Do you know how hard it is
To be named Grace?
Daily, weekly I am reminded
It is not an easy task
It is not an easy commandment
Grace is
Forgiveness, lightness
Justice and peace
Love undeserved
Life born again
Grace is
A warm heart
A gentle hand
Strength for those who need it most
Redemption and reclamation
I see it everywhere, my name
It is in the Bible, the church
Shouts it from the pulpit weekly
My mother accepted it to be cured of her disease
My professor found it to save her life
So many things to
So many people
But I am Grace
I am forgiveness, lightness
I am justice and peace
To all who don't deserve it
Or I hope I am
Or one day will be.
Friday, December 5, 2014
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Teenage Wasteland
I returned to my city this week.
When I was 18, I entered Boston with stars in my eyes and new shoes on my feet, lugging a hamper full of Target-fresh dorm essentials into a cramped and creaking elevator 17 stories into the Boston skyline, certain that I'd chosen the best 4 years of my life already. I know now that that wasn't to be; in fact, within the first week I had serious doubts about the world I'd thrown myself into, but I tried to shrug them off as freshmen blues.
It wasn't the drinking or the rape jokes or the cold winter air that did it to me, nor was it the complete and total lack of anyone from my geographical area (and therefore culture, although I didn't understand that at the time). It was the attitude. It was the complete culture of Boston University, the absolute and oblivious assurance with which my classmates clutched the silver spoons they so vehemently denied to me. "I can't believe my parents only give me $600 a month, that's just...not enough." "Can you throw $40 for the handles we need for tonight?" "I just added $100 in dining dollars, my parents will be in for a surprise in a few weeks..."
I tried. I really tried to avoid the cynicism, to relate to the people I met from Napa and New York City and the Hamptons. I really wanted to ignore how terrible it made me feel when they talked about our $40,000 tuition like it was no big deal, sighing that it was so expensive (for their parents), but it would be worth it, right? And there are always loans, right? I tried to convince myself that my awful, ugly, prison-like horror of a dorm building was worth $16,500 a year in room and board. I tried to tell myself that all those hours spent poring over AP textbooks, earning my 4.2, earning my 98% ACT score, were worth landing in Boston, across the river from the school I had once dreamed of attending. The best place to be a college student. The best school my parents' money could buy.
I couldn't do it. I couldn't forget that I was the oldest, that my two younger brothers deserved to have college money too. I couldn't forget that my mother was a social worker who would starve herself, forgo a desperately needed new car, forgo a bigger apartment, to be able to give me the school we thought I deserved. I couldn't forget that all those thousands spent for gen eds, for classrooms dating back to the 1980s, for a university police force that didn't care in the face of rape, voyeurism, hurt students--all those thousands could have done so much good for people really in need. What were my parents really paying for? The experience of a lifetime? I knew college was supposed to be the best 4 years of my life, and I kept waiting and waiting to feel like I was having a dizzying, exhilarating amount of fun and new experiences and lasting memories.
All of this I've thought about before. But when I returned this time last year, when my friends were sophomores, free from the hulking monstrosity of Warren, I knew I wished I had stayed. It was irrational, it was hypocritical, but the allure of my old friends, my old city--I wished I had stayed. I knew I'd made the right fiscal choice in going to Knoxville, but I wanted to go back. I thought I fit there, and stepping back into Boston was like putting on an old pair of Chucks, holes and all. I remember walking down the Commonwealth Mall near Berklee, snapping pictures of the trees and brownstones and being so, so glad to be alive. How I feel now doesn't take away from the wonder of that trip: riding the T again to Copley so I could sit in the library for a few hours, strolling through the Common and revisiting the ducks at the Public Garden, marveling at Kenmore at night, our northern star flashing and glittering atop the BU bookstore.
But when I returned this year, it was different. I was different. I wear my accent proudly, I happily tell people I'm from Tennessee, I can't wait to show off pictures of my cat or tell people where to get good barbecue in Knoxville, if they ever accidentally wander there. I've defended the south to people who have never been there but think we're all backwoods yokels who married our cousins and only think about politics insofar as we want to keep our guns. I don't fit here anymore. I look around and feel apathy, a thing I never expected to feel in Boston. All the strangers passing me, still wearing designer clothing, still carrying their designer bags, speaking Cantonese, Mandarin, Korean, Spanish, English, all the people desperately trying to "BE YOU" by being just like their peers--I feel like they see me as I move by and know I'm not one of them, I'm not someone buying into their spiel. I am not a prisoner to BU's exorbitant tuition. I can freely say that I think they extort their students, and for once, I can honestly say Thank God that I am not here for that. I miss driving. I miss the mountains. I miss stars. I waited for this trip, anticipated it, but I'm counting the days now that I'm here. Who knew. Who knew it would be this way.
Growing pains suck. This is the second one I've suffered this year, but with each step I'm growing. I love my friends here, and I'm savoring every moment with them, but as for the city? I would sooner see them in Knoxville than here, and once again I'm reminded that letting places become anchors rather than people is unwise in the end.
When I was 18, I entered Boston with stars in my eyes and new shoes on my feet, lugging a hamper full of Target-fresh dorm essentials into a cramped and creaking elevator 17 stories into the Boston skyline, certain that I'd chosen the best 4 years of my life already. I know now that that wasn't to be; in fact, within the first week I had serious doubts about the world I'd thrown myself into, but I tried to shrug them off as freshmen blues.
It wasn't the drinking or the rape jokes or the cold winter air that did it to me, nor was it the complete and total lack of anyone from my geographical area (and therefore culture, although I didn't understand that at the time). It was the attitude. It was the complete culture of Boston University, the absolute and oblivious assurance with which my classmates clutched the silver spoons they so vehemently denied to me. "I can't believe my parents only give me $600 a month, that's just...not enough." "Can you throw $40 for the handles we need for tonight?" "I just added $100 in dining dollars, my parents will be in for a surprise in a few weeks..."
I tried. I really tried to avoid the cynicism, to relate to the people I met from Napa and New York City and the Hamptons. I really wanted to ignore how terrible it made me feel when they talked about our $40,000 tuition like it was no big deal, sighing that it was so expensive (for their parents), but it would be worth it, right? And there are always loans, right? I tried to convince myself that my awful, ugly, prison-like horror of a dorm building was worth $16,500 a year in room and board. I tried to tell myself that all those hours spent poring over AP textbooks, earning my 4.2, earning my 98% ACT score, were worth landing in Boston, across the river from the school I had once dreamed of attending. The best place to be a college student. The best school my parents' money could buy.
I couldn't do it. I couldn't forget that I was the oldest, that my two younger brothers deserved to have college money too. I couldn't forget that my mother was a social worker who would starve herself, forgo a desperately needed new car, forgo a bigger apartment, to be able to give me the school we thought I deserved. I couldn't forget that all those thousands spent for gen eds, for classrooms dating back to the 1980s, for a university police force that didn't care in the face of rape, voyeurism, hurt students--all those thousands could have done so much good for people really in need. What were my parents really paying for? The experience of a lifetime? I knew college was supposed to be the best 4 years of my life, and I kept waiting and waiting to feel like I was having a dizzying, exhilarating amount of fun and new experiences and lasting memories.
All of this I've thought about before. But when I returned this time last year, when my friends were sophomores, free from the hulking monstrosity of Warren, I knew I wished I had stayed. It was irrational, it was hypocritical, but the allure of my old friends, my old city--I wished I had stayed. I knew I'd made the right fiscal choice in going to Knoxville, but I wanted to go back. I thought I fit there, and stepping back into Boston was like putting on an old pair of Chucks, holes and all. I remember walking down the Commonwealth Mall near Berklee, snapping pictures of the trees and brownstones and being so, so glad to be alive. How I feel now doesn't take away from the wonder of that trip: riding the T again to Copley so I could sit in the library for a few hours, strolling through the Common and revisiting the ducks at the Public Garden, marveling at Kenmore at night, our northern star flashing and glittering atop the BU bookstore.
But when I returned this year, it was different. I was different. I wear my accent proudly, I happily tell people I'm from Tennessee, I can't wait to show off pictures of my cat or tell people where to get good barbecue in Knoxville, if they ever accidentally wander there. I've defended the south to people who have never been there but think we're all backwoods yokels who married our cousins and only think about politics insofar as we want to keep our guns. I don't fit here anymore. I look around and feel apathy, a thing I never expected to feel in Boston. All the strangers passing me, still wearing designer clothing, still carrying their designer bags, speaking Cantonese, Mandarin, Korean, Spanish, English, all the people desperately trying to "BE YOU" by being just like their peers--I feel like they see me as I move by and know I'm not one of them, I'm not someone buying into their spiel. I am not a prisoner to BU's exorbitant tuition. I can freely say that I think they extort their students, and for once, I can honestly say Thank God that I am not here for that. I miss driving. I miss the mountains. I miss stars. I waited for this trip, anticipated it, but I'm counting the days now that I'm here. Who knew. Who knew it would be this way.
Growing pains suck. This is the second one I've suffered this year, but with each step I'm growing. I love my friends here, and I'm savoring every moment with them, but as for the city? I would sooner see them in Knoxville than here, and once again I'm reminded that letting places become anchors rather than people is unwise in the end.
Tuesday, September 17, 2013
For my brother
In my dreams, I see my brother.
He is fluid, moving from place to place, his face flickering from young to old, his voice both distant and near. I am searching for him, trying desperately to reach him in time, before he fades away again.
He asks me things, advice, questions about our past and his future. I want to know when I can see him again. He says he does not know. I ask why he isn't closer to me, and he says he didn't choose this path.
I can hear him laughing, see his face as it was when we were children. His eyes were always so serious for a boy so young, dark, seeing all. He was vulnerable. When he smiled, it made you smile, it made you forget those serious eyes. He was quiet, but his laugh was golden. I want to go back and apologize for being the bullying older sister that I was. I want to do it over again, try to right our wrongs. I want to find the places where he was hurt and fix them, so that his eyes will be less serious and his laugh more frequent.
I have known him for his whole life, but he is still a mystery to me. His ways are different, his thoughts of a different hue than mine. He is funny and sly in ways I am not, and his ambitions, his habits, are foreign to me. It has always baffled me, this difference in essence. Since I was old enough to look at him and see a person, not a pesky little brother, I have wanted to reach him. I want to see things as he does, for we are so different.
I wonder if he still admires me. Growing up, my parents told me time and again that he only wanted to be like me, and I didn't understand. When we were older, I often seemed to have more influence over him than they did, but I still couldn't reach him, for all that I tried. I tried to find his hurt and heal it, and found that I could not. I'm still trying.
In my dreams, I see my brother, but even though I am his older sister, he always seems older than me. And despite the fact that I am searching for him because he needs me, I know that in truth, I am searching because I need him.
He is fluid, moving from place to place, his face flickering from young to old, his voice both distant and near. I am searching for him, trying desperately to reach him in time, before he fades away again.
He asks me things, advice, questions about our past and his future. I want to know when I can see him again. He says he does not know. I ask why he isn't closer to me, and he says he didn't choose this path.
I can hear him laughing, see his face as it was when we were children. His eyes were always so serious for a boy so young, dark, seeing all. He was vulnerable. When he smiled, it made you smile, it made you forget those serious eyes. He was quiet, but his laugh was golden. I want to go back and apologize for being the bullying older sister that I was. I want to do it over again, try to right our wrongs. I want to find the places where he was hurt and fix them, so that his eyes will be less serious and his laugh more frequent.
I have known him for his whole life, but he is still a mystery to me. His ways are different, his thoughts of a different hue than mine. He is funny and sly in ways I am not, and his ambitions, his habits, are foreign to me. It has always baffled me, this difference in essence. Since I was old enough to look at him and see a person, not a pesky little brother, I have wanted to reach him. I want to see things as he does, for we are so different.
I wonder if he still admires me. Growing up, my parents told me time and again that he only wanted to be like me, and I didn't understand. When we were older, I often seemed to have more influence over him than they did, but I still couldn't reach him, for all that I tried. I tried to find his hurt and heal it, and found that I could not. I'm still trying.
In my dreams, I see my brother, but even though I am his older sister, he always seems older than me. And despite the fact that I am searching for him because he needs me, I know that in truth, I am searching because I need him.
Monday, February 25, 2013
We Fell
If I go back and retrace where my hand has led me, over smooth pages touched with blue and black and this blog, started when I was young and filled with a fire I couldn't name, I find new things each time. There are truisms I hit upon years ago that only resonate now, past experiences nearly forgotten that lay in wait for me to stumble upon and shake my head at as I go back, back to all the times and places I've lived in.
You still remember all the places you used to go, from the window seat in my first remembered home where I used to watch for my dad, to the crooks of the apple trees I used to sit in and read on hot summer days, to the den at my nana's house where I have sat and listened since I was small. I remember so many moments in the woods of my youth, on the soccer fields, in the cul-de-sacs. And I wonder now, as I try to put it all back together--what does it mean, if anything? How has who I am today changed who I was then?
The past is not concrete. It shimmers, it changes as you do. If you don't believe me, think to a before and after. For me, it is easy: there is a before the divorce and and after; there is a before Preston and an after. Think of an old lover: there is a before and an after. But if you try--if you sit and think and try--you will find that the before cannot be the same once the after is upon you. I remember those afternoons in Bellevue and Preston and know that my parents were happier, but I cannot recall a moment where it is visible. There are a few golden moments, perhaps, all written down and polished a thousand times over, but surely there were more? surely I knew then that they were happy?
Who you were builds who you are, but who you are changes who you were. You gain perspectives, you earn windows into your past where you can reevaluate and pass judgment. But you should be wary: the past will fight back, truth will attempt to surface, and then--
Then it is up to you who you listen to: who you were, or who you are.
You still remember all the places you used to go, from the window seat in my first remembered home where I used to watch for my dad, to the crooks of the apple trees I used to sit in and read on hot summer days, to the den at my nana's house where I have sat and listened since I was small. I remember so many moments in the woods of my youth, on the soccer fields, in the cul-de-sacs. And I wonder now, as I try to put it all back together--what does it mean, if anything? How has who I am today changed who I was then?
The past is not concrete. It shimmers, it changes as you do. If you don't believe me, think to a before and after. For me, it is easy: there is a before the divorce and and after; there is a before Preston and an after. Think of an old lover: there is a before and an after. But if you try--if you sit and think and try--you will find that the before cannot be the same once the after is upon you. I remember those afternoons in Bellevue and Preston and know that my parents were happier, but I cannot recall a moment where it is visible. There are a few golden moments, perhaps, all written down and polished a thousand times over, but surely there were more? surely I knew then that they were happy?
Who you were builds who you are, but who you are changes who you were. You gain perspectives, you earn windows into your past where you can reevaluate and pass judgment. But you should be wary: the past will fight back, truth will attempt to surface, and then--
Then it is up to you who you listen to: who you were, or who you are.
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Excerpts
This notebook is full of searching and finding and looking and seeing--when was I ever so profound?
How is it that I used to know God so well and feel Him so intimately, yet now I can't remember the last time I felt the whisper of anything greater than myself inside me?
I did what I thought I should, I've surrounded myself with pictures and reminders of that holy place, assuming the peace and comfort it brought me would be remembered, but somewhere along the way I lost it. I've been staring at this beautiful illumination for awhile now.
Be Still, let the Tide of Memories wash over you
Listen to the Whispers of the Saints
Feel the Breath of Wisdom refresh your mind
Return to the Place of Peace
your Holy Island
All this it exhorts me, and I've tried and tried to bring any or all of those things to fruition, but I don't know where my Holy Island is anymore. Those remembered places, so dutifully copied down in this little grey book, don't resonate now.
One memory does, however.
It was the day of the Cuddy ducks on the ocean by Lindisfarne, a cold, grey day where the wind needled me and the light, icy rain hurt my face and eyes. I was so--full that day, full with an angst I couldn't name and I didn't have cause for. I set off alone and went deep into the nature preserve on the far side of the island, where I was whipped by razor-sharp sea grass and the wind was even worse. I followed the crashing of the sea to a rise and sat and watched the ocean writhe and beat itself into oblivion agaisnt the rocks, and I remember trying to pray but not finding any of the right words to say.
I'm still sitting there now, being turned to numb stone by the freezing wind, watching the sea try mightily to devour the seaside and those hapless ducks, I'm sitting in a silence so resolute as to be belligerent, and where did my God go? Where did my faith and intimacy and belief go?
When I was 16 I had my own issues to handle, still, but I hadn't lived through what I have now. Somewhere, between the suicide of my friend's mother and going to Boston and losing my faith mentor and the disintegration of a three year romance and coming home again, I grew but my faith did not. And now I sit in a pew on Sundays and enjoy saying the familiar words, but don't get any of that peace anymore. God still exists, I suspect, but where he is in my life, I'm not sure, and I don't know how to go after him. I don't know if I want to; maybe I'm scared of being disappointed and deepening this crisis of faith.
Oh, to be 16 and in that place again, where I could reconcile what didn't make sense to me with little difficulty.
Ultimately that day I spent on the dune was the same day I walked the Pilgrim's Way and reveled in the glory of companionship and faith.
I'd forgotten.
How is it that I used to know God so well and feel Him so intimately, yet now I can't remember the last time I felt the whisper of anything greater than myself inside me?
I did what I thought I should, I've surrounded myself with pictures and reminders of that holy place, assuming the peace and comfort it brought me would be remembered, but somewhere along the way I lost it. I've been staring at this beautiful illumination for awhile now.
Be Still, let the Tide of Memories wash over you
Listen to the Whispers of the Saints
Feel the Breath of Wisdom refresh your mind
Return to the Place of Peace
your Holy Island
All this it exhorts me, and I've tried and tried to bring any or all of those things to fruition, but I don't know where my Holy Island is anymore. Those remembered places, so dutifully copied down in this little grey book, don't resonate now.
One memory does, however.
It was the day of the Cuddy ducks on the ocean by Lindisfarne, a cold, grey day where the wind needled me and the light, icy rain hurt my face and eyes. I was so--full that day, full with an angst I couldn't name and I didn't have cause for. I set off alone and went deep into the nature preserve on the far side of the island, where I was whipped by razor-sharp sea grass and the wind was even worse. I followed the crashing of the sea to a rise and sat and watched the ocean writhe and beat itself into oblivion agaisnt the rocks, and I remember trying to pray but not finding any of the right words to say.
I'm still sitting there now, being turned to numb stone by the freezing wind, watching the sea try mightily to devour the seaside and those hapless ducks, I'm sitting in a silence so resolute as to be belligerent, and where did my God go? Where did my faith and intimacy and belief go?
When I was 16 I had my own issues to handle, still, but I hadn't lived through what I have now. Somewhere, between the suicide of my friend's mother and going to Boston and losing my faith mentor and the disintegration of a three year romance and coming home again, I grew but my faith did not. And now I sit in a pew on Sundays and enjoy saying the familiar words, but don't get any of that peace anymore. God still exists, I suspect, but where he is in my life, I'm not sure, and I don't know how to go after him. I don't know if I want to; maybe I'm scared of being disappointed and deepening this crisis of faith.
Oh, to be 16 and in that place again, where I could reconcile what didn't make sense to me with little difficulty.
Ultimately that day I spent on the dune was the same day I walked the Pilgrim's Way and reveled in the glory of companionship and faith.
I'd forgotten.
Sunday, November 11, 2012
Kettering
I was 13 when we met, and I'd never pretend I knew you well. You were a friend of a friend; we'd all talk sometimes after Film School Sunday mornings or we'd sit near one another at Selah Sunday nights. I remember playing Guitar Hero or Rock Band together on game night, laughing and goofing off. Later, when I dated your best friend, I remember visiting skeleton houses with you--we took turns pushing your wheelchair, and shouted down at you from half-finished windows.
And the hospital. I visited you there. What I remember best is the visceral shock I felt at seeing your laptop sitting innocently where your leg should have been. And the quietness of the ride home after.
But while we were not good friends, while I never knew much about you or spent time alone with you, something about your life and death left an indelible mark on me that I haven't been able to shake. I see hot air balloons and think of it, I hear certain songs and go back to that moment days before you left, when my mom said as gently as she could that you had the look, there was no coming back. To the text I got at 3:00 on a normal afternoon, and the strange emptiness that followed.
Maybe it was that I was in my prime and felt myself invincible, yet watched you dwindle away, only a year older than me. Maybe it was my overwhelming sensitivity to all kinds of injustice then, as I was mired in divorce and a new social climate. More likely it was the first time I was ever faced with such an inescapably wrong outcome and reality. Whatever the case, I haven't been able to escape your memory any more than I've been able to understand why someone, anyone like you should have to be ravaged at 16 and lose a battle with an unfeeling disease.
Whatever the case, Josh, I still remember you and seek to honor that memory. I regret that I didn't know you better, but you taught me an incredible amount about the tenacity of the human spirit in the time I did spend with you. Your memory continues to inform the way I value others and respect the sanctity of life. I hope that wherever you are, you're happy and whole and smiling that infectious smile. You earned that much and more.
And the hospital. I visited you there. What I remember best is the visceral shock I felt at seeing your laptop sitting innocently where your leg should have been. And the quietness of the ride home after.
But while we were not good friends, while I never knew much about you or spent time alone with you, something about your life and death left an indelible mark on me that I haven't been able to shake. I see hot air balloons and think of it, I hear certain songs and go back to that moment days before you left, when my mom said as gently as she could that you had the look, there was no coming back. To the text I got at 3:00 on a normal afternoon, and the strange emptiness that followed.
Maybe it was that I was in my prime and felt myself invincible, yet watched you dwindle away, only a year older than me. Maybe it was my overwhelming sensitivity to all kinds of injustice then, as I was mired in divorce and a new social climate. More likely it was the first time I was ever faced with such an inescapably wrong outcome and reality. Whatever the case, I haven't been able to escape your memory any more than I've been able to understand why someone, anyone like you should have to be ravaged at 16 and lose a battle with an unfeeling disease.
Whatever the case, Josh, I still remember you and seek to honor that memory. I regret that I didn't know you better, but you taught me an incredible amount about the tenacity of the human spirit in the time I did spend with you. Your memory continues to inform the way I value others and respect the sanctity of life. I hope that wherever you are, you're happy and whole and smiling that infectious smile. You earned that much and more.
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Speak, but don't confide.
Fall in love and fall apart,
Things will end before they start.
This was an idea I first had three years ago while in the midst of discovering many new bands with powerful lyrics: what if I took the best lines from the songs I knew and put them together to tell my own story? This piecemeal effort is what you'll find below, with all song and artist credits at the end of the post. No plagiarism was intended. Enjoy.
Tell me what you saw in me, and I'll try to replicate it with a scene:
All my delight, all that mattered,
I couldn't be at rest.
From what I liked, from what I gathered,
I couldn't be my best.
I never meant to cause you pain
Don't go, no
I never meant to lead you on,
Stay with me until I sleep within your arms
I only meant to please me, however.
But we can do much more together
I'm nothing but a selfish man
I could still love you through each stumble, shift and sway
And did you think I'd stay the night?
If it pleases you to leave me, just go,
And did you think I'd love you forever?
For I have no spell on you, it's all a ghost
So don't carry on, carrying efforts, oh no
Somewhere there's room for each of us to grow
If you want to live a lie, and love what you lose
I'd become what I hated when I was with you
But every option I have costs more than I've got.
No man is an island, this I know
The end will come slow
But can't you see that maybe you were the ocean, and I was just a stone?
And love breaks your heart
I know when all's said we're the same.
But love without pain isn't really romance.
I can't get out of what I'm into with you,
Does it trouble your head the way you trouble mine?
Shed your love, shed your love
What might have been lost--
------
I can remember when it was good,
Moments of happiness in bloom
All of the love we left behind,
Watching the flashbacks intertwine,
Memories I will never find.
Step down, just once learn how to be alone
The ground beneath me gone
The sky might open up
And sometimes I can't believe it,
But I'm moving past the feeling and into the light.
Because, after all, it's just one of those things.
-------
Falling Away With You -- Muse
We Looked Like Giants -- Death Cab
What's Wrong -- Grizzly Bear
This Song -- Grizzly Bear
Sleeping Ute (title) -- Grizzly Bear
Speak in Rounds -- Grizzly Bear
Holland -- Sufjan Stevens
Impossible Soul -- Sufjan Stevens
Enchanting Ghost -- Sufjan Stevens
Only This Moment -- Royksopp
7/4 (Shoreline) -- Broken Social Scene
The Suburbs -- Arcade Fire
The Wolves -- Bon Iver
Black Flies -- Ben Howard
All We Ask -- Grizzly Bear
Exile Vilify -- The National
Believing is Art -- Spoon
Shed Your Love -- The Helio Sequence
Plans -- Grizzly Bear
Fire Away -- Dawes
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