About KB

40+ years of an average life has led KB to search for the absurdity in everyday encounters with those around her. Born blocks from the beaches of Southern California but raised in a rural farm community north of Seattle, Kate appreciates the humor of simple moments and ordinary people. The granddaughter of a world renowned author of biological nonfiction, a lifetime love of reading and writing guided Kate into being an English major at the University of Washington. After nearly twenty years of raising her four children and supporting her husband’s career, KB decided it was time to share her writing with others. On her 41st birthday she started her own blog, KBJackson.com. Now a published author of three series, KB is represented by Dawn Dowdle of Blue Ridge Literary Agency. Her middle grade Sasquatch Hunters series is published by Reycraft Books, her Chattertowne mystery series is published by Level Best Books, and her Cruising Sisters series is published by Tule.

It’s Not All About You

Thursday night, Tina Fey performed a satirical piece in response to the horrors of Charlottesville, Virginia last weekend. I personally thought the skit was hilarious, and smart, and insightful.

Not everyone did.

And I’m not just talking about the Nazi sympathizers, the KKK and the white nationalists who didn’t like it. I read a few scathing reviews written by Black people who felt it was yet another example of white liberal women who just don’t get it.

When I read the first article, I was taken aback. As someone who makes a concerted effort to be aware of situations in which tone-deaf white activists miss the mark, I found myself unsure of what to think. So I went to the comments, which I try to avoid because they often leave me feeling worse about the state of things than I did to begin with.

The comments were mixed. They were mixed racially, and they were mixed in terms of their opinions on the skit, and the critique of it. There was no dividing line that I could see. There were white people who liked the skit, and white people who said it was an invitation to just stay home and eat your coconut snowflake feelings embedded in white frosting atop a sheet cake purchased from a Black or Jewish-owned bakery. There were also Black people who felt as though Tina is just an out of touch, rich white liberal woman who will never, CAN never get it.

On the other hand, there were Black and white commenters who continually pointed out that this was satire, that there were many layers to it, that there were ironies, and metaphors, and a big giant mirror for white activists to look into.

My mom and I attended an NAACP rally this morning. Last night she texted her concern about being a white ally, and wondered if white women showing up to an NAACP event was feeding into the “white savior” complex, whether it was helpful to show support in this way, or if it was offensive to be there. She had read several comments on a poem written by a white woman that had left her confused about what is really helpful and supportive to People of color, and what is not.

And it’s a valid question all self-described allies should be asking ourselves.

It turned out that the rally was composed of probably 75% or more white people. There were hippies who have lived through the civil rights era of the 60’s and are genuinely dismayed and baffled that we are here again (still) in 2017. ( I say still, because anyone who has been paying attention knows racism, overt or systemic, never went away. However, I think as a society we were doing our best to operate differently, to make it uncomfortable to be overtly racist. That started changing in November 2008 and we see today the comfort level with being openly racist has men marching with torches and no hoods down the middle of the street. They feel emboldened to say awful hateful things. ) There were people of all ages, though, and some of the most impactful statements were made by two teenage boys.

As they opened up the mic and allowed community members to speak, I was inspired. I’m grateful all these people who spoke are on the side of love and justice. But as the unscheduled speeches went on, and white woman after white woman got up to talk about all the ways they were “woke” and all the things they have done to help Black people, I began to groan inwardly. My friend Tabitha groaned outwardly. My mother leaned over and said, “Wow. It’s really not all about you, lady.”

And we knew the message being sent to POC in that audience.

We are really in love with our own self-righteousness. We are enamored with our do-gooding. We seek accolades for what we do for others because it makes us feel like we are making a difference. And most of it comes from a desire to see justice in this nation, equality, racial unity, etc. But it also comes from a place of self-aggrandizement.

The truth is, even those of us who try to be conscious of our privilege, who recognize the inequality, the lack of justice and the hate that is rising in this country, we fall into the “white savior complex” trap so easily. We want to believe we’re so evolved, that we’re above having biases, and because of that we can be so very blind or tone deaf and never know it.

When I read criticism of white allies by Black people, particularly of white females, it usually feels really icky. Defensiveness rises up inside me, and I want to yell, “Not me! I’m not like them!” And that’s when I know without a shadow of a doubt it’s time for me to shut up and listen.

I can never know what it’s like to be a Black person in this country. I catch glimpses, here and there, and when I’m stunned, that’s my cue to how out of touch I am. White people are freaking out right now about Charlottesville. We freaked out about Trayvon, and Michael Brown, and Sandra Bland. We are still having tremors of shock and horror over Philando Castile.

Guess who’s not freaking out?

Black people.

Know why?

Because they live this shit every damn day. They are not shocked. They are not stunned. They are angry and they are grieved, but they are not surprised.

So when a white person gets all aflutter, and wants pats on the back for being a decent human being, and being on the right side of humanity, they probably aren’t going to get it if they go looking for it from the Black community.

As a matter of fact, they’re probably going to get their feelings hurt.

I know this, because I’ve been there. I know this because I’ve watched it play out in conversations all over Facebook. And I see the indignant response of, “Well! If I’m not appreciated here, I’m just going to take my Black Lives Matter signs and go home!”

Being an ally means setting aside your need for affirmation, and showing up without expectation.

Being an ally means you listen more than you talk (unless you’re talking to other white people, and in that case, by all means, shout it from the rooftops that Black lives should matter as much as any others in this country, that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere, that fascism and racism have no place here and will not go unanswered.)

Being an ally means you do a whole lot of self-checking as you go, you recognize your privilege, where it could bring harm to others, and where it can be used for good,  to access audiences that people of color don’t have the same access to.

We’ve all known those people who “show up to help” and their help ends up being more of a burden than anything else. The person who shows up when you’re sick or sad, and you end up having to comfort them because they are incapable of not making it about them.

“Well, I came to see how you were dealing with cancer, but if you can’t  be cheerful and grateful for my efforts, I’ll take my tuna noodle casserole to someone who will be!”

Don’t be that person. I beg you.

Being an ally means, it’s not about you. Period. If it WERE about you, there would be organizations and rallies to support you and your struggles.

It’s not about me. It’s not about my feelings. Do I get something out of it? Of course I do. Does it suck when someone rejects my way of “helping” ? Absolutely. But if I bring vinegar to a thirsty person, and then get pissy because they don’t want to drink it, who is really the one with the issue?

White allies – I believe there’s a really scathing song about white allies. The O’Jays? but I digress – white allies, we have the ability to be a blessing or a curse to those we are purporting to be acting on behalf of. We have to grow some thicker skin. We have to have uncomfortable conversations, where we face the daily reality of what this country is offering our Black and Brown brothers and sisters. Where they get to be angry and feel whatever they feel, because the racial system we’ve operated in since the very first slave ship landed on our shores is WRONG. Morally, spiritually, ethically wrong. Every day they’re told to get over it and move on because we’re so fragile we can’t stand the discomfort of viewing their raw pain and rage…the same pain and rage we’d be experiencing if roles were reversed. Heck, white people whimper every time it’s not about us and what benefits us. We can’t kum-bah-ya our way out of this. We have to own our part, and work every day to overcome the blind spots of our privilege.

Don’t be afraid to get your hands dirty and your feelings hurt. I have the sense we are in for quite a battle, but I do believe love will always conquer hate, and good will inevitably triumph over evil, even if lately it feels like evil is winning.

Down The Ancestry Rabbit Hole– More Drama Than A Soap Opera

This is a photo of my great grandmother, Mildred. I knew her name was Mildred, but to me, she was always Grandma Lulu. It’s confusing sometimes, keeping all the grandparents straight when you’re a little kid. My older sister Shannon came up with a solution: nicknames based on vacation spots.

Thus, in our family we had Grandma (my mom’s mom), Grandma Mexico (aka Margot, Shannon’s dad’s mom), and Grandma Lulu, short for Honolulu. Grandma Lulu not only traveled often to Honolulu, she was born there.

Now, Grandma Lulu was a fascinating character, on which I would elaborate here, if it weren’t for the fact I have decided her life will be the basis for my next novel.

What I can tell you is that while researching Grandma Lulu, I discovered she had a previously unknown 3rd husband. I remember at the time I looked into it initially, it was confusing, because all the evidence pointed to the fact that her 3rd husband had lied about his last name on their marriage license. Grandma Lulu, on the other hand, lied about her place of birth (she said she was born in Oakland, California, not Hawaii), said that it was her 2nd marriage, not her 3rd,  and shaved 5 years off her age. The age thing isn’t all that surprising, considering she was marrying a man 11 years her junior.

A couple weeks ago I began receiving messages from a man who is a relative of Mildred’s 4th husband, Jay. Mildred stayed married to Jay until his death, and, as far as I know, never married again, living her remaining fifteen years of life single, but dating. A lot. Her married boyfriend, who showed up at her funeral, handcrafted the wooden spice rack that hangs in my mother’s kitchen to this very day.

Grandma Lulu died when I was 10,  so I knew her, but I didn’t know much of her story. She was quiet, and tiny, and she always had froot loops when we came to visit. That was a treat for us, because my mother was a health nut and we always had Wheaties and Cheerios. I knew she liked birds, and she wore Hawaiian mumus, even while living in California. She gave me my first Barbie doll, a ballerina.

As a kid, I wasn’t privy to any of the details of her life, her choices, or her complicated relationship with my grandfather, whom she left behind at 18 months old. I have approached researching her life with curiosity, but enough emotional distance from the pain her choices caused my grandfather to recognize that she had a lot of pain of her own. Her pain likely lead to many of her actions, her multiple marriages, her wanderlust.

Anyway, the man researching Mildred’s life because of his connection to Jay, had lots of questions for me. He was confused by the last name I had attributed to Mildred’s third husband William, which was different from the information on the marriage license. I explained what my research had found, and it spurred us both on to try and figure out why William had not only changed his name from Woodcock to Hubbard, but listed his father’s name differently as well.

And that is how I found myself deeeeep down the rabbit hole of ancestry research.

The name change occurred after William’s father had passed away. He not only used his new name Hubbard when marrying Mildred, he used it on his marriage license to his second wife, Frances.

This is where the story takes an even more interesting turn. William married Frances in 1939. On their marriage license, Frances lists her age as 18, and that this is her first marriage. Initially I was perturbed by the fact that William was 32 at the time of their marriage, but the deeper I dug, the more I realized Frances was no naïve teenager.

In the 1940 census, less than a year after her marriage to William, Frances is back living with her parents. Along with her, is a one year old son, who has a completely different last name, Doiron.  Also living at home is her sister, a 19 year old divorcee with a 4 year old son.

That led me to a marriage record for Frances to a man named Melvin Doiron in October of 1938. At the age of seventeen, she married Melvin, and five months later gave birth to Ronald. Four months after Ronald was born, she married William. One must assume that in the nine months between the two marriages, there was a divorce or annulment. (I would hope)

You might ascribe this behavior to youth, however, Frances went on to marry FOUR MORE MEN. That brings us to a total of six husbands. There’s a possible indication of a seventh, but I haven’t been able to definitively prove that.

By 1941, at the age of 19, Frances was on her third husband. Of course, on her marriage license to husband number three, she said it was only her second marriage. Of all her husbands, Frances managed to marry a McQueen, a McKim and a McKibben. I wonder if there’s a strange psychological reason one might be attracted to a certain part of the alphabet.

I find myself pondering what was going through the mind of Frances, why she couldn’t keep a relationship. I can’t imagine she enjoyed all the ups and downs, although I suppose it’s possible. Part of me wants to believe so many marriages indicate a woman who is a hopeless romantic, even if she didn’t have the skills to pick a  man.

In 1970, Frances and her 5th husband, Gail, divorced after 8 years of marriage. Seven months later, she married her sixth husband, Charles. That marriage lasted from November through to May of the following year. Less than a year after her divorce, she remarried Gail. Somehow, that gave me hope that Frances found happiness. Unfortunately, they divorced again three and a half years later.

More than what was going through Frances’ mind, I think about her son, Ronald. From everything I can see, he was an only child, the product of a short-lived first marriage between his teenage mother and his 23 year old father, who himself ran off at 15 to join the military. Ronald was on his second stepfather before his third birthday. His mother would go on to bring four additional stepfathers into his life. That’s not a lot of stability, although her third husband was around through his teen years.

As for Frances, I’m not sure she got her happily ever after. When she died in 1989, at the age of only 68, She had outlived all of her ex-husbands. I have been unable to find an obituary for her, nor have I been able to locate her grave. Perhaps her son wasn’t sure what last  name to put on her grave marker, so he just had her cremated. If they charge by the letter it might be pretty expensive to create one that says: Here lies Frances Lenora Godfrey Doiron Hubbard (which really should be Woodcock) Fulmer Mcqueen McKim Mckibben McKim (didn’t work the 2nd time either).

For me, these people aren’t just names and dates on a chart. I mentally connect with them, imagine their lives, the era and geographical areas they lived, and I find myself rooting for them to have happy endings. I mourn their losses and cheer their success. The lure of the story takes me places I never imagine when I start looking.

You know you’re down the rabbit hole when you’re looking at the immigration papers of the second wife of your great grandmother’s ex-husband’s second wife’s fifth ex-husband, which is where I currently find myself.

If you would like me to go down YOUR family’s rabbit hole, please contact me at Shoreshfamilyreseach@gmail.com, visit my facebook page Shoresh Family Research, or my website Shoresh Family Research. 

 

 

Independence Day Confessions

This photo courtesy Pugsonparade

As I prepared to write this blog, I went looking for funny Fourth of July photos and memes. Instead, what I found were a lot of mean-spirited things, things that reinforced my dismay at the state of our country, and stuff that in today’s political climate just made me sad. It’s hard to be mad at patriotic pugs, though.

This year, I must admit, I’m struggling to get excited for the Fourth. I guess that’s my main confession. Checking out at the grocery store, going in for a facial appointment, talking to friends, everyone asks, “Any plans for the holiday?” It takes me a moment to even remember what holiday they’re talking about.

In years past, it was a big one for me. Since I was a little girl my family has celebrated, and I have fond memories of each. When I was younger, we’d go to my grandparents’ or my great aunt and uncle’s house  across the street from each other in Laguna Niguel. We’d spend the day at the beach, followed by barbeque and a very deliberate and organized firework display. Uncle Bud would light one safe and sane tower or cone, we’d clap and cheer, and when it was done, he’d move on to the next. The kids got the snakes and the sparklers, and my grandfather would randomly drop firecrackers to scare whoever was standing nearby minding their own business.

After moving to Washington State, we sometimes spent the holiday camping in Coeur D’Alene, Idaho. Once again, my grandfather, who rarely talked and walked at the pace of a mummy, would casually let drop a lit firecracker and keep walking. It was a little passive-aggressive, and he thought it was hilarious.

For the past twenty years off and on (mostly on), my parents hosted at their house. Sometimes we’d have 15 people, sometimes 50. Many were people we’d only see on that one day a year. My father used a propane torch to set off mortars from the launch tubes he nailed into the guard rail that lines the hill alongside their house.  Every year we knew it was going to be THE year someone lost a digit or set the house across the street on fire. It was always an extravaganza of food, fun and fireworks.

Last year was the first year we didn’t do the party, and I was okay with that, although a little melancholy. This year, I’m not even feeling sentimental about it. It’s as if this past political year has sucked the patriotism right out of me. Frankly, I was more excited about Canada’s sesquicentennial on July 1st.  (I think that technically makes confession number two.)

As I’ve been thinking about why I’m not excited, I’ve been  processing my patriotic feelings in general. Some are positive, some are not. And because I’m battling a nasty cold, my brain is too fuzzy to put these into any order of importance. Here, in a stream of consciousness, are my confessions:

  1. I hate apple pie. Okay, maybe hate is too strong of a word. It’s probably at the very bottom of my pie choices. I might eat it if it were given to me without alternative, but I really don’t enjoy it. I like apple crisp (as long as it’s granny smith apples) and I really like the apple berry crumb pie from the Snohomish Pie Company. I’d prefer “American as peach pie” or maybe “American as Rocky Road ice cream.”
  2. I cry every time I hear Neil Diamond’s “America.” I can’t help it. It makes me think of what real patriotism is about, not the kind where we only celebrate those who were born here, but those who were escaping dire circumstances in their homeland and saw this place as a beacon of hope and freedom. On the flip side, if I never heard “Proud to be American” for the rest of my life, I’d be perfectly okay with that.
  3. I no longer idolize our founding fathers. I’m not even sure I like them. The amount of historical research I’ve done has led me to a place where I can appreciate the things they did with good intent, while not ignoring their serious character flaws. I think we do our kids a huge disservice by putting these men on pedestals, because I can say from my own personal experience, it sucks to see your heroes fall. Why do we teach only the cute little poems and legendary stories, while completely ignoring reality? While being men of great vision, they were not moral paragons. They definitely weren’t all (or even mostly) Christian, despite what my local town newspaper published this week. They were deists who had an agenda, and it wasn’t a utopia of freedom for all men, it was an opportunistic one that would benefit THEM. They wrote that ALL men were endowed with certain inalienable rights, life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, ENDOWED BY THEIR CREATOR, while simultaneously holding fellow human beings in bondage of chattal slavery.  Those are not traits I find admirable. And guess what? I can love my country and recognize their contributions while being honest about their flaws.
  4. I love Citizenship ceremonies. I love seeing people from all over the world, from every ethnicity, nation and religion, who know more about our democracy and our constitution than the majority of natural born citizens, pledging to contribute to the beautiful patchwork that makes up the people of this country. I remember going in to my dry cleaners and every time, the woman who worked the counter would put down her citizenship study guide to help me. It made me feel proud to belong to a place where she felt welcome, and that she wanted to be a part of it. At the same time, I recognize that our immigration system is messed up, that it’s too hard for immigrants to come legally, and too easy for some to come illegally. Because I was born here, I consider myself lucky, not entitled, and I don’t begrudge anyone born into a place where there is poverty, famine, war or authoritarian regimes wanting to come here to escape that. I don’t fear people who are not like me, I desire to learn from them.
  5. I am not a fan of the melting pot analogy. I am a fan of cultural diversity. I love to visit the International district in Seattle, Chinatown in San Francisco, Little Saigon in Westminster, Olvera Street in Los Angeles, Little Havana in Miami, Little Italy in New York, the French Quarter in New Orleans. I have no desire to see the colors of the rainbow melted into a homogenous goop. I want to know about where people come from. I have no desire to strip them of their traditions to ‘Muricanize them. Our country is great because of its people, and the people of this country come from all over the world.
  6. Hatred, fear, exclusivity, elitism, nationalism, and racism should not be American values, and they sap my patriotism. What invigorates my patriotism is unity, celebration, hospitality to those in need, men and women who risk it all to serve our nation in the armed forces, Veterans, the families of service members who have made so many sacrifices in support of their soldier, their sailor, their marine, their…what do you call Air force people? Ah, Airmen.  And the Coast Guard. However, our treatment of veterans is definitely not a source of national pride for me.
  7. I discovered I’m related to Francis Scott Key, author of the poem that became the National Anthem. He’s my 3rd cousin, 6x removed. I was excited to discover that fact, but less excited when I read the 3rd verse that no one really thought about or knew existed prior to the protests of Colin Kaepernick, the now much-maligned and former quarterback in the NFL. On a side note, protests are as American as…peach pie.
  8. For those who’ve known me a while, it may not be a surprise that I have a strong affection for the First Nations people of America. As a young child, I wanted to belong to a tribe. I didn’t know enough to know there are more than 500 registered tribes, all with varying languages, culture, traditions, history. They deserve the honor and respect of calling them by name instead of painting them all with one broad cultural brush.
  9. My great grandfather was a World War I veteran, National Commander of the American Legion, LA county Assessor, candidate for governor of the state of California. and a strong advocate for veteran’s affairs. His father was an immigrant from Ireland who settled in the central valley of California, having left his home during the Great Famine. I can admire my great grandfather while also acknowledging he had a huge blind spot regarding immigrants. You see, despite the fact his father came to this country seeking a better life, he believed immigrants, particularly those of Mexican descent, were taking jobs which rightfully belonged to veterans. Rather than solely addressing the failings of the US government to serve the needs of returning veterans and their families or the widows and orphans created by our involvement in global conflicts, he found a convenient  scapegoat. If he were alive today, I would argue to him that we can simultaneously welcome immigrants and still serve our veterans. These two issues are not mutually exclusive.
  10. We’ve spent hundreds of dollars, possibly thousands, on fireworks over the years, on something that literally goes up in a puff of smoke (with report). My husband used to joke “some have a 401k, we have fireworks.” This year, as with last year, we have spent zero dollars. I can tell you it feels really good.
  11. I used to think the American experience was the same for everyone. I didn’t know that there were different levels of “freedom,” depending on your ethnicity and/or your income. I believed opportunities were the same for everyone, and that the American Dream was a reality for anyone who wanted it. Opportunity exists, but I’ve talked to too many people for whom race and poverty have impeded that dream, obstacles had to be overcome that I never had to face, and discouraging discrimination that I never experienced. I don’t take my freedom for granted, not only because I know that it’s a rare and valuable thing, but also because I know many people who have been deprived of it in many ways.
  12. Wonder Woman may be my favorite American this year, and she’s Amazonian. Or Greek. It’s kind of confusing.

I know this is rambling. Like I said, I’m in a weird place, I’ve got the remnants of a nasty cold, and it’s just been a strange year.

So, happy birthday America. Hope you get some therapy and next year I’ll feel more like celebrating. I’m headed to Canada in a couple weeks, and that Justin Trudeau and socialized medicine is pretty appealing. I just think you should know, I’ve got options if you can’t pull it together.

Tales From A Hipster Wedding

hipsterjesus

Last night Jeff and I attended the wedding of our friends Lisa and Doug’s son Alex, who is also a good friend of our eldest daughter Sydney. Alex and Mary, his new wife, are in their early 20’s. Their large circle of friends encompasses a specific demographic which was on stellar display at this event.

A little background info: We have a locally-owned coffee shop in our town that’s a mecca for Sydney and her hipster church friends. Many of them either work there, socialize there, study their Bible there, and/or all of the above.

Lisa and I meet up there every couple months for coffee and their specialty oatmeal, named after Molly, the former manager. We’ve found that on an average day we have a 75% chance of spotting one of our children, and 100% chance of spotting at least 5 people from our church family (attendees of one or more of three local congregations affiliated by denomination.)

We’ve also discovered we can conjure one of the assistant pastors simply by saying his name three times, like Beetlejuice.

This coffee shop has gelato, organic baked goods, and delicious coffee beverages, using beans roasted by their very own roaster. Sydney, during her training, learned the art of the milk pour to create designs in each beverage. It’s a required skill. There’s rarely a time or day when it’s not overflowing with clientele. I prefer the overstuffed leather chairs, but there are many instances we are simply lucky to find a spot.

They have a stage where sometimes there are live musical performances. At other times there are chairs on the stage, and I also like to sit there because it makes me feel like Lisa and I are on a talk show.

This place is like Central Perk from “Friends,” only instead of six vapid gen-x’ers, there are 2 dozen millennials plus Lisa and I.

hipster-coffee-meme-0

When we arrived at the wedding, a barn in the middle of an agricultural valley that has been beautifully repurposed as a wedding venue, I recognized many people from our church and from the coffee shop. We immediately began taking mental inventory of the high hipster ambience.

The beard count alone was off the charts. I lived through the late seventies and early eighties and I don’t think I cumulatively witnessed as many beards in that era as I did last night.

Beards also are a common topic of conversation. There is mutual beard admiration, discussion of beard-al qualities, jokes about the drawbacks of the beard (crumb catcher was at the top of that list), and general beard-related topics.

I would say this is the first wedding I have attended where people were wearing beanies with semi-formal attire. One might think a beanie at a wedding might stand out or seem inappropriate, but I must say– they’ve figured out how to pull it off. These are no poser hipsters. These are all-in hipsters and the beanie is merely an appendage now.

Another trend we noticed was the jewel tone suits and sport coats. The stand-out in that category was a magenta suit, complete with magenta skinny tie and matching round magenta John Lennon glasses. The others were wearing horn-rimmed glasses, often tucked into the beanie and accompanied by various sized ear gauges.

Semi-formal in hipster terms apparently means cable knit sweaters WITH leather patches, as opposed to the more casual fisherman sweater without the leather patches.  Also, the man-buns are slightly tidier than normal.

One kid was doing what my husband referred to as “Full Bieber,” however I felt it was more of an homage to one of those One Direction guys. You tell me–floppy fluffy hair with skinny jeans and bright white tennis shoes ( I think the youngsters call them “kicks.” ). Bieber or Harry Styles?

At our reception table we were seated with a friend, Missy,  who was in town from Texas,  her adorable ginger-haired 5 year old son, along with two other younger couples. Both of the couples featured bearded men and wives who were natural and lovely. That’s I think one of my favorite hipster trends- women who embrace their natural beauty. They all look like they’ve just been outside taking a brisk hike.

I asked the couple next to me how they knew the bride and groom. The man said he’d worked with the bride at the aforementioned coffee shop. “Oh,” I responded. “Then do you know Sydney?”

They and the other couple responded that they did.

“She’s our daughter,” I said proudly, invoking my hipster-adjacent credentials.

They all commented about how that made sense, considering she looked like me. I blushed and sputtered my weak protests, but was flattered by the compliment.

Missy stopped in the middle of her conversation with the couple on the opposite side of the table to get my attention.

“I mentioned Ross Perot was the developer for our neighborhood. They don’t know who Ross Perot is and I’m feeling really old,” she said.

I looked at them. “Ross Perot was the original crazy billionaire who got into politics. He ran for president as an independent against George Bush Senior and Bill Clinton. In 1992.” I paused. “Were any of you even alive in 1992?”

The wife looked at me as if she was hesitant to answer. “Oh, well, I was born in 1994, so…”

I sighed. “Right. Well, he was an economic conservative who siphoned votes from Bush, ultimately getting Bill Clinton elected.”

The husband nodded, with a serious expression. “Interesting. I’ll have to look that up.”

There’s nothing that makes you feel quite so old as realizing events you experienced as an adult are considered “history” to a married couple expecting their first child.

As for the wedding itself, the bride had chosen what Jeff kept referring to as “Garden of Eden-themed” floral décor. The bride and the bridesmaids wore garlands in their hair of leaves and vines with roses, creating a natural, romantic look. There wasn’t a ton of decorations except for lighting and greenery, elegant simplicity creating a serene, understated scene.

It was such a sharp contrast to my own wedding filled with taffeta, Battenberg lace, tulle and extravagant flower arrangements. My wedding hair was a traditional up-do, my bouquet similar to the hundreds I’d cut out of bridal magazines and pasted into my wedding planner, and my music was traditional.

My wedding looked the way I thought weddings were supposed to be. We’d ticked off boxes and went through the motions of a traditional ceremony as if creating a performance for our guests instead of allowing for a moment that was personal and intimate.

I really think these hipsters are onto something. They don’t like a bunch of fuss, they don’t do things because someone said that’s how it’s supposed to be, and they seem to have figured out how to prioritize what’s important to them, casting the superfluous aside.

They want their food clean from toxins, their flannel made with the softest organic cotton, their music to have meaning, and their Instagram to be filled with all manner of adventures.

I can’t resent them for that- I say more power to ’em. Really, who can blame them? I want those things as well. I hope they do turn this planet into the hipster utopia they envision. We would all be better for it.

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We Can’t Always Choose The Music Life Plays For Us, But We Can Choose How We Dance To It

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  • Note from 2021: This blog is proof that perspective is everything.

Once Upon a time (365 days ago to be precise) we all stood together on the precipice of a new year. We sipped champagne and shared midnight kisses, cheered and threw confetti, talked excitedly about future plans and resolutions.

I’m not sure 2016 turned out the way any of us had anticipated, and it’s likely to go down as a year many would like to forget. 2016 is the Voldemort of years- the one of which we shall never speak again. When someone attempts to  begin a sentence, “Do you remember back in 2016 when-” we’ll all shush their mouths as quickly and gently as possible.

I’m turning 45 in 2017. I’ve seen some years. I have never seen a year like this one. Between democalypse 2016 (we miss you, Jon Stewart), increases in race-related conflict, police brutality and police under attack, increases in hate crimes, reduction of interpersonal civility, global unrest, terrorism, and humanitarian crises, this year was already a stinker. Add in a larger than normal amount of iconic celebrity deaths and it was a cesspool of ugly.

But it wasn’t just that stuff that made this year so hard. I lost 2 people significant to me and to people I care about to cancer this year. I attended the funeral of my friend Jason on a Saturday and 6 days later I was comforting my sister and her children over the unexpected passing of her long time significant other John, my nephew Luke’s father.

All year the people I love struggled through loss and grief of various types, fought to keep their heads above water, as one said to me, “I’m operating in 15 minute increments, putting one foot in front of the other.”

This year was just plain hard. Was it harder than other years? Can we statistically prove that? Who knows, but that doesn’t really matter. With a few exceptions, most of my friends and family are ready to be done with 2016.

However, it’s not in me to leave it there. The Pollyanna in me wants to know that there was beauty in the pain, lessons learned, strength gained.

So, in order to not let this shitastrophic year get the best of me, here, in no particular order, are the joyful moments that in some way managed to redeem the rest:

In January I went on a three week Facebook fast, which I’ll be repeating again this year. I started a Bible study on gratitude and spent every day looking for beauty around me. I focused on my family, my writing, my spiritual development. I had lunch dates and coffee dates and was present in my life. I connected with those I love.

In March I was able to celebrate my sister Shannon’s 50th birthday with her by going to visit our sister Colleen In Southern Cal. We sat on the beach in Laguna and talked and laughed. We surprised my niece as she performed for the last time at her high school cheerleading expo. We went out to Palm Springs and sat by the pool and connected.

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In an effort to simplify, I let go of some of my “have-to’s” and focused instead on my “want-to’s.” Turned out I didn’t have to do most of my have-to’s, they were simply burdens I needlessly placed on myself. Holidays had less pressure, and I was able to just be with my people, and we connected.

We spent our spring break at beautiful Lake Coeur d’Alene. We rode four wheelers and got dirty and explored and we connected.

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Parker rode on a camel at the fair, Zoe played a dwarf in her school production of “Shrek,” and an unusually warm spring meant lots of days enjoying Lake Washington and the stunning place we live.

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Sydney and I sung together for the mother’s day tea, Parker bet on the ponies at Emerald Downs, we celebrated Papa Ted’s 90th birthday, and my birthday surprise was a giant poster Parker unfurled at the school concert.

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Jeff and I celebrated our 19th wedding anniversary in St Pete Beach, Florida and missed a hurricane by 12 hours.

Nathan graduated from high school and became a freshman at Washington State University.

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Zoe, Parker and I went to Harrison Hot Springs, Canada to go in search of Bigfoot

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(Spoiler: we didn’t find him)

We saw Kenny Rogers and Lionel Richie in concert, Zoe got to go to Disneyland, Nathan took a graduation road trip with his friends, and we spent much of the summer on the sidelines of soccer fields.

In the fall Jeff and I got to celebrate our friend and neighbor Brian’s 50th birthday in Las Vegas and then just a few days later I was making the rounds in Socal, seeing my sister and her family, old friends, newer friends, and spending time with my extended family at our reunion.

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In all of these moments the priority was connection.

Zoe added volleyball to her schedule which, as an indoor sport, is a nice change. Nathan leaving for college was hard, but watching him thrive on his own is amazing.

Birthday week was a 6 day extravaganza of celebrating Zoe’s 13th, Parker’s 11th, and Sydney’s 22nd.

We spent Thanksgiving with Shannon and her family in Spokane, celebrated the holidays with friends and family at various events, culminating in Christmukkah at our house.

And now, as I sit here typing this, my kids are gathered ’round the table. It’s snowing outside and we’re connecting.

So as it turns out, the reason 2016 can’t beat us is because we are stronger together than anything it tried to send our way. In the midst of pain was blessing. In the midst of struggle was joy and growth.

I’m not sorry to see this year come to an end, there’s no doubt. However, the reason I’m most looking forward to 2017 is not because 2016 didn’t have its moments. It’s because this year Sydney will embark on a new career path. It’s because Parker will finish elementary school and enter middle school. It’s because Nathan is making plans for moving into an apartment with his friends for his sophomore year of college, one step closer to the rest of his life. It’s because Zoe will have my calendar filled with activities as she lives each moment to its fullest.

Jeff and I will be celebrating 20 years of marriage this year. This is our 24th New Year’s Eve together, and we have all sorts of plans for the future.

Even if none of those plans come to fruition, there’s one thing that will matter in 2017… how we connect. If I have a resolution, it’s to be better at connecting, to be in the moment, to find the beauty in simplicity of sitting face to face with someone in our shared humanity.

So here’s to fresh starts… and real connection. Like the quote above says, we can’t always choose the music life plays for us, but we can choose how we dance to it. May 2017 be a year of dancing.

Cheers!

(I picked this photo to end my last post of 2016 because somehow an Alan Alda quote with a typo superimposed over a dolphin seemed to fit exactly right. )

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Your Brother’s Blood Is Crying Out From The Ground

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The events of the past three days have been a vortex of emotion for me. Shock, sadness, anger, rage, hope, frustration, and brokenheartedness.

I want to start by saying: I love you my friends. You wouldn’t be my friends if I didn’t.

I have a lot of white friends. That’s probably obvious considering, well, I’m white. And so is the majority of this country, and specifically my local community.

I have non-white friends too. Black, Asian, Native American, Middle Eastern. I haven’t counted them. I guess I could try, but since I only have ten fingers I’d probably get myself confused.

If I said I have a racially diverse group of friends by accident, I’d be disingenuous. It’s totally on purpose.

I crave racial and cultural diversity in my life. I thrive on meeting people and hearing their stories, their life experiences that are different from mine. I love learning from them because I know my lens is filtered and my view of the world myopic. That’s just a fact of life; you can only truly know the world through your eyes, until you make purposeful attempts to see it from the eyes of others.

Jesus mandated me to love others. I can’t love people well if i don’t know or attempt to understand them. If I don’t listen to them.

In listening, I have heard some things from my friends. Those things have broken my heart. Those things have enlarged my lens and given me the chance to see things I never would have otherwise.

When I see my white friends go silent in the face of another extrajudicial killing of a black man, it hurts my heart. When they remain silent as a second man bleeds on live streaming for the world to see, it angers me. When they post “All lives matter” it grieves me because in my heart I know that means that they have never sat down and talked with a black friend and tried to understand.

When friends that I love and respect remained silent for 24 hours as I wailed in my bedroom over a 4 year old girl’s voice saying “I’m here for you mommy” following her witnessing a man who was sworn to serve and protect her shooting her mother’s boyfriend in front of her eyes, inches from her precious tiny body, but then immediately respond with support following the shooting of Dallas police officers, I start to wonder what kind of friends I have.

I’m sorry, but it’s true.

I, too, am grieving the shooting of the Dallas police and transit officers last night. You can ask my children, who witnessed me cry out like a wounded animal from the pain in my soul when I got the news alert on my phone.

Then I cried more because I knew whatever empathy which had risen in the wake of the death of Philando Castile was immediately dashed with the deaths of those officers, and back in the justifications crept.

Where were you when an innocent man, cooperating with the officer on a minor traffic stop was gunned down in cold blood? Where was your support for HIS life, if you say “all lives matter?” IF all lives matter to you, why weren’t you grieving with the black community over THAT man who didn’t go home to his family that night?

Every time you post the words “All lives matter” you marginalize their pain. You dismiss their agony. You render their struggle meaningless.

It shouldn’t be “their” struggle. It should be OUR struggle. OUR struggle for justice. OUR struggle for racial parity in police encounters. OUR struggle for what is RIGHT.

I don’t hate police officers. I don’t hate anyone. I want police department leadership to clean up an environment which has bred a disparity of treatment and attitude from the moment a person of color drives or walks past an officer.

The statistics are there. A person of color, typically black or Hispanic, is significantly more likely to be stopped, more likely to be searched, more likely to be arrested, more likely to be convicted, and sentenced to longer, more severe terms than their white counterparts. It’s not made up. It’s real and verifiable. I discussed this back when the Zimmerman verdict came down in my blog Devastated but not surprised .

And then you have the reality that officers are almost never held accountable.

My father-in-law was a police officer. My mother-in-law. Two of my husband’s uncles. One remains an officer. I love them. I respect them. I know their hearts. I have friends in law enforcement. I have friends whose spouses are in law enforcement. I can’t imagine how difficult it is every time they head out the door to work. Their job is important. And dangerous.

I also know that my father-in-law struggled with his own racial bias. I heard him say, “When the majority of the black people you see are committing crimes, it changes the way you see people.” That’s the kind of thing that officers say in private but would never admit publicly. That’s a problem in need of being addressed.

When white officers who don’t live in a community made up primarily of minorities come in, men and women who aren’t connected to or in relationship with the people, the setup is adversarial. Guilt is assumed. Distrust by members of the community aggravates encounters. It feels less like civil servants there to protect and serve and more like prison guards keeping  prisoners in check.

Less diverse communities are being policed by even less diverse police departments. They see a black person come into town and they immediately go on high alert.

I learned about this the first time when my college boyfriend was pulled over in my hometown because his “tinted windows made it hard to see the temporary license plate.”

I was reminded again just last month after my friend told me she was followed by an officer for several minutes as she drove through our neighborhood, before finally being pulled over. The officer’s explanation? “You have Texas plates. We are a small community. I need to make sure everyone who is here belongs here.” She lives next door to me. What was it about her that seemed like she didn’t belong?

When incidents occur that are clearly wrong on the part of the officer, the fraternity closes ranks and you hear not a peep of criticism from them or their supporters. That would be disloyal, right?  It’s a family. Family doesn’t talk about its dirty laundry to outsiders (unless you’re a Kardashian) .

How can you address a problem that no one in the fraternity of police wants to admit?

How is the black community supposed to feel when their family members are bleeding in the streets over a broken taillight, but a white racist mass-murderer was taken to burger king on his way to jail?

I get why there’s a brotherhood among officers. You have to implicitly trust your partner and your fellow officers as you go into dangerous situations. You need to know they’ll have your back.

However, that shouldn’t extend to remaining silent when it comes to racism, corruption, or killing people instead of arresting them.

“Not all cops are racist.” OF COURSE THEY AREN’T, but I’ve watched enough cop shows to know that knowledge of a crime without reporting it makes you an accessory. Silence makes you complicit.

Good cops need to stand up for the Black community. White people need to stand up for the Black community.

My friends are crying out in pain over the loss of life, but also fear for their sons, their husbands, their fathers.

When will their anguish register enough with you, my white friends, to stand up and take notice? When will their fears be assuaged by you with promises to do better, to be better, to love and protect their families?

Or will their cries continue to be dismissed by you with the tap of the hashtag key?

Tripping Over Family Tree Roots

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The other day on my way home from walking Parker to school, I got distracted by a passing baby in a stroller and tripped over this tree root. I knew the root was there, as I walk past it (around it if I’m paying attention) every day. Twice in the morning and twice in the afternoon.

It’s not a normal root. This root has evil intentions. It’s somehow sticking out and up at an angle, causing it to be 6-8 inches into the sidewalk and 3-4 inches off the ground. This root has stopped serving any purpose to the tree and now simply lies in wait for victims.

This time the root got me pretty good. I stubbed my toe, flew forward a couple feet, but managed to keep my balance by making some wonky maneuver that left my back feeling pretty tweaked.

I thought to myself, “Someone should do something about that.”

I decided it should be the city, but when I called, no one answered the phone.  I was annoyed that duties were being shirked.

The next day as I walked past the root, I glanced over at it and felt a twinge in my lower back. It was a reminder that I needed to do something about it.

I didn’t.

A few days after that, my lower back was still in pain, and since I had been compensating for a sore back, my neck was beginning to hurt. My hips were beginning to hurt. I was an achy mess.

Every time I walked past the root, I was more irritated. I didn’t plant the tree. This sidewalk is walked by many every day, and no one had done anything about it. Someone could get hurt. Someone DID get hurt! (Me)

I called the city. The first woman I spoke with said I needed to talk to the lady who would decide whose responsibility the tree root was. Then she would determine who I needed to talk to about getting the root removed. She transferred me to the planning department, but alas that woman was out of the office for the president’s day weekend and wouldn’t be back in the office until Tuesday.

I sat and pondered my options. The reality was, I could sit and try to get someone to take accountability for the root, but there was a pretty good chance that since the city expects us to keep those trees alive by watering them, they would expect us to maintain them in other ways, such as malicious root growth.

After all, even though the tree grew on the street side of the sidewalk, it was parallel to my back yard.

If someone gets hurt because of something I know has the potential to cause injury, it doesn’t really matter who’s responsible for the root. I will have neglected to do what I could have done to prevent it. And as time goes on, as the tree grows larger and older, that root is going to become more of a liability.

Such is the case with our family trees and family legacies. In our family trees we have heroes and villains, and we have regular men and women who lived average lives and then became vaguely familiar faces in faded photographs to the generations to come.

But names and dates and black and white photos don’t tell the whole story.

When I first started genealogy research 13 years ago, I had two quests: find the famous connections and go back as far as I could go.

However in the past year and a half, my research has been dovetailing with my own personal growth path which includes spiritual studies, therapy and a complete overhaul of my thought patterns and behavioral habits that haven’t always put me where i want to be.

As a result, I find myself focusing in more closely on the stories of the people from whom I descend. As I have done that, details have emerged that explain generational family cycles that have been unwittingly passed down.

The stories I had been told as a child highlighted the best of my family history, but they don’t paint a complete picture.

Sometimes we are aware of the legacies of dysfunction, but feel like it’s in our DNA, it’s who we are because it’s who they were. We feel powerless to break the cycle.

Sometimes we are living our own frustrating cycles of behavior and have no idea why we do the things that we do. It leaves us feeling broken, and a little crazy.

But I have good news!

We are not powerless against those errant tree roots that mar our family trees and threaten to bring us down. It doesn’t matter whether we planted the tree; Once we have recognized the danger, it’s up to us to get out our metaphorical hack saws and cut that nasty root out of our lives, out of our families, preserving a healthier tree for our children and grandchildren to inherit.

“I’m a yeller.”

No, you’re not. You’re someone for whom yelling was a modeled behavior, and that behavior was modeled to them, and so on. All it takes is one person to break the cycle. That person can be you if you choose!

“I don’t know why I feel so insecure.”

Well, probably because your parent had insecurity and abandonment issues. Or their parent did. My grandfather was abandoned by his mother at 18 months old, by his father shortly after, and left to be raised by his Irish grandfather and haughty German step-grandmother. His way of handling that was to be an emotionally distant workaholic. That doesn’t breed security in your children or your marriage. It leaves scars on that family tree, and on the people who come along afterwards.

” I’m dumb with men.”

Maybe. There’s probably a reason for that too. I learned this past year that my great great grandmother was married multiple times and wanted her grandchildren to call her “Aunt Fanny” instead of grandmother. Her daughter got married at 16, was divorced a short time later, and had a baby with a man (by the appearances of the records) she never married. By the time she married my great grandfather, she was a woman with a past and baggage, probably a boatload of  shame,  who desperately wanted to be loved and cared for. That longing for love and attention caused her to be openly flirtatious in letters we found to her daughter’s fiance. She loved her husband dearly, but the vacancy inside her couldn’t only be filled by him. Honestly.  It couldn’t be filled by any man.

My own family tree is overflowing with great men and women. It’s also riddled with alcoholism, drug addiction, codependency, perfectionism, emotional disconnection, divorce, and abandonment.

So what do we do with the information that who we are isn’t only the choices we’ve made, but also the things we’ve learned to be as a result of generational brokenness?

First, we understand that knowledge is a gift, even when it’s of the ugly that lurks in our family. Knowledge and awareness creates opportunities for personal growth. We take accountability for our own choices. We recognize the role our family history has played in shaping us, and we chop off that damn root completely. For ourselves, and for our kids. And for their kids.

It only takes one person to change the dynamic of the whole family for generations to come.

We don’t have to chop the whole tree down, just the root that is giving us trouble. Then, come spring, that tree will be blossoming because it will no longer be sending its energy to that nasty root.

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PS: If you are interesting in “rooting out” your family tree, visit my website http://familyresearch.strikingly.com/ to learn about the genealogy research packages I am currently offering at 50% off!

I’m Not That Kind Of Girl

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Yes, that’s me last New Year’s Eve In Victoria, BC with Bigfoot. Yes, I am drinking champagne, thus my chumminess with the squatch. However that’s not what I want to attract your focus. Behold… the pink coat.

In the fall of 2014 I was invited to my neighborhood’s semi-annual CAbi party. In case you are unaware, CAbi stands for Carol Anderson by invitation, and it’s a home-based clothing business. It’s Tupperware for clothes, basically.

Each evening that I go to one of these parties (conveniently held next door every spring and fall) my husband cringes as I walk out the door.

“I’m just going for the wine!” I call out cheerfully.

Every time, though, I come home having placed an order.

This time, however, I was determined not to buy anything. I had recently purged many items in my closet and was going for a simpler life. And less laundry, theoretically.

Then I saw it. I got butterflies. It was beautiful.  And it was pink. Cotton candy pink.

I never wear pink. Ever. I’m not a fluffy, girly person, and because of my body type, wearing pink always makes me feel a bit like a drag queen.

But this coat looked like Marilyn Monroe and Audrey Hepburn wrapped up into one stylish package.

I tried it on, and of course all the ladies at the party insisted this coat was ME, and I just HAD to buy it. I felt like a million bucks.

Alas, this coat was not cheap. True to my word, I went home without placing an order.

A couple weeks went by, and the CAbi rep emailed me to say that she was selling off her samples, and I could buy the coat for 50% off! Of course, 50% off of beau coup is still mucho dinero. (Yes, I am aware those are two different languages. Becoming more globally-minded is one of my New Year’s resolutions.)

My husband was out of town. Could I slip a Pepto Bismol pink coat into my clothing repertoire without him noticing? Not likely. But still… I had to have it.

I waited a month before the grand reveal. If I recall, his exact words were, “Whoa! That’s pink!”

There are only so many events for which a pink (with a capital P) wool coat seems an appropriate choice, so over the past year I have only worn it a handful of times. Every time gets a similar reaction to the first; Whoa. That’s pink.

Yesterday was a frosty  morning and I was headed out to my hair appointment. Knowing I would feel fabulous following my sprucing up at the salon, I decided it was a good day for the pink coat.

My hair is the longest it’s been in a while, and my colorist is slowly evolving me into an auburn color. Right now it’s sort of a mahogany shade, and since I can take zero credit, I will admit it looks amazing. I get lots of compliments, and so every time I get a refresh, I walk with a bit more of a spring in my step.

As I walked to pick Parker up after school, I felt fancy. Classy, even. So many times I show up in yoga pants and a pony tail, so it’s nice to step it up once in a while. He took one look at me and said, “You’re wearing pink.”

“Yes. I’m wearing pink.”

“You never wear pink.”

“I know. ”

“I don’t think I’ve seen you wear pink in like 15 months.”

I have no idea where this random number has come from, and I know it to be inaccurate, but his point is made- I never wear pink. He’s not sure what to do with this sudden shift of color palate.

As we crossed the street, another mom that I don’t know said, “I really like your coat!”

“Thank you!” I beamed.

“You remind me of The Gilmore Girls. I don’t know if you watched that show or know what I’m talking about.”

“I know the show, but I didn’t ever watch it.”

“Oh. Well you remind me of that!”

I gave a little laugh as she crossed the other street, not really knowing to what she might be referring, but hoping it was a good thing.

That evening when my husband got home from work I said, “I got a compliment on my coat today.”

“Oh yeah?”

“A mom at the school came up to me and told me she liked my coat and I reminded her of Gilmore Girls.”

He laughed and said, “Which one?”

“Well the mom, I assume.”

He stared at me for a moment, and then chuckled again.

As we waited in line to order our dinner at the local pizza place, he looked at my coat and said, “You’re taking this awfully well.”

“What?”

“Being told you look like a Gilmore Girl. I would think you were more like the one who dated all the men more than the mom.”

Blink. Blink.

“Um. Are you referring to the GOLDEN GIRLS?!”

He began laughing really hard.

“She said GILMORE girls NOT GOLDEN girls!”

“I kept thinking, wow, she seems okay with this. I would think she’d be really offended.”

I pulled out my phone and googled the following photos:

“THIS is the Gilmore girls:”

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He was really laughing at this point.

“I was so confused. You were like ‘I guess I’m like the mom’ and I was like, ‘really?!’ but you seemed to be rolling with it.”

For reference,

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Blanche (the one who dated a lot of men) did wear a lot of pink, as did Sophia, the mother.

“I wonder what pink coat in the Gilmore Girls she was talking about.” So I googled that as well, and sure enough, there were tons of photos like this:

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Having never watched the show, I was unsure whether this was a running gag, or whether the pink coat was considered a staple piece. Further research revealed that the pink coat was the envy of many viewers, which took the sting out of the fact that my husband thought I looked like a geriatric character.

Here’s the thing;

We all have things we love but feel we “can’t get away with.” (Forgive the dangling preposition) Two piece bathing suits. Skinny jeans. Girly clothes. Statement jewelry. Long hair after a certain age. (I remember telling my friend Marques who cuts my hair that I wanted to grow it out until I was too old to wear it long. He replied, “You’re never to old to wear your hair whichever way you want.”)

I say, wear what we love. Buy into the fantasy for that moment. Do I look more like an Easter peep than Audrey Hepburn in my pink coat? Probably.

I like to imagine myself as “that kind of girl” sometimes. Not all the time, but sometimes. And so I shall continue to wear the pink coat on days when I want to be “that kind of girl.”

 

 

 

 

A Legacy Of Significance

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It’s an innate human desire to leave a legacy. We all want to know that at the end of our time here on this planet, our lives have meant something, had a purpose, and that when we are gone, we will have left a mark of some sort.

It’s a rare occurrence when someone leaves a legacy  like that of Mr. Charles “Tuck” Gionet; For he obtained his own legacy of significance through imbuing a sense of significance in those who had the privilege to know him. Every kid who set foot in his classroom, every athlete that stepped on his track came away a better person from knowing him, and came away believing in their own potential.

As I stood near this tree yesterday, awash in tears, I found that I wasn’t just grieving the loss of this amazing man, but was also overwhelmed with the joy of the beautiful stories I was reading of lives changed forever because he gave so much of his heart, his time, his wisdom.

The second greatest loss, after knowing you will never be able to see someone again, is the realization that you missed your opportunity to tell the person what they meant to you. When I first found out Mr. Gionet (after all this time “Tuck” seems so informal) was fighting cancer, this homage began to write itself. And then I remembered the man, and that he would HATE that. As he said to my mother last year, “What, a guy’s gotta get sick for people to tell him how great he looks?”

Truth is, I never believed it would come to this, or that he wasn’t going to overcome this challenge.

I first sat in Mr. Gionet’s classroom in September 1986. While others had trepidation, as his reputation for toughness was well known throughout the halls of Snohomish Junior High School, I had none. For you see, I already knew a secret many of my classmates didn’t: behind that no-nonsense man was a heart of gold. My older sister Colleen had him as a teacher and track coach in 1983-84, and her admiration for him told me everything I needed to know.

Looking back, it’s unfathomable that he was really only a kid when I first had him as a teacher. He already had a commanding presence in the classroom, and a wisdom that belied his age of 26.

On the very first day of World Cultures he did a name exercise. It started with the first person in the front row, they would say their name, followed by the second person who would say the first person’s name, and then their own. The third person named the first two, then said their own name. It went on like that through the whole classroom, until it came to Mr. Gionet, who would then rattle off every single person’s name; Names he never forgot. Ever.

That year he asked me and another student, my friend Eric, to attend a local government meeting. I can’t remember if it was a county council meeting, or if it was a chamber of commerce meeting, but I do remember that he chose us because he said he saw leadership qualities in us. We each gave speeches about “kids today” and what issues mattered to us, and then we opened it up to questions from the officials at the meeting. I will never forget that feeling of knowing that he saw my potential, and gave me a venue to explore it.

There’s something that happens inside you when someone you admire looks at you and says, “I believe in you.” You are forever changed.

By the time I was a junior in high school, Mr. Gionet had transferred up there, and I got him again as a teacher for U.S. history. While others may have dreaded what they knew would be required of them in his class, I was thrilled.

Our very first assignment that year was to write a persuasive essay, which would be strange in a normal history class, but he was no normal history teacher. He cared less about what our opinions were, much more about our critical thinking skills and how well we could defend those opinions.

This was my essay:

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I don’t know if he really preferred banana Popsicles (see, I’ve learned to spell Popsicles since 1988) or if he was simply playing devil’s advocate. That was pretty much a foretelling of the nature of most of our interactions. He would say something, I would contest it. I would say something, he would challenge me.

For all I know, he actually agreed with me most of the time, but he would never admit it, lest I become complacent.

Last Friday night I was sorting through my high school mementos in anticipation of the next night’s 25th reunion, and I came across this cartoon:

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This satirical comic was printed that year in my high school newspaper, created  by one of my fellow U. S. history classmates. While I believe our banter was was much more congenial and light-hearted than this, it illustrates the point well enough.

Notice the teacher is wearing slacks, a button down shirt and a tie. This was something that mattered a lot to him. Manners mattered a lot to him. Civility mattered a lot to him. Involvement and investment mattered a lot to him. (Also, proper spelling of the words “a lot” mattered to him, as my friend Andy reminded me yesterday.)

That first semester I got a B. I wasn’t happy about that. However, in Mr. Gionet’s class, I knew the grades given were always and only the grades we earned.

Our final major assignment of the school year was an oral report on some major event in U.S. history. I knew if I was going to get an A, I was going to have to go all out.

I chose to do my report on the Vietnam war. I didn’t want to stand up and read dry facts off of note cards. I decided I would create a vignette in which I was a teenager during the war, and I would act out a scene of reading and writing letters with a friend who had been drafted and was serving. I compiled actual letters between my mother and her high school friend from his time in Vietnam. I recorded videos off of TV like “White Rabbit” by Jefferson Airplane to be playing in the background as I read the letters out loud. I infused my mother’s responses with facts about the climate in America and what he could expect when he returned home. And I did all of this dressed head to toe in full hippie gear.

Somewhere in my mother’s house is the VHS recording Mr. Gionet insisted on making of my report, and I can tell you that my transcript showed an A for that semester.

When it came time to get letters of recommendation for my college applications, it was a no-brainer that I was going to ask him. There wasn’t a teacher in that school whose opinion mattered more to me, and who I felt knew my potential the best.

I wasn’t disappointed. He wrote me a letter of recommendation that I have kept and looked at occasionally over the years, if only to remind myself that someone great once believed in me.

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The first time I ran into Mr. Gionet after graduation was at the wedding reception of a close friend. I had dropped out of college after three years and was 7 months pregnant with my first child. I didn’t want to talk to him, because all I could think about was that he would be disappointed in me that I hadn’t reached my potential. He looked me in the eyes and said, “Being a mom is the most important job in the world.” And I believed he meant it because he NEVER said anything he didn’t mean.

As news of his passing began to circulate on Saturday morning, something amazing began unfolding before my eyes. He wasn’t just MY favorite teacher who believed in me and made me believe in myself, he was that to nearly every student he ever had. How can it be that over the course of 30 plus years he could make each and every kid feel significant? But he did. The popular kids. The lost kids. The smart kids. The kids who struggled. The athletes. The loners. The whole damn Breakfast Club stood a little taller because this man told them they were more than, and they BELIEVED HIM BECAUSE HE BELIEVED IT ABOUT THEM. He was able to see what made each kid special. He was able to see where their confidence was lacking. He was able to get all of us to catch his vision of who we could be.

He did this without coddling. “Suck it up!” ” Don’t do anything stupid! ” “Fer cryin’ out loud!” (This was his signature phrase, and I can verify it goes back at least as far as 1987, as my yearbook attests. )

IMG_4561(My friend Robyn wrote that)

He did it by fostering confidence through achievement, creating standards, expectations of personal responsibility. He did it by seeing the innate value in each person, making it a priority to know their name.

The last time I laid eyes on him was last summer at the farmer’s market. He was nearly a year into treatment and still had his Clooney good looks, his ascerbic wit and kick-ass attitude. He was anticipating his son’s upcoming wedding, and scoffed at the invitation he had received to attend the class of ’89’s reunion that weekend.

“No one wants an old teacher hanging out at their reunion.”

As I drove to my own reunion Saturday night, my heart heavy with his loss, the words of old friends as they posted story after story of what he meant to each of them running through my mind, I thought to myself, “I hope he knew.”

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Don’t Be Goofy… The Breakdown of flight 848

I know, I know. It’s been months. I actually wrote a few blogs longhand but never got around to typing them up. I’ve been a woman in transition emotionally, working through some identity issues, and, not surprisingly, it is difficult to write when you’re not sure who you are exactly, much less what you want to say.

I’d love to tell you that my first endeavor at writing a blog since Spring is something substantial or meaningful, but alas, it’s just a story that was too long to put as a Facebook status, so it’s going here.  Also, I had to get this incident off of my chest.

Have you ever met someone who, within mere moments of your first encounter, invades both your personal and emotional space ?

Let me tell you about my seat mate on yesterday’s flight. She reminded me a lot of these old “Goofy How-To” videos…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qb0l9Y4OQg

You know, how Goofy is completely and totally self-absorbed and inconsiderate? That.
Yesterday my husband and I flew home from Hawaii. We were in the “extra legroom” seats, which in retrospect wasn’t worth the upgrade. We hadn’t purchased the seats for the legroom, we upgraded because the flight was full and we didn’t have assigned seats together. Both Jeff and I have short enough legs, so while the extra legroom was nice, it didn’t solve the real issue, which  is how narrow the seats and the aisles are.

Our plane had 3 seats on each side where it should have had two, and an aisle so narrow a stick figure would have to go down sideways. No wonder the airlines all got in trouble for only hiring thin flight attendants. No one with even half a curve can fit. It was merely practicality on their part.

Jeff was on the aisle and I was in the middle. Shortly after we sat down, a woman came up and gestured that she was in the window seat.

She seemed pleasant enough, although slightly flustered. She set her water bottle on the floor and then immediately knocked it over on to me with her foot.

We were in the early boarding group, and the boarding process on Alaska seems much slower than, say, Southwest, where there’s a cattle stampede, they tell everybody to sit down and shut up, and the next thing you know, the plane is taking off.

The woman, we’ll call her, uh, “Goofy” for the purpose of this story, got on her cell phone and called what sounded like either a shuttle service or a car rental office. She spoke with them for a bit and then turned to me.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“Do you know what time in Seattle our plane is supposed to arrive?”

“I think about 9pm.”

“Okay, thank you,” she said, and then I realized, she was still on the phone because she was relaying that information to the person on the other end.

A few minutes later, she got my attention again.

“Can I ask you another question?”

“Sure.”

“Do you happen to know what our flight number is?”

“848.”

“Okay, thank you.”

“No problem.”

Then she began speaking again to the person on the phone.

As we started to back away from the gate, I put my headphones on for my takeoff ritual. I’m okay with flying, (unless there’s turbulence) once we hit the 10,000 foot level and the pilot dings the bell. Until then, I’m a bit of a wreck, with my fingernails puncturing the palm of my husband’s hand. Other than imbibing a double of something at the airport bar, I also jam a Sees butterscotch lollipop in my mouth and put on soothing music. I knew my ipod was low on battery, but unfortunately it was lower than i had realized, and cut out right in the middle of Donny Hathaway crooning and right in the middle of the tarmac.

I quickly switched to my phone, which only has a few random songs on it, most of which is Christmas music for some inexplicable  reason. I did manage to find a song I could live with until we were fully airborne.

Since I already had my phone in my hand, I started playing Candy Crush.

I felt a tap on my arm.

“Are we allowed to use phones on airplanes now?”

“You can use your phone as long as it’s on airplane mode. I use it to play games.”

The flight attendants came by three times. The first was to  rent movie players. Goofy waited until they had already passed us to nudge me to get the attendant’s attention so she could rent one.

They next came by for drink orders. She had her headphones in and didn’t hear the request, so I had to get her attention. She ordered red wine.

When they came by for trash, Jeff and I handed all of our trash over. Once they had passed by, Goofy THEN started pulling out her trash and handed it to me to give to the FA. Jeff had to once again get their attention.

A  little while later the flight attendants (FA) announced they were going to be serving food  for payment. They said the only hot meal  was the hula chicken bowl, or something like that.

Goofy pulled out her menu. she then tapped me on the arm.

“I need to use the bathroom. If they come by, tell them I want this,” and pointed to the  picture of the miso chicken.

Besides the fact that you cannot order hot food without paying for it, leaving me in the awkward position of either telling the FA what she wanted, and that they would have to collect from her later, or paying for it myself.

“Um, that’s actually on the flights TO Hawaii. FROM Hawaii the only hot meal is THIS,” i explained, pointing to the hula chicken bowl.

“Oh,” She frowned.

“They have the Beecher’s cheese platter, and then any of these snack packs.”

She looked for a minute and then said, “If they come before I’m back I want THIS,” pointing to the Mediterranean snack pack.

I didn’t bring up the “how am I supposed to deal with payment” part of the issue. Jeff got up into the aisle and let her pass.  When he sat down he said, “One more question and you should be getting paid for your services.”

Thankfully she got back before the cart reached us.

She did offer her snack olives to me which I thought was nice. Jeff and I continued to watch our movie.

As the cart came back around for trash,  once again, she waited until AFTER the FA had passed by to start digging around, and handed me her trash. I held it for a moment, bewildered, as I had no place to put it. She took it back from me, and then called out to the attendant who was passing by to see to another passenger.

When the next drink service came around, she ordered another wine, and then said, ” I don’t suppose I could have another piece of chocolate.”

The FA looked at her questioningly and said, “Pardon?”

Goofy said, ” Well I had a chocolate in my snack pack. I want another piece, but i don’t want to buy another snack pack.”

The attendant pulled out a drawer. “White chocolate or milk chocolate?”

“I just want chocolate. Regular chocolate.”

The FA said, “All we have is white. ” And tossed it on her tray.

A while later she got up to use the bathroom again. Jeff said, “The drink cart is coming. How much you want to bet she will come right after they pass by and then be annoyed that she doesn’t have a drink?”

She did manage to make it back, though, just in time.

When the third drink service reached us, she said, “Do you have any pineapple juice?”

The FA said, “No I’m sorry. We only have POG. Passion orange guava.”

“Do you have any herbal tea?”

“We have orange tea and black tea.”

“You don’t have any peppermint?”

“No, ma’am. Orange and black tea.”

Sigh.

“I guess I’ll have orange.”

She got her tea, pulled out the in-flight magazine and began reading. At this point, our movie had finished, and I was reading my Kindle. We were 4 hours in to a 5 hour and 15 minute flight.

I heard a sniffle.

“Hmm,” I thought to myself. “She must have a cold, that’s why she’s drinking tea.”

Sniff sniff.

I tried to ignore it, but the sniffles kept coming.

And then I heard what sounded like a cat’s mewl.

I glanced over.

She was curled up facing the wall and she was crying. Not a silent cry. Not a tear or two gently wiped away sort of cry. A body-shaking simpering whimpering cry.

I looked at Jeff who was listening to music with headphones. His eyes were closed. I nudged him. He looked at me questioningly.

“She’s crying,” I mouthed.

“What?”

“She’s crying,” I mouthed again, this time with more enunciation.

He pulled his earbud out and leaned in.

“She’s crying,” i whispered through gritted teeth.

He glanced over my head. “Why?”

I whispered in his ear. “I have no idea. One minute she was drinking her tea reading the magazine, the next she was shaking and crying.”

He shrugged his shoulders and put his ear bud back in.

That left me, who was pretending to read, but was really trying to determine what my responsibility was to this woman, to deal with it. Should I pretend I don’t notice to give her privacy? Should I ask her what’s wrong, knowing that question may drag me into spending the next hour of the flight trying to emotionally stabilize a complete stranger?

Before I had to make a decision, she blew her nose, faced forward, pulled up the sweatshirt that had been draped across her lap, folded it, placed it on the arm rest between us, and spread her entire self out like she was in a lazyboy. My eyes grew big as I felt her elbow not only breach my side of the armrest,but breach the side of my body, digging in hard.

I contorted away from it, pushing into Jeff, who was already nursing wounds from every person who had tried to maneuver down the aisle, not to mention the multiple times the cart had passed by. He pushed back a little.

I made eye contact with him and he removed his ear bud. “Her elbow is digging in to my side. ”

“Say something.”

“I can’t. She just stopped crying.”

“Push back.”

I grimaced at him and adjusted my position so that I was facing straight ahead. She leaned towards me, her elbow further in. I leaned forward, bent over, trying to pretend that it wasn’t the most unnatural position. I looked down at her feet, which were splayed  wide and also encroached far into my personal space.

My already smallish amount of empathy for whatever had led her to have an emotional breakdown began to dissipate rapidly.

The attendants announced that we would soon begin our initial descent and that it was time to prepare for landing, including tray tables, trash collection, seat backs, and tablet collection.

Goofy of course missed both the trash collection and the tablet collection, causing me to have to flag the FA down.

We heard the bell ding and felt the plane start to nose downward. At that exact moment, Goofy chose to lay her seat all the way back.

I gasped. The rule follower in me just about lost it.

After our plane landed, I had determined to pretend Goofy didn’t exist. I didn’t want to engage her in any way.

We exited the aircraft, and I sensed her behind me. We got to the inter-concourse train station and suddenly I realized she was standing right next to me.

When the train arrived, I followed Jeff in and faced him. I knew she had gotten on and was behind me.

We got to baggage claim, where there was some confusion about which carousel, and as I saw her coming towards me, I braced myself for her to ask for my assistance.

I may very well be a cold, heartless person, insensitive to the needs of an obviously troubled woman. This time, for some reason, I think I can live with that.

You see, I’m the kind of person who tends to take on responsibility for the problems of other people. I’m a fixer. My therapist has a more technical term for it, but that’s a whole other story. My point is that while my attitude and responses may put out a “whatever ” vibe, inside I’m a wreck, trying to solve the problem of someone I don’t even know. Those 5 plus hours with her actually took an emotional toll on me, and it’s kind of unfair to do that to a stranger. Perhaps she didn’t realize the effect she was having on me, but I got the sense from this one interaction with her, that there are probably many people in her life who feel exactly as I felt whenever she’s around.

We have a choice every day to be either a blessing or a curse to someone. I’ll admit, I was no blessing to her. She sure as heck was no blessing to me either, so we’re even, right?

My therapist is gonna have a field day with this.