happy mother's day to me

I love lists

first, two words:

Compassion: often understood as niceness and as charitable, but the yoga version of the word is more like “empathy exercises” that are for your own benefit to increase your ability to understand other people and thus to understand (and care for) the world.

Valueability: I made this one up. It means desirability but not only in the erotic way. It means desirable-altogether (or not). It means the degree to which you would invest another person with value in your eyes, in your mind, in your heart, in your blood, in your life. There is probably a Greek word for this, but I don’t know it.

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I have always been flawed in the desirability department. It might be said of me, for instance, “He met a nice woman BUT she has a kid.” And friends have drifted away as well, finding me over-burdened and thus “too heavy” in myself and in the ways that my experiences have shaped my mind. Though it's kind of a drag, there are upsides (aside from the obvious value of children in themselves). Placing all your value in desirability is a dangerous addiction, I think. If that’s all you’ve got, well then you can be worthless in your own estimation at a single stroke of someone else, which will almost inevitably come no matter how “flawless” you are, by the simple passage of time and/or an economic downturn and/or anything that leaves you harmed/odd . . . I learned the limits of desirability early bc I was always a “scratch-and-dent”. It is as if I was never even allowed to APPLY for the Pom Pom squad of my culture, so I could never be on its “side”.

the desirability code:if you didn't laugh, you'd blow your head off

I spent the weekend with my grown daughter and her father and her boyfriend. I wound up spending much of that time talking to Mark, actually. It is impossible for me not to compare us to the OJ/Dan situation, because Mark and I too married with the divorce already in progress. By the time I was OJ’s age (23), Mark and I had been together apx 6 years and had not betrayed each other once and never did. I’m not romanticizing – I remember screaming at him, “YOU ARE SUCH A FUCKING IDIOT WERE YOU ALWAYS THIS MUCH OF A FUCKING IDIOT (?) I MUST BE A FUCKING IDIOT FOR EVEN BEING HERE SCREAMING AT YOU!”, so loud that I lost my voice. And it was mostly like that. But I also remember when I finally broke from him and that place, I called his mother crying in pain making her promise to make sure he got a puppy so he wouldn’t be alone that winter. It is a value, is what I’m saying, that we did not maul each other gratuitously in the split because that means now it is possible that in each other we can sometimes have a person whom we’ve known for half our lives, someone who is “like family”. And from him I got a conversation about empathy, which I needed to help me sort out my troubled thoughts:

Every single person is 100% sympathetic. Meaning, if you really completely understood a person, you would empathize with him/her. But only God can be empathetic enough – that’s why He can love child molesters and we can’t. In an everyday way, people do their best trying to understand those with whom they have intimate relationships, ie friends, lovers, family members. But empathy sometimes fails, and sometimes maybe that is necessary.

I’ll give you an example: A white person and a black person become intimates of whatever kind for whatever reason. The white person was raised in a racist society (obviously) and may even come from Alabama and a Baptist family whatever besides. In that case, the black guy could empathize with the white guy’s racism, could understand that it was written into his brain when he was defenseless, that the white guy might struggle with visceral fear or disgust towards black people, and may even feel those things sometimes for his own friend. The black guy could empathize, but he couldn’t follow his friend into those feelings. Practically speaking, the black guy cannot feel as his friend does without hating himself.

Last week was quietly awful. Among other things, it became clear to me that my friendship with OJ might not survive her divorce. I understand how much erotic desirability is power in this culture. I understand that a woman married young is seen as lacking intelligence, imagination and sexual courage. I understand that to her I am something like a cautionary tale for how she might have ended up with a kid even (!), like bruised fruit. I empathize, but I can’t follow her there. And maybe she can’t follow me either into my fear of the value system in which progressive politics are like carbon credits that you use to buy moral superiority even if you act like an asshole interpersonally.

live it up! be an asshole!

Welp, maybe the people who will have stayed close to me in whatever capacity will be few, but they are going to have always been more compassionate than the average since my desirability is culturally questionable, leaving valueability as the only logical measure. (And that means you can work on your compassion just by hanging out with me too [you’re welcome. lol]) playlist:

Velvet Revolver – Used To Love Her – Mark raved about seeing this band. I glazed over, remembering only the name and not the music in all honesty . . . for the life me, I cannot imagine a mosh pit with this song as the soundtrack. In fact, who am I kidding?, I can’t imagine a mosh pit at all.

Krishna Das – Devi Rave, Pilgram Heart – This comes from Roberto, my yoga master, who looked into my face and suggested that chasing Zen like a cheetah after an antelope might be counter-productive at times.

Medeski, Martin & Wood – Where’s the Music, one of G.’s faves – It is a strange pleasure taking hospitality from your child for the first time, in her own first real apartment, eating on her dishes, sleeping on her pillows. It adds a new dimension to the phrase “making friends”. She’s a keeper.

This is what I liked best from what was on the radio on the road. It definitely struck a chord: Langhorne Slim – Diamonds and Gold

Lastly, The Cure - The Lovecats, for FPH cz he likes The Cure and I like the song title. (a peace offering)