Shade

Someone's sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago. ~ Warren Buffett

I wrote this in September, but it seems just as timely.  Enjoy.

 

 I've just returned from paradise. There is something particularly healing and awakening that comes from traveling to somewhere so old.  I had the pleasure of going to the El Yunque Rainforest.  After driving past a very small sign, and ending up in a village where several men passes phrases between each other to get my daughter and I back on track, we entered the rainforest to see very old trees and ferns. We saw bamboo so old, the trunks looked like the strong and beautiful thighs of healthy women lifting up the leafy canopy to the sky.  

 Those trees speak to those who would listen.  They tell stories of many generations of free people and oppressed ones.  I was enjoying shade from trees that I didn't plant.  Instead of simply taking pictures of flowers and tall structures that seemed built instead of grown, I honored them.  I honored what the trees have seen, what storms they have endured, and that they give to us even though we, the tourists, did absolutely nothing to grow them.  Many of us would do little if we heard cutting was scheduled.  Still, we were blessed with amazing beauty, and protected from the heat of a Puerto Rican sunny day.

In that forest, I was reminded of our time in Old San Juan.  When asked about navigating the area, the tour guide at the hotel was quick to say, "Stay away from THIS neighborhood," he said, stabbing the map with his finger.  "The people are poor, and the place is dangerous, but they won't bother the tourists because they know that tourism is the life of this island."  

So, my daughter and I walked around the Old San Juan in virtual peace. It was almost hauntingly peaceful.  We could see the neighborhood.  We could see the colorful houses and the roofs that looked as if a strong wind would blow them away.  The barrio looked like it was a fragile prize to coming storms, for it was on the rocks under the strong walls of the fortress built long ago.  From the Castillo walls, we could see how someone, or some bureaucracy attempted to push and limit this problematic neighborhood from the shade, even though no one alive today planted the metaphorical tree.  

Heartbreaking, and a sign of humanity's limited vision.

I was stepping into a situation I knew I couldn't impact even slightly.   Yet, I was delighted when an older man, who wasn't so well dressed, came to my car and said he would watch it for me while I toured around. "I be right here, protecting your car, for one... or two, or three dollars," he said.  I gave him the money hoping he would get a good meal, and knowing my car was already safe and secure without his watchful eye.  He just wanted a bit of shade.  I was happy to oblige.

 Warren Buffet's words have never been more true.  There is not a person alive who isn't benefiting from trees planted by another.  Not one.  Some of us live in the shade of their parents, who made sure their education was in place so that they could have a fighting chance.  Others of us live in the shade of someone else's missed opportunity.  Some of us share the shade of a tree planted by the enslaved, humans who could never enjoy produce of that tree, or its shelter.  Many of us are too short-minded to think outside of our own experiences, and the light of some egos help them forget the coolness of the shade in which they stand.

The myth of "discovery" is a sick thing; it is ego-maniacal to believe that any of us discovered anything.  We displace.  We ignore and dismiss, then overthrow. We colonize.  We don't discover. 

The same is true of what we own.  If we pulled ourselves us by our bootstraps, someone else made the boots.  If we climbed our own ladder of success, a tree someone else planted was cut to created the pieces of that ladder.  

I invite you to become reconciled to the idea that no matter how much we worship individualism, we are connected to each other, and we are privileged to sit in the shade of others.  Let us plant trees for others.  There is more than enough shade for us all.

 

The Truth

For those of us that feel anxiety that some can look at a fact and never concede that it is true, consider this. The people of this country dunked women in water and called them witches if they survived, and innocent only if they drowned. Eugenics sought to measure the brains of Black folk, and classify and institutionalize the poor, women, homosexuals, and others in order to justify segregation and "sanitation".

 

Additionally, there is a huge movement to remove and reduce information of chattel slavery from the text books that our young people use, to redeem and sanitize American history. Another movement seeks to dispel the idea that slavery was violent, torturous, or evil, and that slave owners were compassionate folk who simply took advantage of a free market. Across the world there are groups in existence simply to disprove the Jewish Holocaust, and every historical genocide has a group of privileged folk who will deny that mass murder was genocide, or that the numbers of those killed are significantly over-reported in the data. 

 

There are others who simply do not have the mental constitution or the strength of soul to accept the truth from other perspectives, period. For this reason, I intentionally tune my ear for the voices on the bottom, the bottom meaning those who are most oppressed, those who do not get the podium, or whose voice is being muffled. For this reason, it behooves us all to be confident in what we know to be true, and to not let the loud, lying screams of mistruth deter what you know you must do.

 

Reconciling Act:  Look back through history with courage and for clarity.  Dare to learn the lessons that so clearly lay on the path behind us.   Quiet your fear that you will lose your place in the world, because lies are the fruit of weak and dying trees.  Be a truth-teller, not one who continuously scrambles to manipulate the truth for personal convenience, to "save face", to "win" or appear heroic in the midst of one's villainy.  Love the Truth, and welcome Wisdom. If you are confident in your beliefs, they need no life-support.  The truth has a life of its own.

Sacred voting

It is an abuse of power for anyone to use a pulpit to convince you that you are immoral if you vote.  The immoral thing is for a pastor of any gender, ethnicity, or class to use the power vested in him or her by God to sway people to not vote due to their personal engagement with Scripture or tradition.  When I preach, I know that I have done my job when someone challenges my interpretation, or tells me that they will have to go home and study the Scripture presented for themselves.  This is what we are called to be as faithful people;  we are called to understand that faithfulness does not mean giving over your intelligence or ability to think for yourselves to be "saved".  

Vote!  Our foreparents didn't have the luxury of choosing "between two evils", if that is your perception of this election.  While they were asked to count the bubbles in a bar of soap, or guess the number of beans in a jar, or charged poll taxes, they simply wanted to vote.  Their choices, the representatives, may not have even cared that they existed; still they knew it was a right that they must seek to exercise.  

In this day and time, as Representative John Lewis stated, voting is sacred.  It is a holy thing.  I think we are in a dangerous place if we will throw everything away because you may disagree.  Going to a church that asks for everyone to do as the leader asks is simply a social club, and has lost the gift of power, voice on behalf of the oppressed, and the diversity in which God relishes.  

*This is not a partisan request; simply my stance against some pastors who I believe are misusing their pulpits in asking their congregations not to vote this election cycle. 

The Blood of Jesus

On the way to church, I noticed a man who had fallen on the sidewalk.  He appeared to be a homeless man, but I admit, he could have just been a pedestrian on his way somewhere.  I didn't stop, though I usually do, because someone had already stopped to help him.  I prayed for him and made it to church on time.

After church, I realized I was starving.  Dinner was sparse (on purpose) last night, and not having breakfast had created a serious growling in my stomach.  Just before pulling into the restaurant, my daughter and I noticed a man lying on the asphalt in a pool of blood.  It was the gentleman from earlier.  This time, he was in the middle of an intersection between the restaurant and a gas station.

I jumped out of the car, and ran to the man.  There was a crowd, but everyone was standing around him, looking at him as he struggled to breathe through the thick blood coming out of his nose.  I yelled for my daughter to get a clean towel out of the car, and noticed that he was bleeding out of his ear and a large cut on the back of his head.  A witness said that he had a bike and a group of folk stole it from him, hitting him with something before he fell to the street.

Here begins my rant.  I ran to the man because I want someone to run to me.  I ran to the man because my Christianity remembers that Jesus went about doing good, and not for the sake of my own ego, but so that we all can help those most in need.  I struggled to lift the man's head by myself so I could put the towel on it and apply pressure.  I wanted to turn him, because he was gurgling in his blood and I didn't want him to drown.  I turned him gently on his side.

Mind you, the people standing around were the members of the little church behind the gas station.  Some of the members had seen what happened and came out to watch as the man began to convulse on the ground.  The pastor, a bishop of some sort, stood over the man and watched me as I attempted to clumsily help the man.

He yelled to his congregation, "Stay back!!!  Don't touch him.  Just pray where you are.  We plead the blood of Jesus!!!!!!  He needs prayer!  Jesus will heal him.  Don't get near him.  Everyone, start praying."

I came out of myself, friends.  May God forgive me, but I am tired of folk.  I continued to apply pressure while coagulating blood continued to drip out of his ear and nose.  I blasted the bishop.  I was livid.

"What?  Stand back?  This man needs prayer, but while we are praying somebody with some medical experience needs to put some feet on their prayer and help!  We cannot be so afraid to help him that he dies here in the streets while good Christians do nothing.  Somebody help!"

What in the world?  The bishop looked at me and appeared ashamed of himself.  He did not, however, approach the man, or touch him because at that point, thick blood was all over the man, on the white arrow on the ground, on my hands and pantsuit, and running down the street into the gutter.  It was the thickest blood I had ever seen, and looked more like extra thick, bright red ketchup than something that could keep a human alive. 

Thankfully, the ambulance was there within minutes.  I had a chance to calm down and look at the pastor and the folk pouring out of the church.  

He was sharp.  He had on a tan suit with a fuschia pin-striped shirt and a beautiful fuschia and orange thick tie.  The bishop was handsome, about my age, and had a deep resonant voice.  His members were working folk.  Some were dressed in their best, but I noticed their best was not necessarily expensive.  I wondered why they hung on his every word, why someone wouldn't break out to help me care for the man.

The bishop was still standing back a safe distance from the dying man.  Still sharp as a tack.

The man went to the hospital alive.  I am not sure if he made it there, however, because he was having a hard time breathing.  I gathered the man's things, gave them to a police officer and watched as the little church went back to their building before leaving to go home.

The bishop of this 30 member church got into his Hummer and drove over the bloody spot where the man had been to go on to his next destination.

Now my issue is not with these few people.  My issue is with the church as a whole.  What is the hesitance about?  When did safety become a Christian virtue?  If we are going to be the church, risk is involved.  We are called to help!  To step outside of ourselves and do as Jesus would.

I heard someone in the crowd say, "We don't know what he may have, so I ain't touching him."  Well, 'tis true.  However, I can tell you that no one out there knew what any of us had.  There is a risk in being community, and in being the church.  I don't have to judge, because on this, the record is clear.   

Matthew 25 says, "For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat; I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger and you invited me in; I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me; I was in prison and you came to visit me...  Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you? The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me..."


That man was a part of Jesus, and some folk missed an opportunity to meet him today.  They watched the blood of Jesus drip down the drain.

Be An Ocean

"Let your waves crash down on me and take me away."
—Yellowcard, Ocean Avenue

When I step into the ocean, the water doesn't avoid my feet,
         not even my interestingly long, brown toes that dig deeply into the soothing sand,
                and cling to the moving grit that makes no promises, but feels so loyal.
It doesn't grade me before I open my mouth.
As a matter of fact, it is attracted to me because I am another living thing.
He just moves to greet me, easily,
Feeling my longing for the waters to drown the disappointment of untouched and lonely skin.

I just need a little tenderness.

When I step into the coolness of the water, the ocean rushes up to me.
It doesn't swirl off in the distance, judging me without talking to me,
       checking to see if I'm a "dime piece,"
               or silently retreating to go to the fairer-skinned, thin women with long hair.

The ocean comes to see about me, and rushes to do so.  The ocean accepts my love.

I welcome him, embrace him by inching further out into his body.
Wet fingers reach out to me, and I do my best to quickly drink in the feeling
        of a million drops of water splashing against me.
Strong legs are happily startled, just to feel again, and the water touches the hem of my garment.

I need a healing that only comes from being loved, and maybe the ocean needs a healing, too.

The overspray pops up onto my skirt, turning the orange into a dark red, as if my garment is living and breathing its own sunset and making its slow fade to the darkest night.

I come here because I am human, and everyday my fifth sense of touch
         is left to wonder if she is dead. 

Less compassionate folk believe only certain curves deserve caresses, attention, affection.  They look past you as if you are less than nothing.  Only swaying hips and well done weaves, bottom implants, and small waists can depend on appreciation, depend on physical touch when they want it. Those pushed to the side who don't often make the cut are left to love themselves and justify being ignored because we refuse to conform to a puny fantasy.

My hips and dips and curves say I'm desperate, though my mouth does not. 
People think I should take what I can get because I am not a tiny size.
But, here I stand, strong and whole, enjoying the ocean.

Why are you better than the ocean?  Why do you reject love in search of quick fixes?
You may end up settling because the ocean waves came your way and you jumped out of the water.

Be an ocean.  Accept love when it comes to you.

At Last

There are alternative ways to live.  Really.  We can choose to step outside of ourselves and see the behaviors and desires and habits that fill space in our lives, but do nothing for us or for the world.  If you are primarily angry, you can let go of it.  Anger is not a personality trait.  No one is born with anger.  You can let it go.

You are not a thief.  Really.  You are a person who has convinced him or herself that there is nothing else out there but what you take.  You've locked yourself into believing you are stuck in a depraved place and it can be no worse... so you take and take and take, never considering that you might be stealing to fill that empty place that some how only manages to fill with thick, sticky pain.  You can let it go.

You are not mean as a snake, at least your essence is not mean.  You've behaved as if you are not happy unless everyone else isn't, and you've decided that it is your role to get everyone told.  You slay folk daily with your mouth and take great pride in the fact that you are the best at what you do.  Often you notice that meanness carves a lonely place, and now you feel stuck in the habit of being so volatile.  And, while you are fixing everyone else, you haven't spent one iota on getting your life right.  That's alright.  Let it go!  Even if you are awkward in approaching your relationships at first in a new way, you can give yourself permission to be who you really are.

This is my mantra: I can let it go.   Sadness is not my uniform.  Depression is not my hairdo, nor my favorite shoes.   I don't have to allow reflex or inertia form how things are in my life.  I certainly will never assume the way things are are the way they will always be. 

I sing "At Last" by Etta James not to announce a new relationship, but for all of us that realize it isn't about singleness, or togetherness; it's not about having much or nothing at all; not even about our failures or our successes.  If it has been about all the things that hang on you, but not about your spirit or your heart, let it go!  It's not about all those things we rehearse and wish for, but won't stick to us as we wish or crave. Today, I can happily say that I am letting go!  

At last, I am that I am, and that is abundantly more than enough.  I'm free.

Reconciling Act:  Make a decision today to love yourself and others better. At last, you can be authentic.  Treat people with kindness, and walk humbly with a gracious God.

A Public Invocation

O God,
We invited you into the spaces and places of our lives.
Right now.  You are welcome.
We invite you, even while we curse the driver of the car that just cut us off,
While we don't tip the server because she was too slow and dares to have an attitude.
Come into the rooms of our lives.
Observe us until we are conscious of you while we justify stealing office supplies,
     or sit back and watch people fail instead of helping them.  
We invite you, O God of the universe,
In the moments when we try to figure out how to "make" her love us the way we desire,
And while we do things we will never tell anyone, 
Planning even while we act 
To declare upon capture or revelation,"The devil made me do it."
Sometimes, dear Lord, we fight ourselves, because we must admit we are scheming
      how to do the things-- we know we shouldn't do-- better and with more precision in our secrecy.

We admit that we only wished you were around when we are at our best.
An invocation reminds us that you have no turn-off switch, and you don't call before dropping by.
We hope that you tolerate us until we ask for forgiveness.
We thank you that you are compassionate even when we won't ask.

Creator, we invite you in the moments we lose patience with our loved ones.
Be with us when we lose patience with ourselves.
Help us to remember that you are God and we are not
      as we rush to judge, to hate, and declare who is hell-bound and subhuman.
Let us feel your presence, the heat of your Being,
So that, perhaps, just maybe, we will take our shoes off and honor your presence in all we do.

Amen.

I Shot The Sheriff...

I shot the sheriff
But I didn't shoot no deputy, oh no!
I shot the sheriff
But I didn't shoot no deputy.
Yeah!

All around in my home town,
They're tryin' to track me down;
They say they want to bring me in guilty
For the killing of a deputy,
For the life of a deputy. -Bob Marley

It occurs to me that Bob Marley has much to say concerning the murder of Trayvon Martin. I am deeply concerned how the media rushes to determine that a dead young man was really only a scoundrel, and therefore, no great loss to society. If you believe some media outlets, Zimmerman did the world a favor. Trayvon had an empty bag that contained weed at some point, and had been suspended. He must have been the scourge of the earth.

When I heard this information on the news, I immediately went to youtube and listened to the some Bob Marley. He has a way of saying things most people are content to only think about. "I Shot the Sheriff" is a powerhouse of a song, quickly enveloping its listener in a syrupy sweet, honey-thick web of harmony and rhythm that welcomes everyone to dance like they really can. The song is hypnotic, mesmerizing. One almost doesn't hear the lyrics the first time. It's only after one is sweaty and out of breath that we realize the song has said something profound in the midst of its melodic genius. Listen with ears for justice, and a very poignant and relevant voice arises.

Bob is singing, ever so coolly, about the plight of the Black man-- any Black man-- who kills in self-defense. He shot the sheriff. He kills, not because he is a genetic criminal, or because killing is what Black folk do. Bob makes it clear that he shoots the sheriff because he is forced to do so. The sheriff is dead because the sheriff was stalking and hunting him--to this charge, he readily admits his guilt. But, Bob didn't kill no deputy.

The parallels are haunting. The song goes on to say that Marley knows he is hated by the sheriff, and he doesn't know why. He had encountered this hatred (and probably this kind of hatred) long enough that he is attempting to get away from it. Minding his own business, he is on the way out of town. Out of no where, he looks to find the sheriff is aiming at him. What is one to do, in the words of my friend Howard Thurman, when one's back is against the wall? "Reflexes got the better of me," he details, and he responds in self-defense.

Me thinks Marley is a prophet, and I know that he knew full-well the delicate and intricate dynamics of a racist society. He says, "I may have done some things, but I didn't do this." Only here can one being stalked and followed, end of being vilified for responding to being hunted. How is it Trayvon, the victim, the one now dead, is revolving into the one who was the aggressor, the one who beat poor little George Zimmerman?

Trayvon did something wrong. He was prey, and prey is not supposed to fight back. If in fact he did approach Zimmerman (which seems improbable and impossible at this point), still--the hunted is supposed to participate in their own death without struggle. So whether this is true or not, the unsettled conversation of race and racism was struggling to produce this dialog since this story broke.

Through a short song, Marley does something very nuanced that one might miss without it being highlighted. He tells a simple story and his is innocence is the constant thread. He says, "If I am guilty I will pay," not as much as an admission, but as if he knows the fluid nature of law in the hands of powerful people who don't look like him. This reality is the most frustrating and crazy-making. Then, as if adding insult to injury, someone has accused him of killing the deputy, too!

Have mercy.

This song raises the issue of compounded guilt. In the minds of limited folk, and embedded in the history of this country, Black folk are guilty from birth. If we haven't committed a crime, it's only a matter of time. If we have committed a crime, then the door is open to pin everything and anything that happened in the vicinity on us. In writing this blog, I remembered a distasteful joke I happened upon. With nausea, I repeat, "How do you know a n*gger is guilty? He's alive."

Trayvon was in the midst of a storm of history and hatred, and didn't know it. His only sin is that he walked easily with treats in hand, through the rain, just trying to make it home.

With great urgency, many of us donned hoodies, wanting to lift up the fact that a young man was stalked and hunted, and killed in cold blood. We want justice. We want that humans are not considered dangerous because they are breathing. We want peace for all the young men and women who wear their hoodies, who lift their hoods not in subversive criminality, but for fashion, anonymity and safety.

I pray that one day a murdered young man's family doesn't have to hear on the news that their son was just a weed-smoking thug who was suspended from school. They shouldn't be told that he was the attacker, as if to say let it go. No one should have to deal with this while they mourn. I pray a child's life doesn't get distilled to a few instances of less-than-favorable behavior. I pray no parent has to experience the loud inference, "He deserved what he got." If he were alive, perhaps Trayvon would admit that he wasn't perfect, but perfection is not the measure to determine who deserves to live. Perhaps Trayvon as prey tried to defend himself from the predator, but he didn't kill no deputy. Let us stay the course and look for justice and make peace, and remember the lessons of prophet Marley:

Every time I plant a seed,
He said kill it before it grow -
He said kill them before they grow.

Reconciling Act: Every person deserves to cultivate seeds and watch them grow. Our streets should not be a hunting ground for young black men due to the residue of a Jim Crow society. Every facet of our lives in America should be steeped in the dismantling of racism. Let us refuse to victimize those who are the victims just to ease the discomfort of those who have been comfortable for too long.

Enough!

Someone called my house.

It was the wrong number, but we struck up a conversation.

Nice voice.

As a result, I was invited out to dinner.

I graciously accepted the offer,

For I am always hungry; and I let everybody know just how much.

So I got dressed to the nines,

I mean sharp as a tack,

And waited for my date to arrive.

And I waited…

And waited…

Finally, I got a call.

He was on the way.

So, I waited some more,

Looking at the clock on the wall.

Surely, any restaurant was closed by now,

But I hadn’t taken off a stitch of clothes.

If anyone had mastered the art of foolishly waiting,

It was me.

I just waited,

And waited some more.

My stone-like pose was interrupted by the doorbell.

He's here!

My blood rushed.

My heart leaped.

My stomach remembered her hunger.

My date was at the door, and I could take my life off pause.

I could live again,

For my every bodily function depended on this man.

I opened the door to find a man, thinking,

What was his name again?

A man, yes, but more of a creature.

He had the most bulbous eyes any human could have

without them falling out of the sockets.

Must have thyroid problems.

His skin was a grayish-brown color,

you know the pasty color dead Black folks look.

Not enough vitamin E in his diet.

He wore a loud red and orange Italian silk shirt with shiny burgundy pants,

and a goldish-greeny medallion lie in a pool of nappy chest hair.

Well, he can hold on to a dollar. He sho ain’t spending it on clothes.

He opened his mouth to say, "hello,"

and I had a flashback of an old war movie.

Certainly a grenade went off in his mouth.

No excuse for this one; his mouth is just tore up!

Poor thing.

“You ready? You look nice.”

How could such an ugly man have such a beautifully resonant voice?

“Yes,” I purred,

like the man was Denzel’s younger and more handsome brother.

What was his name again?

We got to the restaurant, way off the road, and a dirt one, at that.

He wasn’t worried about it closing because this was one of them

momma and ‘nem Disco/Meeting House/Barber Shop/Restaurants.

Ooo, he really wanted to impress me!

He gently held my hand, and led me to a table in the corner, next to the kitchen,

Where I could get a good look

at the greasy, obese man in a brown wife beater dropping sweat into the food.

Drip, drip... hey. They make brown wife beaters?

Ummm...no. No, they don't.

A blond, Black woman who looked like Bobby Womack in the face,

Came off the dance floor, puffing, grabbed something,

and handed us an oily menu with food caked in the crease.

“Just tell Rufus what you want when you is ready.”

Big girl threw the menu at us and went right back to dancing.

Apparently she was off work already.

My date didn’t even look at his menu.

Just asked, “Ru! Man, what you got left?”

“Gots some pig feets and rice, man.”

He looked at Rufus like he had just said filet mignon.

“That’s what we want!”

WE! Are you French? Thanks for asking, fool.

My body was beginning to do what my sick mind wouldn’t.

It was trying to leave that place,

Trying to convince my mind that it had had enough

and it couldn’t stand another minute.

My stomach began to roll,

My hands began to wring each other.

My eyelids began to droop from sheer over-use,

reminding me that they had been stretched open most of the evening,

Peering out the window to see if the man was coming.

Widely staring at him with every mile we ride on the crazy train.

One arm hung limply by my body--I don't know why--but it was

as if I had had a mini-stroke from his

troll-like image offending my pupils

and continuing the offense down the optic nerve

to my overwhelmed and exhausted brain.

I tried, but I couldn’t make it work to save my life.

I was losing the battle of staying seated, but I had to hold on, right?

It would be so rude to leave. Just rude.

And, I don’t know if a taxi could find this place.

I noticed that under the music

and over the spattering of boiled juices in the kitchen,

This man had been incessantly speaking to me.

“Um-hmm,” I dryly responded.

I had no idea what he could have said, but I answered affirmatively, anyway.

He seemed pleased by my answer, which scared me a bit.

Just then, I felt a spooky, looming presence behind me.

It was a plate of food, jutting out of the window to the kitchen,

Offered by chef Rufus,

Who shook the plate as if it were 1000 pounds, and was looking at me like,

“Take the damn food!”

I stood up and grabbed the plate, mostly with one hand,

Because the other one was still inexplicably numb.

I swirled around to find my date had not moved a muscle to reach

toward the plate, and was waiting for me to serve him.

This was too much. Too much!

I usually had a high threshold for crazy,

but my body’s plea was about to be heard.

As I stood holding the plate of heart disease and a stroke or two;

The smell of cigarettes;

The look of gelatinous pig feet and soggy, overcooked rice swimming in pork juice;

The red, pleather walls of the disco with its broken mirrors and velveteen pictures;

The feeling of icky-ness from seeing hair laying on the matted carpet

of the “barber shop” just off the dance floor,

and on the tables of the restaurant;

All the old, rusty, married hustlers

just in there, drinking and eating, cheating, gawking—

I had to go.

I had to get up out of there.

I had to come out of myself, and think better of myself.

I put the plate on the table,

Watching the grease slosh off the plate

and eddy between the folds in the plastic tablecloth.

I looked at my date, squinting my eyes, as if to say,

You bet’ not say one word.

I got my purse and walked with my asthma through the wall of smoke

to the graveled parking lot.

Walked through the parking lot, down the road.

Down the road, to the asphalt.

Along the asphalt road, to my house.

I dropped my shoes,

My purse,

My clothes,

My undergarments,

At the door.

Took a longgggggg, hot shower and Purell'd myself after.

Got out, and went to the kitchen.

Wasn’t having no more leftovers after tonight, so I broiled me a steak,

Baked me a potato,

Threw together me a salad,

And poured me some wine.

Sat my naked tail on my leather couch,

And ate like a queen.

The next day?

I made a covenant to check my caller ID before answering, and got a therapist.

No more wrong numbers will be tolerated here.

Enough.

The Stupidity of Hate

Let's say I hate you. I don't, but for the the sake of building an argument, let's just say it. I hate you, so much so that I am consumed by the depth and breadth of my contempt. I think about hating you day and night, and I shout out obscenities throughout the day just thinking about you, because I've developed a Tourette's of bitterness. *##@*! No doubt about it. I hate you.

It's the kind of feeling that one cannot shake. It's deep and abiding; the sort of hostility you are sure you can hold in your hand and roll around like a hard, slick marble. You can discern it's weight in your palm, and your skin memorizes how it smooth it is. You know what it is through and through. Hatred.

I don't like you, so the mere possibility of a conversation is shut down. There is nothing to talk about, really. You are vile and disposable. You cannot do anything right. Everything you do has an ulterior motive or selfish agenda. If you sneeze, I will tell everyone who would listen how rude you are to expel your germ-ridden, gooey nastiness into the air from which the world has to breathe. Yes, your existence negatively impacts the whole world. Indeed, your existence forces me to hate you. You are a skin and oxygen thief.

You aren't really human in my hatred. In fact, you can't be, because I have to objectify you over and over again to push you as far away from what I think is good and worthy and human. You are an animal at best, certainly not a child of God, or even someone that should (or will) have access to God. To hell you shall go. My hate doesn't necessarily come as a result of something you did. I simply hate you, and even if we once got along, I decided to hate you from the beginning and was just waiting for the precious moment when my precious animosity could live.

Because we have determined you are worthless, I can name you. I don't care how you maintain who you are, I will say who you are, and speak for you. Mute is the only volume I require of you. I have convinced many others that you are pathetic, unintelligible, and proof of evolution. I do so hate you.

Ok, enough. I need a holy pause. Even this exercise makes me feel slimy. I don't hate you, really, not because I couldn't. I don't because there is absolutely nothing that can change the fact that we were made by the same Creator who said that creation was good. Hatred is the refuge for people who are lazy in their engagement with others, and are predisposed to the negative. It takes a lot of energy to close social distance, to become friends with people different from you. In my healthiest moments, I don't use my energy for something so draining and selfish. Hate is just stupid. It is the state of being where one loses one's humanity based on a false reality we made up of others. This sort of animosity chips away at us every moment we sink into that murky, stagnant pool.

Hating others lowers the bar, and becomes an oversimplified way to be in the world. There is no need to be well-informed, no reason to be thoughtful or intelligent in discourse. In hatred, you can be stupid without apology. One can say, "I simply want you gone, and if I want you gone, I no longer care how you go."

Now to what spurred this entry. Wagging fingers forces one to write for the sake of sanity. Smug arrogance, and over-spinning of events makes one respond. Racist overtones and explicit hatred is flying so much, we all feel sick and dizzy to varying degrees, and apparently there is no end in sight. What spurred me to write is the amount of times I hear people on CNN and other media outlets saying some version of: "I support this person, because he represents the best chance to beat Obama." What? If I were a viable candidate, I would be offended. You don't care about my qualifications, my character, my vision-- just that I can be your mythic hero in a time of perceived or manufactured crisis? There is something implicitly wrong with that paradigm.

Some would suggest that displacement at all costs is not hate. It's simply standing against a failed President with failed policies. Bull. This is pure, unadulterated, school yard-variety bitterness in its many forms, veiled in a thin veneer of "patriotism" and a "return to the good ol' days". This hatred is the residue of the potty that has never been cleaned in our American history of deep racism, sexism, classism, rampant bullying, and an acceptable national oppositional defiance that is dangerous. It is one that has been nurtured for so long that some believe it isn't hatred. It's lost its distinction because its old, deep, concrete evil. We've not been honest as a country, and we have not pursued healing in healthy ways.

Let's stop the madness. The great thing is the opposite of love is fear, not hate, and with love, hate doesn't stand a chance. And there's nothing stupid about that.

Being Nice

I received a phone call last night. Anyone who knows me knows that even if you call me at 3:17 a.m., I usually am pretty good about clearing my throat enough to sound like a human. You know, I want to be nice. I want the call to be pleasant, even if what we are discussing isn't. Well, this particular call came just after a very long day, at about 9:15 p.m., and I was not nice.

It started off badly, because I recognized the number that popped up on the phone. I sighed through an inaudible, "Dang it," and really didn't want to answer. It was a call from a person who strikes me as one of the most insecure and passive aggressive people I've ever met. When I saw her number, I already knew that it would be an event, because every time I have engaged with this person, I have ended up completely drained of energy.

So, because I am a "nice" person, I answered, praying that God would transform us both so we could speak to each other without stress. What's funny is that the person who called takes her role in my play of being nice seriously. Her voice dripped with pure honey as she detailed what she needed from me. No genuine greeting. Just her requests that she spent all day writing down so she wouldn't get nervous and forget (She told me she did this...yikes!) She was only asking for something I had already given above and beyond.

My not-yet-a-friend laid into me with her requests and waited for my response. During the thick, unbearable pause, I breathed deeply. I prayed. I moved around in a not so comfortable chair, trying to gain some wisdom from the fibers of the pink fabric covering it. I remembered some techniques of centering prayer, but knew I didn't have time to do it...and suddenly, a still small voice said, "Kelle. You don't have to be nice."

Let me tell you that I didn't curse her, nor did I verbally lay her out as only a Black woman can do. I told her that she was attempting to get something out of me that I didn't owe. It wasn't about money, and I told her as much. I told her that I was not going to be available for fulfill her deep desire to remain present in my life when her season was over.

Something grew in me in those moments. I realized that I don't have to be nice, and that if being nice is my only goal, I was leaving myself open to be taken advantage of over and over again. I realized that they many times I had prided myself in being nice, I wasn't fully present or honest. It was a masquerade, my attempt to be what everyone supposes a Christian, woman minister is. Nice is about ego, about maintaining "the look" with no depth. However, I have to be authentic. This is what each of us are called to be--always.

Well, I wasn't nice, but I was kind. I was assertive and fair. We resolved the issue, by collaborating instead of back off and giving parts of ourselves we didn't want to give.

"Nice" is no aspiration. Be real. Be you.

The Well of Living Well

Facebook is a great tool for social networking. It can also truly reveal that many people are full of fear, insecurity, and have been brutally hurt by the words and actions of others. Without any negative judgment, I see profile pictures of beautiful people who appear to "have it all", who write a series of depressing status updates and seem on the way--if not already there-- to deep depression and the anxiety of desperation.

There is no simple solution. I'm not one who believes in catch-all fixes, either. I am not one to say, "They're married/single/healthy/paid/well-traveled/connected..." Really. However, I am sure of one thing. If we keep looking outside of ourselves for something that should come from the well that God carved and created within us, none of us will ever find the key to our liberation.

Where is your healing? You are healing you have been waiting for all of your life. You are responsible for finding it in the halls of your own soul. God put it there long ago, and your desire is the only map you'll ever need.

There is nothing worse than accepting the awful things people have said about you. People can be mean! Acknowledge the  destructive things you've said about yourself, those terrible, untrue things you've taken on as another skin. There is no greater sin than believing in God, but refusing to believe that you are no temple in which God will dwell. Where is God if God is not near to you?

We hear spoken death all the time, that we are not good enough, that our mistakes are eternal and everlasting. Today is your day to let lie that go. Misery is not your friend unless you choose it to be so.  Wait no longer for someone to free you. Free yourself!

Reconciling Act: The person who finds freedom fastest is the one who understands that they create their own keys. Step into it. Live freely with the confidence of God.