Archive for 2010
not that kind of writing
“Are you doing any writing?”
I scrambled for an answer to my friend’s well-intentioned,”I’m-keeping-you-accountable-and-you’ll-thank-me-later” question. I embellished my latest scribbles.
“Oh yeah, I’m working on this thing…oh, and that project, it’s going well…and have I told you about my children’s book idea?” Jude played at the perimeter of my outstretched legs as I lied.
Truth be told, I have fought it. I have grieved it. I have not wanted to believe it, the Type A, can-do go-getter in me doubting to the end. But I cannot deny it any longer. I can’t have it all. It is the bitter fact of the matter. Of course, if I had the means to employ a butler, a maid, a nanny and a groundskeeper, maybe it would be possible. Maybe I could have a toddler and pursue all my dreams while keeping my house immaculate and entertaining friends and family every weekend. But even then, I’m not so sure.
I say all this partly to explain why I haven’t been posting much lately, why I won’t be posting very often for the foreseeable future. Because I’ve tried. Tried to blog, tried to keep up with the cleaning, tried to cook more, have friends over, join mommy groups, put all the laundry away, return calls, keep up with Swerve business, come up with crafty ways to market my book, do house projects… And it has driven me to the point of insanity. At every turn, something has had to give. And that something is quality. Sure, I can do all the things I want to do, but when I’m juggling so much, multitasking my life (not to mention my son and husband’s lives as well), the quality of my investment goes down fast.
The way I see it, I get a few short years of putting in very long days to write the pages of Jude’s early childhood. These are days that science tells us he won’t tangibly remember, but they are in fact the most important days of both our lives. How I engage these mundane moments lays the groundwork for our future relationship, for his physical and emotional health, for the wholeness of our family. It is a full-time job with a daily requirement of overtime and night shift duty. And when I get a few minutes to me – just me – I’m tired. How am I to focus with any depth, devotion or consistency on pen and paper, or house renovations, or entertaining guests, or landscaping projects, or travel, or marketing my book, or…
I’m done trying. From now on, I will be Krista. I will be wife. And I will be mother. I will become exemplary at mono-tasking those few roles. And I won’t apologize for it anymore. Or feel guilty when a friend asks if I’ve been writing. Of course, being me includes things like writing, having friends over, and keeping up with the laundry. But I won’t be very good at any of it. Chances are, for a little while, I will be an unexceptional friend, a negligent writer, a lax church-goer, a mediocre cleaner, a lapsed Twitterer, a lazy cook, a scattered daughter, a forgetful daughter-in-law, a late arriver, a non-joiner, a poor hostess, and myriad other socially unacceptable labels. Nonetheless, I will be me, lover and fighter, no apologies. And the two most important people in my life will get the best of me. I won’t regret missing out on their lives because I had to write or because I had to get the garden planted or because I had to fulfill some banal commitment to a lesser thing. I’m choosing the good part now. I’m choosing relationship. I’m choosing, ultimately, to die to myself.
So, the next time my friend asks if I’m writing, I’ll tell her honestly and without hesitation, yes. I am writing. It’s just not the kind of writing you do with words.
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As I drove past the farmers market today, I heard a news report that the Corn Refiners Association is petitioning the FDA to rename high fructose corn syrup to simply “corn sugar.” They claim that it’s “the only way to clear up consumer confusion.”
Does anyone else see the trouble with this proposition? Maybe it’s because I recently watched the documentary Food, Inc, but my sense of awareness regarding the foods we eat has hit an all time high. There are countless injustices in this world that enrage me, but when huge corporations and big government get together to dangerously tamper with a commodity that no one can live without, you get my attention.
Since it burst onto the market in the mid-1970s in products like Coke and Pepsi, high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) has left a deadly trail. The US readily allows – nay, encourages – putting HFCS in hundreds of food products now and leads the world in the use of this “corn sugar.” And guess what: we’re the fattest, most unhealthy we’ve ever been…the fattest and most unhealthy nation in the world.
Of course, back in the 70s and 80s, HFCS was seen by everyone in the food industry as a way to save money. Good intentions, right? Sure. But now that we know some of the dangers of this corn concoction, does the FDA (a government-run regulation agency meant to protect us) really think it’s a good idea to simply rename one of the most controversial, dangerous and addictive substances in our food today? Really? Come on, FDA, we the people are not that stupid. We get it…corn is the most government subsidized food in the US by a long shot, but can you put your pocketbooks away for a second and actually do something in the interest of the American people just this once?
Renaming HFCS is the absolute wrong move on the part of the FDA. What they need to do is connect the very obvious dots and take this toxic product out of our foods and off the shelves of our grocery stores. Or at the very least, put a cigarette-style warning on every product that contains it. (Warning: you are about to consume a chemically manipulated food that has been linked to cancer, liver disease, and insulin resistance, to name a few.)
But since money and a few big industry voices talk very loudly, that probably won’t happen. So we as consumers, the ones who actually hold the power, need to protect ourselves. We can start by being more aware of the ingredients in our food. One easy way to do this is by eating simple foods. You know, the stuff we ate as kids: apples, bananas, orange slices, almonds, carrots, celery sticks slathered in natural peanut butter, raisins…you get the picture.
We can also make a visit to the farmers market, where we see the faces and shake the hands of the men and women who grow the foods we eat. If you think prices are a problem, just stop by…you might be surprised. Many farmers are even taking food stamps at our local farmers market these days. Fresh food that tastes like home is for everyone – not just the wealthy.
Should the FDA decide to change high fructose corn syrup’s name to corn sugar, attempting to dupe the American public once again, we don’t have to eat it. We can vote with our dollars. We can choose to buy foods without HFCS. In May 2010, Hunts took HFCS out of its ketchup because customers demanded it. If these men and women in the food industry and in our government understand anything at all, it’s money. So lets start speaking their language.
And while we’re at it, let’s take back our table.
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“The answer must be, I think, that beauty and grace are performed whether or not we will or sense them. The least we can do is try to be there.”
Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
I never know how to start during these moments. The space I have is so narrow, too narrow for all the thoughts and fears, memories and questions, sighs and wanderings. I want to be poetic. I want to be still. I want to be alone and comfortable. I want to cry. I want to sing. There is not time.
So I will simply start. I will turn to the pages of this yellowed book, favored and familiar pages with good stories. I will be present with the pages that tell my story – and all our stories. I will inhale the pages that breathe life, truth, and grace. And I will fall in my trembling place when the pages say, “Just stay where you are. I’m coming to get you.”
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“She has not raised kids, endured severe financial hardship or cared for a dying loved one – in short, she has not lived enough of life to offer us real grace.”
TheOOZE Viral Blogger Review of As Is by “monster,” July 14, 2010
A monster recently crossed my path. A big, hairy monster with a heavy shadow to boot. And the monster said that I didn’t have any “real” grace to offer because I hadn’t given birth to a mentally handicapped son. Because I hadn’t nursed a dying loved one. Because I hadn’t endured financial hardship. Because, in monster’s opinion, I hadn’t really lived. So how could I dare to write about messy grace – a topic that has “been done before and done better by others” in his opinion.
You see, monster decided to read and review As Is for TheOOZE’s Viral Blogger platform, a platform that has earned As Is mixed reviews at best. But in many ways, it’s been refreshing. I have invited the comments and suggestions from peers and have been inspired to work that much harder at my craft. Until this review. Truth be told, monster knocked the wind out of me with his assumptions and judgments as he questioned the authenticity and validity of who I am.
So, as is my MO, I’ve been thinking. Thinking about this book review. Thinking about my writing. Thinking about my story, my life’s story. And most of this thinking has been good because it landed me in a place I needed to be. A place where I was forced to unearth truth and beauty again. And it was there that I discovered we – all of us – have something to say about grace. Because we all have a story. Some stories are grittier than others. Some stories are, on the surface, a little tidier. But not long after we’re out of the womb, life on planet earth collides with us and brings us face to face with moments when grace, mercy, peace, love and truth must show up if we are to go on.
Some of us have cancer.
Some of us have eating disorders.
Some of us have anxiety attacks.
Some of us lose our jobs.
Some of us bury children.
Some of us suffer deep betrayal by the one who said, “till death do us part.”
Some of us are raped.
Some of us endure racial hate.
Some of us are physically abused.
Some of us are bullied in school.
Some of us have barren wombs.
Some of us endure the tragedy of front-line warfare.
Some of us have multiple sclerosis.
Some of us lose limbs in car accidents.
Some of us go without food.
Some of us are sold into sex trafficking.
Some of us are alcoholics.
Some of us suffer depression.
Some of us don’t have clean water to drink.
Some of us lose our homes in floods.
We all need grace. And we need it spoken to us in a variety of voices.
Maybe monster has the luxury of being choosy about who he’ll allow to speak “real” grace into his life. Me – I’ll take grace anywhere I can get it. I’ll take it from the 16-year-old kid at the grocery store. I’ll take it from U2 or Hoagy Carmichael or Beethoven, Annie Dillard or Joan Didion or Frederick Buechner. I’ll take it from my single girlfriends who have no idea what it’s like to be married with children. I’ll take it from my husband who has never suffered a panic attack or battled an eating disorder. I’ll take it from my 13-month-old son who has barely been touched by the tragedy and pain of this world.
I’ll take it from anyone, anywhere, any time. Because if I demand that anyone who speak “real” grace into my life go through the hardest, most catastrophic life events or the exact circumstances I have experienced before they’re qualified, I’ll never receive grace.
I’ve lived long enough to know that none of our storms are the same. And the minute we go around comparing, judging and deciding whose got the biggest, baddest, most hardcore life story, we lose sight of what grace is all about. We lose sight of something whole-making and powerful. We lose sight of coming like children – clamoring, hands open, excited to receive whatever is given.
No, I don’t have the luxury of being picky about where grace comes from. I grasp for it. I inhale it. I gulp it down like a beggar at a feast. And I find it not only in the hardest and most tragic moments that life hurls at me and those around me. But I find it in the mundane and monotonous. Because grace is for all of us in all our moments – not just for those whose stories are the deepest or darkest.
So it turns out that even in a malicious review and personal attack, grace found me. She reminded me who I am, whose I am, and that life is grace (as Buechner says). So thanks, monster. In spite of your shadow, grace won. Real grace.
Grace finds beauty in everything.
U2, Grace
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I will not forget.
I cannot pretend.
This has been the break and bend,
This has been the break and mend,
This has been the break and end
Of me
As I know me,
As I knew me.
Lost, lost, lost
And gone forever,
Is it ok to call this “never”
As I watch the others,
The others go?
Not mothers, no, but others,
Go in and out
In and out
In and out
All day without
A care,
Light as air
As I stare.
Do I romanticize,
Fantasize,
Analyze,
Demonize?
Their eyes
Behind perfect sunglassed shades
Coifed hair
Clean shirts
Important deals being made
While I,
While I,
While I
In smeared and smattered smock
Do slouch and count the Os
Mosaic on the floorboard
And O, how I used to be so clean
A sight to be seen,
Supreme,
The Queen of my Universe
So I thought
Controlled,
In ivory tower,
On pause for hours,
Walking with the flowers,
A superpower
Until,
Until,
Until
Indelible line, pink pale
Nine months later, a wail,
A battle to the finish,
But we fought together, no limits
And that was the last time
I got my way
The day I got you
And all that comes with who
You were born to be,
A soul like me
STRONG
FIGHTER
PASSION
FLYER
Is it any wonder?
Is it any wonder?
Is it any wonder
You bring the thunder
And lighten your momma’s heart
When the pain of old desires comes sharp.
You breathe,
I breathe,
You breathe,
You smile in your sleep,
You laugh and weep,
Your boldness runs deep
Already you keep
A place in your heart for the pain
And the rain
And the shame
Of a world that needs and bleeds
For one like you,
One like you,
One like you,
Who holds his momma’s hand
When she can’t stand
Because she can’t stand,
She can’t stand,
She won’t stand
Alone
Anymore.
So together we weather
The surges of grace
That come our way
As grace, these days,
Floods us in tempest strong.
I know it won’t be long -
I’ll blink,
I’ll blink,
I’ll blink,
These days be gone
And I’ll wish them back,
The smock
The pain
The tears
Endless drain
Of shame and tasks
And more to do than
Ability or facility
And brevity,
O, brevity,
I know these days are brevity
But pain be what pain be:
TEACHER,
WAKER-UPPER,
FAITHFUL LOVER.
And you are enough, my friend,
My son,
My sun,
A treasure,
A pleasure,
A measureless glory,
You are enough.
And I am enough
In fallen state,
In guilt and hate,
A daughter still,
A daughter still
I am enough.
I cannot pretend.
I may not mend.
But he is here.
No fear.
No fear.
No fear.
He is here.
[For mommas everywhere who bleed love.]
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