Murray Seems Recovered

So, our little foster cat (likely to be permanent cat since really, who wants to adopt a cat with a history of an unknown neurological disorder that doesn’t like to be touched?) Murray has almost fully recovered from what we thought would be a terminal illness. You can read about his adventure here and here (and here) if you are so inclined. We took him to three doctors and no one had a very convincing explanation for what was happening. Except that it was neurological and it was getting worse. Poor little guy just laid in his little bed by the heater for over a month. But, we treated him with a homeopathic thing (which we were a little skeptical about - how could those three little tablets somehow heal a progressive neurological condition that was causing him not to be able to walk?). But, one week later, we noticed a marked improvement. Two months later he seems almost as good as new - maybe a little on the slow side but he was never the brightest bulb in the bunch. Although sometimes our alternative health vet seems a little just like “well, just keep and eye on [whatever cat is sick]” and just give them [fill in homeopathic remedy] thus far, we have fostered over 50 cats and kittens in five years and no one has died or had to have even a really expensive treatment. Phineas was the most expensive - he had to go to an eye specialist and other stuff for $500 (which, by the way, was covered by an animal loving reader of this blog!!!) and he ended up just fine and in a super loving home with only slight reduced vision. So three cheers for alternative medicine. Of course, can I prove that the homeopathic treatments work? No, but it does seem to correlate that within a week of the treatment the little cuddle monsters get better. For more information on alternative and complimentary veterinary medicine, please visit the American Holistic Veterinary Medicine Association,The Academy of Veterinary Homeopathy or The Academy of Veterinary Acupuncture. You can also find practitioners in your area on those sites.

On Fun

This is seriously one of the hardest questions of my life. What do I do for fun? What brings me joy? A rush? Relaxation? You know, just fun. If you go back through pictures of me as a girl, a smiling child I am not. I have always been pretty serious.

As the first year of my doctoral work is coming close to an end (only a month a half left), and I tally up the years I have been in school (twenty-three years, not counting preschool and a break from 02-03), I have come to wonder to what extent I have mistaken work and achievement for fun. Or maybe I have the wrong idea of fun, and some of us are just not wired for fun-as-typically conceived (Is writing a paper fun? This is not clear to me). I used to insist that there was too much suffering in the world and that, in fact, no one should be having fun while there was so much pain. Clearly, I have rethought this. I am all for fun and joy and enjoyment. Perhaps, in some ways, it is what makes the suffering in our lives bearable.

But I just can’t figure out what is fun for me. That doesn’t cost a lot. I like massages and vacations. But these are rare and costly. I like to sleep. I enjoy reading and school and even my work. But does this count as fun? I like to knit, but I wouldn’t say I consider it fun. I guess I am talking about letting lose, vegging, laughing, and truly enjoying it. No guilt that you are not writing your paper cleaning the kitchen volunteering at the church doing taxes or swiffering the floor that hasn’t been cleaned for three weeks.

One of the things that I really do enjoy (enjoy=fun? still unclear to me) is blogging so I am going to try to do that more. Maybe I’ll take up sky diving too. Ha. Just kidding. Oh, aren’t I funny. A riot. So much fun.

How do you have fun?

Checking In: Congregations, Cats, Anti-Racism Class, etc.

Ah, school and work are setting in. I’m dying to jump into the conversation on Unitarian Universalist-identified people who are not part of congregations, the limits of Unitarian Univeralist congregationalism, the exciting possibilities for broadening our vision of what it means to be Unitarian Universalist, and the ways that this could expand our reach and ministry. Ms. Theologian links to the various posts here and also eloquently writes about why she is Unitarian Universalist but does not go to church. But, alas, I just don’t have the time to craft something worth putting out there - a lot of important things have already been said. (Come to think of it, I will refer readers to a 2006 post - A Congregationally Based Movement? On Community Ministry and the Work of Our Faith in the World - about my call to community ministry and how I struggle with how that fits into a congregationally-based movement. Slightly longer. Written in third person - why? I do not know. Maybe just how I was feeling that day….)

In other news, our cat Murray is hanging in there. He changes all the time. But seems to not be getting worse (as of the past two days - but who knows).

I am teaching OWL (a comprehensive sexuality education curriculum - Our Whole Lives) and loving it. I was never a huge fan of working with teens. Not so much that I was against it, but I just never understood how people could think it was so awesome. Not that I am clamoring to be a youth minister now, but I “get” it much better how one could consider that as a career option or long-term volunteer option. I’m sure all people who work with young people and really like it think that they are working with especially impressive teens, but I actually think it is true in my case. And my co-facilitator is great too.

I have started five posts relating to the sexual purity movement, a NYTimes article on meat, “the hard work of being a peaceful presence”, and the GA brou-ha-ha (as Philocrities put it) but none have gotten done enough that I want to put them out there. I guess I will just have to resign myself to things being slower while classes are going on and chiming in on discussions a little late in the game.

Speaking of classes, I am taking one called Racializing Whiteness with an excellent instructor who presents ideas, but does a great job of not making everyone feel guilty and horrible (which was my fear of what it would look like) and leaves room for the exploration of issues rather than preaching some sort of party line about the only and right way to be anti-racist (again, this was a fear of mine). I am learning a lot. And now fear less nervous of saying something “wrong” about anti-racism work, since it can be (lest we all forget the brown bag controversy last year) a sensitive subject in our denomination. I think it will help me be more anti-racist (or, framed more positively, more just) in my own life and inform (in a positive way) my ministry and scholarship. Somehow it is a huge relief to me that it is a really helpful and meaningful class and that we have room to learn and grow and grapple with hard questions.

That’s all for now.

p.s. I just read Chalice Chick’s reasons she does go to church. It is super-good. A great compliment to Ms. Theologian’s post about why she does not go to church.

Murray Update

I wrote a day or two ago that our little foster cat Murray is having a hard time walking. We took him to the vet, and it could be worse, I suppose, and we might find out that it is. The vet has determined that Murray has cerebellar hypoplasia. I think. I thought that the vet made a very quick diagnosis and could not adequately explain why Murray’s walk has gotten much worse in the past few days since CH is supposed to be nonprogressive. The alternatives are not good either. So we can hope that it is CH which simply means that Murray will walk funny his whole life, but I have a feeling it will be worse. Poor little guy. Our shelter really likes the vet we go to, and he charges us only half price, but I’ve never had good experiences with him. He is super-quick to diagnose and always 100% sure of his diagnosis. And has been wrong in the past. The result is that usually we end up paying out of pocket to get a second opinion, which several times has been important for our little kitties, but if the vet would just listen better and not be so sure of himself, we wouldn’t have to do that. Sigh. Let’s just hope that, for Murray’s sake, he is right. I hope we’ll know more tomorrow after phone consults with other vets. :(

Murray said to thank you for writing nice comments about him and that he appreciates the support.

When there is not a thing you can do

The mother of one of the boys I mentor has had a stroke. I have known her for 13 years. Her health has never been good, but it doesn’t make it any easier for anyone. There is no one there to be her advocate - to manage things. When someone in my family is hospitalized, there are enough of us to hold vigil - drinking coffee from the coffee vending machine, telling stories, sitting in silence together - whatever it is we do when we wait and hope together. And always someone who works closely with the doctors - explores the options, makes sure the person is comfortable, attended to. In the case this lovely woman - all of her family has children, no one else to watch the children because everyone works so much, precarious jobs, no car, no money, etc. Just getting to the hospital is an ordeal, much less staying there, going back and forth, negotiating with intimidating white doctors. I HATE living so far away and there is nothing I can do. She is in the ICU and there are blood pressure issues involved on top of the stroke. She has no minister to attend to her either. Sigh. I know that her family is doing all that they can. I know that the young man I mentor is scared and hurting. Sometimes there is just no good way to make things better. And we can only do what we can do. Which isn’t very damn much.

On Kindness, Mindfulness, and Coping With Difficult Situations

It is no secret to my friends and family that living in the Northeast has been difficult for me. The weather doesn’t help, but the most difficult thing has been dealing with people being unkind, difficult, impatient, rude, and just downright mean. Let me be clear: I have met MANY wonderful, kind, generous, loving, selfless people here. I am not talking about the absence of amazing people. Rather, the culture of politeness, gentleness, kindness, and patience in everyday situations is just very different from what I have experienced in the Midwest and South, the areas of the country where I am from. I am talking about the general level of kindness, politeness, and respect that I encounter on a daily basis - professional situations, landlords, neighbors, random people I encounter at the store, etc.* Some people think that the kindness and friendliness people find in places like the South is fake or somehow inauthentic. Not me. Give me “fake” friendliness any day over “authentic” rudeness.

But this is not a lament about the culture of everyday politeness and warmth in the Northeast. It is about how we learn to cope with situations that we are not used to and that make us feel bad. Clearly, lots of people find the Northeast/Boston to have a perfectly fine culture of politeness and everyday friendliness and patience (my mom being one of them who is always telling me, “Gosh, I just don’t know what you are talking about, Elizabeth,”when she visits). While it is very hard, I have been trying to practice mindfulness and non-attachment related to these sorts of situations, but in the last few days, they have been accumulating. I find that all my thinking and reminding myself of how want to react to these situations and how I want to feel about these situations doesn’t quite work. My stomach still feels queasy, and it is all I can do not to burst into tears when I think about difficult situation x, y, and z involving unkindness, gruffness, lack of empathy, and selfishness. Like I told my partner today, my zen is being sapped.

What are we to do when we know how we should feel and act about a particular situation, yet we just can’t bring ourselves to feel that way? I tell myself to be mindful, non-attached, calm, to be in the moment, to realize that I cannot control how others treat me, rather only how I react to them. And, I tell myself that all I can do is show the kindness that I seek in my own life, hoping that the anger, or lack of patience, or resentment that people show me, might be gently eased by the understanding and patience I show to them. I work to practice non-attachment - letting go of my need to be treated a certain way, or letting go of my own desire to have others validate or be understanding of me (my driving habits, my work habits, my shopping habits, my mere presence, etc.).

Yet, the last few days have been a good lesson about the ongoing nature of becoming who we want to be. We must also be gentle with ourselves, understanding that we have developed structures of understanding and life-practice that have taken many years to form and, likewise, take many years to un-form. This helps me remember that just as my structures of sensitivity, desire for kindness and gentleness and understanding have developed over many years, so have the structures of impatience, anger, gruffness, and unkindness that cause people to, for instance, yell at me because they think I am putting snow on their sidewalk when shoveling out my car. Perhaps their anger and screaming is okay with them and doesn’t represent any sort of underlying pain or struggle. Or perhaps it does, but they do not yet know where that anger comes from or how to ease it. Either way, learning how to detach from these things that hurt us, and show the sort of understanding and kindness that we would like shown toward us, is a process that cannot take place overnight. It is a journey, something that we must continually be attentive to, understanding that suffering due to attachment to our desires and wants is not something we can or should totally avoid, rather something we can seek to ease with our mindfullness practices, and with time.

May we be gentle on ourselves and gentle with others as we all try to make our way in a very difficult world.

*Please understand that I know that there are plenty of problems with the Midwest and South. I am talking about one particular area that I struggle with and deal with. Of course there are mean, rude, impolite people in the South and Midwest. I am just talking about overall culture here. Also, the difficult professional situations I refer to do not, to this point, include my ministerial ones. In that area, I have been very blessed.

Hello and year in review and year to come…

Greetings loyal blog readers. Hope everyone had a nice holidays. As some of you have noticed, I’ve toned things down as the year has gone on. I mean in terms of frequency of posting. Most of this has been due to lack of time thanks to Latin, but also the sense that perhaps there are just too many words floating around the blogosphere. Must I publish so many of my random thoughts? Must you all read them? I read a quote about Thich Nhat Hanh - something about someone who only speaks when there is something to say and says a lot in a few words - and I liked that. Perhaps it just justifies my increasing tendency as I get older to say less and think more. Nonetheless, I thought I would post an almost end of the year post.

Some of you might remember last year’s New Year’s resolution not to buy clothes for a year. So, I totally held out for five months, which was a good start, but did not carry it through the year. That said, I DID very much reduce the clothes I bought this year. By a lot. I didn’t keep track of the exact numbers, but I would say at least 50%, more if you take into account the five months I was new-clothes free. I try to keep in mind not only the money aspect of new-clothes buying, but the way it sort of feeds into a new-things-make-me-feel-good sort of mentality that I would like to avoid for an array of reasons (including environmental ones). It wasn’t like I was a clothes freak before - but I would get a shirt here and pants there when I was at Target or the mall even if I didn’t really need anything. I do that less.

What else was this blog about this year and what am I thinking about for next year, you ask? 2007 was another year of lots of stuff on the environment and global warming, and how this relates to our eating habits. I have been meaning to post on James Lovelock, after being introduced to him by a great college friend who sent me a heads up and by my grim reaper of a partner who loves to report the most awful, depressing news to me each morning and night so that I am up on all the mayhem in our world. So I will post on Lovelock and his apparently not totally improbable theories about the future of our planet and how we might go about reacting to these ideas. Perhaps my first post of the New Year if I get my act together.

I’ve also tried to share some fun ideas for vegan and vegetarian eating (although now that I look back, not nearly enough! What have I been doing? In my mind, I wrote at least five posts on on my favorite foods, but apparently, not. 2008 will be better.). I am of the mind that the more veganish/vegetarianish we can be in our lives, the better. Perhaps one less burger this week? Switching from cow’s milk to soy? Or taking the plunge and going all out. Each little bit or big bit matters - for animals, for compassionate living, for our earth. I am also of the mind that we should call each other to be our best selves, but try to avoid the judgment and finger-wagging that vegetarians (and liberals and UUs, often) have a tendency to do. How can we support each other in doing what is best for our selves and our world, while at the same time not making ourselves totally miserable in the meantime? How do we find a place between living in a hut in the woods and living in a McMansion with several SUVs in the driveway? Central questions that I try to grapple with here….

Speaking of vegetarianism, I have VERY exciting news about Tofurky Jerky to post very soon. The most exciting vegan food development of the year, in my opinion (followed closely by the development of very convincing and good (not just edible, my friends, but good) tofurky deli slices).

Finally, I did some posts on the sexual purity movement which is what I study in school (among other things). I envision, when I wrench myself from the greedy and merciless claws of Latin, to actually do a blog on this. For now, enjoy a look at the leading sexual purity literature, and get psyched for more to come this year!  Including, more on the cats we foster and adopt (if you want to do this too, send an email and I can hook you up!), occasional political commentary, book reviews, Unitarian Universalist theory and practice, chronic illness (and recovering from it), urgent celebrity commentary, queer/feminist/sexuality stuff, and lots more.

Happy almost 2008.  Warmly, and hopefully, Elizabeth

Kentucky Hits the Big Time

My home state of Kentucky* was featured in the New York Times, y’all. I don’t think it did justice to the lovely (and friendly) state from which I and my family hark, but it was nice.

http://travel.nytimes.com/2007/11/04/travel/04bourbon.html?pagewanted=print 

*You might say to yourself, if you know me, “Elizabeth was born in Ohio. And lived in Ohio most of her life.” This is true. But this, to me, is different from my home state. Going “home” meant going to Reed, Kentucky. When we went back to Ohio we just went back to Ohio.

i’m back. somewhat.

So I’ve not really written much for a few reasons so this is just a little check-in note. First, some exciting news! Elizabeth’s Little Blog’s url www.elizabethslittleblog.com is now up and running again thanks to this blog’s number one (okay, well, only) benefactor, RG. Thanks RG!

My lack of writing has been for two reasons. First, because I’m trying only to write somewhat more meaningful stuff here rather than more random thoughts. I guess I can’t decide what sort of blog I want this to be. So while I decide, I’m writing less. But, that reason is really only a secondary reason to this one: I have to take Latin for my doctoral work and it is killing me. I spend all my time translating and memorizing and trying to understand this crazy language. And I’m also having to continue German translations too, and there can really be no slacking or I get behind. There is no end-of-the-semester catch-up in Latin.  Sooo, I will try to post at least sometime, while I think about where this blog is going. I have been thinking a lot about my call to ministry, trying to find a home church, what it means to have a home church, and about the environment, cats, death, hospice work, vegetarianism and what it has to do with violence in the world, and sorts of other things. I will get to them. In the meantime, I’m enjoying reading the other thoughtful UU blogs out there, especially Looking for Faith, which I’ve been especially impressed with these days.

Until Latin frees me from its grip ever-so-slightly, E

Nothing Profound or Even Semi-Profound to Say

This blog is mostly not about being update about how I am doing. But today it is. Interestingly, I seem most pulled to write a lot on it when I have other pressing things to do. And this summer, almost nothing has been pressing.

So, in a rare instance, I am just writing to say that I am still here and things are going fine. I am working part-time this summer, trying to get my German good enough to pass the language exam September 14th, so that I can have that out of the way before I start Latin (ugg) September 17th. What do these languages have to do with the course of my study you ask? Nada. You just have to get a high pass on two modern languages and a regular old pass on an ancient language and I thought Latin would be easier than Greek. (For those that don’t know, I start a doctoral program in religion in September. I finished my M.Div. in June. I’m still ordination track, just on the somewhat slower track.)

A friend was in town this weekend and it was a great visit. She is a fellow candidate for UU ministry and very wise. She is also adopting one of our kittens. We currently have seven foster kittens and one foster cat (who we’ve had since January - she is a tad difficult to adopt out). Who wants a lovely although not quite friendly but really good-at-heart seven toed kitty named Marisol? I will deliver anywhere in New England! For free! If you will love her and keep her for her whole life.

Hmm. This summer has been really laid back. It makes me feel lazy, but I try to tell myself it is about self-care. I can’t tell if it is really being lazy and tricking myself that it is about self-care, or if it really is about self-care and I just have a must-do-something-must-be-productive voice in my head.  Probably it is somewhere in between.

Well, that’s about it. I’m sure once I have papers to write, all of a sudden I will think of things that I just MUST post on my blog. Also, for some reason www.elizabethslittleblog.com still isn’t working, so you need to go to the wordpress address for it to work. Oh, and my computer got a virus, and they erased my whole computer and all my bookmarks and EVERYTHING in order to fix it. I backed up my main files, but - gosh - it sure takes a lot of work to get your computer back up and working with the right settings and bookmarks and cookies and such.

That’s all.  Elizabeth :)