Folly

Standing on the top of the ladder
shifting side to side, toes
gripping the rung,
reaching for the limb,
wondering "what the hell
am I doing,
is this really worth it",
the inevitable fall, snap
of the twig, the sudden jolt
as gravity reaches up to catch
my foolishness and pull me back to earth,
the reality of precarious existence.

the breeze is nice
scented with honeysuckle and lavender,
blue sky expanding above.
how far to the hills?
into the cool shaded pine air,
soft needles carpet the ground,

why the apple tree in the hard baked orchard?
What the hell does that snake know anyway?!

I get that sinking felling….

Sinking - like quicksand?
That slip into troubled darkness,
the ghost space of a haunted mind.
Pressure squeezing
out life until the empty vacuum waits.
Waiting for the last breath
that triggers the filling; what will come?
Expecting the bite and grit
of sand and water flooding mouth and lungs,
tearing a path around the heart –
to crush the last of love.

Wanting sweet relief of weightlessness
and air; clouds of peace.

It will come, no matter what.

Email I wish I could send to a friend.

Somehow I imagined that as we grow older, we redefine achievement and greatness and throw away the old measuring stick in favor of prospective on what is really important in life.

Eighteen seems very young to accept mediocrity, and how is that giving your best to life anyway? Realizing you’re not the best at something and deciding that it’s ok is the same as giving up. You don’t have to be the best at anything you just have to give your best to everything you do. Is that what you mean? The problem I have isn’t that I’m not the best but that I can’t give 100% to everything I do. I have too many things I want to do so nothing gets my best. My mediocrity isn’t for lack of effort or desires it is the dispersion of effort and desire to do everything. That is the fact of my decisions and my battle is how to come to terms with that. I’m not good enough to be the best at everything and I’m just barely getting everything done OK. So does that make me mediocre?

Could I be the best at just one thing or do I use this dispersion of effort as an excuse to not be the best at anything; a denial of average? What would happen if I focused all my energy to one effort and still only made it half way? Would that mean failure?

Something to think about a little more.

Dear Diary

Monday, April 20, 1987. - Dads been acting strange today. Something was off first thing this morning. I had come down to make breakfast for Melody. Stumbling down the stairs making more noise than I had planned, cringing at the cascade of a green and yellow toy with bells built-into the wheels; something more for a toddler to drive around on the carpet rather than my six year old sister to play with. Dad didn’t make a sound. As I passed by my parents room he was sitting on the edge of his bed (now it’s his) looking through a box of papers and pictures. He didn’t even look at me. I was braced for the hollering, the barking of orders for having disturbed him, but nothing, he didn’t even look up. Relief and worry washed over me as I got to work on breakfast. Melody was sitting at the table gazing absently out the dinning room window. Rain trailed the view through the pane. Mom’s car sat in the driveway waiting, the big maple tree across the street waving back at me; everything seemed paused, anticipating. They didn’t know there was nothing to anticipate. Breakfast was cold cereal and a banana. Mom always made us eat a banana with our cereal and there was a bunch of them browning on the counter. She must have gone shopping before….

Melody and I sat eating, heads bowed over bowls as if praying. I just wish it wasn’t so quiet. Dad came into the kitchen. He tossed mom’s car keys on the table, “Take her to school.” The keys splayed out on the table like a hand holding on to the smooth surface right in front of me. If this had been last Monday they would have been snatched up and Melody would have been rushed to finish and hurried off to school; today they just laid there, frozen to the table, my gut knotted, the picture of Melody and I smiling up at me; strangers. Her hands held those keys everyday. The hemp braid I made at camp when I was ten strayed off to one side out of alignment with the rest, an extra hair tie for Melody, mom always had handy to tame her mane of curls. The cereal floated in the bowl a thin banana slice resting on the spoon paused for the next bite. Melody’s eyes were locked on the keys, if I didn’t do something we’d be home for another day. I don’t think I could stand another day pressed in with all those memories. The house is so full of them there isn’t room for us. Looking through the drizzled window at the distorted view of mom’s car; it’s going to be a tight fit in there too.

Dad just stood there watching me; no yelling, “Well get moving boy!! Didn’t I just tell you to do something!!?” He just waited, his eyes searching me. I don’t know what he was thinking, he just wasn’t acting himself. He was wearing the same clothes he had on yesterday and now that I think about it the bed was made when I saw him earlier slouched at the edge; dad never made the bed. His eyes ringed with red but dry, he could have just come in from work, eyes irritated from the dust of the mill; only it was morning, mom was dead, the funeral had been yesterday, and we are dieing here slowly, instead of the aneurysm that exploded in her, ending everything so quickly.

They had been arguing, mom’s patient voice murmuring between his clear loud thunders; I can’t even remember what they had been arguing about. Just another of many. Then quiet. - - - “Jaaack!!” The anguish in his voice, I don’t remember how I got down the stairs. He was crumpled on the floor with her in his arms, rocking; she wasn’t moving, her mouth slightly open, her hand limp, her keys on the floor, splayed out like a hand.

Mom told me once that because I was first born and a son, that dad named me; mom named Melody. She’d laugh a little and smiled at me conspirator like, “but you’re more like me than you are him”. Then her face would change, her eyes looking at me so far away, “He really does love you, he’s just had a hard time of it and doesn’t know any other way”. “When you get older you two are going to go around, just remember he loves you.” “He wants to prepare you for the world out there that hurt him, but you’re more me than him, so the world you see is a lot prettier.” “Oh, there are monsters out there for sure; walking around looking like people, but inside each one there is a piece of a good soul just waiting for someone to call it out.” She leaned in and looked at me, straight in the eyes, so close to my face, all I could see was her eyes. “That - is what we’re good at.”

I looked in dads eyes, looking for that ‘piece of a good soul’ mom was talking about. His hard look intent on intimidation, looking for a fight, wavered around his eyes; the line of his jaw, muscles twitching with the tension of clenched teeth, proud shoulders pulled back to his military pose, heavy boots anchored to the floor balanced and ready to chase and fight, but his eyes. They looked so frail, tired. Is that what she saw; the man, tired of the fight, but doesn’t know any other way?

I put down the spoon and reached for the keys. They were warm, held by dad all night. I looked at Melody, her face set, like dads. “Maybe we should go to the coast today dad?”

His body shrank a little, off balance, his eyes trailed between his children. All that’s left of her. All that matters. He reached out and took back the keys. “Sounds like a good idea.”

Tough Decisions

When we are sick we go to the doctor, when we get "old" we retire to a comfortable living on our lifetime of investments. If we are career minded we work long hours while our children spend creative days with trained caregivers that enlighten with art, music, reading, and imagination all within the safety of criminal background checks; unless we’re like Sametta Heyward.

Without knowing the story behind the news article, Sametta Heyward was a single mom called in to work, when her sitter canceled on her. She drove her 1 year old and 4 year old to the group home she worked at, set them up with fans, food and drinks, leaving them in the car for her 3-11 swing shift. She has been charged with homicide by child abuse. The article from the Associated Press written by Bruce Smith, I read in the Sunday Register Guard (8/5/07), goes on to recount interviews with neighbors and co-workers describing Sametta as having gone through some difficult times but seemed like a “loving mom”.

I live in a community of poor and working poor. 96% of the kids, my kids go to school with, are on the free and reduced lunch program. I’m using this as an indicator because it means that they are at or below the poverty line set by the state for our county. What I’ve seen has gone by my eyes without much consideration. Over the years my own apathy has blinded me to what had always been a passion; children, their safety, enlightenment and empowerment.

My mother worked, sometimes two jobs,to keep the house going as the main bread winner in our family. My stepfather worked too but his was seasonal field work that slowed down in the winter after the plums were dried into prunes, and didn’t start back up again until early spring when the fields started planting. He worked hard long days and never made much money; so much of our survival was on mom.

We were very lucky for about two years. Really it was one summer and part of the preceding and following school year. We lived in a big house that had four bedrooms, a dinning room, an inside laundry room, and a big backyard that backed up to the neighbors house and a vacant field; no fences to bind us in and free access to blackberry vines, apple and cherry trees, a generous neighbor with a lush vegetable garden, and another with seven kids to play with. Our school was only blocks away and mom worked across the street at the health department. Life was very good then. It was still a financial struggle but we could get by.

My little sister had just started kindergarten and had to go home alone. She was scared alone in the house and would call mom at work everyday because she heard ghosts in the house. My responsibility as the oldest child, was to go straight home after school and take care of my brothers and sister, make dinner and clean the house.

This was one of the best most comfortable times in my families struggle to survive in this world. Everything was as good as it could get; mom and dad working, home close to work and school, fresh fruit and vegi’s to supplement the meager resources available to our budget. Still we were home alone for hours until mom got off work and my sister even longer. My mother had little choice. To not work meant welfare and food stamps, we’d done it before, but she had gotten this job through a program putting women back to work funded by the Carter administration. It was meant to be a future without government assistance. She was excited about it, talking everyday about what she was learning, how much she liked the people she was working with. To her it was a chance at a career that had a future.

Before the end of the next school year, the government administration changed, priorities shifted, and the program she was being paid from lost it’s funding. The shoe string department tried to get other funding to keep her but in the end she lost her job. By the next summer we were living in a motel a mile outside of a desert town in California, the six of us sharing two rooms watching tumble weeds roll by.

As I read the paper this morning and observe the priorities of the current administration I wonder about how little has changed. Children are still not a priority, and families still have to face the decision of what to do with their kids when work is how you feed and house them, but it also takes you away from them. How desperate must a mom be to do what she did? What would I do without the friends, family, and husband that I have? I have been blessed but what about the others. What should I do, what can I do to help? Do I let the vastness of the problem blind me with apathy or is there something I can do?

Spheres

Mother, father, me, two brothers, sister,
Grandma, grandpa, three aunts, four uncles, thirteen cousins,
husband, four sons, daughter never had,
father in-law, mother in-law, three brother and four sisters in-law,
six nephews, four nieces by marriage and blood, two god-daughters, and a god-son,
best friend, best friends husband, three sons and a daughter,
best friends mother and father, sister and two brothers,
good friend, good friends wife, and mother, daughter and niece,
friends husband with a drug problem,
friend that sends her sons to Texas for two months
to see the father that never calls,
laid back friend, husband, son wana be hacker, daughter growing up too fast,
friend across the street, life mate, son, daughter, two sisters, niece, and another on the way,
kids school teachers over seven years, principal, school cooks, and custodians,
kids best friend, kids best friends mother, brother,
school secretary whose husband has Alzheimer’s and lives in a home.
boss and his wife, owner, owners wife, and daughter,
office mate, her disabled husband, and two sons,
coworker that loves horses, her husband, son, and daughter,
and thirty others that work side by side, and over one hundred more
at the other two branches, the seven women and two men that check groceries
at the store, and the four others that run them to the car, and Rose that sells roses,
the young man at the gas station, the other four at the car wash one in college,
and the young lady
looking for a cheap apartment that punches the car wash ticket,
the aloha girls that sell Bad Ass coffee hot or cold for Lui,
the “Is there anything else I can get for you today, Ooook” lady at Jack-in-the-box,
the woman at the Dairy mart whose brother wants a cheap foreclosure to fix up and sell,
and two more of her co-workers, that guy holding the sign selling pizza next to the woman asking for change, PBS and NPR, the marine charged with conspiracy to commit murder for hauling a man out in front of his neighbors to “teach them a lesson” and shooting him, serving 43 days losing one rank and going back to work knowing it was OK, saying he’d do it again.

circles

How narrow our world has become
that we see and hear our stomachs turn
and souls burn,
from the touch of evil brushing the edges
of our sphere as it touches
the next that circled the next that
encircled the eyes
of those who see the horror
and we do nothing,
it isn’t in our world.
It isn’t us. Yet.

Respect and Humanity

My family and I went on a little vacation to Odell Lake. We stayed the six of us, in a one bedroom cabin with my in-laws; mother, father, and sister, a total of nine souls. Four fine days and three nights; so many people in one small space made for just a few tense moments, but the weather was wonderful and between the lodge, lake, playground, woods, and cabin we all had enough space most of the day.

One of the memorable moments for me was a discussion I had with my father in-law; a very fine man with a joyous sense of humor (a balance of clean and dirty jokes depending on the company). I have so much respect for this man that even after 20 years married to his son, I still can’t bring myself to call him by his given name. He is Papa, as the kids call him, or Sir. He noticed this and made mention of it only once, several years ago, and accepted my explanation of why. I just didn’t and still don’t feel comfortable. I’d like to think it’s because I respect him so much and I very much respect his achievements and honors. He has worked hard for the company he retired from 18 years ago, working his way up the ladder to management and retiring at 55. His investments and financial planning has allowed for a comfortable living for him and my mother in-law, and he has helped us over the years when we needed it, even helping with the down payment for our house. I owe a great deal to him and to his example of service to his community and family. So you can imagine that when we somehow ended up on the opposite sides of a debate, I felt some caution. To offend this man would cause me pain but at the same time it isn’t in me to back from a debate about something I believe in, so debate we did.

We discussed Mexican immigration in the US. Not something that we can solve in an afternoon discussion over the dinning table and in the end he and I came to one conclusion we could agree on; if we were faced with watching our children go hungry, and we knew we could find a way to support them by traveling to another country, quite simply, we would.

Hundreds die every year crossing the border; men, women, children. We have criminalized seeking a better life.

Our country is founded on the belief of working hard to make a better life for ourselves and our children and most of us can trace back to an immigrant.

Separating families through deportation is wrong.

Denying education to children that have lived most of their lives in this country just because their parents brought them here when they were too small to make the decision themselves is wrong.

These are mostly moral opinions, however if you could imagine yourself in any of these situations the right and wrong of it would become very apparent.

As for the rest of our discussion, we agree spending billions on a fence is a waste. The Berlin Wall came down and so eventually would anything we would build.

And their will always be those that only see color and culture and will never understand because they don’t want to. They want to believe that these people come to hurt them and take from them their birth-rite, US citizen. When all most want is a job and a home to raise their family in.

When we start seeing the people, when we listen to their story, when we see the desperate eyes, and feel their heart beat in our own chest and know the desire of each of us to achieve and provide for our own, then we will solve. Until then we are only reacting like frightened animals, posturing and blustering, puffing up and trying to frighten back what we won’t really understand. And people keep suffering and dieing.