How To Do This

Let's face it. Our hearts are in tatters. How do we handle it?

Seriously, I'm asking. I'll take any ideas. I'll work through a few here, but I'm open to suggestions.

I have this picture of us like we're crawling along the snowy ground like the soldiers at Valley Forge, clothes reduced to rags, spirits all but crushed, in danger of losing the thread. That frayed, barely there thread that connects us to...everything real and true and right and worth living and dying for.

I rarely get this melodramatic these days, but these are melodramatic days. I mean, honest to god, I woke up this morning out of a dream that I was a player in a Shakespearean masterpiece, just one of the zillions of men and women merely players.. Felt real as this chair I'm sitting on, costumes and all, iambic pentameter, the whole nine.

I'm not here to talk about the president because I'm too sick of him for words and it gets us nowhere. I'm here to talk about us, because we're all we have, and we're the ones that are going to save us. No great exalted savior rising up to take the reins and make it all go away. Just us, here on the ground.

Here's what I do, you could try this. 

I smile at people. If I'm out at CVS and someone is walking out as I'm walking in, I smile at him, at her. If you're not one to usually do this, and you try it, you might be surprised to see the look of slow delight that comes over someone's face as they smile back. Anyone can do this.

I also joke with people in check-out lines. Check-out lines can be insufferable. People get homicidal in check-out lines. Everybody hates being there. But there's always something funny to touch on. Often it's a tabloid headline. "Oh look! The Queen of England is pregnant with quintuplets!" Before you know it you have a gaggle of people giggling with you. The last time this happened, my 13-year-old daughter was with me, and when we got out to the car she told me, with a sweet grin, "Mommy, you're so cute, you have best friends wherever you go." 

This was the highest praise anyone has ever given me. And for those of you who knew my grandmother, Rosemary Foley Baker, you know where I got it from. I didn't come into the world knowing how to do that. And I haven't been good at it my whole adult life. And I'm not good at it every day. But I work at it, because of what she taught me by being who she was, by doing things like bounding off a 500 mile train trip, 4 hours late because the train had "uncoupled," with stories of a dozen new friends she knew by name. To this day I remember two of them were Tyrone and Randy and they were "real dolls."

I'm perhaps the whitest of white folks you ever will see. Maybe you are too. But I have friends, loved ones, who aren't. I bet you do too. They may fall within the confines of the groups that some psychopaths think don't have a right to be. When I see them, run into to them by surprise in town, or meet up for coffee, we hug. One of my best friends wears a head scarf, I see the wary side glances she gets, I know what some people think of her. When I see her, I hug her tight and kiss her cheek, because I love her...but don't think I don't mean to send a message. This woman is MY friend, MY sister, I dare you to fuck with her. She belongs here as much as I do, as much as you do, make no fucking mistake about it. 

One night when my husband was away I fell down the stairs getting my son a drink, just before dawn, and thought I'd broken my back. Guess what friend came flying to my house at my distress call, got me into an ambulance, made sure both my kids stayed safe and cared for, including my autistic nonverbal one...oh by the way, two out of her three kids at home are autistic too, but still, there she was, so anxious to get to me that she'd forgotten all about her scarf, just raced out the door to get to me, her friend who was in trouble. That's what real Muslims are like, in case anyone was wondering.

We live in a world where a hug, a kiss, a smile for chrissakes, can be an open act of rebellion against hatred. And that's tragic in a sense. But it's also an opportunity. She's not alone, my friend who wears hijab. She's got me, and I'm not the only one she's got.  And your guy-friends who are couples, or girl-friends who are couples, the ones married to each other, or engaged, or dating, and having the nerve to exchange loving looks and/or gestures in public, or (gasp, god forbid) hold hands, they're not alone either. They have you, and me, and legions of others. 

And the Mexican migrant workers in line with me at the bank to cash their checks. Guess what, they're not invisible ghosts-drones. If you know a little Spanish, look what happens to their faces when you compliment them on their adorable kids in your broken, insufficient Spanish, or offer a tissue to the one with the runny nose. It takes a millisecond for the shock to wear off, the shock that a white person has noticed they they're people too, and the smiles come, and the warmth comes, and they even compliment your lousy Spanish because you tried. Their English is a lot better than your Spanish, but at least you tried.

And I may be a lily white girl, but guess what. I have a disabled child. A mentally disabled child. One of the brightest lights this world will ever see, he is. Don't think I don't know what Nazis would do to him. Don't think I don't know. We all know. Do you love someone with a disability? Do you think they're safe from the insanity we saw go down in Charlottesville last Saturday? If we want them to be safe, it's up to us to keep them safe. To keep all the groups they target safe, groups that any of us could fall into, at any time. And that means coming together, as one body, and affirming the following, without exception:

We are all the same. Exactly. The. Same. The ones who act like assholes, and the ones who don't. The ones who root for your baseball team, and the ones who don't (it took a lot for me to admit that one). The ones who have hardly any melanin in their skin, and the ones who have lots. The ones who are descended from slaves, and the ones who are descended from the monsters who were the enslavers. The ones who grew into sexual feelings for people with different kinds of private parts or the same kinds of private parts. The ones who think the Messiah came already, and the ones who are still waiting, and the ones who don't give a shit. People who were born within someone's arbitrary borders, and people who were not. People who think the government should stay the hell out of their business and people who want the government all up in their grill (p.s. there's seriously no difference, at the top of the real pyramid of power they're just using us all as cannon fodder to hurl at each other, wise up.) 

Particles and/or waves, blinking in and out, mostly the space in between...that's all any of us are, and by some unfathomable miracle we get to be alive. Not just alive, conscious. Conscious!  What are the odds???? And so what do we do, notice fake differences between your wave/particles and my wave/particles and kill each other over them? Well that's pretty fucking stupid.

We can do this. I have faith that we can do this.

Keep the faith. And let's do this.

I love you.

T

Soldiering On

Anyone familiar with the Schrodinger's cat thought experiment will understand why I didn't want to sneak any looks at the election results when I woke up at 3:30 this morning. No matter how dire it looked at 10:30 p.m. when I unplugged from all electronics, as long as I kept not checking, the state of the union was either a Trump presidency or a Clinton presidency. Either/or was better than finding out it was Trump.

But sooner or later, you have to look in the box, and...yep, seriously dead cat. 

I haven't had a gut-wringing, soul-drenching cry in a while, so that was overdue. I needed to get it out of my system before the kids could wake up and see me. It's only 5:00 a.m. now, and I'm cool, so that's done.

So now what?

I'll tell you now what.

What I'm going to do...what all of us who wish things had gone differently are going to do...is this: 

We're going to do that thing that Michelle Obama told us to do. Her words weren't for nothing.

Go high.

Do I want to spend the next several months wearing a T-shirt that says "I didn't vote for him" so I can look Muslims and people of color and women and Hispanics and the LGBT community and disabled people and war veterans in the eye? Yes, I do. But that's not really an option either. Go high. That's what I can do. That's what we all can do.

I can kick ass and take names regarding all the things I have in front of me, all the things that are my job. Taking loving care of myself, my man, my babies, my home, my family, my friends...that's what I can do. The outcome of an election can't take that away from me or from you. If anything, it can galvanize me, and you. To be great. Not again, but as we've always been, whether or not we've had the wherewithal to notice.

I have the wherewithal to notice. I'm great, not again but still, and so are you.

Love you.

- T

The People Who Help

So Cal and I had to take a trip to the school health center today because he needed to have a PPD skin test. I've never had this test; when I was a kid they did this easy thing where they stuck a little whatsit with four short tines into your inner forearm, felt like nothing, then the nurse checked it in a few days to see if it looked like you had tuberculosis. Now they inject a syringe full of some serum under the skin, looks like a real treat for any kid. Anyway, in order for my boy to be admitted to the dayhab program we've been praying and praying to get him into for...however long, I could count the time in gray hairs and wrinkles I guess, but whatever...he needs to have this test. The program requires it.

And guess what, we're in the home stretch for getting Cal into this program. The biggest hurdle, the medicaid waiver you need for a developmentally disabled child to have access to vital services...we finally got that. I'd say you probably heard my shouts of Hallelujah a few weeks ago when we got that news, but I was in such a weird state of shock that I'd actually made it through the bureaucratic hell I'd been slogging through for years that I almost didn't feel anything. I sat at my dining room table staring at the piece of paper feeling a numbness that I waited to turn into relief. But that's another story that I'm not even sure how to tell yet, so on to today's thing, the PPD test. Like it or not, had to be done.

Calvin's bus came, I shuffled him quickly into the car, and drove him to the clinic for this newest episode of torture I was about to put him through. As I was driving, an assortment of vignettes flashed through my mind, kind of MTV herky jerky style.

The haircuts that have made me feel like a toddler trying to overcome a Mixed Martial Arts heavyweight champion.

The dental work where we tried to wrap him up like a papoose in the special device designed for that purpose to safely restrain him, but that he was able burst through like the Hulk...and the screams that I can still hear and the memory of crying for a half hour before I could start the car for the suffering and wild-eyed terror I'd just helped put my child through.

The blood work a few months ago that took three grown men and me to get accomplished.

The...um...constipation interventions where I've herded him into the corner of the bathroom...you don't need details, they're gross...but I'll tell you that last time we did it I almost ended up with a concussion when my head hit the sink at some point.

The experiences in parking lots lately when Cal is unsure where he is and why, and if he has anything to fear, which can send him bolting for escape like a bull out of a chute, with Mike and/or I both having to frantically wrestle him away from oncoming traffic, noticing kind bystanders putting their hands out to stop cars because they get the gist of what we're doing--and, fortunately for us, not mistaking us for child abductors. (I may or may not have recently face planted outside the local Dollar Tree during one of these adventures. If there's surveillance footage, it's probably hilarious since nobody was killed or overly maimed.)

Anywho, during the ten minutes or so it took to drive the boy to the health center, these were the thoughts meandering around my mind. By the time I parked the car I was shaking. I got out of the car to let Cal out and realized I'd forgotten to turn off the ignition and remove my keys. Yeah, I was in great shape for this.

So in we went. And there they were: The kind-eyed, mom-like nurse practitioner who runs the place, her teeny tiny beautiful and excellent young assistant, and a gorgeous hulking young Latino man, built like a linebacker, who was interning as a temporary assistant. We'd strategically scheduled this little event for when this temp was working.

Cal went immediately into shaking scared animal mode, eyes darting, trying to edge his way out the door, little mewling noises that said "I know this place and I don't like it." The team looked to me for a plan, and I explained that there was no sweet talking or comforting or bribing or cajoling that was going to work, and trying anything like that would just prolong the agony.

"Will he kick?" the woman in charge asked.

I explained that he won't so much kick as just do anything he can to flee. He doesn't lash out at the people perpetrating the violation against him. He just puts all his impressive strength and 139 pounds of very stocky build into getting the fuck out of there, whatever it takes.

I remembered that the way the blood draw had finally worked was to get him on the floor. Nothing to fall off of, easiest to keep him still. So we got down low, beautiful tiny assistant on one side of him, me on the other, startlingly gorgeous linebacker physician's-assistant-in-training supporting and bracing from behind...some terrified screaming, some heartbreaking crying when the needle was inserted and the fluid started going in, and then:

The deed was done.

(And not for nothing, that looks like it frigging hurts. If any of you have had it done lately, you can let me know.)

And up we came, the four of us telling Cal how good and brave he is, my sweet boy calming down pretty quickly, and me looking him right in the eye and promising him donuts. Calvin's food has been very carefully controlled lately. Sky-high triglycerides and some other startling blood work numbers have forced our hand. We've melted twelve pounds of my heroic sweetheart in the past few months through sheer hard work and determination. But today, he was going to get donuts, goddammit. Just for today.

As we got ready to leave, I looked at the three healthcare providers in the room and my eyes clouded over with tears. I wanted to wrap my arms around them each, one at a time (especially the hunky intern), cry on their shoulders, and really tell them how people like us wouldn't be able to get by without people like them. But I had a boy pulling me toward the exit, a boy who'd really earned some donuts, so I settled for the most heartfelt thanks I could get out of my mouth before I was urged out the door.

I hope they know how much they mean to me.

I think I'll send them this post. So they'll know.

Happy...I mean Merry...Aw F-ck It...

You know what I'd like to get for Christmas? And Chanukah? And Kwanzaa? And Boxing Day? And Yule? And Beltane? And Solstice? And Big-Fat-Man-With-The-Long-White-Beard Day? And all of it? To keep with me all through the year?

I'd absolutely LOVE for people to stop pissing and moaning about what we should all say to each other about having a lovely season.

Christians, I hate to point fingers, but this one is on us. My findings are based on the small sample of my own experience, but I gotta tell y'all, I have NEVER heard or read of a non-Christian who was even the tiniest bit ticked off about being wished a "Merry Christmas" during the latter few months of the calendar year. Not a once.

Any bitching or complaining I hear or read, on the other hand, is coming from people who think they're not allowed to say "Merry Christmas," that there's some prime directive coming down from somewhere to persecute them into saying (gasp) "Happy Holidays" to people. As if suggesting that saying "Happy Holidays" is akin to dropping a flaming bag of dog poop afront your manger scene. Really? REALLY? Is this such a big insult that we're flooding social media with it? Wasting rage we could be saving for Donald Trump and those fucking barking Jingle Bell dogs? Sorry, they get on my nerves...but actually, this is great, if you're offended that I hate the barking Jingle Bell dogs, vent your spleen at that, just get the hell off the "don't tell me happy holidays" crusade. (P.S. There's also too much Steve and Edie on the radio, but I'd better stop before I invite death threats toward my general direction.)

Because I LOVE you all, but this petty little war over Merry Christmas v. Happy Holidays really makes you sound like little bitches.

And by the way, you might notice something about the word "holiday." Stay with me, because this is a subtle, complicated one: The word "holiday" is actually a compound word that means the same thing as (wait for it) HOLY DAY.  If anything, it's got more of whatever god you like in it than the Christmas word. Did I just rock your world? Blow your mind?

Wait, there's more. The word "Christ." Anyone? It's Greek. It has to do with being annointed. Blessed. Holy. Oh, there it is again.

Have a happy Christed time. Annointed, blessed, holy time.

In other words (drum roll):

IT. IS. ALL. THE. SAME.

So for the love of Krishna, could we please get over it? Because don't look now, but we have bigger fish to fry, people. While we're all bickering amongst ourselves about how to (or not to) wish each other a lovely winter season of light and love, there's a tiny orange clown-haired demagogue all up in our faces suggesting we bring back the Third Reich. A splinter group of self-hating, diseased psychopaths have hijacked Islam (a faith based on love and respect for all life) for their own murderous purposes, so here's what let's do, let's ban all Muslims. That'll do the trick nicely. Let's paint an entire race of people, who've contributed more light and color and art and brilliance and joy to humanity than could ever be measured, just like all other races and religions, with the same brush. Real smart.

I happen to love and honor a whole bunch of Muslims within my personal sphere, but even if you don't know or care about a single one, is that the kind of world you want? The kind where we're all born into some religious group or other, and have to either (1) live in paranoia that the other guy is crapping all over our cherished beliefs or (2) advocate that we kick out everybody who doesn't look and eat and talk and pray exactly like us?

For me, that world just plain sucks.

But P.S., if that IS the world you want to live in, how long do you think it'll be before the evil darkness that's hating on them decides to come for YOU?

Because in a world where we're run by this kind fear and distrust, no one is safe, no matter what group you're in. That's the one truth you can take to the bank. And it's what the black hats hiding in the shadows are counting on. If we turn on each other, it makes their work a hell of a lot easier.

So let's stop all that crap, shall we?  It's a bad dream we can all wake up from, That monster we're all full of hate and terror about? It lives on our hate and terror. Feeds off it. We can starve that monster to death if we want to. This is not some pretty metaphor. It's the truth. Do your own research, and you'll see it too.

And with the monster dead, that'll make for such a merry everything that no one will have the time or inclination to give a flying you-know-what about what to say around the whatever log or tree or candelabra you favor. We'll all be so happy together, no one will even notice where the light is coming from, because it'll be coming from everywhere.

Merry Happy Jolly Christed Annointed Blessed Holy Time Of Light to all of you.

And for the Love the whole sorry lot of us, be kind.

On the Everloving Edge

Is there anybody out there who has experience taking care of special-needs kids who can keep Calvin alive for me on Thursday, May 21, 2015, between the hours of 3 and 6 p.m.? 

I need a sitter, and not just any sitter will do. Because my child has autism, in case I haven't mentioned it. And make no mistake, I've been working for years to try and solve this problem so I wouldn't end up in these binds all the time so that I have to grovel all abject and pathetic for someone to help yank my ass out of the fire. But I have not yet experienced the glory of snagging that brass ring. Because, speaking of asses, it appears I'm the butt of some sick joke that someone in the vast machine that is public policy thinks is really really REALLY cute.

The way it works is this. They tell you that your child's severe disability means there are wonderful, humane services available to help you out here and there. And there are. You've seen them. They are not the mere stuff of legend. You have friends in situations similar to yours whose families have had access to these services for some time now.  

But let's get something straight. You are NOT entitled to such services that would make life so much more bearable for your family. Someone tells you this right out the gate--so don't get cocky, cowgirl. The point is, though, they're out there, those possibilities of help, and you can find out if you're eligible for them, and then you can apply for them. 

We won't tell you how exactly to do this applying thing, it's kind of trial and error. You have a decent chance of making it, though, kind of like the guys who found the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Nag Hammadi Library. But that's part of the magical adventure of it all, sort of a Pirates of the Caribbean meets Raiders of the Lost Ark deal. So just follow the yellow brick road, then when the road changes color with no warning follow that one, for a while until you realize it was the wrong one (no it wasn't, ha ha), so then of course you just jump in this here helicopter, make a left at the unicorn on the motorcycle, hike the Himalayas at dusk, straight on down the rabbit hole till morning. 

Ok, fine, you can do that, and so you do, because you're a good citizen who follows all the rules, makes all the calls, fills out all the papers, goes to all the medical appointments, gets the mandatory special evaluations, then gets them again when the ones you already have are too old, goes to all the interviews, attends all the mandatory classes, then goes to new mandatory classes because the old ones don't count anymore (ha ha again, you silly), then you find out why your caseworker has disappeared, oh she's been replaced and no one told you, ok, cool, no problem, I'm easy, I got nothing going on over here, just everybody chill, take your time, no worries, I'm doing GREAT.

So you bust your ass, full time, year after year with that carrot dangled in front of you (the one that your child is not entitled to, please don't get the wrong idea), and the punchline is that you never ever fucking get there. At least that's where I'm at. Have been at. For like ever. Is that not a laugh riot? I am so cracking up. My whole family is. Most of all my boy, who works harder within the space of an hour than I do in a month even with all these fun hoops I get to jump through.

Nice, right?

Anyway, May 21. Anyone?

The Force Is Strong With This One

It's something I do every year. Plow through every incarnation of that Dickens story I can find.

There's the little matter of the book, of course, ever since I first read it in my single digits. And every movie. And every animated version. And an awesome little novella that tells the story from Jacob Marley's point of view, and it's about time (that one was a present from my boyfriend on our first Christmas together, the boyfriend I later married, he so gets me). For ten years running there was even the live performance in New York, with my sister (and just fyi, she and I still haven't forgiven whomever's responsible for cutting off our beloved tradition at the knees, and neither one of us can stand hearing any part of the Alan Menken score anymore, makes our eyes go wet and our hearts break audibly).

Anyway, to my point, I do this every December. Over and over. And every year, and in every rendition, something crazy happens. Something rises up from the pages, sneaks off the stage, seeps out of the the screen, right into me...something I could swear up and down that I'd never seen or heard or felt or known before. I get something new each Christmas, with new eyes, and new ears, and maybe even a new heart.

How does a story do that?

I don't know either, but I'll tell you what it was this year. It was that moment when Mrs. Cratchit asks her husband how Tiny Tim behaved in church that day. As expected, Bob Cratchit gives her the scoop that Tim had been "good as gold and better." And Bob goes on to deliver that little speech about his son, as the rest of his family sits around and listens--lines that I've read and heard and seen and felt, and read and heard and seen and felt, over and over, so many times.

"Somehow he gets thoughtful, sitting by himself so much, and thinks the strangest things you ever heard. He told me, coming home, that he hoped people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant for them to remember, upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk and blind men see."

Bob's voice was tremulous when he told them this, and trembled more when he said that Tiny Tim was growing strong and hearty.

Bob's voice was tremulous...and trembled more.

That's what did it to me this year.

His voice was tremulous...and trembled more. Of course it was. Of course it did. Mine sure as hell would have done. The thoughts that floated around Bob Cratchit. Thoughts about how this little child, lodged so much into his heart as to be a part of it, so fragile and bent and broken and wrongly made, so imperfect in the eyes of a world that will not see, ending up being the very vehicle to maybe teach the world around him about the highest force in existence.

Perfect love, that is. Just a little thing like that.

And p.s., in case you don't already know this about me, I could NOT care less what your name for this force is. I really and truly don't care. I don't care what kind of a building you visit to focus your thoughts on this force, or if you don't go anywhere at all. I also don't care which famous ginormous book you might leaf through to help you fathom it, or if you go by a book at all. That you or I or any of us grope our way to feel the force, and come to have it strong with with us in our time, even now and then, in ups and downs, matters more to me, and who cares how. Really. So in  A Christmas Carol,  it's the Christ child that's understood as the catalyst to explode perfect love into the world. But a little disabled boy holding hands with his father in a tiny country church--that's who Dickens sees as having a ghost of a chance (sorry) to carry such an understanding into the here and now. To the regular people going about their business and living their lives around him. If they even let themselves notice him at all.

A little "broken" boy.

Is there anything that could possibly grip your heart harder?  Me neither.

And somehow I've never paused and become "tremulous" about it in such a soul-stopping way, right along with Mr. and Mrs. Cratchit, and all the assundry little Cratchits, until this very time.  Go figure.

Dammit, EVERYTHING makes me cry these last few days before Christmas day. I blame Dickens, I really do.

But that's ok. It really is.

Good as gold and better.

Happy Merry Everything.

Love you,
T

Yes, Grace, there is...

So I'm a little annoyed at Judy Blume right now. Grace is reading Superfudge, one of my favorites, and having a blast, just like I did. But there was something I didn't remember about the book. About three chapters from the end, Judy Blume acts like there's no such thing as Santa Claus.

I was reminded about this little tidbit when Grace suddenly pulled her head out of the book, a puzzled expression all over her face, and stated, "I know where babies come from, and I still believe in Santa."

I was confused, then alarmed as I started to remember. The main character, Peter Hatcher (a fifth grader just like Grace), complains to his parents that they shouldn't be encouraging his younger brother, Fudge, to believe that Santa is real:

"I don't think it's a good idea for you to let him go on believing in Santa....After all you told him where babies come from. How can a kid who knows where babies come from still believe in Santa?"

So now it was clear that the time had come to have that conversation with my child.

She had to be told about the multidimensionality of the universe.

I know. It's the talk nobody's ever ready for.  But there are no manuals for exactly how to grow a kid, particularly where matters of quantum physics are concerned.

So I patiently explained how Santa Claus exists on a dimensional level that's separate from ours, albeit just as real, and that right around the winter solstice there are immutable laws of nature that allow a being like him to cross into the dimension that we're currently experiencing, and that unfortunately there are a lot of parents who aren't up to speed on the physics so that, sadly, their kids have no choice but to grow out of one of the most important truths they used to be privy to.

At one point during my explanation, my daughter interrupted me to ask, "Mommy, are you ok? Your eyes look like you're about to start crying."

I admitted that it makes me sad that some families lose Santa Claus just because they lack a sufficient background in science...but that I was fine. Just fine.

Judy Blume will be getting a strongly worded email from me, however. There are obviously gaps in her education.