So Much Fear In Such Little Time

When one part of my life changes (for better or worse), I silently expect all aspects of my life to also change (only for better). As if I am waiting for one flaw in my life to be fixed so everything else can fall into place. A domino theory for my identity.

Of course, on top of all of this, I arrogantly assume this personal betterment will occur without any personal effort. If the fates give me more free time, for example, I assume that exercise will fill that slot and I will enjoy it!... even though I characteristically dread exercise routines and avidly deter such exertion. And when I come to see my afternoons are instead saturated with naps and other inactive activities, my perception of myself sinks to negativity: I am physically and mentally idle and without motivation.

Currently, I am a few weeks into a sizable change in my life. I have left Los Angeles and the community in which I participated for two years. I am facing an uncertain and important path of travel, exploration and sacred time for my own understanding of life. Not only do I have free time, but I find there is no routine. Every choice for my life is suddenly decided by me--from the time I wake up at 11am to the time I go to bed after two glasses of wine. I am not obligated by a pre-planned schedule, and I am not responsible for much more than myself and my values. I am facing life, the world and society with me, myself and my vulnerability.

So what do I assume from this change? What I desire is not so much based on usage of this opportunity, rather it is based on a personality overhaul. I think many would approach a similar transition as a chance to expose their true selves to the world. I, however, would rather hide behind the facade of a different person when facing the world. During these introductory steps to independence, I prefer to be thinner, less sarcastic, more spontaneous.

The unattainable nature of my dream is unsettling and disappointing. I am frightened to approach my peers, new experiences and the general unknown as the person I am. I am fearful of displaying my true self, complete with flaws, shortcoming and ignorance.

Within the past week, my cowardice has taken physical forms, as well. Sleep has recently been limited, haunted by nightmares or (when sleep finally occurs) uncomfortable. My appetite wavers between dangerously nonexistent to gluttonous. My mood is unpredictable and inexplicable. And while I enjoy sharing conversation with others, I have turned deeply inward.

I carried my self-assigned burden without real understanding of its roots until I forced myself to sit down and ask myself what was wrong. Actually, I hiked around and asked myself. After an hour of solitude in the dried and recently burned forest outside Pine Mountain, California, I "got it." And I was intensely ashamed to realize once again my unsteadiness is caused by my insecurities. Even more embarrassing is that I thought I had harnessed these fears and unrealistic desires.

The upcoming weeks feel like a tidal wave on the horizon and I am only equipped with an umbrella. In other words, I anticipate more discomfort. Learning to let go of fear and embrace the present has been a difficult path for years now. Accompanied by the challenge of loving myself--my current, broken self--I feel overwhelmed.

Now, I have to stop equating a change of scenery with a need for a new self. Adding that burden to what is already a litany of challenges would only break me. If my journey is so important, if this upcoming year still means as much to me as it did when I was in Los Angeles, I have to lift it up, slide on my yoke and walk this path. I am now obligated to refuse fear for my journey.

Lessons from the Poor

On June 17th, Los Angeles will no longer be my home. After spending a bit of time with friends and loved ones, I will arrive in Portland exactly two years after I left, never assuming I would seek out the city again. And from that point, I hope to earn some money doing whatever I have to do that's legal so I can travel to different Catholic Workers and intentional communities around the country and--eventually--the world. I hope to get some writing in along the way, reflecting on my two formative years here in LA. And I know I will be searching for what I need from a community and what I need from a city. Although, I'm sure more questions will arise along my nondescript pilgrimage.


The hardest part so far has been telling the guys down at the kitchen. Albeit flattering, their complete disapproval of my departure forces out suppressed tears and resurrects a forgotten feeling of doubt--the same doubt I struggled with when leaving Portland for Los Angeles. Reactions include the following:


"The sun hasn't shined since you broke the news of leaving... [starts singing] Ain't no sunshine when she's gone..."


"I think I have a chain. Now I just have to find someone who has a manacle so I can tie you to the kitchen. I'll give you a 30' radius."
(another man in response) "Yea, enough for her to get to a piano."


"Oh yea, you're young! Enjoy the world!"


"I'm gonna miss you like the desert misses the rain."


"Oh no! Why?!"


These men from the Hippie Kitchen have not only claimed territory on my heart, but they have managed to grab such a strong hold that I can feel our desperate clinging as I prepare to leave.


Within the past few weeks, I have essentially demanded that I be at the kitchen at least two of the three kitchen days each week. I have kept my eyes panning across the garden for long-lost guests of whom I have been thinking recently. I have created a mental list of guests I want to tell personally that I am leaving soon, yet have delayed a good amount of conversations out of pure grief.


The men and women from the Hippie Kitchen have been the most formative aspect of my time in Los Angeles. They, the outcasts and forgotten of our society, invited me into the intimate details of their lives, demonstrating trust and openness--two qualities, I now realize, I was not offering. They furthered my commitment to nonviolence upon my seeing the plethora of veterans fighting PTSD and other war-related syndromes 35 years after their tours. They challenged and restored my faith in a God who loves us unconditionally. They gave me a reason to be passionate about the work to which I dedicated my past two years.


To see any homeless individual now and not attribute Jesus, dignity, hope and persistence would be to deny all of my experience through the LACW. I am blessed to have worked for these men and women who have so much to give, so much to say, so much love in their hearts, that (for all us Christians) it is indeed sinful to see them for anything less than a true manifestation of Christ's image.


So I prepare to journey and let my heart be torn apart by more wonderful men and women who face strife within an unrelently harsh culture. More tears and more restoration of purpose are in the cards, I'm sure. Maybe I'm just giving my heart to the poor so I can show love over and over again; and, to show the smallest bit of solidarity with their pain, my heart can be broken again and again in return.

"Darren" and "Matt"

It is true: I am leaving in June. I was thinking about waiting until just a few weeks before the official announcement via blog, but then I realized that (1) barely anyone reads this, (2) the few people who do read this already know I'm heading out, and (3) I'm really not that big of a deal, so it's not earth-shattering news that I'm leaving Los Angeles... in fact, I doubt that Los Angeles, a city of 4 million, will notice that I'm even gone.

Despite my cynicism toward the city and its concrete, Babylonian existence, I have experienced very formative situations here and met a slew of people who are making it difficult to think about saying "sayonara."

A few people I don't believe I've mentioned in this blog are from the kitchen: Darren and Matt (names changed, as always). These are two magnificent men with witty spirits. Both are Vietnam vets who are bitter about the VA's treatment of them and their peers (not to mention actually having to be in Vietnam, which gets them pretty irked, too). Although they have such youthful and curious personalities it is hard to believe that either of these men could have been armed and face-to-face with the deemed enemy 40 years back.

Darren has so many interests and has been so many places. Each time I speak with him in the garden, I get sucked into a deep conversation about a sect of the world and his travels, or photography and other hobbies, or happiness and the meaning of life. Recently, Darren lent me a book about creating my own dark room when he learned I started teaching myself photography. Darren is engaging in a way I have rarely come across in others, and is a genuine person, not a cocky, arrogant man seeking to teach me the ways of the world, hoping I will gain something from his wisdom. He is instead modest, not outspoken and willing to share--a great conversational companion.

He is about my height, is always searching for a hug from me, and has a slightly high pitched voice which piques when he is most enthusiastic. Darren limps with the wooden cane he juts in his direct path. I have never seen him eat at the kitchen. Rather, he gets a big container and fills it up. I imagine he eats his beans and salad through the day and night, especially when he is unable to sleep because he is stuck in a rut of depression or deep thought.

And Matt... one of the most child-like 60-somethings I have ever met. He is insistent he is living his second childhood, that he was blessed with a second go-around. Topics of conversation include marriage (ours), his Harley which he has yet to purchase, and college sports. He calls me the "Oregon Hippie Girl" and I just call him by his name, trying not to encourage his flirtatious behavior. Nevertheless, we get along well and he is more protective than predatory. In fact, one day I was breaking up a fight in the line, and Matt almost jumped in to "save" me. I had to talk with him to say that his actions were aggravating the person I was trying to calm down, and to go into the garden. Matt didn't like this at all and refused to listen to me. Later in the garden, he said, in good humor, something along the lines of me being too tough for his help.

Matt is huge. He towers over me and I'm thankful I'm on his good side because I'm sure if he wanted to harm anyone, he could. Matt always wears shorts and usually has some kind of USC or veteran propaganda on his shirt. A do-rag or hat covers his grey cornrows and sunglasses block a good view of his yellowing eyes.

These two men are quite different, but are always excited to see each other. Matt usually shouts out a "hoo-rah," and they both talk about how no one says it the right way anymore. Darren sits and watches the people pass, patiently waiting for his turn to speak while Matt lays on his go-to lines regarding our usual topics of conversation.

I thoroughly enjoy both of their company, and have yet to tell them I'm leaving. Telling the guys at the kitchen is definitely going to be harder than telling the community. The bonds with the guys are why I really came here after college, why I re-upped for another year, why I miss work after being sick and home for a week, and why my heart breaks when I imagine not seeing the 3+ days out of the week. My life with be so different without seeing Darren and Matt on a regular basis.

It's all a part of the transition, I guess.

Stress Levels

"Stress is an ignorant state. It believes that everything is an emergency. Nothing is that important. Just lie down."
--Natalie Goldberg

Ironically enough, I had to re-type the above quote four times before the bold command obeyed. Meanwhile, I was thinking, "You stupid computer!! Why aren't you working?!" And then I realized I was consumed by the ignorance of stress... once again.

My dad will be the first to agree that I have issues with control, which lead to issues of stress and anxiety when I'm at my worst. In college, he called me up to tell me a joke:

Knock knock.
Who's there?
Control Freak.
Cont--
Control Freak who??

Yes, hilarious, Dad.

But in the past four years, I have dealt with my stress in very different ways: playing the piano, crying, eating, watching television, ceramics, talking with friends. Many different ways in handling the repercussions, but never hitting the root of the problem.

And now, as I type, I am dealing with yet another repercussion of my stress. It seems I physically hold my stress in the muscles just behind my shoulder blades. And it seems that life has been just a bit too stressful lately because I have acquired a tight mass at the top of my right shoulder blade which makes any movement of my arm and neck very painful. I went to the doctor on Tuesday, and she said, "Well, you're just a ball of stress!"

I wonder why?

Maybe it's because I'm leaving in June. Leaving Los Angeles, not to mention the community I have spent the past year and a half trying to immerse myself into. I'm looking forward to traveling after I save up some money, but that also means that I will not have the securities of a community as I do now. I will be emotionally homeless.

Maybe it's because I have seen so many flaws in myself lately and have desperately staged a coup over them, trying to perfect myself. The patience and grace that are required to lead such a transition have not, as of yet, come into my grasp. I am grappling with too many flaws and not enough encouragement.

Or maybe it's because of the work I do, the complete surrender I experience when working in the garden, the all-encompassing worry I carry for each person I talk to, and then the heartache I feel when I see pain in one of my friends.

Maybe those are some reasons for the pain in my shoulder.

What is so difficult about all of this is that, unlike Natalie Goldberg's suggestion, I think they all are emergencies. I think all of my problems must be solved immediately for my own sanity, and they must be solved (most importantly) my way.

But in the Catholic Worker lifestyle, and in the peace movement, there is an understanding that the work we do is not for us and we cannot enter this work expecting to see results in our lifetimes. We do the work because it is the right thing to do, because Jesus did this work and because we care for the future of our world. There is an accepted slowness to our projects. While the need peace in foreign countries and even in our hometowns may seem immediate, the reining power of peace as a worldwide phenonenon takes time.

When I compare my own stresses to the problems of the world, and in turn compare my own sense of urgency to the snail-paced spread of global peace, I am humbled. If the world can hold on for peace, and therefore struggle with the discomforts in the meantime, then I can hold on through my own discomforts, as well. So, I will be grateful for my time in Los Angeles and the community in which I have experienced so much love and formation; I will continue to try to see myself through the loving eyes of God; and I will take deep breaths at the kitchen. And one day, I will fully understand the ignorance of stress.

Not Giving Up for Lent

Lent is here again. The season I almost dread because it is a dedicated season in which I am forced to reconcile my benign faith, my faults, my fears, my brokenness. Selfish reasons, I know, especially when the Lenten season is really about Jesus preparing to be sacrificed in the most barbaric sense for the sins of his brothers and sisters--a sacrifice we will never be able to emulate.


Yet, we try. And I almost despise the pressure to find something to "sacrifice" for Lent. What will it be this year? Will chocolate, beer, television, Facebook be enough to parallel Jesus' surrender? I, like many, face the temptation of receiving a tangible result from my Lenten penitence. Weight loss would be nice, or more money in my account. Rarely would my thought process include considering the spiritual repercussions of my choice. So, for the past few years, I have refused (yes, refused) to give up anything for Lent to spite my tendency toward "results." Instead, I led my life as I did through Advent, Pentecost, Ordinary Time--you know, in mediocrity.

This year, however, I decided to redirect myself to a path of reflection, to recognize the blessing within myself. It seems selfish, focusing on myself, and I never like to spend time thinking about how "awesome" I am. In fact, my time is more often spent dissecting my flaws, magnifying my shortcomings, staring intently at the unattainable standards I have set for myself. But after recently reading Henri Nouwen's Life of the Beloved, I came to a new perspective of self-love and self-hatred.

Nouwen insists that we are all broken and incapable of loving others and God until we love ourselves. We must humbly accept our brokenness, yet recognize our lives as a loving honor from God. Life is not a curse, rather the most incredible gift and worth such gratitude and joy which we will never be able to fully express.

It seems the only way we can show appropriate thanks is through loving ourselves despite our flaws--by not looking a gift horse (God) in the mouth. This is where is gets sticky for me. Nouwen's "steps" (although he never refers to them as such) ascend from loving yourself to loving God and others.

I think I've been living my life backwards...

My love has always gone out to others--family, friends, the guys at the kitchen, my community--and I have seen self-love as indulgent, egotistical and unnecessary. If I love others, then I love God. Check. Done. Finished. Next task? But the idea of lifting myself up as I lift up others is a concept not readily available to me. I don't know how to love myself. Sad, isn't it?

This all leaves me with the questions: Does that mean I don't really love my family, friends, the guys at the kitchen and my community? Does my self-hatred mean I also hate God?

I hope not.

These questions are why I'm not giving something up for Lent in the material sense. I am, as said earlier, focusing on a path of reflection. For Lent, I am teaching myself how to love myself because I want to love more. I want to be a peaceful disciple. I want to walk with joy. I need to be in unity with the sanctity of life.

So I'm sacrificing the horrible things I tell myself: that I'm too fat, too mean, too sarcastic, too ungrateful, too ugly, too ignorant. I am laying down my snarling at my flaws and my muted weeping over the unreached goals. I hope to replace this all with joy, forgiveness, some grace when possible and, eventually, love.

Learning the work of love is a lifelong journey, and it was for Jesus as well. He faced the tests of temptation, the bitter hatred of those who deemed him "enemy," and the selflessness of giving one's own life. Yet all the challenges led to the Miracle. The Ressurection. So I am anticipating these vernal weeks to be my first beautiful insight to the intertwined gift of love in all life. Yours. Mine. Ours. And in time, I humbly hope my forthcoming enlightenment will bring the same salvation as the man who, with scarred and bloodied flesh, rolled away the stone to deny death and restore life.

Forgiveness

Then Peter came to him and said, "Lord, how many times must I forgive my brother who sins against me? As many as seven times? Jesus said to him, "Not seven times, I tell you, but seventy-seven times!"
--Matthew 18:21-22

It is difficult to truly forgive, and I am not sure if I am capable of such a beautiful act. My tendency is to hold grudges and judgments in my heart as my mouth speaks words of love, as I write phrases of peace.

At the kitchen, we witness the consequences of gentrification, of war, of misplaced priorities. I see men and women I have grown to love walk through our line; I am struck with sorrow and anger. Am I capable of forgiving those who contribute to oppression? If face to face with a loft-dweller, could I say, "You are persecuting my friends: fellow children of God; although you have hurt me through your oppression of them, I love you not only because I am called to, but because I want to. I ask you to forgive me for my judgments against you. I rejoice in this newfound love, this forgiveness"?

If face to face with a police officer of the mayor, could I say, "Your enforcement of policies has demonized and tortured my friends; yet I forgive you because I cherish the bond we share as brothers and sisters in Christ. I hope you will forgive me for my demonization of you and your work. My love for you is just as important as my love for the poor"?

The struggle to seek forgiveness is great, as well. The flaws I carry are deep and I feel the crevices of sin throughout my day. In order to continue my work, to live a life of nonviolence and to follow the path of Jesus' sacrificial mercy, I must be able to kneel before those I have hurt and understand I may not receive the forgiveness I so desire. I might be instead spat on, criticized, or hurt in return. Yet in the tradition of nonviolence, it is necessary to humble myself in the presence of those I denied. And, in the end, it is necessary that I also lift my own yoke and forgive myself.

Possibly more difficult is to walk away from the act of forgiveness without pride, but with humility--still recognizing my own shortcomings and wrongdoings, seeing myself as a sinner just as the person I forgave, craving the forgiveness of those I have hurt.

And then, to continue to act with love. To continue to forgive and risk hurting others and self once again. To beg mercy from those I have wronged. To love those I do not understand. To embrace those I once deemed my enemies. To recreate my family to include all.

For now, my heart runs with cold currents of righteousness, weakness, fear, seeking validation, perfection and victory. The journey is lengthy and I do not see the end, but I hope I will learn of the forgiveness unconditional love has birthed.

I know that eventually I'll have to write for my blog updates, but so much fun has happened in the past month or so that I thought pictures might be more appropriate (with little snippets of writing in between). Enjoy viewing my holiday adventures.

I made a deal with Herman (left) that he could check out as many books as he'd like from the public library on my library card if I could straighten his hair. Sam (right) didn't require negotiation. He just let me lay on the flat iron.

Rachel and I spent the day together just a while before Christmas. This is just outside the LA County Museum of Art. There was a big square of lamp posts, and we were having fun playing on them (just like all the other little kids who were running around). The picture was taken just seconds before the security guard asked us to get off the piece of artwork. Apparently, it's not meant to be interactive.

Christmas Eve was fantastic. All of us gathered together, sharing songs and gifts.

I got a bouquet of flowers from one of the guys at the Kitchen. Beautiful, no?

It rained on Christmas.

But we (me, Sam, Herman--l to r) cuddled up, listened to Jim Gaffigan's Beyond the Pale album and had some good laughs.


Ian and Dad visited, and boy were we excited! This is at the top of Pepperdine University. We were strictly told not to get out of our vehicle because the campus was closed. Well, if that security guard would have known what rebels we McGillivrays are, he would have thought twice before letting us onto his precious university.

We ate at The Pantry, a local hotspot, the morning before heading off to Disneyland (see below). It was an early morning, but we scarfed down a LOT of food.

And I made Dad and Ian go on the Tea Cup ride with me. (Mom: you were missed)

And they spun me around really really fast.

It was all great fun, although being away from Christmas for the first time was a challenge emotionally. Now, we're all back to our normal schedules. Piano lessons are underway once again. Soon, I hope I'll be taking a writing class at East LA College. Lent is soon on it's way, which means Seder will just just around the corner. While we're still in the midst of winter here in Los Angeles, there is much light. Much hope. Much excitement. Much love.