BFFs.

Something beautiful.

Thanks AJU.

Art.

Calvin makes me art. I love it. The letters he writes are covered in drawings or pictures, colorful quotes and verses. He’s made me beautiful journals and a few other things. He takes great pictures that have made me cry before.

Last week he made this in his art class:

I’m proud of him, I love watching him grow as an artist!

Kung Pao Chicken.

Homemade by Ches with her Grandma’s recipe, assisted by Dave, served at my house. Mmmmm… magic!

And I find chopsticks frankly distressing. Am I alone in thinking it odd that a people ingenious enough to invent paper, gunpowder, kites and any number of other useful objects, and who have a noble history extending back 3,000 years haven’t yet worked out that a pair of knitting needles is no way to capture food? ~Bill Bryson

Ha!

Maybe more applicable:

What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as a child? ~Lin Yutang

Vote for Key Phrase!

Sometimes I like to shout (or mutter under my breath) when I’m frustrated with Quickbooks or something isn’t working in the way I need it to work. Now I need YOUR help to decide what that phrase should be.

Blog followers, please cast your vote!

Your Body Remembers.

Your body remembers.

One of my ballet teachers in high school told this story about hearing a piece of music in Target and not knowing who the composer was, then she started remembering the choreagraphy and was dancing right there in the store.

Your body remembers.

My mind has forgotten the names of my fellow dancers, my teachers, even differences between the types of ballet I studied in elementary, middle, high school. I don’t remember the names of the moves; is it passé or retiré devant? What is sauté, tombé, pas de basque? Was this a Graham or Jose Limon style?

But my body remembers.

Nothing felt quite right this week. The leotards and tights too revealing, even though I used to sit in a girls dressing room half naked without blinking an eye. The shoes hurt my toes, which aren’t used to being cooped up. I can’t remember what is cool, tights rolled up or down? Long sleeves or short sleeves? Skirt or shorts or black pants to warm up? Hair in a bun or french twist?

But when the music starts my body remembers.

The weight I’ve gained in my thighs the last six “ballet free” years make a good turned out fifth position impossible, you could park a truck between my feet that should be touching heel to toe. I can hardly lift my legs above ninety degrees and it hurts my back to do an arabesque because I’m not used to all that weight stretched out away from the center of my body.

Somehow I still remember.

By thirty minutes into class my head is moving unconsciously in the direction of my arms, and when I turn around on the barre to do the second side, I always turn towards the barre. If I’m going from the corner I know to start on the second eight count and not waste the rest of the class’ time by pausing. I remember to watch closely and mark the exercises with my hands working full out so that the teacher knows I’m paying attention. I use all the music, drawing out the movements to suspend that moment. My feet do extra beats in the air even though I can’t remember the names of the steps. I feel when I’m cheating my posture by letting my hips stick out and how to keep my shoulders down even when they’re aching from being moved in old/new ways. I unconsciously attempt doubles because I forget that I haven’t done a true pirouette in years and I used to be able to pull off a triple or a quadruple when I was really ‘on.’ I get dizzy. Lots of hopping, not very much spinning.

Still, my body remembers. That’s something worth celebrating.

What I’m Reading.

This is what I’m reading at the moment. Would love to hear what you are working on- especially fiction, I need some inspiration, some imagination, some more fun.

Fun: The Bostonians by Henry James, my quarterly McSweeney’s subscription (LOVE IT!), The Children’s Hospital by Chris Adrian (might not finish), The Dude Abides, the Gospel according to the Coen brothers (not yet released, got a new copy! ), and a bunch of sweet stuff in the queue. I’m getting held up by the Bostonians, not the quickest read but I’m committed to seeing it through.

Work: Exclusion & Embrace by Miroslav Volf, Freedom of Simplicity by Richard Foster, Awed to Heaven/Rooted in Earth by Walter Brueggeman

Pray: Seven Sacred Pauses by Macrina Wierdekehr, The Nine Faces of God by Peter Hannan SJ, All Saints: Saints/Prophets/and Witnesses for our Time by Robert Ellsberg, and the book of John/book of Isaiah in the Bible alternating.

Jimmy James Mind Control.

Got to talk to the famed Jimmy Jam (aka: Officemate Jimmy) the other day. We agreed that our year together at Pilgrim Manor was awesome, a good formative year of being post-college, first jobs, working in an old supply closet with no windows and having a blast.

I was reminded of how Jimmy James controlled the music but I could make requests. A few cds I liked to play on repeat: Death Cab, Ben Folds, and one by Snow Patrol. He would say “What do you want to listen to today?” I’d say one of those three options, in lieu of any better ideas. James would say “ok, great,” wait for ten minutes until I got sidetracked by something else, and then play whatever he wanted. I never noticed until he told me he was doing it the month before I left.

Hahahaha. Apparently I also used to say “Hey James, you will not believe this!!” and then trail off with distraction, never to finish the story.

Miss you Jimmy.

Taking Care.

 i should take care of you/even when i’m down/even when i’m lonely/even when you’re not around

and i should take care of you, even if you don’t ask me to.

This song was written to Zach William’s wife, Stacey. I always like to hear love songs like this one about friends & family, not just about Calvin. Brittany (my roommate) and I were talking about how love has become so confusing in American society and the church that it’s only expected to be seen in sexual love relationships between men and women and is considered strange outside of that context. I also think sometimes “taking care” of somone can have a tinge of codependence and self-abnegation associated with it. But I’m thinking of the best kind of taking care- the considering, respecting, building trust, having vulnerability and freedom for intimacy with each other. The love. You know.

We should take care of each other, even if we’re not around, even if we don’t ask, even if we’re not getting married to each other. Calvin and Andrew have a really special friendship, they still talk all the time and really took care of each other when they were in Nepal together. He takes care of Calvin in a way that I can’t. I could name a bunch of people that I adore, people that take care of me simply because we are friends or family and they love me. Calvin is one of those people, but so are Gloria and other special girlfriends. And a few dear guy friends too. Does it take a village to take care of one person? ha! Not sure, but anyway, just left with the thought today that I want to take care of  my community, and I want them to take care of me.

Tragic Hack Job.

Last week I drove Marcia home and we were talking, having a great time. We saw Wally and Pat (landlord) two common characters on our block sitting on Wally’s porch next door to us. “Hi Lizzy! Hi Marcia!” Wally said. “Hi!” she replied.

GASP! A small scream of dismay, my jaw dropped.

Pat had trimmed Wally’s tree. The same tree that shades our porch and front windows. The tree that I sat staring at the night before watching birds play in. The tree that provides shade and oxygen for our little section of the neighborhood. The tree that makes me feel like I’m sort of still in the Midwest and not living in a city stuck in the middle of a giant cornfield. That tree I love with my whole soul.

Arms cut off unnecessarily, branches askew, a couple bare spots on the side closest to the porch. A tragic hack job that apparently cost $400/hour.

“YOU CUT THE TREE!” I yelled. “It’s ok, it’s ok” Pat tried to calm me down. Wally started looking a bit worried. “It’s ok Lizzy.” ”I can’t believe you did that!!” “It’ll grow back” Pat said, “It’ll be shedding all over your yard by fall.”

I went inside, laid on my bed and started crying. This might seem like an end of the week fatigue cry but I contend it was purely about the tree. “Where will it end? Where is the line?” I asked myself (and Marcia) remembering threats from Pat and Wally about the apple tree in Wally’s back yard that hangs over our fence.

Later I made the point in defense of my tears that after all I DO have a degree in sustainable business, so that proves I love the environment.

Humility and Racism.

I went on a North Omaha trolley tour recently with Jara, Kenley, and Mimi. It was all about the World’s Fair in 1898 and what it would have looked like here or there or this building was like that. I got bored. Drank some OJ. I closed my eyes, imagining me and Jara in big dresses, walking through the streets talking and riding a REAL trolley.

Reality Check.

We probably wouldn’t have been walking through the streets together talking. We wouldn’t have been doing that because Jara is African-American and I am white. George Smith was lynched in Omaha in 1891 by a white mob who never faced any kind of repercussion. Racial riots and tensions were happening through out the early 1900s and Omaha was significantly segregated. I would most likely not have had a friendship with a woman of color, and if I did we couldn’t have paraded it at the world’s fair.

Go back 50 more years- Jara’s ancestors were slaves.  Jump ahead to the 1950’s, I had family members in the KKK.

It’s a shock to my naive optimism to imagine myself back in 1898 and without the possibility of Jara’s friendship. I hate the fact that as a white, socially- aware American I want to pretend we are integrated, pretend we are diverse, and pretend that racism doesn’t exist anymore. It does and it does even in me; I STILL have prejudices and naive ideas about race. Last year in Uganda I commented to my friend Royii “Well, they ( a young white person doing ministry work in Uganda) are living here so I guess they don’t have those assumptions about race.” He said to me “Didn’t you know, the number one qualification for a missionary in Uganda is to be racist?!”

Now, 2009. Reading this is another reality check. Had a great conversation with Jara and Joe Gerstandt talking about experiences in diversity and inclusion and one thing struck me. I’ve been dancing around this in my mind but haven’t known how to name it. I see white people wanting to make issues of diversity about proving we, as individuals, are not racist. I have to confess this- I want to do it. When issues of diversity come up it’s tempting to make a tally in my head of friends of color or situations where I proved that I’m really open to diversity. Joe said that is a really common response when working with companies, he is talking about creating a culture of diversity, someone gets defensive, and then it becomes about how many people of color went to each person’s high school. Sounds absurd, right? But people do it! I’ve done it!

I don’t think we’re going to get very fair in these larger conversations until we stop taking it personally. It’s not about me, it’s about structural issues of exclusion, and when I make it about me I am minimizing the issue and sinning against the people who are being excluded. These conversations should be about building a community (in WMF, in Omaha, in the world) of innovation and creativity- the kind  that comes from embracing diversity and recognizing people’s unique gifts. Diversity is deeper than race and it’s deeper than my ego about “not being a racist’ person.

Building an innovative and creative world is going to cost those of us who are white and socially aware something. It’s going to cost us the good feeling we get when we say “I have x number of African American friends.” or “I work with a Hispanic guy.” Today I decided that I’m willing to pay that price. I’m confessing my naivete, confessing that I’m going to stop taking it personal, and declaring that I’m done proving I’m not racist.