failure.

ever tried. ever failed. no matter. try again. fail again. fail better. --samuel beckett

i've been thinking about failure lately.  it's an interesting thing, failure, because its definition is slippery.  what does it mean to fail?  does it mean not to accomplish what you set out to accomplish?  does it mean to disappoint others by not accomplishing what they expected you to accomplish?  does it mean not hitting certain benchmarks of success on a prescribed timeline?

at different moments in my life, failure has meant each of those things.  i've nearly dropped out of grad school more times than i can count.  each time i felt disappointment in my own failure to achieve what i had planned to achieve.  but each time i also felt a wonderful sense of release and opportunity for a fresh start.  and i have been accutely aware of the ways in which i have failed to conform to the expectations of others, both in my family and in my church community.  but these failures don't feel like personal failures; they feel like explorations and discoveries, my true self emerging from beneath layers of prescription.

the most difficult version of failure i've had to deal with is the failure to achieve life goals on the timeline i've always been taught to accept.  i'm 34 and unmarried.  i have no children.  purchasing a house seems like a distant fantasy.  i'm still a student after 14 years of school, and will be for another three.  finding a job in my field seems an even more distant fantasy than owning a house.  and then there's the complication of being unsure i even want to accomplish those goals.  it's a constant struggle to remind myself that it's okay not to have achieved these benchmarks by age XX, that it's okay to be different from the prescribed norm i grew up with.  when i fail to remind myself of that, i begin to fail in other ways, too.  because dwelling on the fact that where i am in life constitutes failure according to some grand schema developed by someone else interferes with my ability to succeed in my pursuits, making failure all the more likely.  it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.  not only do i end up a failure according to the prescribed metanarrative, but also according to my own ideas of what it means to be happy and successful.

so i try.  i try to remember that i don't want to be married; rather i want to be married to the right person with whom i can have the kind of relationship i want.  i try to remember that there is still time to accomplish my goals and many avenues to them, not just one.  i try to remember that owning a home is not, in and of itself, a good thing; that sometimes there are alternative and more sustainable ways of living.  and mostly i try to remember that the only measuring stick that matters is my own conscience, not others' prescriptions.

refuge.

i’m reading terry tempest williams’ refuge again, looking for a bit of insight into finding peace within myself when external sources of peace seem lost to me.  i read it the first time as an undergrad at BYU for an assignment in an english course.  my group members and i drove up to the bear river migratory bird refuge to bird watch and take pictures for our presentation.  it was beautiful—a brisk, early spring day with a breeze and bright sunshine.  as we drove into the refuge a flock of redwing blackbirds rose into the sky.  there were hundreds of beautiful tundra swans swimming.  and it was clear why this magical place had been a source of refuge, not only for wild birds, but also for its human visitors.

as i re-read, i’m interested in what i found significant enough to mark on my first time through.  a handful of quotes have drawn enough notice that i’ve marked them again.  some leave me a bit mystified as to what i saw in them.  so far i’ve only found one piece of marginalia that goes beyond underlining.  williams recounts a family gathering soon after her mother tells them she has cancer.  the men in the family gather around to give her a blessing.  williams writes:

'kneeling next to my grandmother, mimi, i felt her strength and the generational history of belief Mormon ritual holds.  we can heal ourselves, i thought, and we can heal each other.'

i underlined that last line and in the margin wrote: 'not quite—god heals us when we have faith.  i wonder if she’s still active.'

when i read my little bit of marginalia, a deep wave of shame washed over me.  not shame at my belief that god heals us through faith.  i still believe in the healing power of faith in god.  but because i read williams’ words as heretic enough that i judged her as 'not quite' right in her views and questioned her standing in the church.

looking back on my note after a decade, i see in my younger self some of the very tendencies that most upset me about mormon culture and attitudes.  we are so confident in our own understanding of the world, that we forget that our knowledge is incomplete.  that simply because we know—or think we know—one thing, doesn’t preclude the possibility of truth in other ideas or understandings.  as my own understandings of mormon teachings have deepened and become nuanced, i have often been frustrated at the closed forum of mormon meetings.  too often our sunday meetings are about reiterating prescribed understandings, rather than exploring the gospel’s possibilities.  and my soul hungers for the opportunity for that exploration.

when i re-read 'we can heal ourselves, i thought, and we can heal each other,' i no longer saw misunderstanding.  instead i saw revelation and i underlined the words again.

buzzed.

yesterday i was called 'sir' for the first time in a long time.  which is not at all surprising, since, at the moment, i look like this:  

a friend gave me a fresh buzz on tuesday.  buzzing my hair started as a form of silent protest, but continues beyond the election because i like it.  i like the $60/haircut it saves me (that's nearly $200 in savings in the last five months).  but mostly i like the way it feels and looks.

there's an honesty in buzzing my hair off.  on some level, i'm saying, 'what you see is what you get.  and you know what?  i like what you see; i'm not going to try to hide it.'  that's incredibly liberating for me.  after starting college, having perfect hair became, for me, a means of compensating for my face.  when i have hair of any length, i get a bit obsessive with making sure it looks just right.  and that it doesn't get mussed over the course of the day.  buzzing it off means i couldn't worry about my hair's perfection if i want to.

of course, i do wonder if buzzing my hair isn't just another way of making sure people don't notice my face.  i am noticed when i buzz my hair.  some of that notice makes me laugh.  like when i get called sir.  or when a sweet old lady in the temple asked me if i was glad my hair was growing back in; and then, when she noticed my confusion, added, "or is it just a cool, easy style for summer?'  i laugh about such notice.  i kind of enjoy messing with people's perceptions about gender.

but the notice i get isn't all comic.  both this week and the last time i buzzed it (about two months ago), i have noticed more men looking at me than usual (this could be a factor of my noticing their attention more; but j(wh) trained me to recognize flirtatious interest so i don't think it's that).  some of the looks are questioning.  buzzed-head-as-oddity.  but some of them are flirtatious--as if a woman with the confidence to buzz her hair is sexually intriguing.

i don't really know what to ultimately make of the increased notice--whether it's just curiosity or whether it's attraction; whether it's only focused on my (lack of) hair or focused on my face; whether it's really about depriving myself of a hiding place or making that hiding place even better.  what i do know is that i like the way i feel when i buzz my hair.  i think i'll keep doing it.  at least for now.

open.

nearly ten years ago i graduated from BYU and moved to virginia to get a masters degree at UVA. i remember sitting in the welcome meeting for new graduate students and feeling a bit of culture shock. the most memorable catalyst for that culture shock was the DGS (director of graduate studies), a very hip man who taught african american studies and late 20th century pop culture--a man with long hair (a definite no-no at the Y) and colorful language (another no-no). i think he had a goatee, too. i wonder if he had a beard card signed by his medical provider...

that first semester at UVA was full of all kinds of new experiences. my first party, by which is meant a lot of people getting together to drink and talk with loud music playing in the background. my first wine & cheese gathering. my first outing to a bar for drinks. my first attempts at explaining mormon peculiarities to drunk people. my first whiff of pot. my first taste of thai food, vegetarian food, and cooked spinach. my first cocktail party (at which i was dubbed the 'mormon alice cooper' for reasons that remain entirely unclear to me).

i embraced every new experience that presented itself so long as it didn't require that i do something that contradicted my own standards. i made a very conscious choice that i would welcome any advance of friendship. for the first time in my life i lived far away from family (only two hours from my oldest brother, but without a car that was a fairly insurmountable distance). i was starting a new educational venture. and i knew that if i didn't build a supportive network for myself in charlottesville i would be miserable.

i didn't end up miserable. i ended up so happy that i wanted to never leave. i made wonderful friends at church. and i made wonderful friends at school. some of my friends from virginia remain among my dearest friends. i wouldn't trade the experiences we shared for anything.

once in a while, when i've described my experiences in charlottesville to other mormons, they've been surprised that i would go out to a bar on a friday night as a regular social activity. or that i would go to what was essentially a slightly grown up version of a kegger. that i wouldn't immediately leave a party when i smelled marijuana. that i laughed about the cross-dressing that i witnessed at a "shock your mom" party (one of the funniest nights ever) rather than being horrified. that when my boyfriend in virginia said 'f*** you' to me, i usually laughed at him because it was never said in anger but rather as part of a teasing that helped make our relationship happy.

i don't want to simply condemn people who would have refused to participate in such activities. i know that different people have different tolerance levels for different things. i respect that. but i think that a lot of people also create their own offense by focusing on something they consider unacceptable rather than looking past it. in my mind, it's far better to hear someone swear without it ruining my day or foreclosing the possibility of knowing that person, and the happiness that friendship with them might bring, than to try to shut myself off from all sources of behavior i deem inappropriate for myself.

what it boils down to for me is this: i want to know and love my world. all of it, not just that part that fits my preconceived notion of good. and focusing on the things i do not like so much that i fail to see wonderful new things or old things in new ways--well, that strikes me as the best way to refuse to know and love my world. and it seems to me that when we're so tuned in to potential sources of offense, we actually grant them much more control of our minds and spirits than they would have if instead we let them roll off our backs and instead we looked for the beautiful.

outrage.

if you know me, you may know that i have a little problem--a small addiction, you might even say. to outrage. and this week i seem to have found more than a handful of sources. so i thought i'd share them, just to get it off my chest.


the very thought of a mother taking her eight-year-old daughter for not only an eyebrow wax but also a bikini wax had the outrage mounting instantly. a bikini wax?!! what exactly was to be removed from the pubic area of an eight-year-old?! i wanted nothing more than to sit these women down and smack them, demanding that they wake up and let their poor daughters grow up seeing the beauty of their bodies as they are. and i realized again how very lucky i was in my parents' attitudes about beauty.

speaking of artificially achieving the ideal, i was horrified to discover that there's such a thing as a 'G-shot' to enhance the G-spot (if you're sensitive about treating genitalia casually, don't read that one). really!? i mean, i'm all for women enjoying sex. but the idea of trying to augment something like the G-spot strikes me as more about imposing ideals from outside than truly enjoying one's body.

and then there's this little gem from the london leader of the british national party (admittedly a far right, all white party which looks to me like it's racist, sexist, and extreme nationalist. but still):

Rape is simply sex (I am talking about 'husband-rape' here, for those who deliberately seek to misunderstand me). Women enjoy sex, so this type of 'rape' cannot be such a terrible physical ordeal. To suggest that rape, when conducted without violence, is a serious crime is like suggesting that force feeding a woman chocolate cake is a heinous offence. A woman would be more inconvenienced by having her handbag snatched.

another candidate for a sound smacking.


these were moments of outrage that, although genuine, were not very personal. i mean, i care deeply about each of those issues--the immense potential for psychological harm our society's beauty myths hold; women's sexuality not being an object to be manipulated, but rather being a source of natural pleasure; and rape being taken seriously, whether it's the kind of violent encounter we most often imagine or the much more common acquaintance rape this politician makes light of. but while i care deeply, this was the kind of almost-pleasurable outrage that comes with conviction of one's moral superiority. it's a distant kind of outrage.

my most recent moment of outrage was much more personal. this afternoon i logged into google reader (something you should all use if you read blogs as obsessively as i do), and found fmhLisa's post about being young and mormon and pregnant. and what i felt was less outrage and more sorrow. and i know that such stories should be taken with a grain of salt. but still it made my heart hurt that a girl could ever be so outcast at a moment when she needs to be loved. and that there could be policies in place (even the more benign one quoted from the church handbook in comment 22) that mandate this kind of treatment. i know the realities of the church are much more complex than could be captured in one anecdote or in quoting a policy. but i recognize the truth in the anecdote and the potential for serious harm in the policy and i want to weep.


but to end on a lighter note: i was taken in so completely by the IRS policy of sending some rebates in the form of goods instead of money to ensure people didn't 'waste' their rebate by paying bills instead of shopping, that my outrage didn't let me remember the date. until the host of marketplace reminded me. at which point i had to laugh at myself. a healthy reminder that my outrage is often fed by my own gullibility coupled with my obsession with pet issues (i hate that our government encourages spending rather than fiscal responsibility as a means to deal with our current economic problems).

synaesthesia.
last night was was an evening of nearly perfect sensory perception. first feasting on ethiopian food. and eating ethiopian feels like feasting, with the food served communally on a large platter and eaten with fingers. and i think yedoro wot is just about culinary divinity. and after eating our fill, it was ryan adams in concert at the wilshire. which was fantastic (in spite of a somewhat lackluster crowd).

i love ryan adams' music. he's an incredible songwriter and he has a gorgeous voice. last night he was on. two hours of incredible music. and he completely belied his reputation as something of a pompous ass. instead he was personable and funny. he sat on a stool with the band rather than taking center stage in a spotlight (except for the closing song 'goodnight hollywood boulevard'). and when he introduced the band, he ended by saying "we're the cardinals."

the thing that moved the concert into the realm of the magical for me was its color. the set opened with the stage glowing blue, ten or twelve lanterns suspended over the stage catching and intensifying the color created by the other lights. throughout the concert the colors shifted from blue to green to gold. red and pink. aqua and fuchsia. orange and purple. and the lanterns gleamed, reflecting the colors or casting their own. about halfway through the concert, when the whole theater seemed infused with orange light, i knew that this was the closest i'd ever been--and may ever be--to synaesthesia.

homage.
in the last week, i've found two or three references to a recent article about world-renowned violinist joshua bell busking in a washington, d.c. metro station. tonight i took a break and read the original article.

it was a stunt. have the best violinist in the nation (one who is paid up to $1000/minute) stand in a busy metro station during rush hour playing difficult and beautiful music on a $3.5 million stradivarius and see just how many people stop. or even notice. when consulted, the music director of the national symphony orchestra surmised that 70-100 people would stop (a small crowd) and 40 or so may know the quality of what they heard. the reality? 27 gave money (a total of $32.17). only 7 stopped to listen. two or three knew the quality of what they heard. and one recognized bell (who is highly recognizable, as he's something of a classical music heartthrob).

the article is beautifully written and well worth the time it takes to read. the accompanying video clips are interesting to watch. as i read, and watched, i longed to have been there. to have discovered that kind of music being played in a metro station. would i have stopped? i don't know. it wouldn't have been the first time, as i often stopped to listen to buskers in both london and boston. and i probably would have dropped some cash into his case before i went on my way. but i know myself. and i know i can get caught up in the stress and busy-ness of life and, while i'm positive i would have noticed, i may have hurried through without much pause.

the article's questions about context and framing in relationship to beauty are of great interest to me. i've been thinking about those questions for a long time. and some of my favorite intellectual arguments with friends have arisen in response to those questions. i'll never forget the day that started with a conversation about the relationship between context and art/beauty on a bus to stratford upon avon and ended with the most incredible adaptation of 12th night. it was one of those days that stays with you for years, reverberating with thought and laughter and beauty. i enjoyed the article because of its subject and its questioning.

but the thing that made me stop as i was reading was john picarello's reaction. a fan of joshua bell (though he didn't recognize him), picarello came off the escalator, heard the music and immediately stopped. he spent nearly ten minutes standing in l'enfant plaza engrossed in the music. having trained as a violinist as a child and teenager, with the aspiration of becoming a professional musician, he recognized the perfection of the playing and the quality of the instrument. he called it "a treat, just a brilliant, incredible way to start the day." he was bewildered by the fact that no one else seemed to recognize what was happening.

this is what really made me stop and notice picarello:

"When he left, Picarello says, 'I humbly threw in $5.' It was humble: You can actually see that on the video. Picarello walks up, barely looking at Bell, and tosses in the money. Then, as if embarrassed, he quickly walks away from the man he once wanted to be."

here was a man who loves music. who once aspired to be what joshua bell is, and who is now a supervisor at the u.s. postal service because he knew he didn't have the ability to make it as a concert violinist. but he still knew the beauty of what he heard and acknowledged it. this response resonated with me. because i often feel this way in my own work. i love the literature i teach. it's magical. because it's not just stories, words conveying set meanings. it's infinitely complex--always greater than the sum of its parts. the work i do--writing about literature; teaching literature--is a form of homage. a humble acknowledgement of beauty and wisdom and raw humanity of a kind i know is beyond my ability to produce.

beauty.
a reflection on female beauty. in two parts.

being beautiful. growing up i thought i was ugly. i was very thin, with knobby knees and generally funny looking legs. my lips were very full and i hated my smile. my hair was first straight as a stick and blah in color and then, after puberty, thick and so wavy i didn't have any idea how to manage it. my face was long and seemed totally uninteresting. my only good point was that i was naturally thin, though that had the downside of meaning i was also naturally without much in the way of curves.

when i was 17, my conviction of my own ugliness cracked for the first time. i broke my arm, and in the emergency room they taped a fashion magazine around my arm as a splint. when the doctor cut it off, he told me i was lucky--the models like the one on the cover of that magazine usually had to inject their lips with collagen, but my lips were naturally full the way they wanted theirs to be. that doctor was simply trying to distract me from the pain of a broken bone. but his casual comment shed a whole new light on my own perception of myself. it had never occurred to me that one of my most hated features could actually be considered beautiful.

in spite of that momentary flash of insight, i was 22 or 23 before i ever thought of myself as attractive. and it took a couple more years to believe i was beautiful, and that only happened in moments. and it only happened after cutting all of my hair off, rejecting many beauty conventions (including wearing make up daily), and refusing to dress myself according to trends unless i liked them for themselves and unless i liked them on myself. i'm very comfortable with my appearance now. physically, i think that i am generally a plain woman who is sometimes pretty and occasionally beautiful. i know how to dress myself. i know how to use make up and i wear it when i feel like it. i love the silver that has been showing up in my dark brown hair for a long time now. most importantly, i've learned that my beauty comes from my mind and my soul and my laughter.

in large part, i have my mother to thank for both my childhood/teenage opinion of my own beauty (this is not a criticism of my mother) and for my current acceptance of my own body and beauty. my mother never stressed being "in style," though she likes pretty clothes and bought us pretty clothes. she was not tapped into trends and didn't shop for particular brands or in certain stores in order to ensure that we were dressed stylishly. she didn't interfere in our own particular tastes. and she herself aged with grace and beauty. i also have my father to thank, because he always made it abundantly clear that he found my mother beautiful and sexy--not in spite of, but because of her gorgeous grey hair and her curvy body which bore seven children. my parents' honesty about physical beauty and their lack of concern for the beauty myths promoted in our society made my own open attitude about beauty--both my own and others'--possible.

selling beauty. this morning, 'day to day' aired a story about dove's new 'pro-age' ad campaign. photos taken by annie liebowitz of women over 50 posing nude. no air-brushing. with the tagline "beauty has no age limit." the ads use a variety of women--mostly white, but a couple of african-americans and at least one who looks mediterranean. and all of them beautiful, though not all of them beautiful in necessarily conventional ways. some are immaculately toned and fit. others are not. all of them show the marks of age in one form or another--grey hair, wrinkles, age spots. and they are not professional models.

part of me is bothered by this. advertising and marketing can get under my skin. i recognize that the majority of the women in this campaign are toned in a way that the majority of american women are not, whether they are over 50 or not. and a photographer of annie liebowitz's caliber can capture beauty in a subject that many people would have a hard time seeing in the live subject. dove is still selling a myth of beauty in some ways. and that is deeply troubling.

but another part of me loves this campaign. i think it's wonderful that dove is not touching up the photos. and it's so very vital to send the message that age is not the enemy of beauty. that beauty is not about matching some platonic ideal of the female form and face. that one needn't tuck and lift and snip and squeeze in order to be beautiful. and the fact of the matter is that in american society, beauty is bought and sold. not just the products that we use to make ourselves beautiful, but the idea of beauty. more than anything else, it is magazines and television and films that provide us with our ideas of beauty. if dove can sell an idea of beauty that is more realistic than the idea sold on the runways of new york, london, and milan; if they can create an ideal that embraces age and experience rather than pre-pubescent blankness; if they can show a beauty that is real rather than imagined, i'm all for it.

sums.
we all know that 2+2=4. right?

generally, i don't disagree with basics of mathematics (except for the whole idea of imaginary numbers; and i don't disagree with it [i mean, it's good to have a square root of -1, right?]; i just find it a little bit odd). but i think that sometimes putting two and two together is not just four; sometimes it's four and something a little bit more than the sum of its parts.

so what am i talking about? the fact that people extrapolate from this little formula, usually learned very early, the aphorism that if you have the components of something, then you have the thing itself. the statement that 2+2=5 has become shorthand for not only a logical error, but also for dangerous forms of mind control. we all know, and must not forget, that 2+2 always equals four.

the problem is that sometimes the parts of something add up to more than their sum. i may have four sunflowers lying on a table in my house, waiting to be trimmed and put in a vase of water. and they are just four sunflowers. but when i see four sunflowers laying on a table in a van gogh painting, they're more than just four sunflowers. they're also a work of art.

this is particularly true, in my opinion, of poetry. tonight on my way home, i happened to catch garrison keillor's writer's almanac for the day. the five-minute mini-program consists of interesting tidbits of literary history, factoids about authors' lives, and a poem. tonight keillor read the poem "how to tell if you're a participant or a staff (a handy guide for day programs)" by david moreau. i listened as the narrator listed all the ways in which to discern whether you are staff or participant, all the while waiting for that something that would turn this rather mundane list of statements into the magic of poetry. because poetry has magic in it. all poetry. even poetry that i dislike. i'm sorry i can't explain it better than calling it magic, but i can't. and this poem--it didn't have it. sure, it calls attention to the difficulties of being in the position of needing assistance in daily living. it nicely illustrates some of the simple things that you and i take for granted every day. and achieving that is worthy of a literary effort. but there is nothing that this work does that demands it be poetry. it would have been as effective written in prose format. the only thing that makes it poetry is the fact that it's been broken into verse shape and labeled "poem." and poetry is not like 2+2=4. words written in verse form do not a poem make. poetry is always more than the sum of its parts.

asset.
yesterday i spoke in my ward. it was a topic i chose myself because it is deeply meaningful to me. and because i have spent a great deal of time studying it recently. i spent a lot of time thinking about it, both in personal study before being asked to speak and over the last week as i tried to define a structure for my talk that would allow me to share some of the insights i had gained through my own study. it went well, though i don't think i fully articulated some of the points i was trying to make. it probably would have been better had i finished writing it more than half an hour before church started so that i could do some re-writing.

after i finished speaking and we had sung the intermediate hymn, the next speaker stood up and proclaimed me an asset. i bit back a smile, until i looked at caroline who was sitting at the back of the chapel, grinning from ear to ear. because i have complained to her and others many times over the course of the last month or so about being declared an asset. the very first sunday i attended my new ward, i bore my testimony. because i felt moved by the spirit to do so. after sacrament, a handful of people pulled me aside to compliment me. these were not pass-in-the-hallway-so-you-say-something-nice type compliments. i've given and received my share of those. these were heartfelt statements of appreciation tinged with a bit of awe. this was repeated several times throughout church that day. and then, during relief society, i made a few comments, as i am wont to do. and the teacher stopped her lesson--stopped it in the middle of a thought--in order to state that i would be such an asset to the ward.

this bothers me. immensely. and not because it feels impersonal or like i'm appreciated only for what i can give the ward. i know these comments are not meant in that way. it bothers me partially because i know how very different my reality is from the appearance created by my statements. not that i'm a hypocrite. just that i am articulate and speak well, that i know how to use rhetoric in order to communicate, which i think often gives people an idea of me that is a little more together than my reality is.

but that's not the biggest reason these comments and compliments bother me. the biggest reason is this: i don't think i should be complimented for simply doing what i should do, for simply being what god has asked me to be. god has given me certain gifts and i believe he expects me to use them. i do--at least i try to. i do not believe i merit compliments for doing so. heaven knows i don't use them as well as i could.

more importantly, i feel like such compliments almost nullify the potential for interaction, learning, and growth that comes with true discourse. i don't want someone to tell me how smart i sound, or how insightful i am, or that my talk should be given in general conference. i want them to respond in kind. i want them to share their insights with me. i want them to engage in conversation, because out of conversation, communion, discourse, come greater light and knowledge for everyone involved. what comes of telling me how great my talk was? nothing, really.

i probably sound ungrateful. and i don't mean to. i appreciate people's compliments. i know they are generally sincere and that they're being nice. i am truly happy if what i have to say helps someone else and i would never want them to keep that to themselves if they want to share that fact (which someone did yesterday; i was happy that the spirit could work through me to help her). but i can't help but be uncomfortable in the face of such comments and praise.

reflect.
about eight years ago, i spent a semester studying in london. upon my first trip to the national gallery, i decided i would work my way through the national gallery and the tate chronologically, beginning with the earliest works and moving on until i reached the contemporary work displayed at the tate. after about four weeks of madonnas and crucifixes and other medieval and early renaissance pieces that generally failed to speak to me, i gave up on my plan and found my way to the tate. where i experienced 20th century art for the first time. and experienced is the correct word. i found myself especially drawn to the abstract expressionists. david smith's sculpture, which relied as much upon surface variations and the way they played with light as it did upon form. mark rothko's beautiful, intense color fields. and pollock's wildly erratic, vibrant, massive works. as i encountered them, i realized that where all of the early art i'd consumed at the national gallery tried to communicate a specific story--often one laden with specific subsurface messages to go along with the story--, these works of abstraction were all about surface. about line and texture and motion. about hue and contrast. but the lovely discovery was that because they are all about surface, they have so much more depth. there is no pat explanation, no set understanding to be gained looking into a pollock. there's no moral of the story to be taken home from a rothko. there is only the color and the form and the texture and your own soul.

light.
my week began and ended with light. i turned thirty-one last monday. my body woke at 6:00, unbidden, to a silence-filled dawn. my blinds were open and i watched as first light crept into the world, infusing the sky with golden periwinkle against which a palm tree stood silhouetted, the whole striated by my blinds. after watching the gold grow stronger and the blue of night fade, i sat up so i could look out on my world and discovered a crystal clear sky, blue mountains beckoning along the horizon. it was a beautiful way to start a new year.

as i moved through that day, thinking about the opportunities created by starting a new year, the clarity of that half an hour laying in bed watching the gleam infuse the world stayed with me. as i looked forward i saw nothing but possibility and happiness and love. in many incarnations, but possibility and happiness and love nonetheless. that feeling stayed with me all week, coloring all of my interactions with others. shaping my attitudes. leaving me feeling happier than i have in years. and for no discernible reason.

last night as i drove on a wild goose chase to meet friends, the sun set, filling the world with shadows. and over the palm trees' silhouette standing against the deepening night sky, the moon captured the sun's light, silver infused with the gold of a sinking sun.

charity: a reflection in three parts.


christmas. at some point just before christmas, my mom told me that my dad had invited two women from their ward to join us for christmas eve. my immediate response was to be peeved. i like my holidays quiet. i don't want to entertain a bunch of people and feel obliged to talk to them if i don't feel like it. i hate small talk with strangers. i don't like trying to find something i have in common with them to talk about. and i made it known to my mom that i wished we could just have a quiet holiday.

but my dad had already made the invitation. and one of the women had agreed. and the other one called on christmas eve to tell us she was rearranging other plans so she could come and be with us. needless to say, i was not pleased.

but once something can't be changed i'm not one to be all snotty about it. so i set to work and helped my mom prepare all kinds of food and set the table pretty and fold the napkins like lotus flowers. and the two women came and one of them was a bit dour and the other one was a bit effervescent. and i was a bit sulky.

until i stopped worrying about how they were ruining my christmas and instead let myself realize how happy they were to be with us. these two beautiful women who didn't have families to be with that night. rather than having a christmas eve i had to suffer through, i ended up enjoying myself and the laughter these two women brought with them into our home.


resolution. i don't often make new year's resolutions. i'm not very good at keeping them. but this year i have made one. i am something of a thinker. and i have been trained by my graduate programs to think by taking other people's thoughts apart. breaking ideas down into component parts to see if they work. what results often sounds negative. because it leads me to point out the ways in which another person's work is inadequate or wrong. this is in part a necessary evil. to make one's way in the world of academia, it's vital to find an opening. some niche that you can make your own. and that can only happen when you show that everyone else has failed to see things your way (which is, of course, the correct way).

but i don't like the fact that this response leaves others feeling like i'm always trying to show them how their thoughts are lacking, how they are weak. it makes it sound like i'm condescending and i don't like being condescending.

i still want to think critically. and i still want to recognize the ways in which an idea may not be sufficient. but i want to read more generously. i want to go with someone in their thoughts and their argument, try to understand it. find the ways in which their thoughts fit with mine, areas where they overlap, places at which there is a gap between them. and try to adjust my own thinking to incorporate the good of theirs while maintaining the good of mine. it is time for more intellectual charity in my life.


god & i. i have been thinking lately about how i have dealt with the fact that i am not where i think i should be. i think i should be married. with a baby. or maybe even two. of course, that's fairly irrational given that i've never even had a legitimate opportunity to marry (i don't count the time a guy i knew showed up at my house and told me god wanted me to marry him as legitimate). but i still haven't let the irrationality of my expectation prevent me from being angry at god for not giving me what i think i deserve. i have tried not to be angry. because i'm pretty sure getting angry at god doesn't accomplish a whole lot. at least nothing positive. it has certainly worked to undermine my happiness.

a couple of weeks ago i was talking to a friend about this issue. not about my anger. more about the fact that i have essentially reached the conclusion that i will most likely never marry. and i got a little weepy (as i'm prone to do). he looked at me and asked me if my being married is a good thing. the answer seemed so obvious that i looked at him funny and then answered yes. his reply was simple: then pray for it. because we have been told that when we ask god in faith for something which is good, he will give it to us.

i wasn't convinced it was that easy and left the conversation a bit skeptical. but i've been thinking about it. about this idea that if we exercise faith and ask god for good things, he will give them to us. that our faith truly is a tool that we can use to bring about good in the world. and i've thought about how i have responded to this particular problem in my life. i certainly have not responded with faith. i have responded with anger and anguish. and with fear. but not with much faith. and it occurs to me that i have not been charitable to god. i have not loved him and believed in his goodness--not where i am concerned. it is time for a more simple faith. trust that god does love me and will provide for me. a more pure love of god--not for what i think he can do for me (that love transforming to anger when he doesn't deliver), but for his essential goodness and mercy and love.