can big ears save the world?

A few months ago I inexplicably developed an allergic reaction to corn. Along with a wheat sensitivity and sugar avoidance, I'm now even more annoyingly in that 21st century category of dinner guests with a mile-long list of dietary special needs. Besides being a pain to my hosts, this limitation is also just a plain drag for me, since I LOVE a good enchilada, crunchy-salty corn chips, and popcorn at the movies.

Now that I think about it, this mysterious reaction developed not too long after seeing Robert Kenner's brilliant Academy Award nominated documentary Food, Inc., "a powerful, startling indictment of industrial food production." (PBS, POV) If you can stomach second helpings, check out also Deborah Koons' terrifying "Future of Food" (2004) and Eric Schlosser's now classic (book and movie) "Fast Food Nation." The films' messages come as no surprise to food justice advocates and folks who have been waving the red flags on health, agri-business and green living for decades. The stark reality of our vulnerability to corporate interests, particularly the devastating story of corn around the planet, is enough to make even a semi-conscious person break out in hives.

Monsanto holds fast to the argument that their genetic breakthroughs are driven by altruistic motives, such as ensuring farmers of explosive "yield potential," boatloads of increased income and the side benefit of conserving habitat for wildlife. (Monsanto) What's not made as clear by the PR spin, is the motivation behind the vaguely Soprano's-like tactics being employed to keep small farmers compliant with the slow but inexorable corporate ingestion of their livelihoods, and some would argue, our lives.

So what's this all got to do with listening, anyway? Can Big Ears really change the world? it's a pretty simple and maybe somewhat counter-intuitive approach to social change: leveraging the double-ear tactic. Being curious. Telling a story. Asking questions instead of sharpshooting answers. Building understanding instead of defense. It all sounds good, until life and livelihood feel threatened and the reptilian brain conspires with the sympathetic nervous system to make sure we're SAFE. We come by it honestly-- fight, flight or freeze are built into the package. But film makers like Kenner, Koons, and Schlosser are the front line of a revolution which will slowly dismantle power structures, institutions, and corporate strangleholds, not through brute strength or intimidation, but the power of story--engaging the listening ears of a public ready to give a deafening response...the vociferous ch-ching of cash registers ringing in organic markets, slow food movements, co-ops, and intensive gardening programs around the planet.

It can't come soon enough. I'm ready for that enchilada.

fast track

A friend of mine has a great behavioral barometer: "Want to know why you're doing something? Stop doing it."

Besides being a test of willpower, the Christian season of Lent can be a testy time, as observant folks run loose without the usual fixes that keep society too hyped up on (fill in the blank...coffee, chocolate, booze, TV) to realize we're riddled with anxiety. I wonder if anyone's done a study on increased accident rates during the 40 days between Ash Wednesday and Easter. Moses fasted for forty days and forty nights, twice; the second time he returned to find the Israelites partying and busted the holy tablets in anger...I can relate after a few weeks without sugar.

The Biblical lesson more commonly referenced among contemporary Christians is the 40 days that Jesus spent in the wilderness before beginning his ministry, a time of being tested by Satan and shoring up his relationship with God--a journey which culminates in Good Friday's crucifixion (kind of makes you want to read the fine print on the release form before repeating that outing) and the resurrection of Easter. So the period of Lent is one marked by abstinence, solemnity, and introspection. Many religious traditions embrace some form of fasting and penitence as a means of drawing closer to God by withdrawing from our human attachments --from the great fast of Ramadan to the penitence of Yom Kippur.

Exploring my ecumenical ways, it's been a while since I've observed a traditional Lent, but always found it a provocative time. One year I gave up using the words "I'm sorry" just to see what would show up in its place. Chocolate, meat, wine, or TV--the tweaks of cravings or temptation of habits invited me to wake up from the sleepy patterns of my daily routine. And, once awake, to lean into the gap that was left when I left my familiar crutches behind. It takes a while to cultivate a taste for sitting in uncomfortable emptiness without shoving a brownie in it. The Buddhists are really on to something here.

Yesterday I sat in St. Lawrence's Basilica with devout Catholic friends visiting from Charlotte. I opened to what I would be willing to leave behind this Lent, what fast would shake things up and make more space for God. The prayer alone felt like a step into the wilderness.

There's hidden sweetness in the stomach's emptiness. We are lutes, no more, no less.

If the soundboxes stuffed full of anything, no music. If the brain and belly are burning clean with fasting, every moment a new song comes out of the fire.

The fog clears, and new energy makes you run up the steps in front of you. Be emptier and cry like reed instruments cry.

Emptier, write secrets with the reed pen.

When you're full of food and drink, Satan sits where your spirit should, an ugly metal statue in place of the Kaaba.

When you fast, good habits gather like friends who want to help.

Fasting is Solomon's ring.

Don't give into some illusion and lose your power,

but even if you have, if you've lost all will and control,

they come back when you fast,

like soldiers appearing out of the ground, pennants flying above them. A table descends to your tents, Jesus' table.

Expect to see it, when you fast, this table spread with other food, better than the broth of cabbages.

~ Rumi ~Ghazal No. 1739 from the Divan-e Shams-e Tabrizi

brave heart

There are a lot of not-so-great parts about getting through a breakup, but one of the toppers has got to be Valentine's Day--especially when said break up is in such close proximity to said "holiday." Everywhere I turn are looming towers of bad milk chocolate in pink cellophane and ubiquitous reminders to remember my sweetie February 14. Ouch. But lest this entry become just another lament on love or diatribe on commercialism, I want to talk about the real issue at hand, or rather, at heart.

Last Sunday I attended an ebullient and gracious religious service during which a congregant got up to share a rather personal valentine's story. He is a family practice physician, and despite the insurance against disease one might guess would come with that line of work, this was the one-year anniversary of his open heart surgery. His talk was accompanied by a slide show with video of his own heart in the operating room, projected in images 5' x 4' on the wall of the sanctuary. He warned us when to close our eyes. I've never been one to look at such things on TV, but the sheer intimacy and courage of such an offering drew me in to watch. I could hear the 7-year old girl sitting next to me, "Yewwww, that's disgusting!" My contorted face echoed her sentiments in silent agreement, but I could not not watch. (Ok, I scrunched up my eyes and closed one in a couple of parts.)

The point of the story-- and the graphic accompaniment --was that in his career as a doctor, he had never successfully resuscitated a patient when applying defibrillation more than 3 times. During his surgery, after the implant was established, the surgeon applied the paddles directly to his heart to prompt the familiar "thum-thump" that would carry the body and the person back into life. The video showed the excruciating suspense of one.. two... three... four... five... six tries. On the sixth, it worked. We breathed a collective sigh of relief, even though the happy ending was standing before us in flesh and (full-on pumping) blood.

Our speaker didn't have to say it: What if the surgeon had given up at the 5th try? In his unsentimental, but transparent account, the man conveyed the almost indescribable gift of appreciating, literally, a second chance at life. This radical experience for which I was an intimate participant truly brought the point home for me. The heart and its vulnerability is magical in myriad ways, and unquestionably a brilliant work of divine design. Being exposed like this invited me to never see this organ the same way again. Watching the grisly images of this fist-sized, miracle mass of muscle--center of our being and energetic seat of love--graphically reminded me of the immensity of life contained in its 11 ounces.

Can we survive a broken heart? Definitely. Then there is rest, and recovery, and healing to be done. Then, what will we do with it? Will we give up on the 5th try? Is it too scary, too fragile to take it back out there? (Well, ummm, YES!) But if we don't, what's the point--isn't that just another kind of death? Most of us would certainly rather not have the pain that's packaged with loving a friend, a child, a parent, a mate. But just like the heart is built to pump 5000 quarts of life-juice each day, we humans are built to love--despite the risks and the breaks and the gluing it back together--because there is also joy to be received, and given, again.

So happy v-day everybody. Brave hearts, all.

p.s. And if you're struggling with the recoverty part, check out this article on Death Bear, the break-up aftercare crusader.

snow going

Hills and trees and houses are frosted with a thick marshmallow frosting of snow that dumped on us last night. The neighborhood is peaceful this morning, put into temporary time-out by Mother Nature. Everything is soft and quiet, no one is jumping up to do their Saturday chores and run out to Walmart. I think we mostly enjoy the forced opportunity to turn off the "go" switch.

So far the only activity of note has been at the several bird feeders hanging outside our window. Always a hot spot, today it's getting even more action, given the limited meal choices imposed by the snowy landscape. Yellow-bellied and downy woodpeckers feast on suet; the brilliant red cardinal stands out in relief against the black and white canvas of the yards below.

The harmonious buffet is suddenly disrupted by a few blackbirds that decide to start a brawl over the suet. Everyone flees the incursion and heads to a nearby copse to wait for the bullies to move on to other territory. There are no diplomats sent to broker a shared agreement; no avian Marshall Rosenberg is dispatched to build a bridge of empathy through communication. The language is clear and not negotiable: the weaker species yield to brute strength and aggressive force--it's just the way it is.

There are plenty of examples in the natural world--happily provided to us in real time via YouTube--of compassion and care among seemingly natural adversaries; the lamb does, on occasion, lie down with the lion--or at least the kitten. The anomaly fascinates and delights us, perhaps with the possibility that even the most primal programming can be overcome with instincts of empathy, nurture and play. Biologists, and social scientists of all stripes continue the debate over whether such models are tenable as examples for homo sapiens to emulate. Read more on one such theory in Frans de Waals book: The Age of Empathy: Nature's Lessons for a Kinder Society.

I am admittedly drawn to inquire and explore the issue of conflict among humans, the more "evolved" species. I want to believe that our human-ness gives us the capacity to act differently, despite the complexities, emotional power and biological legacy of survival that can become triggered when we engaged in even the most quotidian of disagreements.

The thought brings me back to the whole reason I started this blog, Listening for a Change: to ask questions, to venture into the territory of transformation. I am no intrepid explorer--a strange internal brew of something like anxiety mixed with hope prods me forward, usually when I want to run or look the other way.

For me the exploration starts with questions: How can conflict be constructive, rather than destructive? What are the tools we need to transform conflict into greater intimacy, trust, and fulfillment? How do we repair and reconcile relationships that have been severed through betrayal and abuse, even misunderstanding. What does it look like to forgive and to heal? Big stuff. I feel overwhelmed just writing it!

I don't know the answers, but often "I don't know" is a good map to use. I do know that my sweetheart and I are no longer a couple and that parting is painful. A friend and I are in a strained conversation about differing needs. A remark made by someone at lunch "pinched", and I retreated. There's no getting away from it or skipping over it. The way out is through. Hopefully we get to the other side without inflicting more wounds, without having amends to make, by forgiving and being forgiven.

Meanwhile, the hillside is filling with kids and dogs and sleds. Time takes time, healing can be slow going. And a good dose of fun can't hurt either.

Peace. It's not for sissies.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in his 1957 speech Birth of a New Nation, shared a gritty and radical conclusion, based on the influences of his own spirituality and the example and teaching of Mahatma Gandhi:
“The aftermath of nonviolence is the creation of the beloved community. The aftermath of nonviolence is redemption. The aftermath of nonviolence is reconciliation. The aftermath of violence is emptiness and bitterness.”

Images of inconceivable devastation in Haiti have captivated our minds and hearts this week. Yet in the midst of tragedy, there have been countless examples of generosity, humanity, and selflessness.

Perhaps these moments are hopeful glimpses that Martin Luther King's ideal of the "Beloved Community" could be a reality. We have come far, it is true. In Dr. King's day, it was inconceivable that a black U.S. president would be directing intervention efforts in a major international disaster. Still, I want to resist the temptation to focus on a romanticized notion of the dream that Martin Luther King dared us to actualize. On this day of remembrance, I am also compelled to acknowledge how far we have to go--in healthcare, in economic justice, in domestic and international peace.

As one friend said recently, "It's true that what Dr. King did was monumental, but who he was--a man committed to a relationship with God--was what made that possible." Dr. King believed in and relied on the power of Love, a power greater than himself, working through him to transform hearts and minds and communities into containers of healing and justice and peace. For Dr. King the idea of the Beloved Community was not a camp circle singing kumbaya. He led a movement which led real people voluntarily into real encounters with real violence and hatred. Certainly not a volunteer job for the pusillanimous. I admit I would much sooner sign up to serve disaster victims than face clubs and fire hoses in the name of equality, and am humbled to know those that have chosen, and still choose, to do so.

On my way to Atlanta Sunday morning I stopped off at a gas station in a small South Carolina town. At the next pump were two African-American men in their twenties, in suits, presumably on their way to church. I was struck with the realization that the possibility of being harassed, assaulted, and worse still lives in the recent memory (and current experience) of my black neighbors, friends and co-workers. Grandparents may still pass groves of trees where family members where lynched, or neighborhoods that were terrorized by midnight hordes robed in white.

And beyond the ravages of racism are other forms of violence that surround us each day, some explicit, some covert. In the U.S. child abuse is rampant, a sexual assault is reported every two minutes, homicides are a leading cause of death. And all this before widening our vision to the unbearable reality in Darfur, the Congo, Iraq; the list goes on and on. Our compulsion for power and force spawns infinite injustices in economic, socio-political, and interpersonal realms. Our relationship with conflict and violence is older than our humanity, and is unlikely to leave us any time soon.

Yet tragedies like Haiti consistently reveal our capacity to extend beyond self-interest and to experience the heart-expanding joy and goodness and creativity that is unleashed when that occurs. What would the aftermath of an earthquake of Love look like? Cataclysmic indeed. Dr. King could see that world, and he held in his words and example a radical vision for us to inhabit. Today I give thanks for his life and for the challenge of the gift he left in our care.

It's a scary thing to pray that God would use me--I might not like the assignment. Perhaps it is delivering water to disaster victims, perhaps it is defending the defenseless, perhaps it is sitting with others offering the metta-prayer. Perhaps, as President Obama said in his acceptance speech, it is living the commitment to "listening especially when we disagree." Whatever it is, I pray that I do it and that I will cultivate the internal resources to stand, hands extended, in the circle of beloved community. It's not for sissies.

So in many instances, we have been able to stand before the most violent opponents and say in substance, we will meet your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We will meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will and we will still love you. Throw us in jail and we will still love you. Threaten our children and bomb our homes and our churches and as difficult as it is, we will still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our communities at the midnight hours and drag us out on some wayside road and beat us and leave us half-dead, and as difficult as that is, we will still love you. But be assured that we will wear you down by our capacity to suffer and one day we will win our freedom. We will not only win freedom for ourselves, we will so appeal to your heart and your conscience that we will win you in the process and our victory will be a double victory.

(Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered this message to the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, Christmas 1957.)

No Why-ning!

You want to ask the big W-H-Y? Check out "Flying On One Engine", Joshua Weinstein's unflinching documentary about the complex and heartbreaking life of a terminally ill surgeon who barely survives in the U.S., but drags his oxygen tank to in India each year to conduct mass-surgeries on children with facial deformities.

Why does this 8 time Nobel Prize nominee live in poverty? Why must these children live with such unbearable burdens? Why do soft drink executives sleep in 600 count sheets while a volunteer doctor shuffles around rats in his apartment....Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? (birth defects) Why? Why? Why? (starving children) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? (roof caves in) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? (car breaks down) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? (moms with cancer) Why? Why? Why? Why?(no job in sight) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?Why? Why? Why?Why? Why? Why? Why? (dad goes away) Why? Why? Why? Why? (tornadoes) Why? Why? Why? (floods) Why? Why? Why? Why? (fire) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?Why? Why? Why? (greedy bastards) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? (the Holocaust) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? (war in Darfur) Why?Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? (deer ticks) Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?Why? Why? Why? (war, war, and more war) Why? Why? (it didn't work out) Why?Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?Why? Why? Why? (me). And so on.

So far, gnawing on it just hasn't proven fruitful. Karma? God's plan? Sadistic randomness? Greater minds than mine have contemplated the why's and wherefore's of Life's curve balls. I don't get to know the reason "bad" things happen. Besides, as a friend in recovery says, "'Figure it out' is just not one of our slogans.'" I guess what's more relevant, is...what now? I pray I can have even a thimble full of the courage and willingness displayed by the surgeon, parents, and patients in this film.

(But, if you simply must (whine), make it count! You can get a free hour to do so at Rob Brezny's Unhappy Hour where you can milk the why-ne for all its worth, and perhaps break through into the What Next?...

blessings all

green beds

I admit it, I'm a little jealous. My sweetie has been playing around in other beds.

Now why would he want to do that? We practically broke our necks and pushed our collective 100 years to the limit getting a mammoth mattress into the tiny loft of his cabin. It's now draped in deliciously warm and cozy blankets, including a moss-green one we affectionately call Green Acres, and a hand-dyed quilt that is somehow both rugged and gorgeous. Plus, a couple of days a week it has me in it. What more could he want?

Dirt. The man loves dirt. More accurately, he is in love with his garden and, like many garden-lovin' folks, spends as much time as he can between april and november tending to his raised beds with the devotion of a lover--tenderly placing seedlings and seeds in the warm soil of spring, weeding and watering and harvesting throughout the summer season, and, with the first frost, preparing the beds for winter with the tenderness of a dad tucking in his child.

This past Saturday, he solemnly led me to witness the hills of dirt covered in straw, ready to rest.

"They look like burial mounds," I said. "There could be bodies in there." I eyed him suspiciously.

"Look at this compost," he said, tactfully ignoring me. "This is good stuff. Come spring we are ready to go!" His face shines with satisfaction. I shake my head. You can't help but love the guy.

There are two kinds of people, garden people and non-garden people. I am of the non-garden variety, completely happy to enjoy the fragrance and visual appeal that edible landscapes add to neighborhoods, country roads, and even rooftops, but lacking any aptitude for the awe-inspiring process that brings juicy tomatoes and hearty zucchini from the earth.

Living in Asheville, home of all things green and progressive and organic, I'm admittedly self-conscious about this dirty little secret. (This is a gnawing feeling not unlike my fear that the Greenlife checkout gal will publicly shame me over the intercom for forgetting my canvas shopping bags, "Paper bag at line 2. She doesn't have her own bags." "I do have my own bags," I insist. "I just forgot them today!" Checkout gal rolls her eyes.)

Though I don't have the gardening gene, I do appreciate the hard work that makes the garden grow. I am a good appreciator, and glad to put in some sweat equity along the way. We devoured our summer feasts with gusto: thick slices of Cherokee Purple tomatoes, pestos bursting with the tang of thai and sweet basil, savory chutneys, and crisp yard-long beans. (Mustering enthusiasm about the steam on the compost pile is a little more challenging--this skill is for advanced appreciators--but I have diligently saved my banana peels and coffee grounds to do my part in building up the soil.)

Each summer morning before work, David would wade across the dewy grass to putter among the rows of beans and squash and herbs. Each night he would rush home eager as a suitor to visit the patch of soil on the south side of the creek.

"Are you going to see her again?" I teased.

While there are plenty of urban gardeners, my sweetheart lives out in the hinterlands of Western North Carolina. So when we first started dating (at the beginning of the growing season) I was a little skeptical about our country mouse/city mouse differences.

"I get allergic smelling hay," I sang in my best Eva Gabor accent.

How was this going to work? Could our attraction survive my pull toward urban activity and his pastoral past-times?

Joking aside, we considered the topic one day, sitting in the car during a spring downpour. I quoted Drew Barrymore in Ever After: "If the bird and the fish fall in love, where would they live?" Luckily I did not have to admit the source of the quote.

He stared thoughtfully through the windshield for a while, then finally answered in a quiet voice.

"Well, I know that we both need to be in a place that fits," he said. "And I also know that there's such a thing as a flying fish."

Well, he sure put that one to bed! How could you not love a guy like that? Compost, garden girlfriend, and all.