling to which my father was subjected while growing up. I know that some Italians in the United States were interned during WW II.

Put simply, what all of this has taught me is: We humans have to begin being just human. People of all creeds, colors and genders cannot continue this acrimonious habit of accusation and resentment for one another’s entitlements, actual or supposed. Rather, it is long past time that we all begin to work together to bequeath to one another, to anyone deprived, our various blessings.

Shaming people for an accident of birth is divisive and negative. It results in nothing but resentment and increased contentiousness. Everyone has some form of unearned, arbitrary advantage: Christian privilege. Ability privilege. Male privilege. Financial privilege. Educational privilege. Heterosexual privilege.

It is an unearned privilege to be born tall or with excellent vision or superb hearing. Being born part of a two-parent, two-earner family is decidedly a privilege. A genetic inclination conferring talent or mental acuity or physical ability is an unearned privilege. The list is endless.

And while, yes, it is fair and just to require that others acknowledge their benefits from unearned privilege, expecting them to feel guilt for this is worse than damaging; it is unproductive. It merely provokes indignation. When we encounter bitterness from another person over our supposedly having had it easy due to some form of privilege, our private response is always resentment and indignation. We recall our personal struggles and we feel belittled. Rare is the individual who will, in such circumstances, stop, take a deep breath and admit: “I didn’t have it easy, no—but your experience was so much harder!”

Attempting to base global or societal changes on such negativity is always destined to fail, simply because every person, everyone, everywhere, wants to feel validated. They do not want to have their efforts and challenges, their personal story, minimized. The sad and tired script of, “‘I have experienced pain and difficulty.’ ‘Well, mine was worse!’” only perpetuates a sequence of bitter, angry responses. From there the progression through negativity to misunderstanding to viciousness never stops.

The cycle becomes a cyclone when natural reactions of shock and sorrow are labeled “fragility”. For anyone with a developed sense of empathy, it’s painful to face the awfulness that another person has endured, especially when recognizing that we ourselves may have played a role, even inadvertently, in their dreadful reality. But to evince sadness, even anguish, in that circumstance, is not to be fragile, but to display enormous strength. Compassion and empathy always require great strength.

But we can, each of us, make a personal choice to put a full stop to all of this. We can look at others, not with tired eyes seeing only differences while resenting what they seem to have that we do not, but instead considering, “What have they experienced, endured, withstood? How is that similar to what I have known? Is it really better, as I am supposing? Or was it simply awful in a different way?” Or, “Did they have any advantages, no matter how slight, that I did not? Are they cognizant of and grateful for those advantages?” “Can I be strong enough to acknowledge that I may have had some advantage, even the slightest, denied to them?”

We can look, too, beyond stereotypes; recognize and refuse to be enmeshed in them. We can question everything we have been taught, seemed to see, heard, and then draw new conclusions, coming to a richer understanding of those who inhabit this world with us.

No matter what our misunderstanding and behavior has been in the past, we can choose this new reaction. We can, as Gandi remarked, be the change we wish to see in the world.

If we choose to let go of the concept of privilege, we may discover that we have infinite commonalities with people who might seem, superficially, to be our polar opposites. We might at last, and in relief, find that, in our common humanity, there is much more that binds us than separates us.

We might discover that we are all, in fact, simply part of the human family.

If you liked this essay, you might also appreciate “Cultural Appreciation”, which you can locate in the Archives, below, from June 2, 2021.

The Secular Light Show

November 13 will be World Kindness Day, and so I am revisiting this very applicable post from 2020.

In early November 2019, a local family initiated their holiday light display—an astounding and impressive effort; simply lovely. It was, perhaps, a tad early, but what with the invidious daylight savings time having begun two weekends prior, the winter nights were certainly quite long enough to make such a light show worthwhile. The family noted the display on our local neighborhood website, posting photos and inviting people to drive by and enjoy the spectacle. Several website members commented on the exceptional light show, and I punned that it was “delightful”.

But, as always seems to happen these days, a sourpuss (i.e., jackass!) simply had to comment. “This is a very secular display,” he groused. “Christmas without Christ is not Christmas.”

Other members quickly shut him down, pointing out that not only does not everyone celebrate Christmas, but that a light-up baby Jesus in the front yard really made no more of a statement than a reindeer; that religious beliefs were best celebrated in the home and the heart, not on one’s lawn, and not just at a particular season, but throughout the year; that at the holiday season it was best to be building people up, rather than tearing them down; and, finally, that whatever else it might be, the light display was certainly fun and festive and was bringing smiles to the faces of those witnessing it and wonder to the eyes of small children.

Nothing that was said to him, however, no matter how thoughtful or theologically sound, altered the Religious Grinch’s opinion; he remained stubbornly resistant to these various peacemakers, responding emphatically with his opinion that the light spectacle was insulting to the true meaning of Christmas while intimating that he felt picked upon for having stated his opinion.

Mindful of our ever-watchful website “Lead”, who had deleted my comments before, I merely replied with a carefully-pointed remark that I thought it was a lovely gesture that this family had taken so much time, effort, and expense to make so beautiful a display just ahead of World Kindness Day on November 13th. It seemed to me, I continued, a truly kind thing to create such beauty for one’s neighbors to enjoy, and I, for one, was most appreciative of their efforts. Then I private-messaged two of those who had made the most rational and courteous responses to the Religious Grinch, and told them how much I appreciated their efforts, receiving in reply their thanks, good wishes and blessings—blessings and good wishes that they also offered publicly to the Religious Grinch, and which were (perhaps not surprisingly) not returned by him.

Although my true thoughts remained unsaid on the website (at least by me; some others dared make some of these points), there were so many things I wanted to say to Mr. Religious Grinch. I wanted to suggest that perhaps the light display had been set up by a Hindu family celebrating a belated Diwali, not Christmas, or even a NeoPagan family whose spiritual holiday, celebrated with light, is not Christmas but Yule, the winter solstice. I didn’t know, I pondered, if light displays comprised part of the celebrations of Hanukkah or Kwanzaa, but those holidays, rather than Christmas, might be what the lights represented. Soyaluna, Saturnalia, Festivus—even the 6,000-year-old holiday of the Kemet Orthodoxy faith, called “The Return of the Wandering Goddess”, might be the reason behind the glorious twinkling and blinking and racing lights in the front yard of a neighborhood home.

I wanted, too, to ask Mr. Religious Grinch what he had done, or planned to do, to bring a smile to the lips of his neighbors during this holiday season; to provide them a moment’s joy. He certainly had not provided his good wishes to those on the website, so was he planning some other random act of kindness? How would he express his Christ of Christmas during the season? Would he speak a word of loving encouragement to someone sad and depressed, or haul an elderly neighbor’s trash bin through the snow to the curb on garbage collection day? Would he be dropping a dollar into a homeless person’s outstretched hand, or volunteering at a food pantry, or giving a contribution to a domestic violence shelter?

Finally, furiously, I typed my reply to Mr. Religious Grinch–the reply that (lest I become a Grinch myself!) I ever so carefully deleted before my finger, hovering anxiously over it, could press the SEND button:

“Well, sir, since this light show disturbs you so much, perhaps you should set up on your own lawn a very non-secular display, full of stables and Holy Families and angels and stars and Magi and shepherds and sheep and oxen—and YOU could be the ASS!”

If you enjoyed this, then you might also want to read, “The Ghosts of Christmas Trees Past”, which you can locate by scrolling to the Archives, below on this page. It was published on December 18, 2019.