Tag: False promises

Neuropathy

Rita Sommers-Flanagan1 Comment

Photo copied from random internet search

The cold hands of March are not easily forced into the welcoming shape of April. March is in denial about her advancing neuropathy, made worse by the chemicals of decay around her. She pretends to be warm and comfortable, but she’s not.

With a pointed glance, the God of the Floral Sofa tries to shame me for dust, crumbs, and smears of yogurt. “No!” I glare and turn up the music. Thanks to a blogger managing Opal’s Farm in Texas, I recently discovered James McMurtry. I don’t love country music, but an old cowboy dressed in drag to protest the absurdities of the small-minded, hard-hearted Neanderthals among us is worth a listen.

The Beloveds on Okinawa gather each year to pray for peace and health. On Easter Sunday in 1945, a battle began there that would end three months later with 200,000 people dead.

“How many enemies? How many friends?” God asks.

“That’s a false distinction,” I snap.

“Yes. But remember, you’re a false distinction,” God laughs. “And so am I.”

I gather my blankets and beer and sink into the Dark Place. False distinctions parade by in cosmic drag: Life/Death. Love/Hate. Evil/Good. Black/White/Red/Yellow. The air is thick with unexpressed longings. I can’t breathe. Hunger smolders from the sunken eyes of nursing mothers. My own well-fed eyes sting like crazy, but I can’t seem to cry.

Without being requested to do so, my phone organizes my photos into artificial themes so banal I am appalled. The shallow joy, the uncritical eye—these uninvited invasions attempt to pacify and define my little life. But I resist. “Isn’t that your job, God?” I sneer. “Define and pacify my little life.”

“Yes. Absolutely,” Floral Sofa nods. “But no.”

I am terrified by the erosion of compassion around me. Neuropathy of the soul, caused by willfully telling or believing lies, is epidemic.

The ship of which I am captain has sailed. I’m floating over a sea of faces that, like the Mona Lisa, have been artistically blurred, thus removing the sharp lines most of us need to recognize ourselves. We are rendered ambivalent. Our feet flop when we walk, and falls are more frequent. “Take heart, Little Life,” Floral Sofa whispers. “It is in the falling that you find salvation.”

“That’s not the way I want to be saved,” I answer angrily.

“Oh, but I think it is,” the Sofa says. “Either way, I’ll be around.”

I sip my beer, pull my blankets tighter, and plan my elaborate but futile escape.

The One-Eyed Chicken

Rita Sommers-Flanagan3 Comments

The one-eyed chicken turns her good eye towards me, poised to pounce on the moldy cheese I intend to scatter for our flock of five. In terms of pecking order, I doubt she’s at the top, but she’s held her own, foraging and evading predators for months now. I drop chunks of mozzarella well within her visual field and cheer her on.

Each morning, I render thoughts, words, and prayers the way lard is rendered from the carcasses of the beautiful pigs. I endure the heat of certain realities, stirring the hot mess around in the cauldron of my mind, watching impurities rise to the surface. To those in charge of assigning value, the one-eyed chicken might be classified as an impurity and skimmed off the top. But I’ve hung around with The Idea long enough to realize that the one-eyed chicken is not an impurity. She might actually be the purest expression of meaning available.

I don’t know how she lost that eye. I don’t know how it is that humans lose their way and kill each other. We are frightened and ashamed of our perceived inadequacies. Life seems wildly unfair. We’re lonely. Despite warning signs and alarm bells, we continue to accumulate possessions as if they will save us. We don’t realize we’re gathering floatation devices that push us to the surface where our fatal impurities will be most obvious.

And there it is.

We cannot save ourselves, and this makes us go a little crazy. Will humanity survive the adversarial urges that elevate winners and denigrate losers? Can we decenter ourselves enough to relax into being an ever-evolving, transitory, fraction of The Idea?

Botox doesn’t make us younger. Wealth does not make us worth more. Denial doesn’t change the truth. Fame does not make us immortal. We are loved, as is, by The Idea—a fertile complexity that in the end, renders us as wordless and dependent as the day we were born. The Idea that birthed us is in perpetual danger. It must be hell to watch us gorging on toxic delicacies to prove her wrong. Or prove her right. But The Idea needs no proof. We’re the ones who need proof, so we make things up. False justifications and worthless guarantees.

For now, the one-eyed chicken still lays eggs, which of course, proves nothing.

And everything.

Morning Report

Rita Sommers-Flanagan6 Comments

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Yesterday, I washed a week’s worth of dishes, sorted emails, moved the compost bucket to the door, raised the blinds, took a swipe at my hair, put my morning half-beer within arm’s reach, and decided to stay in my pajamas a while longer. It appeared I’d survived another night and still inhabited my corporeal body. Perhaps this was cause for rejoicing. Perhaps this was ordinary. Banal, even. As that thought crossed my mind, I glanced over my spiritual shoulder, waiting for a rebuff or reassurance. Nothing. Then some random curiosity prompted me to google daily global death rates from various causes. It was a terrible mistake. Of course, I myself might get Covid, but the rates are comparatively low. Cancer is pretty high, but I’ve already had cancer. Heart disease takes a lot of people out, and it does run in my family. But here’s what got me by the throat: every single day, 25,000 human beings die of causes related to malnutrition and hunger. Given my hearty breakfast and plans for a snack midmorning, I did not believe I was in imminent danger of this particular fate. But my morning had been trashed.

I stopped glancing over my shoulder and sat very still. I did not want God stopping by. I wanted to sit there by myself, imagining what I would do if I were God instead of the human-inspired insipid bastard who flits around the universe enjoying fame and good fortune. All manner of religious expression seemed as vapid as the press conferences we’re currently being subjected to. God made in the image of humans; human longings pinned as promises to the robes of this almighty manmade tongue-twisted idol. Born out of wedlock, born out of nothing, elevated, emaciated, eternal; God stands accused and convicted. But really does God stand at all? I sipped my beer and waited to be struck dead by lightening.

Instead, I heard a meadowlark. The tom turkeys strutted by, hoping to impress the ladies. The sun had raised itself and was hard at work greening up the earth. I could hardly stand how small I was. Across the valley, my eye caught a movement: It was my archenemy waving a white flag. I swore under my breath and sighed. Then, reluctantly, I raised the arm still attached to my limited body, waved the hand attached to the arm, and warmed a cup of sweet tea. It’s a favorite of his. No words were exchanged. A long day of tiny miracles and cleansing fires ensued, and then I slept.

This morning, before I was fully awake, a dense, resonant essence laid down beside me, enveloped me, and wrapped me in unearned perfection. The holy phantom was tattered and torn, hopeful and helpless, blameless and fully alive. I was defenseless and unafraid. “Good morning, God,” I said. “Happy Easter.’