The Upside of Charlottesville

Yesterday I walked with others in response to the surge in the voice of white supremacists. I carried a sign of the Ghost Busters stamp-out style: No White Privilege. As I walked I thought deeply about White Privilege and began to realize that maybe there is something positive happening underneath the tiki torches. As the margins of white supremacy feel threatened with their diminishing White Privilege we could mark this time as success. Our efforts in civil rights, Our efforts to call out racism, Our efforts to educate children about diversity - maybe our efforts are taking hold to the point where suddenly, these under-educated folks feel threatened and are lashing out. It is horrible to witness, but clearly, opposition to the Nazi voice is strong, educated and ready to move against such mindlessness. Families and institutions are the foundation of White Privilege and racism. The education system can lead children away from their parents' misguided thinking. Institutions (police, health, social services, markets, governments) need to be sure workers do not possess assumptions of White Privilege and have not been brought up racist. Education is the key.

I believe that the actions in Charlottesville indicate that inroads have been made. If we had not been making progress, these buffoons would not have had to rise in so-called protest. We still have a long way to go. These supremacists need to blame their parents, and grandparents, and the institutions that reared them on the path toward their misguided notions. Instead, they blame folks with other colours of skin. They are far off track. Accept that White Privilege is merely a construct created by white skinned humans, to facilitate oppression and all it has done is foster racism. It is only an idea, but one that is socially ingrained so deeply that folks with white skin scarcely notice the benefits they live with. Others, well, they live with the downside every day.

Tell your children that White Privilege is real and wrong. Tell them you have learned. Again, education is the key.

Decolonize - What do our ancestors say?

I have an illness.  I write then lose what I have written.  I cannot remember which PC I was writing on, nor whether I wrote longhand, in a booklet, on bond or in the back of a serviette. I know it was written.  It rests in my mind.  Where is it?  Where is it?  Then, as I look for it, I discover writing that I have no recollection creating.  I know it is mine.  It is in my handwriting.  Here is an example of the latter:

In response to a FB post by a friend who said, and this is a quote: "We cannot correct all of the transgressions of our ancestors/relatives"  (Or, maybe it is paraphrased) and in my preamble to the holographic poem I followed-up on her post with with Response: "True".

This poem is dated November 5, 2012, in the midst of, or advent of #INM and reflects on my motivations for posts in the FB group #HTT going back to June 2008.  My poetry about colonization began in 2003. I had a slow awakening before that and have been on stream of learning.

I do not remember writing this.

(click on the poem for a close-up)

The 2nd last option - before nail biting.

The Dangerous Pen

Here is a test.  Try it.
Oh no!  No clock!  No device!
This would never happen twice
But here I sit
In a tyre shop
No book to read.  No magazine
My purse is tidy now
I know the greeting by the shop phone crew
So what?  Just ponder.
It's just a slow leak so no big deal.
Oh know!  A pen!

She ripped apart the envelope so the white side became her canvas
Then relaxing, diverting, out
Out, the thoughts spilled from the smooth ball-point
Free - from the community store
And then she thanked the cosmos
Her thoughts more random, less connected every day
But still beautiful and fun.
To laugh at one's own foibles is a joyous passing
What folly to believe in the importance of it all
So poems so deep can silly be
These ones of lark are right for me
  nem - Oct 13 in Integra Tire

Whew!  That is a relief.  What does everyone else do while sitting and waiting.  Maybe I should start carrying my knitting (though I shit at knit - tried and failed) to keep me from this perilous habit of writing poems about poems.  Check out my metapoetry series at www.mouthethepoem.blogspot.ca from back in 2010.  I have many others.  It is a neutral habit.  Neither good nor bad.

Hah!

Relief for Routine

Years of nestling and misplaced priorities - money, travel, shelter - have all coiled around the spindle of time and brought me to this moment.  It is a place.  I am drawn to pull it together in this place, far from Huntsville.  Thanks be for that.

I am surprised about what I need around me to feed my distractions so I can settle back to placing words in order, and free.

Dull be thee the strings of my old guitar.
And annoying, worse than vacuuming, is the task toward making them again bright.
But this too must be.
Thanks to the U. of Youtube.
Low E, then A, now high E and only three to go.
Then again my friend will sit near by, as I ponder and drink.

Yes the drink is my second companion.  Maté.  I even brought a kettle, a sieve and a thermos so my supply is continuous.  Coffee begone but for your fragrance and some socially appropriate gestures.  Among whom?  And the laughter buckles my belly though no sound comes out.  Therein lies the rub.
And my extended screen.  This helps too.  I can watch scripts unfold and action and character development.  I can fast forward through the car chases and battle scenes.  I can observe trends... more and more and more blood.  Frontal penis.  Smarter, more articulate children.

And some comfort on the walls.

And a window with tree limbs so close by.  A blue jay today.  And some sparrows have bumped the window, twice in the past two days.  I will begin to mark the time of day.  It must have something to do with the reflection.  I do not want bobbly detractors nor cute stickies.  I need another way to divert the poor wee things.

And a bit of music from days gone by.  And a nice comfy chair where I can read.

I will nestle a bit more in here, but it is almost perfect.  I can pee out my maté a mere 5 steps across the hall.

Just watch me.

Waking thanks in part to W.B. Yeats

Who cares if I cry out loud
At the death of a man so long ago
Just to know he passed and was mourned
Makes tears flow

And much much more has brought this flush
The time the place the visions lost
Yet hopes are borne these long years past
Beneath the frost

In heat of January tides he left
Me here now under snow bound boughs
I hear his calamity and watch
His voice arouse

My soul and others too who know
He was just only just a man
But shrieking through he pushed for truth
I hope I can

So Done I Cry (The Death of WB Yeats) by Nancy E. McLennan 2001

And here I am.  That one was written in a chilly November almost 15 years ago.  It has taken me a long time to return to my work and here I am, scrabbling through piles of papers and electronic files.  As always, I have a goal in mind and I am nearing the finality of my nestling.  This will be my last attempt and nothing will stop me this time.

I am listening to Ooh La La - Faces.  It pulls me back even further.  I am wakening to my life.  It chokes me but it is also invigorating.

Sibling Love

You are such a phoney.

You jump on the band wagon so people will look at you.

This is your latest cause.

What a bullshitter you are.

I listened to my sister, my only living family member, tell me that she thought I was a false person.

She doesn't know me. She doesn't believe me.

A wave came up my neck and my lips went numb as I softly uttered the words, I think you should leave my house now.

She jumped and cackled and screeched in my face.

I knew it! I knew you would do this! She laughed in a sinister way and humped past me into the next room where her suitcases and belongings lay strewn across the room. Screaming.  Hollering about what a horrible fake person I am and that she had predicted I would do this to her.

I tried to take back the words, but she vitriolically refused to consider that possibility.  She continued to tell me who I am. And that she hates me, and has always hated me.

I know, I replied.

She left the room to get some things and start to dress.

Fait accompli, thought I. So I began zipping her luggage and carrying it outside to her car. It was minus sixteen.

This escalated her fury, but hastening the departure would shrink the tirade. This I knew. There was no discussion to be had.

She resisted my efforts to remove her possessions from my house, verbally and physically, but I continued anyway. This made her hate me more. She dressed in the porch – probably minus ten out there. Not very nice of me, but she had by now refused to come in. And I didn't care.

She had told me she had no cash, so I gave her twenty dollars for gasoline. She accepted this.

I removed her dog's bed and other paraphernalia as well. Load after load, boxes, tote bins bags. I just kept carrying them to the car until there was nothing left in my house. She tried to prevent me from carrying things from the porch to the car, and we had a comical wrestling match by the door as she kicked and pulled hair and flailed her arms and screamed until she ran out of steam. Then I continued until there was nothing left in the house. By then, she had her coat on and had begun loading her car.

Outside, she was still screaming her hatred at me. She screamed how pathetic I am. How I deserve to be isolated.

I said several times that I would like to take the words back, but she seemed to relish that they had left my lips. She never once considered taking back any of the words she spewed forth my way. Neither the words before, nor after my having asked her to leave. I guess she believes them to be truth. I told her I was sorry. She was wild and screeching. I asked her why so loud, and she laughed, saying she wanted my neighbours to know the kind of person I am.

There was nobody around and I don't care what people think of me. She doesn't realize that. She thinks, what people think of me, is the most important thing in my life. How could she think that? That every motive I possess is grounded in a desire for other people to think I'm great, in some way. She really does hate me, and she really does not know me.

I was sad, and disappointed about this. I sent her an email telling her that I do not want to remain estranged. I also listed four items I found after her departure: cigarettes, lighter, glasses, and hat. I will deliver them to her friend's house tomorrow.

Now it is a few days passed. I feel a strange euphoria, mixed with sorrow. I am no good to her. I can not serve my sister any more, in any way. I believe I am a good and honest person and I want the world to be a better place, but she thinks I'm an opportunistic phoney that only wants to show off.

I can still distinctly feel the numbness that crossed my lips as I uttered the words asking her to leave my house.

I have lived alone for twelve years and am just not accustomed to people hurling insults at me, anywhere, let-alone in my home. The words came out of me softly and slowly, like they were issued from another world.

Now, as I type, tears have welled. The thought that my Mom was guiding me when I asked my sister to leave has crossed my mind more than once.

I live a peaceful quiet life. Sometimes, I suffer mental problems stemming from ideas that whirl out of proportion and manifest emotional reactions. I have good cognitive techniques that I use to harbour these feelings and recognize that they are driven by my thinking processes. I don't go out of bounds anymore. Sometimes I talk to a friend about the thoughts, but usually within a day or two, I am back on stable ground and happy. I work to maintain good physical and mental health.

My sister has many problems. Many. And by resisting her bullying, I may have exacerbated her troubled life. But I will hold onto the supernatural. The words came slowly and calmly from somewhere deep. Very deep.

I remain sorry. I do not want to remain estranged. But also, I feel strong for having stood up to her. I am not who she tried to make me believe I am. I will never be that person, and I have never been that person. She has never known me, though she has hated me all her life. This I do believe. The hatred is within her. I can not make it go away.

10s of Ks & Carsleeps

Yellow = 10s of ks between sleeps.
18 - carsleeps
6 - paid lodging (range $59-$159)
15 - house guest (5 garage, 4 lawn chair, 2 bed, 3 floor, 1 couch)
Gasoline $1.13-$1.39/litre
Km = 14336
With Dog