Fear of Falling: Improv Jazz and My Wellbeing

I love jazz. I also have a great discomfort with jazz, specifically improvisational jazz. As I listen, I start to feel anxious as the piano and percussion pull farther and farther apart such that one or both will fall out of the song. I feel as disquiet arise in me when a song I “know” takes a turn I wasn’t expecting and now I don’t know where we’re going anymore. It’s as if the security blanket I turn to music to be suddenly smells and feels like it’s not my blanket so not very comforting.

I try to tell myself that perhaps that’s okay. Getting pushed out of comfort zones is a good thing, it builds stamina and resiliency. But is that really true? Why do I keep doing this to myself? Why don’t I just stick to Louis Armstrong standards instead of drifting back to Art Tatum, Thelonious Monk, and Dan Tepfer? At some point I have to say to myself, “you’re just causing your own tension.”

Well, I suppose I am. As uncomfortable as improv jazz makes me, I’m made better by it. It makes me think and challenge my norms. It makes me ask about the intentions of the artist. It also makes me discern the difference between a shift of genius and a shift of folly because not all improv is good improv. At times, it even connects me to racial and socioeconomic reflections because of the spirit that moves within the music.

Yet, even as I acknowledge the gifts of jazz, I also know that I can’t listen to it all the time. It makes me think and feel too much. That’s when I go back to songs that are more compact and tight in their presentation. That could mean a lot of styles of music. Frankly, what pop has going for it is its predictability and limited range. Sometimes I just need to know what’s coming next and that’s okay. Other times, I need to connect to a memory or disconnect from the present. Regardless, it can’t always be jazz.

I guess what I’m getting at is the obvious. There is a time and a place for almost all musical genres. There is a reason why we love soundtracks and our lives have their own soundtracks as well. Music moves us and moves with us and for that I’m grateful.

I’d Do It All over Again… All of It

I’m having a bad day and when I have a bad day I write or draw or both. Today, you are the unwitting recipient of my bad day reflections. This bad day is brought to you by a phone call from my doctor telling me that a test I had the other week had some very concerning results. She wanted me to come to her office ASAP. Fortunately, I work right next to my doctor’s office so I was able to leave work and go straight over. 

When I arrived, she told me that she needed to do a biopsy of some cells, blah, blah, blah… of course by this point I couldn't hear much of what she said because I had hit my saturation level of stress for the day because this new thing means that both my wife and I are struggling with major health concerns. At any rate, we did the biopsy this afternoon and I hope to hear the results by the end of this week. 

But all this is not why I’m writing. See, for the umpteen thousandth time, I had to consider the question of “What if I die soon?” It’s a useful question when discerning practical matters like wills and such but that question never resides simply in the mind. For most of us, the only reason we sit down to think of the practical considerations is as a matter of lessening the emotional worries. The reality is that the emotional matters of fear, loss, and worry are what arise in most of us when faced with the question of our death or the death of a loved one. 

And those feelings and questions are where my family and I have been for the last 18+ months. I’ve walked through my mother’s death and the legacy of reckoning with an irreparable relationship. In other family members, I’ve faced untreated mental illness and substance abuse which often lead to death. I’ve also faced the very real and ongoing possibility of losing my wife to unexpected illness. Now, my own health is back in focus as well.

But even that is not why I’m writing. I’m writing because all this brings up more than just fear of loss and the unknown. It also brings up the question of regret. Are there anchors of shame I’m dragging behind me? Are there relationships that should (note the difference between could and should) be repaired? Are there milestones left undone? 

Of course the answer is yes for all of those questions. The honest answer is that I have lots of pain, heartache, and unpursued dreams in the ripples and wake of my life. My life story contains abuse, trauma, bipolar disease, cancer and all manner of crude survival techniques to get through decades of suicidal thoughts and haunting forces so I damn well should have events that I wish could have been another way. Nevertheless, I don’t look back with regret and I try to release the shame because those dark waters are nothing compared to the wonder and meaning in the journey to get here. 

The truth is that I did the best I could every step of the way given who I am and the resources available to me. The number of moments, relationships, and resources that would have had to be different in my life to produce a different outcome are beyond my capacity. But I do know that I tapped into every resource that came my way and never lost sight of the hope that tomorrow would be different… and it always was. But greatest of all, I held onto the wonder and the meaning. 

Whether I live 50 days or 50 more years, the moments I passed through had meaning and I’ve shared that meaning with others to the best of my ability. Even during years of constant suicidal thoughts and depression, I survived on the moments where I saw glimmers of love, flashes of God, shining through other people. Still today, if I lost my wife to unimaginable illness, I’ve been blessed by our time in a way that I vow to always share in the world for its betterment. 

See, as much as I was overwhelmed by the prospect of cancer this morning, I’m even more clear that every moment has been worth it. I think it’s a false dichotomy to suggest that the opposite of regret is acceptance. The opposite of regret is resilient thriving in the meaning. Sure I want to lose 100lbs, coach rugby, publish extensively, and get a PhD but none of those accomplishments and none of my failures will ever count for more than the meaning in the moments that made them. 

I pray that all may know the meaning of their moments and grow from every one of them into a love of life and a passion for sharing that wonder. Amen.

Mother’s Day Angst

I never feel happy about Mother's Day. It always leaves me feeling burdened with ghosts of the past. But this year is way worse than usual. I recognize that it is in part to do with my mom's recent death but I can't find the words to explain or safe harbor to explore how bad it feels. Maybe it's because it snuck up on me. I've been so busy. Maybe there just aren't good opportunities to explore this on other days. Regardless, I'm making my situation worse and I don't know what proactive steps I need to take to move forward in healthy ways.

I'm also realizing as I sit with this that my extra pain is also about my brother. In many ways, I've had a mother role with him and I'm in the God forsaken place of watching him languish in depression, anxiety, and addiction. Worst if all, I'm powerless to do much to help. So I definitely don't feel like celebrating my role as a mother to him because I'm too busy trying to hold my fears of his down slide at bay. There are other layers of sorrow for him as well that I can’t begin to write out at this time but they are profound and deeply burdening.

Do you know the poem “The Invitation” by Oriah? She goes through this litany where she says she doesn't care about what position you hold or how much money you make or the like. What she wants to know is about your inner integrity, passion, and trust. I sort of feel that way about Mother's Day. I don't want to know how many children you have and what you do to celebrate on this one day. I want to know if you wake up and do what needs to be done as a parent day in and day out. I want to know if you can look your mom in the eye and risk disappointment for the sake of becoming the creation God called you to be. I don't want to be celebrated on this one day as a mother. I want to witness the fruits of your blossoming as my child and dance gratitude, sorrow, hope, pain and love every day and not feel alone in that dance.

I acknowledge I'm cynical about holidays in general because they often reflect consumerism and idolatry more than true celebration. Yet, I am not feeling cynical today. I'm sad and hurting.

Powerlessness of Love

“There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love.” - Martin Luther King, Jr.

I keep finding myself needing to write but unable to put words to page unless it is for something I have to do like a recent grant proposal. As badly as I need the outlet personally and professionally I just can’t seem to make myself do it.  I ask myself why.  A lot of it is because of the emotional strain I’ve been under due some touchy matters (don’t worry, my wife and child are just fine). I feel hamstrung to talk about what is really bothering me because it would either violate someone else’s confidentiality or draw attention to someone that is already deeply vulnerable.  This runs contrary to the lesson I learned years and years ago which is secrets and silence will kill me.  So, I’ve been managing as well as I can in the midst of this silence where I’ve been cut off from my primary supports.

It’s not been pretty but by and large I’ve done pretty well. I’m still experiencing the longest sustained period of my adult life of not being depressed (Yea!!!). This is saying a lot because I’ve weathered some pretty significant strains in the last few years, among them are my mother’s decline and death and a vocational rejection that still has me searching for direction. Nevertheless, I persist… and I’m not just surviving, I’m actually thriving for the most part.

But this damn silence is about to kill me. Talking to my wife and therapist just isn’t enough to save my soul from the darkness that secrets and isolation breed. All this is climaxing in a way that something has got to give soon.  I’ve been going downhill for the past month or so and I need that to stop NOW. 

Maybe the answer is to focus on my particular struggles within all of this. As I consider that angle, I see where a primary agony for me is my feeling of powerlessness to help someone I love not hurt more or outright self-destruct.  Powerlessness is a difficult experience no matter how self-aware one is.

I am powerless to fix the situation and I have to be careful how much responsibility I take for helping because of some very complicated risks. Those two factors collide in ways that leave me feeling agitated and downright angry… well, really I feel fear and sorrow but for now they are manifesting as anger.

As I’ve looked for outlets and understanding I’ve remembered that the Psalmist knew much about powerlessness and for now I find comfort in those cries. I look to the One who knows all of us because we are fearfully and wonderfully made… so beautiful and so precious that it evokes our deepest fears and our most profound awe.

May this journey through powerlessness lead me to a deeper understanding of all who love and need love’s healing. 

You’d be so pretty if…

I grew up hearing the phrase “You’d be so pretty if…” followed by a myriad of pointers on how I should look, act, think, and be.  My mother and grandmother were the primary users of this expression but I occasionally heard it from others too.  They truly believed themselves to be offering loving advice that would make me happy and better liked by others.  But in reality, this utterance deepened existing wounds and reinforced a message that I was not okay as is.

 

Later, I would spend years of my adulthood working through the wake of sorrow caused by repeatedly hearing “you’d be so pretty if… you weren’t so fat… you walked like a lady… you didn’t play in the dirt… you weren’t so heavy… you’re smile wasn’t crooked… you wore makeup… you wore more flattering clothes… you didn’t look so manish…”.  My family didn’t realize that I was at times barely hanging onto life because of depression and shame that dogged me so badly that suicidal thoughts were the norm for me.  Even if they had of realized what I was going through, there still is not a world in which saying “you’d be so pretty if…” is a healthy way to raise a child.

 

Lest you misunderstand my point, I’m not launching into this to rail against my family.  I deeply loved my grandmother and still miss her even though she died almost 12 years ago.  And my mom is currently dying which has led to a very interesting path for her and me to feel reconciled in a positive way to the legacy of our complicated relationship.  When it comes down to it, I believe my family did the best they could to love me and I harbor no resentment over the things that damaged me as I believe it revealed deeper wounds within my family for which we all needed healing.

 

Nevertheless, I was dismayed to have this phrase rehashed this past year as I was helping my mom with some things around her house.  I was immediately transplanted to my childhood and all the shame and pain rushed back to me when my mom looked at me with all sincerity and said, “you’d be so pretty if you just weren’t so fat.”  I managed to cope with that moment in relatively good fashion by telling my mom “the only people I care about think I’m beautiful.”  Later in the evening I turned to my wife and social media for support to process it.

 

The outcome of processing it is what I am primarily interested in writing about today.  I have spent time thinking about who I would be if I had taken all those pieces of advice.  I’ve considered what my life would be like if I had looked, acted, and thought the way they believed would make me pretty.

 

What I’ve decided is that I would not be me.  I would not even be real.  I’d be a shadow of an image that bears no resemblance to the gifts I’ve been given or the experiences I’ve had.  In fact, part of me believes that following that advice would have led to my eventual suicide because the things that have kept me alive in the darkest times are my abilities to eat pain, dress and appear in ways that kept me out of competition within the social conventions of women, and use my strong, broad, “manish” body to hold the weight of crushing sorrow.

 

When I look at who that person would be, I don’t see pretty.  I see sad, empty, and lonely because I would not have known how to be that person.  I am exactly who I was created to be.  I may never be able to see myself as pretty but I know that I am strong, intelligent, resilient, charming, cute, playful, and much more.  When I hold all that I am, what I’ve been able to survive and accomplish, and who encircles me with love, I figure I’m about as beautiful as I’ll ever be.

A Body Of...

A quote from Margaret Cho:

“If you are a woman, if you're a person of colour, if you are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, if you are a person of size, if you are a person od intelligence, if you are a person of integrity, then you are considered a minority in this world.

 

...And it's going to be really hard to find messages of self-love and support anywhere. Especially women's and gay men's culture. It's all about how you have to look a certain way or else you're worthless. You know when you look in the mirror and you think 'oh, I'm so fat, I'm so old, I'm so ugly', don't you know, that's not your authentic self? But that is billions upon billions of dollars of advertising, magazines, movies, billboards, all geared to make you feel shitty about yourself so that you will take your hard earned money and spend it at the mall on some turn-around creme that doesn't turn around shit.

 

When you don't have self-esteem you will hesitate before you do anything in your life. You will hesitate to go for the job you really wanna go for, you will hesitate to ask for a raise, you will hesitate to call yourself an American, you will hesitate to report a rape, you will hesitate to defend yourself when you are discriminated against because of your race, your sexuality, your size, your gender. You will hesitate to vote, you will hesitate to dream. For us to have self-esteem is truly an act of revolution and our revolution is long overdue.”

I’ve been trying to write about the complicated relationship I (and many people) have with body image, self-love, healing, and transformation.  You see, if there is anything I profess as a Christian, it is that Christ offers deliverance from bondage and transformation into new life.  Yet this is something I have struggled to embrace all my life.

 

My awareness of this has never waned but it has been heightened in the past few years because I’ve watched my wife lose about 100 pounds and experience a transformation from carrying body fat as a shield to loving every ounce of herself as an expression of her life.  I envy her experience.  I wish I too could experience that. (I do not want to oversimplify her experience as I know she still struggles every day.  Nevertheless, she has accomplished a great deal of growth and transformation.)

 

Another reason my struggle to embrace my body and experience healing has been especially obvious as of late is that I’ve grown increasingly defensive for my wife.  As she lost weight, people would walk up to her and in all good nature tell her, “you look so good” and “you look beautiful.”  While I recognize that they mean to be encouraging and supportive, the unspoken message of “you weren’t beautiful of good enough before” remains. 

 

My blood boils for her, me, and all who struggle with body image when this happens.  The common experience that my wife and I share is that of using our bodies as a shield of protection.  In similar ways, we have dieted for acceptance, eaten to push away pain, and loathed our bodies for all they pain and struggle they represent.  I still do. 

 

But she doesn’t.  She has finally found the combination of space, support, and love to look at her body one ounce at a time and love the way it has been a protector for her, grieve the past, and transform it into a new creation.  It’s been so beautiful to watch.  Truly, there aren’t words for how life filled and hope giving her journey has been and it’s not over yet.  I am grateful and honored to be a witness and sharer in this journey.

 

But where does all this leave me?  I still find myself in the despair of pain from a childhood that should have destroyed me, depression that won’t stop haunting me, and a body so full of scars seen and unseen that I can barely stand to look at it on most days.  I want what my wife has.  I want that deliverance and transformation that I so deeply believe Christ offers.  Yet, I’ve never experienced that combination of emotional space, physical energy, and external support that it takes to sustain such a life changing, transformation.  Will I ever?  I don’t know but I hope so.

Fighting isn't Really Living

At the risk of rubbing some people the wrong way, I need to say that I am deeply frustrated and angered at the culture of shame that makes people feel like they have to “fight” cancer.  Yes, I’ve lived through cancer 3 times and that involved fighting but that’s not all it took and that’s not what it’s all about.  It’s about life and love.

As I watch my mother decline and try to “fight” cancer even though the doctors keep telling her it’s incurable, advanced, and medically futile, I am enraged at her friend who had the gall to call me and tell me I wasn’t loving enough because I thought mom should choose palliative care. I’m pained to know my mom is in the hospital because of symptoms of chemo rather than at home enjoying time with friends.  And most overwhelmingly, I feel powerless to overcome the chorus of voices in my mother’s life who continue to shame her into fighting cancer instead of enjoying a few good months of friendship and love.

I know that the people mean well when they push her and I'm not questioning the motives behind that. I also know my mom is very scared and doesn't want to miss her next grandchild's birth. I just wish we could join together in a chorus of holding right now instead of disparate voices of mixed messages.

Tears of Hope

I’ve spent most of today crying.  This isn’t really surprising if you look at the current circumstances of my life.  My mother has terminal cancer, my work has some difficult pieces of conflict that will not have resolution for some time, and I have other family circumstances that I’m not free to discuss publically but worry me to literal sickness and fill me with dread.  But it’s not those things per se that have left me crying today.

Today, I’m crying because of a wonderfully whole yet complicated sense of vulnerability.  Last night at work, I sat with a family who discussed their child’s illness and I was struck in a different way by their experience of fear and dread.  I heard it in a way I had never fully understood emotionally even though I did intellectually and academically.  I heard their fear of death and it struck me in a deeply personal way. 

See, I’ve spent most of my life outrunning a legacy of abuse, crushing depression, and illness that have left me feeling as though my death would be a welcome thing.  In spite of my desire for my suffering in this world to end, I’ve pushed forward and lived what others would consider a full life.  I’ve cultivated a family, friendships, and pastoral relationships in a way that reflect my faith that every moment matters in spite of my desire for my suffering to end.

But a funny thing has happened over the past few years.  I’ve experienced healing in ways I didn’t imagine and I hope isn’t done yet.  I’ve moved into and through the suffering to a place of peace with most of it.  Some of it will always be there but I have a growing sense that I am not just my suffering.  Maybe a better way to say it is that I am now living more and more because I love life and not in spite of suffering.

Oh sure, I still have bad days and I suspect my predilection toward suicidal thoughts will always be there but it isn’t all I am.  Yet I’ve had to ask the question “who am I if I’m not suffering?” because so much of my identity has been built around my deep understanding of that experience.  Some would tell you that one of the reasons I’m such a good friend and chaplain is that people sense I truly understand their sorrow and I’m not afraid to go to the dark places with them.  In part, I believe that’s true. Nevertheless, I have a growing suspicion that it’s not the whole story.

All of this brings me to my tears of today.  Since listening last night to that family’s fears of their child dying, I keep flashing on my own precious life and all the things I don’t want to lose or leave behind.  I keep thinking of my wife, daughter, brother, and others who I love so deeply that their loss would break my heart into a thousand pieces.  I keep thinking about my own tenuous health and how desperately I don’t want to leave those things behind.

For the first time in my life, I love more than I hurt and so I want to cling to every precious second I have with those people.  Before, their loss would have been more shattering to an already pulverized soul.  Now, love lives so much larger that the thought of losing them or leaving them fills me with vulnerability and brings tears to my eyes in an ironically hopeful way.  I say ironically hopeful because it has taken finally outrunning my longing for death to realize that my new fear of death reflects healing and restoration.

I don’t know what all this will mean for my work as a chaplain.  I can’t imagine that it’ll have a negative impact.  But that’s not really today’s concern.  For now, I’m crying.  I’m crying for fear, for hope, for love.  And these tears are sacred.  Amen.

Post Election Blues... For Everyone

I always have such a difficult time explaining why I, as an Appalachian-lesbian-mother-chaplain-lover of people, struggle to be energized by presidential elections. People look at me with the "how can you not love Obama" look. I like him. I voted for him. Yet somehow I feel like this whole election missed the point. The constitution places the President primarily in charge of foreign policy. But what really effects most of our lives (clearly since we are at war this is not true for everyone) is local & state politics. Do you know who your alderman is? I do. Do you know where most of your tax dollars go? I do. And the bulk of the political impact on my life comes from the state & local level rather than the Feds. So why are people so excited/disappointed about the presidential election when most of the things that effect our education, economy, & security are close to home?

Please don't misunderstand me. I know what is at stake on a federal level. Nevertheless, I believe that more people are effected by what is happening close to home. What good does it do anyone to have a president who is pro gay marriage if they are living in a food desert or can't hope for a future because their schools are so bad?

National Coming Out Day... Again

Tomorrow is National Coming Out Day and it always puts me in a pensive mood. I think back on the years of my life when coming out was a constant strain due to fear of actual and perceived discrimination and violence. I also reflect on the privilege that I have now as I work for a company that has progressive policies and live in a city where being a lesbian makes me just one in a crowd of… well… all...

kinds of people. Most especially I find myself reflecting on those who still struggle to find safety, acceptance, and love in a world that can be hostile to someone who is struggling to find their way.

I applaud and honor all those who stand with courage to claim their sexuality today and every day. All of us who have and will come out find hope in one another. But trust me when I tell you that I want you to be more to me than the “gay couple down the street” or the “straight ally upstairs.” And I hope I’m more to you. As Pollyanna as it may seem, I still long for a day when I can just be Lavender rather than “the lesbian chaplain” or “the dyke next door.” The fact of the matter is that my sexuality has always felt like an exaggerated element of my life because I had to work so hard to protect it from others. It became a larger detail than what I do for a living or how I treat people. I understand that we are people of labels and categories. We’ve been at it since the day God commissioned Adam to name the animals. Nevertheless, I wish my label was related to the content of my character rather than my sexuality, race, gender, class, education, or age.

On this National Coming Out Day, I pay tribute to all those who stand up for who they are. I also grieve for those who still struggle. And most especially I hope for a day when the quality of our love is of greater importance than who we love.