In Longmont, the town where I've lived for the past twelve years, the City Council has been grappling with the issue of whether to allow hydraulic fracturing, more commonly called fracking, to take place within city limits. The predictable arguments have already begun: Do you heat your house or drive a car? Then you're already pro-fracking, because being against it makes no sense. Do communities want to risk groundwater pollution and other unknown effects of the practice of fracking? Then let municipalities, rather than state and federal governments, decide if and how they want to proceed with fracking.
Last weekend the fracking debate literally came to my door, or rather, the door of my current workplace, Cheese Importers. A local group was collecting signatures for an initiative they seek to put on the November ballot that would ban fracking. One of my co-workers argued that these people are stupid.
Now I do have some questions about the wisdom of fracking in urban areas like the one where I live, so I might very well be one of the "stupid" people who signs the petition. I may even vote for a continued ban on fracking in Longmont, if enough stupid people actually sign the petition. I''m also trying very hard to reverse a lifelong tendency to personalize everything that is said and done in my presence.
"They do have the right to petition. It's a First Amendment right." (Pretty smart response, huh? I'm still drafting off my trip to Washington.)
"Yeah, the right to be stupid," he said, before walking away.
True enough. Everyone risks being stupid when they take a stand, especially when opponents are at least as equally convinced that their viewpoint is correct. I also wanted to laugh, because that's a funny thing to say. But I have to be honest, I was also personalizing. I flinched at the thought that he might think I'm stupid.
Just so you know, I have a lot of respect for this guy. He served in Afghanistan, and the dude knows how to work. He doesn't think anything's beneath him. One thing I'm wondering, though--isn't one of the things he served for was for peoples' right to petition, even to be stupid?
Or is the freedom isn't free argument really about ensuring that everyone sees the world in the same way, i.e., that every military action that our country takes is morally sanctified? I won't be coy about stating my opinion--freedom of speech trumps a country's freedom to make war against any other country it pleases.
Monday, June 11, 2012
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori?
Translation: "Sweet and fitting it is to die for one's country." (Horace's Odes)
I accompanied my eighth-grade son's class to Arlington National Cemetery the Sunday before Memorial Day. I am not known for my pro-war credentials, so I expected to feel uncomfortable at the least, and downright annoyed at worse. Memorial Day Eve is a special time to visit Arlington, where 300,000 American flags graced every grave. I appreciate that act of devotion. I like to think that each of the people who placed the flags said a little blessing as they worked. As we walked along the pleasant grounds of what was once Robert E. Lee's home, it struck me that the tombstones were themselves an ode to the armed services' devotion to bringing order of chaos. As a poetic device, I appreciate that. Order is good. It doesn't erase the fact that legions of war dead, and those who suffered through yet survived the brutality of combat, lie beneath the ground.
We went to the Kennedy family's plot. John and Bobby died so long ago they might as well have lived at the same time as Horace. But I was surprised to find myself moved to tears when I came to Teddy's grave. There's no denying that the man was an old sinner, but I ended up respecting him for his ability to get things done in our national legislature, a feat that appears to have died with him. There were several medals from labor unions atop his grave, and a St. Christopher medal, and some coins and other tokens people had left behind. Maybe I had such a strong response because he died almost three years ago. I don't know. But like I said, it surprised me.
The brother of a seventh-grade student from the middle school had been recently buried in Arlington, and she had asked us to visit his grave. All 45 of us walked to the recent graves. That was also very moving.
So back to what Horace said. I'm always put off when I hear people say that freedom isn't free. To me, that means that somebody else's child or spouse or close relative or friend has had to give their lives so we can be free. Wars keep getting more and more expensive, literally and figuratively, and less and less do they serve the holy purposes stated by our leaders. How many wars have we had to end all wars, and yet war still rages in Afghanistan and Darfur and is brewing elsewhere?
We behave as if someday we're going to get the whole war thing right, when only God has the power to make all things right. Because we as a species seem to be almost incapable of it. The best we can do is to stop making things wrong.
I accompanied my eighth-grade son's class to Arlington National Cemetery the Sunday before Memorial Day. I am not known for my pro-war credentials, so I expected to feel uncomfortable at the least, and downright annoyed at worse. Memorial Day Eve is a special time to visit Arlington, where 300,000 American flags graced every grave. I appreciate that act of devotion. I like to think that each of the people who placed the flags said a little blessing as they worked. As we walked along the pleasant grounds of what was once Robert E. Lee's home, it struck me that the tombstones were themselves an ode to the armed services' devotion to bringing order of chaos. As a poetic device, I appreciate that. Order is good. It doesn't erase the fact that legions of war dead, and those who suffered through yet survived the brutality of combat, lie beneath the ground.
We went to the Kennedy family's plot. John and Bobby died so long ago they might as well have lived at the same time as Horace. But I was surprised to find myself moved to tears when I came to Teddy's grave. There's no denying that the man was an old sinner, but I ended up respecting him for his ability to get things done in our national legislature, a feat that appears to have died with him. There were several medals from labor unions atop his grave, and a St. Christopher medal, and some coins and other tokens people had left behind. Maybe I had such a strong response because he died almost three years ago. I don't know. But like I said, it surprised me.
The brother of a seventh-grade student from the middle school had been recently buried in Arlington, and she had asked us to visit his grave. All 45 of us walked to the recent graves. That was also very moving.
So back to what Horace said. I'm always put off when I hear people say that freedom isn't free. To me, that means that somebody else's child or spouse or close relative or friend has had to give their lives so we can be free. Wars keep getting more and more expensive, literally and figuratively, and less and less do they serve the holy purposes stated by our leaders. How many wars have we had to end all wars, and yet war still rages in Afghanistan and Darfur and is brewing elsewhere?
We behave as if someday we're going to get the whole war thing right, when only God has the power to make all things right. Because we as a species seem to be almost incapable of it. The best we can do is to stop making things wrong.
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
The Stew of Time
Author Robert Caro has published the fourth volume of his biography of LBJ. The first volume was published in 1982. In an interview on NPR, he speaks of his writing process:
CARO: Well, I write in long hand. You know, my first three or four drafts, you can see, are on legal pads in long hand. And then I go to a typewriter, and I know everybody's switching to a computer. And I'm sort of laughed at. You know, everyone says you could do it faster. However, I'm not sure that in my case that faster is better.
I highlight the first and last lines because both are true for me, and go to the truth that slow and steady is my mode.
Who knows how I got to be this way, in this go-go country where I was born and raised, where stopping at traffic signals is widely viewed as an affront to forward progress. It's not just because of my advancing age. I've always been drawn to doing things my own way, in my own time. Caro's comments points to committing oneself to the stew of time. Time is the main ingredient in a stew, where flavors and textures influence each other. Richer flavor is the result.
Speaking of rich flavor, Mahalia Jackson's "I'm Gonna Wait Until My Change Comes" played on my MP3 today. What a voice. What a teacher, through this song, of the benefit of waiting--again, that ingredient of time--for the best to come to you, rather than pushing through the red lights.
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Thoughts on Leadership
When Barack Obama was running for president in 2008, a friend preferred Hillary Clinton to him because he was "too preachy."
"Like Martin Luther King, Jr., preachy? That's not a bad thing."
"If you're standing in front of a congregation, it's not a problem. But a country?" She shook her head. "I want people to be effective."
I chalk it up to a difference in the leadership styles we prefer. After eight years of George W. Bush, I for one was ready to be inspired. To listen to a president who knows how to use the English language elegantly and effectively, passionately and convincingly. To teach. All things a preacher does.
I follow Newark mayor Cory Booker on twitter, and he posted a list last week I find inspirational:
1. To create wealth: give more than you get
2. To obtain freedom: adopt discipline
3. To gain tomorrow: sacrifice today
4. To be secure: take risks
5. To lead: serve
6. To get up: lift another
7. To get revenge: forgive
8. To win: find the lessons in loss
9. To fly: fall often
10. To change the world: change yourself
I can hear my friend saying, "Save it for the pulpit." But I get jazzed hearing talk like this from politicians. As a leader with serious responsibilities, he's on the lookout for the best thinking, which often leads to the best doing and feeling.
Any thoughts on leadership styles?
"Like Martin Luther King, Jr., preachy? That's not a bad thing."
"If you're standing in front of a congregation, it's not a problem. But a country?" She shook her head. "I want people to be effective."
I chalk it up to a difference in the leadership styles we prefer. After eight years of George W. Bush, I for one was ready to be inspired. To listen to a president who knows how to use the English language elegantly and effectively, passionately and convincingly. To teach. All things a preacher does.
I follow Newark mayor Cory Booker on twitter, and he posted a list last week I find inspirational:
1. To create wealth: give more than you get
2. To obtain freedom: adopt discipline
3. To gain tomorrow: sacrifice today
4. To be secure: take risks
5. To lead: serve
6. To get up: lift another
7. To get revenge: forgive
8. To win: find the lessons in loss
9. To fly: fall often
10. To change the world: change yourself
I can hear my friend saying, "Save it for the pulpit." But I get jazzed hearing talk like this from politicians. As a leader with serious responsibilities, he's on the lookout for the best thinking, which often leads to the best doing and feeling.
Any thoughts on leadership styles?
Friday, April 20, 2012
Candidates Chase Skirts
And no, I'm not talking about bimbo eruptions and Secret Service prostitution scandals. I'm talking about the presidential candidates duking it out for the female vote in November.
I've admired Ann Romney since the 2008 presidential campaign. She is well-spoken and genuine. I've long wondered why she isn't the presidential candidate. She might have a real shot at winning.
So I didn't find it funny when a Democratic strategist said that Mrs. Romney had "never worked a day in her life," intimating that she couldn't therefore understand the economic pressures other mothers face. I was a stay-at-home mom for almost ten years, and I know what people in the world of productivity and commerce think of us. We're soap-opera addicted slackers who have let ourselves go, eating bonbons and whatnot. This attitude is what got me fired up to write this blog in the first place, to give voice and value to people who are doing the non-flashy work everyone depends on. When I was at home with my kids, I was a working mom, and I'm quite sure that although Mrs. Romney had help raising her kids, she too was a working mom. A functioning mom, who was emotionally involved with each of her five children. Just because I didn't get a paycheck for my work didn't make it any less valuable. My husband's paycheck was--and still isn't--anywhere near as large as Mr. Romney's, so I do know what from economic pressures.
What is laughable about this is how the Republican candidates and strategists have jumped on Hilary Rosen's foot-in-mouth statement as a sign that Democrats and by extension President Obama are out of touch with moms, wherever they work, and women in general.
I still think Obama and the Democrats have the advantage. One unfortunate statement from a strategist does not undo the fact that Republicans, led by Gov. Rick Perry, and shutting down Planned Parenthood clinics in Texas, and national Republicans are calling for cancellation of government support of family planning. The consequence is that women who live paycheck to paycheck and depend on free birth control and women's health screening will have access to neither. More women are going to get pregnant and have babies they can't support. And the fathers of their children are likely struggling, too.
Who's going to pay for this? The high-minded right-wing politicians and activists who are high-fiving each other for destroying Planned Parenthood clinics by a million cuts? Taxpayers will fund these stressed families, at a likely higher cost than supporting the services family-planning clinics provice, in the same way that taxpayers pay for health care for the working poor, the underinsured and the uninsured.
Some say it's a moral issue--that people who can't afford birth contol shouldn't be having sex. Please. Since when has poverty been equated with vows of celibacy? I work with a young man from Mexico who pointed out to me that in his country, people who are too poor to go out or can't afford a TV have the largest families. " 'Cause what else is there for them to do?" Oh, yeah, they could read the bible together, skipping the sexy parts, of course.
So it bears repeating: keeping Planned Parenthood and other family planning services strong is the best use of taxpayer money. I'm betting there will be a lot of other women who vote accordingly.
I've admired Ann Romney since the 2008 presidential campaign. She is well-spoken and genuine. I've long wondered why she isn't the presidential candidate. She might have a real shot at winning.
So I didn't find it funny when a Democratic strategist said that Mrs. Romney had "never worked a day in her life," intimating that she couldn't therefore understand the economic pressures other mothers face. I was a stay-at-home mom for almost ten years, and I know what people in the world of productivity and commerce think of us. We're soap-opera addicted slackers who have let ourselves go, eating bonbons and whatnot. This attitude is what got me fired up to write this blog in the first place, to give voice and value to people who are doing the non-flashy work everyone depends on. When I was at home with my kids, I was a working mom, and I'm quite sure that although Mrs. Romney had help raising her kids, she too was a working mom. A functioning mom, who was emotionally involved with each of her five children. Just because I didn't get a paycheck for my work didn't make it any less valuable. My husband's paycheck was--and still isn't--anywhere near as large as Mr. Romney's, so I do know what from economic pressures.
What is laughable about this is how the Republican candidates and strategists have jumped on Hilary Rosen's foot-in-mouth statement as a sign that Democrats and by extension President Obama are out of touch with moms, wherever they work, and women in general.
I still think Obama and the Democrats have the advantage. One unfortunate statement from a strategist does not undo the fact that Republicans, led by Gov. Rick Perry, and shutting down Planned Parenthood clinics in Texas, and national Republicans are calling for cancellation of government support of family planning. The consequence is that women who live paycheck to paycheck and depend on free birth control and women's health screening will have access to neither. More women are going to get pregnant and have babies they can't support. And the fathers of their children are likely struggling, too.
Who's going to pay for this? The high-minded right-wing politicians and activists who are high-fiving each other for destroying Planned Parenthood clinics by a million cuts? Taxpayers will fund these stressed families, at a likely higher cost than supporting the services family-planning clinics provice, in the same way that taxpayers pay for health care for the working poor, the underinsured and the uninsured.
Some say it's a moral issue--that people who can't afford birth contol shouldn't be having sex. Please. Since when has poverty been equated with vows of celibacy? I work with a young man from Mexico who pointed out to me that in his country, people who are too poor to go out or can't afford a TV have the largest families. " 'Cause what else is there for them to do?" Oh, yeah, they could read the bible together, skipping the sexy parts, of course.
So it bears repeating: keeping Planned Parenthood and other family planning services strong is the best use of taxpayer money. I'm betting there will be a lot of other women who vote accordingly.
Monday, February 27, 2012
The Triple Bind
Yesterday Don, Patrick and I visited our next-door neighbors and their newborn identical twin daughters, who were born prematurely on February 16. They're both beautiful and perfectly formed, like their parents and their older brother and sister. They are a loving, devoted family who will make the sudden doubling in the number of children in the family work for everyone. I wish every child could be born into a family like this.
Earlier in the day I attended an adult education session at my church outlining the youth sex trade in the U.S. Some of the kids forced into prostitution are fleeing abusive homes. Imagine the horror of finding that the world is even more brutal than the one you escaped from. Others are kids from loving homes who are lured by pimps into sexual slavery.
Most people agree that abortion is undesirable and should be avoided. Having said that, I don't believe that abortion, which has been legal and safe in this country since 1974, should be banned, even if that were possible. That genie is out of the bottle. Women have been ending unplanned pregnancies for centuries, often at great peril to their health. I've never understood why a civilized people would want to go back to a time when known medicine would be denied on supposedly moral grounds.
So I'm all for preventing pregnancies to reduce the need for abortion and increase the likelihood that more babies are born into families prepared to raise them in loving homes. But now on top of the right-to-life movement doing all they can to ban abortions, we've got another contingent who want to defund Planned Parenthood, which provides complete reproductive services to low-income women. They also seek to ensure that birth control and other reproductive services are not covered for employees of some religious organzations. For crying out loud. Wasn't family planning settled on fifty years ago as a societal good?
The third coil of the triple bind for women is that Viagra is still covered by most major health care insurers. Don't get pregnant. Don't have abortions. And be a darling--don't say no to a man with an everlasting erection.
There's no getting this straight, because it's good, old-fashioned crazy-making, designed to confuse women so much they don't know what to do. I can't make this crazy-making go away, any more than I could wish away unplanned pregnancy, abortion, and most especially, the scourge of Viagra.
I'll leave the moralizing to those who believe it's their business to tell other people when to have sex, who to have it with and whether or not to continue or end an unplanned pregnancy. All I can recommend is that you take the most prudent, moderate path--use contraception if you don't want to get pregnant.
Earlier in the day I attended an adult education session at my church outlining the youth sex trade in the U.S. Some of the kids forced into prostitution are fleeing abusive homes. Imagine the horror of finding that the world is even more brutal than the one you escaped from. Others are kids from loving homes who are lured by pimps into sexual slavery.
Most people agree that abortion is undesirable and should be avoided. Having said that, I don't believe that abortion, which has been legal and safe in this country since 1974, should be banned, even if that were possible. That genie is out of the bottle. Women have been ending unplanned pregnancies for centuries, often at great peril to their health. I've never understood why a civilized people would want to go back to a time when known medicine would be denied on supposedly moral grounds.
So I'm all for preventing pregnancies to reduce the need for abortion and increase the likelihood that more babies are born into families prepared to raise them in loving homes. But now on top of the right-to-life movement doing all they can to ban abortions, we've got another contingent who want to defund Planned Parenthood, which provides complete reproductive services to low-income women. They also seek to ensure that birth control and other reproductive services are not covered for employees of some religious organzations. For crying out loud. Wasn't family planning settled on fifty years ago as a societal good?
The third coil of the triple bind for women is that Viagra is still covered by most major health care insurers. Don't get pregnant. Don't have abortions. And be a darling--don't say no to a man with an everlasting erection.
There's no getting this straight, because it's good, old-fashioned crazy-making, designed to confuse women so much they don't know what to do. I can't make this crazy-making go away, any more than I could wish away unplanned pregnancy, abortion, and most especially, the scourge of Viagra.
I'll leave the moralizing to those who believe it's their business to tell other people when to have sex, who to have it with and whether or not to continue or end an unplanned pregnancy. All I can recommend is that you take the most prudent, moderate path--use contraception if you don't want to get pregnant.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
God Gets a Bum Rap
In this week's Parade magazine, Daniel Radcliffe sounded off on God. "I have a problem with religion or anything that says, 'We have all the answers,' because there’s no such thing as 'the answers.' We’re complex. We change our minds on issues all the time. Religion leaves no room for human complexity."
If sounding off on God is good enough for the guy who played Harry Potter, then I figure it's good enough for me. And I have problem with what young Mr. Radcliffe said. Because my experience of religion has not given me all the answers. Au contraire. Though I was raised a Catholic and still identify as a Christian, despite my interest in all things spiritual, I'm more in line with Mahatma Gandhi, who observed, "I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ."
I don't have any more proof than the next guy that God exists, or doesn't exist. So I'll quote another wise guy, the Dalai Lama, who says, "My religion is kindness." Amen to that. I'd add gratitude. And an expectation that good things are in store for each of us, if we only align our desire with what is actually good and wholesome for us.
In my life I've put a lot of pressure on myself, and at the advice of a very wise woman, Renay Oshop, I've spent the last three years learning to let go of those old patterns and allow room for grace to work. I can't say I've been a star student at the grace thing.
But like any mediocre student, I've learned something. I don't know what else to do now, except head in the direction of grace's slow drip, which in the Creator's wisdom is the only way I can receive it. I couldn't handle fast honey, so I get it slowly. I used to feel unblessed and unlucky. Now I know that's an old story I used to tell myself. By telling myself that story, I was cutting off the possibility of noticing what I've been receiving and being grateful for it. Now I'm noticing that things are being placed in my path, whether it's objects or people appearing at the right time, or more subtle opportunities. I don't know where it's all leading--to want to know is to apply pressure again--but watching and waiting for the good stuff is a lot more fun than the old way. It's like collecting pennies vs. waiting for fortune to rain down on me, and only me.
Whether I've noticed it or not, the good stuff has always come to me. Because the God I know doesn't withhold. The God I know is always rooting for us, for me. For everyone. It's no accident that our ancestors worshipped the sun, which gives its light and warmth to all, worthy and unworthy unlike. God doesn't believe in terms of worth or lack of worth. That's how we humans punish each other. So that's another part of my religion--abstaining from the cycle of punishing those deemed unworthy of love.
So believe. Or don't. Because whoever you are, the sun is shining on you
If sounding off on God is good enough for the guy who played Harry Potter, then I figure it's good enough for me. And I have problem with what young Mr. Radcliffe said. Because my experience of religion has not given me all the answers. Au contraire. Though I was raised a Catholic and still identify as a Christian, despite my interest in all things spiritual, I'm more in line with Mahatma Gandhi, who observed, "I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ."
I don't have any more proof than the next guy that God exists, or doesn't exist. So I'll quote another wise guy, the Dalai Lama, who says, "My religion is kindness." Amen to that. I'd add gratitude. And an expectation that good things are in store for each of us, if we only align our desire with what is actually good and wholesome for us.
In my life I've put a lot of pressure on myself, and at the advice of a very wise woman, Renay Oshop, I've spent the last three years learning to let go of those old patterns and allow room for grace to work. I can't say I've been a star student at the grace thing.
But like any mediocre student, I've learned something. I don't know what else to do now, except head in the direction of grace's slow drip, which in the Creator's wisdom is the only way I can receive it. I couldn't handle fast honey, so I get it slowly. I used to feel unblessed and unlucky. Now I know that's an old story I used to tell myself. By telling myself that story, I was cutting off the possibility of noticing what I've been receiving and being grateful for it. Now I'm noticing that things are being placed in my path, whether it's objects or people appearing at the right time, or more subtle opportunities. I don't know where it's all leading--to want to know is to apply pressure again--but watching and waiting for the good stuff is a lot more fun than the old way. It's like collecting pennies vs. waiting for fortune to rain down on me, and only me.
Whether I've noticed it or not, the good stuff has always come to me. Because the God I know doesn't withhold. The God I know is always rooting for us, for me. For everyone. It's no accident that our ancestors worshipped the sun, which gives its light and warmth to all, worthy and unworthy unlike. God doesn't believe in terms of worth or lack of worth. That's how we humans punish each other. So that's another part of my religion--abstaining from the cycle of punishing those deemed unworthy of love.
So believe. Or don't. Because whoever you are, the sun is shining on you
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