Not the blue sky, the grey one

I did not have my phone in my pocket on Saturday morning as I looked out at the grey horizon, the grey clouds, the grey lake. So I did not take a picture to contrast with the photos of blue waves and pink sunsets from earlier in my week on the rocky shore on the west side of Washington Island, Wisconsin. But it is that grey shore, the grey sky, the grey water that I have tried to hold in my mind as I journey back from vacation to daily life.

Grey comes in many shades of dark and bright, in the depth of the distant drizzle and the darker rainstorm moving west with the wind, in the mottled rocks and the active waves. It becomes part of your very gaze. It is the peaceful light cast on your retina, the panorama encoded in the neurons of your brain. It's restful, it's focused. It is breath and air and Spirit, calm and active in the midst of all that lives between heaven and earth.

My breathing is calm and shallow as I think about it. This moment, that moment, and the next one, the next one. They curl into this one, observed and treasured, and carry me into tomorrow. I hope.

I looked and looked and shed a tear or two, then got in the car on Saturday morning and drove home. After a stop for breakfast and a rain-soaked ferry ride, I took a few minutes to reset my daughter's Facebook password while parked outside a fancy kitchen-goods store near Ephraim in Door County. We got French fries at McDonald's in Sturgeon Bay, and later, filled the gas tank north of Manitowoc. Hours later, after the last few agonizing miles of city traffic on Cicero and North Avenue, we pulled up at the curb by our own overgrown backyard and were drenched by another downpour while unloading the car.

For two nights now I've woken up at three or four and listened for the waves and the wind. My imagination is that good--I seem to hear them as my worries seek the comfort of wind and intimate water.

This moment, and the next one. This.

#GleasonMovie

I saw the movie "Gleason" yesterday at the Landmark Cinema on Clark Street in Chicago. I went with two dear friends, who sat, protectively, one on either side of me. Given that it's a movie about a young man's fight with ALS, and my own son, 29 years old, is also battling ALS, I had to steel myself to go. I was afraid of feeling very bad afterward, but that's not what happened.

There's a lot of hard stuff in the movie. ALS takes a lot of stuff from people (including their modesty). It's a disaster that happens not just to individuals but to friends and families—spouses and parents and  children. And the movie shows all of this honestly--in caregivers' exhaustion, altered relationships, constant fighting to hang on to meaning. Chances are, if you see it, you'll cry, and it may be that where you cry might have as much to do with your own life and where you're hurting, as it has to do with Steve Gleason and others with ALS.

In the end, I walked back to the car, through the maze of urban theatre ramps and stairs, feeling exhilarated. It's not that I've survived the challenges of ALS, and certainly I know that the pain and fear my son and his wife face daily are much greater than my own. But there's something about being knocked back on your ass that brings life and love into focus. Go see the movie and be reminded of what it means to be human and just how sweet that is.

Choose your slogan—#nowhiteflags, #kissmyals, #speed4sarah, #gronksgrace, so many more. Do an Ice Bucket Challenge, participate in an ALS Walk, or just make a donation at alsa.org or the ALS Therapy Development Institute. Because we have to beat this thing someday. But meanwhile--go see Gleason. You'll be glad you did.

Under the weeds

Earlier this afternoon I went to work on the weed patch along the north side of my house. I live on a corner, so the three-foot-tall whatever-weeds-they-were were out there for all the neighbors to see as they walk dogs past my house or trail children on their way to the park. I take walks around my town and in observing other north sides of houses, I've learned that most people have something a bit more intentional going on in their greenspace. More to the point, this exuberance of wild greenery is what I see when I come home from work and park at the curb--an example of my failure as a homeowner. So despite the other even more exuberant patches of weeds on the south side of the house, this is what I worked on today.

Weeds didn't used to grow here. Nothing much grew here between the forsythia and the pink almond bushes. It was a dark, cold patch of grown. But the tree in the parkway that shaded everything, leaving the soil cold even while tulips bloomed ten feet away--this tree became ill. The first summer just a few big branches were dead, the next summer two-thirds of the tree failed to leaf out. Lucky for me, it was on the parkway, so it was the village government's responsibility to remove it. It was replaced with a new tree, a plucky, spiky little thing, that in its third summer looks like it's here to stay. But it won't be shading much of anything for many years.

The weeds have been celebrating, growing thick and tall and spindly like they could not do before. There are woody stems and sprouts of volunteer trees and shoots everywhere from the forsythia bush. I decided today that I wanted to be master of this patch, that it should look organized, intentional, as if there were a devoted happy homeowner. on the scene.

Actually I cleared out the weeds last May, in a previous effort to be master of the landscape. The weeds weren't so tall back then. The Lily of the Valley was spreading. It looked like there was hope for something in the nature of a garden here. I went to my sister Linda's house where ferns grow tall and thick next to the foundation. Linda brought these ferns here from the yard at my mother's old house, where we grew up, and they've thrived. They look like a prehistoric landscape where you'd find tiny dinosaurs skittering through the leaves. I dug some up and planted them next to my house, along with a wild geranium. My friend Tara contributed a big fern from her yard as well.

I had tried transplanting ferns before--ones from the garden at my mom's house. All that survived was one small-ish frond that came up faithfully every spring but never became something more--it did not spread to cover the bare ground under the old tree, nor did it lead a takeover against the weeds where the sun came to the area.

Within a week of transplanting the new ferns began to dry, curl and turn brown. Stressed by being moved from one garden to another? Probably. Giving up leaves while building stronger root systems? That would be the optimist's view. Just not going to make it? I can accept failure.

Today as I cleared out weeds and clipped the last of the brown, dried fronds, I discovered ferns that just might make it. There were tiny new still-curled fronds at the center of one plant, more developed growth on three more. They're weren't very tall, but I cleared out the dandelions  and Queen Anne's Lace around them and gave them room to grow. Maybe, I thought, I'll have a nice, thick easy-to-care-for patch of ferns here after all.

It was 12:45 p.m. The sun was bright, and high enough in the sky that the house provided no shade. It as hot. The sun beat down. These ferns which had staged a comeback while tall weeds were around to shade them are now going to be exposed to the hot summer sun every day.

What have I done? Will they make it? Were they better off as they were?

And what kind of metaphor is this for life?


Shelter me, O God, even under the weeds and Slippery Elm of my life.
Do not leave me in the sun, the bright, hot summer heat.
Let me grow in small ways, in moist places, not meddled with.
But if it must be, give me water in proportion to light, coolness rising from the ground.
Save me with your dark and soothing presence.

A woman for president

I was not a Hillary Clinton voter in 2008. I was a Barack Obama fan. I saw his convention speech in 2004 and remember well the Saturday in 2007 when he announced his candidacy for the presidency from the steps of the Old State Capitol in Springfield. It was audacious--an African-American male choosing to stand on the steps of the building where Lincoln gave his "House Divided" speech to begin a campaign to be the president of all America.

Eight years later we're a long way from a post-racial America, and the taunts and lies that have been directed at the extraordinary family living in the White House have shown how ugly and raw and unthinking racism is, even in a country whose founding document says "all men are created equal."

But there it is--"all men." We can't go back and rewrite a historical document, but who would dare use that language today? Women got the vote--eventually. Now it's men and women who are created equal, whose individual talents are recognized, and whose gendered ways of being in the world are beginning to be celebrated in ways that don't deprive women of power.

So yes, I cast my vote for Hillary in the primary and I'll vote for her again in November. I think she's got the right stuff for the job. I think being a centrist and a deal-maker and a listener is what we need right now. The way some Bernie voters are still doing the "my way or the highway" thing scares me. We don't need people staking out positions from which they will not move. We've got enough of that strongman thinking over in the Republican party. So I'm not for Hillary because she's a woman. I'm for Hillary because I think she's right for the time.

But what I'm finding this week is that tears rise in my eyes and there's a lump in my throat when speakers declare that Hillary Clinton will be "the first woman president of the United States of America." I feel tenderness and pride and validation for a feminine way of being in the world.

And when Bill Clinton, in that sly and charming manner he surely used on his mother at the age of 9, painted a picture last night of a young law student, an ambitious career woman, someone whose water broke, who worked for the good of children and mothers, who fussed in her daughter's dorm room until it was time to leave her behind, who just keeps doing the next thing--I don't know if this humanized Hillary for the rest of America, but it sure did for me. Maybe it's because we're close in age. I'm sure when that bio video for her plays on Thursday night, I'll see not only the person and the accomplishments, but also the dresses and the suits that we wore in the 70's and 80's and 90's and 'aughts, along with the life stages of a mother and a working woman.

Twitter and the commentariat went a little nuts last night about Bill's presumption in talking about their marriage without confessing to its troubles, which is to say, his own unfaithfulness. I choose to give her credit for soldiering on, for sticking with the partnership, for working with imperfection.

I've read interesting analyses of Hillary's political and leadership style that cite gender differences in her leadership style and the way gender expectations affect how she is perceived. Some of these have even been written by men. I think she'll be a very capable president, though unlikely to get tons of recognition for the good job she will do. There are many in our bitterly partisan politics who despise her and make cheap fun of her, who don't give her the same room as a man--room in which she can be fully human with faults and misjudgments. But she's got skills, she collaborates, she listens. I think she's what we need now.

I'll still be choking up in November when the election comes around, and I hope in January (she's all that stands between us and Trump!) on Inauguration Day--choking up with hope for a more perfect union in America, led by a woman.

Geek show

So I am not actually watching the Republican National Convention, minute by minute on cable TV or even just the hour of prime-time on the broadcast networks. Can't do it. It's not just that I can't listen to so much rhetoric that I disagree with. The ignorance behind the rhetoric makes me crazy and depressed.

But that doesn't stop me from following the convention, in blogs and on Twitter. It's like the pull of a soap opera. I followed "All My Children" with giddy but ironic embarrassment through high school and college. What delicious, outrageous thing would happen next, spun out slowly from Monday through Thursday, with a cliffhanger on Friday to bring you back again after the weekend. 

Nowadays there's reality TV, also spinning out stories for weeks at a time, stories that regardless of the appearance of spontaneity are arranged and even provoked by producers.  I'm not hooked on any of those, which might have as much to do with being too disorganized to remember to watch as it does with revulsion at the values and obsessions of the people on these shows. 

Politics is the spectacle I follow, though it worries me that political news is more about the story than the policies, more about who's winning and losing than about government serving real people. But all my college-educated high-mindedness still leaves me unable to take my eyes off the geek show that is the Republican presidential nomination process.

I don't use the term geek show lightly. My sainted husband, Lon Grahnke, often reminded people that originally the word geek referred to a sideshow performer who chased and caught chickens and bit their heads off. A geek was the lowest form of carnival performer, despised by other performers, who themselves lived outside the boundaries of polite society. 

Lon's knowledge of geek shows would come up in the context of discussions of professional wrestling. Lon was a journalist and a lifelong pro wrestling fan. If he were alive right now, I'm sure he'd be pitching a piece to his editors comparing Donald Trump and his campaign to a pro wrestling narrative.

Lon reported on pro wrestling in the late 1980s, in a way that earned him the trust of both wrestlers and readers. Was it all fake? He never put that question to the guys he interviewed, because, hey, everybody knew it was a, um, heightened version of reality. Lon's stories did not appear in the sports section but in the Chicago Sun Times' entertainment pages. Wrestling was more like live theatre than baseball, performance art for the masses, circus acts on steroids, with narratives punctuated by body slams and blood in the ring, bluster and the accumulation of crass wealth backstage.

The shared public value was dominance--winning. Also, humiliating the opponent. 

And so we arrive at the Republican National Convention, where the phrase "winning the nomination" seems to me to be heard far more often than "nominated for the office of President of the United States." We're watching a celebration of the contest, not a consideration of the responsibility ahead. The RNC and the Republican presidential contest and debates that preceded it have had much more in common with the wrestling ring than with, say, the Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1858. Not that those 19th-century guys didn't play to the crowd--they did. They were politicians. But they also relied on reason and logic at a time when the nation's ideals were in serious question. The crowds listened, for hours under the hot summer sun.

Trump's message is about winning, vanquishing foes, making fun of losers. He appeals to the downtrodden by conning them with the dazzle of wealth or the promise of the freedom to say whatever you feel, offend whom you may, rather than with actual policy or plans. It's a geek show. He runs this way and that, catches the chicken and then outrageously bites its head off. He body slams opponents by making fun of them. His surrogates incite chants of "lock her up" against his Democratic opponent. You can't help watching to see what he does next, and this week of screw-up after screw-up, badly handled, has not failed to disappoint.

And then, in a turn of events worthy of the wrestling ring, Ted Cruz, the mortal enemy, takes the stage, seems to be making up with Donald, but in a surprising cynical twist, refuses to endorse him, uses the word conscience, and is booed off the stage. 

How can you not watch? 

When Lon reported on professional wrestling he was always respectful of its fans and his readers. The wrestlers he interviewed were also mindful of fans--after all, they bought the tickets and the merchandise. Pundits and analysts have been busy this year figuring out who the Trump voters are and pointing out that the "Make America great again" slogan appeals to people who are fearful of the future in a world that is changing. They point out that the policies of the elite leadership of the Republican party ignored the realities of its ordinary voters. 

Trump's life history shows that he's perfectly willing to use his brand to dupe fans, with schemes like Trump University or simply by not paying the contractors and small businesses who work on his projects. He's done serious damage to social norms in America and it's hard to imagine how the divisiveness he encourages for his own narcissistic ends can be repaired in the months ahead.

Trump's overblown messaging, his theatricality and spontaneity, are entertaining, mesmerizing even, though he's no more qualified to be president than Hulk Hogan. And he has a lot less heart.

RNC

I keep waiting for the moment when Donald Trump is revealed as the two-bit sham that he is, and people's eyes are opened and there's some big realization that what he's selling is not just snake oil, it's toxins. And everyone holds up just short of going over the cliff, like in a cartoon.

But it doesn't seem to be happening. Demographics, math, polls say he will lose in November, but how does anyone walk back the hateful rhetoric being spooled out in Cleveland tonight? How can anyone think this leads to good government?

I can't watch.

Open hearts

Yet another day of following breaking news about violence against police officers, this time in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Another lone gunman walking around with an assault rifle--how could that happen again? How will it not happen again?

I read comments from leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement who condemned the violence--condemned all violence--but did not back down from nor became defensive about peaceful protest against racism. I feel good about their wisdom.

Our only hope is in sharing one another's suffering. It seems a feeble hope, though there is so much suffering to share. Opening our hearts to grief and sadness--well, who wants that? The news cycle has been crummy enough that one could get angry and want to get a sense of control back--might be inspired by a blustering promise to "make America great again."

But that is a call to power. It is not a call to enlightenment, or wisdom, or the way of the cross.

Thinking on these things .... Listening to Thich Nhat Hanh over at onbeing.org