Dear
Readers,
RantWoman is not sure every bad idea that muddles through her head needs to be committed to electrons but RantWoman is seasoning....
RantWoman
is pondering whether she has some kind of unusual gift. Besides ableism, RantWoman seems to be particularly adept at
evoking gaslighting, bullying and feeling blown off from members of Care and
Council. RantWoman is pondering what would happen if she just said “look
Friends, y’all are doing just a fabulous job of plowing into family landmines
related to The Famous Sex Offender Announcement. What can you suggest???? Or is Care and Counsel ony for everyone but RantWoman?”
If all are
lucky, RantWoman’s sarcasm filter WILL kick in, at least long enough to pen the
following item addressed to a Weighty Friend.
A blast
from the past for no obvious reason
Dear Friend
who thought Growling at RantWoman would help,
Remember Sudoku?
Remember you said you did not LIKE Sudoku? RantWoman is considering
retroactively telling you to take that up with God. Time was, Sudoku in Meeting
for Worship was a heaven-sent path away from weird headaches and toward
adjustment to dramatically changed vision.
Dear Friend
who thought Growling at RantWoman would help
Thank you
for talking to Friend S about Worship and Ministry’s request that I not attend
Business Meeting. A couple feedback items while I season various pieces. If
anyone just need to stop here and hold in the Light, please do.
1.
I want to
hold the issues of people who cannot be in the room with me, but “It’s about
the community” one refrain I heard implies I do not care about the community. “We
need time to heal” also annoys me because I do not get a choice about timeline
and taking a break. I am not particularly motivated to deprive the community of
the experience of figuring out this pray and worship together thing. Friend S
says your thought is for people to figure out something helpful. Some of the
time I want to bless that. Some of the
time I wonder how the heck are people going to figure out what works FOR ME
without me in the room. For now I will add “Nothing about us without us” to my
list of concepts to include in a list of terms and resources which I have heard
a clear request for. Some of the time, I want to point out numerous points
where thinking about more than one person yields approaches that provide everyone
a sense of small things they can do that matter.
2.
Right now I
am frustrated about a community piece because Madam Clerk wants people working
on disability actually to meet before we come to Business Meeting. Based on
communications so far I want to do things in different order and see whether I
can convince someone besides the three people who volunteered that the project
will be fun just based on business meeting. I did mean to schedule phone or
email moment before this business meeting but that did not happen.
3.
I get there
are issues of losing one’s temper, but for you or Friend S or anyone else with
more or less normal vision to say “it’s not about the blindness” is ableist. I
collect LOTS of articles about the roles vision plays in communication. I had a
wonderful very helpful conversation one time with Friend J about her mother and
macular degeneration and a whole bunch of annoying blind person behaviors which
urk, I have enough vision to be annoyed by AND not enough vision to avoid
myself. Talk about the bonus plan. Anyway my point: it’s not ONLY about the
blindness sort of kind of unless one also figures that being triggered out of
one’s mind is somehow separate from blindness too.
4.
Care and
Accountability committee told me Madam Clerk asked me to sit down several times
in December. Madam Clerk remembers me standing a lot and I DO feel like I had
plenty of space to speak, too much if one counts losing my temper with Not an
Idiot friend. I had COMPLETELY blacked out any request to sit down. You said
something about I was too triggered AND needed to leave. I WAS triggered but
that is exactly why it was unsafe for me to try to leave. I appreciate astute
questions that came up in conversation with two wise young Friends about that
topic. I meant it about not very safe for me and for anyone around me. However,
I also automatically bristle at “someone gets triggered so they must leave,”
which also has sorry precedent from life on Worship and Ministry. What the
#$($@( kind of wimpy God are we talking about that cannot help with these rough
spots?
5.
Except for
Friend K talking about Nominating committee and not realizing I was talking about
before he was on the committee and you talking about Dec vs November minutes. I
could not tell you who said what about the minutes editing conversation. I do
not know whether it is good or bad that I decided it has to be okay that a
bunch of listening and info chunk bookkeeping I do most of the time completely
shut down. I suppose it is okay to feel enough safety to live with that, except
for continuing issues with silencing in minutes AND I get that it is very
distressing for others to watch triggering. Some people who run meetings though
are better at breathing and letting things settle than others. I decided I
could not even pay attention to that partly because Madam Clerk gets to deal and I also hit a
fabulous “go talk to your counselor point which business meeting does not
particularly get to solve until I distill the piece that belongs there as with
my flashback in worship Sunday.
6.
I do not
know whether it is obvious to Friend PK, but I get really badly triggered in
C&A committee meetings sometimes. I can kind of articulate some things that
happen because of it but the short version, to be repeated in multiple contexts
would be “if you want RantWoman to get triggered less in Meetings then take her
advice about how to cut down on the triggering. That is part of the impetus
behind an accessibility focus committee AND I need space to articulate my
thinking about that but not here for time reasons.
7.
Sunday the
C&A committee were exactly at the same place as Nom Comm years ago was when
they decided everything to do with disability was off topic. The only thing Nom
Comm wanted to talk about was why won’t I resign. On top of your “it’s not
about the blindness” thread, Sunday I made multiple attempts to talk about an
email where I gave people opportunities to think about some what works what
does not work points, In particular One item I sent was about physical
accessibility issues getting to a really great event. I tweeted the organizer
and she was great. She said I was not the only blind person who complained and
then I am sorry that happened and we will try to do better in the future. That
was EXACTLY the right thing. Some version of that apology would go a LONG way
for me around Meeting, but I also am peculiarly stuck about needing to hear
such in a speaker’s own words and I do not know what to do with that wish
8.
all anyone
at the C&A meeting wanted to talk about was “will you stay away on Sunday.”
I consider it great progress that by the end of the meeting at least some
people were willing to think about a half and half scenario.
9.
I do feel
like I need to think about someone I trust to sit next to me sometimes. Young Friend
D mentioned having someone I trust sit next to me and she is one of the people
I would ask to do that except she is only unevenly in business meeting. So I am
trying to think about other names and not automatically clicking. But agreeing
IN ADVANCE is important.
10.
In C&A
we also had to me annoying comments about minutes, comments which do not need
Dial a tirade right now but as a multiple time recording clerk I kind of have
strong opinions about. I do quaintly think minutes can help people see month to
month if progress is occurring about things that might need more attention than
one Friend’s record it for a hundred years standard.
Love and
Blessings!
RantWoman
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