reflection

New Beginnings – A Reflection

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I was going to repost one of my memoir pieces titled, New Beginnings. It took forever to find and when I reread it, it wasn’t something that I wanted to share again. It was hard to recollect and be reminded of some of the things I wrote at the beginning of 2013. It’s hard to look at where I was then and realize how far I’ve come but also how far I have to go.

I wrote then:

“I start 2013 in so much a better place than one year ago.”

I listed a few things that remained intact and speculated on a couple more.

I find that two years later I am in a similar place. 2014 wasn’t perfect, far from it, and there will always be downs to go along with the ups. There will always be things to overcome, health issues still to accept and turn around, career, if you can even call it that, to rise to, learning how to parent an adult, keeping my middle child from feeling like a middle child, teaching my daughter the things I’m still strays if so she won’t be; still searching for me in the vast emotional wasteland that is my head, body, and soul.

I am definitely in a better place now than then and in a better place than a year ago. I am still searching for better than that and a serenity that fits me.

In the last year, I took more deep breaths. I went on two spiritual retreats and one spiritual enrichment. I put more of me into my writing. I wrote more. I found Jesus without losing what I already had that was working with G-d. I believe more. I forgive more. My meds seen to be settling into my body chemistry and smoothing me out, repairing what needs to be but not losing who I am inside even as I still look for the rest of me.

I have several points during the year for my new beginnings. Previously, they were Back to School, Rosh Hashanah, and New Year’s Eve/Day.

I think this year will be a new beginnings appraisal every few weeks to check and discern and understand whether I’m still on the right path. If not, begin again.

You never run out of chances.

Annual Mason Jar Project

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Beginning in 2013, I started keeping a mason jar, an idea I discovered on Pinterest. Throughout the year, you add your happy thoughts to it; then on New Year’s Eve you read through them and remember all of the good times from the past twelve months.

In 2014, I also added a couple of things that weren’t happy but that I wanted to remember and reflect on as the year came to a close (the death of my first church friend, Shirley and the suicide/death of Robin Williams.)

I’ll share three others with you:

3/21: Flower show. It was a good day.

6/4/14: Went to the evening Ascension Mass. Saw A! She’s using a walker – since she broke her leg. It was great to see her.

8/4: Dominican Conference Center. Retreat w/ Bro. Mickey this weekend. I can’t wait! I need this.

Birthday Rituals

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Since I graduated high school I have not attended classes or worked on my birthday. I went on a job interview once; almost got into a car accident and after getting the job it was the first one I was fired from. No more.

I’ve learned my lesson.

I even prefer when my birthday falls on a weekday. My husband works; my kids are in school. I do my thing and we meet at home after school and work let out.

I wander, usually. I go to the mall or if it’s a nice day out, a rare treat even in early December, I go to an outdoor mall. We have a fancy one nearby with boutiques (I can afford to window shop anyway) and a café with benches and statues throughout the open space. It makes me feel as though I’m traveling some place new. I get to pretend I’m a tourist or researching my non-existent novel or a wayward traveler and I take pictures of the most mundane things and enjoy my quiet time with myself.

In the years before she died, my mother began to send me money for my gift. There’d be enough to buy myself something I needed, something I didn’t need and have lunch. I started taking myself out to lunch and beginning to be comfortable in my own skin and on my own, something I dread, but am more and more coming to appreciate and treasure.

The year after she died, my husband gave me his work incentive gift card, which happened to come the same week as my birthday– $50 from American Express and I have the same birthday ritual that I had with my mother’s gift.  He knew how much it would mean to me, and it really did. It was one of the nicest things.

I almost always go to Starbucks, breakfast or lunch, have a drink, or two, relax. Write. By my birthday, the cranberry bliss bars are available.

One year we had a major snowstorm on my birthday – schools were closed and everything; no going out for me. I planned ahead to cook Shepherd’s pie and Yorkshire pudding from scratch. I’m not sure why I wanted it so badly. I might have been reading a Welsh history book or historical novel at that time, and that was all I wanted for my birthday dinner. It tasted amazing! It was also one of the only snowstorms where I wasn’t anxious or panicky.

When I was a kid we always got a birthday cake. It was always a surprise, even when it wasn’t. Whoever’s birthday it was would get called away or asked to do a chore and when we came back, the lights were out and there was cake, lit candles and everyone singing happy birthday.

Every year as we got older, we continued this, every year, and every year we would all be surprised when it was our turn. It was sweet. And we all played along even if we did roll our eyes when we were asked to do the “chore.”

We were always taken aback, surprised, thrilled everyone remembered, and if we weren’t, we played along. This was one of those family traditions that my parents loved.

In our family now, we usually pick a restaurant to go out to dinner and come home to cake. I love birthday cake – anytime of the year. It is never the wrong time to have birthday cake. My favorite kind is vanilla with buttercream frosting and some kind of flower or something made out of frosting. This year we had a vanilla raspberry that I want more of. It was the perfect blend of cake and fruit, whipped cream and fondant. Yummm.

I began my most recent birthday by attending Mass. This really is one of the most enjoyable things I do in a week. The way the light bounces off the pews and the altar; the way the words wash over me; the way the host tastes when it’s mixed with the wine in my mouth. So many senses filled in such short moments.

This year, I actually went home and shared breakfast with my husband and drank Doctor Who tea (the ninth doctor to be precise) before going out again.

Believe it or not, I spent the next hour in Payless Shoes trying on boots. I might have mentioned in earlier writings, but I was so excited to find these boots and that they fit pretty perfectly that I even walked out of the store wearing them. I can’t remember the last time I wore shoes out of a shoe store and still kept my “old” shoes which hadn’t worn out to the point of falling off my feet. I now own three pairs of shoes. Woo-hoo! The last time I bought shoes on my birthday were winter boots several years ago from my mom.

Lunch at Starbucks and cake at home. Since my son was working we had my birthday dinner two days later.

It’s funny how every birthday is the same and yet different. I pack up my Kindle, my notebook or journal and my camera. I wear my favorite clothes – this year my favorite long sweater, my new black boots and my cute black knit hat. I become me for a day and try to figure out how to stay the me I am on my birthday all the rest of the year.

The ritual stays the same year after year; it almost takes no thought or planning at all, but the happenings change just enough and each  year I’m in a new place mentally, emotionally so that year’s wandering brings on new thoughts, new reflections, new grace to find.

The sun is in a different place, the clouds have different formations, the blue in the sky is a different shade. The people I run into in the shops or the café are all different and each brings a special presence to my day that I welcome and can add to my growing inventory of people and places and things and they all form the index for my reflecting and writing, always striving to find my way through the shadows.

Advent – Day 3

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Scripture (Job 22:21)
Saint Clare of Assisi

As I hope in you, O Lord, permit me to come closer to you, that my whole soul may do homage to the greatness of your majesty; that my heart, with its tenderest affections, may acknowledge your infinite love; that my memory may dwell on the admirable mysteries here renewed every day, and that the sacrifice of my whole being may accompany you.

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Bullying and Transphobia – More than One Day a Year

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At the beginning of this week, I reposted something I wrote a few months ago about bullying – what it is by definition, my middle school experience and a more recent one. When I wrote that many months ago, I was angry at the thing that was going on; at the bullying being done against me. The bullying – without remorse, without shame, in fact quite the opposite with almost a smirking, cheerful triumph. I would have thought it was sad if I wasn’t so upset about it.

It was written in haste and fury and the tone probably got away from me. It was also written in the middle of the stress that triggered me all the way back to middle school.

That’s one of the ways triggers work. They lie hidden beneath the surface, in the unconscious until one day something happens that reminds the deep down and it affects you in a strong way with feelings rising that are at once familiar and unfamiliar and they are uncontrollable. Not uncontrollable in your reaction, although sometimes, but you can’t control being affected by it in whatever way you are.

On a conscious level, I didn’t go strawberry picking until my first son was old enough. I didn’t have any other opportunities really, growing up in suburbia, no strawberry patches where we lived, but if I thought about being on a school bus alone I was brought back to that day. When I thought about strawberry picking, even the day I went with my son, it came back to me. I wouldn’t call these triggers as much as memories associated with those very specific instances but it’s very similar to triggers that many (including me) feel much more strongly.

The bullying I experienced a few months ago was different. For one thing, I’m in my forties and my bully is well into his adulthood. For another thing, I forgot that not everyone works in the logical and open-minded section of the world. I was silly enough to think that if I spoke to this person rationally, he would realize how abusive and (verbally) violent he was being. I was wrong about that. For the third thing, this is the internet and people take their anonymity to cause more harm than good very seriously. Up until this point, I had been lucky enough to have experienced the latter folks – the compassionate, the kind, the helpful. This change was a surprise and fairly or not, I was still taken aback by the cruelty of it.

I’m sure this sounds naïve, especially for a forty-something mother of three, but I’ve always believed the best in people and this behavior was beyond my comprehension.

Having said that, I still believe that, but my eyes are opened a little wider and I parse my words a little more. I worry about offending people even though I can’t control how people will react to my words or my actions. I try not to let bullies affect me, but it’s hard not to. When it happens, I’m twelve again. I’m hurt, but I don’t want to rock the boat; I don’t want to make things worse for myself.

It’s fear, plain and simple.

And it’s wrong for other people to make us feel that way; to the point that we change who we are to avoid them.

I chose this week to talk about my bullying occurrences for a reason.  This has been Transgender Visibility/Awareness Week, culminating yesterday with the fifteenth Transgender Day of Remembrance, memorializing those transgender people who die violently each year.

If all we think of is the bullying, that’s bad enough, but coupled with the transphobia and violence especially against trans women of color, although trans men are not immune, it’s nearly epidemic.

It’s not a simple case of being bullied for who you are, for how you present yourself, but to fear for your life in a very literal way, knowing that if you meet a violent death it will probably be horrible. The bullying that comes for others after one of these murders must be terror inducing. I mean I get panic attacks thinking about my experiences and even with those, I’m not afraid of dying violently. There must be something alarming about hearing that someone like you deserved to die because of how they present themselves, how they identify.

For simply being themselves and living authentically like the rest of us try to do, they are given a death sentence, and for many this comes after a series of torture and abuse apart from the everyday kinds of side-eyes and bullying trans people face.

That’s why for me, it’s important to draw attention to every death, every torture that’s publicized in the news, every misgendering, every transphobic word that those of us not in the community don’t see as hurtful because we simply can’t understand how hurtful it is.

For every one that’s publicized there are inestimable numbers that are not reported to the authorities or the media.

Whether you know someone personally who’s been bullied for their gender identity or not, this is the responsibility for all of us to make everyone feel safe in their space, and in their skin on their own terms.

Be supportive, but be careful not to bully them into conforming to what you feel are your rights to information and take care not to put three dimensional people into a one dimensional box. Take care not to label those who choose not to use labels, and don’t assume you know better than the individual person. That probably should go for everyone you meet, not only trans people.

For those of us not in the trans community, it’s brought to us once a year as a day of remembrance, after the murders have already happened. For the trans community this is every day, and they can’t click the next link to avoid it.

Trans people are not a cause. Stopping the transphobic bullying and epidemic levels of murder in their community is a cause, and one that we need to focus on until there is no need for more days of remembrance.

Reflection on Conversion

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“…shows that conversion is not just a one-time event but a lifelong process.”

-The Word Among Us, May 26, 2014 issue

 

When I began my religious studies to become a Roman Catholic, I expected to get the basics, ask some questions, go through with the required rituals and sacraments and then I’d be Catholic.

And while, yes, that is the basic, no-frills description of any person’s conversion, reading this quotation in May really reaffirmed what I had been thinking already for a long time: conversion is not an overnight event. There isn’t a test you have to pass.

There is a period after the Easter sacraments, a mystogogical period to delve further into the mysteries of the Holy Spirit and the Sacraments. I may have been told that this concludes after Pentecost, but I seem to think that I’ve also been told that it continues for a year after joining the Church.

Whichever it is, I feel like I learn something new every day. Whether it’s a new Scripture that I’ve never heard before or am less familiar with than the more ‘popular’ ones; whether it’s a new (to me) day on the calendar, a saint’s day of someone I want to explore further or discovering something deep within myself that I want to reflect on. It is literally an everyday occurrence that either brings a question to be answered or a reflection to be meditated on.

Coming from a Jewish background, I feel as though this conversion is more of a transition. Just as the New Testament is the second part of the Bible for Christians, I feel that my Catholic faith is a second chapter with my Jewish life as the first and the third chapter is written as I move forward spiritually.

For me it’s a never-ending progression as I gather more information and history of Jesus in his time and through his teachings that can only lead to discover knew interpretations for my spirituality to grow deeper and more entwined and woven through my soul.

This wasn’t just a life-long commitment to Jesus; it was a life-long process of learning who I am through Jesus.

St. Kateri Tekakwitha’s Shrine

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We’re reminded throughout the year and the Liturgical calendar of many of the saints through their feast days. Recently, we’ve observed Sts. Simon and Jude, the North American Martyrs and Pope St. John XXIII and Pope St. John Paul II.

Today is All Saints’ Day; that day on the calendar that honors all the saints. Although not today, it is often a holy day of obligation where Catholics are expected to attend Mass. I did attend this morning, and since there is no specific saint mentioned it is a good time to remember the saints that are important to us.

The saint I chose for my confirmation name is St. Elen (of Caernarfon). I wrote about her back when I was going through my sacraments.

Last week was my annual fall retreat, and today I get to tell you about one of the unexpected directions I was sent on during that week: the National Shrine of St. Kateri Tekakwitha.

She was one of the three saints I considered for my confirmation before I was finally led to St. Elen.

I contemplated having St. Kateri because:

  1. She was local,
  2. She was Native American, and
  3. Her name began with a K like mine.

When I read her story what stood out to me was how she was the only Christian among her relatives, and that struck a chord with me during my conversion. I was the only one moved to follow Jesus Christ, and so was the only one talking about Scriptural things. Obviously, I wasn’t trying to convert my family, but that single similarity stayed with me.

At four, Kateri lost her immediate family to a small pox outbreak. She had contracted the virus, and was left scarred by her illness. Upon her death, witnesses say her scars disappeared.

She appeared to three people in the days after her death, and one year later, she appeared again to Father Chauchetière who painted what is considered the oldest portrait of the saint:

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Two of the four National Shrines that honor St. Kateri are in two small nearby villages in upstate New York about a five hour drive south from her burial place in Quebec.

I had heard of Kateri before I became a Catholic, but really only knew that she had been beatified and her place was local. I’ve had a strong connection to Native Americans since I was a child. I think I find myself drawn to cultures other than my own. I had just begun attending Mass when Kateri was canonized in 2012. I received a wallet card from the Shrine as they celebrated her canonization and our whole Diocese celebrated, and I’ve carried that with me since that day in October.

That day in October also held an unrelated significance for me as well: it was the original due date of my middle child, who decided to be two weeks early, lucky for both of us since as it was, the day he was born I was in labor for two days, unbeknownst to me.

I had no intention of traveling to a saint’s shrine on my retreat, but when I glanced at a map and saw how close it was to where I had been on Saturday, I realized that I didn’t have many opportunities to visit something so significant, and since she did have some inspiration for me, I was excited to go once it had been pointed out to me.

It was raining when I got there, so I browsed around the gift shop until it was a light enough mist for me to walk around. The buildings of the shrine close this weekend for the winter (because none of the buildings have heat), so my timing couldn’t have been more perfect. I plan to return when they have one of their events through the spring and summer.

I wandered through the museum first and then upstairs to St. Peter’s Chapel, which is a commemoration to the chapel that Kateri was baptized in. The nearby spring that was used to baptize her (and other converts at that time) still flows. Visitors claim healings and cures after drawing from the holy spring and praying for intercession by St. Kateri.

She lived in the village up the hill for most of her life. It is currently the only completely excavated Iroquois site in the country. Although the area had a history, it hadn’t been a shrine to her until Pope St. John Paul II beatified her in 1980.

The air was cool, the mist was wet and the sky was grey. I hadn’t realized until last week how much that type of weather is my weather. Very often I talk about my trip to Wales; more like pilgrimage, and when something reminds me of Wales, it is much more than the anecdote of a week’s vacation. There are so many non-religious, spiritual things associated with the simple phrase, it reminds me of Wales.

The fact that walking around the wet grass, seeing the bright yet muted oranges and reds against the greens, browns and greys as light played off the puddles was so reminiscent of my Wales that I had to sit and catch my breath. I was also moved to sit for quite a while in the chapel reading James Martin’s second prayer. The spirit was truly with me on this day. It was the perfect reading for the place; a perfect place to meditate on the Gospel, on Fr. Martin’s reflections, and to feel my own.

I walked.

I sat.

I prayed.

I meditated.

It was very consoling; reassuring of all that is right in the world.

It was exceptionally reflective and it gave me the impulse and the space to be reflective.

It reminded me of why I became a Catholic as well as why I became a writer. Both are similar answers even though they don’t come easily to the conscious mind: I can’t be anything else. Neither was anything that I was looking for, but instead they found me. Both are faith driven, both are involuntary, instinctive, and they both need caring to keep them potent.

Let me share the beauty of St. Kateri Tekakwitha’s Shrine with you:

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The Train Station

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Apart from a variety of subways and commuter trains, I’ve only taken long distance trains twice for traveling. The first was across the UK in the 80s, which was a blast, and the second was last year to visit my friend and his friends to watch and celebrate the Supernatural ninth season finale.

I loved the visit, but the train travel made up half of the fun. It was an adventure.

My anxiety gave me bits to worry about, and I would have to stay over in Penn Station from 2am to 7am until my last train home, but all the parts in between were new and wondrous, and sleeping on my suitcase at 3am in Penn Station was not actually as bad as I was expecting.

I have always called this my retreat week, and as I mentioned earlier in the week, that may not be the correct word to use. In my search for a better word, journey came to mind, and while I still haven’t settled on it (or any other), I was zapped with creative lightning, better known as inspiration and actually said out loud: What better place to begin this week’s journey than at the train station.

It wasn’t bright and early, but I managed to get myself to the Amtrak station at the tail end of Sunday morning, and began by taking photos outside.

I don’t remember the old station, but the new one is very attractive and welcoming. (I sound like a tourist guide.)The last time I was there was Easter week and it was cold and cloudy and rushed.

When I went in this time, I took inventory of the place – coffee shop, gift store, waiting area, ticket counter, post office section and people.

I didn’t look too out of place – I had my briefcase with my notebooks, an umbrella, so I more or less fit in with most of the other travelers.

I found a seat and people watched for a few minutes, trying to squint my eyes enough to see the departures board as if I needed to see when that train was getting into DC.

For a second, I forgot that I wasn’t actually going anywhere.

I still felt like pretending. I took out my Kindle and that was where the unexpected urge to begin James Martin’s Together on Retreat with the First Prayer appeared. Seriously – I was just going to play a game and see what I wanted to do there.

My space wasn’t silent; it was barely still, but even so I felt the solitude in spite of the people milling about, hugging, taking pictures, checking the sizes of their carry-ons, calling each other from across the station. I noticed a Tardis hat, and the Red Caps finding wheelchairs and carting luggage around.

I could feel myself inwardly smiling.

It reminded me of the sensation of traveling: the list making, the packing, the plans, and the heartbeat of excitement that is the mix of adventure and anxiety – that typical but not typical wonder, not of getting from point A to point B, but the thrill of everything that comes in between.

I began to read.

His first prayer is to reflect on the scripture Mark 1:16-20, the call of the first disciples. This was very dramatic for me, having only recently been called. Once He (Jesus) beckons them, they follow. There’s no real suspense for us, the reader, knowing the outcome of this nearly two thousand year old book, but the part of me at home in the train station was envious, not only of their first-hand account of Jesus’ teachings but of their impending travel to parts unknown.

I wonder if they thought about the new things they’d see; or the old things they’d see with new eyes. Did they just go without a second thought or was there deliberation in hindsight?

This is one of the reasons that much of my writing, even the non-travely writing often has travel and journeying metaphors. Moving from one place to the next, whether physically or emotionally remains how I describe the changes in my life, physically and metaphysically.

I’m walking a path, parts of it are dark, parts of it are scary, but portions are also light and exciting. Sometimes we have a traveling partner, a companion, and sometimes, for some sections of it, we travel alone. Well, not quite alone. Walking with G-d, we are never alone.

And so the train station was so many things that day. I didn’t notice how long I’d been just sitting there, reading, contemplating, meditating and writing. It was more of jotting things down, and typing notes into my Kindle where I agreed with Father Martin. He was like a whisper in my ear, sharing his time in the Holy Land, and letting me take his experiences and use them to create an oasis of Holy Land around my seat by the window.

For a moment, I wondered if I could afford one round trip ticket. What is the cheapest ticket that I could buy and still get back by tonight? I didn’t bother to check. Sometimes, the journey isn’t getting on the train; it’s finding the next place on the map and heading thataway.

There are so many things to think about this week.

No point sitting still; I hear the whistle; it’s time to go!

The Unexpected

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So far this week, at least the start of it, has been something else, in many ways, both good and bad. My anxiety reared its ugly, irrational head, some personal and family issues came up, and to be honest, this is my only week and I’m ignoring them/head sanding for the moment. That’s not to say that I’m not thinking about them or the situation; on the contrary, I’m thinking about them a lot, but this is the one week I can concentrate on me and not feel guilty about it. There are some health issues that I need to think about and deal with and I’ve been praying on that as well. That is one of the reasons I went to the healing/anointing mass on Monday. The one regret that I have for this week is that I can’t afford a couple of nights at a hotel/motel, like a pretend vacation, but not a vacation, kind of a prayerful, working (writing) vacation or some other word that hasn’t come to me yet.

Back to the guilt, I have always been in Mommy-mode, even in high school and college. I guess it’s hardwired in my nature, but it backs me into a corner and despite the instinct that everyone comes before me. It hasn’t always bothered me; it’s just the way it is, and because of that it’s kind of expected, including by me.

Part of the last two years, as I write often about, is discovering who I am. Part of that person has been hidden under fear of expectations of who I was supposed to be. The past can’t be changed, but those losses can be acknowledged and mourned.

The enormity of how much has changed for me is almost too much to confront, but who I am now is still evolving.

An obvious change is my level of religiousness. It isn’t just that I believe, because I’ve always believed in G-d and afterlife, but I believe in other things. I attend church at least four times a week. I’m thinking of joining a ministry. I didn’t become Catholic to fit in, but because Jesus asked me to follow him, much in the same way he called to the first disciples to follow him. For me, not the literal words, but the essence in a shimmering light. I don’t often talk about my moment. I still may write separately about it.

I have ideas of what I want to do this week. Primarily, I try to jump start my writing, but it appears the Spirit has other plans for me, guiding me to more spiritual places: the water, the train station and the city murals, the Anointing Mass and now today, to St. Kateri. I almost took her name as my confirmation name; she was one of my choices before settling on St. Elen. St. Kateri’s story is somewhat similar to mine, choosing the path apart from her family; speaking openly of her conversion.

I’m meditating and pondering more on what G-d’s plan is for me. Where do His wants and my wants meet? Can I openly, more openly be the spiritual person I feel deep within myself, rising more insistently to the surface? How can those around me get used to my love for the church and church things? I don’t have to go to church; I want to. I need to. My soul needs to. Not my immortal soul that goes to Hell if I fail my “obligations” but my soul-self, the me I am deep within who needs the church like I need writing.

Like I need air.

I know it’s not who I used to be. I know it’s not what my family and friends are used to, but it is who I am, and while I’m still changing, this won’t.

It won’t all spill out at once, but I can’t keep myself hidden. Some things are still hidden from me. I can feel them poking, but they’re not ready to be released and I’m probably hot ready for them just yet.

I’m not the same person. And once I truly accept that, I can start being my authentic self and slowly the people around me can adapt, hopefully.

As you can see, this consciousness streamed. My impromptu writing almost never ends up where I’ve expected it to go. I do wonder where tomorrow will take me. Maybe somewhere to help me explain what I need and who I want to be.