Some things on my mind right now:
- How until someone with federal power takes notice and says something, the Occupy Movement all over the country remains a local issue. Local in from coast to coast. Dealt with in all sorts of different ways. I wonder if it’s caused camaraderie in mayors the way it’s caused it in occupiers?
- How jaded my generation is, how excited and optimistic I am, and why I’m still mostly following the news instead of being part of it.
- How even people with the right sort of ideas can really miss the picture sometimes. Example: When I was working with kids in AmeriCorps, I was taught never to use rice or dried beans or other edible products as art supplies – it was too likely to be painful to a child without enough to eat at home. Now, I teach Sunday school for a Unitarian Universalist congregation, and they don’t bat an eye at using rice in art. Why not? None of their kids are going hungry. Woah, demographics.
- What makes me claim some neurotransmitters as my own, whereas others (the ones I ingest in birth control instance) I am uncomfortable with, and try to separate. How I will feel when I can’t point to an outside source of hormones to take the blame away from me when I react to situations in ways I wish I didn’t. What I’ll do if my insecurity and sadness are, in fact, based squarely in the same place that I base my sense of self.
- Gender, gender, gender. My gender, kids’ genders, gender choice and gender presentation and how to give options and support without pushing or weighing things in one way or another. Gender is complicated. Gender is great!
- How crazy it is to base relationships on appreciation of difference instead of (or, let’s be honest, in addition to) appreciation of sameness. Whether I’ll be able to love myself a little more easily if I can stop being afraid that the parts of me that aren’t like the things I admire in other people somehow make me bad.
- How much I love America. How proud I am to be American. How afraid I am of America, and how sick I am of the way Americans set up media to speak to ourselves. Today in doctors office I caught some morning news program. It was bad. Just, really bad.
- Gradschool. Getting a masters level degree. Not getting a PhD even though lots of my friends and one of my parents are getting or have one. Trying not to feel like getting an MSW instead makes me less smart, hard working, accomplished, worthwhile…
- Syntax. Sentence structures are fun!
- How hard it is to buy clothes that fit, and how I kind of wish they didn’t even PUT misleading information like “small” or “large” or “size 6” or “size 10” on things. Also, how very nice it is to be able to buy clothes, and to have clothes that fit.
- My hands hurt. I am brave. I am not anathema.
- How totally, unutterably lucky and blessed I am to have the life and the brain and the body and the skills I do, and to be loved by so many amazing people. How biodiversity is amazing. How closely connected wolves are to domestic dogs. How much I love moss. How beautiful the world is, fences and vines, leaves and the dark shadows they leave on the sidewalk, sunshine and clouds. That kind of stuff. You know.
Thank you for writing. It is always interesting to hear what’s on your mind!
I had some thoughts as I was reading. I think the Occupy Movement *is* a local issue, all over the country, and I think that’s part of what makes it strong. I think that our generation is no more jaded than any given generation, which is to say, we as a social group are pretty jaded, and yet we listen and pay attention and some of us speak loudly enough for the world to hear.
I think your comment about rice gets right to the point. It makes me think about teaching, and all the biases and prejudices that get passed on from teacher to student, inevitably, always. The person of the teacher always bleeds over a little into the words and numbers and songs that she or he teaches. And it’s great, and it’s a little scary, and something I think it’s important to be mindful of.
I think that news programs are just, like, talking to someone else. I used to be upset whenever I watched CNN, but then I realized, the way CNN is presenting news stories is geared towards someone who is not like me at all. Possibly not like you, either.
I think that your working on an MSW is awesome. I think an MSW is something very special, just as special as a Ph.D. or a different Master’s degree or a J.D. or an M.D. You learn to help people. That, to my mind, is as difficult, as great of an accomplishment as learning about the Internet or about a particular culture or about law or how to sew people up.
Lastly, I think you’re wonderful – the happiness, the curiosity, the bravery, the sadness, the insecurity, and all the other parts of you. I don’t think any of those parts is bad, or shameful, they are just that – parts of a whole person, and you take away one, there is no longer a whole there. To end on a holiday-note, this Thanksgiving, I am thankful for my friends, and I am happy to count you – all of you, not some subset of you – among that number.
Have a great Thanksgiving!
Vlad