Uh oh...here we go again.

So...I found ANOTHER personality test, the Enneagram 9 Types (http://www.9types.com/), and I am a number 7. Does my love of personality tests make me obsessed with self? Or just interested in being self-knowledgable? I must admit this is pretty right on. I bolded the ones that hit the nail on the head (aka, all of them).

Type 7: Adventurers are energetic, lively, and optimistic. They want to contribute to the world.

How to Get Along with Me:

Give me companionship, affection, and freedom.
Engage with me in stimulating conversation and laughter.
Appreciate my grand visions and listen to my stories.
Don't try to change my style. Accept me the way I am.
Be responsible for youself. I dislike clingy or needy people.
Don't tell me what to do.

What I Like About Being a Seven:

being optimistic and not letting life's troubles get me down
being spontaneous and free-spirited
being outspoken and outrageous. It's part of the fun.
being generous and trying to make the world a better place
having the guts to take risks and to try exciting adventures
having such varied interests and abilities

What's Hard About Being a Seven:

not having enough time to do all the things I want
not completing things I start
not being able to profit from the benefits that come from specializing; not making a commitment to a career
having a tendency to be ungrounded; getting lost in plans or fantasies
feeling confined when I'm in a one-to-one relationship

Global warming as "tool of Satan"

Christians, particularly the fundamentalists of the Religious Right, fascinate me. I'm both repelled and attracted to them, much like roadkill....you know it's gonna be nasty but you can't help but look. Here are some particualrly amusing sections from an article I read on global warming and Jerry Falwell:
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Falwell Says Global Warming Tool of Satan by Bob Allen, 03-01-07, http://www.ethicsdaily.com/article_detail.cfm?AID=8596

Moral Majority founder Jerry Falwell, who has worked for decades to involve conservative Christians in politics, said Sunday the debate over global warming is a tool of Satan being used to distract churches from their primary focus of preaching the gospel. "If I decide here as the pastor and our deacons decide that we're going to get caught up in the global warming thing, we're not going to be able to reach the masses of souls for Christ, because our attention will be elsewhere, " Falwell said in Sunday's sermon at Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Va. "That's pretty wise for Satan to concoct." ...

Falwell didn't deny the earth is warmer than it once was, but he said fluctuations in the earth's temperature have nothing to do with human activity. He described the "truth" linking global warming to a rise in man-made carbon dioxide gases as the "greatest deception in the history of science." ...

Falwell cited two Bible verses that he said apply to the global-warming debate: Psalm 24:1-2, which declares "The earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof," and Genesis 8:22, which says there will be seasons of spring, summer, fall and winter for "as long as the earth remains."...

"Now how long will the earth remain?" Falwell asked. "It will remain until the new heavens and the new earth come. And that won't happen until, well, over in the last two chapters of the Bible--after the tribulation, after the thousand-year reign of Christ, then new heavens and new earth. Why? Because the former things are passed away. The earth will go up in dissolution from severe heat. The environmentalists will be really shook up then, because God is going to blow it all away, and bring down new heavens and new earth."

In recent years, "since Al Gore invented the Internet and then accelerated global warming," Falwell said, "our world has been in turmoil." Unfortunately, Falwell said, "naïve Christian leaders are also being duped," jumping on a bandwagon with "persons who are on the left of everything." "I agree every Christian ought to be an environmentalist of reasonable sort," Falwell said. "We should certainly pick up trash. We ought to beautify the earth as best we can. We ought to keep the streams clean. But we shouldn't be hugging trees and worshipping the creation more than we worship the Creator, and that is what global warming is all about."

Falwell said a better name for Gore's film, which later the evening following Falwell's Sunday morning sermon won an Oscar for best documentary, would be "A Convenient Untruth--convenient for him to alarm the people for his own political advantage, without any background."
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As I said, pretty hilarious. But then there is this, http://www.christiansandclimate.org/statement, which renews my faith in the Church. I bought a book today called, "It's Easy Being Green" with all these pratical steps to make your lifestyle more eco-friendly. I would really like to implement some of these enivornmentally sound practices into our life in l'Arche. Perhaps I will post an entry with some of the ideas I find. More on that later.

Waves...

What is the appropriate, socially acceptable amount of time to mourn for a bereaved pet? A few days? A few weeks? Maybe it depends on the number of years you've had the pet. Or perhaps the age and maturity level of the surviving owner. Maybe it's a combination. I've had Cinnamon for 16 years. I was 7 then and I'm 23 year now. That means for 2/3s of my life, 66.66%, Cinnamon has been around. It's like he became a permanent fixture...I just always expected him to be around. And then, on Thursday, I came home to find him gone. He's been declining in health since December but was psychologically healthy. Never seemed to be in pain, even though he was losing weight. Never became a recluse. Never ceased to want to be around people, to give and receive affection. His sister, Oreo (yes, yes...we named them when we were in early elementary school), has been psychologically wack for the last year or so...like an angry, crazy aunt who lives in the basement and never sees the light of day. But Cinnamon....rocked. We were thoroughly attached to one another. We had our rituals...waking me up in the early morning, meeting me on the stairs, greeting me when I walked in the door. Ugh. This hurts a lot.

It really does feel like such a loss, no matter how minor a cats life may seem to the world. Funny, there are plenty of people on this earth who treat human life as frivolous and unsacred. I can only imagine what they must think of me, blubbering over the lost life of my sweet cat. My friend made a good point when he said, "The world can be a very lonely, alienating place. Those creatures that help us overcome our loneliness, that provide us with companionship and unconditional love, are a great gift to us. Their loss can be very devastating." That's really all it was with my cat. I cared for him. He cared for me. Nothing else, really. No human baggage. It's hard to lose that companionship, the unconditional love of a non-human friend.

Man...I sound like one of those freaky cat lovers who collect all-things-cat, and have cat calendars and shirts printed with their cats' faces on them, and little cat tombstones for their graves. I never had Cinnamon pose in our family portraits or ever referred to him as a "little human being." But his absence is profound, and the devastation I feel makes him seem more than just a pet. So this is what grief feels like. I've experienced grief before, of course. I've experienced very painful loss -- the disolvement of certain friendships, breaking up with Nick when I was in highschool, Melissa going away to college, leaving Uganda, the loss of my faith, crying my eyes out in the basement of Ferrin when I broke up with Steve, the death of classmates. I'm blessed (or maybe not blessed?) to never have experienced major loss of life...no relatives or friends. Just my dear sweet cat who lived a long, happy, contented life and who died peacefully and without pain. And I'm sad. I know this will pass. Grief comes in waves. First it crashes down. And then it subsides. And the waves come, but they come farther and farther apart.

But the loss does feel profound, however embarrassing it is to mourn for the loss of a pet. Given my habit of grieving for the roadkill squirrels and lion-hunted antelope, this probably should come as no surprise. I'm an emotional sap. I cry a lot. I often have profound, deep, earth-shaking emotional experiences and I value these experiences, however painful they may be. I just hate the finality, the loss of control. And I am overwhelmed when I think about all the death in the world, the retched, senseless deaths of those killed in suicide attacks or natural disasters....if I feel this bad about the death of my cat, what of the 50 who died today in Iraq? The twenty-some children killed this month in Palestine? The lonely deaths of the elderly and disabled in institutions? The untimely deaths of my classmates at Gordon? The woman taking groceries out of her car in DC who was struck and killed by a bus? What of all these lives? How many people are mourning their deaths?

Death is earth-shaking, life-shattering. Grief comes in waves. But the loss of life itself comes like a giant crash of a boulder in still water....ripples moving out and out and out and affecting ....everyone really. Everything is disturbed. And my heart aches for those grieving mothers and fathers and children and friends and loved ones. My heart aches for them because, though my loss feels significant, I will move on mostly unscathed. But imagine...your baby dying in your arms? Death overwhelms me. Life ripples in a pond, like waves in the sea.

Cinnamon

My cat died today. I found him in the living room when I came home for the weekend. I've cried a lot. I'm sad. He was a part of my life for 16 years. That's 2/3 of my life. Now he's gone. Death sucks.

In opposition to the recent VA law...

I referred to the recent VA law regarding the withholding of funds for non-profit groups that provide services to undocumented folks. More or less, these non-profits provide services to anyone in need, regardless of documentation (imagine: someone comes to a free clinic with a gushing wound, near death, and the doctor must search him for proper US documentation first. If no documentation found, the doctor can't treat him! Cruel? Yes...) This is f'ing messed up. Do you know how many times I've entered countries without proper documentation? I've been an illegal alien in various places around the world....my visa expired several months into my stay in Uganda....I didn't even get a visa for Romania because it was too much of a hassle. I was there, for all intents and purposes, illegally. Anyway, we are becoming neo-fascists. The movie, Children of Men, is quite prophetic in its portrayal of a near-future Europe that has come to demonize foreigners, forcing them into camps that closely resemble the Jewish ghettos during WWII. Anyway, the below link allows individuals to contact their senators regarding this atrocious law. I encourage all to take a stance.

http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/organizationsORG/LAJC/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=6550&t=VJC.

Community and sickness....

I'm coming down with something. This is what happens when 9 germ-producing-and-expelling bodies live together under one roof. Ha! I was listening to NPR the other night after I dropped the folks off at their exercise class...one of the news stories was about the flew epedemic that swept over the world at the turn of the century. Virtually every inhabited continent on the earth was affected (and infected) and millions upon millions died. The story focused primarily on 6 communities in the US that survived the flu 'plague' unscathed, with no deaths reported. These communities included a military base, Princeton U, several other schools, etc. Researches found that the reason these communities were able to live out the epedemic without loss of life was the practice of sequestering the healthy from the outside world. This is just the opposite of qaurentining the sick off from the healthy (think Camus' The Plague). These sequested communities didn't allow any vistors and remained isolated for months. And they survived. I was thinking about what would happen if a flu outbreak happened today. My committment to this community, l'Arche, means I'm responsible for the lives of people in this house, people who are more medically fragile than most. And as a Christian, I'm responsible for my neighbor, those in and outside of my community. This is something to think about, with all this talk of impending flu. How will the Church respond if and when something like this occurs? How is the Church responding now to the AIDS epedemic in Africa? Will remain faithful when our own bodily health is on the line? I'm thinking out loud here...I'm much better at asking questions than answering them.

Oh, Virginia, mired in racism and xenophobia.

I am rarely proud to associate myself with this state, Virginia, when it comes to its historically racist past and homophobic, xenophobic present. Virginia was one of the first established colonies in the New World and Jamestown, VA, the first settlement. And yet, even after 400 years of existence, we are still producing laws and policies that are overtly racist and xenophobic. Interestingly enough, more presidents have been born and raised in the Commonwealth of Virginia than any other state in the Union. Virginia has a lot to offer, but it has offered so little in regards to justice, tolerance, and humility over the past 4 centuries. In honor of Black History Month (starting tomorrow) and to quench my own curiosity, I've done a bit of research on Virginia's ugly past and present:

*1619, first African slaves arrive in VA
*1661, in order to maintain needed labor on Jamestown's tobacco plantations, VA legislature legally recognizes slavery
*1667, VA legislature declares Christian baptism does not "exempt slaves from bondage"
*1705, VA legislature passes statute on "casual killing of slaves" that states, "If any slave resist his master...correcting such slave, and shall happen to be killed in such correction...the master shall be free of all punishment...as if such accident never happened." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_codes)
*1723, free African-Americans in VA are forbidden by law to carry weapons or associate with slaves.
*1762, the VA legislature passes law forbidden black males from voting.
*1792, northern States begin freeing slaves. With invention of cotton gin, demand for slavery increases and Virginia law forbids free blacks from entering the State.

Jumping ahead to Jim Crow era...

*1870, VA passes education statute prohibiting white and 'colored' children from being taught in the same school.
*1873, VA miscegenation state code: white persons who married Negroes would be jailed for at least one year, and fined a minimum of $100.
*1900, VA passes statute requiring railroads to offer separate cars for black and white passengers
*1901, city of Alexandria passes city ordinance requiring segregated streetcars
*1912, VA residential statute passed, stating "the preservation of the public morals, public health and public order, in the cities and towns of this commonwealth is endangered by the residence of white and colored people in close proximity to one another," authorizing cities and towns that adopted the provision, to be divided into districts known as "Segregation districts
*1924, to reinforce anti-miscegenation laws passed in the 1600s, VA passed law that prohibited whites from marrying anyone with “a single drop of Negro blood”
*1930, VA state code requires segregated audiences of every theatre, movie theatre, opera house, and other places of entertainment
*1930, VA passes bill for the "preservation of the white race," defining a white person as on with "no trace whatsoever" of non-white blood.
*1967, in court case Loving v Virginia, an inter-racial couple married in DC are arrested upon returning home to Virginia. The Supreme Court ruled anti-miscegenation laws unconstitutional.

Here are some incidences of racism and xenophobia that have happened more recently:
-former Senator George Allen's uses term 'macaca', a racial slur, in referring to a young man connected with the campaign of his opponent, James Webb
-Virginia Representative Virgil Goode went on record as opposed to newly-elected Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison's intention, as a believer in Islam, to use the Koran in his swearing-in ceremony.
-Virginia state legislator, Delegate Frank D. Hargrove, Sr., offended African-Americans and Jews in his comments in opposition to legislation which would have the state apologize for slavery. Virginia apologizing for slavery in its past, Hargrove said, would be similar to having Jews apologize for killing Christ. When Delegate David L. Englin, who is Jewish, called Hargrove's remarks "inflammatory," Hargrove told Englin his skin was too thin.

And most recently, I read this headline today on the front-page of the Washington Post: "Va. House Approves Bill On Illegal Immigration: Aim Is to Block Access To State, Local Funds." (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/30/AR2007013001780.html) This bill could force the Virginia Association of Free Clinics and the Salvation Army, among other groups, to verify immigrant status before offering assistance to those in need or lose their funding (according to the article). Sponsor of the bill, Del. Miller from Manassas (my friggen' hometown) says, "The ultimate goal is to make the commonwealth of Virginia an unwelcome place if you are in this country illegally." The article also stated that Virginia has passed a number of other bills to make life "difficult for those who have entered the country illegally" - denying in-state college tuition to illegal immigrants, punishing employers who hire undocumented workers, expanding the power of police to apprehend undocumented persons.

The ACLU chapter in Virginia provides some more information regarding the infringement upon immigrant rights in Virginia: http://www.acluva.org/pages/ImmRights.html Are these policies and those during slavery and the Jim Crow era not intimately related, rooted from the same distrust and hatred of the Other? Something must be done....

Immigration: The Migration of the Desperate

The church Hazel and I go to most Sundays, Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church, places an enormous amount of emphasis on issues of social justice, advocacy, and reform. In last week's newsletter was this insert regarding the current immigration crisis in America. I found it profound and important to share.

Looking at Root Causes: Why do Immigrants Come to the US?
*"We must never forget that many immigrants come to this country in desperate circumstances. Some have fled political persecution, war, economic devastation... Others have wagered on finding a better life in this country in the face of economic desperation at home. As Pope John Paul II has noted, 'In many regions of the world today people live in tragic situations of instability and uncertainty. It does not come as a surprise that in such contexts the poor and the destitute make plans to escape, to seek a new land that can offer them bread, dignity, and peace. This is the migration of the desperate..."
-US Catholic Bishops, Welcoming the Stranger Among Us: Unity in Diversity, Nov. 15, 2000
*Economic injustice still plagues most of the world, providing a strong impetus for immigration. Given the current situation, any true "solution" to illegal immigration to the US must take into account the root causes of the poverty from which many immigrants are trying to escape.
-There are 60 countries in today's world that are poorer than they were 30 years ago.
-A fifth of the world's population (1.2 billion human beings) live on less than $1 per day.
-Almost 50% of the world's population (2.8 billion human beings) live on less than $2 per day.
-Each second, a child dies of malnutrition.

An Unjust Trading System *The poorest countries of the world account for only 0.4% of international trade, yet they lose an estimated $700 billion a year due to unfair trade policies. The US and other developed nations are currently pursuing "free trade" agreements with developing countries. These developing countries, which often utilize higher levels of tariffs and taxes on incoming goods in order to gather revenue for their governments, are forced to eliminate these tariffs and taxes as a part of the free trade agreements. Yet, many people concerned with poverty are pointing to statistics which show that unregulated, "free" trade primarily benefits wealthy corporations and wealthy countries; poverty is INCREASING around the world despite increased free trade. The gap between the rich and the poor as increased under fair trade policies -- the median income of the richest 10% is 122 times HIGHER than the poorest 10%. From the perspective of Catholic Social Teaching, this is not authentic human development for all groups of people.
*One of the most unjust aspects of the trade system is the use of agricultural subsidies by the US and EU. The US provides hundreds of billions of dollars on agricultural subsidies, most of which goes to a few large agri-businesses who control most of the agricultural production in the US. This allows agricultural production to occur en masse and to knock smaller competitors -- both in the US and in developing countries -- out of business. (my interjection: Please see the documentaries "Life and Debt" and "Black Gold" for more information).

The Failure of the "Washington Consensus" *In the 80s and 90s, the international financial institutions, such as the IMF and the World Bank, promoted a set of policies called the "Washington Consensus." Many developing countries were pressured to liberalize trade and the financial sector, cut bank on social spending, and privatize services that were run by the state. For example, many countries in Latin America followed the recommended policies, but found that economic rates were better before the changes than after. The region remains poor. Many experts agree that this was a major setback for Latin America. Unfortunately, some of the same policies are still being recommended by financial institutions.

The Continuing Debt Crisis
*Despite recent initiative to reduce the debt of poor countries, such as the Heavily-Indebted Poor Country (HIPC) Initiative and the Multi-lateral Debt Relief Initiative (MDRI), dozens of countries still have not received relief and are still enslaved to debt. High levels of debt hurt the poor because the money that governments must spend on paying interests on debts takes valuable resources away from much-needed social services in poor countries (my interjection: check out Bono's One Campaign -- http://www.one.org/).

Insufficient Development Aid *In 1970, at the UN General Assembly, developed country governments pledged to devote .7% of their GNI on Official Development Assistance by the mid 1970s. However, NONE of the developed country donors reached this goal. Instead of .7% , the amount of aid has been closer to .3%, some $100 billion short. The US has donated the least of all developed nations, allocating just .22% of its GNI to ODA. (Norway .93%, Denmark .81%, Sweden .92%, Austria .52%, UK .48%, France .47%, Canada .34%) (my interjection: compare this .22% with the 49% currently allocated to defense and military in the national budget.) In 2005, the EU pledged to spend .56% of GNI on poverty reduction by 2010, and .7% by 2015. People concerned about global poverty are calling the US to take similar action.

Prayer to Change Our Hearts, Our Policies-Undocumented persons among us are often accused of break the law. Let us remember that it is our poverty-producing policies which break the law of human dignity. Change our hearts and our policies, O God.
-Our leaders see these people as burdens. Yet, if we came from a life without opportunities, wouldn’t we do the same? Change our hearts and our policies, O God.
-We long for a more just world, where families need not be separated for lack of opportunity. Inspire us to challenge the system and structures that perpetuate poverty. Change our hearts and our policies, O God.
Amen.

Those weeks...

It's been one of "those" weeks where you look back and think, "Did I really make it to Friday?" Oye. It's all a blur, somewhere in my subconscious, properly suppressed next to the death of my cat Skittles when I was 7 and the time I fell off my bike in front of some neighborhood kids......or the time I had a panic attack and broke my babysitter's window and then pretended I knew nothing about it (until they called the police because the broken window looked suspiciously like a break in...and the officer held his flashlight up to my fingers and compared them to the ones on the window...and I knew it was over then). Ha! So much for suppressed, traumatic memories....they are boiling back up like volcanic lava. Isn't that what good psycho-therapy is? Unleashing the latent memories that haunt us and stunt our growth? Well, at least I'm freed of those.

No, really, the week was not traumatic like that incident with the window and the police officer. But as I explained it to my brother-o-law on the phone, "I'm a bad assistant." I really am, at least when it comes to dates and finances and paper pushing. I would make a horrible bureaucrat. But I'll take that as my own personal compliment. A bureaucrat came and visited our lovely home the other day and we were shaking in our stocking feet. She was from Medicaid Waver, and essentially has the power to make or break our life as a L’Arche community. It Is MA that provides our slots for group housing. It is MA that houses and feeds the supports the core members through monthly funding. It is through MA that we assistants have a salary (or stipend, rather). We are really at their mercy. So, when they show up unannounced to check up on our records, it's always a bit disconcerting. I hid in my room, until my addiction to caffeine lured me from my monastic cell to the kitchen where I caught glimpse of a real live bureaucrat, slaving away over her laptop with our schedules and med records and maintenance check lists strewn about her. But then, as I commented on the flurries outside (to myself), she looked up from her work and said to me, "Oh yes. Isn't it beautiful?" and I decided then that she wasn't two-headed monster waiting to rip our throats out....she was actually a blood-and-flesh human being. So that was nice. And she had mercy and grace on us for not signing this or that form.

This will be my job next year, battling the bureaucracy, keeping files up to date. The house is, essentially, screwed. Ha! No...as Debbie and I figured out tonight when I was making chipatis and peanut Thai noodles on the stove, I develop certain capacities when under stress, particularly the S and J of Myers-Briggs. If you are an S and a J, you are impeccable, probably Type A, highly organized, neatly pressed. I am not these things...most of the time (I actually went out of the house today wearing fleece from head to toe, without my teeth brushed, and my shirt on backwards). But Debbie, a usual SJ, when under stress, becomes an FP, evidenced by the fact that she put a metal bowl in the microwave to dethaw the broccoli, which I promptly pulled out, thanks to the help of adrenaline and the SJ coursing through my blood. We did had a mighty feast tonight, and 5 guests to dinner, including a developmentally disabled person named Jong who was pretty raucous. He found and ate three of our bagels in about 5 minutes flat. We were shocked into a state of awed silence.

Well, I've digressed. This week, Tuesday, I was supposed to take Eduardo to the dentist. I had scheduled and rescheduled this appointment twice and was very aware of the day and the time, not to mention the office called and reminded me on Monday. Blah blah. And yet, Tuesday morning rolls around and (due to a late night session with Stephen Colbert), I find myself turning my alarm clock off for another hour and .5 until I wake up at 10 -- the EXACT time I am supposed to be at the dentist with ED. Problem is, the ED is at work and the dentist is 20 minutes away. This is where I begin to perspire with dread. Fortunately, the office was merciful (maybe my shaking voice helped) and ED was slow but easy-going, and we raced there and made it in time for ED to have a new tooth.

As we were leaving the parking garage after the appointment, I realize I must pay $3.00 to a machine, rather than a teller. So, I pull out two crumpled ones and try desperately to stuff them into the machine, only to have them spit out again and again. The cars are lining up behind me. I'm leaning out the window, cursing at the machine all the while ED is smiling at himself in the mirror, until I prompt him to "look around for quarters." So, he finds me about 10 pennies (who knew?) and enjoys the "game" while I am perspiring with dread again and the line of cars behind me is approaching 4. Finally, a miracle of the Lord, some quarters are sent down like manna from Heaven and we make it out of the garage. ED is unfazed but I'm a wreck.

We drive out of the garage onto the main highway, and I sense something is wrong and ED, the perceptive one, says, "What's that funny noise coming from your car?" Like finding a lump on your back or coughing up a bit of blood, your first inclination is to ignore it, because it could only be something awful and it's much easier to deny it than face it. So I ignore it but it gets worse and it feels like I'm driving over gravel, though the road is smooth. Finally, I pull into a parking lot and, with dread of course, start the solemn walk around my car, checking each tire until....I find the last tire in the rear is flat. Completely flat. ED is not concerned and continues to smile at himself in the car mirror. Yay for Zoloft. But I begin to sweat again and my SJ kicks into action -- pull out the tire pump in my trunk, blow up the tire, and try desperately to make it the 13 miles home without totally ruining my rims. We make it, but just barely. The nice man at the shop on Glebe found the leak (which was not hard because it was whistling air out at a loud and rapid rate at the site where the cursed nail had punctured it) and plugged it and then over-charged me. I am sweaty and haggard and let it go.

That was my Tuesday morning....from slumber to total chaos. Such is L’Arche and life, I guess. That evening was my birthday celebration which was a sweet affair. It was then that everything was redeemed. And it's Thursday night and Eduardo's tooth hasn't fallen out yet which I'm counting as a miracle. Call up the Pope. The weeks really do fly in L’Arche. It's almost February. I just turned 23. I thought by this age, I would have my shit figured out, but I guess we all have our strengths and weaknesses and will have (many of) them for the rest of our lives. Today at our team meeting, Barbara was affirming all of us for being so "competent" and I looked at her and laughed. "Barbara, if you only saw me Tuesday." She replied, "We all have our days."

More wisdom from JV:

Many of [the handicapped] have not developed their capacities of reason; so they live in a situation of trust…Religious faith comes easily to someone who lives on trust…For somebody who lives on reason, though, faith is not very interesting or easy.
The Other Side, March '86

Community is the place of forgiveness. In spite of all the trust we may have in each other there are always words that wound, self-promoting attitudes, situations where susceptibilities clash. That is why living together implies a certain cross, a constant effort and an acceptance which is daily and mutual forgiveness.
Community and Growth

One of the things that we discover when we live with the poor, is that they awaken our hearts as we tell each other's stories; they open us up to people; but they also reveal our own poverty.
Address to Lambeth Conference, July '98

We shouldn't seek the ideal community. It is a question of loving those whom God has set beside us today. They are signs of God.
Community and Growth

My hope is that more and more people will discover that the peace we all yearn for is not just the work of governments but the task of each one of us. We can all become makers of peace.
Finding Peace

God is not to be found in the ideal but is hidden in the poverty of the present moment, in all that is broken and inadequate in our communities and in our own hearts.
Letter from Trosly, August '03

This is kind of sad....

Man. I thought I was well-traveled. But the Earth is so massive and I've been...hardly anywhere! I need to hop down to Mexico. I feel obligated, being their overbearing, ignorant neighbor to the north.



create your own visited countries map
or vertaling Duits Nederlands

Jean Vanier insight

“The Word became flesh to communicate to us human beings caught in the mud, the pain, the fears and the brokenness of existence, the life, the joy, the communion, the ecstatic gift of love that is the source of all love and life and unity in our universe and that is the very life of God.”

a wedding.

Melissa and Jacob are married. I am an official sister-in-law. They're wedding was beautiful, as far as I know. It's hard to have an objective perspective (an oxymoron) when standing next to the bride and groom. I was, perhaps, a bit obsequious...fawning over Melissa's train like a lackey. It was a delightful experience to be in a wedding, to witness the union of two people you love - one whom you've known your entire life and another whom you've grown to love in a short time.

The homily, given by one Dr Ellen Davis of Duke's Divinity School, encouraged Jacob and Melissa to "preach a sermon" with their marriage. And what would that sermon be? What would they preach to the world through the example of their marriage? Peace-making, care for the earth, respect for life, love for children, delight in simple things. I really do think marriage is meant to benefit the world. I think I read a Sojourners article on that once. Marriage for the common good. Strange way of saying it, but I do agree with the premise.

Will and I talked a bit in the car on the way over to the rehearsal dinner about the great risk that is taken when entering into a marriage covenant with someone. We are all going to pass away. We all must say goodbye someday. When we enter into a union with someone, we are bearing their humanity, their mortality, along with ours. "Sickness or in health. Until death do us part." Damn...if people really listened to the vows they made, really thought of their weight, their intensity, the divorce rate would be much lower in the United States. And the marriage rate would be lower, too, when you think about it. Marriage is no joke. It involves the most joyous aspects of life, and the deepest sorrow. And, as spouses and friends and family members, we must endure all of it together.

Strange Debbie food combinations:

-tomato sauce with French toast
-peanut butter on an everything bagel
-dried squid and peanuts

I'm sure I will update this list later.

The great divorce...

And so, it is finished. The Episcopal Church is broken in two. Martyn Minns was on the cover of the Washington Post yesterday, embracing a vestry member as the vote tally was read. I may feel theologically and politically alienated at Truro, but I was raised in that church, baptized and confirmed in that church. It is truly my home church, and no matter how different my understanding of the world and my faith, it will never cease to be my home church. Therefore, because I disagree with their dissenting and their theo-political understanding of the Gospel, do I leave? They have left the ECUSA, of course, so does that give me liberty to leave them? Once again, I feel spiritually homeless. I love the Episcopal Church, even with all its disfunctionalities, and I am intimately connected to Truro Church, one of the main leaders in the "fight to break away." This almost feels like being the child of divorced parents. You must pick a side! You must choose who you want to live with! Who will be your guardian now? This a hard place to be, especially when both "parents" are berating the other, equally as militant and self-righteous. It's enough to make me want to find a new family altogether.

Time ticks on...

Looks like the Fire Department has overturned it's eviction notice. One down, a million to go. The DC city council is so chaotic, not to mention hostile to non-profits like l'Arche which are highly reputable. I don't get it.

Went out to a pub last night with Sarah, Mandy, and Deb. It was a LOT of fun. Mandy has been trying to get to me to see this local band, Scythian, for a long while - like three months! I couldn't believe their following. The bar was PACKED with twenty-somethings and thirty-somethings, professionals and yuppies, mostly. We made are way right in front so we were practically staring the band members in the eyes, watching the sweat trickle down their faces. They're a Celtic-fusion-rock-bluegrass band, or something. Guitar and violin and drums. Interesting. And we DANCED, like madwomen. I miss dancing. I feel like we danced all the time at Gordon -- we were dancing fools.

Christmas is coming at a rapid rate and I am missing Christ Church more and more with every passing day of Advent. I don't understand how most Protestant churches worship outside of a liturgical calendar. It's like existing in a seasonal vacuum, with the occasional holiday (Christmas and Easter) punctuating the sameness. This would be hard for me. I constantly need to be reminded of the faith I'm attempting to live, reminded of the story I am in, reminded of the many who have come before me and the many who will come after me. I need reminders. The change of colors on the alter, the seasonal hymns, the Scripture passages, the candles and flowers.

I'm applying to programs soon, though I'm sure I'll wait until the last possible moment. I believe Febuary 1st is the do-or-die date. I am leaning more and more towards the MDiv. And maybe a dual degree with an MSW. But the registrar told me that could take 4 years. Yikes! I get freshet thinking about committing to something for a year, let alone 4! That's like a PhD program or something. Do I really want to be in school for the rest of my life? Maybe. I was telling mom last night that I eventually hope to be paid for thinking, because I'm much more of a thinker than a doer. I feel comfortable with theories much more than with practical details. I suck at details. Hence my inability to spell or write legibly after all these years. Details details.

I had horrible dreams last night but, fortunately, I don't quite remember what they were about. Something awful, though...That I can remember. The kind that you wake up from in a cold sweat, hoping and praying that it isn't true, and even when you find out it isn't, you are so disturbed that your mind even came up with such a thing. I only wonder what Freud would say.

An article in the Washington Post...

The District Bureaucracy Bears Down On a Dream
By Marc Fisher
Tuesday, December 5, 2006; Page B01


John Cook doesn't look like a man facing the prospect of 900 days in jail. As I meet Cook in the home he runs for mentally disabled people in Adams Morgan, the D.C. government is threatening to slam him with fines and jail time because he refuses to evict a 75-year-old man whose greatest wish in life is to have his own little apartment.

In a gentle but firm voice, Cook makes it clear: "I will not comply with this illegal, unnecessary and dangerous eviction notice." With that, he graciously takes me to meet Eugene Sampson and his cat, Joseph.

You might think that the D.C. government had done enough harm to Sampson, who spent nearly half a century of his life confined to Forest Haven, the city's now-shuttered snake pit for the retarded. But it's not done with Sampson. Ten days ago, just before Thanksgiving, the city's fire department issued the order to evict Sampson because the Health Department had complained that he is the sixth resident in a group home that the Consumer and Regulatory Affairs Department says is certified for only five disabled people.

With every day that passes, Cook's potential punishment increases by $300 and 90 days in jail.

" 'Evicted' is kind of a harsh word," says D.C. fire spokesman Alan Etter. "I think 'relocated to a proper situation' is better."

Why does Sampson have to go?

"It's a safety issue because they had one more person than they were permitted to have," Etter says. "And this person had mobility issues -- he's in a wheelchair -- and he's on the top floor. If there were to be a fire, evacuating him would be difficult."

Sounds reasonable, right? Except for this: Sampson does not use a wheelchair. I accompanied him on his daily walk to the corner, where he likes to meet people and say hello. And this: He doesn't live on the top floor, but rather on the first floor of the house, run by L'Arche, the worldwide charity that operates what many in the mental disabilities field consider some of the planet's best and most humane group homes.

The fire department wants Sampson out, even though Cook, executive director of L'Arche in Washington, applied months ago for a change in paperwork that would make it okay for the sixth person in the home to stay. Technically, L'Arche is in violation of the District's five-resident cap, but there are enough bedrooms in the house for several more residents, and the charity has repeatedly sought to raise the cap, with no response from the city.

Once again, the inability of a big bureaucracy to exercise a bit of discretion is leading to an assault on those who devote themselves to doing good. Last week, we had the sad spectacle of Fairfax County putting the letter of the law ahead of the grace of human generosity, deciding -- until a Washington Post story and the ensuing public outcry forced it to backtrack -- that charities and individuals may not give home-cooked food to the hungry and the homeless. Now the District government is going after L'Arche, which seeks to give mentally disabled people lives of dignity and purpose.

Thrilled with his new studio apartment in the rowhouse on Ontario Place NW, Sampson has hung his paintings on the wall. He shows me the little cabinet where Joseph the cat hides when Sampson is out. He talks about his days at an activities program in Tenleytown: "We make stuff. On Fridays, we have a movie."

On a shelf, he keeps a photo of his trip to the Caribbean, which he took after a court ordered the District to find the money former Forest Haven residents had earned doing jobs there.Sampson worked as a pallbearer; many times, he and one other man were the only people attending funerals at Forest Haven. When Sampson finally got his few thousand dollars, he had to spend down his assets or lose his Medicaid coverage, Cook explains. Thus, the cruise.

What did you like about the trip? I ask."Elvis Presley," Sampson says, with a big grin. The impersonators -- finally good for something.

Nothing the D.C. government can do would make Cook remove Sampson from the only apartment he's ever had.

Cook spends an inordinate chunk of his life fighting D.C. bureaucrats. Mostly, their inane wishes are his commands. Like the time a fire inspector came in, saw Joseph and ordered Cook to install a "cat door," a four-foot-high obstacle to keep the cat out of the kitchen. Cook immediately complied.

A year later, the same inspector returned and summoned Cook: "What's that thing?"

"Your cat door."

The inspector couldn't recall his arbitrary command. The cat door went away.

"L'Arche operates in 16 states, and everybody's got problems with the government," Cook says. "But nobody experiences anything like what we go through here. This city devalues and humiliates people with intellectual disabilities."

In a city where the group home system is riddled with awful places, the District aims its fire instead at an unusually inviting and pleasant facility.

The city forced L'Arche to post a sign announcing that the building houses the mentally retarded. The city told L'Arche to seal up a beautiful fireplace, even though the residents all understand the dangers of fire. The city required L'Arche to install locks on cabinets where household cleansers are kept, even though the residents use those products in their work as janitors or housekeepers.

"There is a constant effort to stigmatize, to demean and humiliate," Cook says. "It's a signal to residents that they aren't right and they aren't like us."

And it is all done with your tax dollars, in your name.

intro? vert?

Maybe I'm turning into an introvert, I'm not sure. I'm not really sure what it's like to be an introvert, and sometimes I have a hard time identifying them, so I really don't know whether I'm morphing into one or not. But tonight, as I was sitting in a cramped seat in a room crammed with people talking and laughing, I found myself feeling less and less energized, until finally, by the end, I was so tired I wanted to take a nap right there. Maybe it's just sleep depervation or temperature of the room (it felt like 100 degrees). Or maybe that I didn't know many of them. All those things. But, for one moment at least, I found myself comiserating with the introverted soul.

Thanksgiving came and went...and now we are strattling that time between Thanksgiving and Christmas, with Advent just around the corner. I'm going to enjoy Advent this year, though the change of Church seasons is only going to make the absence of Christ Church in my life more pronounced. I've forgotten how much I enjoyed Christ Church and now that I'm no longer part of a regular church community of my own, I feel even more hungry for the liturgy, the sites and sounds and smells of a high church Anglo-Catholic service. The Catholic church where I go now is as low as it gets with the priests still wearing their vestments. And we do Communion at the front, not in the middle like some new-agey Catholic churches. I don't think I have an opinion on this either way. But, again, despite the fact I am going to a Catholic church, I find myself missing the pomp and circumstance of Christ Church, the feeling of mystery and awe the accompanies high liturgies.

Melissa and Jacob were home for the holiday which was a lot of fun, and Gwyn was here for a bit as well which was really nice. We talked a lot about the wedding and did some shopping and were able to cross some things off the list. We even visited the reception site which, in the end, is a pretty nice place, considering it is at a fire station (!). I pick up my bridesmaid dress tomorrow...hopefully it fits better. Still so much to plan and to think about. And Christmas is coming up. I have a feeling we won't even notice. We will be too preoccupied with what's going on post-Christmas, I can tell that much.

I think it's time for a post-l'Arche-celebration beer and an episode of the Colbert Report, a bi-weekly ritual in our household, it seems. Frtiz is scolding Eduardo (who is already in bed) to "Be careful. Don't do that. Not funny. Behave." because the bathroom floor is wet after his shower. I feel that. I hate walking into bathrooms with wet floors when I'm wearing socks. I don't think Fritz realizes he's talking to a wall, because Eduardo's already snoaring. Hilarious. Time for a beer.

A short visit...

Steve came in on Sunday and just left today, Tuesday, so it was a short visit. I'm really glad he was able to come down and "experience" l'Arche here in Arlington, especially because he has something to compare it to. He said this house had a similar feel, which supports the theory that l'Arche is similar all over the country, if not the world. But, it also has it's own culture. And we've only been open for a few months. Seems hard to believe I'm approaching my three month point!

We hung around Arlington on Sunday night. I took him to Murky Coffee, one of my favorite haunts, and we ate out in Clarendon. Then we came home and drank some wine with Dottie, Mandy, and Debbie and talked about life while eating goldfish. On Monday, we went into DC and perused the Natural History, Air and Space, and Holocaust museums. The last was, of course, the most intense. I remember going once when I was a senior in high school. And I think once was enough. Those images don't leave your mind for a long time. The museum is doing a lot of advocacy work for Darfur and the genocide going on over there. They projected pictures of the Darfur region on the side of the building so that cars passing by could see them. Pretty powerful.

Then, this morning, Steve and I had breakfast and talked about future hopes and future plans. Egypt! Grad school! Who knows! We both reflected on the fact that someday we hope to all be back together again, living with eachother or near eachother on our own plot of land where we grow our own vegetables and sew our own clothes and harvest the energy of the sun to run our electric appliances (if we have any). I really could see all of us going off and having these adventures over seas, or stacking up a few grad-degrees, or moving here and there for different jobs...and then once that is out of our system, congregating back into one place again where we can live daily life together. Devon sent me a letter from Italy with the same sentiments. It really is hard to live your life so closely with others during such a formative period of your early adult years, and then have to leave...just because it's the "normal" thing to do. I don't know if I'll ever adjust. And I don't know if I'll have make friends like I did in college. I'll make friends, but my relationships with them will be different. Not good or bad. Just not the same.

It seems like Steve really "found" his soul in l'Arche, as he put it. L'Arche is a place of peace, of acceptance, and it's hard to leave places of refuge like these for the outer world that's scary and uninviting. L'Arche homes really are witnesses of peace to the larger society, particularly our war-obsessed one. We are not called to be sectarian, but we are also not called to conform to the mainstream. We are called to something different, a place where we can be ourselves and be with eachother.

I wonder if I could make it to Egypt before graduate school started. Hmm. Or for the Spring. Devon and Lex want me to come to France. A second annual Lex/Dev/Heath trip to Europe! I love the idea! That could become an expensive tradition.

I've been doing the mornings a lot this week which are never easy, but aren't that hard after I initially wake up. It's those first few moments of hearing the alarm that are the worst. Then, it's rise and shine. And shower time.

I will be home for Thanksgiving until Sunday night. I am on Monday morning (a pattern?). I look forward to seeing M and J, and to cooking a serious amount and perhaps baking some bread. This time last year I was flying to Portland to spend Thanksgiving at l'Arche. Now I'm here. It seems ages ago. I remember initially being totally freaked out by the idea of living with the developmentally disabled. I mean who in their right mind chooses to live with people who are awkward, medically fragile, strange? But then again, who in their right mind wouldn't want to live with people who love to laugh, who don't judge by appearance, who have open hearts? We so often choose to surround ourselves with people who make us feel bad about ourselves, or we surround ourselves with no one at all. Now that seems unwise. Stupid, in fact.

At least 4 times a day, Hazel will say to me, "I like you. I like you." She always wants to remind me that she likes me. I don't know many people who would be that vulnerable. But Hazel does this naturally. She justs wants you to know that she likes you. And that's really it.

Trying to balance the world...

I've always liked an integrated life. It makes me feel less hypocritical, more consistent. I don't have a strong desire for personal space or privacy; I'm an open book about most things and am (overly?) interested in the lives of people around me. I want this friend to be friends with that friend and my parents to be a part of my social life -- and I don't usually feel comfortable until this happens. I really try hard to avoid a segmented life. I'd much prefer overlap.

But these days, it's hard to have an integrated life. My sister is in Portland. My friends are scattered through out the country and very few of them have been able to witness this "thing" that is l'Arche. I am making plans for school next year but have no connection to those institutions, unless you want to count more distant connections through my sister or my dad. I'm trying to study for the GRE while trying also to "live l'Arche" ... and the two don't really fit together. And, there's also my sister's wedding in January to plan for. Lots of little fragments that don't really fit together, no matter how much I try.

I think some people enjoy having multiple lives, either consecutively or simultaneously. They act this way when they are at work and then this way when they are at home. They have 3 sets of friends. They have multiple personalities. They can easily get up and go with out looking back, forming a new life somewhere else. But this isn't how I work. I like everything to fit together, like some giant, meaningful puzzle. But trying to fit all the pieces together is exhausting. I'm trying to balance the world...a very complex world at that.

Maybe that's why my faith has, at times, felt so fragile. I want everything to fit together, but there are some pieces that just don't fit and don't belong. This is the problem with being an idealist (which I am occasional embarrassed to reveal about myself). Idealists are forced to run around this crazy, messed up, complicated world with a mental/emotional/spiritual picture inside their head of That Which Should Be. They want roses and get weeds in return. I'm not asking that the whole world make sense. I'm just asking that some meaning or pattern or shape would take form out of all the chaos. I don't think that's too much to ask....though sometimes that seems like an impossible request. I don't even need to know what it's all goign to look like in the end. I'll never understand why some Christians get so worked up on the "End Times." They have it all mapped out, down to the months and years. Pre-trib, post-trib, blah blah. What the heck? I'm not asking to know all that! I just want to know that there IS meaning, even if I never figure out what it is! That is what ultimately will bring me comfort....knowing I'm in the midst of some massive puzzle slowly being put together. It's shape and form isn't as important as it's very existence. This is where faith comes in. Believing without seeing. Moving forward without knowing the way.