Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

So much right speech around the birth of a baby!  A balm to the soul, especially after the election.  This baby starts fresh and in uninterested in anything but the love coming his way.  And right now I'm in his groove, as they say.  There is never enough praising and admiring and cuddling and smiles.  Tomorrow I'm back to the real world with a dentist appointment and errands, but today I'm going to float in happiness.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Our new little grandson was born yesterday in the afternoon, and I was with my daughter and her husband throughout labor and delivery.  My daughter kept thanking me for being there, and I was so touched by all the love they both expressed and how instantly in love with their son they were.  What a privilege it was to witness such joy.  The nurses and doctor were encouraging and kind, and the atmosphere one of support and kindness.  What a miracle the entire birth process is, and how like warriors we women are.  We are fierce and courageous and determined.  We breathe through the pain for the baby.  Every woman who has given birth is a hero to me.  I believe we should be proud of our power and our capacity for bringing a living being into the world.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I saw the movie "Loving" yesterday and wept at the end.  Not only is it a beautiful film, and well acted, but it is a true story.  My weeping also had to do with the realization that I had been shut out from Virginia in that era by my own interracial marriage.  I knew I didn't dare take my husband to see where I'd spent the longest period of my childhood, even though I wanted badly to show him the beautiful spot where I'd lived.  We were rural Virginia, in the Tidewater region, and as children my brother and friends and I had complete freedom.  We could bike to the Rappahanock River ten miles away, and my mother would simply tell us to be home by dinner.  We wandered in the woods alone.  In the movie, Mildred Loving yearns to be back in the country with her family, and I understood immediately that longing.  I married my husband at nineteen, and when my best childhood friend's husband was killed in Vietnam I was in Fiji, but when she remarried she wanted me at the wedding, but I couldn't bring my husband and baby there.  Too dangerous.  We knew we couldn't be seen in a car together in that area. 
And after my husband died, I still had two mixed race children I did not want exposed to that kind of hatred.  So I stayed away, though we visited my friend and her new husband in Indiana where they settled on his parents' farm. 
Yesterday, I thought of the loss.  The fear.  The shame of being different.  The trips I did not make to Virginia or Missouri, where my parents' were from.  I thought of how much it hurt me then and still hurts now.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Our whole family was together for Thanksgiving, and we had a lovely day.  We went around the table giving thanks, and we all affirmed that politics will not make us negative about people.  Everyone helped cook, and everyone got down on the floor and played with the one year old.  We are all excited about the coming baby, now overdue a week, but bound to arrive next week.  We had a beautiful day and many took a walk among the fall folliage.  Yesterday we went to a museum with the eight year old, and walked around outside as well.  Then some of us went to a nursery for holiday ornaments, and then the crew had Greek food together at a cafe we could walk to.  This morning we sent our daughter and granddaughter off to the airport in pouring rain, but the two days that mattered were crisp and sunny.  Everyone's speech was careful, as our daughter is divorcing her husband, and his two sons were with their mother.  We know they will still be in our lives in some way, but we await our daughter's directions.  For her, she's feeling her way through a painful time, and may not yet know what she wishes.  But I dared to ask about the boys for the holidays and she said yes to sending them presents as I had planned.  Change is complicated and touchy and I think our family supported and loved without questioning.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Well, I've done about all I can until tomorrow.  And I'll have a lot of help then.  And like my daughter, I've said about all that can be said about the baby not being born yet, and heard all the stories about babies who were late one or two weeks.  It doesn't seem to comfort my daughter and its not doing much for me either, so I've retreated to a quiet place where its one day at a time, and lots of going easy on myself.  I'm excited about the holiday and seeing my older daughter and my granddaughter.  What a treat!  I've ordered for my grandson, and figured out what to order from my granddaughter for Christmas.  Somewhere between now and then is my pregnant daughter's birthday, my granddaughter's dad's birthday and my best friend's birthday, but I have ideas.  Yesterday a box was delivered that I ordered for my husband and myself:  new robes and pajamas.  It seems self indulgent and luxurious to get something right now.  But it's fun.  I love my robe.  It's snuggy and cosy for winter and so soft.  I'm pampering myself.  A little gift to myself before the holidays hit full bore. 

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Our daughter is five days past her due date and feeling low.  She's having too much time to worry about the baby.  I told her today that Buddhists say, "Don't believe what you think".  Her hormones are whacky and she's uncomfortable, tired, and unable to focus well on anything else, naturally.  I feel bad for her, but this is the fate of 50% of women who give birth after their due date.  There is little reassurance for her at this point.  She wants her baby.  I pray for her and the baby, but I'm helpless to do much more than keep her company as she picks up a curtain rod at Target and take her out to lunch.  We are all in a holding pattern, and the fact that a holiday is coming up makes it a bit more tense.  I'm trying to make what food I can ahead, in case I'm in the hospital with my daughter on the day.  Tomorrow morning I pick up the turkey, then will brine it and have it sit in the refrigerator for two days.  One pie is baked and frozen, as is the cranberry sauce, and I'll do the other two pies and soup tomorrow.  I want to be prepared for whatever comes whenever.  Hah!  Spoken like a woman with delusions of control!

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We're all waiting for a baby.  I feel the tug of being near.  I was thinking of going to meditation and dharma talk but couldn't bear the thought of being that far away if my daughter was beginning labor here.  I'm not saying I'm needed, they will do fine.  It's that my heart is tied to hers and the baby's right now.  I always feel that tie with my little grandson, and the pull can be so strong it hurts.  And I'll never forget leaving my granddaughter when they moved up north and just passing through the city on the freeway made me want to jump out of the car and rush to her doorstep.  My love is that deep and wide, and it expands with every grandchild.  I feel the absence as they are busy with their lives.  I'm connected even if they don't feel it.  In the old days Indians would tie their breast skin and hang from it.  It's that strong.  What strange and wonderful blessings these grandchildren bring us.  They teach us what is important and how to be silent in our need to be near them, for they have their lives to live and we are but a small part of it.  But they wake us up again to deep, connective love, and we feel the joy of it in every cell of our bodies.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

It's the Big Game today and it's raining and storming.  I read yesterday the reasons why the stadium is no longer filled on the day, but the newspaper article neglected to mention all the new information on concussions, the business of football versus the joy of the game, the injuries inflicted and the feeling that school rivalries are archaic.  The elephants in the room, and there are a herd of them, remain silent in the sports pages.  This year, there is also the pall after the election, which has created such uncertainty that our fears rush in to grab and shake us.  I liked to read about some sports, mostly baseball, but also anything about my alma mater.  My father raised my brother and I as sports fans, and we saw many games.  My brother was quite an athlete, and so we saw those as well.  And I did love seeing the Cubs win the World Series.  But the constant threat of moving, the trading of players so the roster seems strange and new each year, the sheer greed of the schools and owners is depressing.  It's better to watch little kids run around in magnet ball (soccer) than see what even that sport has become for grownups.  If everything in our culture is all about the bottom line then passion and character and devotion go out the window.  It's looking a lot like that window is closed tight.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

My friend and I were discussing this morning how we knew and were told nothing when we had our babies.  Now perhaps the doctors tell too much.  We both decided we were glad we were kept in the dark.  It seems as if doctors place a huge burden on the pregnant moms to eat right, take so many safety precautions, and the upshot is they worry their heads off about the possibilities.  My daughter received some assurances yesterday because they offered her the option of having another ultrasound and checked the baby again and all looked well.  Bless her heart.  She wants her baby out safe and sound.  It will be soon, the I know very well how the waiting feels. 
How informed to we want to be?  What is right speech for doctors?  It must be a balance, a delicate one, and reassuring without promises.  I feel grateful to all the medical people who walk these tightropes every day, and to the mothers who love their babies before they see them.  They are advocating for their children even in the womb.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

A friend emailed me yesterday about ways to connect with people who voted differently than we did and possibly meeting to go to the midwest to dialogue and hear what they have to say.   I smiled, because she's a great organizer and I've been wanting to DO SOMETHING.  I have a lot of relatives I could visit, and they could put me in touch with people in their churches and clubs.  We don't want to turn away, we want to understand better.  Taking an action feels better to me than moaning and groaning.  I LIKE people, and I get along with lots of different people, possibly due to moving around the country a lot, and also because my people come from the midwest and I love them.  So this idea is just the ticket for me.  I had an immediate surge of gratitude towards my friend.  I don't know what will develop, but it's a positive direction, and that's good enough for me.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Our daughter is feeling the pressure of people's comments, opinions and worries around her pregnancy.  Some of her friends are pushing for natural childbirth and others feel she ought to be doing this or that.  She's clearly disturbed by it, but holding her own.  These people don't intend to practice wrong speech, but they are not practicing careful speech.  She doesn't need any stress.  She's worried herself about how labor will be and if the baby will be healthy, and talking at her doesn't help.  It's pretty universal that people stick their noses in other people's business, especially emotionally vulnerable pregnant women.  I remember all the "advice" I got, and how it only made me feel not up to the task.  Our daughter is strong, and she will weather this.  She's going through the hugest transition there is, and her heart is about to fall in love with her baby, and her world turn upside down.  She doesn't need anyone telling her this, she FEELS it.  But it sure would be nice if people around her were gentle and without opinions.  Or kept them to themselves.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Transitions are hard.  I've watched my son and daughter-in-law adjust to having a baby, and though he is their greatest joy, it has been difficult.  Now the whole country is transitioning to a new administration and the shock of the new, and our daughter is about to give birth and have her and our son-in-law's lives topsy turvy.  Transitions stun us.  The ground beneath our feet feels shaky.  Our rhythms are disrupted.  Change is the only constant, yet we seem to naturally resist.  We want to hold on to what is "known".  Yet from change we receive blessings like these two little grandsons:  the one year old and the about to be born baby.  Those of us on the outskirts of these big upheavals need to support the ones most affected.  In flux is a state that rightly is the constant.  Everything is changing, transforming, reshaping, surprising.  Many of us were surprised by the election, but when we look at history, we see the arc.  Movements of people, from the Middle East to Europe, from Mexico and Central America to here, distrupt, even as this migration is the history of humankind.  Everything is shifting, and we need to face our fear and know that we counter these disruptions by compassion, empathy and love.  Reach out and embrace the new and unfamiliar, and see what it has to teach us about our capacity to open and learn and become active and awake in the midst of it all.  It can be a gift, if we let it.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

You can write all the children's books you want about famous women and how girls can be whatever they want to be, but right here in the real world our country can't elect a woman President, these little girls' mommies and daddies are struggling with day care, unequal pay, the lion's share of the responsibility for children still falling on women, and the fact that the poor are mostly women and children struggling to feed themselves without enough flexibility, vacation, and maternity leave.  These kids see their mothers and grandmothers and aunts are penalized by being a female, and that attention is mainly given to women who agree to be sex objects.  These girls are going to find themselves pressured and targeted by bullies, then by aggressive male sexual pressures.  They are going to go off to college hopeful, and find themselves raped at a party by people they thought were friends in places they thought were safe.  And the nuclear families they participate in become terror cages with one in four of them being battered. 
I'm not exaggerating.  I worked in safehouses for twelve years.  This country, this world, turns away from abuse of women.  And it begins with speech.  Don't let anyone berate a woman in your presence.  Object when a little girl is sexualized.  Help a battered woman and her children get to safety and get their new lives started.  Forget Madame Curie.  Cultivate some real live women who are change makers right here and now.  Support them, join them.  Bring your children and grandchildren (male and female) to events where women are the speakers or the performers or the readers of their own writing.  Do something. 

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

A few days ago I finished reading "The Snow Child", a novel set in Alaska and playing with an old fairy tale about a snow child who comes to life, kind of like Pinnochio.  The novel is about loss and healing and reads like a prose poem.  My friend recommended it to me.  The wilderness of Alaska becomes a character in the book, and sadness and joy are intermixed, as well as magical realism.  For anyone who has grieved the loss of someone they loved, it is revealing and soothing.  But it also is working for me right now in grieving for the election results, and to face the fear that this brings to many of us.  I, personally am grieving that I will not live to see a woman U.S. President, and my granddaughters still live in a world where women are not valued equally.  There was a hurdle ready to be jumped over, and the runner crashed and fell.  Someone else, another time, will have to struggle again and it won't be soon.  This lesson is a cautionary tale about reaching too high.  And Michelle Obama's refrain of when they go low we go high, though the morally correct stance, ends with the low winning this time around.  I'm not giving up, and I will become more active politically because of this week, but the idea that a lot of people in this country, unlike any other Westernized nation, don't believe in women in the highest offices, is a body blow, like the ERA not passing.  But we've absorbed the blows before and we will learn from this.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I am discombobulated for sure.  I forgot a lunch date with a friend, forgot to drop off something at another friend's house, and didn't notice my cell phone wasn't working.  I'm stunned by the election, stunned that my daughter is about to give birth, stunned that I'm old, stunned that I have so much to do for the holidays.  I'll snap out of it.  I did a bunch of errands that were loose ends this morning, including finally filling the gas tank in my car.  Today I see the friend I missed yesterday, and also my therapist, who hopefully will help me get my head screwed on straight.  It certainly feels misaligned right now.  Tonight my husband and I go to see a dumb movie, so that should get me back in my culture and time.  Respecting disorientation is essential.  Shocks to the body and mind cannot be ignored or denied.  I'm going to be careful with myself and others until I again feel more myself.  Whatever that means!

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

As I was walking the dogs this morning I was humming "Suzanne", Leonard Cohen's song, which I consider sad but beautiful.  I'm glad there was a huge voter turnout and sad personally because the person didn't win I voted for.  She sent a generous, kind heartfelt email to all of us who supported her:  the epitome of right speech.  But mostly this campaign has been chock a block full of wrong speech.  By everyone, all the time.  We're all tired of it.  I don't know if this campaign will cause a shift toward or away from civility, but I hope all the old tricks will no longer work.  Let's try to somehow get back to policies and principles.  Let's expect morals and character to be prerequisites to leadership.  And maybe I'm just going to be writing a whole lot of letters to the editors.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Right speech is definitely voting, no matter who you vote for.  Voting protects our democracy, and it is our basic right and responsibility.  Where I live the ballot is long and heavy, but what better effort than to protect our ability to guide our government and express our beliefs?  My husband mailed his ballot a week ago, but I still like trudging up the hill, encountering friends and neighbors, and getting the sticker after.  I'm proud of myself.  The campaign has been ugly and awful, and much has been said that shouldn't have been uttered, but now it's our chance to speak.  And what we say means more than all the sound bites ever devised.  When we speak, the country listens.  I hope and pray there is a large turnout, and those who have this privilege use it.  You are not powerless if you take action.  It may not go your or my way, but your vote is counted and it speaks.  And everything on the ballot impacts you.  Everything. 

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

Ah.  There are so many examples of wrong speech in this election that I bend under the weight of them.  I can only hope right speech will squeeze in and calm the environment post election.  The predictions are that the incivility will continue unabated, but everyone I know is exhausted and disgusted and maybe, just maybe, we've had enough of letting our inner tantrum child out for the year.  Turning off and tuning out may be appropriate later this week.  I saw in the newspaper that there was a huge surge in people going to the movies this weekend.  Well, hello.  Anything to escape the nightmare of the campaign.  I'd have gone as well, but I was busy reading a legal thriller.  My own form of escape.  I'm hoping the idea of upcoming Thanksgiving gets us in gratitude mode, and reminds us of the bounty and resources we are so blessed with.  For once, I'm thinking:  watch football, get out your aggression that way.  Just stay away from shutting down the government.  We actually need it, if you think about it.  Come on people, come back to earth.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

I spent the morning and midday with my foster granddaughter, and I felt I had been accommodating because originally we were scheduled for the Sunday before, but two things came up for her and I said lets not pack in too much.  So her mother said she had nothing on the following Saturday, yesterday, and I agreed to switch.  But Friday in the evening I got an email that they were taking her to her cousin's water polo game, so suddenly another squeeze.  I texted back that the movie was at 9:55 and we were having lunch after.  The mother said no problem.  But the movie was longer than I expected, my granddaughter wanted to quickly get a gift at a store right there, we had slow service at the cafe, and the traffic, because it was Saturday, was horrible.  I was anxious, and when we pulled up, her mother got out of their car and said they were late and had missed the start of the game, said nothing to me, but was clearly angry.  This is after eleven years of being on time on my end, though they have been late and kept me waiting a few times.  I'm offended.  As long as I was picking her up from a short day of school I served a purpose, but now that I've asked to be relieved of that duty, I'm in the way.
I said nothing.  But I will not promise to get her back again on a tight schedule on time.  She lives a freeway away from me and we are usually going a few miles in the other direction.  I am not going to stress myself out because they have the usual harried schedule of events.  I don't feel valued or appreciated except by my granddaughter.  That is why I hang in there for her sake.  I'm hoping some kind of apology is forthcoming, but if that does not happen, I am going to be careful to clearly state that I can't promise to be on the dot.  I did have my granddaughter call and say we were running late, due to traffic and taking longer at the cafe.  Rushing would have been dangerous, and I am a careful driver, especially now that my granddaughter sits in the front passenger seat.  I want no sudden stops or jerky movements. 
We'll see how this plays out.  I'm going to correct my communication to include no promises.  The tension is too much, and my granddaughter felt it more than I did. 

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

We watched the World Series last night, and after the whole crazy five hours was over I was impressed with the graciousness of the Cubs players responses.  They gave credit to Cleveland, and weren't pointing number one fingers and puffing out their chests.  They seemed blown away, and humbled, and so so grateful.  I like that in a team.  They looked so young to me, just boys, most of them, and there was a sense that no one stood out and carried the team on his shoulders, rather, it took every one of them to win this, and there was no stand out superstar whom the team depended on.  That meant it was up to each of them.  No hiding, no invisibility, it took a village and they knew it.  They kept plugging away, plugging away, and didn't give up when Cleveland tied them and surged ahead.  Just presence, one pitch at a time, one catch at a time, and then it was over.  They looked surprised, because they were in the groove of the present, and that rhythm saw them through. 
I'd like to keep that game in my mind, and emulate them in my own day to day existence.  Just do what I'm supposed to do minute by minute, and not worry about the rest.  It's a good way to live.

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

The day before yesterday a friend from the Midwest called and said she'd had a difficult few months and several friends died or were very sick and her mother was deteriorating rapidly.  Yesterday my best friend called and a woman in her apartment complex had died.  Just gone to sleep, and though her husband called 911 and she was rushed in the ambulance, she died soon after arriving there.  And yesterday I was talking to my friend about her CT scan and whether her cancer drug was still working.  Another friend just returned last night from visiting her mother who, in her nineties, is failing rapidly.  This is hard stuff to talk about, and describing it hardly does justice to the complex of emotions these losses arouse in us.  We are of an age that mortality looms.  And this being Fall, and the harbinger of holidays, family memories, and in my case anniversary of family deaths:  my mother's and father's, my brothers and dear friends, a certain gloominess easily descends on me. 
Now add the election, world conflicts, climate change, and even flu shots.  The world seems sick, and in need of a nice cup of chicken soup and and a good book.  But how to administer the medicine?  Compassion must be our response.  First toward ourselves and then all others.  I feel a lot of compassion for trees right now.  I live in a drought area and I see them dying off, being cut down.  Today I will concentrate on the trees. 

Wandering Along the Path: Right Speech

The political news is distressing, yes, but as I was walking the dogs I ran into my neighbor outside of her house taking down Halloween decorations.  She has lung cancer and goes today for a CT scan to see if the drug that is keeping her alive is still working.  Normally, after a year, it ceases being effective.  So that put things in perspective.  She's so strong and resilient and upbeat, but she doesn't lie or minimize her situation.  She's a hero.  I immediately realized how my prayers should be addressed.  I hope she's the exception, and the drug is doing its thing.  I hope she continues to have quality of life and strength and all the support she wants and needs.  Yet she's also on her path alone, and I feel that reality strongly.  In the midst of news headlines swirling around us are ordinary people struggling to survive and find the courage to make life and death decisions, and there are people who have had those decisions taken out of their hands, which is even worse.  May they find peace and love surrounding them.