Loving from the other side of the door

My niece Mahalia has a neighbor cat whom she adores.  Unfortunately, the cat doesn't adore kids and has bitten Mahalia three times.  Mahalia has pronounced that the cat says she's sorry and won't do it again.  Mahalia has forgiven the cat, so they should open the door and let the cat in to visit.  My sister wisely said no.  Mahalia pleaded saying that she loves the cat and wants it to come in.  My sister wisely stated, "We can love the cat from the other side of the door."

In my family love and trust and intimacy and safety were all one pile.  If we loved, we trusted.  If we longed to be close, we were safe.  Unfortunately, the pedophiles and critical abusers of the world are like the biting cats and nobody closed the door, not even me.  In fact, in so many ways, I was like Mahalia, hurting but ever so hopeful.

My sitter last Friday stood us up.  We were going dancing, Tim went to pick her up, and she wasn't there.  No call, no note.  I emailed her that night and she just today, seven days later, replied saying how sorry she was.  And irrationally, since my top sitter wasn't available for some upcoming dates, I found myself wanting to book her again.  I stopped myself.  She didn't mean to be irresponsible but she was.  She didn't mean to wreck my evening but she did. So I emailed another teen who had indicated an interest in babysitting and I'll try another after that.  I'm done asking my old sitter for at least a year.  She's young and might mature.  I'll try her again next spring but not before.

I used to think that I had to be angry with people to get away from the hurt and I expended a lot of energy being mad and a lot more energy ping-ponging back and forth between intimate fondness and angry distance.  Anger drains me and dislike connects me to them in a powerfully unhappy way.

Now I'm finding that I don't need to be mad to be safe and I can be fond from a distance.  I can love them from the other side of the door and that makes all the difference.

My theme for Lent

In January, I was walking laps at the Y when I realized that I believed "Pain is the only way."  I also realized that I wanted to trade off this belief for a new one.  Although early, I had hit upon my theme for Lent 2011.  (Almost sounds like a concert tour of something- "Lent.  2011.") 

This last Wednesday was the start of Lent and despite my early clarity I wasn't feeling completely satisfied with my theme now two months later.  Since Wednesday I've expanded my theme.  Here goes.

For Lent I am releasing:
Pain is the only way.
Frustration is the only way.
Never enough.

Also today I had an insight which is both painful and liberating.  My parents wanted me to be successful but not too happy.  They want me to be successful so that my accomplishments can vindicate their sacrifices for me and they don't want me to be too happy about it because they aren't happy. They want their sacrifices to mean something but they don't want my happiness to rub their faces in their own choices.

They love me as best they can and would never of course say that and yet, there it is.

I was glowing about square dancing the other day, saying how much we've all enjoyed ourselves.  My mom may have gotten up and left to tend the kids and after a couple minutes of listening, my dad said, "Well, I bet Tim doesn't enjoy this as much as you do."  Tried to pop my bubble. 

How much different would my relationship with my parents be if when I glowed, they glowed back?  What would it be like to never feel the need to defend or minimize my happiness?

A month ago, I called my dad frantic in worry about my surgery and how we were going to pay for it on top of all the other unexpected expenses that month.  He offered his help and support and he talked about himself- his disillusionment in his 30's and 40's, his struggles with his health, how his story had turned out so differently than he expected.  This was a golden conversation, 20 minutes of heart-to-heart connection.  This was the best connection we've had in years, like maybe 7 or 8 years.  At the time, I was really blessed he could meet me in my suffering.  Today I am struck that he can only meet me in suffering and not in happiness.  He has no matching excitement, no enthusiasms to throw back into the conversation.  Ok, that's unfair- he does read some books he likes and he talks about how great his dog is.  But share his happiness?  What happiness? is my response.

One of the main reasons this was our best connection of the decade was because when I came to them and shared about being abused as a child, literally the same day I remembered, he completely shut down.  He recently told another family member that he was glad she was more upbeat because her sadness was such a drag.  So basically, he's good for 20 minutes commiserating about problems he can help with, but I best to get over the grief and pain quickly.  I feel like my dad has a relational dimmer switch which dims that which is too happy and ignores that which is too dark.  When I started counseling 9 years ago, one of my chief complaints is that I felt girdled in by my family.  Now I don't feel so much constrained as sad.

Which brings me back to the themes of "Happy, happy, happy" and "Pain and frustration are the only way; never enough."  I realized that I have believed that if I ever became too happy for my family, that I would be abandoned.  So, I've always diluted my pleasure with frustration, exasperation, and a constant drive for more.  There was a time my dissatisfaction served me, propelled me from my dysfunction where I was miserable into the great scary unknown.  But this is not that time.  My life is not in shambles.  I am not axle deep in dysfunction.  I am not co-dependent.  And my ambient frustration, exasperation, and drive for more is undermining my happiness.  I am abandoning me.

I choose to trade off.  I am going to walk on down my path of happiness.  I'm going to dance and yoga and art.  I'm going to grieve and lament and live deeply into the real suffering of my life, too.  I'm busting out of the girdle and I am coming back for me again and again as many times as it takes to live my life.  I'm not rebelling against my parents, nor spiting, nor abandoning.  We've walked together as far as they can go thus far and quite frankly, I've walked on miles and states and half a continent beyond, yet I've been corded back there still like some mutant umbilicus.  This Lent, I wave, blow them a kiss, send them my love and release 'never enough' and exasperation.  Pain and frustration are no longer my home town and I'll send my love from the road to happiness. 

The punctuation isn't silent

This is the one I promised to look for.

:)A 

Dissing 1793 Chinese style

Anjali and I were reading our history book and came to the chapter in which-

In 1793, George III of England, upset by a huge trade imbalance, sends his charming, famous ambassador George Macartney to Chi'en-lung, the Chinese emperor to negotiate a better trade agreement and to advertise by bringing samples of the many fabulous British goods for sale.  Unbeknownst to Macartney, Chi'en-lung didn't receive ambassadors, ever.  He received bearers of tribute as fit his supremacy.  Chi'en-lung finally deigned to see the ambassador, took all his goods without looking at them, read his message from King George, and penned this response:

"O King, you live beyond many seas.  However, driven by your humble wish to take part in the glorious benefits of our civilization, you have respectfully sent your messenger, bearing your tokens of good will.  This messenger has crossed the seas to pay me respects on my birthday.  And you have sent offerings of the goods of your country to show your devotion to me.  But we have no need of your goods.  Strange and costly objects like these do not interest me; we possess all things.  Our ways have nothing to do with yours.  Even if your messenger were competent enough to acquire some basic ways of ours, he could not then perform them in your barbarous country.  We cannot do the things that you ask."

Part of me smiles, wishing I had that kind of self-confidence.  "We possess all things."  Wow, that's some kind of imperviousness.  Another part of me cringes, remembering when I and my ideas have been dismissed without even a glance. 

In the way of real life, the British didn't take this lying down.  They did find one product from their holdings in India which the Chinese would buy- opium.  In fact, against their emperor's wishes, they would smuggle it in, become addicted to it, and make the English dealers wildly rich.  So do I admire their ingenuity and tenacity or lament their mean-spiritedness?

What about you?  Have you ever been dismissed like this?  How did you respond?

Zigging or zagging or what?

Tim's boss at A&P told him 2 weeks ago that his hours would be cut come March.  So, we took a deep breath, put our heads together, and started planning how we could recruit more tutors.  I started putting out my feelers for jobs and found a lead on the homeschool yahoo group for a part-time homestay coordinator which with Tim's reduction of hours would be a good fit.  I pulled Mark out of playschool to save money.  I posted for tutoring on Craig's List and started inquiring after a part-time job.  Zig.

Last week, Tim's boss comes back and says that the budget was not approved, Tim's consulting job is being terminated, and there's an opening for another job, full-time with benefits, but paying the same amount for 40 hours that Tim's making now for 30.  So, Tim's looking at needing to keep his FedEx job (approx 20 hrs/wk), working 10 more hours weekly, plus losing his ability to work from home.  Tutoring's out.  My flexibility is out the window and likely so is my part-time job.  But of course, I'd just sent in the application hours before the news broke after working on it for 2 hours.  With less resiliency, I had a tough transition but Tim was so grateful and cheerful in the face of everything that after spending the weekend happily together, I faced Monday in pretty good cheer.  Zag. 

This week, Tim accepts the new job by email and Monday his boss comes and says that everything is in limbo, pending approval from superiors.  Contrary to what he'd said previously, Tim can't start the new job Tuesday March 1 but can continue to work under the old deal temporarily.  And of course, I have a phone interview for the homestay coordinator position that afternoon.  I leveled with her, asking how soon she'd need an answer- no later than this Friday and the sooner the better.  So, we exchange more information, she calls my references, and we meet by phone again today to go point by point through the contract.  Tim's confident that we can make it work; I'm less enthusiastic but we'll need the money either way and this is a potentially more convenient option than subbing.  I accepted this afternoon. 

I think I'm going to like it eventually.  Maybe even by Saturday.  But today after zigging and zagging and un-zigging and de-zagging, I'm weary.