love

The Ranking of Souls

~ heroin heroine

Many years ago my private school introduced DEIJ exercises (diversity, equity, inclusion and justice) during one of our teacher training days. It was a fairly new concept at the time and we prided ourselves on being progressive. It was my day off so I missed the initial session. I was told it began with teachers lined up in a straight line at the far end of a large green field. Questions were asked and if answered in the affirmative you took a giant step forward.

Questions like:
Did you grow up in a two parent home?
As a child did you have food security?
Has your family remained free of incarceration/justice system?
Do you feel welcome in most group settings?
Do you identify as white?
Did you receive a higher education?
Do you own your own home?

Yeses bred more yeses – exponentially. Looking around the field it must have been apparent that a secure upbringing reaped de-facto future benefits. Of course this was the reason for the exercise.

This part of the day I understood.

Later the teachers were handed a worksheet to rank whom they would choose to live with on a deserted island. People such as carpenter, doctor, professor, captain, Gilligan. Okay, it didn’t include Gilligan – but it did include two other distinct prototypes: violent criminal and drug addict.

I was told the drug addict came in last.

Logic must have escaped my fellow teachers. Who chooses to live with someone who is violent vs. someone who suffers from addiction? In a setting without laws or law enforcement why favor the criminal? And what kind of violent criminal are we talking about? If the crime was motivated by greed can they share limited supplies? If driven by power can they live within a democratic structure? Do they have a history of destruction of private property, assault, murder or rape? Do these tendencies evaporate on a deserted beach?

In all honesty, I wouldn’t rush to choose a person suffering from substance use disorder (SUD) either. The scientist, the boat builder, the storyteller – they have obvious benefits. But the person with SUD wouldn’t be last. Admittedly they can be violent: but it’s nearly always in pursuit of their drug. (Which, hello, makes it a non sequitur on a deserted island!) It is also true that active drug users are inconsistent contributors to a functioning society. But active addiction requires access to a drug.

At the time these exercises occurred my teenage daughter was in prison for her addiction. I was angry upon learning of my fellow teacher’s decision making process. It seemed curiously uncaring for a group of progressive educators. And if statistics ring true nearly every one of them knew someone suffering from the disease of addiction. Did they not believe in recovery? Could they not see the human inside? I understand the “eyes wide shut” response. Maybe they didn’t want to look too closely. And then there is the daydream of many a worn out caregiver: life on a deserted island! On this island we never bring our problematic family. We are alone, reading a book, tilting our noses to the welcoming sun.

I considered the human tendency to dislike in others what we dislike in ourselves. Many of us struggle with over-indulgence, keeping our word, consistency, making permanent lifestyle changes. So maybe it was as simple as not wanting to look at themselves.

I am not sure. I will never be sure. It’s too late now to go back and ask. And I don’t know if people would be honest with me. But I do know I was left with a vision: my daughter moving backwards across that green field; like a chess piece being cleared from the board. Thoughtlessly removed when she could still bring so much to the game.

Adult Woman Buys Self Teddy Bear

~ heroin heroine ~ 3 Comments

Buckled into the front passenger seat of my Honda CRV is a medium size teddy bear. The scruffy kind. His golden eyes stare dutifully ahead. Even when I hit snow drifts and his ear shook from the weight of his thick Vermont Teddy Bear tag: he remained resolute.

I bought him earlier today. At a pastel colored factory with a view of snow capped mountains and a sliver of Lake Champlain. When the little dark haired boy at the register asked me who he was for – I did not say for myself. But Bear knew he belonged to me. Upon checkout I stopped them from sealing him up inside a brown cardboard box. No worries, I explained, I can carry him out. As if I was environmentally conscious instead of emotionally needy.

I won’t name him beyond ‘Bear.’
Bear seems about right.

When my kids were little they called their goldfish “fishy,” their mouse “mousy” and their long-haired hamster “fluffy.” I used to laugh at what appeared to be a lack of imagination before chalking it up to language reinforcement.

We also had a gerbil called Blackie. (He was black, of course.) Upon returning home one afternoon my daughter and I stumbled upon an unfortunate scene. His little wire cage had been ripped apart, and he was being freshly spit out from our terriers mouth: his body wet and irreparably broken.

With both hands wrapped tightly around the dog’s collar, my daughter dragged her to the bathroom and slammed the door shut behind them. Rushing to listen, ear to closed door, I heard her say over and over “I forgive you, I forgive you, I forgive you – but you should not have done this terrible thing.”

My heart broke in that impossible moment.
To have such a little girl.

I look at Bear now and he tells me to stop being so sentimental.
He tells me that it’s just part of the stuff of life – like his own recycled cotton stuffing. Just another

Dog
Gerbil
Girl
Mom
Bear.

Modern Love

~ heroin heroine ~ 2 Comments

There is a program on National Public Radio that does a spectacularly good job at deconstructing a word most of us feel we can confidently define: love.

In one episode Jason Alexander narrates his love for the family goldfish. The loss of someone close to him has forged his affection for this swimmingly simple little golden fish. Its presence represents an escape, and an embracing, of the crumbling reality of existence.

Can love be tempered by unpleasant realities? The program would say yes. Most of us, especially those of us with decades of life behind us, would agree.

We all have our own “modern love” story. Mine would be about my daughter, who many might describe as hard to love.  They would be wrong.

Admittedly, she was hard to snuggle.  She preferred the plastic embrace of her car seat. The car seat could be parked far from me: she was happy with any room, any corner. She tracked me with her eyes, but she tracked other things with equal interest. I took to forcibly putting her in a snuggly and walking up and down the street with her.

Glowering was also a specialty. She was a beautiful blonde baby with fat pink cheeks, green eyes, and a perma-scowl. Her mouth, right from the get-go, had a natural down turn to it. Glowering with the addition of defiantly crossed arms came later. When asked to give her name during her kindergarten interview she stood up, turned her chair backward to the teacher, crossed her arms, and sat down. She remained that way for the entire interview.

My husband and I remained enamored. (Why should she perform tricks like a trained seal? Maybe we have the next Hillary!) We affectionately nicknamed her “little black cloud.” We would mimic her mood in a dreary Eeyore voice – desperately trying to add some EB White levity to our situation. Sometimes we would just mime a “brewing storm”  by circling our fluttering hand over our weary heads.

But of course at this young age it isn’t about them loving you. It’s about you loving them.

Loving her could be exhausting. It wasn’t easy for my daughter to accept love. She appeared to weigh it, to quantify it – to find it lacking. She was often displeased. I came to see it as her natural default button. She screamed about sitting in the cart at the grocery store. She screamed at her older sister to claim the best barbie. She screamed if she could hear you chewing during dinner. She screamed for the last cookie, to hold mommy’s hand, to find the most Easter eggs. She screamed over minor transitions. It was relentless. Her ability to express love was buried under an itchy blanket of sensory issues, fear, jealousy, and an unshakeable sadness.

But she loved us too. It was apparent in the way she would fit herself to your side when watching a Disney movie. And in the occasional half smile with tilted head. In the way she kissed her dog’s bearded face. And the gifts of found flowers or crayoned pictures.

So, yeah, love is not only tempered by unpleasant realities… in can grow in them. It may even grow hardier. We are living proof.  We are the dandelions of love.