How Do You Spell Flaws? M-E. Ann's Open Call

Annie, are you sure this information will not be held against us at some future time?  How about now?

My stomach is beginning to tighten.

Where to begin?

1.  I am chronically late.  It is now 9 p.m..  You requested our Open Call lists over twelve hours ago.

2.  Forgetful and scattered.  When my youngest was in preschool I was terrified I'd forget to send her in with her teddy bear on Teddy Bear Day just as I had forgotten to put her older sister in pajama's on Pajama Day and pack her older brother a sack lunch on Picnic Day.  I was so proud of myself when I remembered to put the bear in the car and felt like celebrating when I arrived at her preschool.  That was before I noticed that I'd left her at home.  (Don't worry.  Her father was at home at the time.  And besides, I'm sure the Statute of Limitations applies here, I'm quite certain.)

3.  I loathe talking on the phone.  It requires spontaneity and good verbal communication skills.  I have neither.  Last night I watched the movie 'The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter' about the life of a deaf mute.  I was jealous.

4.  I never look at the expiration date on perishables.  Today I brought home and orange juice from the grocery store that had an expiration date from last Thursday.

5  I hate confrontation.  I would never return to the grocery store to complain that they sold orange juice today that had an expiration date from last Thursday.

6.  I'm emotionally lazy.  Rather than work on standing up for myself,  I married an overly-assertive man was because HE would return to the grocery store to complain that they sold orange juice today that had an expiration date from last Thursday.

7. Frequently I mail letters without stamps.

8.  If solitude were a state of being that paid by the hour, I'd have enough money to buy my own island.  Coconuts do not have expiration dates.

9.  Wherever I am, I dream of being someplace else.

10.  I'm insecure about everything of, in, on, and about myself.  When I receive praise for something I've done, I feel undeserving.  When praise is withheld, I feel I deserve to feel undeserving.

11.  I am a sloppy artist.  Rather than aim for perfection, I spend more time working out how to cover up all of my mistakes.

12.   My attention span is severely limited and I bore easily.  Although I have a boatload of flaws left to list, I'm already eyeing my colored pencils with disturbing intensity.

Besides, my stomach is still a bit queasy.  Probably from drinking the orange juice I bought today that had and expiration date from last Thursday.

It is not THEM. It is US.

It begins here:
"You get your temper from your father's side of the family, not mine."
"Whatever problems you have, you can blame them on your mother."

It progresses:
"If your generation were not so irresponsible and selfish, there would be stability in our future."

We acquiesce:
"Were you a jock in high school or a nerd, hipster,  Goth, R.O.T.C. or Jesus freak?"

Soon, we learn that there is safety and comfort in numbers:
"It is the Republicans that got us into this mess and the Democrats who will get us out.  Vote for our side."


And finally we decide that if we are right, then they must be wrong:
" What does he know?  He's just a fear-mongering Christian, a greedy Jew, a terrorist Muslim." 
"I'm glad I'm not one of them."

I don't believe in coincidence.

On 9-11-2001 Christine Green, the youngest victim of the Tucson shooting, was born into a world that was paralyzed by grief and polarized by fear.  She was too young to choose sides or to comprehend the insidious emotion of hatred.  She simply was.

On  1-9-2011, Christine Green was taken out of a world that was paralyzed by grief and polarized by fear.  The numbers in those dates remained the same; only their sequence had changed.

There is a need right now to look beyond the obvious and read the signs of the times.   The date of her birth and of her death each add up to the number Five.    In Numerology Five is the number of change;  more specifically, change in the midst of chaos.

I don't believe in coincidence.

The drawing that accompanies this text was finished on the day of the shooting.  I had originally intended it to be for my son, an inmate, and for all of the men and women locked behind penitentiary walls.

But on that day, as I watched in disbelief while the various camps circled their wagons and hurled blame at one another,  I realized that we are the inmates and that as long as we swaddle our apprehensions in cunning layers of division and blame, we will remain sentenced for life to a prison of ignorance, rage and loss.

Inside each of us there is a wall bound together with a mortar composed of fear and pride whose bricks are the unexamined detritus of our prejudice.  They are those hard-baked thoughts that tell us that all Whites are imperious racists, Blacks are inferior,  Hispanics are lazy,  Jews are greedy,  Christians are simple-minded,  Liberals are Socialist radicals,  Conservatives are self-righteous,  Muslims are terrorists, Atheists and Pagans are evil,  Homosexuals are depraved,  Foreigners can't be trusted,  Priests are pedophiles,  Athletes are stupid,  Actors are superficial,  Intellects are arrogant,  the Humble are weak,  the Wealthy are indifferent,  and the Poor are ignorant.

But most of them just say,  I am right and you are wrong."


I don't believe in coincidence.

And I don't want to believe that a little girl who was slain by a madman; a product of our collective indifference to unconditional love which is the object of our humanity, on a date that mirrors that of her birth, both pointing us to the message that the separatist paradigms within tribes, classes, races, religions, political parties and ideological casts have got to change- has died in vain.

For my part I would rather be taken out of this world while attempting to love and understand my supposed enemy than to remain alive attempting to prove that I am right.


Christine Green was only nine years old.  Nine, the sacred number of harmony, Divine Will, eternity,  creation, completion and endings.  She was a ballerina, a daughter, a big sister, a friend, a student and a bright little harbinger of hope.

She was not one of Them.


She was one of US.


We ALL are.


I don't believe in coincidence.
It is time to wake up.


Illustration text:  Freedom is a state of mind.  Peace cannot exist around you if it does not exist within you.  Forgive all, especially yourself.  Happiness is a choice.  The only way out is by going within.  Now matters.  Listen to the silence.

NEW YEAR'S EVESDROPPING

Of course, you don't think it will happen to you.  No one ever does.

But then you hear it.  Just when you think that you've dodged the fixed gaze of last year's insouciance and have thoroughly scanned the horizon for easier vows, you overhear that niggling internal dialog that ruins everything.

You know the one: 

That ambush of integrity that corners you at the edge of your holiday celebration.  The one that comes just as you stand on the precipice of blissful ignorance ready to enter the new year unfettered by conscience.

It is the blight that is left swilling in your brain after twelve months of careless indulgence.  It is the sodden heap of regret and the Pollyanna-threat of renewal.

Now suddenly you are beset with introspection when all you crave is frivolous action.  It is the ultimate buzz kill and it stings like hell.  

I know because it happened to me.

Damn.

A New Year is cresting; it's unblemished promise scouring my unconscious seeking out only the choicest moments of failure or weakness from which will come those prickly resolutions for the next unfolding.

What now?

Do I sort through my mistakes and losses with an indifferent eye to avoid the shame and grief that need only a nod to activate their bottomless despairing?

Or  hold the weight of new dreams against the door of old misgivings and risk losing all credibility?

Or perhaps just dance with the pathology of remorse until we both collapse in giddy forgiveness?

How much retrospection is required before redemption?

How much purity, for resurrection?

Will they come this year?

And so I resign:

That the weight will be lighter;

the giving, greater;

the inaction, activated;

the prospects, productive

and all gains, good.

I will gather my belligerence and shake it until it smiles.

And walk into the New Year

holding the light.....

and perhaps

a strong drink.

One trip at a time. 

Happy New Year! 

PLEASE STOP! A Declamation Against Christmas Card Abuse

I promised myself I would not let this happen.  I told myself last year that when the 2010 Christmas cards came filtering in that I would NOT be negatively overcome by the seemingly mandatory inclusion of the increasingly popular MASS HOLIDAY LETTER.

But after receiving more of them this year than in any year previously, I can barely contain my frustration.

Almost invariably they come from those I don't know very well - Those I know through someone else or from some long-ago stage of my life. Stages so removed and distant that I can barely maintain an emotional connection with my own memories of those times let alone a sentimental tethering to the peripheral inhabitants on the edges of them.

Look, If we know each other, then I have likely already heard that your eldest was married in June, your mother-in-law loves her new room at the assisted-living facility and your 15-year old Beagle named Spud was put to sleep at the benevolent hand of your vet.  And if we have a sincere bond between us but one that fate or logistics prevents from updating more than once a year, I welcome your news.

Conversely, if I don't know you well enough to have heard those things, why would you believe that it matters?

Once upon a time, when it was still only possible to gush in pen and ink, those revelations would have meant something.  Why?  Because they would have been written by hand in each and every card.  Effort and care would have backed whatever favorably superficial news you felt compelled to share lending to it an air of intimacy and elevating its importance.

 I would have understood that whatever your news, it must have been important enough to you that you took the time to form each letter within every word just to spell it out for me.  I would have been touched by that and likely responded to it in my return Christmas greeting.

However, if you and I are casual acquaintances, I don't really care to receive that newsy Xerox informing me of your trip to Fiji with your dentist and his wife in February or how many hours it took on the boat before you saw land.  Why would I?

I'm not even sure why I am on your Christmas card list in the first place, unless it is because you are suffering from a bout of insecurity or existential angst and feel it necessary to proclaim the most lustrous highlights of your existence to as many people as you feel might be impressed by them.

Seriously.

And while I am truly sorry that your health has been suffering, is my knowledge of this information really going to deepen our connection?  I now know more about the state of your colon, gastrointestinal blockages and cholesterol levels than I do the state of your mind.

If we are not close friends, then the odds are that I don't know your children well either - If at all.  So, why would I need to be told which colleges they were accepted into or how many ski trips they took to Telluride since October or the names of your grandchildren replete with an additional litany of all their activities and accomplishments in the past calendar year?

Honestly, what would make anyone believe that a detailed accounting of all the beaches and shops you visited on that snorkeling trip to Cabo would be of any interest whatsoever to someone who knows so little of you that they are not even sure how to spell your last name?

I'm sorry.  I am simply not buying the saccharine theory that this is a legitimate display of friendship; of saying, "I care."

How is your telling me about that autumn camping trip through Yellowstone, the cruise to the Caribbean or your three-week tour of the vineyards in Southern France a sign that you care for anyone or anything other than letting as many people as possible know you have time on your hands and money to spare?

If you don't care enough to share with me who you are, why do you want me to know so much about what you do?

And for those who can find nothing more substantial to chronicle than a blithe list of acquisitions, accomplishments and assets, have you ever considered how these polished manifestoes to everything bright and shiny might impact a recipient whose current state is not so blessed?  Someone who has perhaps lost a loved one, a home, a job, is battling a serious illness or depression?

Do you really care for those poor sods on your Christmas card list or do you simply want to make sure they know that your gig is better than theirs?

Try as I might, I can't help believing that this insipid display of unmitigated and superficial preening is not for our benefit but for yours, and it makes me feel like little more than a cog in the wheel of your grasping self-importance.

Do me a favor.  Take me off of your list.

Or, if you are really sincere in wanting to let me know that you are thinking of me, just sign your name with love.

And give me a call sometime.