Only Connect...

Connection is a funny thing.  It can pounce on you as you turn a corner, or take off running down the path as it eludes your grasp.  It's something that can happen when we don't want it (or at least aren't expecting it), and leave a heavy hole of absence when we want it most.  The latter can be painful, but when the former reminds you of the latter, it's worse.

A little over 48 hours ago, I went to a gathering at Golden Gate Park called Off the Grid.  It's a once a month gathering of select food trucks and outdoor seating.  Prices are slightly high, and the chairs aren't the most comfortable, but you pay for the lively setting as much as the food.  It's like concrete picnic.  Almost everyone is part of a group, or at least a couple.  Kids, dogs, families, friends...it's all there.  The new priest at my parish has successfully been able to encourage members of our congregation to attend this gathering, and it was this small group that I was meeting up with.

While I was walking there I had a premonition, though I was unaware of it at the time.  I had a sort of daydream/vision that while at the gathering, someone attempted to take my purse off of me.  I tried to fight them off, but instead I ended up getting shot.  I didn't die, but I bled profusely.  It was at this point in the vision when I brushed it off.  "Dramatic much?" I thought to myself.  I was convinced my brain was overreacting.  It's been known to happen, though there is usually an external cue that triggers it.  This time there wasn't one.  Or at least, none that I could physically see.

A few minutes later, I found my group, grabbed my food, along with my chair, and got ready to dive into food truck gluttony.  I was seated next to a woman that I barely knew (I hardly ever saw her at church), and she started talking to me about all of the wonderful things that she was finding out about the City: cafes, musical and comedy performances, etc.  I sat and chewed more than listened.  And then the bullet found me.

"Oh," she said, "And I just met this wonderful young opera singer, Margaret Holstead*.  She just graduated from the Conservatory and was having a yard sale.  She had all of these wonderful records, I just couldn't believe it!"   (*Name has been changed to protect the privacy of those unknowingly involved...and to prevent any self incrimination.)

The first name immediately caught my attention.  Though common, the fact that her name was paired up with opera and the Conservatory struck a familiar chord (as it were).  But the last name didn't match.  I knew of a Margaret Gardner* who had studied opera at the Conservatory.  To explain how I knew, I have to go back two years.  Because that's when I met him.

Mark Finnigan*.  We only dated for two weeks, but during those two weeks was when I came the closest to getting what I wanted, as far as romantic relationships are concerned.  I felt as if I had met my childhood best friend at the age of 26.  I won't go into details, but it all ended because he felt that he wasn't ready to get involved with anyone.  I was left broken hearted, but resolved to continue in my search for someone who was ready to connect with me.  Surely, if I had found him, it wouldn't be hard to find someone else.  But I couldn't get him out of my mind, and, try as I might, I couldn't come close to connecting with anyone as well as I did with him.  There really was something different about him that I had never had before or since.  We tried to be friends, but on my end, it was all on the unspoken pretense that he still wasn't ready for anything romantic.  I guess I held it in my mind that maybe when he was ready, we could pick up where we left off.  I soon learned to never tell yourself something about the future when it involves someone else.

He didn't lie, but he wasn't exactly honest, either.  He had rejoined the dating website we had met on, and I only later found out that he had done so before we had reconnected.  He withheld this from me, and it wasn't until I revisited my message inbox on the site did I notice his profile was back up.  Two weeks of silence after this discovery, I decided it was best to end things.  No one can really be friends with someone they want to be with--but who doesn't want to be with them--no matter how much they might wish it otherwise.  I had tried on at least three previous occasions, and all I ever got from it wasn't worth having, much less keeping.

So the pain and broken heart were revisited much sooner than I had hoped, but I again resolved to move forward.  More difficult to do are the things that are only said.  I never quite got over my loss, for reasons I won't go into here.  Suffice to say, the pain did subside significantly, though it took longer than originally anticipated, but the memory and longing remained clear.  The desire to connect with him in some way--usually indirectly--would crop up unexpectedly, so I used the only tool that I knew of where I could  seemingly satiate my desire anonymously.  (Sometimes I think whoever invented Google must have made a deal with the Devil that included all of our souls.)  And it was while I was on one of my ill advised searches for connection that I found out about his relationship with Margaret.  A picture was enough of a confirmation--I didn't need to see the words.

But this time, at the gathering of the food trucks, the words would paint the picture for me and I was forced to look.

"I'm sorry," I said to my new acquaintance, "but do you mean Margaret Gardner?"

"Oh yes!  That's right.  I got the names mixed up for some reason.  Yes, that's her.  She's a lovely girl."  I began to inquire more information, just to be sure it was the same person.  It was, and what's more, my food truck companion offered more information than I had asked.

"She lives very near here, actually.  Just over the hill.  She and her boyfriend."

"Oh."  Bang.  Zip!  Please excuse me.  I'm so sorry about the mess, really.  It's just that I don't have any control over my circulatory system.  It just kinda keeps on pumping, even if there's a leak.  I'm sure it'll stop soon, though...you really do have to wait these things out.

The woman with the undesired connection to the one I still desired kept up her pace down her winding path of monologue, but I had since fallen behind.  I made the half-hearted sounds of someone who was trying to show that they were listening, but who really didn't have the energy to be that convincing.  I could feel the bullet still lodged somewhere between my heart and my belly and I started to think that it might help if I walked around a bit.  I managed to use the cold air as an excuse to get my blood flowing again, and I headed off in a direction that would hopefully help me escape what had already found me.

I'll spare you the internal drama, and the events immediately proceeding my foray into friendly fire.  I'm sure if you've gotten this far, and have had similar experiences, you are quite capable of imagining for yourself what happens when old wounds are reopened.  All that's left to talk about is now--the present--and the gifts that came when I decided to stay there.

Twenty four hours or so after, the bleeding had subsided, but the pain remained.  I had talked, corresponded, and slept for dreamless spurts, and it was time to start moving again.  But instead of moving away from it, I decided to move with and through it.  What better way to start the process than a trip to the gym?

I walked there, as I usually do, as a warm up before getting on the treadmill (saves time and the fresh air usually does me good).  Admittedly, I was still lost in thoughts about future encounters that would probably never happen, when a piercing cry stopped me in my tracks.  Above the noise of the busy traffic, it sounded almost like a bird call but without the confidence.  Eyes scanning the fence by the dog park, I managed to pick out a tiny ball of grey fluff.  There was no sign of the mother cat or any siblings.  This little guy was all alone and very frightened when I approached him.  After a minute's contemplation, I decided that he was either ferral and/or his mother was sure to come back for him at some point, and to continue on to my destination; but after I was finished, I planned to come back and check on him and decide from there what to do.

****

Circuit training has become the custom routine for me lately (as opposed to just rotating on the machines), and today it was ball walls and bar lunges with a lap in between sets.  (By the way, I love saying ball walls.)  Ball walls (ha!) consists of squatting while holding a medicine ball, and then tossing it up high at the wall.  On its way down, you get back into the squat position only to catch it and release it again.  Bar lunges involve holding a weighted bar above your head while you lunge across the floor, trying to get your back knee as close to the ground as you can before going back up.  It wasn't until my second set of these that my shoulders started to ache halfway across the floor.  As I walked the lap after my set, a little voice in my head said, "Hurts to hold all that pain up there, huh?"  Softly, I nodded. 

"But what else am I supposed to do?" I asked.

"Let it hold you," it replied.  I didn't like the sound of that.  To me, that was threatening.  It incited the idea that I would lose myself, lose my way and never return.  But I knew the Voice was right.  I finished my lap and came back to the medicine ball.

"Now," the Voice continued, "I want you to think of that ball as your pain.  Toss it up and let it come back to you, and be ready to receive it when it does."  My spiritual gut groaned and a lump developed in my throat, but I did what I was told.  What I realized as I did it was that there is this rhythm that we can have with pain and disappointment: there's a time to grieve, and a time for letting go and setting the pain free, only to know that we are not entirely done with it yet (and it is not done with us).  The trick is to be ready to receive it when it comes falling back in the gravity of human drama.  We have to hold it, and let it hold us, before moving away from it again.  It's the cosmic see-saw and tug of war.

As for the next round of lunges, my shoulders ached, but I tried to connect to the pain rather than power through it.  I allowed it to be there and even invited it deeper into my body.  I may not have been in perfect form, but the clouds in my mind were clearing and I was starting to feel normal again.  I was so relieved from my workout that I almost forgot about my little friend in the weeds by the dog park.

****

The closer I got to the fence where I last saw him, I strained to hear his little cries.  None came, and I thought that maybe his mother (or even an owner) had indeed found him.  I soon saw his still little body right where I left him.  His eyes were closed, but he was still breathing.  I called to him and he slowly opened his eyes.  Putting a couple of fingers through the fence, I attempted to get him to come to me, but he didn't budge.  His sharp mews were escaping from his little body, but they seemed to say, "Leave me alone!"  I decided it was probably for the best and turned to go.  But his mews continued and hit my heart like tiny sharp arrows.  I couldn't leave him.

Twenty minutes of being curled up in my sweatshirt later, I had the little guy in my room, set up in a large microwave box lined with towels.  I had no food to give him, and initially his mews persisted.  He managed to calm down while I put in a call to Animal Care and Control.  The dispatcher told me there was no guarantee that they could be out anytime soon, and that was a problem for me since I needed to leave within two hours and no one else was going to be home from what I knew.  I decided to chance it and follow through with my original plans and hope for the best.

They came by when I was still out, and little Oliver (as I decided to name him) was still in his box, snoozing, when I got home--a can of wet food in hand.  Thankfully, he lapped up his serving, and I pondered what to do next.  I called Control back, but they said they couldn't get anyone out there until the following day.  I was going to be out all day, and I had no idea if anyone else would be home while I was gone.  Fortunately, before I had left earlier, a friend had seen my post on Facebook about my new find and had inquired if I needed help in taking care of him.  I called my friend back and we made arrangements for him to swing by and pick up Oliver within the next couple of hours.

It was during that space of time that I began to reflect on all that had happened in the last 48 hours.  In a correspondence with my priest, she encouraged me to discern what I was meant to learn from the painful experience I had encountered.  "Something new is about to be born," she said, referring to my upcoming move across the country to go into a Masters program. "So it may be that this is the final letting go?  Or something else."  In my reply, I said I really didn't know for sure what the lesson or message was.  It could very well have been a wake up call to finally let go and move on, or it could have been a way for me to know that he and I are still connected somehow (however painful that connection might feel).

As I sat on my bed with Oliver crawling around me (and sometimes sitting still long enough for me to show him some physical affection), I started to think that maybe it wasn't a coincidence that I found him when I did.  Here was this new life, so fragile and in need of care and protection.  His present was a fractured series of events, and his future was uncertain.  This was the representation of my life ahead of me, and it came in the form of an absolutely adorable mewing grey ball of fur.  It was then that I realized that while my connection with Mark certainly mattered in the past--and might still matter in some small way now--my focus needed to be on the life that lay out before me: exciting, unknown, and absolutely terrifying.  I need to embrace that future and all the feelings that come with it as much as I embraced the tiny kitten in my sweatshirt on a walk home on a windy day, never forgetting that the first step before the embrace is the openness for connection, the bending at the knees to catch the ball as it falls, and trusting the pain just enough to hold me before I'm ready to let go.     

P.S. Here's that little representation that I mentioned.

                                                                       

  

The Pact

"I don't understand," he said in exasperation.  "What is...THIS?  This connection between us that just leaves me feeling empty and full of longing, but I feel like I can't live without it?  I don't even know if I can understand...or how to explain..."

She looked at him deeply, her eyes steady yet searching, like a beacon looking out to sea.  "I think I know," she said at last.  She paused again before launching into her story.  "It's because...when we were younger...seven, maybe eight, I had this tree house.  We spent almost every day there together.  Just us.  And we'd stay there for hours.  I can't remember how many times Mom had to drive you home because it was after dark."  She went on.  "One day, we made a pact.  We swore that we would never forget it, cross our hearts, hope to die..."

"Fifty needles in my eye if I lie?" he finished.

"Yes," she continued, her face still blank, her eyes still searching, like she was reading a page from an ancient text.  "And then, I left.  I moved away and the tree house rotted from its abandonment.  And now, almost twenty years later, we met again as strangers.  We had forgotten, but not completely.  Something still remained."

"That is the tension you sense," she explained.  "We are remembering that we have forgotten.  And while we cannot fully remember, we can't fully forget, either."  She had finished speaking, but her eyes still held his.

He drew back from her, as if trying to escape the knife that had already sunk into his gut.  All of what she had said was a lie, of course.  There had been no tree house, no pact. They had never met until only a few years before.  All of it had been random chance.

Still, he knew that every word she spoke was true.

With Without

**originally written 9/12/09**

Why is it that the idea of being with you
Scares me more than being without you?
What kind of sane person chooses that?!
It's like I chose what was behind door #1:
The certainty of emptiness,
A black hole for a spotlight,
The solidity, the beautiful, concrete solidity
Of nothingness.
Because I couldn't handle the storm tossed seas
Behind door #3.
Wave after terrible wave,
Crashing
Crushing
My little boat of a body,
Making me feel like the only reason
I was drowning was because I never learned how to swim.
And door #2?
The straight jacket of you?
Forget it!
Can't live
Can't breathe
Can't move
Cuz I'm too scared that if I do
I'll lose a drop
A breath
A word
Of you.
No freedom versus the freedom of nothing. . .
Hmmm. . .
It's safer here in the quiet without the sound
Of my boots knocking---
No reference implied
To what you'd want to do with me on a Saturday night.
It's safer with the pain of knowing I'm alone with
Nothingness
Than knowing I'll have nothing for the pain
That'll come to spill my guts---
Open me up so far in
And forgive all of my sins---
Maybe.
Maybe.
Maybe, baby.
That terrible word of "maybe."
A gray zone of uncertainty.
Not light
Not dark.
Pre-dawn fog
Still not sure if it wants to lift
The filmy veil of night.
Maybe means waiting.
An eye of the hurricane,
A loosening of a strap---
A prison
In its own writing of the word.
Bye baby maybe.
Hello. . .
Nobody.
Eeny
Meeny
Miny
Mo,
I choose. . .
This.
. . . . . .
What a way to go.

Uncertainty

It's always so hard to know what
To write in these messages.
You think that you're being witty and clever
By referencing
(Subtly)
Something they said in their profile.
But in reality, you look like some idiot who can't come up with an
Original thought;
And so you have to resort to merely
Looking like you have some semblance
Of wit and humor,
Which ends up being a big turn off for them,
Leading to their silence and leaving you
Wondering what it was you said.
I can't seem to remember this ever happening with you.
You who I met,
You who I wrote to,
Almost two years ago.
Somehow with you I knew it was different.
I knew that when I wrote
"Hi, I'm Beth and I like taking long walks off of short piers, preferably at sunset,"
You'd get it.
But you didn't.
You didn't just get it.
You loved it.
You said it was, quote, genius.
Unquote.
And, to my suggestion that, instead
Of the traditional ho-hum meet up for coffee
Or dinner and a movie,
We go and do laundry,
You replied, quote,
Beyond genius.
Unquote.
And somehow, some way,
That acknowledgement told me
You got it.
You got the subtlety that it was not,
In fact,
That we were on
A date doing laundry,
But that we were doing laundry
And on a date.
And it was the best first date
I ever had.
I beat you at two games of Gin Rummy
While we watched our clothes dance in the machines.
You showed me a different way to fold shirts and
Kept me laughing through dinner.
And at the end of the night,
Not a kiss with the mouth,
But with words to my ears
And a sincere look in your eyes,
"I had a really great time."
You got it.
And after that we seamlessly rushed in,
Full speed ahead.
I wasn't quite sure
But the fish that was you
Swimming around in circles just below my feet said,
"Come on in, the water's fine."
For the record, I didn't jump in
So that I could make you mine.
Nevertheless, I jumped, fell in over my head. . .
And then you were gone.
Later on
You said,
"I wanted you in, but not all the way."
Yet something tells me that, even if
I had let the bottoms of my feet sink below
The surface,
You wouldn't have stayed.
And so I was left soaked through
To my bones,
Not knowing what else to do
But wait for your return.
Slowly, I climbed out, shivering
My body in shock from the cold.
And waited.
And waited.
And finally began to realize that,
As scared as you were
To swim with another,
I was just as afraid of falling in.
The idea of doing so was magically
Thrilling.
But when that water hits your face like a
Stone cold brick of ice,
You wake up.
The fear, the doubt, setlles in,
Like the weight of water-logged shoes pulling you down.
What if?. . .
What if I get too tired and can't feel my legs?. . .
What if there's a storm?. . .
What if I drown?. . .
What if some giant whale comes up and swallows me whole?
What will become of me then?
It's safer to wait.
Even though I know
That if I see you swimming around again,
And hear you ask me to get
More than just my feet wet,
Promising me that your little fish ass
Won't swim away,
I won't believe you.
So now I'm stuck with writing words
Of wit without
Knowing how they'll be received.
There is no certainty in this search,
As you so well proved.
But it is what we are compelled to do,
If we allow our hearts to be moved.

The Virtue of Honesty

**Originally posted on OK Cupid as a journal post (same date)**

For those who have read the first line of my About Me section, you know that I believe honesty to be a virtue.  But it isn't only a virtue that I expect myself to have: it's something I want in the people I date as well.  Honesty doesn't mean saying the first thing that comes to your mind, nor is it being a smart ass just because you can (and you feel like if you are not acting like a smart ass, then you're not being "honest").  Rather, it means divulging information that is relevant to a given scenario and doing it not for the sake of ego, but for the sake of the other person (or even, perhaps, for the sake of relieving yourself of a guilty conscience...whatever the case may be).

I am tempted to go over the recent event which prompted me to write this entry, but I feel that it wouldn't do much good.  What's done is done.  I held my ground when I found out the truth and acted accordingly.  I don't need to dish out crap when it isn't warranted.  The person who made the mistake is decent and kind, but made a serious error in not being upfront.  That's all that needs to be said on that count.

All I can say is, to anyone out there reading this: if you're planning on witholding information, it will catch up with you, and it may not end well.  Granted, we don't want all of our skeletons to be revealed within the first few dates; but when it's pertinent information, don't hide it behind the curtain.  Yes, you may be rejected by someone you like because of your chosen honesty, but what's worse in the long run?  Deceiving someone (even with the best of intentions) for a long period of time, and possibly hurting that person in the end, or being upfront from the start with the strong chance of getting your ego bruised?  No one likes getting their ego crushed for sure, but I don't think anyone likes to hurt other people that they could possibly care about either.  And that's what you have to consider: the bigger picture.

We all want someone who will accept us for who we are in our entirety.  (Ok, maybe some of us are on here strictly for the casual sex.  I am not one of them, but, to each their own.)  And if that's really what we want, we should act accordingly.  Honesty may not get you everywhere you want to go, but it will get you to the places that really matter.  Lying only gets you so far, and usually ends up going nowhere.  Take your pick.

The Cost of Freedom

"Find the cost of freedom buried in the ground.  Mother Earth will swallow you.  Lay your body down." ~Find the Cost of Freedom~ Crosby Stills Nash and Young

I'm writing this entry on Memorial Day weekend.  Usually people make use of this three day weekend to get great deals at local retailers, get together with family and friends for a barbeque, or just take advantage of a day where they get to sleep in.  I admit, I'm guilty of this as well.  But this year, for some reason, I got to thinking.  There is so much propoganda around this holiday, both related and unrelated.  The related propoganda comes in the form of "Honor those who have fought for freedom."  I have no trouble honoring a good majority of service men and women.  It truly is a form of service that I know I wouldn't be able to do.  But my beef is with the idea that they are fighting for freedom.  What does that mean exactly?  What does someone fighting over in Iraq have to do with my civil liberties?  (And frankly, haven't our civil liberties been somewhat diminished since this whole war on terror started?)   What freedoms are they protecting?  Who exactly is threatening these freedoms?  While I will gladly honor those who have fought in past wars and even in the current ones--though I do not agree with the motives in which those wars were and are being fought--I have a difficult time swallowing the sound bite of "fighting for freedom."  If they are fighting for freedom, does that mean they're fighting against the bill that was passed in Arizona which makes it easier for police to target brown people?  Are they fighting for the rights of LGBT people to have their marriages legally recognized?  Are they fighting for a woman's right to low cost health care?  Are they fighting for people to be free from the oppression of poverty? 

The answer to these questions is, obviously, no.  The freedom that is mentioned in that line of propoganda is abstract.  While some may sum it up as, "They're fighting so that I can continue to live my life as I please and don't have to worry about someone coming in to tell me what I can do or say" it isn't clear exactly how fighting in a war is the best insurance policy for those rights.  Furthermore, as alluded to by the questions above, exactly which freedoms are they upholding?  I honestly believe that those in uniform are not fighting for freedom, but against some potential (yet unspoken) threat to those freedoms.  In today's events, that threat may look like Muslims who want to take over our way of life by way of Caliphate.  So of course, we need to pass state laws that forbid Sharia law.  And we need to engage in wars in predominantly Muslim countries (except Saudi Arabia, cuz...you know...they're the good guys).  You get the idea.  This isn't about a fight for freedom, at least in the case of the wars we are currently engaged in.  This is about a perceived threat.  Maybe not even that.  Maybe it's something that's only been vocalized as being perceived without actually consciously perceiving it.  In other words, it's been said that this threat is perceived, but no person with an adequate amount of brain cells would actually perceive that to be an actual threat.

When I think of people who have fought for freedom, I think of the Freedom Riders, the people who marched in Selma, Ida B. Wells, Susan B. Anthony, Frederick Douglas, Rigoberta Menchu, the Zapatistas, Cesar Chavez, Howard Kunstler, Jesus, Moses, and many countless others who have fought and continue to fight on the side of the oppressed.  Because if anyone is in need of freedom, it is certainly those who are oppressed--whether directly by a malicious dictator, or indirectly through laws passed by governments or even citizens themselves. 

The bumper sticker that says, "Freedom Isn't Free" is true in a very literal sense.  Many people have paid with their lives in the struggle for freedom, both in this country and throughout the world.  But what is also true is the quote, "No one is free while others are oppressed."  Think about it.  If men and women in uniform are willing to lay down their lives for some greater cause (i.e. freedom, or as discussed above, the perceived threat to freedom), and yet our own government continues to chip away at our rights, then what exactly are they fighting and dying for?  We honor our soldiers with federal holidays and yet the government constantly takes away health care (including mental health care) for veterans.  We proudly display American flags, and yet women recruits and soldiers are raped and sexually assaulted by their peers, and have very little support within the structure of the military to press charges; not to mention that should these women become pregnant as a result and choose to terminate their pregnancies, their abortions will not be covered under their insurance provided by the government.  Again, what freedoms are being upheld?  What freedoms are people dying for?

What I am about to say next may anger some, but I'm willing to take that risk.  While I know that it may never happen, I do not think that Memorial Day should be just about those in uniform who have lost their lives in combat.  I think it should be about remembering all of those, both known and unknown, who have fought against oppression and have died as a result.  And it shouldn't be just for those who have died in our own country, but from all over the world.  Perhaps the weight of known and unknown names will give us pause before we light up the barbeque or head out to that three day sale at Macy's. 

Ok, I know this won't happen.  It won't.  And if it did, it would probably end up being commercialized just like everything else that's appropriated by the mainstream.  "Be sure to come in and get your free Ghandi gift bag with a purchase of $50 or more!"  My point is that, in the current state of things, the real cost of freedom is losing the very notion of what freedom is.  By honoring those who have supposedly fought for it, we buy into the illusion that we are free from oppression, as well as being protected from those who would serve to take our current freedoms away.  We have let the earth swallow up our conscience, our awareness of how things really are, and we have erected an abstract and false idea in its stead.  Should we continue to worship this idea blindly, a new form shall be erected: a simple marker, much like a headstone, which reads: Memores libero.

This Doesn't Make Sense

It's amazing what Facebook can do.  It lets you find that old friend from elementary school.  It allows you to get in touch with and make amends with people you have wronged.  It lets you post anything and everything of interest, from the mundane to the hilarious to the fascinating.  You get to tell your current partner that you no longer want to be with them just by changing your relationship status (who said breaking up is hard to do?).  And, of course, you get to "stalk" your exes.  But on Thursday evening, I got the shock of my life when I learned that a former classmate, commrade and friend was murdered in her home that morning.

Her name was Melanie.  She was 27, full of life, love, passion, and joy.  And this beautiful life was cut short by the man she was dating, who decided that her life was something he wanted to possess and destroy because he thought so little of his own.  He stabbed her.  I don't know how many times.  I don't even know what led up to it.  But he stabbed her, and then left.  Someone in her house (or possibly herself), called the police who then arrived at the scene before 5:30am.  She was taken to the hospital and pronounced dead.  That was it.  Mel was gone.

Even describing it now seems unreal.  It just doesn't seem possible.  Who could do that to anyone, let alone her?  I hear it all the time on the news: someone in this city was gunned down, there was a drive by in this area, a robbery gone wrong in this neighborhood.  On and on and on.  These are tragedies for someone, but they have never been for me.  I love watching CSI (Las Vegas, never Miami), and watching everyone connected with the murder victim come in for questioning and try to figure out "Whodunnit?"  But now, I know who it was, I know what happened (mostly), and I know she's gone.  And somehow it still doesn't make sense.  I can't wrap my brain around the idea that I won't ever see her again.

She and I weren't close, but I always enjoyed her company whenever I was around her.  She had a happy personality, and she was real.  There was no b.s. with her, no faking it.  Just Mel.  She had a passion for social justice, too, and I loved having her around at meetings.  I don't remember anything specific about any one meeting in particular, but I remember I always liked having her there.  It wasn't until about a day after I heard the news that I remembered there was a picture of us together after we both graduated from De Anza College (she graduated with honors, btw).  I remember posing with her, and how after we hugged each other, we said we'd stay in touch.  We never did.  Then Facebook came along, we were added to each others' friend list, and still there wasn't much contact.  I took her presence for granted.

I'm not going on some kind of guilt trip here.  I'm just realizing that life is unpredictable and to not take anything for granted.  Trite, I know...but it's true.  Mel wouldn't want me to feel guilty.  I think she would want me to know that she's all right where she is, and that, while what happened to her wasn't fair and shouldn't have happened, the fact remains that it did.  And now it's up to us who are holding the weight of grief in hearts to decide what to do now.   

On one of my friends' statuses, a few of us began discussing issues of domestic violence (since this was one of those incidents, as someone pointed out).  Someone else said that they would make an effort to honor her at the Womyn's Day march next month.  On her wall where someone left a condolence message, two people who hadn't seen or been in contact with each other for more than 20 years reconnected.  I dedicated my yoga practice to her the following evening, and was able to find some sense of peace in knowing that she was all right.

This was and is a tragedy.  There was absolutely no sound reason for this beautiful, young and vibrant woman's life to be ended so soon.  It makes no sense whatsoever.  I've heard a lot of times people saying that God has a plan.  Honestly, I don't buy it.  If tragedy and severe hardship are part of God's plan, then we believe in (and worship) one sadistic cosmic asshole.  I believe that God's plan is for us to find our truest and most authentic selves.  It's when we deny that process of exploration that tragedy like this occurs.  People make choices every day.  The choice that her murderer made, for whatever reason, was a poor one that has affected many.  And I hope he lives with it.  I hope he finds his own authentic self and can take responsibility for what he has done.  I hope he realizes that the life he took was well on its way to being authentic and true, if it wasn't there already.  I hope we never forget her light.  I hope we never forget our own light, and how, even in this dark and difficult time, we can let it shine.