Gratitude

September 15, 2009
Fell asleep last night to the sound of pouring rain. It was really coming down hard. I don't even think it was in the forecast, but it arrived nonetheless. It was a pleasant sound and I am told that this area really needs the rain.
Woke up this morning filled with a sense of gratitude and even a kind of amazement at how this life is unfolding. I never could have planned for this and a couple of years ago when I was in overwhelming pain, I could never have imagined where I would be at this point in my life. But here I am. I am on this incredible journey—we have traveled over 5000 miles—and I have met so many people and seen places I never would have seen otherwise. I have been able to get a new appreciation for who I am and what my work is on the planet and for the wide range of landscape and beauty that exists across the northern part of this country. I have seen the differences and the commonalities between places and people. I have never been at a loss for things to observe, analyze, and think about. This is a trip that I will always remember, of course, but also one that will provide me with things to think about for the rest of my life. And for me, that's an important thing! I have also gained a deeper sense of possibility. We are living in a hugely dysfunctional society and seem to lack the will to change that. Oddly enough, though, the very fact that I have seen good people doing nothing gives me more hope than ever that we can save the planet. It may well not be the US that leads in this. I see no evidence that the will is here. But this country will collapse to a certain degree and that will give other people a chance to do things. And I believe that the only way enough people in the US will change is when there is no choice. Reality will dictate. Too bad, but really, the choices have been there and people have chosen poorly. Soon there won't be so much choice. And for the good of humanity as a whole, I think that this country will have to feel pain. The tragic thing is that it will take some time for the people who created the mess to feel this pain, and those who have never had much in the way of choice will suffer more. I have always wanted this to be otherwise. I used to think that surely, if only people realized how bad things were, they would choose differently. They would become more aware. They would think about other people or the long-term consequences of their actions. And going into this trip, I really thought that I would find some evidence that people are trying to make thoughtful and serious changes. I thought that churches would be taking this opportunity to remind people that there are things more important than a consumer lifestyle and that we're all in this together. Instead I found silence. Deafening silence. And I found people who live in complete ignorance of the fact that there's a world out there in which not everyone thinks the same way. I have lost hope and found it again. I have little hope left that this country will be able to change in ways that are sustainable and healthy. I have more hope than ever that other people in other places will heed the call. Being here makes me happy because I see—at least on the surface—a committed bunch of people living in healthy ways. There are not enough of them and it wouldn't work everywhere in exactly this way, but at least I have found some people who have an awareness and are willing to put that awareness into action and not just talk about it. This makes me glad. And now I know more surely than I ever did that I am not at home in this country. I never have been and I never will be. It may well be that I am doomed to perpetual disappointment. If that is to be the case, then so be it. I can live with that. That's another thing I have learned on this trip. I can be joyful in the midst of it all. But to do that I have to live my life in ways that are ethical and moral to me. I think I used to spend far to much time trying to find some little corner of the box to fit myself into. And now I am quite certain that the box that is US culture is far too small, far too confining, and doesn't have much to offer. I have to interact with the box, but I don't have to live in it. For me, there is no way in. So I guess the overarching discovery of this trip for me has been a sense of acceptance of what is. I don't mean acceptance in the sense that I thing everything's hunky-dory and now I'm going to settle down and be a good little United Statesian, but rather an acceptance of who I am and what this country is and how I need to maneuver through it all. I don't have to like things to accept them. I can accept that choices have been made and people are, by their lack of action and their ignorance, willing to go along with the way things are. I can accept the pain I feel that this is so. I can also accept that that way of life is totally unacceptable for me, so I choose otherwise. I can see the pain ahead and I can talk about things as I see them. In my experience people do not like this, even when it is the mildest of comments. I can accept this too. It is what it is. I am who I am. The universe is what it is. I just need to keep on educating myself and staying as awake and grounded as possible.
I have always been uncomfortable with thoughts like this because it sounds kind of condescending. But I was actually watching some show in some motel room and there were 4 different people talking about the health care debate. Jay Leno of all people said that people get what they deserve. They don't know what they're talking about, they don't care to educate themselves about the issue, and they just spout off these bumper sticker slogans that they hear on the news without knowing the first thing about what they're saying. The congresswoman next to him was pretty uncomfortable. But I think he was absolutely right. And he said it with an air of resignation about the whole thing. That's how I feel about it all. The only discomfort that remains for me is the knowledge that people without choices and without the same opportunities for education—either institutional education or self-education—will be the ones to bear the brunt of it all at first. By the time the powerful start feeling the pain, it'll be far too late.
And so midway through September I find myself at home in my own skin to a degree that I have never felt before. I am comfortable in my role as an outlier. I can embrace this and know that I could never be anything else. I am not sure I would know how to live in a place where I felt at home. I have always—from the time I was a small child—felt misplaced. That is what is normal for me. I live on the fringes and would be completely lost if I ever found myself smack in the center of anything. This used too bother me. And then I realized that this is where the growth happens—on the margins. Interaction, growth, expansion—it all starts at the edge and the edge is the world I inhabit. It's a good thing!