Faith

The other day while on the phone with my dad, he ventured into the treacherous territory of religion and asked me if I even had a Bible in my possession anymore. "I dunno. Maybe? ..." I replied sheepishly. If there is one thing in the world I am loath to do, it is disappoint my father.

I could tell he was unnerved by the thought. He acknowledged that my faith isn't what it used to be or what he wished it was. He told me that I was now old enough to fend for my own spiritual self, and that were I to die, I'd not have the benefit of youthful ignorance to shield me from eternal damnation.

I didn't know what to say. It wasn't a good time to get into one of those discussions. There is, I've learned, never a good time to get into those discussions. So I try to let them pass. I don't protest. I acknowledge that I am testing fate by being quietly agnostic.

My parents want me back in church. They want me reading the Bible and giving praise and thanks to God at all times for everything I have. They want me to regard unfortunate things that happen as, depending on the situation, the work of the devil or the work of God, who works in mysterious ways. They want me to believe that Jesus was literally born of a virgin and Noah literally had a big boat with two of each animal on it through forty days and nights of flooding. They want a lot of things that I can't give them.

I've never told them that these are things I can't give anymore, but I imagine they've been able to sense it. My MySpace page (which my mom has seen) lists me as agnostic, and if either of them has ever read this blog, they've probably sensed a marked irreverence to authority, especially the Ultimate Authority of a Vengeful God.

And yet, I am terrified to tell them what I really believe. Above all, I don't want to hurt them or make them feel that they failed in any way. They are devout, and their faith has helped them heal wounds and move forward in life. They can't see why anyone would see the world differently, other than sheer stubbornness and arrogance. I want them to know that my beliefs — or lack of them — are not borne out of any of that. I'm not an atheist, even though more often than not I identify with atheist sentiment more than I do Christian sentiment. I am not a disbeliever. And I am not one of those believers who conveniently adopts whatever beliefs suit her lifestyle (think Madonna). I am not someone who is "spiritual but not religious." I am neither. I am human.

I am curious. I am reverent of the things I can know and intrigued by the things I cannot know. I am amazed by the mechanics of life and do not wish to hurry through my time on this earth so I can get to some gaudy prize on the other side. I am confused. I have conflicting ideas about everything. I know that my human brain cannot possibly calculate the concept of an omniscient God. I value love and acceptance and life and laughter and goodwill above rigid doctrines of belief. I am superstitious, but absentmindedly so. I do not take books literally. I am hopeful.

I know some devout religious folks might look at my belief system(s) and dub them convenient and easy and meaningless: the nebulous beliefs of a naive and young woman who has yet to really face her mortality. But what could be less convenient than acknowledging that you know nothing and, beyond that, will have the physiological capacity to know nothing until — and possibly beyond — the day you die?

This post over at Lost in the Underground does a wonderful job of summing up my take on God, The Divine, Nature. That thing we think we feel but that we can never really know or define without assuming too much. Whatever you'd like to call it.

My parents may fear for my mortal soul, but I don't. And that's truly knowing peace, isn't it?

Whiff

Just now I was cleaning off my incredibly filthy balcony — scraping up the moldy, dripping remains of the pumpkins, repotting the mum I bought, cleaning up dirt I flung everywhere while repotting, scraping the dead roots out of all the other pots, etc. — and I got a whiff of a smell that nearly knocked me down.

It was of my Nana's trailer, her last one — the blue one — that, even when it was new, smelled of ancient nicotine pressure cooked into every absorbent surface, cheaply made plastic trailer doorknobs and ceiling tiles, dusty mauve carpet so thin paths were worn from room to room, and yellowing linoleum pock-marked with cigarette burns...

Day 274 -- Krissie

[for Monday, Oct. 1]



My big sister turned [age withheld to protect the chronically OLD!!!] Monday. I swooped down to Hardin County to surprise her, but my mom accidentally let the surprise slip as we were ten minutes away from taking her out to lunch, but that's okay. It was funny anyway.

Let me tell you a bit about my sister. She's possibly the most friendly person you'll ever meet. She describes herself by saying she's never met a stranger. I swear, any time I go anywhere in Savannah with her, it is a non-stop reunion of friends and co-workers and acquaintances from the time we enter a place to the time we exit.

She's a fabulous mother, as evidenced by the complete awesomeness of my nephews. And I'm not just saying that; I'd call them brats if they were brats, but they are great, great kids who are simultaneously courteous and precocious, self-aware and funny.

Now let me tell you a bit about some of the favorite stories my sister loves to tell. She's about eight years older than I am, so by the time I came roaring into existence (on Christmas Day, no less, which surely deposited a good bit of playful resentment into her for a while as she sat at my grandmother's house and wondered where the hell Santa was), she was hitting the practical jokester age. That part of her came into full bloom as I got old enough to hobble around on my own.

She loves to remind me of the time that she put Tabasco sauce on my peanut butter sandwich. And the time she made me eat a crabapple. And the time she told me to eat some red onions that she convinced me was actually red cabbage.

Actually, now that I think about it, maybe I can blame her for the picky eating habits I eventually developed.

Oh my god, it all makes so much sense now!

Happy birthday, Kris.

Project 365

Ouch

I woke up with an unbelievably sore neck. It's like a hundred little gnomes took turns punching me while I slept. Or like I slept with my head turned around 180 degrees. Times like these it would be useful to have a personal masseuse* boyfriend around to work it out for me.

I think my sister found my blog. Hey, sis! Welcome to my Emporium of Ceaseless Whining. It's where my creativity — and my free time — comes to die! Make yourself at home. Have some cheese and crackers. I'll make you a Sex on the Beach, like old times.

*I just looked up "masseuse" to make sure I was spelling it correctly, and the definition is "a woman who gives massages professionally." Is this an outdated definition, Dictionary.com? Or is there an alternate spelling for a man who gives massages professionally? /word wonkery.

Swag

Every time I visit my parents, I return with a car full of stuff. It's just kind of the way we do things; they get tired of stuff or accumulate things they think I'd like to have, so they just pass along various crap to me. Same goes for my grandmother (she gives me lots of bras and pajamas that I usually end up passing along because they don't fit). (They are all clutter-enablers.)

My return trip this time included a new espresso/coffee maker (I don't drink either, but I might give it a shot), some big drawing tablets, and a shoebox full of old photos. Hand-picked by me for optimum comedy/sweetness.

My scanner is warmed up and now begins the task of scanning in my favorites.

This Flickr set will contain the bulk of them.

Day 238 -- Birthday Boy

[for Sunday, Aug. 26]



My little brother turned 20 yesterday -- 20! -- and I am kind of freaking out over how much he has changed in the past five years.

Last night I dug through a bottomless box of old photos in my parents' living room, and came across picture after picture of him making the sweetest/silliest/goofiest faces, from his time spent as a little toddler cutie-pie to his pudgy, awkward adolescent period to the time just two years ago when he had long, shaggy hair and black plastic glasses (much like my own dad when he graduated from high school). My parents and I marveled at his transformation. My dad said, "He's a man now."

And, by all accounts, he is.

But he's still my little brother.

(As soon as I get back to Memphis, I'm scanning in some of those photos, so there will be an update to this post forthcoming.)

Project 365

The moms in my family

My grandmother, my aunt Cindy, my sister Krissie, and my mom.

Today we sat around a table outside in the absolutely gorgeous mid-May weather, just up a bank from the river in Parsons, and I listened to each of them describe their lives as wives and mothers. It's a tale of cooking and cleaning and confusion and unconditional love. My grandmother likes to tell the story of her persnickety children and late husband, who were so dead-set against eating instant potatoes that they'd demand to see the potato skins before they'd chow down on the fluffy mound of potatoes in front of them. My sister jokes about her husband calling her at 8 a.m. and asking her what's for supper that night. My aunt describes the time when she first married my uncle, how his parents would still call every morning to wake him up to go to work. My mom laughs about when she and my dad first married, how, if she'd be away for the weekend, she'd leave carefully prepared dinners in Tupperware containers in the fridge, and how she'd come home and see them untouched, only to find out that my dad had gone to my grandmother's to eat instead.

This wife/mother thing, it's a constant comedic (and, to me, infinitely frustrating and mind-boggling) struggle against the enigmatic force of nature that is Man. My cousin Keri is in the on-deck circle, slated to get married next summer, even though, chronologically, I'm the next up. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little uneasy about how my life is panning out. There's something about sitting around with your family on Mother's Day that will certainly make you think twice about your deliberately childless, romance-less life. I enjoy being the spinster aunt, the one in the family with no major obligations beyond work. But I can't help but romanticize what it might be like to join my aunts and grandmother and sister and mother in their sacred status as life-givers and providers. That's not to say I'd join them in their quest to have dinner on the table every night (or any of the accompanying spoils that metaphor entails). We all have a good laugh at the thought of such nonsense (the women in my family all work their asses off and, quite often, don't have dinner on the table, and don't feel guilty about it), but our laughing doesn't stop the men from asking and expecting that dinner to be prepared. Some traditions die hard. Insert patriarchy-blaming here (or anywhere! everywhere!).

But, life it is what it is. And, for now, it's mostly good for us. And for that I am grateful and proud. And hopeful.

Day 133 -- Mom Laughing

When my mom laughs, my world goes brighter. Today I said something terribly unfunny (in one of my many misguided attempts to be funny) and she gave me the best courtesy laugh and laid her head on my shoulder. It was such a great Mom moment. She goes above and beyond to make her kids feel special.

Happy Mother's Day, Mom. You are the absolute greatest mother I could have ever asked for.

Day 39 — Granny's stuff

My great-grandmother, for as long as I knew her, was a small woman: frail, with a humpback, who we always assumed went to great pains to keep her hair dyed a velvety almond brown. She would go every week at the same time — Saturday morning, if I recall — and sit beneath one of those mammoth dryers at the beauty shop on Main Street in Saltillo, for as long as it took to get her hair perfectly round and airy. It wasn't until she became too ill to live alone and take care of herself that we realized, after no one had done much more than comb and style her hair for weeks, that the woman barely had a grey hair on her head.

And that was the way with my great-grandmother; there was always more about her that I didn't know than I did. From the way my family talks about her, it seems like she was a completely different person before I was born than she was after. My father speaks of the awful things she would do and say — and truly some of them are downright evil — and I just can't imagine my Granny — my small, frail, shaky, cackling Granny — acting like that.

My sister loves to tell the story of the time Granny got so mad at Krissie's pet rooster that she chased it around the yard and whacked its head off. Then she chopped off one of its feet and put it in a small white box on top of a layer of cotton and brought it back to prove to Krissie what she'd done. My sister kept that foot for a long time. I remember looking at it in that same white box and wondering what a rooster could do to make someone so mad.

During my lifetime, Granny's meanness was, as far as I can tell, tempered somewhat by the steady breakdown of her body. I look at pictures of her in her younger days, when her only son was meeting my grandmother and preparing to marry, and it's amazing how solid she was: tall and thick, and muscular like a farm wife has to be when she's carrying slop to the hogs and spending hours with her arms in the air, pinning wet sheets to cables strung up in the back yard. But as she topped 70, 80, and 90, she shrank in stature and I watched as her skin began to droop and sag and nearly drip off her bones. It became soft and easy to bruise, like the skin of a finicky banana. It showed the marks of a hundred accidental bumps and nicks.

And no matter how crooked and gnarled her hands became, she always kept her fingernails — which were long and impeccably filed — painted mauve.

On my way to my parents' the other day, I passed by her old house, which has sat vacant pretty much since her death, and noticed my dad's car in the driveway. I turned around and went back to see what he was up to there.

He was inside, changing out some light bulbs. I looked around at what was left of the place — an old Zenith floor unit TV, a stack of gilded-frame mirrors and landscape prints, boxes of fabric patterns and clothes, some dishes and glassware, and some random papers — and noticed that, since the last time I'd been in there, they'd managed to condense everything that was left into the living room. We're getting ready to put the house on the market. Part of me wants to just move in and clean it up and keep it in the family. I've got lots of memories in that house: Toasting grilled cheeses in the toaster oven, trimming the hedges for piddly amounts of money, peeking into the cedar chest and taking big whiffs of the woody scent, pilfering through the secret compartment of Granny's jewelry box and trying on her clip-on earrings, watching Wheel of Fortune, greeting trick-or-treaters at her front door.

On the floor was a dark-brown fedora. My great-grandfather's. He used to wear those and carry a cane, and I have these memories of my brother, when he was a baby, wearing the hat and carting the cane around, to the great amusement of Grandaddy. He died not long after those memories were imprinted.

Granny never got over him. I would sit with her on trips home from college and she would talk about how much she missed him.

What heartache is left in that house.

So I decided to take some with me. Not heartache, per se, but little pieces to remind me of that house and the people who lived in it, who I never really even got the chance to meet.

Project 365