Suck

Crappy day today. I feel like I should be using all that stupid chat room grammar and syntax that belie the fact that I must be getting old since I don't understand it. I feel so withdrawn that I don't even want to capitalize and spell. As a measure of how bad this day has been , I just spent 8 minutes trying to find an example of aforementioned jargon to add a little funny to the post and failed profoundly. No searches would reveal it and hitting "next blog" close to 20 times, usually a surefire way to find some, was utterly unproductive. So, sorry folks, no funny today. So, I started the day with another speeding ticket. I was thinking about my ex-husband and the money he owes me, not paying attention and the cop just followed me for 3 miles until I finally noticed him and slowed down. Then, he turned his lights on and gave me the ticket. I can't even count all of the different levels that sucks on. So, with the day starting poorly, I seemed to lose any small amount of tact and common sense that I normally possess, revealing things I shouldn't reveal and making jokes that make me look bad in the wrong company over the course of the day while I was working at the Exchange. I have definitely lost all of that newfound contentment, which actually lasted quite awhile. I think I'll go curl up in bed and maybe try to muster up the energy to read my book.

Dust to dust

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since.
“Whenever you feel like criticizing anyone,” he told me, “just remember that all the people in the world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.”

-F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

Last week, I wrote a blog about my feelings regarding the social awkwardness of some of the people on the island. In it, I expressed frustration, exasperation, anger, a little bit of despair and defeat and some implied superiority. I have felt uncomfortable with myself since then. Not uncomfortable that I published those feelings but uncomfortable that I have them at all.

You really do think you’re better than we are. But we don’t know. We don’t know if you’re actually better. I mean, you came into the world with certain advantages, sure, that’s the legacy. But you didn’t earn it. You didn’t work for it. You never had anybody come up to you and say that you deserve these things more than anyone else. They were just handed to you. So that doesn’t make you better than us. It just makes you luckier than us.

-Anya to Buffy, the Vampire Slayer

When I talk about humility, I often find that people rush to assure me that my reactions are normal. And I do feel better to learn that some of the people that bother me, bother everyone else as well. It makes it less personal and I am required to take less responsibility for what I see as a failed interaction. However, in the assurance of others that I’ve done nothing wrong, it’s easy to forget that the code of ethics that I’ve chosen for myself doesn’t always agree with my friends.

What Boba Fett and Darth Maul and Kyle Katarn and to a lesser extend Mace Windu all have in common is their appeal to fifteen-year-old boys’ images of themselves: essentially bad-ass but, you know, honorable about it.

-Tom Bissell, “Pale Starship, Pale Rider: The Ambiguous Appeal of Boba Fett”

I think everyone should live by a code. It makes life more deliberate. It is good to draw a line in the sand. Even if you jump back and forth over it, at least it exists as a point of reference. Without a personal sense of the rule of law, life feels directionless and chaotic. There is no reason to do anything. One becomes a monarch with no parliament to check and balance the laws that we make for the kingdom of our lives. I don’t think even the Red Queen liked herself in that situation, shouting “Off with their heads!” so randomly that she was feared but ignored.

“We are allowed to do anything,” so they say. That is true, but not everything is good. “We are allowed to do anything” –but not everything is helpful. No one should be looking out for his own interests, but for the interests of others.

-1 Corinthians 10:23-24

Lutheran services begin with a time of confession in the liturgy. I have found that since I left behind the fervent Christianity that I practiced as an easy shield between the scary world and myself, I usually think that I don’t really sin all that often. I believe that sin is making a choice that does not follow Christ’s commandments to love God with all of my heart and soul and mind and to love others as God loves me. I believe that those two commandments act as a constitution of sorts. All other laws have to be in compliance with those at the top. (I have yet to decide what should act as the Supreme Court in this analogy.) Anything else in the Bible is just a suggestion or an example of how to apply this new contract to our lives. This makes a lot of the behavior that many public and vocal Christians decry as sinful not necessarily so. They can cite all the scripture that they want; if their letter-of-the-law line in the sand is on the wrong side of the spirit of Christ’s commandment, it isn’t actually relevant to me. Christ represents a new covenant between God and people and that new agreement leaves a lot of room of individual interpretation. It’s disconcerting and a little scary to have so little guidance. However, I don't make a lot of choices between good and evil. I've put myself in the habit of making mostly loving decisions and I rest comfortably on that. This is where the personal code comes in.

River: You're a liar. I don't think your intentions are honorable.

Early: Well, no. I'm a bounty hunter. It's generally not considered honorable so much as... I live by a code, though.

-“Objects in Space,” Firefly

However, I do sin. It’s hard to live by a code. It requires doing things that I know I should do, even though I don’t like the way I have been reminded to do it. :ast Tuesday night, I did not enjoy choir at all. When that stranger spoke to me about sitting up when I sang, I could no longer think about anything other than my posture. I desperately wanted to prove that she wasn’t the boss of me, but I knew that to intentionally slouch while singing in a choir was dishonorable. Most of the time, I ended up in this compromise position in which I didn’t cross my legs, but my shoulders remained hunched. How childish. I felt unwelcome and I covered that up by trying to assert my free will where it didn’t belong. I had made a mistake and I was upset that someone had noticed. The whole purpose of a formal choir is to blend in and create as pure a sound as possible. If I had confessed to myself that I had been wrong, I could have forgiven myself and moved on to contribute positively again.

Remember that from dust thou art formed and to dust thou shalt return.

While I was clearing out the greenhouses with Rhonda, there were times when we would not speak at all but would simply focus on our tasks. Like road trips and retreats, that type of manual labor invites long talking about life’s milestones and we did a lot of that. But, there were times of quiet, when we left each other to our own thoughts because, in discussing life’s milestones, one usually has to process them all over again. During one of these times, I was cutting twine and stalks with a knife and untangling them from the trellis. I was thinking about my father and the good way that he responded to being caught having committed a white-collar crime. My father’s strong belief in Christ allowed him to utilize the traditions that he was raised in, which allowed him to take responsibility for his actions so that they did not do any lasting harm to my family, and in fact, improved our dynamic in many ways, which is an unusual resolution for white-collar crime families. Christianity offers a tradition of confession, penance and forgiveness. Although the idea has its beginning with the belief that Christ’s innocent penance earned forgiveness for all, even the secular parts of our world are influenced by this idea that if you serve your time, then the deed should be forgiven. Every toddler knows that if you say, “I’m sorry,” after hitting your brother, you won’t get into as much trouble. However, some toddlers learn very quickly that forgiveness is easier to obtain than permission and take advantage of their ability to apologize and get out of trouble without really meaning the words that they say. I’ve certainly dealt with enough teenagers who yelled, “I said I’m sorry already! Can’t you just leave me alone?” I don’t leave them alone because it’s not enough. They can’t feel forgiven until they truly acknowledge whatever mistake they made that brought them out into the hallway in the first place. An apology without true regret for hurting another is worthless. So, to be successful, even secular situations must be brought back to the pure Christian tradition that involves acknowledging what harm was done and truly believing it was wrong –otherwise known as confession- before penance and forgiveness can take place. We must do what we do not want to do by admitting that we made a mistake before the balance can be restored.

I once had a garden / filled with flowers / that grew only on dark / thoughts / but they needed constant / attention / & one day I decided / I had better things / to do.

-Brian Andreas, Mostly True

My landlady is a crazy kook. (Really, have I ever heard of a normal landlord?) She is well into her sixties and she puts false eyelashes on every day plus a good thick layer of what seems to be stage makeup. This is on an island where women don’t shave anything, men go without deodorant and where high-heeled shoes and any kind of dress clothes are certainly superfluous. She pulls her hair back into two barrettes at either side of her head and her hair is just long enough to curl under her ears. It is very much a Baby Jane scenario. My relationship with Carol is complicated, but I try to be polite and speak with her when I get the chance. However, we have some tensions that exist. I'm not sure where they came from, but I think a lot of the explanation lies in the fact that we simply live different types of lives. Recently, I threw some rotten apples out into the woods by the road. Steve had told me to do that and Carol pays for garbage by the can and asked me to be aware of my amount of garbage. She knocked on the trailer door to ask if they were mine. I said they were and she said, “Well, don’t,” and began to talk about vermin, which I certainly know enough about. I was pleasant throughout the conversation and apologized, explaining I was trying to save on garbage. However, I certainly felt like she was being crazy to think that vermin would be attracted to our houses more than they already were because of those apples. Two days later, she left a note on my door, saying she “expected” that the fruit would be picked up and thrown away. She didn’t ask, she instructed me to do this. This was in the middle of that week when everyone seemed to be insulting me or telling me what to do. I chafed at the note and all it implied. I left and went to Jeff’s house so that I wouldn’t have to deal with it until later. I turned it over and over in my head over the next two days, trying to think of what to say to her and how to justify leaving the fruit out there. Believe me, I was creative. I realized, though, that all of those plans were a result of my embarrassment at having made a mistake. Here I was again, having to live up to my own personal code by doing what I didn’t want to do because I didn’t like the way I had been reminded to do it. The moral, of course, is that once I simply took two minutes and picked up the apples, I was calmer and more content. I didn’t have to spend any more energy watering my dark flowers. When I told my friend Mindy this story, she interrupted me before I reached the end. She said: “Can I give you some advice that’s easier for me to say than do myself? Pick up the apples. You’ll be so much happier.” That advice summarizes the goodness at the core of her feistiness that makes me glad I found Mindy for a friend.

Create for yourself a new indomitable perception of faithfulness. What is usually called faithfulness passes so quickly. Let this be your faithfulness: You will experience moments, fleeting moments, with the other person. The human being will appear to you then as if filled, irradiated, with the archetype of his/her spirit. And then there may be, indeed will be, other moments, long periods of time when human beings are darkened. At such times, you will learn to say to yourself, “The spirit makes me strong. I remember the archetype. I saw it once. No illusion, no deception shall rob me of it.” Always struggle for the image that you saw. This struggle is faithfulness. Striving thus for faithfulness you shall be close to one another as if endowed with the protective powers of angels.

-Rudolf Steiner

All of these anecdotes bring me to Ash Wednesday. I was a mess when I walked up the stairs to church that morning. The night before I had driven out to Jeff’s house at 10:45 at night so I wouldn’t have to sob and weep alone. All of the hurt from the slights that had been dealt out combined with my guilt for reacting with arrogance and frustration to them. I had been ordered around by my landlady and told to do what I already knew that I should do by a total stranger. I felt unwelcome in choir, which made me realize that I don’t really belong here. Not that I shouldn’t be here but that this is not my place, my Ebenezer. What brought me to this island was not what brought everyone else here. I was sad that such a beautiful place can’t really be home. I had read the Faithfulness Pledge in a magazine, which brought my thoughts and feelings back to Dennis and my failure to love him through his illness, which is a totally unrealistic thing to beat myself up about but I was already snowballing into an avalanche at that point and logic had nothing to do with anything. Aside from all of this, I realized that I did not remember what Ash Wednesday was about. I remember watching videos of fasching when I took German in high school. I know all about Mardi Gras and Fat Tuesday but why there was Ash Wednesday, nope. It turns out that it is a time of confession. The actual holiday commemorates Christ’s 40 days in the desert where he fasted and faced temptation before he allowed himself to be the penance served by the world. We are reminded that Christ is lord and that means we do not have to be. We are dust and this very mortality relieves us of the burden to get it right all of the time. We can confess and be forgiven.

For all false judgments, for uncharitable thoughts towards our neighbors, and for our prejudice and contempt towards those who differ from us, accept out repentance, Lord.

The Ash Wednesday service was Episcopal, which meant there was ceremony, symbolism and kneeling. As I knelt to have the ashes drawn on my forehead and to be told that I am dust, my tears came back.

Our anger at our frustration, we confess to you, Lord.

All of this intensity comes because I try to do this all myself. I believe that if I can heal myself, then I will truly have regained all of my power. It’s not enough, though. Like the teenager in the hallway, I am angry because I have made mistakes and have been caught in it. Not just this week, but also throughout my adult life. I am angry at my frustration that comes from being unable to fix it myself. I must be like Rhonda and give the soil time to reestablish its systems of bugs and minerals and air pockets and whatever else actually does the business of actually forming food before I try to plant new seeds. I must honor the fact that very little in growing has to do with the farmer.

A broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

It does not surprise me that as the sun shone on the giant miniature train set-up (think Silver Spoons over several acres with its own miniature town complete with buildings 2-3 feet tall) and I drove with funk music echoing in my ears a few days after Ash Wednesday, that I would feel so at peace and comfortable with myself. It was like I had sat down in an easy chair that was also me and the two of us blended seamlessly. I had confessed. I had served my penance of crazy emotional intensity. I had been forgiven. I could be myself.

Pencil Me In

After a month of working only three days a week, all of a sudden I have more work than I know what to do with. First, Jeff is giving me one of his shifts at The Exchange because he is trying to use the next two weeks for intense packing. He has to move from the house he has lived in for the last ten years and that equals quite a bit of stuff to sort through. Also, Bill, my manager and the Flava, waits tables at the best restaurant on the island because he can make more money there in two nights than he could working 40 hours in retail. So I am closing two nights this week for him. Also, one of the men at church needs some manual labor to carrying landscaping rubbish to a trailer, then making a burn pile and watching to make sure it doesn’t get out of control. I’ll make $20 an hour doing that. College degree be damned. So, today I worked at the book store, tomorrow, I’ll burn stuff, Wednesday I’ll be at the Exchange, Thursday, I’ll be at the bookstore AND at the Flava, Friday I’ll be at the Exchange and possibly a dinner party that night and Saturday I’ll be closing the Flava. Whew! Wish me luck.

Putting the "L" back in Lutheran

I have just experienced my first Lutheran potluck and I am not quite sure that it was traditional in the let’s-give-the-ladies-in-the-kitchen-a-hand kind of way that Garrison Keillor has made so famous. First, it was during Lent. Nobody thought to check with the pastor before it was scheduled and announced but after Tom and Karin did so during the passing of the peace, I heard Pastor John mention quietly that we don’t normally have parties during Lent but what the heck. That’s part of why I like Pastor John. He has a sense of the proprieties but he knows when to let go of them, too. He will often stop us all mid-hymn if the volunteer accompanist has taken the wrong tempo or begin prayers again if he starts in the wrong place. One Sunday he was discussing the ritual washing of the hands before distributing the bread and the wine and his use of waterless hand-cleaner to make the ritual pragmatic as well. The woman who carries her oxygen tank with her (and often has to leave right after taking communion first because it is running out) argued with him in the middle of church, asking, demanding that she be able to take the elements herself rather than having them handed to her. He tried to talk about how that would then contaminate all of the host since her hands were not necessarily clean, but she would not back down from her defense of her own health. He gave it one more try and gracefully acquiesced before beginning communion. She did not shake anyone’s hand that Sunday during the passing of the peace. However, two weeks ago, she gave me a great big hug, exclaiming how much better hugs were. This week, she was back to her no-touching routine. I knelt next to her to take communion and noticed that the pastor let her take her own bread and winked at her.

So, despite the fact the the potluck was being held during Lent, it had an “All-American” theme for Valentine’s Day. We were encouraged to bring meatloaf, mashed potatoes, apple pie: whatever we associated with all-American. We ended up with two types of beans and wienies, a lasagna-type dish with cheddar cheese on top, a loaf of bread and butter, five pies (the strawberry-rhubarb was by far the best), and three different kinds of cookies. There was also beer, which I don’t remember Grandma ever mentioning in her Lutheran upbringing but now that I think about the German immigrant legacy, certainly makes sense as traditional. I forgot about the potluck until 20 minutes before church started, so I stopped at the market to get Coca-Cola and Oreo’s, the two most American foodstuffs I can think of.

After eating, we had a sing-along of good old American love songs, such as “Sentimental Journey,” “Don’t Sit Under The Apple Tree,” and “Shine on Harvest Moon.” I’m the only person in our 20-member church who is younger than 40 and most are over 65. They commented when I didn’t know “Peg O’ My Heart.” I thought my mom and my elementary school music teacher, Miss. Marquis, would be proud of my knowledge of the American songbook. Jared, the pianist (who is also the head chef at the Rosario Resort) was taking requests and I think that my grandma would be a little disconcerted that when one of the women shouted, “I Want A Girl” as in the song “I want a girl just like the girl who married dear old dad” and her partner leaned over to say sotto voce, “You’ve already got one.” Then, everyone laughed. I’m not sure where in the German immigrant legacy the lesbians come in, but I guess they must be in there somewhere.

There are actual three different brqanches of our church on three different islands and the pastor usually does three services on a Sunday morning. Some of the congregation came over from Lopez to share our potluck with us and I sat next to a lovely couple, Pat and Gordon. They were in their seventies and she mentioned in passing that they had been married for a little over a year. At one point, when we weren’t talking, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that he handed her a candy heart, taken from the center of the table that said, “I love u.” I just barely kept the “Aww” in my mouth.

So, all in all, I highly approve of these potlucks, especially the singing. We’re going to have another one for St. Patrick’s Day, or at least we talked about it. It still won’t be Easter yet, so maybe the pastor might nix it until then. However, I certainly hope they slip it by him again.

The Big Payback - duh duh da da duh duh da

Today, driving home, exhausted from working out to James Brown, I felt more myself than, maybe, I ever have. It was a moment of beautiful clarity. When I think about the way I behaved when I was younger - all the things I put up with, all the things I was embarrassed by, all the things I didn’t say – I know that I was stifling my true personhood. I was not fully myself. This is not saying that I shouldn’t have been who I was then. She was who I had to be in order to be who I am now. But this sense of contentment with myself now makes all of that angst worth something. I’m even comfortable with this liminal stage that I’m in.

I’d like to thank someone for this and the first person to come to mind is James Brown. However, I know in my heart that God gave me a framework to make my choices and to live my life within and the pattern created by those choices and experiences culminated in this feeling of total recognition.

The last week has been another emotionally intense week. I’ve been trying to get it into some cohesive, elegant writing, but since the intensity has resolved itself into this acceptance of myself, the impetus is less strong.

I’ve always loved the phrase from Fredrick Buechner, “. . . a marriage made in Heaven is one where a man and a woman become more richly themselves together that the chances either of them could have managed to become alone.” I had the entire essay that it comes from read at my wedding. I continue to believe that Buechner was right and that means that my marriage was not, since this current awareness of self exposes that I did not become more richly myself than I have managed to become alone. That is, strangely, comforting.

Rhonda, Part II

Dear Elena,

Do you remember when I was so braindead to the world because I’d been hit with too much betrayal and transition and I had my house to sell and a yard/garden full of weeds and you came over and just did the work since I was totally paralyzed at the thought of where-do-I-even-start? Well, I started to repay you just a little bit today.


This is how the community on the island works. A woman named Rena lives next door to where I live and has a small farm there. She had back surgery this year so she’s taking a break from growing. However, she wants her facilities to be used for good things, so she offered Rhonda the use of her greenhouses. This is a huge boon for Rhonda since she won’t be able to afford building greenhouses for another couple of years and she get a jump on spring planting in this crucial first planting.

So, I went with Rhonda and we cleared out two of the three greenhouses in about five hours. I don’t think I’ve worked that hard since I got here. In the second greenhouse, Rena had been growing cherry tomatoes and the vines were all tangled in the trellis with rope and by their own machinations. All of the plants were completely dried out and moldy. I cleaned that all by myself. It was like hacking through the jungle with Indiana Jones, if I do say so myself. The satisfaction involved in completing that task was like building something but in reverse. Both involve looking at a new image when the job is done and knowing that I was responsible for the change. It was a gorgeous day. It had snowed the day before but the sun was out, making the colors of the farm brilliant as the snow melted. As the greenhouses warmed up as the day went by, the snow would melt and slough off. Neat. We took a break in the middle of the work to eat peanut butter and homemade plum jam sandwiches and to drink homemade chai tea. We cleared every dead thing out of those greenhouses, leaving perfect, chocolaty, turned and raked soil beds. Rhonda like to let the new equilibrium get established before planting seeds so we got to leave all that potential when we came back to my house for some navy bean soup that I had made. She likes to honor the fact that most of what happens in growing doesn’t have anything to do with the farmer.

We’ll just leave that metaphor unspoken and simply enjoy it.

Don't Tell Mom

I'm doing some grant writing for my dad and in the middle of an email to him with a new draft of a particular section of an application, I wrote this:

Braxton just caught a rat. I dropped the computer. It's OK, though. She's here because its snowing so Jeff dropped her off here before going to the Exchange. I'm glad she is because the rat actually tripped the rat trap but got away. I could see the whole thing but I don't think I would have been willing to go catch the stunned creature with my hands. I gave Braxton a piece of leftover sausage as a reward for taking it outside for me.

Don't tell Mom.

Go Gently,
Rebecca

Stunted

It's hard living in a place where almost everyone has stunted social skills. I mean, I'm physically tired and worn out from dealing with people here. I just want to go home and not talk to anyone for days.

My pastor says that thing about islanders is that they live on an island. Then he leaves a pause for the laughter that an obvious definition like that should cause. He goes on to explain that people on islands are there deliberately. One doesn't just end up living somewhere where most conveniences of modern living are often unavailable. Part of that deliberate choice often comes from not fitting in socially anywhere else.

Now, some of you are forming pictures of cast iron pots and kettles in your heads as you read this and to you I stick out my tongue and say, "Thppss!" My social awkwardness (sometimes I'm a little feisty, for those of you that don't know) is nothing compared to out here. It's hard to describe. I'm afraid that putting it into words will make it seems less. But, after the 10th man has said, "Hey! wake up!" when he has walked into my store while I was reading (my book store, mind you) or suggested laziness in some other way, I have a right to be tired. Guys start conversations with, "Are you in a good mood today?" even if I have never been in a bad mood with that individual in the past. Another man has asked my name four times but still calls me Pyewacket (the store name) because he can't remember it. He's not even slightly embarrassed. He just walked in the store looking for Jane even though he has called twice today and spoken to me both times, learning that Jane wasn't here both times, saying only "You've not who I'm looking for," when he walked in. The warm fuzzies are just rolling out of me with greetings like that. This is in addition to all of the clumsy come-ons that are inevitable on an island full of bachelors of every age. Sometimes I'm charmed by them but lately I just want to tell Larry and Roger that it just doesn't matter how old I am. I think this stems from some confrontations that I've had lately. They fall into two categories: passive-aggressive men and pushy women.

Hannah, despite her peroxided hair and punk sense of style, grew up a hippie. She has traumatic memories of having to drink cashew milk, working at the food co-op and coaxing her stoned mother to clean the fridge or to arrive on time to school functions. She has brought to my attention that many people on the island behave passively-aggressively because that is the only way for hippies and other liberals to admit any kind of disagreement with anyone else. Anything more direct and it must be admitted that, no, we can't all just get along. So, when George, the founder of The Exchange asked me, "Don't you think everything looks better now? So much less clothing than before." I looked him the eyes and said, "No." When he asked indignantly "Why not?" I listed my reasons. This offended him to a degree that he attempted to verbally abuse me to get me to agree with him for 20 minutes. The fact that I wouldn't allow him to belittle me or my opinions but rather engaged with him only when his arguments were respectful and pointed out when his other statements weren't, made him more angry. Those of you with the pots and kettles in your heads are laughing but that fight isn't really what I'm complaining about. I will take responsibility for heated words and my occasionally abrasive tone in that one. Later, however, although George and the rest of the staff had approved the wording of a brochure I had written, George proceeded to rewrite every sentence, keeping my organization and ideas but changing the words and submitted that for publication. Plus, although he fought with every member of The Exchange staff that week, I'm the only one who didn't get an apology. I'm not teaching teenagers anymore and I just don't feel like dealing with those kinds of tantrums. Sure, I fight, but I go back later and try to find a resolution, not revenge. Another man implies every time he comes into the store that I'm lying when I say that I like living here. He says things like, "Well, have fun at home for Christmas. It was nice knowing you. Be sure to take everything with you," in this super smarmy Dale Carnegie tone. When I told him calmly, smiling and in a simple straight-forward way that I would prefer it if he didn't suggest that, he slowly boiled into a rage while he shopped for books, finally yelling that I should call the police (he said that four times) because he wasn't ever leaving. I never moved past calm and straightforward in that conversation. Again, it was like standing in the hallway waiting for an over-wrought kid to wind down.

The pushy women make me even more grumpy. I don't mind being told what to do when a hierarchy or even a relationship is already established. Bosses, mentors, directors, close friends, my mother, my father and Daniel: they all get to tell me when I'm out of line or when there was a better way to have done something. The other girl that works at the bookstore left me a list of "Things to do if I have time" that included shelve books, vacume [sic] if needed and to love and accept myself totally. Let's keep in mind that she can't count the money accurately, has trouble alphabetizing and doesn't read anything other than metaphysical books. #1 What does she think I do with my day? #2 Who is she to be giving me suggestions? I don't leave 3rd grade math exercises for her to practice with do I? Also this week, at choir practice, during the break a woman was speaking to the high school girl that sits next to me and I heard something about "and your neighbor . . ." Since the woman's tone was light, I continued walking toward them smiling and asked, "What about her neighbor?" "You need to sit up when you sing, too." What?!? I wish I had thought quickly enough to say, "Hi, I'm Rebecca, we weren't properly introduced before you started correcting me." #1 She walks in late every week. #2 We were sight-reading a difficult piece previous to the break and I was focused on notes rather than tone. #3 Who is she to tell me what to do? The director is the type to make her unhappiness with my behavior known if necessary. I would never dream of correcting a total stranger, especially in such a patronizing way. I was left gaping.

So, all of these slights and insults, both intentional and those rising out of simple social ignorance have put me on edge. This week it's hard to remember the sense of community that I love here, because it feels like a dysfunctional family with all of its hidden barbs and unresolved tensions.

Too-Tight Rhonda

Many of you have asked for descriptions of the type of people that live on the island. One that I have found myself using as an example over and over on my trip back to the Midwest has been that of Rhonda. She's really neat. She's about my age and really adorable, with cute blonde curly hair and that sparkly cute-girl personality. Often her shoulder-length hair is in two pigtails and she has that classic farm-girl aspect to her. Rhonda has a certain fashion quirk of wearing clothes that are way too small for her. She's not at all big, but seems to choose children's clothing, so that blouses gap between buttons and pants force flesh up and over. It seems to be a deliberate fashion choice and is part of what makes Rhonda sweet. (Jeff always looks a little scandalized when I refer to her as Too-Tight Rhonda because I think he thinks he'll slip and actually address her that way if he hears it enough.) Rhonda has been especially kind to me since my arrival on the island. She makes sure to invite me to things and told me, "I've been thinking about you singing all those words all by yourself to I WILL SURVIVE around the campfire. I thought, 'That's the kind of girl that I want to be friends with.'" It's always nice when someone has been thinking about you during times when you aren't actually together and she's the first to really express her approval of me in such an unequivocal way. I'm filled with the metaphorical warm feeling just thinking about how nice she is.

The really cool thing about Rhonda is, though, that she has a vision for her life and she is following it. Rhonda is a farmer. She has been working as a kind of farm manager, I think, contracting with farmers on the islands to help them produce more efficiently. She was working witht the Bullock family, (http://www.permacultureportal.com/HTML/Hm.htm) who are famous permaculture practitioners. However, recently, she has managed to lease an acre of good farmland in Crow Valley, which is on the main road through the island. I know that it is good farmland because I overheard her telling joe Bullock about it at the celebration party and he got really excited once he realized just what piece she had. I like it because you can see her working as you drive from town to The Exchange. She is going into business for herself, growing organic food sustainably to sell locally. She says she's scared to death, especailly because she does not have all the money she needs to get started but when I drove by and the sun was shining on her kneeling and measuring out the plots by hand while her dog sat above her on the hill, watching, I was jealous. She is doing what I want to be doing: following a passion. She has gained the skills she needs and is now dedicating herself to a goal that doesn't exploit anything or anyone. And she loves it.

Rhonda is offering shares of the harvest for $500 for 20 weeks worth of vegetabes. The list of what she intends to grow includes artichokes, arugula, chioggia & golden beets, broccoli & brussel sprouts, joi choi cabbage, collards & cauliflower, lemon cucumbers, herbs - culinary and medical, deer tongue lettuce, parsnips, trunips & rutabagas, golden & red raspberries, strawberries galore, cherokee purple tomatoes, winter squast and raven zucchini. That's not even all of it. As you might have guessed, the clever phrasing is hers from her brochure. She calls it la campesina project and writes that she is located, "at lone cow farm 1969 orcas road on a south facing slope, of the flanks of crow valley in the salish sea, on beautiful orcas island." She also writes, "An extra pair of hands, another kindred spirit & more kind hearts are aways welcome at the project . . . young & old alike . . ." I've already told her that I'd like to help out but I think I will call again and use this time that I'm not working to at least help someone else follow her passion.

Everyday Living

In my conversations with people since I've been home, I realize that it's hard for some of you to picture my surroundings. I will try to show you pictures as I get them developed and digitized.

This is the Island Flavor where I currently do not work but hope to work there in the future. I do spend a lot of time there chatting with Hannah, who is one of two women friends that I have made all on my own. For some reason, wherever I go, I seem to latch on to sassy women with great laughs and here is not exception.


The Flava is at the top of a T intersection. If you follow the stem of that T away from the Flava (it's called Prune Alley; how cool is that?) on the left will be Shearwater Kayaks, which is where Jeff works in the summer and occasionally, I will carry spring rolls from the organic deli over if Tom is there and have lunch with him because the conversation is always interesting.


If you turn around and look behind you after looking at Shearwater, you will see the only true grocery store on the island. The existence of a grocery store has been a popular one, especially for those that think I have left civilization altogether. I even included the parking lot in this picture to show the extent of civilization possible, but I've never actually seen it full. Notice the dominance of VW cars. The VW density is probably the highest in the country here.

Everyday occurances

Things of note that have happened since I returned to the island after the holidays:

-The island received 3 inches of snow, which ground everything to a halt, especially for people at the end of driveways (usually gravel roads) on an incline. Even church was cancelled. Unusually, the snow and ice stuck around for over a week. This hasn’t happened in about ten years.
-My pipes froze but did not burst because the kooky guy that built this place used dishwasher tubing instead of copper pipes.
-My class on memoir writing was cancelled due to lack of participation.
-I had my first choir rehearsal. I like the high standards of the director. Dr. Whitecotton and Alan would approve of her. We’re doing a Benjamin Britten piece using the poems of Christopher Smart. It’s goofy. Although I have been stuck in the front row with the other first sopranos, I’ve made my first outreach to the back row, where all of the fun people are. The high school girl next to me is all stuck up and defensive. A stranger group of men I’ve never seen than in this bass section. Imagine every crazy intellectual outdoor man (Whitman, Hemingway, etc.) and someone that looks like him sings bass in this choir.
-I lost all of my hours at the Island Flavor.
-I’ve applied to substitute at the schools but have so far been ignored.
-I’ve met Owen Lawrence, Rachel’s new baby with a full head of long, dark hair. I needed that.
-I went over to the state-of-the-art animal shelter to spend time with the two pugs that were there waiting for their owners to get back from drug rehab. Although it was fun, neither equaled Retha for personality or cuddliness.
-I refilled the 100-gallon propane tank and bought a cord of wood. This was before I knew that I had lost my hours at the Flav.
-I’ve begun working out regularly with a woman named Mindy. We meet at 7 in the morning so we can listen to regular CD’s instead of work-out cover band CD’s. We’ve been shuffling the Beastie Boys with a 70’s mix of hers so the other day, “Sabotage” was followed by “Me and Mrs. Jones.” It was surreal.
-I’ve begun listing things that I get at the Exchange (mostly books) on the internet for sale. I’ve already made over $20.

I think that’s it. Just a little update on day-to-day life. I hope you enjoyed it.

Bubbling to the top

I’ve been laying kind of low lately; as always during the past two years, some days are harder than others. I seem to have had a slew of “some days” all in a row. Some of this has to do with having lost all of my hours at the Island Flavor, because they have reduced the hours in general for the winter. Since it was my major source of income, I’m a little panicked. Because I have some savings, I’m not panicked a lot. This has given me a lot of time to myself in the last week or so. It’s been pretty intense. Especially since I no longer have free cable or any other sort of television since mine went out. Apparently, the guy who normally lives in my trailer was pirating his cable off of my landlady and when the storms hit, his splice knocked out everyone around and brought the fury of the cable company down on my landlady. Since hell hath no fury like a couch potato denied, I think he’s probably glad he’s safe in Thailand.

For the past two years, I have relinquished my title as The Girl Who Doesn’t Watch TV entirely. I dub the summer after Dennis left as The Summer I Spent On The Couch because very literally every day I would wake up in the morning, go work out, come back, shower, and lay on the couch to watch TV for the rest of the day. Because I had no cable, as often as not, I would end up watching infomercials. It was a sad, sad time for me. I think I developed a little crush on Ron Popeil. After that, I was just in the habit and when I got here and there was free cable, I was doomed. Since having to live in the quiet with my own thoughts and no work, I realize that I have been using TV and busy-ness to keep from thinking. It’s been a pretty intense week. I’ve knitted. I’ve read my epic fantasy series. I’ve listed items for sale on the internet. I’ve worked on my quilt made out of Dennis’s boxer shorts. I’ve avoided cleaning. All with music in the background instead of VH1’s Top 100 Celebrity Overindulgences chattering away in my head. And I think that little bits of passion have begun bubbling up out of the quiet. I’ve begun to want things for myself. I look forward to carving out community for myself in a city. I’ve realized that I still form lesson plans in my head and talk about favorite lectures from my past. I guess I’m not done with teaching even if I’m still not quite ready to go back. I think about dating and going to grad school. I think about living this life as a barrista/used bookstore attendant with no responsibilities in a city environment. I looked at the classifieds in the Chicago Reader. I no longer have that smushed, cottony, distanced feeling when I think about what’s next. It’s intense. I can also draw tears and a panicky feeling just by breathing in too deeply. I think that the resurgence of passion is what’s making some days harder than others. Still, it’s better than betrayals making some days harder than others.

Well, back to my scissors.

Total Girl

Today, I was a total girl and did not change my own flat tire. In my old life, I considered myself fairly competent in that area. I carried fix-a-flat in my trunk, and had one of those guarantees with NTB so that they would fix any flat for free once I bought the tires from them. Well, that just won’t work here on the island. When I tried to use the fix-a-flat, it just wouldn’t come out of the can and even if it did work, the closest NTB is at least a ferry crossing away.

So, here’s how it happened. I had left Jeff’s house and was calmly driving along listening to the dulcet tones of Nick Drake because I had watched the movie Garden State yesterday and heard some on the soundtrack. Also, I’ve had a tough couple of days emotionally and Nick Drake just felt right. It’s raining (of course it’s raining) which is actually a good thing because that means that it has warmed up and the snow is being washed away. So, I’m cruising along, happy not to be driving in the slush and ice that I’ve been driving in lately because, although there are four snowplows on the island, only one of them works. (You know you’ve grown up in Chicagoland, when you have a superiority complex about snow removal.) So, I’m fairly mellow and successfully watching out for rocks that have slid down the mountainside onto the road. In fact, I’m so successful that my hubris causes me to think that this next thing in the road is probably just a big clump of slush. Sorry, Odysseus, you should have paid a little more attention to the gods with that one. I hear a big thud, then a hissing, then I realized that if I let go of the steering wheel, I veered distinctly to the right. So, I pulled over right near the Studio 4:20, which is also a horse farm. The horses looked at me strangely as I got out to confirm, yup, it’s definitely flat.

To give myself, credit, I at least entertained the notion of being a big girl and fixing it myself. Hey, I’ve got a Saturn, the most user-friendly car in the world! I flicked on the blinkers, opened the trunk, pushed the ratty wool blanket, tarp, drop cloth, seal-a-meal and argyle rain boots out to the edges of the compartment and lifted up the flooring. I was off to a good start in that, yes, there was a spare tire under there with detailed instructions on the cover. As I began to skim the directions, however, some other part of my brain began pulling up little bits of remembered conversations. I think I remember someone once saying that you have to be careful where to put the jack or you’ll bend vital parts of the car. That kid yelling, “Oh, fudge!” in slow motion as he lost all those lugnuts on A Christmas Story. The feel of skinned knuckles that I was sure I would acquire since I would have to trial and error most of the screwing and unscrewing in relation to the ground. I realized that I was kidding myself. I’d never even watched someone else change a tire. On a sunny day when I had a recent history of being emotionally stable, sure I could take the time and puzzle it out. In the rain, after several days of crying simply because I took too deep a breath, I didn’t stand a chance. So, I closed the trunk, got out my Kermit the Frog umbrella and began walking back to Jeff’s house, reveling in the good spirits that I, now, wasn’t going to lose.

Earlier, when I attempted to use my fix-a-flat, I also tried calling Jeff to see if he would come out. Since the island is mountainous, there are lots of places where cell phones don’t get signals because those places are in what is called the shadow of the mountain. Studio 4:20 is not, however, one of those dead zones. Yet, still, I was unable to call Jeff. The reason for this I that I had earlier been stupid and had left my phone on while I drove the length of the island and back several times. Every time I crossed through aforementioned mountain shadows, my phone labored to find a signal for the entire length of the shadow, which runs the battery down pretty quickly. Needless to say, it was quite unoperational by the time that I needed it.

So, I’m walking in the rain and several trucks pass going the opposite direction and wave, since it’s that kind of place. After about a quarter of a mile, I hear a car coming up behind me and stick out my thumb. Don’t freak out, Mom, people hitchhike on the island all the time. In fact, I usually pick them up if I can. They make for usually pretty interesting conversations. So, that karma (ha ha, car-ma) must have been paying off because a little old man named Thurmond picked me up in his shiny new red truck. The cab was very warm and we talked a little bit about how he came to the island in 1946 after the war. It also took us a little while to figure out just exactly where I needed to be dropped off.

So, I made some coffee and did some dishes while Jeff got out of bed with barely a grumble. I did get to ride in his VW bug, which I’ve never gotten to do before because my car is so much nicer, we always take it. It has little miniature windshield wipers (read that last phrase in a teeny-tiny voice) and he has a little squeegee to wipe the steam from the inside of the windshield that occurs when warm wet bodies pile into a cold car. It also has no heat, so I was glad that I grabbed a pair of mittens. The rest of the story is pretty anti-climactic. Jeff changed the tire with ease and good-humor while actually instructing me in how to do it the next time, with helpful hints and the like. He was impressed at the engineering of the little tiny spare and the jack. The tire is now at the Shell station. They’ll call when it’s fixed and I assume I will have to put it back on so I’m glad I watched Jeff take it off.

So, another adventure on the island. There is no moral to this one or even many jokes. Just an experience I wouldn’t have had if there was an NTB around or even a house closer to the road than 500 feet.

Meltdown in a snowstorm

I have loved going backstage in theatres ever since Greg Becker's uncle gave us a tour of the Auditorium Theater after a production of Phantom of the Opera when I was in high school. It was glorious and the dominant memory that I have of it is looking up to see a gigantic skirt hanging from one of the booms. They just lowered it onto Christine when necessary! Freaking cool. I guess that I must have had experiences going backstage before that since Dad did so much work in the theatre and I know that my freshman year we must have had a small tour of the new Steppenwolf Theatre because I remember going to see opening night of their first production there. But Greg Becker pointing out his uncle's white sneakers under the curtain at intermission because he was in position to catch the falling chandelier felt like "real" backstage stuff.

Since then, I have gotten to see a three-legged dog in the basement of Steppenwolf, toured the Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, and played in the costume shop of Cedar Point theme park, Plus, I've been a studio teacher, so I have gotten to wander through the Schubert with the kids from The Full Monty, I got to see a dress rehearsal of Kander/Ebb/McNally's The Visit at the Goodman and I went on tour with Dragontales and learned quite a bit about the life and smells of real stagehands.

Today, I got to see the wig and make-up shop of the Lyric Opera and to talk to their wigmaster and wig shop manager for a good 45 minutes. They were so welcoming and personable. I was tagging along with my friend Camilla, who is a fabulous fashion and costume designer. (She made my wedding dress, for those of you out there that were impressed by it.) Camilla is in an exclusive graduate program at Penn State University to get her Master's in costume design after getting her undergraduate degree in Fashion here in Chicago. She has worked her ass off and I have so much respect for her talents. She reads the plays she designs for as literature. She does more than read them; she studies them. She does oodles of research on the history of design so her own productions have real depth and authenticity. She has a passion and she has done the work to gain the skills to fulfill that passion. If I doubted her passion, I would be proven wrong by the time we spent together before the opera at the Field Museum's Jackie Kennedy exhibit. She was the perfect person to go see that with since she marvels at the actual construction of the gowns and knows the work of the designers and can understand how the dresses and suits came to be designed. She loved it. She more than loved it; she appreciated it. That appreciation made my own experience better.

When we got into the wig shop, Camilla didn't start right in because she is sometimes shy, so the wigmaster started on his usual spiel for dummies with, "Almost all of our wigs are made from human hair." He got one or two more sentences out and Camilla asked, "So, do you do your own ventilation?" Rick did a visible double-take and then smiled. I had no idea what they were talking about after that. They were absorbed in talking about what they knew because it was interesting to them and because they wanted to see if there was anything they could learn from one another. Pure passion. Camilla had her portfolio and he wanted to see it, out of genuine interest. They had a passion and it was satisfying to watch them share it with each other.

And so, we get to my meltdown. I don't have a passion. That's why I moved to the island: to rest and allow a latent passion rise to the surface. It's getting better; I have hobbies now, at least. That helps. But no passion. No desire that shapes the choices that I make in life. It sucks. But, I didn't realize that that old angst was rising to the surface in its place until I was slogging through the snow walking home from the train station. Frustration at not being picked up in what I believed to be a timely fashion (even though I knew I was rediculous to expect my mom to be a chauffer) acted as a release and I had a slight meltdown with my mom (who's wonderful) when I got home.

I was reading another blog and the man wrote about finding his "Ebenezer" in the town he had recently moved to, referring to the old hymn, "Come Thou Font Of Every Blessing," which is basically a plea to God, asking him to show us the way. Actually, rather than a plea, it's more of a request asked in a tone of confidence that the answer will come. I know that I will find something that I want to learn skills in order to do. I will find my Ebenezer. It just sucks sometimes that I'm not home yet.

Here I raise my Ebenezer
Hither by thy help I'm come
And I hope by thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home

Chestnuts roasting

How was your holiday, Rebecca? Good question. Glad you asked. I spent a good part of the first week with my family, just hanging around the house or running errands with my mother. We made chocolate thumbprint cookies and I worked on making the magnets that were gifts to my extended family. (hint - when making magnets, always glue the decorative part to the side of the magnet that does NOT stick to metal; otherwise, you have to go back and fix like half of them) Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are the best parts of my family's celebration. My brothers arrive sometime in the afternoon of the 24th. Paul made it easy to light a fire in the fireplace and Mom has the tree lit. The night before, Jill, Clara and the twins were over to set up the train around the base (time-outs were involved; I'll not mention who had to take them). In that setting, we just hang out. I am so thankful that I was born into a family that in full of people that have the same perspective on live and what to do with time and into a house that has room for all of us to have our own space. We enjoy just being together. Often, that time involves making fun of my dad. I miss that casual time most when I'm on Orcas. We went to 5:00 church, which is designed for families with young children: only one or two verses of each carol and no sermon.

We are not good role models to the other children, despite the twenty to thirty years that we have of supposed maturity. It didn't help that we were in folding chairs in the Narthex and had no hymnals for the weird hymns that they put at the beginning of the service. We can do all the verses of the traditional ones in three part harmony (it would be four, but I'm the only girl). So, the lack of anything to do during the hymns makes us a little bored and we fill the time making each other laugh. Upon noticing the 5-year-old boy with light streaming pink through his ears, wearing a hand-knit-by-his-mother traditional German folk sweater, David whispered to me, "If he's really lucky, they'll take lots and lots of pictures." When the child with the strangely Cornish accent was reading, "In those days a decree went out from Ceasar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria," he sounded oddly indentical to in his struggle to pronouce the passage as Paul had on a fateful Chrstmas years ago that we've never allowed him to forget. David leaned over, patted him on the shoulder soothingly and comforted, "I'm sure he's a very bright boy." The implication was clear and very funny. Poor Paul, when he went to light his candle from the pastor's, the wick of his hit the wick of Jerry's in just the right way to extinguish the flame that the pastor had carried all the way from the Christ candle while reciting, "In the beginning was the word," and so forth. David leaned over again and asked, "What did Jerry say when you snuffed the light of Christ?" As if the accident itself hadn't already reduced us to silent choking tears in an extremely solemn moment of ceremony. Good thing Presbyterians don't put too much stock in symbolism. :-)

Dinner on Christmas Eve involved shrimp, lobster and crab legs. Woohoo! That kind of interactive food makes much of our own entertainment. We have always woken up on Christmas morning together, although there is always debate and complaining about when the first should and does rise. We snack on whatever is available (trust me, there's lots), have our own Advent ceremony celebrating Christ's birth with candles and songs, then settle into unwrapping presents. In past years, Dad has made us guess and gone about the order of who opens what with some formula known only to him. This year was a little less formula and a little more carnage. As we're all adults now, apparently guessing has been put out to pasture. After the paper was mostly picked up and David's Roomba was set to charge its battery, Mom makes amazing eggs, I make toast with the corners buttered too and Dad made a pot of the coffee that I brought from my store that was roasted on the 20th. We then laze about for the rest of our day, involving each other in our explorations of our presents. We did attempt a movie, but when we got to the theatre, THE LIFE AQUATIc had never even arrived, so we went home to make more of our own entertainment. All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable two-day holiday.