Cornucopia with street crossing

Below is an actual email from RantWoman's archive with time stamps preserved. RantWoman retrieved it while factchecking who actually was present at a long ago Nominating Committee meeting where everything to do with disability was declared off topic. Who? Not one person RantWoman mentioned, but a different former Clerk of many things.

 

From: Friend whose current title implies one MIGHT wish to be able to expect more of her, aka "It's not Good for the Community Friend" before RantWoman managed to speak when she desparately needed to speak to someone of the Grab the Blind Person and bless them issue presented here.

Date: Tue, 14 Jun 2011 19:08:32 -0700 (PDT)

Subject: Re: It's about crossing the street

To: (RantWoman)

 

(emphasis added)

too much to read, RantWoman (with RantWoman's first name misspelled).

I do catch a desire to go slow and breathe, though

 

________________________________

From: RantWoman

To: Friend whose title ...as above

Cc: Previous holder of said title

Sent: Tue, June 14, 2011 5:37:46 AM

Subject: It's about crossing the street

 

Hi Friend

 

Thank you for the phone conversation last night.

 

Thank you for the thought about everyone having pain and suffering

being a choice. I think there is a difference between letting pain

show and suffering. More than one person has said I have seemed more

frustrated recently than in the past. Well, duh! On the other hand, I

decided about the time I turned 40 that I was going to stop pretending

that some lifelong problems didn't cause difficulty. If it has taken

this long and 2 detached retinas and a whole bunch of other stuff for

other people to notice, maybe I have been doing too good a job of

pretending for a long time.

 

There is a difference though between letting pain show and suffering.

If I let pain show it's because I do not have energy to keep hiding it

or because there are really good practical reasons I need to live in

physical reality. People should not assume that because I am letting

pain show that I am suffering. I am not letting pain show to cause

other people suffering. If others suffer on my account, God bless them

but it's not something I mean to cause. …

 

On the other hand, I am not exempt from responsibility for causing

pain if the cause is within my control and part of the whole said committee thing

really IS a sincere effort to figure out whether I am causing other

pain in a way I can control and need to fix OR whether I just need to

take up space for my reality the same way everyone else does about

children and travel plans and concert schedules. At this point I think

there is both but I am not getting good signals because of people not

dealing with what looks different because of vision loss. And then a

bunch of supposed elders need to consider whether we can TRY to

address conflicts like grownups. I am sorry the answer with the

current lot seems to be NO and people basically stopped talking and

being willing to interact.

 

So that's one issue with my continuing proviso regarding people

talking ABOUT me, not TO ME.

 

But back to Drama in Meeting for Business. Thank you for mentioning my

nomination. Again, I expect that was considerably more talking ABOUT

me than talking TO me. Very few people realize half the issue has to do with crossing the street and the other half has to do with my repeated ccrack about Hospitality Committee being pastoral care plus knives and hot liquids. Whatever do I mean?

 

I actually LIKE going walking with a certain Friend. (For the record, Conflict Is a Gift of God Friend)  I have lots of people in my life with mobility challenges. That Friend has bad knees but he sets a better pace than lots of other people I frequently travel with. He has ONE problem though: he is a lousy sighted guide in the first place but in the second he thinks I should be willing just to expect that multiple lanes of traffic will see my white cane at numbers of times when it looks to me like he is just unwilling to walk to the stop light. In split second decisions, I don't need to argue

with that Friend. I don't need other people to season things for a few millenia. I just need not to get run over.

 

The knives and hot liquids issue has to do partly I guess with me still needing space for some feelings about vision loss and with an incident involving that Friend and another Friend I have also had occasion to observe over time in Meeting and out of Meeting. Both have

hidden disabilities and it actually took ME many MONTHS of reflection to get a couple really important points about what was under anyone's control and what was not. There are BIG hold tenderly points on both sides of that incident AND big issues of ME needing to come to a

better centered place about issues on both sides. I am of two minds about whether any of that should have played out in more detail in Meeting for Business. Like I say, there are BIG hold tenderly points which are not "Get out of jail free." I don't think it's necessarily terrible for a community to know each other's sore places. In general I think the choice to bring it up belongs to the person involved BUT I think there is room for Friends to observe and then decisions about

how to handle tenderly, a point where I know there is various history in Meeting.

 

These points are tangled with some other bad boundaries on my part and with some other basic respect for my time issues and some other vulnerability because for instance of new barriers for me about reading. Then there are some other Quaker world according to that

Friend not being world according to others points. Only the latter really made it to Meeting for Business. When I find ways to take responsibility for my own needs and see past my personal rage and irritation, I think some of what happened was a valuable exercise in

Quaker process and in seeing what Friends get or don't get. I do not

think my nomination was the best vehicle for that. In fact, if I wanted to be in suffering mode, I could have a really big tirade about a number of isms and why (RantWoman) instead of other vehicles but sometimes we go with what we have. Business Meeting is on the minds of

multiple people in our community and I expect more will work itself

out in the fullness of time.

 

But why IN THIS CASE let things go to Business Meeting?

 

One reason is the talking ABOUT vs talking TO.

 

Another issue is that I have FULL STOPS about people not even trying with a clearness committee and about the decision being made not involving a conversation among all committee members and no interaction with my question about how is Spirit moving among us. I think this is a particularly big problem because I frequently experience the incoming clerk as very disrespectful and dismissive and

insensitive about others' reactions and because I do not see the other

people wanting to throw me off the committee as being able to model conflict resolution.

 

Still another reason is how little respect Nominating Committee showed for my time and discernment. Because no one on W&M talked to me directly, I ONLY got secondhand mush when ( 2 Friends) talked to me.


At that point, I took IMMEDIATE action to try to get direct

information and made LOTS of efforts to hear people.

 

[In the conversation referenced here, members of Nominating Committee including a VERY Weighty Friend declared everything to do with disability and reasonable accommodations off-topic]

Conversations with Nom Comm were all about why won't I resign. When I

tried to explain interactions between(a certain committee) experience and

accommodations, I heard NO willingness by Nom Comm to reconsider. I

stand by the point that came up multiple times that I was called to

ask whether Nom Comm was seasoning the wrong questions.

 

I had told Nom Comm multiple times multiple ways that I was unclear

but that knowing what roster they intended to propose might have made

a difference in my discernment. I finally sent (members of Nominating Committee) a "cut

the crap" email on Saturday night and when I saw there were no new

names, I became VERY clear that I needed to be heard. IF there had

been new names, I am not sure how I would have been led differently

but I definitely would have been led differently. At this point I am

clear about some "we are all ministers of God" points and that is

enough said for now.

 

(paragraph omitted)

 

In the Light

 

RantWoman

Eeyore does Hanukkah? Night 6

The pink one

Note the Christmas cactus of Quaker provenance

 

RantWoman has meant to post something every night of Hanukkah. That has not happened.

 

RantWoman always remembers a player from Scrabble club who was Jewish. She died fairly young of cancer. She worked at a Christmas gifts store and kept working there until the end because she needed health insurance. She definitely had mixed feelings.

 

Tonight if RantWoman were more focused she would go find the radio story about the Jewish Santa. Or the short stories about Hanukkah and children who are different in the Christmas jumble.

 

Instead, RantWoman is going to grab the theme of being different for herself. See RantMom is a little bit magic-challenged. If it were up to RantMom, no one would have told the RantChildren about either Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny.  RantWoman as oldest child definitely has some bewildered memories of people asking her about “Santy Claus.” At some point by the time the other Rant siblings appeared, RantMom relented and went with the cultural flow.  RantWoman is probably not even going to try to confirm her memories with RantMom because RantMom would probably deny them anyway.

 

 RantWoman is not even sure about the tooth fairy though baby teeth fall out around school age. RantWoman still thinks Little Sister knew more about such magic than RantWoman but has NO idea how  that occurred..  In the Rant household in the middle of last century, RantWoman thinks the going rate for lost teeth was maybe 25 cents. RantWoman definitely remembers some school friends whose household tooth fairies delivered up to $5, In other words, in tooth fairy land, you get the parents you get and inspiration and magic are going to have to wait for another day.

Hanukkah 5 The Maccabeats - I Have a Little Dreidel - Hanukkah

Nothing like the dreidel song with materials science and several different music formats. Bluegrass. Techno. rap?

Hanukkah 2

A decidedly unmiraculous and unheroic way to observe Hanukkah. We are richer for diversity. 


Text of the image:
Unpacked our Nativity Scene yesterday. Removed all the Jews, Arabs, and foreigners. Ended up with a jackass and a handful of sheep.

For Hanukkah 1

Europe's anti-Semitism and ours NYT

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/29/opinion/antisemitism-europe-jews.html


A hate crime in West Seattle.
https://westseattleblog.com/2018/11/no-to-anti-semitism-in-west-seattle-and-everywhere-demonstration-planned-sunday

Advent and Skä•noñh - Great Law of Peace Center - Thanksgiving Address

RantWoman means this partly as an initial meditation for the first Sunday in Advent. Insert Bible passages as led.

Cornucopia???

Pink

 

“…not sure we can keep you in our community…”

 

“OUR community” or maybe GOD’s community???

 

WTF??? Did RantWoman hear you correctly???? I mean, you know that part about the pastoral care committees insisting in Business meeting on giving the community blanket permission to ignore RantWoman’s emails? Ignoring emails has been working so well so far, right? What could POSSIBLY go wrong now, meaning besides just fabulous timing colliding with the season of multiple RantWoman personal emotional minefields? Seriously! RantWoman is having enough trouble separating the actually occurring present tense OWWW’s from the past ones lying around for the oblivious to plow into.

 

Ya wanna hassle RantWoman? Get in Line! And NO, you do not get to season this one on one with RantWoman. RantWoman’s head is about to explode. RantWoman is pretty sure that NO single person can or should even try to do “everything” but that different members of the community TOGETHER in lots of small ways CAN make a big difference about lots of things.

 

So how about we start with just one slice of things on RantWoman’s mind, in sort of reverse chronological order except when memory is non-linear?


Upcoming (well, now past) bad bus driver day anniversary… documented elsewhere
 
A recent convention featuring acute grieving for two pillars of the organization, the absurd juxtaposition of blind people who have concealed carry permits and a presentation about active shooters, and a lucky student who connected with badly needed help, not to mention a couple vivid illustrations of the power and importance of sticking up for oneself about fair housing and guide doguser rights.

 RantWoman forgot to mention a detail from a recent scholarship reception: besides the cash door prize and the subsequent purchase of raffle tickets, one of the awardees introduced herself: “I am blind because I got queer bashed.”

Deceased University of WY student Matthew Shepard has finally been laid to rest. In particular he has been Interred at the national cathedral. RantWoman notes the final resting place. RantWoman more importantly shakes thinking of Gay piano teacher who survived the University of WY in the late 1950’s

Here we add a jumble of events from Meeting life: the long struggle over same-gender marriage, recent mention f a long out of date book, a reflection during Annual Session about someone getting to travel all over NPYM being spokeskid for same-gender marriage.

 

RantWoman is a little unclear about thespokes kid timeline.

 

Probably somewhere after all the things that could not be said in high school including the nice Baptists who could almost deal with gay musicians and had NO tools for a pedophile creep who specialized in boys whose parents were too uptight to talk about sex. RantWoman has spent decades doing that forgive 70 x 7 thing, years, cataloguing all the things that made … more vulnerable than average. And the fact that rage usually breaks out once or twice this time of year may or may not mean anyone has in the present tense  done anything wrong, as opposed to clueless.

Or was the spokeskid when RantWoman and Blind roommate were cooling our heels one summer playing pinball at a bar called Debasement. (Blind Roommate regularly beat RantWoman!)  Was it when a physics grad student and some others and RantWoman were shepherding the addition of something to do with LGBT+ equality through the college process into the diversity statement (quotable quote from a highly placed official: “…always welcome the um, er, diverse…”)

 


Or was it when the office manager at the SANE office noted one day to RantWoman and Amazing Artist friend “you two would like each other.”

 

So go ahead. Be brokenhearted if that seems likely to help. Or count your blessings, and consider what makes a difference. And forgive yourself for parts that cannot ever be fixed and trust that fixing the pieces that can be fixed matters.

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