After The Battlefield

An IED went off close
too close
close enough

to render his speech gone
hand coordination spotty
neck rotation capacity decreased
potential paralysis

24 years old
white, christian, male,
not married
no kids
bed-bound
not goin home today
tomorrow
or any time next week

Rehab: the rest of his life

He can thumb up for "yes"
and thumb down for "no"
and teeter-totter them for "sorta"

No entrance to his room without a gown

A 4'9, male, Taiwanese, non-English speaking nurse sees
the Bible and helps me robe up. Not for a pulpit--
for contact precautions, though this nurse adorns me
with garb as though i'm about to inherit the throne.

From somewhere down the hall, in another room there comes
a groaning and then "Bitch. You bitch."

Over and over.
"Bitch. You bitch."

I can't help it: I look.

Another Asian nurse bends over
this other white, christian, male,
traumatic brain injured patient, swabbing
his wounds, lifting his legs to reach the sore
places, the infected places, the places that
ache him into hate speech.

Later an African American colleague would say "it reminds me
of the way slaves used to take care of their sick masters."

Gowned now. Heading back to the original purpose of my visit.
His head lifts off the bed. He smiles. We exchange symbol systems,
I touch him and end in prayer.

His wide-open, searching, pleading eyes haunt me, the hate speech haunts me.

What gender dies for this country?
Who cleans up the continued and perpetual casualties of war?
Who "pays" the cost of combat?
Once the hating is done over there,
what color does the hate wear here, Mr. President?

Screaming

I am screaming inside tonight.
I am screaming because I have...

I have never, in all my life, cared about an election, cared about political persuasion, cared about the outcome on a single day like I do in this time. It feels like the dawn. Like a time-bomb. I see faces and hear stories and find myself refusing to give into the part of me that rebukes hope and optimism. My friend's futures, our generation's ability to sustain itself, our grandchildren's Earth, our potential to reconcile with lost-allies--all of it comes to a head in this time.

Vote for Obama. Do it. It's right, right now.

Vote No on Prop 8. Let people build families on the principle of love, not the tight-rope walking game prescribed by traditional gender roles.

We are screaming for a new momentum.

We are pleading with our music, our t-shirts, our blogs, our organizing and campaigning: do not send our peers out to die any longer; do not destroy our planet; do not build bombs while neglecting the infrastructure of our neighborhoods. Give us a reason to go to college. Give us security in economic reform. Give us a reason to travel abroad without fear. Give us a sense of national pride that can co-exist with dissent and resistance.

We are screaming for a new momentum.

Surprise surprise. I'm finding it increasingly difficult to talk about G-d. Not because I don't believe in something. I do. But I just can't talk about it, can't name it. Chaplains--whether they like to or not--represent religious tradition. When we walk in the room, people have assumptions about who we are, what we believe and what we are there to do. Often times this works to an advantage. But every once in a while, I am struck by how little I actually reflect those assumptions. No classical doctrine of G-d works for me. Not one. If anything, I think G-d is something that happens. But even that's far fetched. While watching a video on youtube today, I stumbled across a quote by Toni Morrison: "We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives." How I do language, in this job, in this life--it matters. I will not sell my patients, people with guts and resounding vulnerability, a false comfort I don't believe in just to ease momentary suffering.

Another Chaplaincy First

My favorite patient left today,
discharged

taking with him
all that PTSD, all that sorrow,
all that "what if" stuff that can so quickly
deaden his ability to recognize good things

like how quickly he opened up to me,
how easy it was for me to pastor to him,
how the other guys followed his example
and spoke about their experience
instead of white knuckling it inside.

My favorite patient left today,
discharged

taking with him
all that courage, all that soul-searching honesty,
all the "casualties of war" that can so quickly
trigger him into believing it's all violence and terror.

My favorite patient left today,
discharged

but I'm still here,
still showing up on the unit where guys just like him
make decisions to surrender or keep the wheel turning,
still here hoping another one like him sits on the chair to my left,
still here missing him already,
thanking G-d for the beauty he brought,
thanking G-d for the little crack he chiseled in my heart,
thanking G-d that he was one of my "firsts"
and hoping wherever he goes,
whatever he does,
he never forgets what it felt like to be heard,
because I will never forget what it felt like to listen to him.

Facebook Reunions

Finding high school friends on Facebook
can inspire dread or excitement--depending.
Finding high school friends on Facebook
can make you remember hilarious things
or hideous things--depending.

She was my best friend. We looked alike: blonde, muscular build,
light eyes. We played soccer together, sang in the choir together
and we cleaned up each other's drunken puke or kept each other's
secrets depending on what kind of week it'd been at home,
school, on the field, or in our bodies. We stayed down for one
another until there was nothing more to be down about. Separate.
Miles apart. No malice. Just gone.

She recently posted 2 pictures as part of her "site."
A side belly profile and an ultrasound.
8 weeks of life
discernible without effort,
curled up inside,
beginning to protrude after 17 weeks on the outside.
She will be an incredible mother. I thought so back in the day.
I think so right now after not having seen her for 10 years.

There are memories you keep but don't remember until they're tapped.
And there are memories that function like gas stoves--
something always under the surface,
creating a subtle yet distinct smell and vulnerability,
just waiting for the ignition of fire to
erupt its ever-dwelling force.

Mine was cut out somewhere in between 8 and 17 weeks.
It's not for your debate senator.
It's not for your proposition lobbyist.
It's not for your theory you PC 3rd wave bitch.
This memory is my flame.

Finding high school friends on Facebook
can reconnect you
with all that's been
disconnected--depending.

CPE, Anger & Staying Engaged

For those of you who don't know, I just started a year-long chaplaincy residency at the VA in Palo Alto. This paid internship is part of a training program called Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE). Each unit of CPE is different. My units follow the seasons: Fall, Winter, Spring & Summer; by the time the year is over I will have accumulated 4 units of CPE which will lend themselves (should I choose to go forward with it) over to a chaplaincy certification process. These units are also part of my requirements for ordination in the UCC. I chose to work in a VA setting instead of a hospital b/c I'm concerned about the lives being affected by U.S. driven wars both at home and abroad. I wanted to gain skills working with the PTSD population in particular and men in general. This decision landed me in military culture. I am an employee of the U.S. Government. Needless to say, I am constantly surrounded by "difference." This is the hardest work I have ever done in my life.

Each unit begins with a declaration of learning goals. We must identify and flesh out 2 professional goals and 2 personal goals--4 in total. Students are encouraged to search themselves and come up with what THEY need to work on given the context, population and supervisory systems in place. Supervisors help students identify what processes and procedures can be engaged once the goals have been stated, but it's up to the student to name her growing edges. What an amazing exercise! Persons who don't know their own issues have a hard time with this process, but I'm finding it powerfully provocative. I want to bring up one of my learning goals as a discussion topic here on my blog because it intersects with what Wade & Eli have currently brought up in their own writing: arrogance, judgment and loyalty. So let us discuss...

Gayatri Spivak writes that we become human only in response to the call the "other" makes on our life. What responsibility do I have to an/other who not only thinks differently than me, but in that thinking minimizes my humanity, wishes that I would change at my core, and (taken to an extreme) wants persons like me dead? What responsibility do I have to Palin who mocks every advance in human rights with her sound-byte rhetoric devoid of substance and stupid syllabic jabs of juvenille humor? Do I need to hear her out? When should I stop listening? Where do I find her humanity? She is so easy to despise. All the lofty Christian claims to love enemies, to do kindness--they lose their applicability when she opens her mouth.

I use Palin as an example because she is current, but this is a long standing trend in my life. I cannot stand injustice(s). Yes, I'm perpetuating injustice by living in this country, by consuming in ways that hurt the earth. Yes, I consciously and unconsciously do hurtful things sometimes. I'm not above it, but that doesn't mean I can look on systemic racism, homophobia, colonization or any other human-driven murderous action without judgment. I simply cannot. I'm pissed a lot. Pissed at poverty, pro-life parties that love big weapons, littering, animal cruelty, human torture, I could go on and on and on. And that's the problem. There is so much to go on and on about. There's so much wrong. (And yes, there's so much right too, but that's not what I'm talking about today) The sheer amount of suffering and evil--especially visible in a place like the VA--is enough to make a person shrivel up on the inside. Or there's always the option of looking the other way, not taking any of the shit into account. But that's the ultimate evil and not an option in my case.


Yesterday I sat with Marjorie (my pastor) and lamented this part of my personhood, told her how tired I was of being angry, tired of scaring other people with my anger, tired of always being at odds with someone. She isn't the first person I've sought out for help with this. I get similar answers: don't drop the prophetic parts of your personality, but try to find ways of manifesting deep peace and contentment or else you will be consumed by the anger. I don't want to be consumed. I want to be a peace-maker. I don't want to look away. I want to help heal the wounds. So back to the professed learning goal. Clearly, I'm in an (hierarchical, military, patriarchal) environment that challenges my values and world-view everyday. I want to learn how to stay engaged in the work of justice-seeking without turning into a bitter zombie, without falling into the isolated abyss of overly-self-righteous indignation (like Bill Maher, for instance). How do I go about it??

Bill Maher's Religulous

Yes. I saw it. More like: I survived it. Don't get me wrong, Bill Maher is often right on target. In fact, I agree with 80% of what he went after in his documentary. And some of his stuff is hilarious. But why does he have to be so arrogant, so culturally insensitive (read: racist as hell), so narrow-minded while supposedly deconstructing religious certainty? He has some certainty issues of his own that need deconstructing. His way of "interviewing" people absolutely replicates colonial patterns of domination and exploitation. James was quick to point out that the one time an interviewee demanded to be heard (instead of repeatedly talked over) Maher stood up and said "I'm out." Guess he can't stand a dose of his own medicine. And that's just my point. It seems like every time I hear the content of a good agnostic/atheist argument it's coming in the form of belligerent condescension--the very "form" that agnostics and atheists hate in religious people!!!

He wants to talk about all the "violence" done in the name of religion throughout the years. But I wonder, what exactly does a "first world" heterosexual male of affluence over-powering and denying voice to a Muslim woman look like? He may not like religion (and I don't either most the time), but his closing scene had plot, setting and music that would fit right into any crusade.

So that's my critique from the head. My heart is curious about Bill Maher.

Whenever anyone is that opposed to any one thing, without taking context of that "thing" into consideration AT ALL, I often find there's a love/hate relationship beneath it all. (Think about all those out-spoken homophobes out there who have been caught behind closed doors with same gender lovers.) My point: it's really easy to see the terrible atrocities carried out in the name of religion, but you'd have to be selectively blind not to see the ways religion also helps, heals, and strengthens. I wonder why Maher--with all of his insight, intelligence and humorous wisdom--cannot see the good along with the bad. I wonder where his one-sidedness on this issue originates from. At one point in the film he admitted to the privilege of entertaining doubt. He admitted that people caught between a rock and a hard place often need faith in order to survive. I wish he would have explored this particular phenomenon more deeply because it was the only time, though out the entire documentary, that I felt his humanness, his vulnerability pierce through the self-righteous, chip-on-the-shoulder facade.

I'd love to hear the thoughts of my other clergy, athiest and agnostic friends on this one.

Single Working Moms

When I was a little girl
my mom would often announce
her arrival home after a long day by taking off her "work clothes"
and pouring a gin and tonic (which I mistakenly took for water once...yuck!).
A ritual rite of passage,
transitioning from one role to another,
from working woman to wife/mother,
transitioning from one reality to another,
from executive's chair to lavender leather couch.
The desparation and speed with which she unhooked,
unbuttoned, pulled down and twisted off the cap
signified a desire I couldn't begin to comprehend
as a child. But today, as I take my earrings off
one by one, slip off the socks just heavy enough
to avoid blisters in these god-awful "suitable" shoes,
and rest bed-side comfortable in my body for the first time all day,
I'm taken aback by her straddling two worlds of seemingly divergent
details. I'd like to think my toes inhabit worlds
less alien from one another, and if it is so, G*d bless her
for making such integration a possibility.