Now I have nothing

In my arrogance
     I thought I had wisdom.

In my pride
     I thought I had faith.

In my vanity,
     I thought I had love for you.

Now I see these things do not avail me
     because I saw them as mine.

Now I stand before your gate;
     the begging bowl is empty.

Now there is nothing but you.

K.A.


Entry in diary on March 2, 2012, a few days after returning from gathering in Manapakkam

Mutability

Two days ago, after trying to last the evening without it, I finally turned on the air conditioner in my home. It felt decadent and untimely to do it, even though one thermometer in my home was still registering 90 degrees at~ 6:00 p.m. It was only early May after all, and just the previous week I had woken to frost on my deck. Spring seemed to have bypassed us all together, and now we were plopped into the middle of summer.

This morning the temperature has plunged back into the 40s, and again, I have tried to resist going to the thermostat but have caved in and turned on the heat. Outside it appears be wet and chilly, although I haven't stuck my head outside the door yet. I weigh the chances of my tackling the garden bed, which needs more soil and compost added, and wonder if can wait until next weekend.

It is easy to jump to the conclusion that this spring is a lesson in developing patience and flexibility, but these days I tend to look more for messages of perseverance and the need to brave some personal discomfort to achieve something. I am usually all too ready to interpret anything that interferes with my physical ease or convenience as an omen that I am not meant to exert myself. What would it be like for me to live in another culture and climate where every day might bring physical hardship and pain, where I would have to live with scarcity, hunger, aching muscles, instability, danger? Of course, I don't relish the thought of others lacking the basic needs for survival and personal safety, but I do envy the ability of many of the people in other parts of the US or the world to accept the mutability and adversity of their lives with equanimity and courage. The grackle, who was just now delousing himself on my deck, cannot afford to care what the temperature is; he takes a moment to groom, and then he's off to find food or shelter or another grackle.

Perseverance, resilience, courage, inner poise - these I want to begin cultivating today, even if I don't get my outside garden planted.

Never seek to tell thy love,
Love that never told can be;
For the gentle wind doth move
Silently, invisibly

Sharing beloved works and being disappointed with the reception that meets them, or the perceptions that seem to miss their mark, can be just as ego bruising as seeing our own words misquoted or printed with errors. Emily Dickinson called this going public "the auction of the soul." Why does our ego attach itself to other people's works and words? Is only that we want our tastes vindicated or validated, or does it scratch deeper than that? One of the most miserable nights of my life was a reading given at the close of a two-week poetry workshop I took one summer. I chose to read a relatively quiet poem in a somewhat boisterous crowd of writers. I left vowing never to write another poem and certainly to never share any of my written work again in that kind of a forum. But I can also feel that way when I share a book or a movie with someone and they fail to delight in it in the same way I do. A mentor of mine who taught religious history once remarked that most of her undergraduate students "read history to find themselves in it," or words to that effect. She didn't mean that they read to gain insight into themselves but to find ideas and positions that reflected their own. A truly good reader/listener/viewer does not read to see only a reflection of herself, or at least she shouldn't be dominated by that reflection. How many times have I begun an annotated argument in the margin of some book I'm reading before I get more than a few pages into it? I sometimes think I only know my thoughts in opposition to those of another. And how many times have I found ways to quibble with a book or a movie lent to me by a friend as a means of preserving my individuality and, perhaps, superiority even to that good friend. Despite working in a university and wanting to support, for the most part, its mission, there are many times when I think it breeds a kind of unattractive kind of mental dyspepsia rather than generous reflection and deliberation. Okay, now I'm going to take MY dyspeptic self home.

The Humorous Classicist

Whodda thunk that a reason for studying classical languages and literature would be the exercise of the funny bone. I was recently introduced to Tales of a Wayward Classicist through a Facebook entry that steered me to a hilarious blog on illiterate Latin tatoos. Turns out that the Wayward Classicist performs the cyber version of stand up comic and is phenomenally good at it. Well, now, let me rethink my use or misuse of phenomenal. See? Classicists apparently make you more scrupulous about your use of language as well. Bored students, tenured and lazy professors, wedding magazines, and failures in domestic life all provide rich material for his blogs. Mrs. Church's course of Latin III never made Virgil seem all that funny, or even Ovid, for that matter, but WC's translations of Catullus or medieval Latin broadside poetry has me grinning broadly if not laughing out loud. Which makes me wonder - are there cells of subversive early Icelandic scholars out there? Are there Hebrew scholars skewering the inanities they find proliferating around them? Are there Sanskrit pundits sharpening their wits at the expense of aspiring twitterers? Think I'll tread softly for a while.

I find myself incredibly saddened by the tale of Sami al-Haj, who was recently released from Guantánamo after 6 plus years. I am happy for him and for his family that he was finally released, but I am deeply angered and ashamed of my country's treatment of him and other prisoners, whether they are guilty or not. It is, of course, more shocking to our sensibilities that we held someone in such appalling circumstances when there was obviously no evidence against him. However, as a country that prides itself on the jealous protection of individual rights and civil liberties, it is completely inexcusable for us to treat any prisoner in this fashion.

I recognize that this published expression of indignation is long overdue, although I have shared these sentiments with like-minded friends for years now. The residual problem for me is how to respond to these atrocities. The retaliatory side wants to see Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeldt, Ashcroft, Yoo, and others subjected to the same dehumanizing conditions, the same torture methods, the same lack of hope for a trial or release. However, an "ends justifies the means" argument makes me no better than these untried criminals. How do we hold them - and ourselves accountable - and not behave as brutally and vindictively as they have?

As someone who witnessed the protests of the 1960s and 1970s, I can attest to how repugnant much of the self-righteousness of that era was. I was no exception, and I must share in the responsibility for the conservative backlash that occurred as a result of the posturing and rhetoric of much of my generation. Recent peace protests strike me as tepid imitations of the protest movements of the past century, with an occasional, pathetic attempt to revive some of the earlier street theater antics. I think the low numbers who have turned out for these protests reveal that others in this country also question the wisdom of simply repeating past gestures of resistance.

We need to learn to oppose the abuse of power in newer and more effective ways. We also need to find ways to quietly persist in resistance. The extremes of the past led to a kind of burn-out on social activism. Trying to continuously fuel a movement with indignation and anger, as justifiable as those responses may be, will not work over the long haul. Soon, the inevitable lethargy provides an opening for the venal, the power hungry, and the sociopaths who find their way into the corridors of power.

I don't claim to have the answers or to know what shape that opposition should take. The recent caucuses in Iowa renewed my hope to some extent. I saw sober citizens engaging in the process in a thoughtful and deliberate way that was very heartening. Furthermore, there are voices increasingly emerging in the country that are calling for candidates to tell the truth, regardless of how unpalatable we may find it, e.g. Thomas Friedman in an op ed in The New York Times [www.nytimes.com/2008/05/04/opinion/04friedman.html?ex=1210651200&en=f575e3ff061ca21f&ei=5070&emc=eta1] But often, this seems like too faint a glimmer of light in the gathering darkness.

The great spiritual masters throughout human history have stressed that integrity in action can only be the result of individual evolution and inner peace. The response from the activist side is that we do not have the luxury of such personal development in the face of injustice, natural disaster, human suffering and danger to the environment. As I struggle to find my own way with love and compassion, I need to remember that others share my frustration. I need to remember this not only to feel myself connected to others but also so that I may be more tolerant of the variety of responses to the current ugliness in our government and our culture at large. Still, I am left with the question of my own responsibility as a citizen of the US to see that justice is done and done well.

I would welcome thoughtful response from others. Many of you may be much further along this path, and if you feel inclined to share your thoughts and insights, it would be helpful. Others may simply share my sense of not knowing "what next." That too would be encouraging and welcome.

Introducing Mr. Paddypaws

It is with some embarrassment that I acknowledge the omission of a significant member of my household, Mr. Paddypaws, more commonly known as Paddy or Buzzbomb. Paddy started out in life as "Dante" the cat, and he is still on record under that nom de guerre at the local vet's office. However, my son told me the name was pretentious, so in the absence of any conspicuous evidence of literary genius, I succumbed to pressure and changed his name. In many ways, Paddy does suit him better, especially when he is feeling feisty. And Mr. Paddypaws gives some indication of his, ahem, impressive size. He does have a certain air of dignity and self-awareness not always found in Iowa farm cats, which is another way of saying he's smarter than hell. As you can see from the one photo, he can be faster than he looks. He is definitely not happy about my leaving for a week-long gathering in Cleveland and has been giving my suitcase a baleful eye. Food has a remarkable way of soothing his ruffled feelings, however.

Here is a link to more pictures of my visit to Chennai and to Tirippur in the SW part of Tamil Nadu: Visit to India 7-08. July is supposed to be the monsoon season, but it was hot and dry for most of my visit, all of which made for better pictures, I guess.