June 23^rd 2009 Through the Mekong River Delta and on to Can Tho

The second full day in Vietnam saw us heading away from the big city atmosphere and into the countryside, where the lives of everyday people began to become more visible to us.  I was rather taken with the way middle-upper class housing was designed, which often included a business on the ground floor and 2 or 3 narrow stories more on top reaching into the sky; they were ingenious examples of space usage and material conservation.  Most were brightly colored, and nearly all of them had Buddhist shrines on the rooftop.  The same building type was used to house many apartments, but these were giving way in some areas to larger multi-story dwellings.  Shanty-style housing was apparent here and there, both in the city and outside of it, and we learned from our tour guide that poor areas were being cleared for the establishment of large high-rises, and people were basically being shunted out whether they wanted to move or not.

Access to electricity and clean water, something we take for granted in the US, is still patchy in many areas of Vietnam.  I already knew going to SE Asia that I could not drink the water there, nor use it from the faucet to brush my teeth.  In restaurants, we were never given water in a glass as is customary in much of the US, and all drinks were ordered and had to be wiped clean when they arrived.  Power lines were a tangle of wires leading from the poles to homes and businesses, and I found myself wondering what they did when one malfunctioned?  It seemed impossible to my untrained eye to recognize which line went to which building, and overall they seemed like gigantic fire hazards.

As the countryside rolled outside our windows in a colorful display of highway-side businesses and farmland, I noticed several interesting similarities and differences.  The traffic, of course, remained completely foreign to me—never before had I seen so many mopeds and bicycles moving at a frighteningly expedient pace mixed in with cars, trucks and buses.  Traffic looked like an ocean of fluid travelers, weaving in and out, honking horns and passing with ease.  I saw small vehicles carrying a dizzying array of goods, and mopeds ferrying a similarly large amount of people.  Often entire families were perched on the back of a moped, with an adult driving and one on the back, with a child or two sandwiched in between.  Businesses were strikingly similar to what is seen in rural parts of the US along major roadways, with stacks of items for sale displayed outside a small shop front competing with each other for customers.  Plants, yard statues, and Buddhist shrines made up the most visible large shops, while fruit and vegetable sellers had little carts here and there with mounds of brightly colored produce for sale.  I was delighted to discover many cafes dotting the roadside as well, many with small tables and hammocks for patrons to nap in or at least recline while sipping their drinks.  I longed to stop at one and try it out, but with a sigh, I realized the next hard lesson of a guided tour: there are no voluntary stops to take pictures, get a local drink, or simply just hang out.  I resigned myself to taking video footage and stills as the bus hurtled down the highway.

On the way to Can Tho, we stopped at the Mekong Rest Stop (MRS) to have lunch.  This restaurant seemed to exist entirely for the sake of tourists, as evidenced by the numerous tour buses outside, the extremely developed gift shop, and the television that played a video of people visiting the MRS in a constant repeating loop.  It was well-decorated and had lots of emphasis on traditional Vietnamese clothing and art, but smelled entirely of fish, something I thought I would acclimate to but never did, making this yet another of many meals where I would be served food and find it difficult to eat what I was given.  Complicating this problem was the amount of food that was served to vegetarians, which was in portions so large that there was no way, even had the food been palatable to me, that I could have finished what I was given.  When lunch was served, it was “elephant” fish—so named because they looked like an elephant’s ear—and many courses of unidentifiable items for all the carnivores, and plate after plate of spring rolls, vegetables, and rice for me.  I was bemused to discover that in Vietnam, “vegetarian” means “keep serving mushrooms,” much as it does in the US.  I ate what I could, but between the smell and the fish staring at me from one seat over (they had been served standing up, fins, tail, eyes and all, with these gaping mouths, all fried in batter) towards the end it was all I could do to keep from vomiting my cocktail all over the nice place setting.  I think my stomach was beginning to bother me at this point, so I ordered a coconut milk, served in the coconut, which tasted awful but helped to settle my churning insides slightly.  I wanted nothing more than to escape this place where white tourists were unloaded from their cozy buses to the entryway, then led out through the gift shop before getting back on their respective group tour transportation.  It was commercial and revolting, and I was relieved to finally step into my own bus once more.

We took a ferry ride across the Mekong River after walking through one of the poorest areas we had been in yet.  The shine of the big city was completely gone, and we were greeted with the sight and smell of garbage that littered the streets, cracked sidewalks and strange liquids flowing over the surface of the pavement.  Far from being abhorrent, I found myself relaxing and looking forward to the ride on the ferry, which was to carry us (and our bus) across the river and to the highway on the other side.  It was not a tourist destination per say, and the ferry was populated by regular ole Vietnamese going about their day, driving trucks across the river via ferry or simply taking the trip themselves.  No one tried to sell us anything, and people pretty much ignored us aside from the passing glance of interest.  I was slightly disturbed to see the giant billboards beside the river were mainly using white-skinned Western-looking people to advertise their products (soap and hair cream), it seemed kind of odd to me, and reminded me of a conversation I had once with a dark-skinned person in the US, where they expressed their dismay at growing up with few dark faces in advertisements or on television, few visual examples that they identified with.

Our journey resumed on the other side, and we climbed back in the bus once more, heading towards the industrial city of Can Tho.  No matter how tired I was, I could not pull my face from the window and go to sleep.  I guess I was worried I might miss something significant, and all the money I borrowed in loans or used out tax return to make it here would be wasted, but it was more than that.  I was fascinated with this country, completely taken by the beauty of the countryside and the bright blue of the sky that seemed to stretch for miles into the horizon.  I was beginning to run on a constant state of exhaustion, but I was growing used to it, much as the impact of the heat and humidity was beginning to lessen, even if it did not fade.

Once in Can Tho, we headed to the hotel, the Ninh Kieu 2, where we would be spending the night.  I was immediately impressed with the city, which seemed far less commercial and more like a place that I could explore, without the Tourist Police and the incessant hawkers of goods chasing me down.  After we checked in, another member of the WSU contingent who had taken a Buddhism class with me recently headed towards a local temple the tour guide had indicated was nearby.  We chuckled as we passed a huge AIG building on the same street, and I wondered aloud if AIG was the same pariah in Vietnam as it seems to be in the US.  After much dodging of dogs, mopeds, and people, we finally found the Muniransay Pagoda on Hoa Binh, right down the street from our hotel like Mr. Tum promised.   I had wanted to buy flowers or fruit to make an offering, but finding flowers proved a futile endeavor, so I settled on a bag of tiny apples from a vendor right in front of the temple.

Once inside, I was immediately taken aback by how beautiful it was.  An ornate gateway led to a courtyard that had a giant sculpture in the middle with brightly painted lotuses and images of The Buddha and Bodhisattvas.  It appeared to have been a fountain at some point in time, but had fallen into disuse and was just a pool of stagnant water.  The sanctuary area was up a steep flight of stairs and inside another highly decorative entryway.  Before starting up, I looked around uneasily, not wanting to intrude and not really knowing the rules of the temple, having never been to anything like this before.  Saffron-robed monks were busily carrying boxes in and out of what appeared to be a kitchen area, but there were few of them around, and none of them seemed to notice that we were there.  It seemed deserted for some reason, or only sparsely populated.  I exchanged glances with the other student I had gone to the pagoda with, and we started up the stairs, removing our shoes and stepping into the sanctuary.  A young monk was just around the corner speaking with a lay person, we exchanged smiles and he came over to speak with us.

Upon querying him (he spoke quite good English, actually) we learned that the temple was Mahayana Buddhist, and that it was alright to make offerings there.  He brought out a plate for the apples I had offered, which made setting them in the shrine much easier.  Smiling warmly, he also brought out bottles of water for us and seemed genuinely happy to speak with us—something I had not yet experienced yet in Vietnam, where up until that point I had felt more like a walking dollar sign or an intruder into someone’s city than a welcome visitor.  He spoke with us until he had to leave, and we walked out to the front, taking some breathtaking pictures of the temple area on the way out.  We saw two other monks who were also departing, and they also greeted us kindly, asking where we were from and wishing us well before they climbed into a van together and headed off.  I was put completely at ease by these monks, who had taken time out of their busy lives to speak with us and make us feel so welcome in Vietnam.

On the way back to the hotel we wandered around the side streets of Can Tho, which was surprisingly difficult to navigate on foot.  I could readily understand why many people chose to get around via moped instead, as the sidewalks were a mess of broken concrete, animal feces, street vendors, and garbage, and in many areas, the sidewalk was so narrow that it was impossible to traverse; we had to walk on the street instead.  For the most part, the locals chose to ignore our presence or look disparagingly in our direction, although when we were just outside the pagoda a woman looked very sternly at us while we spoke to the monks outside, and then strangely, we saw her three more times while we were walking back (which honestly creeped me out a little).  I decided to buy an interesting-looking puffy cake from a street vendor mainly to find out what it was, only to discover that it was a tasteless steamed dough thing filled with what appeared to be meat in the middle.  Perplexed (and with an evaporated appetite) I left it wrapped on the side of the street in the hopes that someone else would want it instead.

That evening we had a meeting with our first NGO, Peace Trees Vietnam.  We had a presentation on the work PTV does in the Quang Tri Province, a rural, impoverished area that has been host to an array of unexploded ordinance since the end of the Vietnam War.  They focus on landmine education and awareness, clearance, and assistance to survivors of landmine accidents in the form of scholarships and continuing support.  We were able to query the representative from PTV Quang Le about the work that they do, learning that they are largely apolitical, work extensively with other NGOs, and have been working at this for around 14 years.  When I asked about the involvement of Buddhist monks and nuns in landmine awareness education in Vietnam, I received confirmation that the Sangha in Vietnam does not involve itself in social issues, which I had expected from prior research.  State-sanctioned monks and nuns are not permitted to engage in any sort of activities that would be contrary to their religious calling in Vietnam, and those that do so are heavily frowned upon.

June 22^nd 2009 Ho Chi Minh City

Our first trip out into Vietnam was exhilarating, heartbreaking, and utterly amazing.  Morning came very soon after scant amounts of sleep, beginning with breakfast and then a trip to a busy marketplace not far from the hotel.

Breakfast was overwhelmingly filling and abundant, giving me the feeling that I was some sort of economic imperialist, with access to all sorts of things our tour guide Mr. Tum told us during his stories that everyday Vietnamese do not have in their diets except for on special occasions.  Chicken, for instance, which I picked out of my traditional Vietnamese breakfast soup with a shudder and passed on to a fellow traveler, was a highly prized commodity amongst those who could not afford such things, information that made me feel deeply guilty, juxtaposed with revulsion at the concept of eating chicken.

The marketplace was colorful, crowded, and full of more intense smells drifting over from the in-house butcher and many food stalls scattered across the center of the indoor area.  I was at once assailed by the menagerie of images and the hawking cries of the sellers, who jostled for attention amongst the masses of tourists and local shoppers alike.  More than beautiful and interesting, the market was a crash course in dealing with local economics, where I learned how to barter with the local people and try (miserably) to avoid paying too much or try to push people too low.

I realized quickly that the cost of not knowing the true value of local currency (the Vietnamese Dong) relative to the USD translated into a more expensive shopping endeavor.  I bought a wooden Hotei Buddha statue that was quite reasonable at 5 USD, but then a set of chopsticks that was far from reasonable at 8 USD.  I felt rushed, unsure of market price, and mainly as if I were behaving like a flustered tourist not used to bartering in the area.

The stacks of housewares and jewelry gave way to the butcher shop, which I quickened my pace to walk through, trying not to breathe.  It was as if someone had condensed all of the negative smells of Vietnam into a few square feet, a groggy blend of garbage, fish, and stale air.  I was realizing that this smell permeated everything from the hotel room to my hair and clothing, a maddening challenge to my plans of wearing clothing more than one day in a row.

First on the official agenda was a trip through downtown Saigon, where we primarily tried to not be run over by the hundreds of mopeds that made up traffic there.  According to our tour guide, there are more mopeds per capita than anywhere else in the world, and I believe him!    We learned the hard way that there are weak enforcements for traffic laws, few visible lights, and even fewer guarantees that we would make it to the other side without a collision.  I joked that “watch the tourist run” must be a national sport, or at least a national past time…which we played again and again.

Our tour stopped at the Reunification Palace, where we were able to peer into the past, as preserved during the time of the Vietnam War, where many of the items in use by officials during this period were encapsulated in rooms for viewing.  Conservation efforts were weak, and I was troubled by the lack of protection for artifacts in the balmy air, in a museum with no air conditioning and few tactics to inhibit mold growth and moisture damage.  It stunned me to realize this difference, having been in numerous museums in the US where preservation techniques are generally above a certain threshold, regardless of limits to funding.  It became patently obvious here that the limits to funding are far more severe in Vietnam.

Next up was the Cu Chi Tunnels, which were sort of a living museum in a jungle setting that combined staff dressed in Viet Cong attire with models of Viet Cong engaged in various pertinent activities—weapons crafting, shoe making, etc.—which created the feeling of walking back in time.  We had the opportunity to walk through the jungle paths, see a presentation on the building and historic use of the tunnels, and also to see one of the staff cram himself down inside the opening to one which was only slightly larger than his head.  After a rather morbid tour of exhibits that included a variety of traps, weaponry, and graphic pictures depicting the demise of American GIs in full color, we had the chance to crawl through an actual tunnel, widened for our huge Western bodies, of course.  Here I realized that I would never have made it as a Viet Cong, nor as one of the American GIs going into the tunnels to destroy them, but I made it to the 100 meter mark and out to the fresh air without having to sheepishly turn around.  Altogether, the museum was put together well, and seeing the Vietnam War from the point of view of the Viet Cong was creepy, but something you just can’t see in the US.  Exhausted, we headed back to our hotel to pack up for the next day, where we were to hit the ground running with sunscreen on and bleary eyes pressed to the tour bus windows once again.

Traveling through the city was extremely eye-opening for me.  The opulence of Louis Vuitton and Gucci stores nestled up against the endemic poverty that bled through to tourist eyes if they were looking properly began to wear on me at this point.  In the touristy sections, the streets were relatively clean and well-kept, and Saigon even hosted its own “Tourist Police” force that made sure that all the people who were in Vietnam to spend their money would be able to do so unhindered and in relative safety.  It quickly became paradoxical to be there studying human rights, while feeling as if I were able to escape to the safety and frigid coolness of the tour bus I had paid for a spot on, always viewing from afar and removed from the reality.  People were obviously living in the construction sites in the center of the city, children the same age as my own were sent out to beg or to sell postcards late in the evening that I bought, my face burning with shame.  As much as I tired of being called “Madame,” I know that the hotel I went to each night was air conditioned and clean, and I had access to more food than many of the people I passed on the street.  On one hand, it was thrilling to be there, thousands of miles away from the familiar, seeing a place I only knew from peer-reviewed journals and the Internet.  On the flipside of that was a gnawing guilt that I was living so comfortably, eating so well, and only seeing the nicest areas of a city that surely had darker places to show than the well-scrubbed boulevards and the white-gloved hands opening doors for me.  It left me ashamed and confused, and more than a bit guilty that I had traveled so far just to be living as some of the richest people do in the region.

June 21^st, 2009

(Shortly after arriving in Ho Chi Minh City)

My first impression of the Ho Chi Minh City airport was the smell.  It seemed a mixture of the herbs and spices used in Vietnamese cooking and the smell of many Asian supermarkets, combined with sweat and the faint scent of garbage.  It was not pleasant in the least, and along with the heat, I was immediately overwhelmed.  Even inside the airport, it was hot, making the passing through immigration all the more trying as I struggled with my baggage and grumbled about my backpack being manhandled and obviously searched by airport security, who had fumbled with the latches and placed everything back haphazardly.

Leaving the airport building was a bizarre process, since there were around 50-60 people cued up behind barriers outside the airport waiting to meet friends and family members who had arrived on the plane from Hong Kong.  It looked like a haphazard red carpet affair at a movie premiere, except no one was cheering, they were just standing there tiredly and looking on, hopeful to see the person they were waiting on.  For myself, I just wanted away from the smell, which had only intensified with leaving the confines of the airport.  Between the immediately repressive heat and the general scent of Ho Chi Minh City, it was a relief to finally get on the tour bus and head towards the May Hotel, where we would spend our first two nights in Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City (which, for the record, I never did figure out which was the more appropriate name).

The May Hotel was stunning at first glance, with lots of glass and gilding, and a very stylish use of flowers.  As we checked in, I felt the realization that we were going to be living quite well—much better than the majority of the local people—over the next ten days sink in.  Everything in the hotel had a gleam to it, as if people spent time polishing doorknobs and mirrors daily.  I found myself wondering where those people went when their shifts were done—was it to a home in one of the shanty houses we passed on the way to the hotel?  Did their own house have running water and electricity like my room did?  Ethical analyses became part of my everyday consciousness by day two.

June 20^th 2009

(In Kentucky, prior to departure, early hours of the morning)

Everything is packed and sitting beside me on the floor while I catch up on some reading and make the first of many journal entries for this trip.  I am feeling tentative about the plane trip to come, but more so stretched into a thin line that spreads out across my psyche; this is likely due to lack of sleep than anything else.  I have this grand plan to reset my body clock with minimal impact on the way I feel, and in the process, avoid jet lag entirely.  Will this be effective?  No idea.  I am in fact questioning this logic as I lean back on the bed in the guest room of C’s aunt’s house, because it feels so comfortable, and I am so very tired.  Finding it difficult to focus, I am discovering that it is easier to just stew on the fear of flying and try to figure out ways to escape its clutches than to read any more journal articles, so hopefully when C is done with her own preparations we can have a conversation instead, one that involves nothing about airplanes, malaria, or questionable water sources in developing nations.  I need the distraction of small talk right now.

(In the air en route to Ho Chi Minh City)

I am now on the second flight of my trip west towards San Francisco, California.  The flight from Cincy to Chicago was much less terrifying than anticipated and gave way to actual enjoyment of the flight.  Perhaps it was the Rescue Remedy, or maybe it was that I simply had not slept yet, but it was an almost delightful (!) ride, even down to the little transit plane we were crammed into on the short hop to Chicago.  The cloud cover was an amazing sight to see, and I was fortunate enough to see the sun rise as the plane turned briefly towards the east.

I miss my family terribly already, and although I am jokingly referring to “how nice it is to be responsible for only myself” there is this dull ache inside as I find myself thinking constantly that I wish they could see the things I am seeing.  No matter how many pictures I take, or how many short film clips, I can never truly capture what it is like to be at 34,000 feet in a plane.  Granted, flying with a child on a plane is pure insanity that I generally do not wish to partake in, but that does not mean I do not wish that they could see the world from the clouds.

This journey has been very revealing so far, and it has only just begun.  Two dominant themes that emerge are the shattering of illusions and the realization of Śūnyatā (emptiness), both of which are intimately connected.  When I was talking to C before we departed Kentucky many parts of the conversation turned again and again to the concept of illusions being shattered, as we share a mutual friend who ended up being far different than either of us could ever have imagined. I cannot speak for C, but for myself, my destruction of illusions made me realize much about my own attachments, aversions, and the liberating concept of Śūnyatā.

As I approach the airspace over San Francisco at an expedient pace, I am reminded that I am far different than the trembling and broken woman who left there with a little boy in her arms on a train approximately 12 years ago. I am stronger, less battered about by illusions of my own and those of others.  I have come into my own self and have witnessed and/or brought about so many changes over time in the way I interface with the world.  Illusion and emptiness play heavily into this series of transitions, although I do not feel as though I can properly articulate this here in this moment of writing.

When illusions are shattered, Śūnyatā is realized.  Fear of flying was an illusion, and now that it is (mostly) conquered, there is a greater chance of peace.  Fear of being empty has been met head on with an embracing of the emptiness, making the fear of shattering illusions irrelevant.  It seems to logically follow that aside from Garchen Rinpoche and Tsunma, my husband is the brightest Bodhisattva I have ever met.

Its all so weird how it works out.

Soon, I will be getting on a big metal thing and flying across the world.  I am able to do this by virtue of modern technology, which terrifies and elates me, giving me a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to feel the fear and do it anyway.  Little things tick on the back of my brain these last days before I depart, with each treasured activity becoming more conscious and visceral, important…critical to my survival as much as is breathing.  Those stories I read to my children as they curve under my arm and listen with bright eyes might be the last ones I read if I were to plummet suddenly to my death in a plane.  All of which leades me to a further line of questioning: Why is it that death compells life?

Surely, if being aware feels good, if being aware simply is good, then being aware all the time must be quite good indeed.  I sincerely hope that I can retain this way of looking at the world.  It is imminently more fulfilling than a million wasted and exasperated moments.

I have been taking breaks from writing this policy paper on Sri Lanka to sit in my own head and reflect on everything that has happened in the last few days.  Presuming that my life continues to follow its haphazard and unpredictable series of surprises, challenges, and obstacles, I suppose I should not be shocked at what has happened….on the other hand, I am devastated.

I first met Trevor King when I was 16 years old.  We were different in many ways–he was the son of a devoutly Christian woman and a man who worked for the FBI in Chinese Counter-Intelligence.  He had a difficult time articulating his emotions.  I was passionate and more than a bit of a thrill-seeker, a heathen from a broken home with a penchant for being loud.  We found common ground in music and art, and enjoyed each other’s company immensely.  We went to see the Cure, Marilyn Manson, and numerous shows where he introduced me to Christcore, which I loved.

When I gave birth to my son at 18, he was there to cut the cord.  He became “Uncle Trevor,” and we stayed in touch through the first few years of my son’s life, moving to California (he in the south and me in the north) and somehow managed to maintain a good friendship through all the strangeness and passing of the years.

To this day, I am not sure how/why we lost touch in the end around a decade ago.  It may have been that I got married and had more kids and ran out of time to keep up with friends (which I have), or it might have been as silly as losing a phone number when we moved across town.

Even so, I never stopped regarding him as a dear friend, one of the people I actually wanted to run into again some day.  The painting he gave me in 1997 has hung in every house I have lived in since, and it now hangs in my office, where I stop and look at it often, wondering what happened to all the years as they passed by.  I have looked for him on numerous occasions, wanting to tell him about my life….to hear about his, but nothing ever turned up.

One day, I came across his name, and realized he was on Facebook.   I immediately rattled off a message, and sent off a friends request, and checked it the next day, noticing with some confusion that it looked like it never was sent.  Having strange problems with FB at the time, I sent another, and the same thing happened.  Confused, I consulted someone else…who told me that there was no way for this to be an accident, the only answer was that Trevor was clicking “ignore” on the request.

I….wha?

Processing this over the past few days has been difficult.  On the one hand, I could have gone the rest of my life not finding him, and that would have been sad, but not entirely horrible.  Lots of people get lost over the course of a lifetime, and there is no way to avoid that.  I discovered that “dear but lost” is a far better place than “dear but hates you.”

There are so many things I want to say to him, the most overwhelming question being “why?”  I have no idea what I could have done to make someone give me the cold shoulder so unceremoniously after all these years, and perhaps that is what is the hardest.  I have no concrete answer, just a big gaping hole instead of an explaination.  Was it because I became a Buddhist?  Maybe because he has an arbitrary expiration date on friends, and I went and spoiled like moldy leftovers?

Perhaps it is because I was his charity project all along, and being the friend of the teenage mother is not quite the same rush as when she gets married and goes on with her life, having a home and a family of her own, that doesn’t include being wide-eyed and thankful for patronage from a noble friend.  Was my independence frightening to him?  Emasculating? 

I tend to over-analyze, I know this, and even more so when I am working on big projects (like now).  Even so…I can’t quite shake the sense of feeling like someone I knew and loved is dead, and the only thing left to do is move on and mourn for what was instead of hoping for an “is.”

Buddhism has been beneficial in this instance, as I have been reading all the doctrines I have been looking at academically, and really trying to come to peace with this.  Trevor….suffered.  He is suffering.  As a boshisattva he is muddling through his own life,  and he acted from his wounded heart like we all do.  I can forgive him for the pain he caused me, knowing that over the course of our friendship, I caused him immeasurable amounts of pain.

I still wish I knew what I did that made him turn away in the end.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_uPo5LHUTc

I thought the future held
a perfect place for us
That together we would learn to be
the best that we could be
In my naivety I ran
I fell and lost my way
Somehow I always end up falling over me
And one day
I woke to find
The future had no place
for me
I was unwanted in a world
that with my hands I helped build
Where once was honesty and pride
I now stand broken and alone
Just a shadow
of what I was meant to be
They say that Time will heal
The truth shall set us free
Well that depends
on what it is
that you choose to believe
In this prison made of lies
We see what it is we want to see
And find comfort in this
broken hall of dreams
Does anybody feel
the way I do?
Is there anybody out there?
Are you hearing me?
I believe in you
Will you believe in me?
Or am I alone
in this hall of dreams?
I believe in you
You believe in me
But I have no trust
in anything
Somehow I’m always
always falling over me
Somehow I’m always
I’m always falling over me

-VNV Nation “Holding On”

Often these thoughts pop into my head as I walk around the house on evenings like this, where I have been up writing and reading for hours, and I am stretching my legs to get the blood flowing again, getting a cup of tea, trying not to want to eat something, for I know I will only gain another clump of fat, regardless of how my body is trying to cope with being up this late by making me hungry.

In these walks I can see the dirt on the floor, where I am on day 5 of not vacuuming yet, and the baskets of unfolded laundry heaped in the schoolroom, after they spent days sitting in the living room. I wince as I pass the stacks of books that are bursting out of my office corner mess, papers pushing at the seams of my workspace until it looks ready to vomit notecards and paper-clips, and invariably I cry out as I step on a Lego or a tack. I slump, feeling defeated, knowing its too late to vacuum and not wake someone up, and really? Would I be able to stop? Or at least that’s the answer I give myself when I leave laundry in the washer at the end of my day for the gazillionth time. I walk back to my computer.

If I was a SAHM, I would already be asleep, getting ready to start my day well-rested and brightly cooing at my kids as we set out on our adventures for the day. “Time for math, everyone!” I would grin. “Now its spelling time!” My apron would smell fresh and would not have spaghetti sauce on it from last night’s dinner, nor would my hair be awkwardly fuzzed out around my hair, looking more like a tumbleweed than a hairstyle. My floor would be vacuumed thrice daily. My dishes would never stack more than three high in the sink, which would always shine merrily to greet me. I would never need Valium, or even mid-day cocktails.

My children would never have to look for their laundry in the laundry room, because it would be folded neatly in their drawers. Meals would be organized and planned, and would include a variety of in-season fruits and vegetables, all bought at remarkably low prices, because as a SAHM? I could pay attention.

I would never have to slug through my day waiting for naptime after being up late writing or avoiding writing by reading blogs, only to discover that the first one that went down for nap is waking up as the second one to go down fell asleep, thus canceling my hopes of mid-day rest. Stress over recipes would be common, but stress over 25 page papers would be nonexistent.

I would learn to sew, make my kids their own costumes for Halloween and their clothes in their favorite colors. My living room would be littered with attractive wicker baskets instead of unread mail and kids toys, and I would spend my time thinking of ways to make my kids happy instead of trying to find ways to get everything done on time.

I know the grass is always greener, but still….

The one good thing I have to say that has come of all this neighborhood fracas is that the parents of the block (and there are many of us) have come together in a sort of solidarity that both inspires and humbles me. I have unearthed even more stories from them about their own kids being harassed by these people, almost like its a big coming-out party for all of us who have gotten into arguments with this man (and now his wife) over children being children. I am flabberghasted…I didn’t even realize it was that bad!

I am (mentally of course, still trying to make it through finals and the end of the term and going to SE Asia and and and and so forth) contriving a plan to galvanize a parents’ association out of this, starting with a petition from all of us to send to the neighborhood priority board to request intervention. Then I am thinking we can go on tours of the local fire department and police department, and maybe have coffee while our kids make noise in the front yards.

Of course, I started to trail off into organizing kid-run sit-down protests in front of his house complete with megaphones and signs. While it would be lots of fun, I think that it would be alienating. I also think that I have been studying non-violent direct action for so long, my brain has begun to show the effects.

Thank you, grumpy neighbor….you gave us the energy to build a community. ^__^

I am not certain why I am actually writing this down, except perhaps to detoxify from it and maybe even mull it over in my head a bit. It is a pretty personal blog post, more so than many I have written, so if that sort of thing is not your cup of tea, please take this as your personal cue to exit stage left.

We have a problematic neighbor, one who has plagued us since nearly the day we moved in. He is a middle aged man who is very angry…and he directs his anger and poor sense of self esteem mainly at children, who seem to irk him to no end. Often, he is known to call the police when children are riding their bikes past his house, or kids who are playing a bit too loudly. Our family has been visited by more than a few red-faced police officers who mumble apologies about the neighbor calling them “because the children were playing too loud,” which we generally meet with a sigh and a kind reassurance that they are not bothering us, we do not think the less of them, and yes, we know they are doing their job.

The last time this happened, I invited the officer in, and thanked him for answering the call, no matter how absurd it seemed, and made sure that the kids understood that this was what democracy is all about….anyone has access to the law, even grumpy and bitter old men who have a little too much time on their hands. The kids enjoyed getting to talk to a “real live police officer,” and I tried to generate as much positivity about it as possible.

Generally, we try to avoid this neighbor as much as possible, but today our kids had one of their friends over and the neighbor started being particularly nasty. Apparently they were all playing “rock band” and singing/playing air drums/etc, and this annoyed him, so he made some comment to them, Hershaw told him that “they were all just kids, so leave them alone,” and it degenerated into name calling, with this middle-aged man calling children “dorks” and “worthless” and “brats.”

I walked outside with the kids into the backyard, and quirked a brow in the direction of the neighbor’s house, seeing he had already run back inside and left his wife out there to field the conversation. I asked her what the problem was, and she informed me that all the children were being too loud, and went on and on about how she couldn’t understand it, children were so much quieter when she was a child, etc.
I pointed out that they were just children, and that perhaps if her and her husband had not chosen to live on a street with 34 other children, they might not be bothered by the noise.

At this, the man stomped out of his back door, pointed his finger accusingly at me, and asked me how Hershaw’s father was. Huh? I told him that my husband was at work, and I had no idea what he was going on about, and really, what did that have to do with this conversation? He crossed his arms and gave me a smug glance “No….his REAL father…how IS he?” Taken aback, I breathed in with flared nostrils, and steadied my gaze. “How precisely is that any of your business?” He plowed forward. “And what about Muse’s father, hmmm? How is HE?”

I stared at him, my brain spinning. Was this guy for real? Did he seriously go and look up public records information and search through court records to dig up information on me for some sort of moral argument? As I was considering this, he continued “You are just trash, you know that? Your children have three different fathers, and you….are just trash.” Hershaw spoke up at this point “My mother and father have been married for years, you have really wrong information.”

My heart flip-flopped, and then began to bleed slowly out of my body and onto the ground below my feet. Was he seriously saying these things in front of my children? Was he degrading me….and them….like that? It felt like a bad dream, but I lifted my chin, somehow, and stood my ground.

My voice was measured and fierce, but I could feel myself tremble inside as I felt the twisted morality of an entire society wash over me like a wave, threatening to pull me into the undertow. “I do not need your approval to have children, get married, or live my life. And honestly, considering that all of this is none of your business in the first place, you are just using a faulty moral argument to make yourself feel better because you know you are wrong.” I sensed the yard of kids quiet and still around me, and I wanted to make every word count, every word something I would not be ashamed to say. I wanted to speak calmly to this hateful man, to set the example. My hatred was boiling closer to the surface by the minute, coupled with despair, and rage. I was poignantly aware of how much being called names was affecting me, and I despised that more than anything at the moment of impact.

He must have sensed my agony regardless of my firm upper lip, because he plunged forward. “When are you dropping the next one, huh? When is the next loudmouthed brat going to arrive?” I cocked my head “Excuse me?” He gestured to my stomach. “You look like you are about to pop any day now…so when is it going to be?” I felt the incredulous anger rise up again, hot and wild, and it seeped its way into my voice, I am sure. “Are you calling me fat then? Because…(name of offending neighbor redacted), you know when you ask a woman who is not pregnant when she is due….its basically like you called her fat…” He shrugged. “Who cares, you are just worthless bitch trash anyway.”

I was reeling inside at this point, but acutely aware of the kids around me, still watching, still learning. “You, Sir….are an imbecile. An angry, emotionally stunted, socially inept little man. Do you realize that?” As soon as I said those words, I logically knew that they were wrong. Hate cannot fight hate…anger cannot erase anger. I swallowed, choking on the rest of it in my throat, then turned around very slowly. “Okay everyone….new rule. We are not talking to the neighbors on that particular side of the fence, ever. By ever, I mean, all the time…so even if they speak to you, do not respond. Just turn around, and walk away. Alright?” Nods all around. I straightened my back, and walked as gracefully as my shattered insides would allow towards the house, where I began sobbing quietly as soon as I walked across the threshold of the back door.

This stunned me, because his words…as ill-placed as they were, and as creepy as it is for someone to be googling/searching county records/etc for my name and private information, that logical skin-crawling feeling took second seat to the immense, exhausting despair that was spinning in my belly. I breathed in and out, shallowly, feeling as if I were about to hyper-ventilate. Is this really what we reduce some women to? Is this the dramatic stigma that follows women around when they have led “non-traditional” lives, when they made choices that are not mainstream? Are we whores? Trash? Wastes of society and all effort put into us, just because we were different?

As I processed this, I began to filter through the logic and the emotive, but it was quite difficult. I hadn’t even considered that perception that others might have for a very long time, and I guess I deluded myself into believing that if I didn’t pay credence to it, then it didn’t matter. Yes I had a child two weeks before my eighteenth birthday. Yes I got married to a man I did not love when my oldest son was a toddler, and yes I divorced that man after he shoved his fist into my face, knowing that I was pregnant with his child and completely unable to fathom staying with him just because of the two bindings between us. I birthed that babe, and went on to get married a second time, and my husband adopted Hershaw and Muse legally and socially. They have never known anyone else to be their father, who I have had three more children with, all within “wedlock,” and altogether, we have a very happy, functioning family.

I have a BS in Anthropology, graduated as a University Honors Scholar, and have won various scholarships and awards. In about a year, I will have a Masters Degree in International and Comparative Politics, and I will go on to work for a human rights organization. Is all that good stuff…stuff I worked hard to accomplish, or that I work hard to perpetuate….is it all thrown aside because I am “trash”? Forever tainted by teenage pregnancy? In this line of moral platitudes my neighbor ascribes to, are people who got married at the appropriate time and produced their children at the appropriate time somehow “better” because they did so in the “proper” order? Does it matter if they do other things that are morally reprehensible, like ignore their children because they view them as “appropriately timed” possessions that are investments and little else? What if those “perfect” parents are alcoholics, or beat their kids behind closed, perfectly painted doors, while smiling for the Christmas cards every year? Are they still “valuable” and I still “trash”?

Is there a time limit on being “trash”? When my children grow up and go on to lead their own lives, and I am working in some sort of professional capacity, will that label fade? Or is it a permanent stigma, a stinking, dripping stench that clings to a woman through her entire life, no matter what she does or what she becomes. And what are they before they become “socially acceptable?” Is the person that birthed a bright and beautiful baby boy and put him to her breast to nurse on that warm summer day almost 13 years ago…was she “trash,” but the Graduate Scholar with the marriage and the family and the minivan somehow is not?

Again, logic overrides, but the heart churns. I know I am not “trash.” I know I am a good mother, and realistically, I am no more or less a good mother than I was when I first became one. But emotionally, I am dumbstruck, broken into a thousand pieces and laying all over the pavement, because all of my self-esteem and achievements seemed to tremble in the presence of an old bitter man calling me a “fat worthless bitch piece of trash.” I cannot pretend the words did not sting, and I cannot lie to myself and act like it didn’t affect me, even though I managed to speak to my son about it afterwards, telling him that he should remember the 37 practices of Bodhisattvas, he should remember that even if someone comes to us with anger and hatred, we cannot hate them back. All we can do….all we should do…is love them. I told him that he could smile to the neighbor and bow to him respectfully, and then turn away, if he saw fit to do so.

As for myself, I am trying to take my own advice.

profile of new haircut

I don’t get haircuts often, but when I do, I really enjoy them.