30 December 2017

Big Problems for 2018

Oh dear.

I am in the vortex of New Year's Resolutions.

In years past, I have eschewed resolution-making easily, tossing aside the urge like so many flyers home from school, avoiding the pull of self-improvement without a care.

But this year is different.  This year, I want to change ALL THE THINGS.  I want to be better in ALL THE WAYS.   I feel the desire to be better and the temptation of resolve, and I strongly suspect that waiting for me on the other side is disappointment and failure.  As a woman who has increasingly lived by the mantra "The Secret to Happiness is Low Expectations," I am confused and concerned by this sudden urge to set the bar high and reach for the goddamn stars.

Let's put the devil in the details.  Let's list all the ways in which I seek to be a better human being in 2018.

  1. Pray more.
  2. Read more books.
  3. Exercise more.
  4. Write more.
  5. Eat better: includes eating more vegetables and fewer carbs, and drinking more water and less wine.
  6. FlyLady my house.
  7. Plan meals and grocery shopping consistently.  And execute on those plans.
  8. Keep up the family calendar (AKA: reduce scheduling chaos)
  9. Learn to play the violin.

And those are just the ones I thought of in the last 5 minutes; I'm pretty sure there are more.  Which means: this list is far too long for one woman.  Those are too many things to improve upon.  I can't decide what to cut! What to focus on!  What to shoot for!  

I think I know why I'm feeling the need for so many positive transformations.  2017 was terrible.  I need 2018 to be better, and I want to feel like I have some degree of control over making it so.  

On the one hand, I have this oh-so-strong urge to take charge and make everything better, and on the other, I have this knowledge that I am not in control, that I cannot force myself or the world around me to comply with my wishes.  I cannot bring Ann back, I cannot bring my mother back, I cannot turn back time and save my children from the particular pain of losing a beloved dog.

It is very likely that the best course of action for me is to resolve instead to breathe, be still, and practice mercy, patience and kindness, to myself and all around me, starting with my family.  I suspect the Pope is on to something here:



So, crazy unattainable plans on one side, the Pope on the other.  What to do...what to do...

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09 December 2017

THANK YOU MOM

First I want to thank everyone for being here to honor my mom and support our family.  We are incredibly appreciative of your love and support.

The thing I most want to say today is thank you mom.  Thank you for giving me the life I have, the faith I have in a loving God, and the experience of being raised by someone who worked quietly, consistently, and with great integrity, for her family, community, and world.

Thank you mom, for the gift of laughter.  Many of my favorite childhood memories are of laughing.  Laughing really hard at Mary Tyler Moore, Bob Newhart, and especially MASH.  Laughing at the Sunday comics, the Far Side and Bloom County.  Even Doonsebury, which I rarely got, but which I knew must be funny because my mom and the rest of my family sure thought so.  Laughing about our family lore – the inside jokes and stories that made me so glad I was a Murphy.  Looking through family photos this past week, I was struck by how many of them capture all of us laughing – you can almost see the tears streaming down our faces in some of them.

Even as she got sicker and less herself, she kept her wonderful sense of humor, and seeing it pop up was always a bright spot in my visits with her these past few years.  Not long after my folks celebrated their 50th anniversary, I asked her if she had any words of wisdom about how they had stayed married for so long.  Her instant reply: "Nope.  Just a lack of imagination."

I can't truly express how delightful it was to hear her crack that joke.  It was playful, hopeful, hilarious...and just so completely her.  

Thank you mom, for the gift of caring about the world.  Bob talked about her many causes, the organizations she supported and the ways she was an activist here in Sonoma and beyond.  Talking with my family this week, I realized how many things she was involved with that I had no idea about – and my dad even remarked that some of her philanthropic efforts even he never knew about.  Hers was not a “selfie” kind of activism – it never would have occurred to her talk about, much less promote, her contributions.
 
The cause that left the biggest impression on me as a kid was her involvement with Sonoma Action for Nuclear Disarmament, and the weekly vigils she attended at the Plaza.  She stood there, with her candle and peace sign, every single week.  As a kid, I admit I sort of thought “What the heck is the point of that?  Standing there with a candle?  In this tiny town?  That’s IT?”  I didn’t have the long view then.  But now I think she did even more than bring about nuclear disarmament for our entire country and world: just as significant to me, her daughter, was the example she embodied, of standing for what she believed in and of doing whatever she could to shape the world she wanted to live in. 

This past January, I went to the women’s march in Oakland with a group of friends – other moms I know from soccer fields and birthday parties.  And every single of them said that this was the first time they had ever participated in ANY kind of march or demonstration: to which I responded: “Seriously???”  As our friend Kaeti Bailie joked when I told her this story: “WHO RAISED YOU?”  Not Rose Murphy, who carried many a protest sign in her day, most frequently one that proclaimed peace and love.  I learned from her life long example that you show up for the things you care about and that gestures large and small make a powerful difference, sometimes in ways you don’t expect.

Thank you mom, for the gift of literature and language. 
Mom was a huge reader, and as a teenager and young adult I got most of my reading recommendations from her.  Great novels, volumes of Irish poetry, the ever-present New Yorker magazine – these were some of her favorite things, and were always ways she and I connected.

And clearly, mom was a gifted writer.  In her books, articles, and reflections, she knew how to express herself, how to make ideas clear and tell captivating stories.  Her writing is now, for me, a way to continue my conversations with her, to keep getting to know her and learn from her.  Reading Dervla, The Secret Irish Bard, is particularly delightful – her creativity and imagination leap from the page.  I am grateful beyond measure that as my children grow up – and their own children someday -- they will be able to read her words and get to know the beautiful woman she was.

Even today, she is still giving.  Because of who she was to each of us, and to each of you, I am still receiving gifts and blessings from her.  So many of you have shared stories with us about how she helped you or how much fun you had together. I’ve heard about her college days, her San Francisco days, her wonderful friendship to others, and her contributions to Sonoma – each story is another gift, and each of you has helped fill in the gaps that a daughter naturally has in understanding her mother.  It is a joy, even as we have to let her go, to see more fully the impact she had and the ripples of love she spread in every direction.

So thank you, mom, for bringing all of these people together today; thank you for the countless ways you actively loved us, your family, and the entire world. Thank you for showing me how beautiful each person is in the eyes of God.  I love you, I miss you, and I look forward to being with you again. 

20 August 2017

SUSTENANCE

Charlottesville is consuming me. I admit to being obsessed with all the coverage and interviews. It cannot be good for me to watch too much CNN and listen to too many talking heads, but I cannot look away. I am fascinated by how human beings can grow such hate in their hearts and minds, hate that leads them to see others as less than human. It’s a specific kind of selfishness that is truly terrifying. It’s fear. It has always been fear and it will always be fear.

Look into your own family, look at the people you love. Why do they lash out, why do they do hurtful things, even to people they love?  Fear.  


I look at my own children, who I know are good and kind people, and I’m shocked multiple times a week at how vicious they can be with each other, how immediately defensive they are when they feel threatened and fearful. If they are about to get in trouble, if they know they did something hurtful, if they think they are about to get steamrolled -- they are virulently defensive. They feed each other to the wolves.

It’s disheartening to see, partly because it suggests that we, their parents, aren’t doing a very good job at helping them navigate interpersonal relationships. We want them to know, in their hearts, the power of a sincere apology, of raw empathy and kindness. As parents, we know that these things are the foundation of relationships that sustain us and ultimately bring us peace and joy.

Relationships that sustain us: this is what we need in our culture and communities. What is so terribly sad to me is to look back 25 years, to the way I saw the world when I first joined the Jesuit Volunteer Corps, and to recognize that at that time, I thought I lived in a progression that was taking the country forward. I thought I was on and part of a path that was bringing more good into the world, more love and compassion, more empathy and understanding. Less divisiveness.

But when I look at what’s happening -- everything from the Neo-Nazi violence in Charlottesville, to the way we attack "neglectful" parents when their children get hurt, to the relentless viciousness of social media -- I am chilled by how far it seems we have gone in the other direction. Children of the world, THIS is why parents are alarmed at what the culture is teaching you, showing you and planting in you. We do not want you to look around and see the nastiness and the vapidness and grow up breathing that air. I do not want my daughters to see the Kardashians, laugh at the shallowness with which that family is portrayed for the sake of ratings, and simply be entertained. I do not want my sons to see tasteless memes about sex, and simply be amused.

There is a through line, for me, between these mindless, slippery slope allowances and the hate and hurt assaulting our communities. Both are about demeaning others and putting things (profit? power?) before people. Neither will ever help us build the relationships we need.

When Trump was elected, I wept bitterly because I felt fear. It was, then, an unnamed fear of something sinister coming, or more rightly, being revealed. I knew, in my bones, that the weeks and months ahead would be filled with things that would make me ache for people, for my children and for the children of people I don't understand, like the neo-nazi's filling the TV screen. Watching recent days unfold, I feel as though I am watching my fears materialize, those fears of what Trump’s presidency would usher in. I knew this would happen. Standing in my kitchen on election night, I wept each time my son came in to tell me that another state had been called for Trump. And I knew we should be bracing ourselves for ugliness, for the infliction of pain and for all manner of affronts to human dignity and goodness. I knew Charlottesville was coming.

How can simple human kindness make a difference? It doesn't seem strong enough in the face of hate marches and seas of swastikas and weaponized cars. It doesn't seem like enough, until I look at the most important times in my own life, those that have transformed me and brought me peace. They are all intimate and personal occasions of connection -- falling in love, the birth of a child, listening to a friend's story of suffering.  The private moments when we are most present to each other are the moments that make us the strongest.  

This is my activism, paying attention to the private moments that connect us all and looking for more and more of them to sustain me.

My children, my sweet children, those I’ve given birth to and those I haven't, I know who you are. I know you are made of goodness and kindness to your core. I know, and you know, that the behavior we are witnessing is antithetical to love and humanity. Find ways to rise above your own fear and defensiveness; find ways to rise above others’ as well. Reject, resist, and repel the hatred you see swirling around us. Learn about it, understand what is out there, but turn to the people around you and cultivate the habits of being that drive out hate. Start with the people closest to you, then turn outwards to others, but keep it going. Never stop radiating love, patience and empathy. Never, ever stop. You are what the world needs now.

30 January 2017

Thank God for Freezing Soccer Mornings

We were up at 6am, in rural Turlock, California, ready to cheer on a field full of 10-year olds competing in their early morning State Cup Quarterfinal.

It was 34 degrees outside -- not so impressive if you're playing winter soccer in Chicago, or New York, or Kansas, but pretty freakin' cold if you happen to be 10-year old California girls and their parents.

The grass crunched beneath our feet. We blew frosty smoke rings from our mouths. We stomped our feet and talked about how it was damn cold but WOW it could be even colder, and at least the sun was out.

We cheered on our girls, hoping to will them to victory with our support and encouragement. And then, we felt heartsick and helpless as we watched them go down in defeat. We fretted to each other that they deserved this win, that the score didn't tell the real story.

We joked "At least we'll get our Sunday back," since by midway through the second half it was clear that we weren't returning for a 2pm Semifinal. None of us really wanted our Sunday back.

We high fived the losing team -- our daughters -- as they ran by our outstretched hands at the end of it all. I slapped my own daughter's hand as she ran by in a blur, and saw eyes full of tears and a face crumpled in torment. She, with visions of being the next Carly Lloyd, had run smack dab into the wall of 10-year old failure and was feelin' it, big time.

We took the team to crepes afterwards, in rural, sleepy Turlock, where we enjoyed the parent table a few feet from the player table, where they stuffed themselves with crepes piled high with nutella and strawberries and whipped cream: no need for our young athletes to be smart and healthy with no afternoon game beckoning.

It was a bittersweet morning, and I will forever love these days, as gut-wrenching as they can be.

The owners of the Creperie in rural, sleepy Turlock were absolutely thrilled to see us pile into their small cafe. Thrilled, cheerful, welcoming, and then, as our large group kept streaming in, ever so slightly panicked and then downright stressed out by the impact we had on their three crepe machine establishment. It took forever to get our food. For. Eh. Ver.

The owners of the Creperie in rural, sleepy Turlock are, as it happens, Syrian immigrants.

That’s how we spent our Sunday morning, and thank God we did. Because had I not been there, riding the wave and crash of U11 competitive soccer, I would have been in front of a screen somewhere, swallowing up the fear and rage that I find rising in me lately when I see my Facebook feed, check Twitter for the current outrage, and scan npr.org’s pages.

There are more than enough horrors happening in our country these days to fill our every moment and every breath. There are marches to go to and phone calls to make and airports to occupy. There are difficult conversations to have – with people we agree with as much as those we don’t. If we are to be responsible and well-informed, we have to do the work to make sure we are getting real information.

We will see more horrors. Of course we will. The time to wonder if this will be the thing that does him in is over. The time to make this – or the next thing, or the thing after that – be the thing that wakes up our country and unites us in ridding ourselves of this orange cancer is here and now.

But for today, I am grateful for the freezing cold pitch beneath my feet and the chance to watch my daughter lose her soccer game, because I needed a wee-bit of a break from the chaos of the real world. Today, I am grateful for delicious crepes, sweet balm after a tough loss, prepared with love and enthusiasm by a lovely Syrian couple now living in the middle of California.

My daughter is sleeping on the couch next to me, still in her stinky soccer socks.

Tomorrow morning, she will shower. And tomorrow morning, I will call some US Representatives who need to know that I oppose Betsy De Vos’s nomination as Education Secretary and that I want him or her to vote against it. Tomorrow, I will tell a friend of mine that yes, I will go with her to my local representative’s office to thank him for opposing DJT so far and to let him know that I expect him to continue to do exactly that at every turn. Tomorrow, I will search for reliable news sources, and I will resist the click bait that beckons me and my righteous indignation.

Today, I am grateful that I got to watch my 10-year old daughter play her heart out and lose her State Cup Quarterfinal. There’s always next year, and maybe we can go back and visit the Syrians.


01 January 2017

What Can Be Our Response?

Here is an unspeakable secret: paradise is all around us and we do not understand.
It is wide open. The sword is taken away,
but we do not know it. I am present
without knowing it at all, in this unspeakable paradise, and I behold this secret, this wide open secret which is there for everyone, free.
– Thomas Merton 
Thank you, Thomas Merton, for your words, and thank you to my friend Linda for sharing them on Facebook this morning to usher in 2017.

Perhaps this is what all angst and anxiety stem from: we are present in unspeakable paradise without knowing it, even while we search for it high and low, with desperation and urgency.  We are searching for that paradise with every resolution, every firm decision to be better, do better, love better.  Paradise is all around us: why don't we see it?  Why aren't we aware of every moment we are living in it?  Why don't we know it?

That existential crisis will be even more palpable in this, our beloved country, as we watch Donald J. Trump assume the mantle of leadership and tweet his strange brand of narcissism and megalomania into the world.  

What can be our response, not only to Trump but to the slings and arrows of daily, difficult, wrenching life?  We must see, enjoy, create, share and demand beauty.  We must make something beautiful and put it out into the world.  We must light that small candle in the darkness.  We must.  It is essential.  It is all that matters.  

Write.  Make music.  Paint.  Draw.  Grow things.  Tend to animals.  Read.  Cook.  Teach.  Design.  Push.  Resistance takes a million forms, so pick the one that fits you like a warm and loving sweater, but pick one or you will spend your time in this paradise feeling cold and shackled.  Pick one, so that you can begin to see the paradise all around you.  Pick one: it is there for you, for everyone, free.

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Open A Drawer

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