"Just help me go slow, I've been hurrying on"

Oh yes, months and months since I've written here, I know. Lots going on, and I've drawn back into myself a bit through the summer and fall. But here we are, on a cool and sunny and glorious early November afternoon; I'm listening to Conor Oberst (doing what always sounds to me like his best Bob Dylan impression) on his latest CD, and I thought I'd use my extra hour to at least get something down.

Daylight savings time always delights me, reminding me as it does that time as we experience it is just as much something generally agreed upon as it is any objectively existent reality.

Drew and I had a walk this morning, and a good conversation about different approaches to faith--particularly Christianity. We both tend to feel drawn to and focused on the social justice aspects of Christianity, more than the particularities of individual salvation (if that makes any sense as a necessarily overly simplistic and messy distinction). Thinking a in a bit more integrative vein this morning, I was wrestling with the idea that our goal is to have our will and God's will be one and the same. I do subscribe to that goal, in the sense that I think when we are truly compassionate and connected and open to creation, we don't want anything for ourselves that isn't also good for others. But I often feel that some Christian approaches (and probably other traditions, as well, that I'm not as familiar with) begin from the premise that we are naturally sinful and willful and selfish, and we must become broken and empty so God (or Christ, depending on your orientation) can fill us with this new being--so we can be born again. Myself, I tend to believe that actually we humans are naturally good, compassionate, and made in God's image, and that we must work to connect and live in harmony with this true self. Which in practice doesn't necessarily actually look totally different, but I think sometimes the attitude of it can be extremely different.

Do we start from the premise that we are flawed, and so must be broken and remade, or do we start from the premise that we are naturally good and must unlearn or transcend or work through the attitudes and behaviors that keep us distant from our true selves (like materialism, prejudice, envy, etc.)? I've seen on tee shirts and bumper stickers the saying: "Born right the first time." And while I don't support the condescending connotation that has (nor do I generally support the idea of proclaiming huge, complicated value-based ideas on tee shirts and bumper stickers, which in my experience are not great tools for promoting respectful dialogue...but that's another issue), there's something about that sentiment, if spoken in a spirit of love, that resonates with me.

Not sure if that makes sense, exactly, but it's what's in my head at the moment. I think maybe I'm particularly engaged with some of this right now as I contemplate the little being that is developing inside me as I am about halfway through my first pregnancy. I wonder...Where did she come from? What is her nature? How does she experience existence with no language, no images, no experience of the outside world? There's a whole host of existential, biological, spiritual questions. And practical questions: What are we going to teach her? What kind of life are we going to give her?

On a lighter note, I've been thinking that maybe it would be a great childhood traveling around with your parents in a mini-camper, having no money and visiting friends and playing guitar and taking photographs all around the country. It's funny that just as I'm entering into what is somewhat clearly a phase of my life that has an entirely different level of responsibility and a new need for safety and security, I am also really reexamining the side of myself that deeply values and is oriented toward freedom (and, on a concrete level, travel). It's an exciting time to contemplate alternate lives, whether we really end up exploring them or not. In the meantime, we're beginning to plan and recruit family and friends to help with what will need to be hasty house renovations this spring back at Beaver Creek. Truth is--I admit--I love the flux, the potential, the undecided nature of it all as the next great adventure begins.

Tea and Trees

Last night I woke up around 3am, feeling a heavy weight on my leg. It took me a few moments to realize that weight was Kelly--our 60lb golden retriever--trying to climb into our double bed. She was panting and shaking, severely alarmed by the lightning storm raging outside. It seems Kelly has grown increasingly nervous about storms in the four years or so she's lived with us. We let her come into bed and she hunkered down in between us, alternately panting, shaking, and whimpering for the next few hours while the storms passed through. We were all pretty tired this morning.

Today has turned out to be hazy, warm and breezy. The feeling in the air suggests that some more rain will probably be moving through at some point.

All this rain is good for the garden, I think, though I'm a little nervous that the seeds we put in this past weekend might actually get drowned as the soil continues to be compacted by the heavy storms. Overall the garden is in good shape. We used nearly all of our available bed space this year--hedging our bets with lots of tomato and pepper seedlings, along with peas, short season corn, parsnips, leeks, brussels sprouts, summer and winter squash, melons, basil and beans. Hopefully we'll be making trips back to WV in August and September to harvest the literal fruits (and vegetables) of our labors.

It's good to be home. The backyard has new wonders everyday, from buttercups and cherry blossoms to hummingbirds and snapping turtles. Drew was off from work last week and we enjoyed getting some projects done, taking lots of walks and hikes, attending a seemingly endless succession of social events, and each other's company. It also gave us some time to process and plan, as Drew has recently taken a new job that will potentially impact our long term plans together, including probably necessitating an eventual move to an adjacent county. For the next year, though, it means he will be living with me in Harrisonburg, which is exciting. I'm still struggling some with the idea of leaving the schoolhouse and our community of friends here, but thankfully it's not too far away and we don't need to make any big decisions for a while yet.

For now, I'm trying to concentrate on enjoying the summer stretching out before me. I took the huge luxury of not getting a real job for the next two months, so other than a once a week yoga class and a weeklong stint as a camp cook in July, I'm blissfully uncommitted. I'm hoping to get some house projects done, take lots of walks with Kelly, volunteer some, tend the garden and yard, complete the work for my summer peacebuilding institute course, and spend time visiting family and friends. Hoping I'll also be able to slow down enough to get some feeling of peace and centeredness heading into next year and beyond. Some persistent tension and recent sickness is a cue that all is not quite well in the internal emotional/mental/spiritual sphere at the moment. Hopefully nothing that can't be fixed by tea, trees, and time.

I've also been using my free time for lots of less productive pursuits, including downloading lots of podcasts, following the election news obsessively, and looking up useless information on the internet. Last night, Drew and I took a break from watching political speeches to research the cartoon character Miffy. Miffy is a line-drawn, primary colored rabbit who has adventures with her dog and other little animal friends. The Miffy stories center around educational backyard adventures or projects that Miffy completes cooperatively with the help of her neighbors. They play non-competitive games where the object is for everyone to end up with the same amount at the end. This is indescribably appealing to me both as a conflict transformation student and as a fan of adorable anthropomorphic children's book characters. I'm glad I married someone who will tolerate me wandering around the house in the morning singing: "Miffy: a sweet little bunny..."

we now return to your regularly scheduled navel-gazing

"Ahhhh...."

That is the sound of a satisfied exhale. All of my papers have been written, all of the residents of my dorm safely sent off to their summer pursuits. Even the majority of my end of the year paperwork is completed. (Feel free to join me in a sigh of vicarious exhausted satisfaction--I highly recommend it).

Yesterday, I attended a meeting for all faculty and staff. I was pleasantly surprised during a midmorning break to look around and realize that there were several people I knew and would actually like to talk to. This is still sort of a novel experience for me, as a person who is still sort of new to this community and excruciatingly uncomfortable in large group social situations. (Unless I have a role. This is part of what makes me such a relatively good facilitator or presenter, think...I am so relieved to have something I'm supposed to be doing that I really throw my whole heart into it. And facilitating, especially, is a role where my hyper-awareness of people's reactions can be an advantage.)

In any case, there has been a string of receptions, meetings, celebrations this past week with graduation and the end of the year. I've enjoyed going out and being with people, but it has also been challenging on account of the sort of low-level social anxiety described above. In reflecting on that, one thing I've been wondering about is whether my sort of general distaste for small talk is part of why I've been drawn to work with teenagers over the past six or seven years. Because I think that young women (or at least young American women), as a demographic group, probably hate small talk more than any other population on the planet. They have no use for it. It's like this weird thing adults do :) .

Many times--both in my old job and now--when a girl sits down next to me at lunch or sits down on the couch in my office, there's this almost palpable tension for the first few minutes while we do the obligatory small talk. They are just waiting--breathlessly, desperately waiting--for an opening so they can talk about what they _really_ want to talk about, say what they really came to say. And very often that's something deeply personal, or important, or emotionally charged (at least at the time). So small talk, in this context, becomes an annoying ritual you need to get out of the way before you can talk about real stuff.

I don't dismiss small talk that easily. I think it is a ritual, but one that has important function in building connections, trust, a feeling of belonging...all that good stuff. Of course you're not going to go up to someone you barely know and bear your soul to them during a coffee break. But at the same time, I struggle with the space in between greeting and deep exchange--it can be like a no man's land to me, emotionally and socially. I'm just trying to pick my way through it, dodging bullets, hoping to get to the point of comfort with someone where it feels fine to talk about anything, from weather to logistics to tragedy. Half the time I just give up and jump back in my trench. This--as you might imagine--can make me not so fun at parties :) .

Again with the metaphors. If I continue to think of social situations in terms of battlefields, they will continue to make me nervous, right? Right. So what are they more like that is pleasant? I'm going to work on that. Suggestions welcome.

Today, it is hazy and already warm in the valley. There's another department social event on the calendar, then I'm heading home to WV for the rest of the weekend. I'm especially looking forward to being outside, hanging out with our dog and getting my hands in the dirt of the garden. It's been an intense few weeks of hard work and mixed feelings, and I'm hoping the rocky soil of home will soothe my soul some.

The day came singing, calling us from our dreams
back to this house. Walls of river mud
plaster slathered over studs like the wooden ribs
of boats, buoying us up
in this ocean of land.
Here in our space within a space where we
trap the light, admire it, bathe in it
where it falls.

Complete Contemplative Portfolio

I am experiencing continuing technical difficulties with creating an actual DVD, so I decided to go ahead and post my final portfolio project for Contemplative Photography on the web. (For regular visitors, the first slideshow is the same one that appeared in the previous post)

Portfolio Intro "Taking Stock":

Reflections on artistic process
In the process of putting together this portfolio, I've been thinking a lot about the connection between the process of creating photographs and the process of writing poetry. I majored in English as an undergrad, with a concentration in creative writing, and spent a lot of time reading, writing, revising and critiquing poetry. The comparisons between the two forms are obvious in some ways: both are primarily concerned with using images to communicate a message or invoke a feeling, both rely heavily on metaphor, both can be done carelessly or with great attention.

At the same time, I'm also really appreciating the the differences between the experiences of writing and photographing. Sometimes I feel photography—despite the technical and artistic challenges of creating a good photograph—is somehow easier than poetry, in the sense that it is more direct. The process of poetry is a little bit like translating a feeling into an image, then translating that image into words, which have both intellectual meaning and musical sound. Of course, not all poetry works directly with images, but anyone who has taken an introductory creative writing class knows the tyranny of the “objective correlative”: “No ideas but in things!” I'd like to think that type of academic training, which encouraged me to constantly translate between feelings, ideas, images, and words, has influenced my photography through this semester.

More generally, through actively engaging with the photographic process this semester, I've come to see in poetry and photography a shared experience of craft and composition. One of the things I had been least excited about in anticipating this class was learning digital editing. It was something I dreaded; it seemed technical and also kind of dishonest (or maybe like cheating...as in, “I wasn't good enough to get the shot right the first time, so I'll just fix it in Photoshop”). So I was shocked to discover, maybe about halfway through the semester, that I love editing photos.

What I've realized now is, while some people can and do have a utilitarian attitude toward working with photos digitally, that the editing process can also be a careful process of loving attention; more like revising a poem than erasing a mistake. Just as I come to feel closer to and more invested in my poems as I work and rework them, I started to get very “into” my photos as I edited. As I engaged in the process of giving an image my full attention, looking for the promise in it, intuitively examining it for emotional resonance, and working to bring out that resonance, I felt that process itself was literally creative—making something new from the raw material of the image.

That experience of full attention is something I found evidence of as I looked through my photographs. I like to make pictures that focus on one thing, or evoke one feeling. There were a lot of my photos that involved getting down on eye level with subjects, walking around to see them from different angles, working to engage them in the space and create a sense of intimacy in the image.

I was also surprised to find that I liked working in black and white. As a person who absolutely loves color (as you can see in a couple of the color stills, evidencing the bright orange and red walls of my house), I always tended toward color photography. And while I still enjoy photographing in color, I found as I was pulling together images for the final project that it was the black and white versions of photos that really spoke to me. The light and shadow seemed to have a power of distillation that made the images more powerful. Just like poetry is prose distilled and made more potent, it felt to me that black and white photography could sometimes distill an image—strengthening it's emotional content by changing our relationship to it. Just like poetry is the familiar medium of words, made magic and unfamiliar through economy and craft.

Approaches and Values
As I worked on the portfolio and on this reflection, I went back to reread the introduction to my poetry portfolio that I wrote in 2002. I found one line that seems to almost anticipate the photographic approach I've discovered through this course. Six years ago, I wrote: “Generally, I prefer a poem that focuses on a single idea. To use another metaphor, if one thinks of a poem as a room, I would rather the poem be a dark room with one object in the middle under a spotlight, than a well-lit room filled with beautiful things, although both types of rooms have their merits.” Looking through the images I've created over the semester, I notice that, literally, that is how I like to photograph—focusing on one thing, under a (literal or figurative) spotlight. As I write this now, I also realize it's the way I like to interact with people—having one on one conversations rather than being in a group. I might even go so far to say that it's the way I've structured my life—putting down roots in one community, instead of traveling around to lots of different places for a little while.

I'd like to think that approach to photography, and to my life, says something about my values, and that it embodies the “respect, humility and wonder” that we have been talking about through the semester. In thinking about how I practice those values, I believe I need to be careful that the desire for focus and attention doesn't turn into a desire for control. I took a big lesson from the sand dollar photos, which were some of my favorites. The assignment was to try different kinds of lighting. Not knowing very much about lighting, I spent a whole morning just placing the sand dollar in different places in my apartment and playing with camera settings, rather than attempting to get some particular “shot” that I imagined or planned. My photos were much better when I just started taking pictures, and took a lot of them, and spent a lot of time with the subject...trying different angles, just playing around. As soon as I start thinking of how I “want it to look,” instead of just being open to how it does look, my photos start to feel pretentious and contrived. I sometimes face a similar struggle with poetry. My writing suffers when I try to be too clever, or start self-censoring, instead of just letting the words come.

So here I am at the end of the semester, with a little movie of images and quotation and music that is not what I set out to do, or what I imagined I would make, but just what happened when I let myself get involved with the images. I hope that the sense of intimacy with the world, deep attention, and poignancy that I feel when I look at these pictures together as a whole comes through to the viewer.

In addition to the portfolio, I wanted to go ahead and share a slideshow of some color photos I took over the course of the semester. These are more numerous, and harder to tie together into a whole, but I suppose the overarching theme is trying to find new ways of seeing what's around me--finding and defining ourselves in relationship to the world.

Slideshow

This tiny movie has taken up several hours of my life. It is my final project in progress for a photography course I am taking this spring. The music is from "Fever Dream" by Iron and Wine, off the album Our Endless Numbered Days. The quotation from Pema Chodron is incorporated here to emphasize the sort of magic intimacy with the world that sometimes happens when you focus all of your attention on one little moment.










It seems a little sad to me, but I can't tell if that's something inherent in the photos or just the fact that I'm feeling sad today. I think I tend to experience the world as poignant most of the time. (I looked up that word to be sure I was using it right. According to a note in Mirriam Webster, "poignant implies a bittersweet response that combines pity and longing or other contradictory emotions." So, yes...that's the term I was looking for. The note, incidentally, is in the fascinating context of a discussion of the proper distinctions between describing something as "moving," "touching," "poignant," "pathetic," or "affecting." You really do learn something new every day.)

The full quotation--in case you didn't have your glasses on to read the tiny screen, and/or you care to see it punctuated properly: "Mindfulness is loving all the details of our lives, and awareness is the natural thing that happens: life begins to open up, and you realize that you're always standing at the center of the world."

A light at the end of the tunnel

Train of thought this morning:
*I am feeling very uninspired about this paper I need to write.
*Remember what your undergrad thesis adviser said: "don't get it right...just get it writ'."
*I wonder if my thesis adviser is still teaching at Pomona? (brief visit to Pomona's website)
*Wow, Pomona has a lot of new profs, and from the looks of it a pretty awesome English department right now.
*I love reading the "interests" paragraphs on English department staff bios: T.S. Eliot, Marxist and media theory, the history of vulnerability, the development of the maxim, food studies, digital culture (seriously, these all appear on the staff bios page...I can't make this stuff up).
I kind of miss studying literature.

It goes on from there, but let me pause here to briefly highlight the metaphor "train of thought." I always associated that with the idea of forward motion--progressing on a track. Not until this morning, when I was doubting whether that really accurately reflected my thought process, did the idea occur to me that a train is in essence a series of discrete but linked cars, each coupled to the next. The idea of picking up (and releasing) cars as the journey progresses...now that has some metaphorical resonance. Why had I never thought about it like that before? Is that how everyone else thinks of it?

Anyway (I'll show some limited restraint and only allude to a pun about getting "derailed"), where I've ended up is feeling a bit nostalgic for the days of novels and verse. I was complaining to Drew last night that all of my thoughts these days are very concrete. Academic musings focus on EPA regulations, governance structures, economic history, activism strategies, coal mines...and even my personal reflections are tending toward the material, with thoughts on timing transplants for the garden and materials lists for the planned renovations on the house this summer. The sort of running abstract, emotive commentary that's usually going in my head is strangely absent these days.

Drew suggested this might be a function of the fact that all of the reading I'm doing lately is academic--texts on research methods, advocacy planning handbooks, articles on the coal industry, planning guides for community development program monitoring and evaluation, and the like. It is interesting to realize that at the height (or depth?) of my previous higher education experience, I was engrossed in Henry James and contemporary poetry--equally academic but entirely different. One might expect an overall different effect on the psyche here, in a social science oriented graduate program focused on training practitioners to work in the field. And while hours spent pouring over Finnegan's Wake did at times strike me as fascinating but frivolous, the time now devoted to analyzing the dynamics of conflict in various contexts can seem unremittingly relevant to the point of tedium.

I've always had a great admiration for career activists--people who seemed to be completely fulfilled and fed and inspired by working on the ground, day after day, to change things for the better. At the same time, those folks always seemed like the "other," in a sense, even after I spent five years doing grassroots nonprofit work. That passion for the concrete work of making things better is something I aspire to and have moments of, but not so much my default setting.

And of course being, for example, a poet and an activist are by no means mutually exclusive. I always defended the intensive study of literature as a way to look at how human beings talk about what is most important to them. And most great novels have some element of examining the interplay of the personal and the political/contextual. It's just that I'm still working on the integrative process on a personal level. How do I take all that beauty and theory and get it dirty? How do I hold the concrete forms of real life up in the light of aesthetics and emotion so I can appreciate their intrinsic luminosity? How do I decompartmentalize the world, dissolve that false barrier between the mundane and the transcendent (which, after all, is kind of a stodgy, enlightenment-era, Eurocentric, imperialist sort of orientation to the world on some level)?

I guess I'll consider that after I finish my paper. Sigh.

scavenger hunt

I generally consider myself an organized and responsible person. This weekend, though, I was a person who had three expired insurance cards in her glovebox, but not the current one...necessitating two extra trips from garage to home, twenty minutes of rifling through the aforementioned glovebox, a phone call to the insurance company, and the general testing of Drew's patience.

There was one scene that basically summed up the experience:
me: (rifling through pile of papers in the glovebox) "Oh--maybe this is it!" (pulls out insurance card with hopeful enthusiasm)
drew: "Did you find it?"
me: "Oh, no...this one is from 2006." (I start to put the paper back in the pile)
drew: (through slightly clenched teeth, but still lovingly) "Don't put that back in there...throw it away."

Alls well that ends well--my inspection is up to date and we are still happily married. It's just that I don't think of myself as a flighty, disorganized kind of person, you know? But in the context above, it's sort of hard to argue with that label.

Here's the thing...also in that glovebox: sweet note my mom sent me three years ago saying she was proud of the woman I'd become, book of matches from the "Hot Spot" in SC, where Sarah and I stopped and bought flip flops at midnight on our way home after being stranded in Atlanta for four hours with a flat tire, shiny lip gloss from when I visited Dublin in NYC two years ago, 35mm camera I got to take with me on my drive to California for my senior year of college with roll of undeveloped film still in it. And countless other random momenta (or detritus, if you're an unsentimental type).

A certain level of chaos in my life is what leaves me receptive to moments of magic and unexpected memory. If I always knew exactly what was going to be in a folder or a box when I opened it, I'd only remember certain things on purpose, when I decided to.

Not that any of this justifies the insurance card fiasco...there's nothing magical about finding an insurance card from 2006. He was right about throwing that away.

There is a theory that people will unconsciously leave things in places they want to return to. Perhaps my resistance to organized filing really a manifestation of my relationship to memory and an attempt to rebel against the pressure to live life as a linear narrative. Seems like the most likely explanation, right?

On dynamic confusion, stunning productivity, and dirt

Looking back, it seems I'm managing to post at the rate of once per month. Not exactly stunning productivity, but it could be worse, eh? "Productivity" is not a word I'd actually associate with any area of my life at the moment...certainly not my academics. I feel as though I am wrestling with some interesting and important questions in some of the writing and research I'm doing right now, it's just that so far the questions are winning. Perhaps one source of my trouble is the metaphor of wrestling with those questions. Better, I think, to attempt to dance with them. Dancing may involve some dynamic confusion about who is leading who, and getting one's toes stepped on once in awhile, but all that is still preferable to being pinned to a mat. Engagement, rather than domination, admitting I'll only ever get one version of a multivalent "truth"...that's the way to go. Or maybe I've just become all buffleheaded* from all of this nonviolent, peacebuilding stuff.

(*"Bufflehead, n. A small North American diving duck, related to the goldeneye, with a large puffy head. " The adjective form I've just now invented. It means just what it sounds like it means. If you think people should refrain from inventing words, I invite you to go look up "peacebuilding" --the field in which I am currently pursuing a Master's Degree--in Miriam-Webster.)

I spent last weekend in WV, with a brief detour (or re-tour) to Harrisonburg for a meeting of a Deep Ecology discussion group that one of my classmates is organizing. Lots of thoughts about that group, but I was left with the impression that I might be more optimistic about the prospects for widespread environmentalism than your average deep ecology group participant. I attribute that optimism in large part to the fact that we spent the day before and the day after the discussion getting our hands dirty--starting some seeds in the house (tomatoes, peppers, basil, and the like) and others right in the ground (parsnips, leeks, peas).

Incidentally, we tested our garden soil and found that it was acidic and low in nitrogen. Happily, we had buckets of wood ash sitting around from the winter, which balance acidity, and friends who could give us manure from their farm to up the nitrogen. Drew's charming (seriously) tendency for borderline obsessive, somewhat free associative research has been a tremendous boon for our gardening enterprise. He knows all that good stuff.

We also turned our compost pile on Sunday; it's funny how in the proper context dirt is sort of exciting (as in, "look, we piled up all our trash and made dirt! sweet!").

I might not have predicted, in my younger days, how much I would enjoy gardening and other homesteading-type projects. Isn't kind of exciting how you never really know who exactly you're going to turn out to be in the end?

Goal for this weekend: more dancing (of both the literal and figurative varieties)

musings on social role theory, silent radios, and pink bunny shirts

In the dashboard of my little plucky Honda is a silent radio. Silent radio is not its own particular art form, like silent film. In fact, "silent radio" is nothing but a euphemism for broken radio. I just find it a more aurally pleasing and slightly less depressing phrase. A few weeks ago, I needed to have my car battery replaced (which was a bit of an adventure in itself, but a story for another time), and apparently when the car loses power, it resets the radio. Because the radio has an "anti-theft" feature, there is a code which must be entered to make the radio work again after it loses power. I have no idea what that code is. If I had the serial number of the radio, I could potentially contact the manufacturer and request the code. The serial number is--according to information I've been able to gather through google searches--on the back of the radio. Which wouldn't be a major problem if the radio wasn't currently installed in the dashboard. But it is.

Maybe this is the universe's way of telling me it's time to get a new radio. It's true that the old one had developed a bad habit of holding CDs hostage, refusing to either play or eject them. This could be fixed only by artfully prying the CD from the slot with a fingernail or credit card. Not so good for the CDs, nor very safe when one is driving. Still, I'm a little frustrated to have to replace it right now. Currently I can't even set the clock (to ascertain the correct time requires adding four hours, then subtracting ten minutes, from the time on the display). This wouldn't really be too urgent except that we are heading down to Louisiana next week, which is approximately a 16 1/2 hour drive each way. Too long to go without a radio; no euphemizing your way around that one.

But that's all really very minor, as concerns go. Other current minor concerns include a long list of homework assignments, the few extra pounds I seem to put on each winter despite my best intentions, the pile of dirty dishes in my sink, figuring out what I'm going to do this summer, and a general uncertainty about what the future holds. So it seems like some of my current concerns could be addressed through increased motivation, and others through relaxing and not worrying about things. I'm not sure I can do both at the same time, though.

I also have some other, more abstract concerns (you can't be surprised). Somewhere along the line, I realize I have equated being an adult with being adaptive. In high school and through much of college, I was determinedly, even self-consciously non-conformist, even a little bit of an iconoclast. As I've gotten older, I've let go of what I think of as the outer expressions of that. I wanted to be taken seriously, so I lost the baggy jeans, lip ring, bleach blond pixie cut, etc. And truth is, I feel equally at home in my skin with low maintenance long hair, fitted jeans, and my relatively conservative nose stud. But I'm worried that that adaptation becomes a habit.

It's easier to blend in, once you get used to it, and I start doing other things that aren't just entirely aesthetic. Like since I've moved from WV to here, I shave under my arms for the first time since sophomore year of college because I don't want to offend people, or I don't wear my pink shirt with bunnies on it (that I _really_ like) because I'm concerned about looking professional. I have really mixed feelings about all this. I don't need to stand out or be in people's faces about things--that feels to me like a positive thing that comes from self-confidence. At the same time, I wonder how much I'm compromising my own expression and values to fit into the culture of a place...and whether that is ok with me or not.

The outer stuff is, of course, tied with the inner stuff. It's hard for me to feel entirely myself here, and I think the fact that I'm thinking about those externals is pointing to some deeper discomfort about trying to fit in or be something I'm not, and that putting me in danger of losing myself, or parts of myself. It's not as though I am in danger of losing my moral core, or turning into someone else. I am the first one to jump into a debate, or push back against a decision I don't think is fair. But there are things that are less clear--my leadership style, my beliefs about and approach to "discipline," the way I think about young people I work with, my spiritual beliefs--that are less rock solid, and that tend to be pushed around by the pressure of a dominant culture or approach. And it's not as though I'm in fundamental opposition to that dominant culture, but I need to remember that I have freedom to work within it in my own way, and that I don't have to fit into a mold to be good at what I'm doing. In fact, I'm much better at everything--job, school, life in general--when I am working authentically, in my own style and my own voice. It's not just an idealistic desire to do things my own way, it's also that I am actually better at things when I do them my own way (not to mention happier).

But I have a habit of feeling like there is some 'model' that I am supposed to be emulating, an ideal that I'm expected to live up to. And I have a related habit of feeling as though I'm never quite living up to it. I'm not sure if I'm articulating it well...the difference between having high standards for oneself, and wanting to do the best job at something that one possibly can (which is positive) versus feeling like one is being judged against some external standard, and needs to live up to someone else's expectations of what she should be doing (which is negative).

It feels like a very delicate balance--working hard, respecting the culture you're part of, being open to other's suggestions, staying true to yourself, growing up and not losing yourself.

It's funny, because there is this recurring cultural narrative that features the characters who were rebellious or idealistic in their youth, and now have become conformist cogs in the machinery of society, people who lose their dreams. But it's not as simple as all that. You aren't just an independent idealist or a soulless conformist. There's all sorts of intervening variables of context and personal evolution and respect for other people and other values and changing priorities. I mean, I live in rural West Virginia and am in graduate school for conflict transformation. It's not as though I've sold out, gotten highlights and an SUV and moved to the suburbs. But I'm not sure that the subtle shifts and small compromises are any less dangerous, in the long run, in terms of the project of finding and holding on to yourself--your true, authentic self--in the world.

Which is again over simplifying the matter--as if there was some true authentic self we could ultimately reveal and put on display and act as 24/7 regardless of anything. I think perhaps only zen masters and tiny children are capable of that. But the point, I suppose, is that I am concerned when I start to feel alienated from myself, and I need to be conscious about getting back to the center. Sometimes that means taking a hike, or doing yoga, or going on a road trip, or spending time with people I love. Sometimes I think it means cutting off all my hair, or wearing my pink bunny shirt--silly as those things may sound--just to remind myself that I'm not sensible, or conservative, and to remember that I'm brave.

Persephone's snapshots

Blogger has a little blank spot on the form you fill in to make a blog entry. It is a space for "Labels for this post:" Beneath that title, there is a little caption (can you "caption" words? I vote yes...) that reads "e.g. scooters, vacation, fall." It reminds me of a list poem. Here is my list poem for today--an unseasonably warm Mardi Gras in Virginia: Cardinals, okra, summer shoes.

I spent the weekend at home in West Virginia, seeing friends, sleeping in, and working on floor plan drawings for the schoolhouse (which may be getting some interior walls in the near future). I also spent a good amount of time taking photographs with both the new digital camera we got and Drew's digital SLR. When I look at photos, I'm so often struck by the way they can be almost perfect, but in failing to achieve perfection, they're sort of useless. Like the framing was a little crooked, or there is a weird dog hair that got on the lens and marred the shot, or I didn't quite focus on what I meant to. Because the photo is a distilled moment, concentrated image, those objectively small flaws render the whole thing ultimately ineffective. That's not quite the right language...too mechanical sounding...but to say the photo is ruined seems overly harsh. The photo class I'm in is about doing photography as a contemplative practice, a discipline, and being open to receiving images in an attitude of awareness and receptivity. Which means the focus is specifically not on the product of the final image, but I can't let it go that easily.

Sometimes when I look at those almost perfect photos, I wonder if I would feel less disappointed if it were totally wrong--completely out of focus, not at all what I meant to capture, obviously boring or poorly conceived or composed. That makes me wonder about my approach to life--would I rather have something totally fail, a person totally disappoint me, an experience be completely awful, or would I rather have something that is (or think about something as) nearly successful, almost perfect, not quite wonderful?

I think the truth is that I would much rather experience something as almost perfect. That way, you still get the imaginary version in which it was perfect. When I look at the photo that was almost great, I can picture what the photo would have looked like if it had come out perfectly. I can adjust the focus in my mind, change the imaginary lighting, pluck the dog hair from the frame of my fantasy world. And I do that with life, as well. When I look back on experiences, relationships, attempts that didn't work out, I realize that I tend to frame those things in my memory in such as way as to preserve the parallel, imaginary memory of that thing working out differently.

And in doing so, I simplify (reduce, essentialize--look, I'm constructing the alternate sentences that I might have typed!) the complexity of these failures and disappointments to a small or single "fatal flaw." If I can do that, I can take the leap of fantasy to remove that flaw and construct the alternative version--like the photos. Like the really important friendship that I lost the summer I turned 20...all of those complicated things can be reduced to "I was very depressed at that time." Then I can imagine hypothetical, not-depressed me, who would have done lots of things differently and would still have that friendship today. I can imagine going to visit that friend the next fall, going to each other's college graduations, I can picture her at my wedding, I can imagine the phone conversation we would have had last week. I can do all that because I can revert to the idealized image or memory of our friendship. I don't think I could do that if I saw the situation as one in which everything fell apart and our relationship fundamentally changed--because I can't imagine from that what the friendship we didn't have might have looked like. Just like I can imagine the photo I would have taken if I'd focused just a little sharper on that one petal, but I can't look at a completely underexposed frame and picture how it would have turned out if I'd done everything differently.

Is the almost-perfect version more heartbreaking? Intuitively, one might think so, but I don't think that's true. I think it's sweeter and softer. It's like cheating...you get the real version, but you also get to keep the imaginary, perfect version (which of course would not have been perfect in real life, just like the photo wouldn't have been). To me, it makes it easier to feel good about my life and my choices, and to forgive people--and myself--for times when things didn't turn out, I can see how it could have worked. I'm more motivated to take pictures if I can look at a photo and believe that I almost got an amazing image. Because then I feel like I might next time...if I can just remember to focus a little more carefully.

Perspective

It's Tuesday morning. Sitting here, looking out the window, it occurs to me that I could describe the morning as cool and dreary (that would be the perspective from outside) or I could describe it as muted and cozy (that would be the perspective from inside). I had a long talk this week with Drew during which he really called me on the fact that my mood is primarily dependent on my perspective, not my situation per se. He also pointed out--kindly but firmly--that the former needed some consistent, genuine work. The actual conversation was longer, tougher and more circuitous than that concise and sort of neutral summary might suggest, but that's the point I'm holding on to at the moment. So, my ongoing goal is to keep my perspective--on my personal life, at least--on a tight leash, otherwise it can pull me right off the trail I'm trying to head down and drag me around into all sorts of muddy, messy places. Hence...it's a muted, cozy Tuesday morning, with a soft grey sky hovering over the mountains.

I actually find myself anxious for class, which is a good feeling. Classes here meet once a week or less, but for big blocks of time...anywhere from an hour and a half to all day, with my two weekly classes meeting in three hour sessions. So I do all this reading, and get all into it, and then have to wait several days to talk about it...so that is hard in some ways, but I'm really enjoying the feeling of anticipation about it. It's a good feeling to be so looking forward to the meetings.

Today, as I worked on one of my papers, I was thinking about the comparison between Appalachia and colonized areas around the world. It's a comparison I heard drawn when I first moved to West Virgina, and since have often used myself. In fact, I basically focused on West Virginia for every assignment in last semester's course on International Development (my professor humored me, basically agreeing with the comparison). So I am thinking about that this morning, particularly after starting a book on the power and limits of metaphor in social theory (Incidentally, I'm happily surprised at how much of my background in literary theory is transferable to conflict theory and research approaches, that's pretty awesome :) ).

The thing that is in my head this morning, in terms of that comparison, is the idea of what could have been. The capacity and desire to do hypothetical thinking is essential for nonprofit work, peacebuilding, and no doubt a host of other types of work, because you need to be able to have a vision for what could be, how things could be different (albeit a very flexible vision so you don't become a big, bad, imperialistic hegemonic oppressor). Most of the time, that's a very inspiring, liberating, useful faculty. However there are situations in which the "what if" dreaming can become a little depressing.

For example, I am remembering an article I read about development in different areas in Africa, and the author made this point that because of this history of colonialism, there is this huge unknowable of how Africa might have developed on its own, or what it could have been (ok, I'm cringing at the connotations of that language, but please understand my point is that colonialism stripped much of the continent of resources and created a huge mess that a lot of time and resources have gone into trying to recover from, _not_ that the whole continent is somehow a lost cause or failure). This is one area where I think the parallels between Appalachia and post-colonial regions are very striking.

Sometimes when I'm reading about some of the struggles in Appalachia--be it "internal" struggles like economic development or education or health, or "external" struggles like people fighting against destructive mining practices--I wonder what would have happened if the history and development of the region had gone differently. It is such an amazing place, with an incredible cultural heritage, a history of strong, creative people, and obviously an incredible wealth of natural resources. And, again, not to imply that Appalachia is a mess, but there are so many issues there linked to structural and historical injustice. Of course, one could make that same general statement about a lot of places in America, as well as elsewhere, but sometimes it just breaks my heart to think about what a raw deal the region has gotten, historically, and continues to get in many ways.

That motivates me, though, in the same moment that it makes my heart sink a little.

It's nearly noon now. I had planned to go to the store to get some flour so I could make cookies, but that may need to wait until tomorrow. It continues to be a novelty that the store here is about one mile (or five minutes) away, but somehow it still takes me several days between when I put something on my shopping list and when I actually make it out to get it.

Reading back over this, it occurs to me I may need to work on the balance between poetry and politics in my life over the next few months. I'm not too worried, though, politics only ever wins temporarily in my world :) .

A fresh start

If you're reading this, it's likely you found your way here from the old Friendster blog (where the increasingly obtrusive advertising finally overcame my resistance to setting up a new webpage) or from Facebook. Either way, thanks for following along. The fact that you made multiple clicks to read this post makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

It's been a few months since I've posted anything, I know. That's partially due to the amount of time I'm spending in front of the computer typing up reading reflections or research papers, but it's also been a challenge to get my thoughts together. At home, I'd sit down to type a post late at night when I couldn't fall asleep, or with a cup of tea on a weekend morning. Here, I don't find those same soft pockets of time. The rhythm of my days is more irregular--an hour free here or there, a short break before dinner, fifteen minutes to wind down at the end of the day before collapsing into bed. And when I get the hour or so that it really takes me to compose my thoughts, sit down, and write something, I feel like I ought to use it instead to get a chapter of reading out of the way, or visit the gym, or return a phone call or email that I've let go for too long.

In any case, here I am with a free evening, a snazzy new blog layout, and a cup of decaf. In an ideal world, I would probably also have some insight or clarity or something along those lines, but I think we'll forge ahead anyway.

So here I am at the beginning of second semester, still girlishly enamored of graduate level academia. I've got two classes--Theory and Research--which require me to choose specific conflicts to focus on for semester-long projects. I've put in a proposal to investigate the current controversy in the WV State Legislature over water quality standards for the former, and one to study the affects of Mountaintop Removal Mining on nearby communities for the latter. I've been increasingly drawn to examine environmental justice issues in Appalachia. I'm hoping a semester spent focusing a good deal of energy on those issues will help me evaluate whether I might be able to (and want to) focus on them in the future, either as a volunteer or doing some kind of career in advocacy, policy or sustainable development in that vein.

I'm also taking a class in Strategic Advocacy and Activism, which studies successful nonviolent social change movements. That class met for the first time today and it is going to be great, I think. Sort of a different slant than most of the other classes offered in my program--more political, more concerned with studying history--it's all about waging conflict, rather than resolving it. It's inspiring to remember what has been done and think about what could be.

Rounding out the menu are a couple of one credit offerings--a seminar in "Integrated Peacebuilding" and a course on "Contemplative Photography." There are several courses offered in the spring that are considered "specialized practice courses"--workshops, basically, on negotiation, mediation, circle processes, and other skills. I'll need a few credits of those eventually for degree requirements, but after taking the introductory "Practice" class this fall and a semester of mediating, facilitating and negotiating in my role as a dorm director, I have to admit I'm kind of burned out on the interpersonal, touchy-feely, relationship building side of conflict transformation. Neuroscience, social constructivism, and fighting the evil coal companies...bring it on :) .

This is getting so long that I'm feeling like I ought to insert some subheadings. And I still haven't gotten around to what I was originally thinking about when I sat down to type. Namely, I've been thinking lately about how so many of us become different versions of ourselves at night. When I worked at a camp, we would go around to each shelter every night to "do tuck-ins," and we always advised new camp staff to try to avoid getting into heavy or difficult conversations right before bed (which is, of course, when all of the issues came up and people started crying and everyone _wanted_ to talk about hard things). Now, working in the dorm, I see many girls who struggle emotionally at night time. And it's not only that things sometimes seem more difficult at night...there's also equally often moments of amazing intimacy that transpire in moonlit conversations, or over a late night cup of tea.

What is it about the simple absence of light that opens up deep and different parts of us? Is it simply that we get tired, or is there some shift in our melatonin levels or something about our circadian rhythms that is connected with our psychological and emotional state? Or is it something more mystical, something spiritual? I suppose I'm assuming it happens to everyone. I don't think it's an experience particular to women, is it? Or something exclusive to generally overly emotional people? :)

Whatever the explanation, I find myself sometimes wondering who people become when they go home at night. What goes through their head in the moment right after they get into bed and turn off the light. Sometimes I like to think that all through the day, maybe our minds are edging closer to whatever that place is that we go when we are dreaming...maybe when the sun goes down, something in us begins to crawl into ourselves, or toward our souls. I remember a friend once remarked to me how strange it is when we fall asleep beside someone--how we are closest to someone else just in the moment before they are totally lost to us, retreating into themselves in dreams. But perhaps if that's true, there is also the possibility that we can choose to awake wide open--ready to meet the day and each other fresh, outside of ourselves. And that everyday we walk back in, wiser and different than we were.