spark

on parables and jellyfish

Visiting the lighthouse beach at low tide on Sanibel island, it wasn't long before we noticed hundreds of comb jellies floating in the receding waters around our ankles, and then realized that hundreds more were stranded on the sand.

Griffin scooped up one, than another, releasing them back into the water. I coached him to take them out at least knee-deep rather than placing them in withdrawing waves, but all the while, I inwardly recognized the futility of returning them to the sea. Even supposing they were not already too dessicated or too squashed to survive, or that the rescued jellyfish didn't immediately wash right back up on the beach, it seemed naïve to imagine that the recovery mission would make a significant impact on the jellyfish population at large, and even more naïve to think that humans even should rescue creatures for whom being stranded on a beach at low tide is simply a natural part of life (or death, as it were). Is feeling sad about something normal and unavoidable compassionate, or excessively sentimental?   

I kept my jaded thoughts to myself. Soon all three brothers had banded together to save the jellyfish. I felt proud of their compassion, and a bit condescending regarding their innocence. 

Dan hung back with the rescue squad, who had started to realize the magnitude of their task and were beginning to compromise between saving every jelly and making forward progress along the beach. Meanwhile, I explored the shoreline ahead. Soon I rounded the bend of Point Ybel, and was dazzled and dismayed by what I saw:

Thousands of jellyfish had been washed up. They were actually quite pretty, sparkling in the sun, but at first sight it was also slightly horrific to witness such a massive number of animals beached at once. Still, death by low tide is par for the course, why should I mourn it any more than I mourn the coquinas gobbled up by ibises or the cicadas at home that are starting to slow down and die now that summer is winding down? 

Dan caught up to me; like me, he was waffling between feeling touched by the heroic efforts of the children and recognizing the futility of human intervention.  Then he uttered the parabolical quote:

"It mattered to that one."

Do you remember the story of the starfish? If not, here it is in a nutshell: a man is walking allong a beach that is deserted save for himself and hosts of beached starfish. Everywhere he walks, stranded starfish. At length he comes upon a boy who is stooping and picking up one starfish at a time, throwing them back into the ocean, then repeating with the next starfish. The man asks him why he's doing this, since it's far too great a task for the boy to make a difference. The boy stoops again, picks up a starfish, throws it into the water, looks at the man, and replies, "it made a difference to that one."

I felt momentarily chastised, and a little sad that I no longer possess that hope of saving the whole world via salvaging a few jellyfish. I wondered, is it wrong for me to pass the jellies by without saving them, or is there value to accepting their fate without stress or sorrow? I have noticed that some people are able to be dispassionate when confronted with animal remains, unaffected by sorrow and merely interested - even fascinated - in what can be learned from the animal as is. Others feel intense pain and sadness and do not wish to examine animal remains. There are positive sides and drawbacks to each, I am sure. 

Each of us also has our pivot point, too - the bug that we cannot squash, the jelly that we cannot save. Griffin found that critical nexus when he rounded the point and saw the stranded thousands. First daunted, then accepting, he moved on from dying eumetazoans to wading on the sand bars, examining healthy mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms.

For me, the parable of the starfish is too simplistic. Like the plight of the comb jellies, it only brings more questions for me:

When does life have value? When does it have more value or less value? 

When is it right/ethical/necessary/good to promote life and when is it right/ethical/necessary/good to allow life to end?

How do we recognize an acceptable tipping point? What makes it acceptable to save the life of one animal but feed another to it? When do we give up on saving jellies, and when do we persevere?

Is there value to feeling sorrow about something that cannot be prevented or changed? Is there value to not feeling sorrow about something that has already happened, like the frog hit by our car or baby birds killed by a cat, or something unavoidable and natural, like a beached fish or the stranded jellyfish? 

I have no answers to these questions. They wash up at my feet and sparkle like so many jellies, and I don't know whether to pick them up and throw them back, to study them on the sand, or to walk by them entirely.

coming out of the fog

I am the adult daughter of an abusive mother and an enabling father. 

It is difficult to speak these thoughts out loud, and doing so is a recent development for me, a personal resurrection.  Emotional abuse thrives on secrecy, as it keeps the subjects of the abuse compliant and easy to reach.  Those who try to cast it off are scorned, shunned, derided by the very people who should, in a better world, be their champions.  Children who grow up in an atmosphere of control and invalidation learn to be fearful of voicing their experiences.

An abuser etches harmful words on the souls of her children and convinces them that they are the truth. If the children are fortunate, somebody will be present who can smooth these words out and provide a healthy view of reality. If they are unfortunate, they will be alone, isolated, and confused regarding what is reality and what is a lie.  If they stand up for themselves, they will be punished, not only by their abuser, but also by others influenced by the abuser. They will be told not to air dirty laundry, even though talking about abuse is the only way to heal.  They will be told to forgive and to forget, even though forgetting means submitting oneself to abuse over and over and over again. They will be told to bury the hatchet, even though they are not the ones holding it. They will be threatened and shamed in the abuser's efforts to regain control and bully the abused person back into submission.

I am speaking these things in public because without openness, there is no healing, there is only the secrecy in which abuse thrives. That secrecy protects the abuser(s) and assures that their targets cannot escape. I know that a dysfunctional family, when exposed, experiences pain, feels raw.  That rawness is not my responsibility. It is the responsibility of the generations of dysfunctional parents before me, who each passed their burdens down to their children, intentionally or not. 

Once there was a girl who called me a whore, for a joke, repeatedly. When I stood up to her, she complained that I hurt her feelings. I understand that her feelings were hurt, but I do not regret standing up for myself, nor do I think she had much of a right to complain about her feelings being hurt by her friend asking her not to call her a whore any more.  Just so with parents who harm their children. I acknowledge that estrangement is difficult for those parents, but a person who does harm to another does not have the right to cry foul when the hurt person declares "no more." 

I have heard accusations. I have heard insults. I have heard litanies of my faults. I have heard demands. I have heard threats. I have heard some pretty words but not heard words surrounding them that make them seem meaningful, nor seen any actions that lead me to believe those pretty words are true. I have been subjected to fear, obligation, and guilt (FOG), the triple-threat of the dysfunctional family.  I have not heard introspection, self-reflection, thoughtful consideration, sharing of responsibility. I have not seen change.

Nobody wants an estrangement. Nobody picks it as their first line of emotional defense or starts it on a whim. Estrangement is not about one particular event or a grudge; it is about a pervasive pattern of behavior from which a person has decided to disentangle themselves in order to be happy and healthy. There is always, always a long, exhausting back story. Decades spent wishing for and trying to achieve change. A lifetime of hurt that runs through the past and continues into the present.

Nor does hurt negate positive memories. I have oodles of them. I also know that many of the parts of myself that I like a lot were influenced by my parents, and that they have many good traits. Happy memories and good characteristics still exist, even in abusive families, but they are not enough to excuse the abuse or to remove its effects. Moments of happiness do not obligate a person to dedicate herself to a lifetime of a broken relationship. 

I have four siblings.  I will not speak for them, because in families such as mine, each sibling has their own story and suffers their own effects. Individual impact is affected by birth order, gender, personality, favoritism, scapegoating, and so much more. I've seen how that plays out in the generation older than me. I know it will play out in its own way in my generation.  I love my siblings, enjoy my relationships with them, and appreciate the moments of compassionate witness and shared experience that we have. I know that not all of them will like my speaking in public. I have been informed - perhaps erroneously, perhaps accurately - that one or more of them think I'm delusional. I hope that this is nothing but the gaslighting of a woman struggling to get her narcissistic supply, but if it's true, I understand how a person could have that perspective.

I'm not delusional, though. I am me. I own my truth, the good parts and the bad.  

I was instructed recently to "end this," and so I am ending it. I'm done. 

I am coming out of the fog.

I will be myself. I will work to overcome the anxiety, fear, and shame that shackle me. I acknowledge the heredity and upbringing that contributed to these issues in the past, and take responsibility for handling them in the present time. 

I will not fraternize with people who do me harm, physically or emotionally.  I will not subject my children to such people. I will continue to build a community of reciprocal relationships with friends and family members who play actively positive roles in our lives and who show a willingness to work constructively together in times of interpersonal struggle. 

I will not allow any person to bully and intimidate my family via threats of legal action. 

I will be a compassionate witness for others who need to share their stories and come out of secrecy, whether it is about abuse or any other personal trial. I will express my gratitude to the friends who share their struggles with me in order to let me know that I am not alone.

I will work hard to be a truly loving parent who understands who her children are as people, who will respect their rights, who rejects control-based parenting advice with its negative views of the nature of children.  I will listen to my children's concerns. I will acknowledge my mistakes and apologize genuinely to them. I will not shame them or withdraw love from them when who they are is at odds with who I am. I will not use my size, experience, or age to oppress them. I will exercise patience, self-restraint, compassion.

I will expect my husband to confront me and support my children when I harm them. I will support them when they believe that he has done something unfair, or when I witness him doing something hurtful. We will work as a family to encourage an atmosphere of respect for all members, regardless of age. 

I understand that my children may choose their own paths.  I will work to be open to their criticism and understanding if, despite my intents in this time, I fail to play a sufficiently positive role in their lives. I will accept whatever relationship they wish to have with me in the future. I do not own their bodies or their minds, now or ever. 

We are each the captains of our own souls. I greet those who sail with me in this time, even as I bid farewell and smooth sailing to those with whom I can no longer travel.

what is unconditional love, anyway?

I've been criticized recently by a blog reader who, although invited to read this site and a password-protected family log years ago, initially chose not to read, declaring a lack of interest in blogs in general.  Pictures of grandchildren and other family goings-on remained of little interest; she remained a nonreader until a few months ago, when she was informed that she was being "trashed" here by me. This reader checks in almost daily but does not spend significant time actually reading entries or commenting unless she perceives the entry as a direct attack on herself. Her sister (the informant) does the same. Regardless of the actual content, this reader has chosen to perceive the entire blog as a condemnation of herself.

Very few of the entries here even allude to her, and none of them mention her by name or describe her personal information and experiences. Some of those to which she has taken the most offense have nothing whatsoever to do with her.

This entry is different. This one is explicitly about her. And more specifically, about the comment on this post that my blog spam filter caught 3 days ago: 

Mom said:

I'll give you an example of unconditional parenting and unconditional love: It is loving your child, no matter what she says about and does to you. It is trying to address issues and speak with her, even offer to go to therapy with her, instead of treating her with the silence and contempt she accords you while at the same time bashing you publicly in a blog. It is never giving up hoping for reconciliation even after she refuses to answer your letters and phone calls and denies you access to her children. It is trying to forgive her when she treats her loving father with the same silence and neglect. It is understanding that you are not perfect, and neither is she. It is wishing her success in her attempts to perfect parenting. It is hoping she grows in tolerance for those whose opinions differ from her own. Even the Continental Congress sent letters to King George and tried to reconcile with England. While very cleverly done, the song is flawed: It is NEVER to late to apologize. I love you unconditionally.

So, is it enough to tell somebody that you love them unconditionally, if your actions across decades don't back up your words?  Keep in mind the quote from Kohn included in that entry:

How we feel about our kids isn't as important as how they experience those feelings and how they regard the way we treat them.

What is unconditional love, anyway? The Changing Minds site is a resource describing the myriad ways in which humans interact in order to change each other (which would, in itself, be a goal-oriented and therefore conditional act). They describe unconditional love thusly:

Love everyone and everything, without attaching strings and without judging them.

Have personal regard and respect for the people you meet. Treat them as equals and not inferior or superior in any way.

Work on the principle that everyone is, at heart, good. Assume that although they may do questionable things, the person underneath is fundamentally pure.

If you love someone unconditionally, then you cannot judge or blame them or find them bad...

...Unconditional love means love without condition. It means giving love without expecting anything in return, including any reciprocal love.

You know, I can't tell you how another person feels inside, but I can tell you what I experience in my interacions with that person. I can tell you whether I feel loved. And I don't feel loved by the person who posted this comment, and haven't since early childhood. For that person to make this a matter of my own personal flaws and failings rather than owning and discussing her own role in it is not consistent with unconditional love. Insisting that I pursue the course of action that feels right to her rather than the one that feels healthy to me is not unconditional, either. 

Now, regarding public bashing: talking about my feelings is not bashing. Nor is discussing my parenting goals. Owning and talking about my own truth is my prerogative. Part of my truth is that I have noticed that public comments such as this one generally contain more loving and accepting language than private conversations or written communication sent directly to me. In those types of conversations, I have been called delusional, hard-hearted, a poor communicator, and avoidant.  I've been informed that her friends, when polled (kindof the older generation's version of blogging, no?), believe that she's entitled to disrespect her children's boundaries. I've been threatened with the "I hope your children do this to you someday" line, a classic conditional-parent move. I've been threatened with a lawsuit because physical access to my children is apparently more important to her than the effects of legal action on their family. These are all my personal experiences and mine to share.

If you don't want somebody to talk about how you abuse them, try not abusing them.

Furthermore, owning and talking about it is important to my own healing and to being able to share ideas with other people. Without talking about experiences, how can we change a world in which an author who writes stuff like this is still a best-seller?

"...Mom or Dad should have some means of making their youngster want to cooperate...I will suggest one: it is a muscle lying snugly against the base of the neck...when firmly squeezed, it sends little messengers to the brain saying "This hurts: avoid recurrence at all costs." The pain is only temporary; it can cause no damage. But it is an amazingly effective and practical recourse for parents when their youngster ignores a direct command to move."

Let me tell you, that maneuver hurts and you shut up and get in line right quick. Meet James Dobson, y'all, quoted from my mother's parenting go-to, Dare to Discipline. When friends and family members felt frustrated with their kids, she recommended it or its companion, The Strong-Willed Child. I read DTD about five years ago to see what exactly it contained and was so saddened that anybody would take parenting advice from a man who has such a low opinion of children, so little compassion for them, and so little understanding of their development. This is the same guy who recommends that parents spank with a "neutral object" like a switch or paddle, a recommendation that should stop a compassionate parent in their tracks. When you hit somebody with something, it's no longer a "neutral object." It's a weapon. These physical assaults on small children (including spanking, slapping, pinching, the Vulcan neck pinch up there, soap in the mouth, etc.) serve to control a child through physical discomfort and to instill fear of the parent in the child. Once this fear is established, the parent can continue to control the child by playing on that fear via verbal/emotional assault. I don't care how unconditionally the parent thinks they love their child, this is very conditional. And that child probably does not feel very loved or valued for who they are.

The woman who wrote the comment quoted above recommended multiple times that I punish a two-year-old child who was overwhelmed at various family events. She invaded my privacy as a child, as a teen, and now stalks me publicly. She submits "requests" which are really demands and tantrums if the requests are denied, then writes me letters telling me what a bad, bad person I am. She harasses my husband by phone because we're not conducting a relationship with her and my father in the way that they want us to. 

I know she feels loving. But her kind of love doesn't feel like love to this recipient.

Acceptance? Yes, I accept that this person has good and bad aspects. That doesn't mean I have to like the bad ones or subject myself or my family to them. Avoidance? Seems pretty healthy and natural to avoid somebody who does these things. I'm not angry or contemptuous about it, it just is the way it is. And since it is the way it is, I'm going to talk about it.

Maybe if my mother had talked out loud about her experiences and feelings in public, she would have gotten some better advice than that which Dobson had to offer.

And if it's really never too late to apologize, why not offer one? Here's a handy-dandy guide. Works a lot better than throwing around accusations, interrupting a family's peace, or stalking somebody's blog. 

 

claus-ing a commotion

"So, Reese, what is Santa going to bring you?" asks the boys' hairstylist, two and a half boys through our visit to her salon and struggling for small talk.  Reese is silent.  I shift in my seat, lean forward to explain the pause in conversation...but then, decide to wait. 

The stylist clips around one ear, swivels the chair around, continues around his other ear.  Reese is now facing me and I can see his eyes in his slightly-lowered face.  His brows are drawn in thought.  He casts a sideways look.

"Um, Kim?  Santa isn't real.  He's just a guy in a costume."

Again, I wait for the reaction.  Kim widens her eyes, chuckles briefly in surprise, but doesn't know what to make of what Reese has just said, and lapses back into silence.  

Relieved that at least his proclamation wasn't made in the presence of anybody his own age, I quoted him on Facebook...and was almost immediately informed that actually, he has spread the truthy word to his own age group.  In a mall play area.  At the top of his lungs.  And oh yeah, his brother broke the news to a younger friend last year.  Fortunately for my friendship with her parents, she didn't buy it.  

Well, shit.  This is the stuff people raise their eyebrows and ask about when they find out that your family doesn't "do" Santa.  What will you do when your kid almost inevitably spills the beans to some other kid?  After all, as a non-believer he is a minority in a vast, Christmas-celebratin', Santa-believin' world. And since he's a minority, most people are going to assume that he celebrates Christmas (which we do) and believes in Santa (which we don't), thereby ensuring that at some point (or two or three or ten) he is going to be stuck in a sticky situation, having to respond to a statement or query that slams together his own world view with his somewhat-less-than-fully-developed social skills.   

Fortunately for me, so far there hasn't been any major fallout from Reese and Griffin's Clausian indiscretions.  These exchanges carry the potential of getting hairy for both kids and parents, though, as in the case of a friend of mine who also has a no-nonsense son named Reese.  Last year, her Reese informed a neighborhood friend about Santa's non-existence.  From his point of view, he was providing information that he believed to be accurate to a friend who had just said something apparently inaccurate. This is typical, even healthy, for early elementary kids. They're learning about fact and fiction, about how to navigate the social intricacies of correcting people who are mistaken.  The problem is, when you correct a friend about Santa, the friend can end up confused and distressed, and his parent can end up frustrated and angry - angry at the child who spilled the beans, and angry at the parent who raised him.  In this case, the other child's parent requested that the boys be kept apart for a month, until Christmas had passed.  Ouch.  

How do we avoid these situations?  Some of what my family does:

• celebrate our own annual traditions and talk about how they developed
• read about world religions, seasons, holidays, and traditions
• talk about what traditions our friends celebrate
• encourage compassionate ways of handling conflict/disagreement
• discuss why friends might believe the things they do, and why we believe the things we do
• consider how sensitive words like "lie," "game", and "pretend" can be to our friends who incorporate Santa in their holiday traditions
• make time to discuss sticky situations that arise
• think about ways to be true to ourselves without hurting other people's feelings

Of course, proactive parenting and tolerance training can only go so far.  As one friend put it, once a child has information, the adult no longer controls that information.  I can share my perspective with a child and try to hand him some tools, but ultimately, he has social skills and an understanding of the world that are filtered through his own cognitive abilities.  Even assuming we could "perfectly" parent a five-year-old, he's still five.  A five-year-old is a stickler for accuracy. If his friend says the sky is green, he's probably going to inform him it's blue.  If somebody misidentifies a dinosaur, you can bet he'll be quick to provide the correct name. And when that friend says that only kids who believe in Santa get presents, he's going to tell him that Santa isn't real.  It's his truth. 

Even once a kid gets old enough to understand that it's probably not a good idea to correct his friends that way, he's still going to be mulling this stuff over. Griff came to me this evening and asked, "why do some parents lie to their kids about Santa?"  Now, I know and you know that many parents do not consider Santa to be a lie, or they consider it a white lie, and this whole truth-or-lie topic is not at all what I want to get into here.  If you want to dig into that topic, read and comment on last year's post.  For the purposes of this post, consider this: many second-graders believe that a man who lives at the North Pole flies around the world in a sleigh and makes gift deliveries at their house and the homes of other children.  They don't believe this in a metaphorical, spirit-of-giving way.  They believe it in a very straightforward way.  And Griff knows that the gifts that appear (wonderously! overnight! how does it work?) under our tree were purchased or made by his family members. So to his almost-eight-year-old mind, telling a kid that Santa put it there - or setting things up so that a kid will form that conclusion on his or her own - is a lie.  And he doesn't understand why a family might do that.

So I gave him some context.  Those parents?  They probably believed in Santa when they were kids.  And they enjoyed it, and eventually figured out what was going on, and still loved the tradition, and when they had kids they wanted to give them just the same kind of feelings and memories.  And adults sometimes feel like childhood is full of more imagination and wonder and mystery than adulthood is, and they want to enhance that, and watch their kids experience that kind of trusting belief.  

He asked me: did my family do that?  I explained that no, my mom had a traumatic Santa experience, so she didn't continue that tradition, and because of that, my happy childhood Christmas memories aren't combined with Santa. Dan's family does have lots of great stories about the "evidence" left by Santa and when I met him, there were still gifts "from Santa" under their tree, but when our children were born, he decided that all those good feelings didn't rely specifically upon Santa, but upon the inherent joy of families sharing happy times and traditions together.  So we chose not to do it.  I asked Griff and Reese if they wished we did.  They both said no.  And if my experience is any indication, they mean it, and they won't ever feel "deprived" as so many people assume (yes, people say this to me!).  

I think the childhood-memories piece is, perhaps, the key to bridging the gap between Santa and non-Santa families.  We're each pursuing our own vision of a comfy, cozy, magical, wonderful, inspirational time.  Our ideas of how to do that hinge upon our own childhood experiences.  Most of us cherish the intangible "Holiday Spirit" of love and giving.  Some of us call it Santa. Some of us don't.  If we understand this, can it take some - maybe even most - of the angst out of five-year-old confrontations over Saint Nick?

I've told you some of what my family does, and I'd also like to share my hopes for how all adults would approach these issues, especially during this time of year:

• discuss the many things people believe and the ways they worship/celebrate
• assume that people you meet probably don't do things the way you do - they may celebrate a different holiday or no holiday at all.  They may include the same traditions as you or different ones.  
• think of small talk topics that don't center around Santa (I cannot tell you how many grocery store clerks ask my kids about Santa every year - and every time I wonder if it will be the time the kids loudly spoil the Santa Secret for every other kid in the store).
• talk about why your family chose your traditions, and also about why other families might have chosen their traditions.  
• please don't teach children that only good kids get presents, or only kids who believe...it's just not true
• please don't assume that children who don't celebrate the same way yours do are deprived or that their parents are devoid of imagination and a sense of whimsy (yes, people assume this about me, and it sucks).
• please do realize that there are many ways of having "magic" in a holiday, that Santa is just one of those ways, and that there's no way to compare the amount of magic in one family versus another.

Do you have any proactive tips for Santa-lovin' or Santa-leavin' families?  How about advice for both kinds of families for those awkward moments when all the thoughtful, proactive parenting in the world goes out the window and a kid lets the cat out of the bag? Does each kind of family owe compassion to the other? How can they extend that compassion during a tricky moment?  

(And to parents of children who may have been at Short Pump Mall one afternoon two weeks ago...I'm really sorry if my dreamy, whimsical, but no-nonsense kid put a wrinkle in your holiday season, and hope it was only a very small blip in an otherwise joyful time.)

chipping away

Boycotts are on my mind.  The political / homophobic issues surrounding Target started it, and it was continued by a new wave of talk about Nestlé due to their support of BlogHer '10, which fell right at the end of World Breastfeeding Week. Along with discussion of the ways these companies negatively impact the world around them and choices consumers might make came statements in defense of Target and Nestlé, allegations of astroturfing, cynical remarks about the nature of corporations and the powerlessness of consumers, complaints about lack of choice/alternatives, and negative assumptions about boycotters themselves.

It worries me that we feel this powerless.  It bothers me that we're jaded enough to say "meh, so another company did something I don't like.  None of them are perfect.  What's the point of changing what I do?" It worries me that many people say they don't care what a corporation does, or that even when they do care, they don't feel like they can be agents of change, or they don't think they have other options.

To be sure, there really are places in the United States where a Wal-Mart is it, as far as shopping for any sort of supplies goes.  There really and truly is no other brick-and-mortar source in town.  Driving long distances costs time and money.  Ordering online requires a computer, a credit card, and a decent delivery system, among other things.  Boycotting would probably not make sense under those circumstances.  For some of us, a boycott is simply inconvenient.  For others, it's prohibitively difficult.  If you seriously cannot avoid purchasing a specific item because it's necessary to your life and there is no substitute, don't join a boycott against it.  If you cannot avoid a specific store because there are seriously no other viable options for you, no reasonable person could ask you to participate in a full boycott. 

But for the rest of us: we do have choices.  Far more than we usually admit.  We like to say "I can't" or "it's too difficult" or "but I have to..."  but what we really mean is "I don't want to do it because it's inconvenient."  And you know? I get that.  I'm human, I like convenience, I opt for convenience more frequently than I'd like to admit.  BUT I also get that I'm making a choice, nobody is forcing me to make that choice, and if I don't like what happens in the world because of my choice and the choices of others, I have the option to make a different choice.

Making a change is uncomfortable, and our discomfort can make us get tied up in lots of "yes, but..." kinds of thoughts that excuse us from changing our behavior, thoughts like:

But I'm only one person, if I stop buying their products, it's not like it really makes that much of a difference.

One of the truly great things I learned - really learned, down to my core - as a child was that I should weigh my actions with regard to whether or not it would be a good idea if everybody did what I'm doing.  Sure, picking one flower doesn't decimate the wildflowers at a state park, but if everybody did it? If everybody littered? If everybody supported a sexist and racist candidate?  Now, on the other hand, what if everybody composted? If everybody picked up one piece of trash when they take a walk? If everybody showed compassion to people who were different from them?  

Things add up.  I can't tell you how many times I have made a lifestyle choice, and after somebody noticed it, they asked me for information, and it became a topic of conversation among our friends, and they spread the idea to their friends, and so on.  Not in an evangelistic, beat-you-over-the-head way, but just in a "huh, Jess does this, what's that all about? I'll ask her" kind of way.  

A friend of mine, when she gets to feeling like what she does doesn't matter, writes 1+1+1+1+1.  Ones are small, but they add up.  You ever seen a jar of pennies that turned out to be $20 worth? People are like that, too.  We do matter as individuals, no matter how small we can seem.

You can be part of one "everybody" or another "everybody."  Which one fits your personal moral standards? 

Ugh, corporations will always be corrupt.  No corporation is going to 100% match my own beliefs.  There's no use buying another company's products because they're probably just as bad.

Knowing for sure that one particular company does something you find to be morally repugnant is different from the possibility that someday in the future you will find out something horrible about another company.  If that does happen, you can re-evaluate then. 

As for companies always being corrupt? Companies are made of people.  People like you and me.  Those people can make choices, too.  Ethical people can be heads of corporations, and maybe if we encouraged corporate ethics more, they would outnumber unethical people.

It's true that finding a perfect match for your beliefs may not happen.  That's why it's important to weigh these things as they come.  A Twitter friend was disapproving of my Target boycott because he viewed it as taking away money that could be spent on projects like Target House, which provides free accommodations to families of children receiving treatment at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee.  My feeling is that denying rights to up to 10% of the US population and treating these people like sub-humans cannot be outweighed by any amount of support to children with cancer.  Do you believe that pretty acts of charity cover up mistreatment of a segment of the population?  Maybe you do.  Maybe Target's actions don't bother you because of your own moral beliefs.  What I'm saying here is that even if no company perfectly matches your values, you can take a look at what they're doing and decide for yourself if it's ok with you.  And if you really have to make a choice between one company and another and neither is perfect (none of us are perfect and the companies we run aren't, either), you can look at them and decide which values are more important.

You're going to make choices one way or another.  You're going to prefer one store over another for some reason.  Will it be the brand of milk they carry, the distance from your house, the causes they support, the effects they have on the world?  You get to decide how to make that choice, just do it consciously! 

It's just too difficult, it's overwhelming, what would I buy if I don't buy from this store / any of this company's products?

It is overwhelming, isn't it?  I don't know how you feel when you face a decision like this, but I go from lack of awareness to full awareness and desire to act on it very quickly, and I don't want to do any half-assed approach, either.  I feel like knowing something about a company means I should refrain from buying any of its products, and that I should write letters and spread the word, etc.  That's a lot to wrap your mind around, much less to devote your time and mental energy toward. 

So: baby steps.  Pick one product, or downsize your shopping habits.  Do that until it feels totally normal and easy.  Then push yourself just one small step forward again.

Years ago, I wanted to tackle a whole bunch of "green living" projects.  I wanted to compost, to get rid of paper products, to cloth diaper, to shop more local, to join a CSA, and a host of other things I can't even remember now.  Trying to figure out how to do all of them at once stressed me out completely (I'm prone to anxiety, which doesn't make matters any easier...yay, spinny busy head!).  So I slowed myself down.  Self: you already cloth diaper.  What's next?  Cloth napkins.  Then use up the paper towels.  Then eventually have a composting project.  Etc.  It took YEARS, but today I am living a life much more in line with those values.  It's not perfect.  I sometimes slack on one thing or another and there's always one more thing I could do.  But in each moment, I did what I felt like I could do.  Making tiny adjustments meant never throwing myself into total discomfort...yet I've transformed considerably. 

I've been boycotting Nestlé for somewhere between 5-7 years, can't remember exactly.  Products that we no longer purchase that used to be commonly consumed in our house include Buitoni pasta/sauces/cheese, Carnation condensed/evaporated milks, Libby's pumpkin, Toll House chocolate chips, Baby Ruth, Bit O'Honey, Butterfinger, Nestlé Crunch, Edy's/Dreyer's ice creams & sorbets, Gobstoppers candy, Häagen-Dazs ice cream, Nerds candy, Nesquick chocolate milk mix, Nestlé hot chocolate mixes, Runts candy, Sweetarts candy, 100 Grand bars...and I'm sure there was more. 

And you know what? It started with chocolate chips.  I checked different brands, made a choice that seemed more ethical, and bought it instead.  That's all!  Every now and then I would realize that another item we like is owned by Nestlé, and I'd phase it out.  I still miss coffee-flavored Häagen-Dazs, but that's a pretty small price to pay compared to malnourished babies, undermined breastfeeding mothers, child slavery, and more.  There are other ice creams. 

What I still haven't done: written a letter.  I suck at that.  Maybe I should pledge to make that my +1 thing for the next year? 

I'd like to encourage you to be willing to be just a little more uncomfortable, even if only temporarily, for the sake of your values.  Whatever those values are.  When you hear about somebody's ethical concerns about a company, here's what I'm inviting you to do:

1. Read their link.  I don't care what the source is, read it.  

2. If you agree with what the corporation is doing, if it doesn't violate your principles in the slightest, go about your business. You're better informed because you now know that some people are concerned about this company's choices.  If somebody engages you in discussion about it, you can talk about it from an educated position. 

3. If you disagree with what the corporation is doing, if it seems unethical to you, look for more information before making a decision about how to proceed.

4. If the information seems legit, challenge yourself to do something.  Question whether you feel comfortable sending money to this company.  Think about whether you can buy less, or not buy at all.  Consider that you will probably be sinking the same amount of money into the local economy if you shop elsewhere or buy other products.  Consider sharing your thoughts with friends and with the companies themselves. 

5. Decide: what is your +1?  Choose one small thing, and do it. You can always do more later.

You matter!

If you'd like to read more about Nestlé, I recommend the excellent summary at PhD in Parenting.  For more about the issues surrounding Target's political contributions, please see the Human Rights Campaign and MoveOn.org.

word of the day 201/365: sparkle

Ok, so I did find something in the otherwise-depressing discount store.  I'm calling this my Hipster Princess hat.  It's completely ridiculous and I love it.

This week (today may be Tuesday but it feels like the weekend to me because it's the first day we've had any down time in 9 days) was long long long and exhausting.  I keep getting bogged down in despair over how completely illogical and unempathetic many people can be.  Pissed-off drive-through people who give mean gestures and glares instead of the benefit of the doubt, parents mired in fear who disrespect their children in the name of discipline, random people making mean remarks about other folks' weight or worries or mental status.  Oh, what an awful, heart-hurting week.  So I'm putting on my Hipster Princess hat and laying down my weariness, and I'm going out to find some beautiful, sparkly, hopeful things for y'all.  And then I'm going to feel refreshed and ready to go be an ambassador for compassion again, ok?  Ok.

♥ First, if you haven't seen Amy Krouse Rosenthal's "thought bubble" about kindness yet, go check it out. Then, go even farther back in time and listen to sweet little Sophia's advice.  If a kid can get it, the rest of us have no excuse, right?

♥ Listen to Nataly Dawn's sigh-worthy, goosebumpy cover of the Magnetic Fields' "The Book of Love".

♥ My friend Lynz wants to start a letter-writing project: think of somebody (she suggests somebody on your Facebook friends list) to whom you haven't spoken in a long time.  Send them something in the mail.  Anything!  It's up to you! Just connect!

♥ I discovered earlier this week that the grocery store has mini versions of those Lofthouse cookies I love so much (I know, gross, but I do).  Buy a pack and feel abundant as you share and share and share teeny sprinkled cookie goodness.

♥ Take a peek at a parenting card and get a boost to your mama (or papa) mojo.

♥ Love me a good parody.  Choose out-and-proud Alejandro-based "You're a Homo" or Old Spice send-up "Study like a scholar, scholar" or Star-Trekky "I am Beautiful."

♥ Yeah, this is more like it...a beautiful secret.

♥ Oh, do I ever love stop motion. And stop motion combined with graffiti, animation, repurposed recyclables, and evolutionary theory? awesome. Xxcept maybe not quite the uplifting tone I was going for. Hmm. Ok, one by kids. Hooray!

♥ Awww, see what happens when you work to overcome misunderstandings?

♥ Wouldn't you love to receive one of these pencils? Or to give them away?

♥ I love love love this love project.  Send in an address or start your own.  Love art more than hearts?  Nominate somebody to receive real small art.

♥ Oh! Magnets for a compassion project! Everybody hit the craft stores and DIY, ok? How fun to make repostable messages to spread around your town. 

♥ Photographers, what do you think about this 100 Possibilities project?  Nifty!

♥ I don't know how he did this, but it's cool.

♥ This is so me.  So is this. 

Ok, so happy, sparkly hat back on.  Afternoon of alone time accomplished.  Once more into the breach!

word of the day 200/365: copious

The very first post I created with the "affirmations" tag is a little watercolor sign I made for myself and that I occasionally share with somebody.  A while back I sent it to a mother expecting her 2nd child.  A few days ago I posted it on Facebook and tagged it for a friend who is feeling stretched thin.  Yesterday I needed to repeat those words: "There is enough of me.  There is enough for me."  Unfortunately, I didn't realize that I needed this mantra until I found myself fighting two two-year-olds for chips.  Yes, I poured chips in a bowl and declared them to be "only for the grown-ups," and as soon as I said it, my inner voice was going, "really? REALLY, Jess?" but at the same time another inner voice was complaining about how the kids were going to eat all the chips and I wouldn't get any at all and I just couldn't deal without having some chips and guacamole! I NEED MY CHIPS AND GUACAMOLE!

You could say that I wasn't feeling terribly abundant in that moment.

There are themes each of us has in our lives, ideas we return to over and over again, and the idea of abundance is one of mine.  Do I feel like I have enough of something (emotional or physical) to share?  How can I get to a place where sharing feels possible for me?  Several times in the past week, I've come back to this theme in conversations with friends, and one thing that is emerging in all of our lives right now is an idea of how the concepts of kindness and empathy are related to abundance.  In order to express kindness or feel empathy, one has to be feeling full of what you're offering before you can give it away.  When Patience and her kids prepare for a kindness mission, they take time first to give themselves the same kindness that they will be giving to others.  When I'm feeling particularly taxed and unable to be empathetic toward my children, I know it's time to give myself some grace and allow myself to be a grumpy human, too.

What if you get stuck in a place of feeling depleted, rather than abundant?  A poverty mindset sets in, a feeling of never having enough of anything.  Not enough space, not enough time, not enough relaxation, not enough of your material goods.    When you feel emotionally impoverished, you do not feel like you have enough of anything to share.  You feel resentful of demands placed on you.  You offer less of yourself, regardless of how much or how little you actually have.  Sometimes this is just a passing stage.  Sometimes we can be entrenched in impoverishment for a long time.  Sometimes that feeling pervades a person's whole life. 

Abundance is similar - it can be a fleeting feeling, an occasional practice, or a lifelong habit.  When you feel abundant, you feel content with who and what and where you are.  You feel free from want and able to pay attention to other people.  Because you're not scrabbling to get what's yours, you have the emotional energy to notice the needs of others and provide these loving acts: meals for friends, child care, simple gifts, a smile, a compliment, a phone call.  

During grad school, a classmate reprimanded me for "not being kind".  While I still disagree with her perception of the "unkind" incident, part of what she was telling me was that social niceties - "being kind" - are important.  While I was not being actively rude, I was not extending myself any farther than I had to.  I was performing the bare minimum of social tact.  I was not freely offering myself.  She was right: I was not kind.  Eventually I felt able to think about how infrequently I was offering more of myself than was expected - how infrequently I was being kind.  Why wasn't I inspired to give more?  Why didn't I even notice the opportunities for giving more?  I now suspect that the answer is in family culture.  Did you grow up in an atmosphere of abundance or of impoverishment?  Again, I'm not talking about material goods or financial affluence.  I'm talking about the attitudes in your family - was there a feeling of having what you needed and being able to share, or was there a sense of lack and stinginess?  I've come to realize that my own family of origin had a "poverty story" - we were not living in actual poverty, but we very much believed that most people had more things, better stuff, greater privileges than we did.  What's more, we frequently attached negative moral value to these "have-mores."  Anybody who looked like they had more than we did was "rich", and to be "rich" was to be snobbish, amoral, selfish.  At the same time, our family was not in the habit of serving others, and we were not (to my memory) surrounded by people for which kind acts were an everyday habit.  We were scrabbling to protect our own interests rather than extending ourselves to others, and, with a childhood steeped in this sense of deprivation, emotional impoverishment became habit for me.  

When we moved back to Virginia six years ago, I was coming from an extra-impoverished place - the isolation of stay-at-home motherhood without a community of other families.  It was critical to me - from a thinking-of-my-family standpoint - to put down community roots in Richmond.  I was fortunate enough to meet some women who belonged to loving communities, and because their community needs were being met, they were able to extend kindness to me and share friendship and support for my family.  In time, through that community, I met other communities, and as time went by, I was better able to define my own needs, and meet them, and then...then! Once I felt secure in these communities, I discovered that that sense of being deprived was leaving me.  And once I felt more abundant, I was able to learn from the kind people around me how to express kindness in my own way.  It's still a work in progress.  I still pitch battles over bowls of chips on bad days.  But now my family belongs to a local culture in which it's customary to bring meals to families when a new baby is born, or somebody is sick, or the family moves to a new house, or some other situation in which it might be useful to spare them the effort of having to prepare or buy a meal themselves.  I also know many people who make an effort to do kind things for both friends and strangers - small uplifting items, good deeds, sharing positive thoughts. Because these acts are happening all around us, we feel full of kindness, knowing that it will be given to us if we need it, knowing that we have enough of it to share with others.  Their good deeds serve as inspiration for our own, and our acts inspire them, and so we go on fueling our community together.  I am so glad that my children have a chance at growing up surrounded by this approach to the world.  What can it mean, to grow to adulthood within a community that knows how copious its emotional resources are and that gladly shares them?

word of the day 120/365: compassion

This is the new - and not inexpensive - abstract art that was installed in my bedroom today.  Notice the colorful stripes, the ghostly marine imagery on the left, the intersecting curves not unlike the flaking of thin plates of some crysalline substance.  Mica, perhaps.  Observe how the arcs radiate out from (and draw your eye toward) a single, dark point. 

There is, in fact, crystal involved, and the dark point is where a toddler forced the pointed end of a whelk shell through a layer of glass into an LCD display.  Namely, the LCD display of my laptop, rendering an otherwise completely functional computer absolutely useless. 

I was oddly calm when my attention was called to the damage, which happened while the toddler and an older brother were watching a video.  Feeling compassion for the kids? No problem.

Feeling compassion for myself? Somewhat harder.  What kind of idiot allows two children under the age of five to use a laptop without sitting right on top of them? 

In all honesty, though, even if I'd been sitting right there, I might not have known he had the shell.  Even if I'd seen the shell, I never would have expected him to put it through the screen.  And experience had shown me that nothing bad happens when the kids use the laptop for Netflix or PBS games.  Two-and-a-half years and this is the first damage done.

So I'm chalking this up to experience and giving myself some grace.  I haven't figured out yet how (or when) to fix the computer, nor have I worked out a timely way to get the information I need off of it.  Like, um, a million years' worth of unanswered email that I was going to sift through this weekend.  Yeah, I hadn't switched to web-based mail yet.  Back to what kind of idiot...  

And you know? It's rather pretty.  Hard to be mad at yourself or your kids when you discover something so beautiful. 

word of the day 60/365: big

Y'all...I HAD FRICKIN' CHANNEL 12 NEWS IN MY HOUSE TODAY.

That's my friend Sarah in the photo above, giving an interview to the reporter who came to talk to us and film some picket sign-making.  The media is all over this - I went to Channel 8 earlier this afternoon, Sarah and Patience have given other interviews.  It's crazy.  Amid all this we were scrabbling to meet work demands and figure out child care for each other and trying to get our heads around what we need to do tomorrow while WBC is here in town and still find time for a last-minute social media blitz for Pennies in Protest.  Which, by the way, has an official domain now. For real. www.penniesinprotest.com.   The better to link you, my dear.

This thing - the small way of helping out that we dreamed up last Thursday - is exploding. It is SO amazing. Tonight we have topped $7K, which may not sound like much to some big-time fundraisers, but we're talking about four moms who just wanted to show our support for organizations being targeted by a bully. We didn't think that anybody should stand by while one group of people is being horrid and disrespectful to another group, we wanted to stand by the Holocaust Museum, the Jerusalem Connection, the JCC and Hillel, and Hermitage High and their Gay/Straight Alliance. We wanted to let those groups know that the vast, vast majority of people in the world respect them, support them, and want good things for them.  We wanted to show the rest of the world, in our own small way, that compassion and nonviolence (in word and in deed) are desirable, viable things.

While the WBC visits tomorrow are nothing to look forward to, what I DO look forward to is meeting some of the many, many people who have been working hard this past few days to find their own ways of fighting ignorance and hatred and bringing more light into this world.  The empowerment I have seen and heard people express, the sense of ownership people have for standing up for what they believe in, is incredible.  These are humans at their finest.  RVA and all of our friends everywhere, you are powerful! You are loving, you are strong, and you will change the world.

Griff has decided to join me at the VCU rally tomorrow - I will pick him up early from school so that he can participate (exercising freedoms and standing up for what's right is much more important than the 2nd half of the school day, with all due respect to his fabulous 1st-grade teacher).  He helped me decorate the Pennies in Protest jar we're bringing to the Holocaust Museum tomorrow, and he thought that it was both literally and figuratively BIG.  I agree, kiddo.

word of the day 43/365: perseverance

i dare you, originally uploaded by theloushe.

Reese has a temperament of iron. He is unbendable, unbribable, unforceable. He cannot be reasoned, threatened, cajoled, or pleaded into doing anything he does not wish to do. If he thinks you are even faintly suggesting a course of action that isn't his idea to start with, he hunkers down, sinks his claws into the ground, and his face hardens into an expression that can best be interpreted as I dare you to even try to shake my resolve. Yesterday was one of the days (much more rare now at age 4.5, thank goodness) when he decides that asking politely for something is absolutely anathema to him.  You would think that uttering the word "please" or simply using a nice tone of voice would kill him.  He digs in, refuses to yield.  He would rather go without the thing he desires so strongly than give in and ask without screaming.  It's wild and somewhat baffling.

My mother's parenting Bible was James Dobson's Dare to Discipline and she has been known to hand out copies of The Strong-Willed Child to parents whom she considered to be in need of guidance. As a young adult, I embraced the message these books promote: that parents must be in control no matter what the cost to the child, and that children are tyrannical creatures who must be forcibly shaped into obedient, subservient ways. I believed that parents who prefer "gentle discipline" were permissive and lax (read: bad parents). I scoffed at the section of my developmental psychology text that presented the evidence against spanking. Hey, I was spanked and I turned out ok. Right?

After birthing my own child, I still pictured myself parenting a la Dobson, but as I got to know this baby and watch his development, the rest of my developmental psychology came back. I also belonged to parent communities that presented me with all kinds of new (to me) ideas. Some seemed radical and I dismissed them. Others, like the ideas in How to Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk, appealed to my sense of reason and all that I knew of child development. The big picture came together: these are people we're raising. How do we raise people who are socially responsible and emotionally healthy? Can we provide guidance in a respectful way?

To be fair, I picked up Dare to Discipline and read it. It was a painful experience. It explained much about my childhood (the section on the neck pinch was especially hard to read). I felt saddened that there are parents who are vulnerable to its harmful messages. I also noticed that while reading it, it was hard to resist the view of children presented in it: children are the enemy and parents must subdue them. Flexibility is a sin. While reading it, I was more short-tempered with my own child, less loving. It was easy to overlook the blatant misinterpretation of psychological principles and embrace the shame-and-blame style. Oh, it was poison. It was hate language. I shredded it.

I am "that parent" who is so reviled by Dobon and his followers: call me permissive or lax if you wish. I consider it proactive, respectful, collaborative. I am still the parent, the guide, the teacher, but I can fill those roles without bludgeoning my children emotionally or physically.  Discipline is not synonymous with punishment; discipline is about teaching.

But oh, it is so, SO hard, especially when you have a child like this one. He taps into the violence in me, my innate need for control. Raised by a spanker with a need for control, I struggle with physical punishment and desire for control, myself. I have spanked (I have even had seasons of spanking). It was not the right choice. I am committed to an ever-more-nonviolent path of parenting. One thing that helps strengthen my resolve is the knowledge that violent parenting is not only harmful to the child, but makes it much harder for that child to be a gentle and loving parent, themselves. I can break the cycle. I can end it here.

(Aside: I loathe the attitude among some proponents of gentle discipline that parents who spank are bad people. If you are fortunate enough to have a temperament or life experiences that do not make you susceptible to anger, count your blessings and realize that you don't spank not only through determination, but also because you have not been in that dark place. Hate the sin, have compassion for the sinner.)

That which does not kill me - or lead me to flay my children - will make me stronger. And what makes Reese a "strong-willed" or "stubborn" child will serve him well in life. I worry much less about him and peer pressure than I do about eager-to-please Griff. Reese is a nonconformist, for better or for worse. And I will survive parenting him. We will both persevere and we will both be better people for it.

Griffin reminded me yesterday of the (new-school) Electric Company song about perseverance. I can't link directly to it but if you go here you can scroll through the clips until you find a music clip titled "Persevere 'till you find your way." It's pretty far down the list.  Thanks for the inspo, Griff!

Here's a list of resources that I have found helpful over the years and a few I want to read as well, listed from what I found easiest to swallow in my less-gentle days to those that I used to consider "out-there" but now find to be useful sources of inspiration. 

♥ The Baby Book (William Sears)
♥ The No-Cry Sleep Solution (Elizabeth Pantley)
♥ The Discipline Book (Martha & William Sears)
♥ How To Talk So Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids Will Talk (Adele Faber & Elaine Mazlish)
♥ The Daily Groove (daily parenting inspiration via email)
♥ NonViolent Communication (Marshall Rosenberg)
♥ Hand in Hand Parenting (articles from multiple sources, site owned by Patty Wipfler)
♥ The Natural Child Project (articles from multiple authors, maintained by Jan Hunt)
♥ Playful Parenting (Lawrence Cohen)
♥ Raising Freethinkers (Dale McGowan)
♥ Raising Your Spirited Child (Mary Sheedy Kurcinka)
♥ Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves (Naomi Aldort)
♥ Unconditional Parenting (Alfie Kohn)
♥ Punished By Rewards (Alfie Kohn)
♥ Mothering.com (magazine and discussion boards, truly changed my life)