HONESTLY SPEAKING

Living Lives Bigger than Ourselves

I get to hold a lot of babies.  Yesterday, I met a new little girl, she's probably 6 months old.  She's so beautiful.  One of the cutest things about her is that she has these huge adorable chubby thighs.  I joked with her mom, "at what point is it that 'chubby thighs' are no longer an attractive quality about a woman?"  We laughed and nodded knowing all to well that we grow up and feel self conscious about even a pinch of fat on our thighs making bathing suit wearing the dread of any woman who hasn't had all the fat sucked unnaturally out of her thighs.

Similarly, I was thinking about selfishness and sin. Yesterday was the "Fall Festival" at the church I adore.  Families gathered and we put on a full carnival complete with a cake walk with goodies made by moms and elderly ladies from the church, face painting and gunny sack races.  It was so good.  It is probably my very favorite event that I get to do all year long.

After the carnival I gather all of the kids and we do a costume parade.  The costume parade isn't super sophisticated...it's really a line of about 100 kids single file in their costumes following me around in circles.  Afterwards, I lead them into the parking lot where elaborately decorated trunks of cars are opened and the parents pass out candy at "trunk or treat".  It's really quite amazing. I love love love it.  If you ever want to just have a wonderful smiling day, come to the Newhall Presbyterian Church's Fall Festival.  Just before I released the kids to "Trunk or Treat" I said "Be polite, only take one piece of candy. When you do what should we say?" they all chimed "Thank you" then I added, "and then flash them a cute smile too because grown ups love nice kids".

I've re-read the chapter in Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller titled "Problems".  An excerpt from the chapter:

"Yeah," Tony started in. "Some friends were over at the house, and they have a kid, about four or five years old or something, and they were telling me all about child training.  They said their kid had this slight problem telling them the truth about whether or not he had broken something or whether or not he had put away his toys, you know, things like that.  So later I started wondering why we train kids at all.  I wondered, you know, if I ever had a couple of kids and I trained one of them, taught him right from wrong, and the other I didn't train at all, I wonder which would be the better kid."

"The kid you teach right from wrong, of course," I told him.

"Of course but that really should tell us something about the human condition. We have to be taught to be good. It doesn't come completely natural. In my mind, that's a flaw in the human condition."

It's true. I sat through the nature nurture debates in college. When it comes down to it, we loathe parents who don't discipline their kids.  Their kids are wild and disruptive and hard to manage.  Some personalities are able to self-govern a little better than others even if they aren't given guidance or teaching of right from wrong, but generally they are just trying to please society and see the reward and punishment system that exists both socially and legally in our society.

At some point, just like the little girls thighs we don't tolerate selfishness in people.  Instead of it being a childlike behavior, we name people selfish, narcissistic, egocentric and pretentious.  Sometimes I want to say "grow up! Start realizing that the world needs you to care less about yourself and more about the community"  I am totally guilty of this selfishness, but in general I try to be less selfish and more selfless.  I think we'll always be growing into this idea.

I got really mad in public Saturday night.  I think the last time I did this was in high school when one of my best friends had lied and betrayed me for the 100th time.  I lost it then, I told her what I thought.  I saw a selfish man the other night, hurting my friend, yanking her arm...trying to lead her into the dark.  I got mad.  I got really mad.  I said some really true things with some strong cuss words.  I was filled with rage towards the atrocities that I have seen this man commit against several of my women friends.  I see that he is vacant inside, I told him that I was sorry about that fact, but that I would like him to never fill that vacancy with women. I also told him that his masculinity could not be found in them.  Men wanted to hit him, but I hit him with the truth in my words so that no one would be arrested for assault.  I was shaking, filled with adrenaline.

Afterwards, I felt guilty.  Women are never supposed to think it's okay to get mad, especially christian women.  We're supposed to remain sweet and kind and passive.  I'm trying to feel okay about getting mad at ugly sin and selfishness. 

The thing is, selfishness is really harmful.  This is why I try to teach the little boys and girls that I oversee and love to take one piece of candy and say thank you at trunk or treat.  I felt this weekend like I wanted to teach the boys to be totally rockin' gentlemen that would never be that guy at the party being a total asshole. 

I want to throw up when I hear about the atrocities that we commit against each other because we are selfish.  Rape. Pornography. Murder. Car Accidents. Iraq. Molestation. Drug Addiction. Etc.

Our world can be quite ugly, and so it seems that childhood remains the place to set things straight. When this doesn't happen for a kid, they are left floundering through adulthood trying to figure out what up and down is, and trying to figure out how the man or woman in the mirror can get back at a world that robbed their innocence and joy as a child. 

So my kids are making cards for the people in Gulfport, Mississippi who I will get to spend time with this month. I'm trying to teach them that there is pain in the world, and that they can bring a little light to it.  They catch on so fast, they open up their beautiful hearts and write notes that bring light into my life, and beauty that Mississippi will see I'm sure through stickers and markers and cut up cardstock.  Its good to know kids.  They remind me how to be as we show them how to live.

Surround yourself with beauty...

I've never posted a picture...so I thought I'd try.  This is the painting I bought while I was in DC.  It is called "Lavendar" by Rob VanderZee. It is my first "purchased" piece of art.  It kind of put my $40 Target framed photography to shame and made me take it down.  My conversation with Rob helped me realize that it was time to start making my own art.  It was time to let go of my inhibitions and fear of being "not good enough".  When you grow up with a brother that is so insanely talented as a painter...it causes one to have a little fear of sucking.  I'm the singer...I'm the writer...but I've never given myself permission to be the artist.  I've made my first piece and you know what? People like it.  I know because it hangs in my living room and people ask "ooo who did that?" and I say "I did".  I would post 'my first canvas'...but I can't seem to figure out my camera chip wtih this computer etc etc.  Soon. I promise. 

Rob encouraged me to surround myself, in my home especially, with things that I find beautiful. He said that he thought if I did this it would inspire me to create more beauty.  So...I bought his painting. I love it. I really do. I wake up to it every morning. I spent all of my "spending money" and then some on it.  I went and bought some cereal at the grocery store that afternoon in Virginia because I knew I'd dipped into the "expensive food at restaurants" fund. I carried it onto the plane...they gave me a lot of hell at the security station.  I didn't think they were going to let me through.  The flight attendant was absolutly charming...she didn't even say anything accept "I'll make sure to keep this safe if you'd like".  The pilot handed it too me with admiration as I exited...it was really quite wonderful that they loved it too.  It was the beauty I'd found on my adventure...and now it lives on Sarah Street with me.  You have to check out Rob's studio if you're ever in the Alexandria, VA area.  His work will take your breath away. His website will give you a flavor...but seeing it in person is really what you have to do.  I swear his work has a pulse...it's so alive and wonderful.  Rob is wonderful too.  You can see on the internet that "Lavendar" is sold.  I like that becuase it means that there isn't another one...and that it lives at my house. I'll keep creating art...I might even go make something right now.

...and Kristie and her painting lived happily ever after.

Once you see their MySpace page...

I'm thankful to Rhett Smith and for the added attension that my blog has recently recieved because he liked my thoughts about MySpace and it's oppritunity for child pornography.  It's a good conversation to get into.  A conversation to have as people who love kids, who know them and can care about them, a good conversation for parents to have, and one that we need to use a lot of grace with when we love the girls especially who are splaying their bodies before an unknown audience.

I'll forever be passionate about seeing girls know thier worth and know how to be young women in this culture.  I wish I knew just what that was supposed to look like.  I'm 25...still figuring it out.  I know more than I did a few years ago, and even more than I did when I was 16...so that's good I suppose. :)

I guess what I am feeling is the need to say something to the effect of "let's be careful" when we are too punitive to girls for posting sexy offers for sexual favors or maybe just a peek through their pictures.  We always always always want to look to the reason that girls are doing that and help to nurture and heal that part of their selves.  The solution and action to take is a combination between loving them enough to say something about it, showing them through relationships with healthy men and women why this behavior is just not good enough for their precious selves, and then praying that they'll let you stay in the conversation long enough to love them through this time of discovery, ambiguity and fear.

My heart breaks when I see the discrepency between kids I know in real life, and who they present themselves as online. I think there is a danger in calling out the hypocrisy, yet it needs attension.  I just never never never want us to become people who shout "what a slut you REALLY are" or "I thought you were better than this" the disgust that can become the hallmark of the way women are treated throughout their adolescent years as they try to figure out their sexuality.  It's just not easy.  It's a process, one that usually involves failing at that and succeeding.  Our anger is not to be placed on these girls, but should be placed on the culture, on broken family systems and on the enemy of the beauty of these girls.

The hypocrisy and discrepency between private and public life is not new.  What is new is the access to the private lives that were once secret.  The old saying "if these walls could speak" or "who are you when no one's looking" is now as easy to figure out as a click of the mouse.  I wonder sometimes about the common sense that one has to have to POST something that would be controversial on the internet, but common sense is just not all that common sometimes.

As we love kids, look at their MySpace accounts, and walk with them through their lives, we have to be for them, not against them.  We want them to hear our concern, not our judgement.  We also have to stand firm and break the silence, telling kids that integrity matters...and who they are online...should reflect who they are all the time.

Ashley's Special Day

I drove up late. Looked for a parking spot, and silently scurried to the doors of the church. As I walked there I thought, "good, I cried all morning...the tears are 'out' so I don't have to cry here."

I walked in the door and there was her picture. Lump=throat.

I heard music playing...and feared I'd already missed something wonderful.  I looked through the double doors, doors I've looked through my whole life.  I looked at the steps I sat on to hear Children's Sermons and the pews I used to crawl underneath as a child, with my brother and friends.

The pews were full of people in black clothing. The room was filled with music because a full orchestra filled the stairs and the chancel and the space that might have felt very empty without these wonderful musicians sitting in it.

It took my breath away, and the tears flooded in.  So did the sobs.  I was so overwhelmed with grief and beauty and strange hope in these moments.  It felt like a dream to see an orchestra, a magnificant surprise on this gloomy Saturday.

I walked forward and found a place near my dad. I sat next to him and leaned against his presence.  He and my mom were sitting where they always sit at Burbank Presbyterian Church.  I was glad. It was familiar.

I listened and drank it in. I drank in the music and the memories. I nodded and smiled, and tasted salty tears as they poured out.  I didn't want it to end...I wanted the orchestra to play and play and play...a melody for my grief. 

Ashley Tears

So the tears finally came.  I have been praying for them all week.  I dreamed I was at Ashley's funeral.  From the ceiling was a large sign boardered in purple and blue glitter.  In blue glitter in fun cursive writing was her name "ashley".  I wish I could draw it for you...it was like a "viva las vegas" sign or something.  You'd expect it to blink at you. I remember thinking if Ashley was here she would say "yes! you guys this is awesome!" Rows and rows of chairs were in this big empty room.  I couldn't find anywhere to sit.  I felt alone.  I sat with some friends.  Then in full hollywood fashion a screen dropped down from the cieling.  It was of a film.  It was a carefully edited film of Ashley's life. Funny moments, cute moments, moments that made you miss her.  I began to wimper and cry (remember this is all still in my dream) and my friend turned to me and started making fun of my crying. The audience laughed...but it was a laugh track.  I turned to my friend and said, "why are you making fun of me? I need to cry!" 

I woke from my dream...and it was as if my own movie started to play. Funny moments, cute moments, moments that made me miss her.  And I cried.  I let it out...muffled by my pillow. I keep lapseing into the tears...my head is pounding.

Right now I'm washing a skirt I want to wear to her funeral, and laying in my pjs on my bed sharing all this with you.  And I debated...do I share?  Do I share these intimate moments of grief with you?

I don't know why, but all week I keep hearing her voice in my head. Its like an audio file of my memories is playing.  One day at work when the Ashley memories were particularly loud in my head, I made a little playlist on my computer.  I got caught by my boss blareing Pink Floyd "Wish You Were Here"...candles lit...florescant light off...computer screen illuminated.  He walks in with an elder of the church. Ooops. They both like me...so it's okay...but it was funny.  At least I wasn't burning insence too. I think Pink Floyd "Wish You Were Here" is officially the best "grief" song ever. 

I am really sad. I know she's with God, I know she's so much better off than I am...that she is in the full glory of who she was created to be.  But, I think it sucks.

Ashley

It's been a long week.  I'm tired...and it's Wednesday.  I'm looking into my week...wondering how feesable a pjs on the couch day might be?

The best way I can describe my life right now is in the words of a poet whom I have forgotten the name of:

"Yet then sometimes the clouds do roll in again after the rain."

I guess it just shows that you just never know how many storm systems are going to hit you all at once. 

Just when I was praying for stregnth to endure one last moment of an event I had kept a smile for all weekend...I got a phone call.  One of those phone calls.

It was one of my best friends Susan.  Her voicemail was grim. "Kristie, call me as soon as you get this."

I called and discovered that a childhood friend named Ashley Barnett had died. 

I've spent the last few days staring out the window of my office, laying in bed with my eyes open and mentally listing the things we have done together in our growing up years.  THe list continues to grow as my subconcious mind seems to be going all day and here are there surfacing memories to the edges of the space I'm trying to hide from.  I hear her voice.  I hear her saying my name. I hear her saying my friends names.  I remember our conversations...and her smile.  I remember how she always would fondly remind me of how I used to leave little notes in her desk when she was a first grader in my mom's class.  She said she thought she had gotten a note from a celebrity, afterall, I was the "teacher's daughter".  I used to pick she and her brother up every morning before school when we were in high school choir together.  I remember that we were always running late.

It's all these details that seem to sum up a person.  I don't even know what she did as a profession.  I know it was in entertainment...but what I remember is her essence.  It was her soul, her joy, her energy that made her feel so fun to be around.

Only a few weeks ago, I saw her at Starbucks. My favorite Starbucks: Oak and Pass.  We chatted and were so thrilled to catch up.  My friend Michelle and I were talking yesterday about how sometimes the hardest part is that a person's history just ends...and that's what makes it really hard to bear.  Hard to not be able to call them again and say "hey remember _____________, I was just gonna tell you..."

So, I'm sad.  I'm looking forward to the funeral...because I want to hear all about her, and let it wash over me and allow me to feel in the presence of a bunch of other people that have their heart breaking because they've lost a dear friend.

Mississippi

It's official. I'm going to Gulfport, MS November 14th.  Sooo great.  I'm so tired. must sleep.  Will write more...soon.

MySpace...and Unintentional Teenage Prostitution

I went to a junior/high school girl's sleepover last weekend.  I won't reveal the organization to protect the girls, but I must discuss the issues that I have encountered. Three of the high school girls hung out with me a bit through the night...and we got onto the topic of MySpace.  Before I get into this topic I want to say that all myspace sites are not terrible, I have many friends on it, and I myself for several reasons...have a "myspace".

For those of you who aren't familiar, this is an online database of personal websites that can be linked/networked together by asking someone to be your "friend"...which means their picture and a link to their site exists on your site.

I've grown both entranced and depressed by this cultural phenomenon.  The way I see it, these "pages" are a person's way of saying "this is who I am...this is what I want you to see".  Unfortunately, it seems to double as an unintentional...dare I say...prostitution website.  Just spend 5 minutes browsing MySpace pages and the pictures and your mouth will drop at what both girls and guys are willing to reveal.  Cleavage is modest.

One of the girls had a picture of she and two of her 14 year old friends, sitting like charlie's angel's...but with Big Stick Popsicles in their mouths.  Their eyes were suggestive and inviting.  "Overtly sexual" doesn't pay any sort of homage to the nature of some of these pictures.  It's outright child pornography. Self-produced child pornography.

I found another sophomore in high school that I know, tonguing a girlfriend of hers, the pictures title was "wanna join?".  If I had a quarter for every time she has "playboy" written on her site, I'd have a new pair of designer jeans.  She describes what she'll do and how to contact her. 

I hesitate to sound too much like a female James Dobson...but I must.  This oversexualization of our culture will have a high price to pay.  What kind of vacancy will live in the eyes of these girls once they are college students? The skin of a woman is not supposed to be the feast for the eyes of the entire world wide web. 

Back to the girls at the sleepover. We went online because they were offended that I had viewed their sites and hadn't invited them to be "friends" so we went on to make this rite of passage/friendship happen.  With the girls over my shoulder I looked at their pictures.  I reacted out loud.  I said "oooo why would you have that picture on your site? Do you know how sexual that is? If you knew who was looking at that picture, and what they were thinking you'd wear a burka."  We discussed it.  We looked at their pictures and I said "girls you are so beautiful. Some of your beauty is to show the world.  Then, some of it is a treasure made for a sacred relationship with a man you will marry.  You don't want that to be posted on the internet.  It cheapens the gorgeous sexy girl you are...and you will be enjoyed for.  You want to be the person that decides who sees that...not a search engine."

The girls expressed that they didn't realize how sexual their pictures were, they truly thought that these poses were "cute". And can we blame them?  No! At least one part of them is still naive and child-like. Everything in the hedonist media culture they have been born into suggests an "anything goes...don't be a prude...you are sexual...be!"

Sex is wonderful. Sexiness is beautiful. It is part of being a woman.  Just like everything though...there is a context for which this is expressed in a healthy way.  I cringe as I write this because I see a librarian with a bun on top of her head saying "there is a time, and a place'.  I in no way want to demonize sexuality as so many puritanical movements have done. 

I do think that in our post-modern pluralistic society we have to stand in that gap, in the tension of it all and sort through right and wrong in order to save the selves of boys and girls. 

I remember working at Starbucks when I was 18, and my co-worker told me that she and another barista were going to begin stripping on the weekends for extra money.  They came to work shortly after with designer purses and jewelry accessorizing their black polo, green apron and kacki pants. I noted that these vibrant college graduates soon also wore a vacancy in their eyes.  They were no longer as bright and wondrous, and their designer clothing and accessories had to stand in the place of the beauty that used to exude from their eyes.

I found this expert on one of the sophomore's website that I know:

read me and see why i smile
Current mood: disappointed

What does one do when they have no answers to their questions? What do we do when we feel we have no 1 to talk to even though there are people all around? What do we do when we feel we will never find that person who we can trust with our dreams and fears? What do we do when we feel completely alone, blank?

We smile... and act as if everything is okay, as if we enjoy being here, as if we feel our lives are worth living.

This is the emptiness.  This is what rips my heart out of my chest and causes my myspace induced depression. I hate it.

So, just when I've made you feel like the world has fallen apart at the seams and crawling up in a blanket on your bed is the best remedy...good news! One of the girls, the one with the Popsicle pictures...took the picture off of her site.  Now, her pictures are fun and truly cute pictures of she and her friends enjoying high school life.  It's a small thing I know, but it encourages my heart.  It spurs me on to have more good and open conversation with young men and women about the Internet and myspace and just how they're feeling about that loneliness inside.

November Plans

It looks as if I've made more of a decision about where and how I am going to go down south this November.  I've been having second thoughts about going down with the Red Cross.  I just don't want to go there and do something that I could do here in the various shelters at the Dream Center, or other locations here in LA.  I've been praying about it...for direction.  I think I have some today.

I recieved and email today from Bel Air Pres and they are taking a team down to do clean up/construction work.  I'm excited because it feels like this will be a good use of my time and money and etc. I would leave November 14th and then stay an extra week past the week that Bel AIr is planning on staying down there which will include Thanksgiving. I can imagine that it will turn my sense of thanksgiving upsidedown this year.  My time down there with and without Bel Air is done in partnership with Presbyterians for Disaster Assistance.  I'd be camping in a tent village and helping with whatever they need.  I'm excited...but will have to raise some support...which is fine it's not a lot of money.  Good huh? I'm thrilled.

I'm already considering how I will do without a shower for 2 weeks, if that is required of me...and it might be.  My friend Carissa tells me that my house and car have a nice smell.  I think that "nice smell" might be a different smell..."homeless Kristie smell".  I have a very accute sense of smell...so we will hope that in the same way I am unable to smell "my good kristie smell" I will be unable to smell my "homeless kristie smell".  :)

I'll keep you posted on the progress of my plans as they develop. Yeah! Pray please?

Sometimes I'm just a little worried about...

What is it about worrying that I am so prone to hang on to? I know that it does nothing for me yet I seem to do a rather good job at constructing something that can keep my mind whirling while sleeping.  Last night it was insurance: subconscious dream worrying! I had a dream that I couldn't find a car insurance company that would accept me...then I had no insurance...and I was worried.  Weird.  I mean...that's what's on my to do list today: find better car insurance rate.  But...what in the world? 

My dreams are vivid most nights.  Some disturbing...others beautiful...others a play by play of something just odd or a conglomerate of things I am worrying about.

For instance Saturday night I was worrying about stuff at work.  "why didn't I plan ahead better?" "will people be mad at me?" "Is there a way to hide that I totally dropped the ball on a minor/major/etc issue?"  Truth is...I am WAY too hard on myself...I work my ass off doing everything 200 % so when it's 150% I freak.

Hopefully you are relating...and not shaking your head and ready to abandon our friendship all together as you read this. :) I think I need to pray before bed. Lift the worries up to God.  I know it sounds cliche but I know that this helps...I've done it...and it's pretty remarkable.  Funny how we don't trust things to really be as they are...like God's word.  We assume that based on our experience...we know better.

I love Philippians 4:6-7 a formula for worrying.  A sort of "how to" guide for our anxiety:

"Have no anxiety about anything, but in everything pray and ask, with a thankful heart, present your requests to God.  And the Peace of God, which we don't really understand, will guard your heart and your mind in Christ Jesus."

I love that "which we don't really understand".  I love that it's a mystery...it doesn't say "which you should try to understand or wrap your brain around".  It's about trusting...about leaning in and saying "you know what in 2 weeks this moment will not be as intense to me...so I'm gonna trust that it's all gonna work out"  And it usually does. 

But I'm convinced that we don't get that peace unless we ask for it.  Unless we put our worries into the hands of God...and take a deep breath and lean into that peace that He does provide.

I'll be heading over to Starbucks today to knit and sit and read and write. I'll have another Starbucks post this afternoon.  I love the Starbucks people. I really could write a book on what I learn from observing their coming and going...especially at Oak and Pass Starbucks in Burbank...that's my haunt. I love it.

Have a great day! And...don't worry...pray!