What Could Have Been

The Return of the Jedi.....ahhh. How I love the Star Wars saga, and I know I'm not alone. It
resonates for a reason, that simple reason being it rests on the greatest themes of all time.



Lately this image from the end of ROTJ literally keeps appearing in my mind. Trying to figure it out I've realized that I have many friends who are grappling with the permanent scars life is lashing on them. Myself, I have angled to try to convince myself and others that these dramatic and painful events aren't permanent, that we can overcome, that by lending our thoughts and our efforts towards good -- towards The Force, if you'll forgive me -- is the way out.



I've always identified with Luke Skywalker from the "could go either way"perspective. I'm not an Obi Wan, always clear and focused, without doubts and never truly in peril. I recognize and look up to those people, but I could never claim to be them. (Maybe in about 30 years....)



But I'm not an Anakin all the way, either. I battle darkness, and anger, and the occasional conviction that I can overcome what hurts me with more hurt. But I don't really believe that. And I don't want the people I love to ever believe that either.



So I look at my friends in pain, and I see their turning point. And I think about my own. There are clear moments to me when the woman I could have been, the woman I wanted to be, was lost to this life. My personal spiritual beliefs tell me that even if we go the wrong way, we will be restored to who we could have been through love. But you know.....I want to see that person, those people, NOW.

My heart is hurting for the turning point of losing ourselves in this life.

Like a Knife in My Heart....

I owe someone an apology. In preparation for our 20th college reunion, my friend Jay said, "It's like a knife in my heart that we're not young anymore" -- and I immediately told him all the reasons he shouldn't feel that way.

Well, I take it all back.

I love this picture representing the feeling, because it's not gory and it's not sad, and in many ways I think it represents strength. The heart still glows around the blade, and the two seem to be in the process of becoming one.

I knew my return to campus would trigger many conflicting emotions, and I thought I was prepared, but truthfully I did not anticipate the cascade of feeling that I think Jay had in advance.....and perhaps we all had before the weekend was over. The realization that essentially the same amount of time had passed since graduation that had passed from our births to when we all first met was monumental for me. It was wonderful to see so many familiar faces, and so many beloved to me. Our lives were different then, and have perhaps become even more different now, but we will always have our Davidson experience during a formative time in our development and that keeps us connected.

What I did not expect was the powerful feeling that this was a turning point.

Going forward, I think I need to not take for granted that Davidson will always bind us, at least to the degree for which I hope and which I need. I am recommitting to these relationships.

The knife may not come out, but the heart will always be strong.

The Skinny Branch

So this is, as they say, me "going out on the skinny branch."

I want to write just a little bit about the whole social response to Tiger Woods and his admission of infidelity to his wife, Elin. And since he and Elin are the parents of two very young children, I think it may not be over the line to say that he has strayed from something much bigger and more significant than just his relationship with one woman.

It's always a shock to realize how imperfect you are, and I mean that sincerely.

Item One that Troubles Me: I know. We all know. Any grown-up aware of your situation knows. You are the last to know.

I don't believe that I am any better than this man, or better than any other person. I was raised in a faith tradition that says all are flawed, and to tell yourself otherwise is to head down a dangerous and arrogant path. So please, stop educating me, and stop acting like admitting you are human is some Big Revelation to anyone but you. It's insulting. I encourage this conversation with yourself, but truly you are the last to know. We know.

Item Two that Troubles Me: As a society, we are more and more likely to say that this failure is not relevant.

I believe that the only the two people in a marriage who know what it is and what is going on (and sometimes not even then) is, well, those two people. I myself have been divorced. I am not interested in encouraging judgement on the highs and lows of other people's relationships. But I'm also a little freaked-out that we seem to have swung from making adulterly an offense punishable by death, to shrugging it off and saying it doesn't have anything to do with "us."

When we say as a society that it is irrelevant, and everyone votes in their online polls about how they don't care about his personal life, it feels to me like we are turning our backs on a very sad and vulnerable situation. We are saying, look, just play golf, and you -- the Mrs. -- quit complaining, there is plenty of money in this for you, the kids will eat, and it will all be fine.

I'm pretty sure no on in the Woods' house is fine. And it's painful to me that the public choice seems to be to say it's none of our business and who cares, or to make jokes or attack the participants in some way.

On Father's Day, the NY Times ran a beautiful feature on this family: how they loved each other, how it was a dream come true, how they inspired other people in so many ways. That was about 6 months ago. I don't think I'll ever forget that picture.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/14/sports/golf/14woods.html?_r=1

Please don't think I'm saying I have the answers. I'm not saying that.

But I am saying that if we can't stand up for the fact that it is a big deal when a family is permanently scarred by these kinds of choices and events, we are in worse trouble than I already thought.

Photo credit OSU: http://www.flickr.com/photos/osucommons/3528718369/

Storm Brewing

Sometimes in the middle of a beautiful sunny day, there is a terrible secret.

Sometimes when our eyes are full of delight and our hearts are full of love, we can be blind to the actual climate of a situation, and those clouds can come roiling up out of nowhere and, well.....you just wished you'd checked The Weather Channel.

I had a tough experience this weekend watching a dear friend verbally attack someone else that I love, and it all happened at what was supposed to be a nice event. After a little reconnaissance I figured out what happened, but that didn't really make it any better. It got me thinking about the difference between how a person feels and how they act.

I don't really want to argue about the feelings. You can't tell people their feelings are wrong. (You can, but it makes things worse.) But I might want to have a conversation about the actions. I'm debating this because I was not directly involved and it may alienate me from the person who said some inappropriate things. He's in a very stressful emotional state to begin with, and I don't want to upset him more. But I have not been able to stop thinking about how unkind the words were and how far out of kilter they were with the actual situation.

I did call the person who received the aggression, and extended my regrets that it happened. That might be enough.

It might not.

Photo credit Zevotron, http://www.flickr.com/photos/randomurl/842016056/

It Takes Two

"Few things help an individual more than to place responsibility upon him and to let you know that you trust him." Booker Taliaferro Washington

I have a stack of notepaper, each page of which has a snappy quote. Some are good, some are not good, and some stop me in my tracks. The one from Booker T. today was the latter.

We seem so anxious to apply one or the other, but rarely both. Some might say trust is earned, not bestowed, and I do agree with that. But I think there are also times when one has to be willing to give both responsibility and trust in order to really get results.

Our public assistance program is a great example of all responsibility, zero trust. I don't have the answer, but I do worry that heaping obligation on people while simultaneously indicating a complete lack of trust is a dynamic headed for failure.

I also see a lot of this in the personal lives of people around me. A tight demand for meeting expectations and needs, but extreme stinginess in the trust department. Like the public assistance program, it seems to thrive on resentment and anger. The more resentful a person is, the more responsibility is demanded and the more trust is witheld.

It's hard to watch, and even harder to change. All that any of us can do is to support putting responsiblity and trust together as often as we can, and try to show it working in our own lives.

Photo credit: Vagawi, http://www.flickr.com/photos/vagawi/3155400274/