Dog shit: ruminations on culture

Walking down the street this morning, a bag of dog shit loosely dangling from my left hand, I remembered a story I must have read somewhere. The details are fuzzy, but I think it was a David Sedaris story about seeing a photo of some American starlet (Cameron Diaz? Jennifer Aniston?) walking down the beach with her dog and a plastic bag, while he was getting his hair cut in France. [Feel free to correct me - I beg you to let me know the real story since I appear unable to recall it!] The hair dresser was appalled that this American beauty was blithely walking along, bag of shit in hand. Quelle horreur! Because in France, of course, this picking up of shit is not the cultural norm. They have darling little green street cleaning vehicles for such things in Paris, for example.

Of course, we're forever grateful to Harvey Milk for, among other things, initiating this pooper-scooper culture we live in. It is disgusting to deal with other people's dog shit. But really, isn't so it interesting that in this culture we live in, the individual is responsible for picking up shit, instead of the state.

Which then reminded me of a book that the wonderful Pierre gave me, called "The European Dream." The basic premise of the book is that one of the chief differences between the so-called American Dream and the European Dream is the definition of the individual and what s/he is responsible for. The American Dream rewards the individual who is self-reliant, entrepreneurial, the "self-made" man, independent, doesn't need a hand-out. The government is not responsible for taking care of any number of social problems -- homelessness, poverty, the education gap. Instead a gigantic social service and non-profit sector exists to handle these, as long as the will of the individual is to support it. All in the interest of keeping taxes low. If you want to contribute to helping other people, so be it, but the overall ethic is that we'd rather keep taxes low and helping other people voluntary.

I'm grossly oversimplifying obviously [in the interest of not being hours late for work]. Anyway, in this context, that simple act of picking up fresh shit really struck me as so indicative of a number of things that are both laudable and lame about American culture. Yes, we should be responsible for ourselves -- I agree. But what about those people who can't be? Then the rest of us have to deal with their dog shit anyway, since they don't. Would it really be so bad for everyone to pay a little more, in the interest of there being less shit?

Knowing Things Doesn't Tell You How to Live With Them

It occurred to me yesterday that learning all of the facts about something doesn't provide any real preparation for that particular thing. It doesn't replace the experience -- which imparts lessons that no book or website ever could.

When I was pregnant with Laurent, I read a lot of baby books, just as all new parents probably do. Meanwhile my mother would stand back and remark, "You have just no idea," with strong emphasis on the "no." At the time I remember thinking she was just expressing a resentment toward my life-long reliance on books. Turns out she was right, of course. There was just no way that a stack of books could prepare me for the realities of a baby. They helped a little, sometimes, but really I just learned from doing it.

While listening to Carla on the phone the other day relate all that the doctors told her about anaplastic astrocytoma, grade 3, which repeated much of what Martine had already read me from mayoclinic.com while we discussed the situation earlier that same day, I realized that none of the medical facts help a bit with the hardest part of this whole thing. Knowing the details doesn't help me figure out how to live with my sister's death.

What was more helpful than medical facts actually, was something Martine emailed me this morning, from a teacher of hers, Zhenja La Rosa, regarding the Hindu festival of Maha Shivaratri, marked at this past new moon.

Maha Shivaratri is an invitation into the potency of darkness, the possibilities that open up from uncertainty and doubt, and the power of imagination.

Shiva Sutra 1.2 states "knowledge is bondage" (jnanam bandhah). It's a reminder that if we think we already know, there is very little room for an expansion of consciousness. It's only when we step into doubt that we can open to the moreness of life.

I have been struggling with the not-knowing, with my confusion about what to do, how to act, how to be with this. In that vacuum, it was natural probably to focus on the facts, forgetting that that particular knowledge is bondage because it gives primacy to the head in a situation when only my heart is really called for. That's the only place I need to be in order to operate in the best way.

If I take a hint from Zhenja, then I can let that uncertainty and doubt sit there and not be quite so driven to be done with them. I know I'll figure it out, we'll all figure it out, as we go through and experience it.

For Martine

This is a love letter to my sister #1, Martine, a way of sending you a squeeze so that you know, even from this distance, that your little hand is always in mine.

* * * * *

This morning Laura began the practice by telling the story of her eyes. Ten years ago, her retinas detached and she was blind for 5 months. Throughout that period of blindness, she wished and wished to see the love in her mother's face, to see color, to see the beauty of the world around us. The surgery that she had to restore her vision has left her with lingering pain which, at its most acute, serves as a constant reminder of the blessing of her restored sight. It is so easy to take it for granted, and when her pain is strongest, she remembers to appreciate and feel grateful and celebrate.

The dark reminds us of the light, underscores the brightness. When the heart is cloaked, she said, may we remember the graceful upturned foot of Shiva, showing us the way back up, the way out, the way back.

Of course, these were the words I most needed to hear this morning. And I thought you might appreciate them, too.

In the midst of this darkness we are in right now with Carla and her diagnosis and all of the other shit that has come with it, may we remember the good, the sweet, the beautiful of our life. May we use it to shine out all the brighter, to do more good and add more joy.

Out of this darkness I am celebrating my good fortune to have you as my sister, to feel the power of our kinship and deep gratitude to our parents.

Yes, this situation sucks and I wish it weren't true that we are now contemplating the loss of Carla from our lives so much sooner than we ever could have imagined. So let's sing *now*, let's not wait. Let's remember, through the haze of cancer and chemo and death, that we have is so very sweet.

All my love to you.

World-class Worry Wart

I had the great good fortune of growing up in a three-story Victorian house that had survived the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire. My parents bought this house in 1970 and slowly rehabilitated it away from its turn-of-the-century bordello interior and hideous stucco'ed exterior. For all its beauty and mostly-original charms, it was a pretty nerve-wracking place to grow up in and taught me at a young age to worry up a storm.

My room was on the third floor, under the eaves, with windows that looked down onto Liberty Street far below. It was cozy and fulfilled all my childhood fantasies of living in a garrett, spying the world from my crow's nest, hiding out in my hermit's cave. But in a strong wind or when the 24 rumbled up and down Castro in the days before the bus line was electrified, the windows rattled like mad. A little dwarf-size closet door under the eaves would also creakily and ever-so-slowly open on its own in that same strong wind, leaving me many a night wide-eyed and terrified, waiting for something to come crawling out. The stairs creaked and popped, sometimes when there was no one on them. Creepy cracked skylights scared the wits out of me more than once. And don't even get me started on the basement.

As a San Franciscan child, I was steeped in the lore of the 1906 Earthquake and Fire. I was constantly aware of it, thinking about how our house had survived it, and constantly waiting for the next Big One. Some well-meaning person had given me a reproduction of the front page of the San Francisco paper from the time of the Earthquake as a birthday gift when I was probably 9. In its cheap plastic frame, this stood in my room for years, filling my head with the details. April 18, 5:13 am. 3,000 dead. A fire that burned for four days, burning 2/3 of the city’s houses.

And here I was in our rickety wooden house that could barely withstand a gust of wind and would likely not be as lucky the next time.

Over and over, night after night, I’d mull the possibilities. When the Big One came, would the house crumble? If I was in my room, could I possibly survive, my third floor collapsing neatly on top of the other two?

Or would the house, instead, fall backward in one piece and slide down the steep hill toward 20th Street? That might be survivable, since I could crawl out the windows of my room and ride it out.

But what if somehow it toppled the other way, into Liberty Street? Could I move fast enough toward the back of the house, so that I could crawl out the windows and stand atop the rubble?

Would I be in my pajamas?

Where should I keep my valuables so I could grab them and how could I be sure to get Pancho, my beloved dog-brother, out with me?

And if the house survived, but the fire came, how would the firefighters get me out of those old windows? Would the ladders reach?

What if I had to jump?

It's no wonder I am so very good at worrying. Thanks to that house, I devoted countless sleepless childhood hours to honing my craft, so that the reflex to go mentally catastrophic is instantaneous and I can almost always - no matter the situation - find something to worry about. It's a source of endless amusement to my zen husband. But we'll see who's laughing when the roof caves in and I'm the one with the well-articulated escape plan. ;)

Huge Ackman

"Huge Ackman" is what Joe heard the first time he heard the name "Hugh Jackman." This cracks me up to no end, and reminds me how much I love errors and mispronunciation -- probably the kinder-gentler flip-side of my tendency to mentally red-pencil people as they speak. I think Joe *used* to think my tendency to giggle insanely about these things was mean -- but I hope he by now knows, twenty years later, that it's really just that these goofs tickle a part of my brain triggering the laugh response. Can't help it.

I still crack up about "anorka" (instead of "anorak," that one kills me), which happened at least 15 years ago if not longer, and am also fond of my own slip on the word "awry," which I pronounced "awe-ree" since that felt onomatopoeic -- the very word itself gone wrong.

And then of course there's all the classic weird English in translation, of which one of my favorites is not from a distant land, but from far away Mill Valley. On the menu at The Cantina, it is possible to order a dish which features "chunks offender pork."

Anyway, if you see me today and I'm snickering to myself, you'll know why. It's that damn Huge Ackman - just can't get him out of my head!