There are good days, and there are bad days.
If one were to survey the breadth of my writing since I truly began pouring my heart out at age 12, anyone would likely conclude that most of these days, for me, are bad. And perhaps for ages 12-18 and 20-22, they would be correct about that. But these days, my writing is a small glimpse of me.
"For a therapist, you really don't talk about your feelings very much," commented a lover. "You're always there to listen to everyone else's problems but you don't talk about yourself."
I thought for a moment and realized she was right. Few people in my life evoke my genuine "opening up." Even within romantic partnerships- when the sharing stops, when the "I can share anything with you" feeling dissipates and both parties stop listening... it's always a signal that the end of the relationship is, at least emotionally, drawing near.
I thought about why I "don't talk."
"It's because I write," I answered. The two things are far from mutually exclusive, of course, but my feelings are typically expressed through art and words on paper (or in ether). I've always felt far more eloquent on paper... and far less judged. It's always been very difficult for me to imagine that anyone wants to hear my thoughts.
Today as I sat alone in my office, door closed, I took an inventory.
My shoulders, feeling weak, sore and strained as though "a house on my shoulders"- as one of my Spanish-speaking inmates would say later that day.
My neck stiffens, and cannot turn all the way to the right without a sharp pain shooting into my shoulder.
The deep ache in my chest, the one that makes me feel ill.
The feeling reminds me of when I was 14... after being very physically ill for a very long time, my mother took me to a "reflexologist" out of desperation. I had seen every doctor the Valley had available (which took no time at all), had every test... all were flummoxed. My crippling anxiety was, quite literally, killing me. Continuous vomiting eroded away my esophagus, my teeth; I couldn't eat or get above 91 lbs. The reflexologist (or "witch doctor" as we jokingly called her) called upon her bizarre methods, that seemed more like parlor tricks than any sort of science, and told me that I was out of alignment. She stated that my spine was putting pressure on my heart in such a way that blood was pooling in my heart, and in my stomach. When I feel this ache in my chest, I imagine blood pooling in my heart. It thumps loudly. It feels sluggish, as though a tranquilizer dart has pierced my sternum. It hurts.
I fight off thoughts that I can't help obsess about, and ache more. I certainly allow myself time and means to delve into the pain, diving deep down until the clear teal water turns to persistent but non-malevolent black where no light is able to penetrate. To much time, perhaps. Perhaps I revel in it too much. Writing too many sad things, listening to too many sad songs, drawing too many sad pictures. I turn it over and over and over and over again in my head, thinking that surely - as with everything else - I can think my way out of it. I can use my intelligence to solve any problem. This just requires some problem solving! Surely there is a simple solution to fix this heartache...
But there's not. There's no pill. There's no drink. No procedure. Or ritual. Or exercise. No sweet treat. Or letter. Or phone call. Or escape. Or words.
No matter how many times I think about it... no matter how desperately I turn it over and over and over again in my mind, wearing it smooth like a gem in a tumbler... there's just no fixing it.
It just is.
This pain sits rooted in my chest, nestled into the hollow cocoon-like muscle with barbs securely embedded in the tough flesh. Right now, this heartbreak just sits.
And it will sit. Until it's quite ready to depart.
And until this I write. And I cry. And I draw. And I cry. And I think about how very far I've come and how different my existence is now. And I use that as fuel... to remind me that things will change. Continue to change.
Far, far more often then ever do I feel unabashed joy. My heart swells and beats out steel drum rhythms and sings to me. It feels as though it might explode. The tears come, but this time with joy. It comes more frequently. It lasts longer. These are the moments I desperately wish to share with another.
And, as I thought today, sometimes it's hard to be alive. I brace myself against the emotion as it hits me like a wave, washing away the very ground I stand on. My brains reels and yammers in colors and sheets of typewritten paper and stomach acid. Yelping and growling and spitting and spinning.
"What do you have to do to make her/him/them love/respect/want you??" it wails desperately
"Why her and not you?" it scowls
"Why isn't/aren't this/you enough?" it demands
"What are you doing wrong?" it chastens
"Why are you still feeling this way?" it judges
"Why can't you fix this?" it barks
Shhhhh h h h h . . . . I say
Shhhh Shh Shh.
You aren't helping.
I stroke the pain as though it's a scared feral dog and speak softly to it.
Time puts all things as they should be. And you can survive anything.
Anything but death, which will be the easiest thing you'll ever do.
But while you are alive, you will be surviving. Inevitably, without choice, you will survive.
Cry when you need to. Speak when you need to. Try to understand that you cannot always understand. Forgive yourself for emotions that you cannot, should not, and will not ever strangle from yourself.
Forgive yourself.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Monday, July 4, 2011
Saturday, July 2, 2011
the person that I want to be
I have always been adept at procrastination, but these past weeks I have sharpened my skills to a near surgical precision.
Recent heady conversations with dear friends have provided ample fodder for thinking, for musing, for pensive "brooding." In addition, I have been considering the song below. Who I was, who I want to be, who I once wanted to be, who I am now.
My desire to know myself, to truly know myself, is indomitable.
Recent interpersonal situations at work have cast light on parts of me that I continue to hope are not there. I have seen them, they are unnervingly strong and cantankerous, but I continue to hope that with more ignoring they will go away.
I desire to be the sort of person with no penchant for cruelty. Someone who does not delight in aligning with others to bitch endlessly and "talk shit"... As I stop to consider it, that is a rather apt term.
I consider my next tattoo: "primum non nocere" down my forearm, and a part of me fears that I will be unable to live up to this charge I give myself to "do no harm."
Of course I will be unable to. I am human. And humans, scampering mindlessly about in their daily lives, injure one another both unwittingly and with great purpose every day. A complete Gandhi-Mother Theresa-Buddhaesque desire for nonviolence and gentility would not prevent me from injuring my fellow man. Injury can occur through ignorance, through unrequited love, even self-preservation.
Instead, the tattoo would serve as all the rest do: a quiet reminder. A reminder to do my best - extend my arm in civility and love whenever possible - to sit in inaction when the desire to proclaim myself "better than" washes over me - to stay quiet when the desire to engage in that delicious, vicious cattiness arises - and, most of all, attempt to never pass up the opportunity to help another.
It will serve as a reminder as all my tattoos do -
As my foot tells me that there is no avoiding my pain or my past, and that the best way of managing it is to lock eyes with it and continue pushing through.
As my chest tells me that good comes from every evil, and that love and growth occur with every injury. That sometimes our very best parts are also our most wounded.
As my arm tells me that death is not to be feared with every dear moment so full of life. Living in the Great Integrity means "she never fears the tiger because there seems to be no place to sink his claws."
As my back reminds me that my heart belongs to one, and that my love for her - whoever, wherever she may be - never stops burning.
When I die my body will be littered with languages, important reminders deserving a more permanent etching than the notes I used to scrawl across my hands in high school.
In considering the song below I challenged myself to think of myself five years ago and remember the expectations that I had of this day.
Five years ago I was a member of a college cohort that I loved dearly... but that never quite seemed to fit me as well as it did the others. The "popular kids." I drifted further away as they prepared for graduation and I prepared for a final year of delayed practicum. I hoped that we would keep in touch. (we did not)
I was in a relationship with a battle-torn woman who cut herself bloody and blacked out her windows. In retrospect, I was in this relationship to prevent her final self-destruction. Alas our relationship ended in the coming months and she did not self-destruct... though it remains touch-and-go to this day.
Five years ago I did not know where my career would take me, nor did I have any ideas. I was broke, digging a cavernous hole of debt, and finding purpose only in caring for others and ignoring myself. My aggravation with life and my partnership showed me these same aforementioned parts of myself- the parts that are cruelly sarcastic and cannot control anger. The parts I first unleashed on my mother after the years of abuse finally stopped. I had gone a year without being hospitalized but there were times I still missed having a gun.
Where did that girl imagine she would be in five years?
Fuck if I know.
Where is she?
She is in a quiet, cool room with the thick curtains drawn for an uncharacteristic moment... feet under the covers and next to a gigantic, long-haired black dog whose features can't be differentiated when she curls into a 110 lb. ball.
This girl knows years more about love and forgiveness and friendship and God. She cries more, plays video games less and loves life so much, much more. She has made her peace with God and is so grateful for the loves and loves lost of the past half-decade. She still doubts herself, but hate is no longer turned inward with nearly the frequency or ferocity with which it once was. I find myself questioning whether this hate is present at all, though I dare not make such a bold statement.
This girl, who is a woman, who still feels odd when referring to herself as such... this girl often finds herself confused and questioning, sad. Lonely. Just as alone as ever in numbers, but feeling far less so than in years prior. Still searching for a soul-mate to lock eyes with and disassemble with. Someone to revel in intensity with.
Still pushing myself to do more, still feeling... slightly... as though it's never enough. This feeling too has dissipated. I am no longer so driven to seek more. More, more, More, MORE. I am more able to see the butterfly effects of all small things. And of big things.
My work pits me against a monstrous corrupt machine in which masses of people are discarded and dehumanized. It is easy, during weeks like this one, to feel as though it's all too big. Yesterday I felt as though juggernaut is unstoppable and the quest for human decency and repair is futile. It's no wonder why I can't remember who I wanted to be five years ago. Sometimes I can't remember who I wanted to be yesterday.
Today I want to be kind.
I want to continue to be fond of myself, and I want to begin caring for myself with the same ferociousness that I feel for those I love.
I want to let my heart be the most important part of me. I want to show how big my heart is. Not for any sort of acknowledgment or accolade, but for the purpose of surveying it myself. And improving the small bit of land/space/time that we are each given upon receipt of a soul.
Side note:
During my recent ECHOcardiogram I was able to see my heart. I lay uncomfortably on my side with a pretty woman's hand grazing my left breast and watched the grainy gray valves of my beating heart flapping open and closed, open and closed, open and closed. I felt joyous and unnerved. It looked... so strange. Alien. More than that, it looked very small. My heart is actually not very big at all. Not at all like the romantic muscle responsible for my being alive, my blood flow and my every love and devotion.
(Yes of course it is not the 1500's and I do know that my every love and devotion resides in my brain... but I nonetheless I know how intensely my heart aches when my brain breaks)
The tech examined a brightly colored map of blood flow with great focus. To me it appeared to be a beautifully lit mess, blood swirling in and about in a terrible, jumbled-up frenzy.
As many times as I had thought my heart surely broken, I was mildly surprised to see it there in front of me- pumping along reliably, no nicks or cracks in sight. But small. The size of my soon-to-be-removed kidney. So small. And so fragile.
I am a girl with a normal sized heart and a normal sized brain. Ever wanting to do better, to be better. As a friend recently commented, the best thing I can accomplish might be to realize just this. That I am a extremely normal, normally flawed human. Not as an act of resignation, but as an act of forgiveness.
I know that more than likely
I will continue to fuck things up.
I will continue to get unrealistically upset with "bad" drivers.
I will continue to eat more sugar and drink more beer than I should.
I will continue to procrastinate with mindless activities, avoiding valuable ones.
I will continue to curse like a prison inmate.
But I can also
Learn from my mistakes and make good whenever possible.
Take every opportunity to meditate and improve my frustration tolerance- or at least sing along loudly with a great song.
Enjoy the sights and sounds of a walk in the way that my dog does, and find joy in healthy food that nourishes me.
Give myself time to think of nothing and relax, balancing it with distraction-free time for thinking and doing.
Speak words of love and encouragement to those in need.
There is ever room for improvement.
And there always, always will be.
It's comforting to feel that I might just be the person that I want to be.
Recent heady conversations with dear friends have provided ample fodder for thinking, for musing, for pensive "brooding." In addition, I have been considering the song below. Who I was, who I want to be, who I once wanted to be, who I am now.
My desire to know myself, to truly know myself, is indomitable.
Recent interpersonal situations at work have cast light on parts of me that I continue to hope are not there. I have seen them, they are unnervingly strong and cantankerous, but I continue to hope that with more ignoring they will go away.
I desire to be the sort of person with no penchant for cruelty. Someone who does not delight in aligning with others to bitch endlessly and "talk shit"... As I stop to consider it, that is a rather apt term.
I consider my next tattoo: "primum non nocere" down my forearm, and a part of me fears that I will be unable to live up to this charge I give myself to "do no harm."
Of course I will be unable to. I am human. And humans, scampering mindlessly about in their daily lives, injure one another both unwittingly and with great purpose every day. A complete Gandhi-Mother Theresa-Buddhaesque desire for nonviolence and gentility would not prevent me from injuring my fellow man. Injury can occur through ignorance, through unrequited love, even self-preservation.
Instead, the tattoo would serve as all the rest do: a quiet reminder. A reminder to do my best - extend my arm in civility and love whenever possible - to sit in inaction when the desire to proclaim myself "better than" washes over me - to stay quiet when the desire to engage in that delicious, vicious cattiness arises - and, most of all, attempt to never pass up the opportunity to help another.
It will serve as a reminder as all my tattoos do -
As my foot tells me that there is no avoiding my pain or my past, and that the best way of managing it is to lock eyes with it and continue pushing through.
As my chest tells me that good comes from every evil, and that love and growth occur with every injury. That sometimes our very best parts are also our most wounded.
As my arm tells me that death is not to be feared with every dear moment so full of life. Living in the Great Integrity means "she never fears the tiger because there seems to be no place to sink his claws."
As my back reminds me that my heart belongs to one, and that my love for her - whoever, wherever she may be - never stops burning.
When I die my body will be littered with languages, important reminders deserving a more permanent etching than the notes I used to scrawl across my hands in high school.
In considering the song below I challenged myself to think of myself five years ago and remember the expectations that I had of this day.
Five years ago I was a member of a college cohort that I loved dearly... but that never quite seemed to fit me as well as it did the others. The "popular kids." I drifted further away as they prepared for graduation and I prepared for a final year of delayed practicum. I hoped that we would keep in touch. (we did not)
I was in a relationship with a battle-torn woman who cut herself bloody and blacked out her windows. In retrospect, I was in this relationship to prevent her final self-destruction. Alas our relationship ended in the coming months and she did not self-destruct... though it remains touch-and-go to this day.
Five years ago I did not know where my career would take me, nor did I have any ideas. I was broke, digging a cavernous hole of debt, and finding purpose only in caring for others and ignoring myself. My aggravation with life and my partnership showed me these same aforementioned parts of myself- the parts that are cruelly sarcastic and cannot control anger. The parts I first unleashed on my mother after the years of abuse finally stopped. I had gone a year without being hospitalized but there were times I still missed having a gun.
Where did that girl imagine she would be in five years?
Fuck if I know.
Where is she?
She is in a quiet, cool room with the thick curtains drawn for an uncharacteristic moment... feet under the covers and next to a gigantic, long-haired black dog whose features can't be differentiated when she curls into a 110 lb. ball.
This girl knows years more about love and forgiveness and friendship and God. She cries more, plays video games less and loves life so much, much more. She has made her peace with God and is so grateful for the loves and loves lost of the past half-decade. She still doubts herself, but hate is no longer turned inward with nearly the frequency or ferocity with which it once was. I find myself questioning whether this hate is present at all, though I dare not make such a bold statement.
This girl, who is a woman, who still feels odd when referring to herself as such... this girl often finds herself confused and questioning, sad. Lonely. Just as alone as ever in numbers, but feeling far less so than in years prior. Still searching for a soul-mate to lock eyes with and disassemble with. Someone to revel in intensity with.
Still pushing myself to do more, still feeling... slightly... as though it's never enough. This feeling too has dissipated. I am no longer so driven to seek more. More, more, More, MORE. I am more able to see the butterfly effects of all small things. And of big things.
My work pits me against a monstrous corrupt machine in which masses of people are discarded and dehumanized. It is easy, during weeks like this one, to feel as though it's all too big. Yesterday I felt as though juggernaut is unstoppable and the quest for human decency and repair is futile. It's no wonder why I can't remember who I wanted to be five years ago. Sometimes I can't remember who I wanted to be yesterday.
Today I want to be kind.
I want to continue to be fond of myself, and I want to begin caring for myself with the same ferociousness that I feel for those I love.
I want to let my heart be the most important part of me. I want to show how big my heart is. Not for any sort of acknowledgment or accolade, but for the purpose of surveying it myself. And improving the small bit of land/space/time that we are each given upon receipt of a soul.
Side note:
During my recent ECHOcardiogram I was able to see my heart. I lay uncomfortably on my side with a pretty woman's hand grazing my left breast and watched the grainy gray valves of my beating heart flapping open and closed, open and closed, open and closed. I felt joyous and unnerved. It looked... so strange. Alien. More than that, it looked very small. My heart is actually not very big at all. Not at all like the romantic muscle responsible for my being alive, my blood flow and my every love and devotion.
(Yes of course it is not the 1500's and I do know that my every love and devotion resides in my brain... but I nonetheless I know how intensely my heart aches when my brain breaks)
The tech examined a brightly colored map of blood flow with great focus. To me it appeared to be a beautifully lit mess, blood swirling in and about in a terrible, jumbled-up frenzy.
As many times as I had thought my heart surely broken, I was mildly surprised to see it there in front of me- pumping along reliably, no nicks or cracks in sight. But small. The size of my soon-to-be-removed kidney. So small. And so fragile.
I am a girl with a normal sized heart and a normal sized brain. Ever wanting to do better, to be better. As a friend recently commented, the best thing I can accomplish might be to realize just this. That I am a extremely normal, normally flawed human. Not as an act of resignation, but as an act of forgiveness.
I know that more than likely
I will continue to fuck things up.
I will continue to get unrealistically upset with "bad" drivers.
I will continue to eat more sugar and drink more beer than I should.
I will continue to procrastinate with mindless activities, avoiding valuable ones.
I will continue to curse like a prison inmate.
But I can also
Learn from my mistakes and make good whenever possible.
Take every opportunity to meditate and improve my frustration tolerance- or at least sing along loudly with a great song.
Enjoy the sights and sounds of a walk in the way that my dog does, and find joy in healthy food that nourishes me.
Give myself time to think of nothing and relax, balancing it with distraction-free time for thinking and doing.
Speak words of love and encouragement to those in need.
There is ever room for improvement.
And there always, always will be.
It's comforting to feel that I might just be the person that I want to be.
in my mind
"In my mind
In a future five years from now
I'm a hundred and twenty pounds
And I never get hungover
Because I
Will be the picture of discipline
Never minding what state I'm in
And I will be someone I admire
And it's funny how I imagined
That I would be that person now
But it does not seem to have happened
Maybe I've just forgotten how
To see
That I'm not exactly the person that I thought I'd be.
And in my mind
In the far-away here-and-now
I've become in-control somehow
And I never lose my wallet
Because I
Will be the picture of discipline
Never fucking-up anything
And I'll be a good defensive driver
And it's funny how I imagined
That I would be that person now
But it does not seem to have happened
Maybe I've just forgotten how
To see
That I'll never be the person that I thought I'd be.
And in my mind
When I'm old I am beautiful,
Planting tulips and vegetables
Which I will mindfully watch over
Not like me now
I'm so busy with everything
That I don't look at anything
But I'm sure I'll look when I am older
And it's funny how I imagined
That I could be that person now
That that's not what I want
But that's what I wanted
That I'd be giving up somehow
How strange to see
That I don't want to be the person that I want to be.
And in my mind
I imagine so many things
Things that aren't really happening
And when they put me in the ground
I'll start pounding the lid,
Saying, "I haven't finished yet,
I still have a tattoo to get,
It says, 'I'm living in the moment'".
And it's funny how I imagined
That I could win this win-less fight
Maybe it isn't all that funny
That I've been fighting all my life
But maybe I have to think it's funny
If I want to live before I die
And maybe it's funniest of all
To think I'll die before I actually
See
That I am exactly the person that I want to be.
Fuck yes.
I am exactly the person that I want to be. "
-Amanda Palmer
In a future five years from now
I'm a hundred and twenty pounds
And I never get hungover
Because I
Will be the picture of discipline
Never minding what state I'm in
And I will be someone I admire
And it's funny how I imagined
That I would be that person now
But it does not seem to have happened
Maybe I've just forgotten how
To see
That I'm not exactly the person that I thought I'd be.
And in my mind
In the far-away here-and-now
I've become in-control somehow
And I never lose my wallet
Because I
Will be the picture of discipline
Never fucking-up anything
And I'll be a good defensive driver
And it's funny how I imagined
That I would be that person now
But it does not seem to have happened
Maybe I've just forgotten how
To see
That I'll never be the person that I thought I'd be.
And in my mind
When I'm old I am beautiful,
Planting tulips and vegetables
Which I will mindfully watch over
Not like me now
I'm so busy with everything
That I don't look at anything
But I'm sure I'll look when I am older
And it's funny how I imagined
That I could be that person now
That that's not what I want
But that's what I wanted
That I'd be giving up somehow
How strange to see
That I don't want to be the person that I want to be.
And in my mind
I imagine so many things
Things that aren't really happening
And when they put me in the ground
I'll start pounding the lid,
Saying, "I haven't finished yet,
I still have a tattoo to get,
It says, 'I'm living in the moment'".
And it's funny how I imagined
That I could win this win-less fight
Maybe it isn't all that funny
That I've been fighting all my life
But maybe I have to think it's funny
If I want to live before I die
And maybe it's funniest of all
To think I'll die before I actually
See
That I am exactly the person that I want to be.
Fuck yes.
I am exactly the person that I want to be. "
-Amanda Palmer
Saturday, June 11, 2011
violently
My thoughts are like violent waves crashing against the rocks. Imposing, overwhelming, unstoppable. They churn and make my stomach sick. It aches, it burns, I vomit while brushing my teeth. The biggness of what-I-want-to-be against the scrim of the-smallness-of-me... far too big to fit. It looms, colossal, like some toothy black monster who is far beyond being stuffed in the closet or under the bed. It all smashes in my brain. My insides shiver violently, very literally (I wonder if anyone else ever feels it), every muscle tensed and quivering. Violent. Tears sit perched on the brink. I feel the pressure in my sinuses, behind my eyes. Smashing, smashing. It smashes me. In my head I see concrete walls and crash test dummies, breaking glass and metal debris.
I want- I need - need need need everything so big and so bad. I'm so much bigger than I can contain... I can only sit quietly, stiffly, achingly, sickly, burningly, sluggishly, bones creaking, midsection expanding, stomach acid chewing away... pulled in every direction simulanteously. Only my skin keeps the bloodmusclecartilagesineworganstendonsbonesbrains from exploding in a giant pink cloud of mist. But the skin can't keep my mind inside. The violence. It is all violent. It was born that way, created that way, shaped that way, remains that way.
There are things so big, too big, too impossible... they tire me. I need to do so much that I do nothing. It sticks in my brain and can't be screamed out, can't come out in all the tears and snot and burnt vocal chords. Inhibition and sheer laziness settles on top and prevents me from trying.
If I were a cutter, blood would flow on nights like this... only to jar me back into only five senses.
I am not a cutter.
My stomach is burning. It hurts like 14. There is a ball of air stuck in my throat.
I just can't be BIG enough. It's all so big. The mountain to climb is so big and I am so small. I cannot force it to be easier. I can't even stop wanting the things I shouldn't want.
Finally... a breath. This is sobering. It provides a shot-glass worth of comfort. Perhaps that comfort comes from the labeling: of things I shouldn't want as things I shouldn't want. It feels better than labeling them as things I want, things I need, but can never have. I haven't the first clue what I need.
I want- I need - need need need everything so big and so bad. I'm so much bigger than I can contain... I can only sit quietly, stiffly, achingly, sickly, burningly, sluggishly, bones creaking, midsection expanding, stomach acid chewing away... pulled in every direction simulanteously. Only my skin keeps the bloodmusclecartilagesineworganstendonsbonesbrains from exploding in a giant pink cloud of mist. But the skin can't keep my mind inside. The violence. It is all violent. It was born that way, created that way, shaped that way, remains that way.
There are things so big, too big, too impossible... they tire me. I need to do so much that I do nothing. It sticks in my brain and can't be screamed out, can't come out in all the tears and snot and burnt vocal chords. Inhibition and sheer laziness settles on top and prevents me from trying.
If I were a cutter, blood would flow on nights like this... only to jar me back into only five senses.
I am not a cutter.
My stomach is burning. It hurts like 14. There is a ball of air stuck in my throat.
I just can't be BIG enough. It's all so big. The mountain to climb is so big and I am so small. I cannot force it to be easier. I can't even stop wanting the things I shouldn't want.
Finally... a breath. This is sobering. It provides a shot-glass worth of comfort. Perhaps that comfort comes from the labeling: of things I shouldn't want as things I shouldn't want. It feels better than labeling them as things I want, things I need, but can never have. I haven't the first clue what I need.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
the why
in the ups and downs and the heavy, dense pieces of my mind... things only make sense for scarce minutes at a time. Most often the moments come as I'm drifting off to sleep. I think of things I want to write down, but without the energy to move my arms I can only repeat them over and over... hoping I remember in the morning. I don't remember.
No matter their opinions on the subject, when I share with people that I'm about to donate an organ they all ask the same question. "Why are you doing that?"
I could write a book about (and I will) my answers to that question. But I could answer it in three words.
Because it's right.
The more people who profess carelessness, or the more people who say "but why should you care?"... the more alien I feel. I can't wrap my thoughts around it. I can't wrap my head around how we each feel that WE are the only beings that matter. How we assume ulterior motives when someone seeks to help "just because." How we cant help but ask, "what's in it for me?"
What is in it for us?
I was told by someone that it would be "too much to ask" of my organ recipient simply to pay it forward. That *I* shouldn't expect anything in repayment. (Is that what that would be??)
It boggles my mind.
I was told that I can't expect anyone to support me, help care for me through this "elective" process, because it's "not their problem." It makes my insides hurt more than any operation ever could.
Perhaps what's "in it for me" is the knowledge that there is still such a thing as altruism... should such a thing exist. I need desperately to prove to myself that there is still good in the world. That people do still care. Perhaps I need to be the change I want to see in the world. Perhaps what's in it for me is karma. Perhaps it's improving my chances that, should I ever need the help of another or a life-saving organ, the fates will shine on me. Perhaps it's just right.
Every person on this list of 111,136 (as of 9:15pm today) is a son or a daughter. Many of them are husbands or wives, fathers or mothers. And every one of them will die soon. Without help, or luck, that is. With deaths and impending deaths, the list that gets both shorter and longer every day. And for most of these men, women and children (90%), a new lease on life can be easily granted by others.
If I have two of something, but only need one... and someone else, anyone else, has none and will die without one... how could I not share my good fortune? How could I possibly look away? How could I possibly say No. You can die because of my neglect.
But it's not MY fault, you might say. Then whose is it?
We're all responsible for one another. We all depend on one another every day. We depend on farmers and ranchers to grow our food. We depend on truck drivers to bring our gasoline. We depend on law enforcement to lock away our murderers. We depend on surgeons to sew our broken pieces back together. Can we depend on each other for things that we are not paid for?
There are enough of us.
There are enough of us that truly do care for others. That have an answer to the "why do you care?" question. That would step up to protect another human being. I don't know if we could solve any problem. But I know we could nearly eradicate the suffering that we go through when our own bodies begin to fail us.
I could not bear to think of myself as someone who is not THERE when others need her. When I help someone I love, when I am there for them, there are those who say "well I didn't ask you to do that."
My response to that is, of course you didn't. You should never HAVE to. If you love someone, if you care for them, or even if you don't... they should never need to ask you for help. Help is an obligation.
Lately I have struggled to uphold this ideal. Not to fold under the pressure of an epidemic ideal: "well you don't help me, so why should I do help you?" Railing against it crumples my insides into tightly squeezed fists of doubt and anxiety. It can be so hard not to act out of pain. So hard not to turn your hurt back out into the world. Not to betray your ideals because of the betrayal of another.
It hurts to be good.
No matter their opinions on the subject, when I share with people that I'm about to donate an organ they all ask the same question. "Why are you doing that?"
I could write a book about (and I will) my answers to that question. But I could answer it in three words.
Because it's right.
The more people who profess carelessness, or the more people who say "but why should you care?"... the more alien I feel. I can't wrap my thoughts around it. I can't wrap my head around how we each feel that WE are the only beings that matter. How we assume ulterior motives when someone seeks to help "just because." How we cant help but ask, "what's in it for me?"
What is in it for us?
I was told by someone that it would be "too much to ask" of my organ recipient simply to pay it forward. That *I* shouldn't expect anything in repayment. (Is that what that would be??)
It boggles my mind.
I was told that I can't expect anyone to support me, help care for me through this "elective" process, because it's "not their problem." It makes my insides hurt more than any operation ever could.
Perhaps what's "in it for me" is the knowledge that there is still such a thing as altruism... should such a thing exist. I need desperately to prove to myself that there is still good in the world. That people do still care. Perhaps I need to be the change I want to see in the world. Perhaps what's in it for me is karma. Perhaps it's improving my chances that, should I ever need the help of another or a life-saving organ, the fates will shine on me. Perhaps it's just right.
Every person on this list of 111,136 (as of 9:15pm today) is a son or a daughter. Many of them are husbands or wives, fathers or mothers. And every one of them will die soon. Without help, or luck, that is. With deaths and impending deaths, the list that gets both shorter and longer every day. And for most of these men, women and children (90%), a new lease on life can be easily granted by others.
If I have two of something, but only need one... and someone else, anyone else, has none and will die without one... how could I not share my good fortune? How could I possibly look away? How could I possibly say No. You can die because of my neglect.
But it's not MY fault, you might say. Then whose is it?
We're all responsible for one another. We all depend on one another every day. We depend on farmers and ranchers to grow our food. We depend on truck drivers to bring our gasoline. We depend on law enforcement to lock away our murderers. We depend on surgeons to sew our broken pieces back together. Can we depend on each other for things that we are not paid for?
There are enough of us.
There are enough of us that truly do care for others. That have an answer to the "why do you care?" question. That would step up to protect another human being. I don't know if we could solve any problem. But I know we could nearly eradicate the suffering that we go through when our own bodies begin to fail us.
I could not bear to think of myself as someone who is not THERE when others need her. When I help someone I love, when I am there for them, there are those who say "well I didn't ask you to do that."
My response to that is, of course you didn't. You should never HAVE to. If you love someone, if you care for them, or even if you don't... they should never need to ask you for help. Help is an obligation.
Lately I have struggled to uphold this ideal. Not to fold under the pressure of an epidemic ideal: "well you don't help me, so why should I do help you?" Railing against it crumples my insides into tightly squeezed fists of doubt and anxiety. It can be so hard not to act out of pain. So hard not to turn your hurt back out into the world. Not to betray your ideals because of the betrayal of another.
It hurts to be good.
Saturday, May 14, 2011
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