When things all fit together....

I'm teaching Introduction to Sociology this semester for the first time in 6 or 7 years. After a few lectures of introduction, the first unit is on "culture."  We read two articles illustrating different aspects of culture.  The first, by Mieke Loe, describes the cultural environment of a restaurant she calls, "Bazooms."  The second, by Haunani Kay-Trask, describes the cultural commodification of Hawaiin culture.  Both readings highlight issues of gender, of work, of culture and cultural hegemony.  The class had a good discussion of the readings on Tuesday.

On Thursday, I planned to show a video, "Mardi Gras: Made in China," which contrasts the lives of young women in China manufacturing mardi gras beads to those of Mardi Gras revelers in New Orleans. The video highlights the working conditions of the women, the culture of China, and the treatment of women at Mardi Gras who are willing to bear their breasts for beads. One part of the video shows the women returning home to celebrate the Chinese New Year.

So, on Thursday, driving in to work NPR happened to have a segment on the changing cultural celebration of Chinese New Year in rural areas of China.  The segment mentioned the enhancement and co-opting of traditional practices for the benefit of tourists; the shifting meaning of the holiday within the country; and the differences between rural and urban China.  It was perfect!  All of my themes tied together!  I played the segment for the class. I don't think they were as excited as I was...but once you start looking for sociology, you see it everywhere.

Mary Poppins and the Dancing Cow

I went to the movie Saving Mr. Banks a few weeks ago. I really enjoyed the movie and it inspired me to go back and re-read the Mary Poppins story.  I remember enjoying the book as a girl and was curious to see again how the book differed from the Disney movie....turns out it is pretty different.

But, here is one story from the book that never made it to the movie. I've been trying to decide if I think it is an optimistic or pessimistic story.  It is from the chapter, "The Dancing Cow," and goes something like this.
_______________________________________
The children see a cow walking down the road and ask Mary Poppins about this unusual sight.  She remarks that she knows this cow well, she was a friend of Mary's mother, and goes on to tell the children about the cow.  This cow lived in a beautiful meadow filled with buttercups. She had everything she needed and was quite content and happy with her life.  One evening, as she was getting ready to go to sleep, she had this urge to start dancing.  She hopped up, skipped around the meadow and danced all night under the stars. When the morning came, she was still dancing.  She felt light and filled with joy, but as the day went on she couldn't stop dancing.  All day and all night, day after day, she danced in the meadow. She couldn't stop to eat or sleep and after a week was worried that she may never stop dancing.

She set off to seek the advice of the king, who was a wise man.  After some deliberation, he noticed that the cow had a star stuck on her horn and that was the cause of her dancing.  The king's courtiers tried to remove the star, but it was firmly stuck.  As a last resort, the king suggested that the cow try jumping over the moon.  The cow wasn't too keen on this idea, but they went out to the courtyard and she leapt into the air.  She sailed up, high in the sky, and soared over the moon.  As she passed over the moon she felt the star fall away and return to the sky.  She came back to the ground in her old meadow and her life returned to "normal."  No dancing.  She was happy to return to her life of order and calm.

But, after some days she grew dissatisfied. She missed her dancing. She missed the joy of skipping through the meadow.  She visited Mary Poppin's mother and told her story.  Mary's mother replied, "You silly cow.  Stars fall from the sky all the time, but you can't expect two stars to fall in one meadow during your lifetime. If it were me, I'd go look for one. " 

"I will," said the Red Cow joyously, "I will indeed."

At the end of the story, the children look out in the lane but the cow has gone.  "I do hope she finds one," they say quietly.
_______________________________________________________
Now, my question is:  optimistic or pessimistic story?  Good that the cow can hope to find another star?  Or, sad that she has roamed the streets for years looking?

Giving Up and Giving In

From Merriam Webster's online dictionary:

Giving up:  to yield control or possession of (surrender); to desist from (abandon); to declare incurable or insoluble

Giving in:   to yield under insistence or entreaty;  SYNS: surrender, yield, submit

We usually look at giving up as a negative...if only we would try harder we could reach our goal...if only we put in more effort we would win.  We are encouraged to keep trying, keep going, keep pushing, keep giving time and energy to the task.  Athletic coaches are fond of the phrase, "winners never quit."  Winners don't give up.

In the same way, giving in is, basically, losing.  When a river bank collapses after a heavy rain it gives out or caves in.  Whatever words we use, they signify disaster.

But it has been on my mind lately that sometimes giving up and giving in are exactly what is required.  Sometimes we need to give up control, give up trying to answer unanswerable questions, give up trying to make sense and give in to life. Surrender to the universe.

in the spaces...

I've spent the last few weeks preparing for a new semester.  I'm teaching introductory sociology again after a hiatus of 6 or 7 years.  Thinking I would probably never be teaching the course again I got rid of most of my notes and materials in the latest of my office moves....bad decision. So, I've been doing a lot of reading, refreshing myself on the materials I want to cover.

Two classic pieces for introductory sociology are C. Wright Mills "The Promise" in which the term "sociological imagination" is coined and Alan Johnson's "The Forest, the Trees, and the One Thing."  Both emphasize the interrelationship of individuals and societies...people shape society and are shaped by society.  One metaphor (analogy?) sometimes used to describe this relationship is that of a river.  The banks of the river contain and structure the water flow, but over time the water itself starts to shift the banks, cutting a new path.

But, every time I read Johnson's article, I'm struck again by the importance of empty space.  As he describes it, we can think of people as individual trees, but if we take those trees and put them near one another, we have created a forest.  What creates the forest though, is not just the accumulation of individual trees, but the spaces between them. These empty spaces create the forest.

In many teaching training instructions we are advised to not be afraid of silence in the classroom, to give students time to respond, to not rush in with an answer.  This is certainly true in intimate conversations, like those between a therapist and a client, but I find them, too, in my relationships with students.  Sometimes the silence is needed to create a space for the words.  Robert Krulwich has a great story that focuses on silence.  He talks about two Bible stories, Abraham and Isaac and Noah.  He describes how much of each story takes place in silence. (You can listen to it here...http://www.radiolab.org/story/91898-in-silence/)  Now, are these silences because the recorder of the story thought the responses were insignificant or are they silences because they hold meaning?  Are the silent voices of women and minorities in history because they had nothing important to say or because nobody bothered to record them or because it is their silence itself that is meaningful.

It is reminiscent of Claude Debussy's quote, "Music is the space between the notes."  It is the pattern, the rhythm, the distance of one from another that makes a series of notes music.  In the same way, it is what happens in the space between people that creates a relationship. 

 

A New Year

I've never been much of one for making new year's resolutions, so I've decided not to start.  But it seems like every now and then a person should take stock of where they are and where they are headed...not much sense in looking back at where you have been.  So, maybe tonight I'll do a little stock taking, in private, with a good drink, a warm fire, and a calm heart.

One thing I can say about this year, I have encountered more kindness than I thought possible, more care and concern, more love, and more friendship than I knew existed.  Oh, but wait, that is looking backward!!

I will look forward.

Living in the Gray

                                               

It seems like one of the developmental tasks of adulthood is coming to recognize, accept, and maybe even appreciate the "grayness" of life.  Not every decision is black and white, not every experience is totally positive or negative, no person is all good or all bad.  My acceptance of grayness has been maybe longer in coming than for most.  I've always wanted to know the answer, to seek some absolute truth, to have a definitive solution to a problem.  Long ago I learned to love my gray hair. Now I've found I'm beginning to enjoy the inherent ambiguity and uncertainty of life...well, sometimes.

My new problem is that we tend to have fewer ways to talk about the middle. Our vocabulary emphasizes extremes.  There are so many words for anger:  irate, incensed, outraged.  There are words for calm; peaceful, serene, tranquil.  But what do we call something inbetween...."okay"? "Happy"?  They seem weak and ineffectual.  Other choices might be ambivalent, conflicted, uncertain, accepting.  But they all have a somewhat negative connotation.  I guess we have experimenting, exploring, discovering, at least those words convey some sense of wonder and excitement, but I think they also imply that there is an endpoint, a treasure at the end of the road.

It is not only language that troubles me, but gestures as well.  What is there between a handshake and a kiss? Is it a hug?  How do you convey a sense of closeness and friendship without a sexual connotation? With non-romantic interests a hug works well, if you are a hugger.  But what about that in between category of "possibles"?  People living in your gray zone. People with whom there is no romantic intent (yet), but with whom there is emotional,but not physical, intimacy (at least not now).  A hug might give the wrong impression, but doing nothing feels wrong, too.

I think if we, as adults, are to truly embrace our gray, we need better words!!!

Sitting with dying

I spent several hours today sitting with dying.  B, one of my hospice patients, who I've been visiting since January, is near death. She is only vaguely aware of my presence, but I am so acutely aware of hers.  Sitting by her bedside, holding her hand, watching the rapid pulse at the base of her neck, listening to the ragged breaths, I think about her life.  At 96 she has seen great changes, suffered tragic losses, celebrated wonderful moments. Her daughter remarked at one point, "It's like childbirth. There is suffering to bring life into the world and suffering to leave it."

Sitting with dying is alternatively challenging and calming.  Sitting still, awkwardly leaning over a bed rail to hold a hand, makes your back ache. Listening to the labored breathing tempts you to hurry the process. At the same time, there can be a peace. The quiet words of reassurance, of compassion, of caring, resonate in your very soul. The shared stories, the tears, and even the laughs, remind you of the life you are living.  Your focus narrows on the friend in the bed, but your heart feels open to the whole world.