September 26, 2005

Forgive and Forget?

I’ve been in a place of self-reflection of late. Mostly, I’ve been thinking about past relationships and their undoing. I’ve come to a place of seeing that my partners have had their part in the undoing of a love and I have had mine. To a greater or lesser degree, I am responsible. That, really, is not the point, though. I am thinking about how to move past pain and regret into a place of forgiveness.

Forgetting Is Not Part of the Equation.

I’ve come to believe that forgiveness has nothing to do with forgetting. That is a naïve equation. If I forget it is as if nothing happened; a consequence of this is that nothing is learned. Learning is a costly endeavor. Learning about the human heart is the most costly of all. We humans are imperfect. We love partly out of selfish motives, partly out of selfless motives. There is a paradox in that and that paradox creates a tension that I think is fundamental to the heart’s longing for a beloved.

No, forgiveness can only happen when the choice is made to exonerate the other in full knowledge of the pain. How else can healing happen? I can merrily allow the disease to go on, lying to myself and the other or I can face down the difficulty and let go of my claim. This is not to say that I will stand and be a doormat: that is stupidity. Forgiveness is the absolution that allows for repentance (allowing for my overtly religious vocabulary).

What Does this Mean for Me?

I have come to a point of declaring a general amnesty to all those that have hurt me. This does not mean that I wish to reestablish connections with all of these people. In some cases I don’t believe that they are capable of an honest relationship of any sort. People that have elected to lie cannot be trusted to be honest. People that have trashed my heart repeatedly cannot be seen as friends; they have proven that their moral character is diminished. There is a point when forgiveness becomes an expression of cheap grace that demands no repentance. That is foolishness. I will be nobody’s doormat. But, equally, I will not live in bitterness toward those people.

There are people that I once loved. There are people that chose to treat the love offered cheaply. There are those that I offended and hurt as well. Forgiveness means not forgetting the pain, but moving beyond it. I will not allow my life to be defined by the way others have treated my heart. That is foolishness. Equally, I will not be the slave of my own desire for them to hurt like they hurt me.

Bitterness

“Get over it” has become my new mantra. I can choose life of choose death. Get busy living or dying, but just sitting is not life. I will not give the power to hurt me to those that have been unworthy of my heart’s deepest emotions. I have recently given that to a person that was in no way worthy of that. My mistake: I should never have allowed myself to go there. Get over it… get over her. Move on without harboring any bitterness toward her. She is not worth the energy.

Bitterness is expensive. It costs life itself. It seems to me that the many psycho-babes that I encountered had some measure of this in their lives. It is like poison. It eventually becomes the stuff that defines relationships in the light of a past not processed. The sins of the past become the context of the present and I am held accountable for the sins of others. That is the result of not living in forgiveness. I will not do that to anybody else. As for those of you that have done this to me, you have to live with your own private hell with flames of your own kindling and chains of your own forging. This was not done to you; by choosing not to let go you have made this into a hell.

You have two choices, roast in the flames or get over it.

It really is that simple.

September 11, 2005

Sundry Thoughts on Sunday Morning

It is early on Sunday Morning. The last several days have been OK. I am starting to fall into a rhythm at school, though five in the morning still seems like cruel and unusual punishment. I am having better success with my fifth period science class, though I still want to find things that I can do “hands-on.” The room I have is not set up for anything like that, sadly. I will have to improvise something.

Sixth period is my problem group. I have resigned myself to having some “fun” activity at the end of the day. I let them play something. It is a reward for merely being difficult for the previous forty minutes. They are SPED kids. The attention span has been tried and pushed to its limits. Also, most have reading difficulties. Again, this is life science. I would like to have something more hands-on, but the room… same song, different key.

Trying to Think About 9/11

I tried to write about 9/11, but found that what I remember most is the assault on Civil Rights that congress passed under the ironically named “The Patriot Act.” I kept thinking of the lives lost in Iraq and Afghanistan owing to wars based on lies. I kept thinking about one of my students over the summer. I had given a writing assignment. I took what I thought would be an innocuous theme: “If I could speak to the President, I’d ask him…” Seemed like a good thing at the time. One girl wrote, “I would ask him why he killed my cousin. I miss him…” What could I say? When I wrote my comments to her, I told her about losing my cousin in Viet Nam. Shallow comfort: two deaths for lies told to the American people by our leaders.

I still stand resolute in my conviction that the war on terror is an unjust war. War is not a metaphor in this sentence, like the “War on Poverty.” This is a shooting war with no clearly defined enemy. Why has there been no outcry against the idea of a war against an idea? That is most frightening to me.

Yes, there are horrible and immoral people that will use terror as a weapon. We have had such a group in this country. The KKK was the terrorist wing of the Democratic Party in the South following the Civil War. The Democrats faced their demons; and have done well in separating themselves from this bloody past. Ironically, the Republican Party was the party of individual rights. It now has become the party of neo-fascism. It is the party of terror on an international scale. Why have we not considered the reason for the birth of terror? We created this monster though years of dependency on the resource they hold: oil. When human dignity is crushed so a foreign power can take a resource, the people that are broken can be rallied as a potent political force. Add religion to the mix and it becomes a crusade.

I am in no way condoning these acts: they are cruel, heartless, and barbarous. I would hope that we could find a way to break free from this cycle of despair. We are a creative and resourceful people. We need to do a new thing.

Back To Other Thoughts

I have been suffering from compassion-overload with the non-stop news about Hurricane Katrina. I have begun to wonder if there are any other events in the world news. It was horrible. I wonder why the administration that had demanded centralization of response to natural disaster could not respond more quickly. A hurricane is not like an earthquake. An earthquake strikes with no warning. The weather service can see a hurricane as it begins formation and sets a trajectory. It was not the wind or rain that did the most damage; it was the storm surge that followed. The levees were overwhelmed. Build a city on the coast below sea-level and floods must be anticipated.

It is all too easy to blame the director of FEMA. Yes, he bears some responsibility. The greater measure of responsibility goes to the Chief Executive that appeared oblivious to the threat. Centralize authority and the buck is going to land on the central authority’s desk. It did one thing for Mr. Bush. Cindy Sheehan was effectively blown off of the news.

Disorganized Thinking This Morning

I generally like to write to a theme. I like to have some coherency in what I am saying. If you are taking time to read, I need to write clearly. Today seems to be the exception to the rule. My mind is all over the map.

I am looking forward to school on Monday. I like the kids. I like it when I can see them learning. I like it when they push themselves a bit. Yeah, there are discipline problems. But they are not overwhelming. I just keep on keeping on. I like the school where I am working and enjoy my colleagues.

That’s all for now… maybe next time I’ll be more clear in my thoughts.

Happy Sunday.

- tDF

September 06, 2005

Unusual Emotional Response...

I've had a strange sensation for the past several days: I'm happy. It has been so long. I like this. This is a good thing. I could get used to this.

I've felt depressed, down, anxious for so long that the feeling of contentment and hope was unusual. A bit like singing poetry by Emily Dickinson to the tune of "The Yellow Rose of Texas." Try it, it works! Go ahead, you know you want to...

My life closed twice
Before its close
And it remains to see
If immortality unveil
A third event to me

So huge so hopeless
To conceive as those
that twice befell
For parting is all we know of heaven
and all we need of hell.



Go ahead... try it!


Gilligan died September 2nd; his death was announced today. Bob Denver expired at age seventy. I remember him as Maynard G. Krebbs. The lyrics to the Gilligan's Island theme song can be sung to the tune to "Stairway to Heaven." Seems darkly appropriate. But I digress...

There are several things that need to happen yet before I can say that my life has its order back. But I can see clear to their completion. I feel like I am at the edge of the forest and entering a new phase of life that is good.

Life finds a way. This happiness thing seems good to me.

-tDF

September 04, 2005

Order and Chaos in My Home

I suppose that one of the barometers of my emotional wellbeing is the condition of my apartment. When I am doing well things are clean and orderly. Well, maybe not too orderly, but most assuredly clean. Chaos in my home is very disconcerting. I can deal with a little clutter here and there, but I like things to be in some sort of discernable order. Lately my home has been a mess. Today was time to reclaim my environs.

It Seemed Like I Only Slept Here

My little apartment was my concession to my daughter’s need to be on land. Prior to this I was happy living on my boat. During my nautical hiatus, I lived a life that required that every thing have its place and every place had a thing that was assigned to it. A boat, even one as large as I inhabited, is a small place. There is little room for clutter, especially underway. The expression “ship-shape” is survival on-board. Chaos can be disastrous on a vessel. Order is part of survival.

While my boat was not always “Bristol,” it was orderly. My home had become disorderly, no not merely disorderly, it had become downright dirty. During the past year and a half I had come to a point of only sleeping here. I read in previous postings a concern that I was not in my space; my space was becoming a drop off point. I had allowed myself to fall into an orbit around an unworthy sun. This, I believe, exacerbated the chaos that followed – and was displayed by the condition of my home.

When my marriage to SL ended, I slipped into a very deep depression. Living on the water was my salve. The ocean is healing for me. The need for order was therapeutic. I moved on land when my daughter began to require more privacy than a 34-foot long sloop would allow. In a sense, I had severed my connection with the ocean that was healing to me. My depression became more pronounced and I began to realize that I had to reform my life. That, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. Life is evolution. Nevertheless, the circumstances that ensued began my decline to my nadir.

Need Meeting Need?

I met MM during a time of grief for both of us. I was acutely aware of my isolation and wanting to be “coupled.” She was divorced and had just lost a parent. I believe that it is cynical to reduce emotion to the mutual fulfillment of needs, but I will not discount the motivation to find in another what we crave for ourselves. I believe that she was craving a sense of loving that she missed; I know that I was craving a partner. I tried to date some following SL. I also knew that I could easily have fallen into a period using sex as a drug. I realized, when I bedded a young secretary at the agency where I worked, that I was beginning down that path. I stopped. I had a few unsuccessful dates. There was, however, no real relationship for nearly two years after my divorce.

My life had become chaotic. I was looking for order. I thought I might have found it with MM. I was mistaken. Instead, I found greater chaos and consider that I narrowly averted falling into her many neuroses. I do not believe, looking back, that MM is capable of equal loving. She takes. She did not know how to give a gift. She would make investments, but was looking for a return. Equally, she did not know how to accept a gift; she looked for the hidden clause, the trap, the attached string. I gave unconditionally. She could not see this and considered that there was some implicit demand being made. There was none.

I do know, as I look back, that I began to lose myself.

Now, I have to say that I am not attempting to indict MM. On the contrary, I am responsible for the choices that I made. I chose a needy person that, in the end, may have some more serious issues that I hope she will address. I suppose the pressing question is what was so damned attractive about a person that was one step away from emotional implosion? Ah, there’s the rub…

From Chaos Comes Order?

This may work for cosmology and for Nietzsche; it does not work for me in a relationship. I looked at my home and realized that the chaos was reasserting itself. It was doing this in no uncertain way. It was doing this in a way that would ultimately be destructive for me. The dirty floors (which I had previously scrubbed once a month) and the mound of laundry were only symptoms of a greater issue. I was letting my life spin out of control. This is dangerous for a person fighting depression. This is difficult for a person whose loss is clouding his vision. This was dangerous for me.

I’ve already written enough about the ending of this relationship. There is no need to say more. It came to a bad end, sadly. One that was fostered by lies, manipulations, deceit. My part in this was to allow it to happen. All at once, I saw. I felt no anger, just the compelling need to break free from the darkness that MM had brought to my life. It is over. I am glad for that. To celebrate, I scrubbed my floors.

That does not sound like much of a celebration. However, it was a reclaiming of my space for me. That is more to the point. I cleaned and organized as if I was striking at the periphery of the chaos that had begun to reassert itself in my life. There is much work to be done, but the floors are clean enough to eat off of. My bathroom feels like the restroom in a four-star restaurant.

What Remains to Be Done?

There is much more than scrubbing floors and organizing the house for the simple pleasure of eating at my table and feeling at home in my space. That is a great thing. It began with my getting rid of the leopard that MM had given me. I gave it to the little girl next door. She is two. She can have it as a nice toy rather than being a constant reminder of a lost love. I threw out the shirt with the leopard on it from Las Vegas. I’m done with her. Be gone.

I have begun to work again. I have to complete my credential. I will do that this year. I have to organize my finances. I have to find a decent car. All of these things will be done. I want to organize my life to make space for a woman that is worthy of me.

That sounds so egocentric to me, still. I have always thought of myself as the one that had to be worthy of my partner. This tended to make me see my partner is an exaulted light, as more than she was. In a very real sense this was incredibly unfair to any partner since they could never be what I saw. Changing the paradigm also changes the need for this person to be something she is not. She only needs to be honest, kind, forgiving, strong, loving, and wise.

I am reclaiming food that I loved and loved to prepare: beautiful seafood, mushrooms, lamb, all seasoned for a mediterrianian palate. I am listening to the music I love: Blues, Jazz,and doing it live. I am reading again. I am enjoying fiction for the joy of the written word. I am riding my bike again. I am finding the things that gave me joy before I shut them away to suite the whims of another.

I am moving on. I cleaned my floors. I organized my kitchen. I am sorting through the mess that I laughingly called my finances. I am coming out of the storm. My sails are set and my course laid in.

It is my space, not a shitbox. I live hear. I like it here. Bristol. Yes, it is Bristol.

September 01, 2005

Life Finds a Way

My friend MAS has a favorite saying from Deepak Chopra: “Life finds a way.” I do not know the context of the quote. I like the idea that the simple, unadorned thought communicates to me: “Don’t sweat it dude; life is powerful stuff, it will find a way.”

An Indomitable Desire to Live

Life is stubborn stuff. It adapts and creates new possibilities to make itself possible. It is as if it wills itself into being and continuing to be. Life finds a way. It does not let go, but looks for the options that take the disheartening situations and turn them to its advantage. Darwin called it “natural selection.” Adaptation, the willingness to change and modify one’s self, is what makes life possible. The only absolute is the will to be. The rest is context. If science teaches us anything about life it is that overspecialization leads to extinction. Niche species, for all their charm and beauty, are dependent upon one set of variables, one food source, one environment. They die out quickly as the situation changes. Soon they are supplanted by other species that can make the leap.

I wonder why we, as a people, have apotheosized a style of life and canonized its claims in language that is nearly liturgical. We forget that it was our willingness to move beyond a set perimeter that allowed us to develop and to create new things. Hardship only creates opportunity for creativity. We descend from predators. Predation assumes intelligence. Intelligence is predicated upon creativity. It is the ability to see and advantage and exploit it in a situation that seems hopeless that creates a lust to live that must be satisfied.

In the immortal words of Chumba Wamba, “I get knocked down, but I get up again/ain’t nothin’ gonna keep me down…” Life finds a way.

Moving Beyond the Past

It seems that the hardest port to disembark is memory. The dock lines seem not to completely be released as we set sail into the dark unknown of the future. All of our hopes and dreams, our fears and prejudices, our love and hatred follow in one form or another. Moving beyond the past does not mean a disengagement from the past. It does mean that it no longer becomes the determining factor in the trajectory of life. The Christian church called this redemption and forgiveness. Pity it could never really practice these cardinal virtues, seeking instead to dwell in sin and guilt. But that is another posting for another day. Forgiveness: there is a powerful concept. It is key to setting sail from the past into the reality of this moment.

Forgiveness is the recognition of falling short of the mark. It is that simple. We all miss the target, we all fail. We get up again and start over. Failure does not become our legacy or our destiny; it is the opportunity to create a new way that propels us into the future with is wondrous dreams and terrible nightmares. We move on. We admit our fault and make do to do better. Beyond this forgiveness is the recognition of the same in others. They fail us. They fall short. But they try again to fix the problem. There is the crux of the thing: it is not simply enabling the same behavior as destiny, it is moving beyond into a new thing. Throw off the lines and dare to face the future. This is the only way that anything can live.

History?

I am, by training and temperament, a historian. This means that I am a patient man that has listened to the past but will not be imprisoned by it. The past is the pavement on the road to the future. It makes clear how we will arrive, it is not the destination. I learn from the past. I’ve made mistakes and, hopefully, have learned from them. I am not a prisoner to how the past played out. Santayana was correct: we study history to avoid its repetition. But I would go beyond: we study history to fulfill its hope.

Personal history is part of my motivation with the Dancing Fool. It is a way to set markers and to see where I am going and where I have to correct my course. I looked back to a posting about a year ago. Last year at this time I wrote that I was “Rounding the Bend.” That semester presented problems but it was finally a success. It brought me to this moment. History is like the stream of karma: each moment touch the next leading us to the present and into the future. But this awareness of the future cannot be allowed to severe our ties to the now if we are to live authentically. I know this to be true for me.

Here and Now

I remember my ninth grade English teacher, Mr. Peterson. He asked us to write a series of “Here and Now” observations. That assignment was in summer, before school nearly 35 years ago. “Here and now I see…” was the assignment. It forced me to begin to see, not merely to look at, my environment. It began the understanding that this moment is all that I really have. The past is memory, the future a dream. I live in my perception of the now. It is all I have. It is the moment that has to be embraced.

This realization allowed me to see that a life well lived in this moment makes for a life authentically lived. And it is true: Life finds a way…

Ah, but I am only a fool…