The Lesson of the Itsy-Bitsy Spider Song

For sixteen years, I have loved a cat named Perchance, but called Percie. An orange tabby with spots and stripes, eyes that began amber and turned green, a being more joyful and more stubborn than possibly any others I have known. Throughout that time, the sun was her drug of her choice. Okay, she dabbled in catnip, but her true vice was the light and heat of the sun. She never could get enough of it, even when we lived in Phoenix and for three weeks, the temperature was over 120 degrees every day, and it was miserable. Percie, though, loved it. She would have slept on sun-cooked cement for 24 hours a day if we had just stopped worrying about things like dehydration and let her do what she wanted.

For sixteen years, I knew every spot and stripe on her. I knew her moods and her personality. I could look at her and know what she was thinking. Sometimes it was "Oh, this is such a good nap!" and sometimes it was "If you rub my tummy, I will bite you." I would have told you I knew everything about her, but I didn't. I didn't know this cat I loved so much was riddled with cancer. Except, of course, that I did--if not the diagnosis, I knew that my time with her was slipping away. Of course, that's a reasonable thought when you have a cat who is sixteen. Hell, it's a reasonable thought at any point in any relationship. We are all here for a finite amount of time.

And, so, when I'd look out and see Percie sleeping in a sunbeam, and I would know "this is her last summer" or "not only is this her last summer, but she knows it, and she is determined not to miss a moment of it"--I squelched that knowing. I told myself I didn't know. I told myself to stop being morbid. And the more I pretended not to know, the more I could convince myself I didn't know other things, until I stopped knowing  altogether and missed it and wondered where it had gone.

As I struggled to find that knowing, especially as Percie became ill, I called upon my guides for strength and, well, for guidance. And all I would hear is Tai, my little Asian girl guide, singing "The itsy-bisty spider climbed up the water spout. Down came the rain and washed the spider out. Out came the sun and dried up all the rain. And the itsy-bitsy spider climbed up the spout again." 

And she would sing it over and over. I would hear it in my dreams. (So if you're now cursing me for getting these lyrics stuck in your head, imagine having them there, even in your dreams, for three months.) And so I'd ask for guidance and get a nursery song playing in my head incessantly until I figured out--which took longer than it should--what it meant. That itsy-bitsy spider is all about the impermanence of life. It's about beginnings and endings, about being washed away one moment and back in the sun again....back in the sun, knowing the next rain wasn't far away.

Maybe, I reasoned, the message was that we were going to keep doing the same things over and over--going to keep helping her battle infections and nausea and dehydration so that she would be well. Of course, I knew at some level that wasn't it. The rain was coming to take my sunshine-loving cat away. Another ending, another beginning. And there was nothing to do but accept it.

I let Percie go to the person she loved most, my mom, knowing she would find an afterlife of endless sun-napping and the occasional gecko chase.

And I found a new cat, Gabby, and brought her home and we settled in. The beginning was nice. Everything was new and so exciting to her. I got to slowly learn her language. We were having a great time. And then came today--only the fifth day of knowing her--and we butted heads. She wanted what she wanted. I wanted her to understand the natural patterns of my day and energy. Yes, I would start the morning with a play session, but then she needed to know that I would spend hours at the computer, pretty much ignoring her and she was supposed to amuse herself...which she did, by being impossible. Up on the kitchen counters, scratching the couch, into the Christmas tree. I stopped, I played with her, got her jumping and running and pouncing, all in the hopes that she'd settle down and I could go back to my computer. But as soon as I'd sneak away, she'd be causing trouble again, and I'd have to stop. I just kept getting crankier and so did she.

Finally, I called it a day, and had a hot bath. As she always does when I'm in the bathroom, Gabby settled on the other side of the door, waiting for me. (Not surprisingly, since she's a rescue cat, she has some separation anxiety.) But this time she waited quietly, not crying or scratching. When I came out, she was no longer cranky, but the loving kitty I adore and she was so glad to see me. I scratched her ears and praised her for waiting patiently. I pointed out that she had been brave and, just like I had promised, I had come back to her.

Today the rain had washed us out, I told her. I had forgotten she has only been here a few days and she is quite young. She needs more mothering and she can't be expected to know all of what a sixteen-year-old cat came to know. I need to be more patient with her and remember that this time is also finite. I will never get back these first few months before we settle into a routine. I need to make time for them.

Tomorrow, I promised her, the sun will come out and we will start over again.

reincarnation

reincarnation

explain to me
why we return
again and again
to this world
of never quite
what we need;

do we actually
turn to each other
and say
“you know
I’m headed back--
last time didn’t suck enough.”

–Cynthia Sillitoe, December 2013

A November Ode

       A November Ode

One day, you will leave
(or I will)
and we will grieve
then love again–
we both know how.

Time nudges us forward,
whether or not we care,
into a-moon-apart
at least until stars realign.

But today is sunny
and we are warm,
and it’s enough.

        --Cynthia Sillitoe, November 2013

The Pitfalls of Conversation in the 21st Century (Or Just Because You Posted It Doesn't Mean I Saw It.)

Ok, I just know I'm not the only person who has experienced this. You meet up with a friend or relative who launches into a conversation about people and events and you have no idea what she's talking about. Sometimes it's something small like a book or movie they liked. Sometimes it's like...apparently this person has broken up with their significant other or changed jobs or, I don't know, had a child. And the conversation starts in the middle and you realize, with a sinking feeling, you are supposed to know the back story to this all, but you don't....and you think....damn that social media.

And, hey, I love social media. Here I am blogging. I'm on Facebook. My cat is on Facebook (though she has woefully neglected her page in her quest to enjoy every last minute of nice weather.) Theoretically, I'm on Pinterest except I signed up for it and figured it out in the middle of the night, so I was under the influence of Ambien, and....I don't remember my password or how it all works. I may figure that out, but it's kind of low on my priority list. And every time I get a notification that someone is following me on Pinterest, I think, "Ok, they're going to be disappointed."

Here's the deal, people. I can barely keep up with my own life. Seriously. And I suspect I'm not alone in this. It doesn't mean I don't love your Facebook posts, but I might miss a few. I might only check out your blog every couple of months and find a few dozen entries I haven't read, including the one that says you've had triplets and moved to Siberia. And I'm definitely missing your Pinterest boards about your new obsession with building your own robots.

I use Facebook for three main reasons:

1. to keep everyone appraised of my cat's life
2. to post all the witty and sarcastic remarks that only the cat might otherwise hear
3. to say "help, help!" when something in my life goes wrong.

And I love that rush of support and love and funny comments, but I don't expect to hear from everyone I know. If someone goes weeks without even reading my Facebook comments or blog, I don't take it personally. I figure they're just all trying to keep up with their own lives.

Not to mention trying to remember all their passwords.

The Balm of Gilead

More than 30 years ago, a wave of feminism rose up against the Mormon (LDS) church. My mom not only joined it, she wrote about it, and, in doing so, gained a certain amount of notoriety and disfavor with the church's leadership. She would clash with church leadership many more times, but it began with a group of women who stepped forward and asked for more.

As those who know me or read my blog are aware, I carry psychic scars of that struggle, not to mention a case of PTSD triggered by anything connected to Mormonism. I have never read most of my mom's writings related to the church and I have distanced myself from the intellectual communities in which my parents played a huge role. I even decided to stop reading and watching local media because it always holds triggers. And so I live in Utah and I have no idea what's going on around me, unless someone tells me or it makes it to CNN.

I was aware of the fact that the battle for equality in the LDS church had continued and recently a new awakening had blossomed. I even have cousins involved in it. Still, I remained cynical. And kind of annoyed. I rolled my eyes and thought, "Fine. Battle the behemoth if that's what you want to do, but don't expect it to change." Most often I wondered why anyone would want to fight. Why not just get out?

You see, because I have never had any faith in the LDS gospel and because I have never been comfortable in an LDS congregation--the closest I've ever come to comfort is ambivalence--it's hard for me to relate to those who have both great faith in the gospel and ideological qualms with the church. I have to remind myself that it's possible to have both and how difficult that must be.

Yesterday, a friend sent my dad an e-mail letting him know about this bright young feminist who had a tribute to my mom on Facebook. As he does with all things concerning Facebook, my dad forwarded it to me. I clicked on the link and found Hannah Wheelwright's page. She'd posted a short, but powerful poem by my mom. I smiled when I saw she'd chosen a simple typewriter font for it because that's probably what my mom would have chosen. I sent her a message telling her I appreciated how she'd used it and wished her well in the struggle.

Later, I did an Internet search, found her blog, and read some of the posts, including one about why, out of respect, the church should correctly be referred to as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or the LDS church, not the Mormon church. I've resisted this for decades because I don't like doing what the church wants me to do. That said, her argument about the power of language reminded me that I had learned this same lesson from my mom. And that maybe I need to show respect even when I feel I have not received it in return. It's something I need to think about.

I also discovered just how powerful and extensive this network of LDS feminists--both male and female, gay and straight--has become. I have always known that every fight for equality has spanned generations and always some of those fighters succumb to cynicism. Whether it's women's suffrage, or an end to racial segregation, or the idea of women being ordained in the LDS church, it's always tempting to say, as I have said, it will never happen. I never wanted to be one of those people, but it happened to me anyway. Fortunately, even amid the cynics' warnings, some people push on.

While the LDS church will never be my spiritual path, I see a possibility of a more just and inclusive church. I have never thought the struggle my mom was part of was for nothing. Confronting injustice is a righteous act. I also never thought I'd see the fruition of that struggle. Now I think I might.

And that takes the sting out of a lot of my wounds.

Birthright

Birthright

I am my mother’s daughter,
so I know
the difference between fewer and less,
and the healing properties of chocolate.
I know
all the president’s men,
and the lyrics of Simon and Garfunkel,
and
how to read a poem.

I am my mother’s daughter,
so I know
how to navigate seas
of shadows and light
and speak truth
even when you ache.
(Especially when you ache.)

I am my mother’s daughter,
so I know
beauty is all around us
and danger nearby.
I know hogans face east
and life is okay
if the cat is all right.

I am my mother’s daughter,
so I know,
how autumn explodes,
things end and begin again
in November.
I know
the scents of cedar and sage,
and the sound of a drum
calling us out to dance.

–Cynthia Sillitoe, August 2013

Didn't I Leave?

Disclaimer: this is one of those posts where I take issue with the Mormon church, so you might not want to read it. And if you disagree with it and want to explain the church's position on this issue so that I will better understand, please don't waste either of our time. I know the explanations. I just don't buy them. 

So, here I am, working on my Etsy store (yay!) and having a lovely day, except this conversation keeps going through my head, over and over, like it was in a Star Trek feedback loop, and once again it's about Mormonism....

And I just thought, "Didn't I leave?" I mean, it could be argued I never really joined, having never been baptized, but...yeah, I left. Except some of it stayed tattooed (a Mormon tattoo?) on my psyche and I never seem to truly escape it. My experience has been when one of these loops starts, something has triggered it psychically and the only way to get out of it is to have the conversation. So maybe someone I know needs to hear/read this. I don't know. But I finally decided to stop what I was doing and blog about it in the hopes that I can then go on with my day.

If you asked me what tenet of Mormon religion I really objected to most, it would be temple weddings. A temple wedding is a ceremony where two people (well, a man and a woman) are sealed to each other for eternity. They are the weddings all good Mormons aspire to have. The kicker is that those actually present at the ceremony have to be Mormons in good standing. My own understanding of that (which could be inaccurate) is that they need to be active in the church, have a testimony that the Mormon gospel is true, and they need to pay their tithing regularly.

If you're not willing to do all of that, you don't go to the ceremony. Even if it's your kid getting married, you're not getting in. (No, I am not kidding.) They do have a room at the temple where all the non-Mormons or not-good-enough Mormons can wait and then join the rest of the family for pictures outside the temple.

The church used to be a little more lenient about all this. My parents actually were able to get permission to have a wedding in the chapel of a Mormon church and my dad's family (who were all not Mormon) were able to be there, and then the next day, my parents were sealed in the temple, and only my mom's family (at least those who had paid their tithing) attended that, but everyone was happy. The church doesn't allow that any more because it would be what everyone would want.

Anyway, I totally understand why the Mormon church has its policy. In fact, I see two different reasons for it. One is the need for something to be sacred. I'm the first to admit other cultures have that. In Native American cultures, a Sun Dance is sacred. It's not open to everyone and it can't be photographed. Of course, it's also not a wedding.

The other reason I think the Mormon church (Yes, I know I'm supposed to call it the LDS church, but I decline to do that because they want me to....and not doing what the Mormon church wants me to is my revenge for all the nights as a kid I couldn't sleep because I was afraid my parents would be excommunicated. Believe me, it's my due.) Anyway, as I was saying, a more cynical reason for temple weddings is that it's a really good way to keep those tithing dollars coming in. I'm willing to bet (I can bet, having left) that about half the people who now pay tithing do it to be able to attend temple weddings. Well, that and to not feel guilty about having not paid tithing every time their bishop looks at them. (I know Jews and Catholics have a longer guilt tradition, but...um, Mormons can give you a run for their money.)

Not only does this temple wedding notion not hold up with my own beliefs and the God I've come to know, it doesn't square with the few years I attended Primary (Mormon Sunday School for kids.) One really practical lesson I learned from Primary was not to pick my nose. (You'd be surprised how many prayers include that. Again, I'm not kidding. Prayers like "Heavenly Father, thank you for our blessings, help us to listen to our teachers, and be reverent and obedient, and not pinch/kick the kid next to us and not pick our noses and eat the boogers....")

But the more religious lessons I learned in Primary were that Heavenly Father all of us loves us, we are all his children, and family is forever. Ok, um, what part of "family is forever" includes "but only some of them get to be at your wedding?"

(An aside, thanks to therapy, I now know family is not forever if you don't want it to be. When my therapist asked me why I still spent time in toxic relationships with relatives, I chimed back, "Family is forever," and she said, "Didn't you leave? Because if you're not going to believe other Mormon tenets, I suggest you let go of that one, too." And I did.)

My experience with this is far from unique. Anyone who has left the Mormon church knows this pain and any Mormon who had a temple wedding can list relatives who weren't able to attend. I have known people who have lost their Mormon faith and struggled with what to do about their kids' weddings. I've known people who opted not to attend. They couldn't say and do the things they needed to in order to be at their child's wedding and not feel like an absolute hypocrite. Often this causes a little family tension; sometimes it tears a family apart.  I have also known other people who went to the other extreme. A friend who had no belief left in Mormonism told me that she gladly went to the bishop and said everything she needed to say to be at her kids' weddings and she didn't regret it.

When I broached this subject with a Mormon friend, she echoed that. She assured me she would say or do whatever it took to see her kid's wedding. I looked at her a minute and said, "What if, in order to be at that wedding, you had to condemn the Mormon church? What if you had to throw Joseph Smith and Jesus Christ and everything you believe in under the bus to be at your kid's wedding? And what does that say to your kid? On the one hand, I guess he or she could say they were the most important thing in the world to you. But they could also take with them the idea that belief is something you discard when it gets in the way."

And now maybe I can get on with my day....and not pick my nose and eat the boogers because Heavenly Father just hates that.

With Apologies to Robert Frost

One Traveler

If I could go back
to where the roads diverged
and take the other,
the one more worn,
the one more traveled,
would my feet ache less?

I dream at night of that yellow wood
and wake, disoriented,
remembering what it was like
to see and know
but not believe.

Beside me,
my golden cat
turns her belly up,
and sleepily we start the day
knowing that way leads on to way.

--Cynthia Sillitoe, July 2013

Where I've Been

Uh, yeah...it's been a while since I checked in here.

In May, I started an Etsy store. And I love it. And then I started making Etsy treasuries, which are kind of like Pintrest boards of all the things I love on Etsy. I've gotten a little obsessed with those, but there's so much great art and Etsy is a lovely place to spend hours.

And then it's been hot and Percie has wanted to be out in the heat and I am forever bringing her in. You can lead a cat to water, but you can't make her drink. You also can't make her believe that you're doing her a favor by not letting her roast in the sun.

And then I got hooked on Candy Crush and a few games like it. The only problem is I, uh, suck at them and probably don't fully understand how I'm supposed to get from level to level. I do not have a "solve a spacial puzzle" brain. I have a "remember that conversation you had with Grandma thirty years ago" brain. And I no longer let myself buy the extra moves to help me get to a new level because they almost never do. Candy Crush for me is all about being content with playing the same level every day, all week, and maybe the next week, and then suddenly a miracle happens and I actually complete it. And I'm never sure how I did that, so I remain clueless.

Each day, I spend a little time in the studio, and sometimes I even get some art made. Usually that happens if it's cool enough to let Percie stay out. Otherwise, I bring her in and try to encourage her to sleep on her shelf above the art table. Instead, she knocks stuff off the table and I pick it up and she knocks it off again, all the while screaming "Let me outside! The Geneva Convention says I'm allowed to stay outside as long as I want even if it's 300 degrees!"

I keep buying her toys that I hope will entertain her (and get her stoned with catnip.) They don't work and I order more. I try to do that during the day because at night I'm busy making Ambien-induced trips to Walmart.com to buy two bottles of raspberry and vanilla scented hand soap and some citrus scent bathtub cleaner. (Ambien must make me crave fruit in a subconscious way.) And then I wake up the next morning and check my e-mail and think "Why did I buy hand soap and bathroom cleaner at 3 a.m., especially since the shipping is more than the cost of the purchase?"

And then Percie says...."Is it morning? Can I go outside?"

Abundance

On the coffee table, I have a basket which holds Hershey kisses. (My preferred form of daily chocolate.) When the basket gets low, I ask my dad--who likes errands, unlike me--to get me a new bag. (You can get them in a really big bag.) Now what some people would do is open the bag, fill up the basket a ways, or even to the brim, and then put the bag away in the pantry. Not me. I open that bag and pour out the kisses until they fill the basket, and overflow, and scatter across the coffee table, and sometimes onto the floor.

And then I marvel at this beautiful sight and think: abundance is divine.

Matriarchal Blessing

Matriarchal Blessing

I asked you once

for a matriarchal blessing
and you,

my heretical mother, 

looked at me askance

and said,

"I already gave you life."

--Cynthia Sillitoe, April 2013

Why I Listen

If you've read my past blogs, you know I have a team of spirit guides (yeah, I know) called the Peanut Gallery. They give me advice on both big things and little things and I do my best to listen to them, even when they don't make sense. When I don't listen to them, I tend to regret it.

So, today, I was watching The Hobbit and drawing, when I got a very strong psychic nudge along with "Pay attention." And I just blinked. Pay attention to what? The movie? Drawing? And then they said, "Go get the mail." And I thought, "But I'm busy....Dad'll bring it in....ok, here I go to get the mail, and, for all this bother, there better be money out there." 

Instead of money, there was some lovely art from friends, some stamps I ordered off Ebay, and a form letter from my Crohn's doc reminding me to get a blood test. No big whoop. They just like to keep an eye on everything. When I did the math, I realized, yep, it was about time for that. Or maybe a month late. And I thought, "Ok, going to the regular doctor on Monday, I'll get it done there, and have him send it over." And I threw away the letter. 

Anyway, suddenly I felt this overwhelming feeling that I shouldn't have done that and I said, "Is this what I'm supposed to be paying attention to?" and they said, "Yes."

So, since I don't believe in unquestioning obedience, even to them, I said back, "What's the deal? I'll get the blood test done and sent over. Oh, please, you're seriously going to make me go to two different clinics on Monday? Ok, fine, I'm paying attention..."

I called my Crohn's doctor's office and asked that they put an order in the computer, so that I could swing by on Monday, and then I headed back to the movie, stopping (as any hobbit would) to put together a snack. 

The phone rang. It was the Crohn's doc's office saying, "We're really glad you called because we haven't heard back from the insurance and we have more Asacol (one of my meds) samples for you until we do hear back."

And I said, "Ok." And then I remembered. "You know, I still had some left from my last prescription, so I haven't started on the ones you gave me before. I assume I just take the dose on the bottle?" 

And she said, "What's the dose on the bottle?"

And I said, "Six a day."

And she said. "Oh, no, that's too much. Take five a day. Does it really say six? And you didn't do that yet, right?"

And I said, "No, I didn't, but I would have started the too-high dosage this weekend, when you folks weren't in the office...."

Nice save, Peanut Gallery, nice save. 

Now back to defeating Smaug. 

Tarot Reading

Tarot Reading

You were The Magician;
you cast it differently,
but all my life you were

and The High Priestesses
you invoked never knew
as much as you.

Once I read for you
and drew The Moon.
I flinched, "a bad omen,"
but you said, "not for us,
we were named for that moon."

Names aside, most of all,
you were The Sun,
constant, light, and warmth.

When you died,
I bought new cards.
I smudged them with sage
and wrapped them in silken ferns,
blessing them for my journey--

for my journey still.

--Cynthia Sillitoe, April 2013

Demystifying Grandma

Recently, someone remarked to me what a saint her father had become since his death. I told her that was nothing. My grandma started becoming a saint before she died. Not to everyone, but....there was definitely a myth started at some point and passed down through a few of us. For instance, I grew up believing that, at any sort of discord, my grandma would shatter into tiny pieces. Frequently, this was used to get a younger sibling (or niece) to take on someone else's chores. I also grew up believing she was perfect. Anyone doing anything less than perfect could be reprimanded by her example, though we could also count on never meeting her standard. When my mom realized I'd heard and believed all this, she swiftly debunked it.

"Grandma has many wonderful qualities," she would say, "but she is not perfect. She gets mad, she gets frustrated, she gets angry; she just doesn't do it out loud. And," my mom added, "Grandma isn't going to shatter if you don't dry the dishes right. Wait a minute, why are you drying dishes there? New rule: you only do chores that Grandma or Grandpa ask you to do. If it's one of my siblings, you tell them to do their own chores. And stop being so eager to please. Honestly!"

But I digress....

In later years, not only did I realize my mom was right (as she usually was), but I used to have a lot of fun teasing my grandma about her image in the family, which was a cross between Snow White and Joan of Arc.

One time, when she'd come to dinner with me and my mom, I really let her have it.

"Grandma," I said, "Do you know you've never once lost your temper?"

She rolled her eyes and replied, "I seem to remember a time or two."

"Grandma," I said, "do you know you've never once had an unkind thought about anyone?"

"Has your mom told you about how, once a couple of boys tossed her in a lake and she had to sit through the rest of the picnic in wet clothes, and then she got mono? I could have just shaken them."

At that point, my mom wondered aloud what had happened to those boys and my grandma started rattling off who they married, what careers they'd chosen, how many children they'd each had, and what those children were named. That was Grandma for you. If you met her once and mentioned you had to rush off to visit a relative in the hospital, three years later, when you met again, she would ask you how your relative was. She would remember their name, what they'd had, what hospital they'd been in, who their doctor was. All of it.

But anyway, back to the teasing:

"Grandma, do you know you never once wished you could sleep in rather than go to church?"

She considered this. "It wasn't so much that I wanted to sleep in, but I did wish it would start later in the day, especially when I had young children."

"Speaking of children, Grandma, did you know you had eight immaculate conceptions?"

She turned bright pink, but also laughed and then wiped her eyes. "What about the miscarriages?" she asked when she could speak again.

"Oh, those were lust," my mom said. "It's probably why you lost them, Mom."

"Well," I admitted, "I was told if you ever did participate in lustful acts, Grandpa probably persuaded you."

Turning even pinker, Grandma retorted, "I don't remember needing much persuasion."

At that point, while we were not literally rolling on the floor, laughing, we were all pretty close to it.

I once recounted this story to a relative. who asked, in a somewhat scandalized tone, "You talked to Grandma about sex?!" She then told me she only talked to Grandma about her children and her church job. I pointed out that since I had neither children nor a church job, Grandma and I needed another subject.

I love that I can still hear Grandma's laugh.

Nearing Sleep

Nearing Sleep

I miss you,
I say,
as you stroke my hair.

You just laugh
and so do I
and then I miss you more.

--Cynthia Sillitoe, April 2013

Advice To A Former Me

A few months ago either on Facebook or CNN or a magazine I flipped through....somewhere I saw the question "what would you tell your fifteen year old self if you could?" My first reaction was to wince because fifteen going on sixteen is when I became chronically ill. And I thought of all the past selves I felt ill-equipped to advise, that's the toughest one.

My second reaction was, "Oh, wow. She so wouldn't want to hear from me." That fifteen year old Cynthia knew everything and didn't need any advice from anyone. That Cynthia liked this John Lennon quote: "life is what happens when you're busy making other plans." And yet she still had her life all planned out. Every last detail.

I've thought a lot about this and I think I know what I'd tell her. First, I'd break it to her gently that absolutely nothing would happen according to her plan. Some things would happen, but out of the order she expected; some things she was sure of wouldn't happen at all, and some things she never expected to happen would happen. But that whole sequence of events? Uh, yeah, just let that go now.

And then I'd tell her, "Cynthia, you're going to have an amazing and rich life, full of pain and joy, love and loss, and while you won't enjoy every moment, you will look back on your journey--past, present, and future--and be proud to claim it as yours."

And I'd say one last thing: "You know this little computer company called Apple?  Buy stock  in it. You'll  thank me later."

Just Watching The Cycle Go Round and Round

Disclaimer: this post has nothing to do with laundry or bicycles or even unicycles, but with cycles of abuse, including sexual abuse and rape, so feel free to jump ship now.

I just finished reading Broken by Shy Keenan. It's a heartbreaking, gut-twisting, awful memoir about a girl's horrific abuse, physical and sexual, as a child. I've read a lot of books about child abuse. (Why, you ask? Because I have a gene in me that says "seek out darkness, try to understand it, try to stop it." I got mine from my mom. She got her "seek out darkness" gene from her dad, a cop. I can't explain it. It's not that I enjoy someone else's suffering. Just that I feel the need to bear witness to suffering and say to the person, I can't change this, but I hear you. I believe you.") Through decades of reading and listening to the stories of survivors, I have come to understand, as much as I can, the horrible damage one incident, let alone decades of it, can do to someone's soul.

I believe in evil. I believe sexual abuse is evil. I believe sexual abuse of children is eviler--that it is one thing for an adult to cope with a sexual attack, but for a kid, who is powerless and still coming to understand the world and their place in it, it's just devastating. And evilest...well, that's when someone, be it a priest or just some whacko with a god complex, sexually abuses a child and tells them it's God's will. Nothing like destroying their connection to the divine right along with everything else.

What I took away from this book, though, was a new understanding of the role of abuse in crime. I'd been aware of it. In fact, I overheard a conversation between my mom and one of her cop friends. They were arguing over--if somehow child abuse stopped to exist--just how much the prison population would drop. They were pretty sure that the majority of prisoners, regardless of what they were arrested for, had been abused as kids. Now, that doesn't give them a free pass on breaking laws, but...

What this book made me thing was: "What do we expect?" Kid grows up constantly sexually abused, is ignored by her mother, who is too busy shoplifting, lives in a home with no moral code, no security. Kid gets older, starts acting out. Everyone is so surprised. Kid says she's being abused, no one believes her, so it goes on and on. She gets angrier and acts out more, she winds up in reform school, where she is abused by staff, and, gosh darn it, if she doesn't get angrier. And yeah, when she gets out, she starts a life of crime. Not only is she angry, she still has no moral code. All her life what she has seen is that when someone wants something they take it. So that's what she does. But then when she wants to press charges against her abuser, she has no credibility because she is now a convicted felon with a long rap sheet, not to mention medical records stating that she's mentally disturbed. (Well, if you'd been raped daily for your whole life, and had an STD before you hit puberty, and thought it was all your fault, you'd be pretty disturbed yourself.) Unfortunately, all that gives her zero credibility, which doesn't end the abuse, only makes her angrier, and allows a pedophile to continue to prey on children.

Of course, if someone had believed her the first, or second, or seventh time, she told, and then had gotten her out of that situation and moved her somewhere safe--because way too often kids in foster care or state care wind up vulnerable to more abusers--maybe she never would have wound up in prison.

I have seen this in someone I love. Someone who was abused, and then struggled with anger and defiance, and lashing out, only to then be lectured and disciplined, which made him angrier and less trusting, which led to more discipline. What he needed was to be heard. He'd wound up in situations he didn't choose and his pain had led to anger and yes, it can be challenging to find ways to constructively direct anger, but what will not work is punishing him for anger. And it's so much easier for us to judge than it is to empathize.

I didn't really follow the Steubenville rape case. I knew it was happening and I knew a community was divided over it, and that's about all I knew. I don't know much about either the boys or the girl, so I can't tell you if these kids just had an appalling lack of judgement, empathy, decency, resulting from a break down in their childhood or families or whatever....or if they were sociopaths. The difference being sociopaths can't learn empathy. They just can't. So maybe the parents in question were sadly lacking in the conversations they had with their sons. Or, for all I know, maybe they did everything right and....their sons were sociopaths.

Anyway, where I came into the news story was when people online started posting snarky, stupid comments--and let's face it, we've all posted snarky, stupid comments, myself included--about how these young men might feel once they got to the big house and were raped themselves. I can't tell you how many times I almost puked on my computer screen. Seriously? Have we gotten to that point? I'm not saying they shouldn't have been prosecuted and done their time. I'm just saying that maybe no one deserves to be raped. Also, that maybe taking even violent offenders and exposing them to more violence, well, just maybe that makes things worse. Maybe it will just make them angry and more violent. As the Mahatma would say, "An eye for an eye will leave the whole world blind."

I'm not trying to sound like I've got the moral high ground. I mean, you should have heard me cheering for joy when Bin Laden died. And, even at the time, I wondered if I should have felt that joy at the death of another human being. I suspected I should be more evolved. But I couldn't, not for Osama Bin Laden, and I didn't even lose anyone close to me in his many attacks against the U.S. and other countries.

That said, while I shed no tears for the bullets that ended his life, I never once said "Hey, maybe you should rape him first. That'll teach him." Even Bin Laden didn't deserve rape.

April 6th

April 6th is a date of significance to Mormons and to me. To Mormons, it's the date Joseph Smith began the church. It's also, at least to many Mormons, the true birth date of Christ. (No, I don't know or even care why.)

It will come as no surprise to people who know me that I have a love-hate relationship with the Mormon church. Actually, it's more complicated than that. On any given day, I feel annoyance, bemusement, anger, pain, or disinterest. Sometimes I ignore anything to do with Mormonism. Other days, I have to rant. And then I hear back from Mormons I know. Admittedly, they speak mostly in silence: You're making too much of this. It was never intended that way. It doesn't matter. Why are you still talking about it? It isn't nice to talk about it. Sometimes I even hear It didn't happen. You're making this up.

Oh, how I wish I were.

I have a fantasy of somehow producing an x-ray of my psyche. I could then display and point to each wound, scarred and ugly as if from the lash of a whip. I could say not only "That one is Mormonism," but with some I could be awfully specific. "That one there," I would say, "is when, at the age of three, I first realized my parents could be excommunicated from the church." In fact, I have a special cluster of psychic scars just dealing with excommunication. During the recent transition to a new pope, one of the CNN experts said that, once they entered the conclave, the cardinals could not communicate with the outside world, "under the threat of excommunication." I looked at my dad and said, "Under The Threat of Excommunication would be a good title for a book about my childhood."

Not that I myself ever faced that threat personally because I never got baptized. That's another story. All I will say now is that it was not an accident. You're supposed to get baptized at eight and I spent a year, from when I was seven and a half to when I was eight and a half, with a perpetual stomachache. If any of my relatives baptize me after I die (yes, they can do that) I hereby promise to wreak as much havoc on them from the other side as I can. It doesn't matter that even in Mormonism, there is a caveat that the soul being baptized can decline. I will still get even with you. (Can you tell I have a cluster of scars all from being pressured about baptism?)

Between the two of them, my parents wrote and spoke about plenty of subjects the Mormon church didn't really want discussed, let alone criticized, and it usually drew the attention of church officials to them. It wasn't just my parents. For instance, the reason I felt it so young was that a Mormon feminist named Sonia Johnson fought against the church and its stance towards the Equal Rights Amendment. (They disliked that about as much as, decades later, they would dislike California's prop 8.) My mom began a series of articles about Sonia. By the time I was three, Sonia had been excommunicated, and I somehow knew, if they could excommunicate her, they could excommunicate my parents.

(An interesting factoid about Mormon excommunication. They call the meeting where they decide your fate a "court." This does not mean the person in question gets to have representation and plead their case. In fact, Sonia was not even allowed to attend her court. My dad tells me that as far as he knows there isn't even a set procedure. Basically, they can do whatever they want.)

As I got older, I became familiar with the patterns of what my parents and their friends referred to as "purges." Sometimes the church reacted to individual misdeeds, but most of the time it was a purge. They'd put out an edict, remind people that certain subjects shouldn't be spoken of, certain publications were frowned upon, certain gatherings (particularly the annual Sunstone symposium, which was and still is a big draw for historians and intellectuals) were forbidden. When people didn't fall into line, they intensified the pressure. First, your bishop would warn you, then a stake president would get involved. If you couldn't get back in his good graces, it could go further up the chain. Purges lasted a few months to a year and always ended the same way. The church made examples of people, excommunicating a few, disciplining others, and, at that point, everyone else did fall into line, at least for a while.

One day in late March, when I was in junior high, the church was in the midst of another round of purging, and my parents were on their list of targets, I came home to find, among the mail, an envelope from the church addressed to my mom. It was not the first envelope like that I'd seen, addressed to one or both of my parents, especially over the last few months. For some reason, though, I thought this was it. This was the letter telling her they were holding a court against her. Not that she would care about losing church privileges. She'd long since stopped attending, but, because she was well-known, it would become very public.

The way my mom remembered this day was that she pulled into the driveway and I raced out. Pale and trembling, I held the envelope out to her. She opened it, found it was something innocuous like a reminder to pay tithing, which she hadn't paid in over a decade, but they still seemed to think she would, and told me, "Cynthia, it's nothing, sweetheart." I think I burst into tears.

And in that moment, she decided it was enough. She would no longer let the church wield that kind of power over us. She spoke to her devoutly Mormon parents in person, sent letters to her siblings, and then wrote to the church and asked to be removed from their rolls. (My dad later did the same.)

With the eye for symbolism she always had, she timed it so the date on her letter to the church was April 6th.

Or, as I like to call it, Liberation Day.

Interfacing With A Non-INFJ World

As we've established, in the Meyers-Briggs Test Indicator, I am an INFJ. Unfortunately, most Americans are either an ESTJ  or an ESFJ.

Being an INFJ in a non-INFJ world is like scuba diving. If I have enough energy, I can turn that energy into an oxygen tank, and float around, admire the views and meet the inhabitants. Of course, eventually, I run out of oxygen and have to resurface into my world. If I don't have energy, though, I'm basically holding my breath, seeing how long I can last without passing out, going mad, and/or dying.

Here's an example: a phone call with my dad. As an ESTJ, he does not speak my language. I speak his, but I prefer to speak mine.

Dad: "How are you?"

My response, if I were an ESTJ, would be "Well, I feel kind of awful, but I'm going to see how much I can get done before I need to rest, and by the way did you see/hear about (insert three news stories) and can you believe the weather is (insert whatever the weather is doing.)

My INFJ, and therefore, natural response: "Ok."

Dad: "What's up?"

Me as an ESTJ: "Well, I woke up, caught up on email and social media while doing my blue light winter depression treatment, had some chocolate milk, took my pills, and went to the bathroom, but not in that order. Now I'm in the studio, trying to get something done while I have energy, and you're interrupting me."

Me as an INFJ: "Nothing." (Because even though all of the above happened, none of it mattered enough to be worth the energy to speak it.)

Dad: "How's Percie?"

Me as an INFJ: "Fine, I guess. I haven't seen her."

At this point, I can tell I'm driving him as crazy as he's driving me. An ESTJ would have gone downstairs first thing in the morning to check on the cat, but, again, that's a waste of energy. If Percie wants to interact, she'll either come up stairs or she'll yell at me to come down. In fact, I think Percie might be an INFJ, too. She can spend 23 hours asleep and/or ignoring the world, and then, for one hour, wants constant interaction. After that, she wants to curl up for another 23 hours and not talk. I totally understand. After I'm extremely social, even with people I adore, I need an hour or two in a room with the curtains drawn, a chocolate bar, and absolute silence.

Speaking of curtains, ESTJs will open curtains in the morning, because that's what you do in the mornings. INFJs open the curtains if they want to look out, or if their INFJ cat wants to look out. An ESTJ answers the phone because it rings. I answer the phone if I want to (or need to) talk to the person who is calling. (A big INFJ shout-out to whoever invented caller id. That's a damn fine invention. I'm also fond of live chat.)

An ESTJ might say, "Tell me about your day."

An INFJ will say "Tell me how you felt, what you thought, what you read between the lines, what they didn't say, and if possible, what you dreamed last night and what you think it means. Tell me about something that matters. Or tell me something funny because otherwise meaningless chatter can be amusing if it's funny. But don't talk to me for an hour and a half about nothing that matters, has no substance, and is not even funny simply because you want to fend off silence."

See, we INFJs aren't afraid of silence. In fact, we know that silence, in addition to a respite of conversation, is a conversation all itself. It's an intangible conversation, carried on waves of energy instead of sound, but it's still a conversation.

Sean

I knew Sean most of my childhood. We went to the same hippie/intellectual/do-it-yourself cooperative charter school back before charter schools were common. I don't think we were always in the same class, but the school was small enough that you pretty much knew everyone. We were in kindergarten together, I'm certain, and in fifth and sixth grades together.

Sean was tall and athletic. He was an incredible artist. He specialized in intricate and patterned geometric drawings that the other kids then wanted to learn. He was cool because he didn't try to be. He was smart and funny, but also kind of reserved. He listened more than he spoke. I knew him, but I didn't. I wish I had paid more attention.

I remember in sixth grade we didn't have a cafeteria, but ate in our classroom. Sean would get his milk, stand next to the trash, drink the milk in one, long pull, and toss the carton in the trash. I think one day someone brought in a quart or bought extra milk cartons to see how much he could drink. I'm vague on the details. I only remember he met the challenge.

I can imagine Sean in a dozen careers--attorney, psychologist, software engineer, architect, doctor, dotcom millionaire. But none of that happened because, on March 1st, 1994, he was killed by a drunk driver with multiple DUIs and a suspended driver's license. The other night, I thought, "It's almost twenty years since Sean was killed." Turns out it's almost nineteen. Nineteen years. He only lived seventeen.

As I reread press clippings, I came across a quote from another high school student: "Sean was honorable." That may sound like a strange thing for one teenage boy to say about another, but it resonated with me. Sean was honorable. He was fair in a way kids rarely are. In fact, if there had ever been a playground dispute, and we kids needed to choose an arbitrator, Sean would have been everyone's choice. We would have all trusted him to listen to both sides and decide what was fair, not favoring friends and not caring about how it would affect him socially.

Back when the veil between the worlds was thin for me and all sorts of spirits came through to me, Sean was one of them. Normally, I have this theory that spirits don't concern themselves with physical things, and I've had plenty of spirits show up when I was in the tub. Still, when as a grown woman, I stepped out of a tub and reached for a towel, all very Rubenesque, I was startled to sense the energy of a boy I had known since kindergarten. And I said, "Sean! I'm naked! Get out of here! Come back when I'm dressed!" He didn't come back, but I swear I heard him laughing. And it was so Sean because he was the kind of person who could pull a practical joke on you, and, rather than being embarrassed, you would laugh, and feel somewhat flattered that he'd chosen you.

The night of the accident, a group of high school students were on the shoulder of the highway, changing a flat tire. As the car, driven by a drunk driver, veered onto the shoulder, the other kids jumped out of the way. Only Sean was struck. This image haunts me. One of my clearest memories of Sean was playing dodgeball. You know, someone throws the ball into the circle, once you're hit, you're out of the game. (I was usually the first one out.) Sean, though, used to drive us all to frustration. He was so agile and focused that usually the recess bell would end before Sean would get hit in dodgeball. Even though he was closest to the car that night, part of me can't believe he was the one who couldn't evade it.

As morbid as it sounds, I've never been able to shake the image of how that last moment must have been. I see him in the headlights, the car speeding and yet time slowing down, and Sean trying to jump out of the way. It has merged with the last real image I had of Sean. Our grade school class got together for a reunion, I think right before high school. As things wound down, a bunch of kids played basketball. Sean, of course, was in the thick of it. I remember glancing over my shoulder, seeing Sean in the air, going for a lay-up, all grace and finesse and promise.

And so, for me, Sean is always in flight.

Weighty Matters

Governor Chris Christie and I have three things in common: we both think President Obama is hell of a guy, we're both overweight, and neither of us have any interest in other people's feedback about our weight.

A little background: I almost starved to death twice due to Crohn's disease. The first time was due to a misdiagnosis, the second just because we couldn't get it under control. Thankfully it is now, but, yeah...I got very, very thin...down to 80 pounds the first time and 100 pounds the second time, though I was sicker (like ICU sick) the second time because I was so anemic.

What I learned during that time:

I really like to eat.

I would rather eat than be thin.

I also decided that if I could ever eat what I wanted to eat, that's what I was going to do. (Actually, there are still a ton of foods I can't eat in spite of the Crohn's being under control. Ironically, a lot of them are fruits and vegetables.) And that's what I did.

Ultimately, after a few months of me doing things like oh, having a large slice of apple pie for breakfast, lasagna for lunch, lasagna for dinner, and another slice of apple pie for dessert, I gained back that weight and  then some and people around me, including my doctors, started saying "Uh....."

And I said, "I don't care."

Of course, I started to gain weight, especially since I also have CFS/ME (known by most people as chronic fatigue syndrome, though that's a dumb name and we're working to get it changed.) One of the things about CFS/ME is that exercise--even light exercise--makes it worse. So, yes, I have a medical excuse not to exercise, which is kind of cool.

What I don't like about being overweight is that total strangers make judgments about me. Like they think I'm lazy (no, but see the chronic fatigue syndrome part), or I'm not motivated (uh yeah....try getting that past anyone who actually knows me) or I'm unhappy.

Quite the opposite, I'm the happiest I've been in years. And, except for things I don't believe in like body mass index, I'm the healthiest I've been in years. Even my doctors have to agree with this. I may be overweight, but I have

low blood pressure
low blood sugar
low cholesterol
a healthy heart

This summer, my energy level was higher than it had been in twenty years and I was walking much longer distances than I did back in my skinny days. And, whenever someone gives me a look or makes a comment, um....I laugh all the way to the bakery.

Play It Again, Tai

A little less than a year ago, a new guide entered my "Peanut Gallery" of guides. Her name is Tai. You can read more about her here. (This will make more sense if you've read the first one.) Anyway, Tai is my joy guide. (If that freaks you out, think of her as an imaginary friend. She won't mind.)

I don't actually see guides. In fact, Tai's the only one I "see" at all, if only in my mind's eye. I'm glad I do, though, because she cracks me up. When I'm stressed, she makes what looks like a dying goldfish face. And then there are her hands. You know when a kid is young enough that their hands are kind of chubby and dimpled? That's how Tai's hands are and, when she is really happy about something, she waves them excitedly, as if she cannot contain her delight. (This is usually a response to new art supplies.)

I also hear Tai--again in my mind--which is not something I ordinarily do. She has a wonderful laugh and I go out of my way to find ways to make her laugh. I also tell her that I'd like to put her laugh on an audio mpeg. She said, "That would be cool."

I discovered right away that Tai responds to music, at least certain music. I'm always trying to figure out what catches her attention and what doesn't. (She has her own playlist on my ipod, plus a bunch of favorite youtube videos.) I could play any version of "What A Wonderful World" without Tai showing any interest. If I play Louis Amstrong's version, Tai is enraptured. I can see her tilt her head and listen. In fact, she seems very drawn to blues, jazz, and old spirituals. Among spirituals, she really likes "Way Beyond The Blue" but her favorite is "Wade In The Water." She loves the verse "I went down to the valley to pray. My soul got happy and I stayed all day." According to Tai, our souls are supposed to be happy--if not always, then most of the time.

This does not mean everything with Tai is that deep. She really likes the Muppets version of the Village People's "In The Navy." I finally caught on that what she likes best about it is the stomping rhythm of the chorus: "We want you, we want you, we want you as a new recruit." Another recent Tai favorite song  is "Moon River." As with many songs, I couldn't remember all the lyrics, so I went to youtube. I played several versions and the one Tai responded to was Elton John's. (He performed it at a concert, though, as far as I can tell, he's never released it as a song.) Why Elton John and not Audrey Hepburn? (Another Tai favorite is "Son of a Preacher Man" by Dusty Springfield. Again, I don't know why.)

When Tai likes a song, I can use it to summon her, even on a bad day. Of course, this means I may hear her say "Um, play it again please." I caught on to the fact that she never asked for a song (or a video) to be played twice, but always three times. I tend to see things symbolically, so I kept trying to figure out the three connection. For instance, I've always thought Tai was around the age of three or four. (Tai won't tell me anything about her previous life--or lives--because "it's not important.") Three to me also means the Trinity. In Tarot, the third card in the Major Arcana, is the Empress, which is a card of abundance. In numerology, three symbolizes drama and joy. In The Gift Of Asher Lev by Chaim Potok, three is a riddle throughout the book, and, as it was one of my mom's favorite books, maybe it was a message from her?

 I finally got a connection strong enough with Tai to say "Why three?" and she said, "Three is my favorite number because, um, I like it's shape."

"Anything else?" I asked.

"No," she said, seeming a little perplexed, "it's just my favorite."

Tai has lots of favorites. Red is her favorite color. Elephants are her favorite animal. Cheetos are her favorite snack. Her favorite celebrities are the Dalai Lama-- ("he seems really happy") and Barack Obama-- ("he seems really nice and, um, I like when he sings.") Kermit is her favorite Muppet, followed by Animal. (Kermit sings. Animal's red. Makes sense.) She's not too keen on Miss Piggy, except when she's doing her "Hi-ya" karate. Tai's favorite word is "grooving"--as in "We're grooving to tunes."

And, in addition to the Muppets, she has a favorite form of comedy. Remember how I said I'll do about anything to make her laugh? One day, I told her that old knock-knock joke... You know:

"Knock knock"

"Who's there?"

"Banana"

"Banana who?"

"Knock knock"

"Who's there?"

"Banana"

on and on until she was exasperated and I said "Orange"

and she said, taken aback, "Orange who?"

and I said, "Orange you glad I didn't say banana?"

And then I discovered that along with her melodic laugh, she has a deep chuckle, which I'd also like to put on an mpeg.

That night, as I was trying to fall asleep, I heard a little voice say "Knock knock" and I said "Who's there?" and she said, "Tai" and I said, "Tai who?" and she said, "Um, just Tai."

Ode To Mormon Feminists

ode to mormon feminists

three decades later,
and the sisters rise,
again,
for the same crumbs,
symbolic though they may be,
never a whole loaf
to chase away hunger

lower your veil
for her sin
is your sin

a taint passed from mother to daughter
remember this shame

lower your veil,
it will conceal all
your flaws
and distort your vision

know your place, she says
you would say,
know your value.

--Cynthia Sillitoe, January 2013

Conspiracies of Silence and Omission

Note: this blog may annoy/anger my relatives and/or Mormons. Consider yourselves warned. From this point on, you're offended at your own risk.

Tonight, I started reading Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's book Black Profiles of Courage. In his essays about prominent people of African descent in American history, he writes not only of these important historical figures, but of what he sees (and I see) as a concerted attempt to write them out of history. And the more I read, the more I find myself muttering, "Tell me about it, Kareem."

Those who know me through my blog or not, know that I have an ambivalent relationship with the Mormon church. (Yes, I know it's properly addressed as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I won't call it that because defying the church's public relations' campaigns is one of the joys of my life.) Anyway, my life has been a strange microcosm of Utah. I had a mother from a devout Mormon family, a father from a very non-Mormon family, who converted. Years after they married, my parents started questioning church teachings, which led us as a family down a long and winding path further away from the religion. As such, I find myself knowing some things about church history and doctrine which most active Mormons might not know, and then I find myself not knowing things that would have become obvious if I'd stayed in the church.

In the days when "Which Greek hero/gay leader/jazz musician/femme fatale are you" quizzes were all the rage on Facebook, one was "Which Book of Mormon Character Are You?" I reported this idly to my mom, noting that so far none of our relatives has turned out to be female characters. My mom looked at me for a minute, took a deep breath, then said, "Cynthia, there are no female characters in the Book of Mormon. Well, there are two, but only one has a name, and neither is someone you'd want to be."

"Huh?"

"Well, you can assume somewhere there are women because generations of sons continue to be born to men, but uh...yeah. It's not like the Bible. You won't find women like Ruth or Esther, or Mary, or Martha."

At that point, I commenced screaming.

See, one of my qualms with Mormonism is that there's a "separate but equal" bit going on. Men and women have different roles in the religion which are both supposed to be equally important, though a woman's path could never lead her to be prophet of the church. (Unless a future prophet has a major revelation.) One of the many topics my mom got into hot water over was equality in the priesthood. Men get the priesthood which gives them the ability to heal, have visions, etc., and eventually maybe lead the church. Women don't get that. Women get to have babies. Although if women choose not to--or are unable to--have babies, they can't get the priesthood by default.

So my screaming went like this: "What the hell? Did you all know that? All the Mormon feminists who have been fighting for generations, they knew they weren't in the Book of Mormon, right? Why the hell would they think they could demand equality from a church whose gospel doesn't even mention them?" (Actually, this is the edited version. My real screaming was far more profane.)

And then it went like this: "So, you as a little girl, were raised to seek solace and wisdom in a book where you would find no one like you? No role models at all? How did you do that? Ok, clearly you didn't forever, but for how many generations have Mormon women sat in pews and read scripture all about men?"

"Well," my mom said, "the Bible is scripture, too, and you could find a few good women in that. Setting aside Eve, of course. It's amazing how women have suffered because of one woman and her lust for an apple." (She was trying to calm me down with humor, but it wasn't working.)

"So how do women get the Priesthood?" I asked my mom, because I know there are devout Mormon women who believe there will be a revelation from the prophet. "I mean, is that prophet going to say, it has been revealed to me that Brother Joseph missed translating a gold plate and now regrets it? Will someone have to dig up a new addition to the gospel? Or will the prophet have to admit that the scripture is...uh... flawed?"

Of course, the Mormon Church has gotten really good at revising history. In efforts to move away from connections to polygamy, and perhaps also to create a female role model, the last few years have seen a lot of books about Joseph Smith and his wife Emma. Not his only wife, but apparently the one he loved most, and his spiritual wife. Everywhere you turn, there are articles, essays, blogs, books and even movies about Emma Smith. She is the face of Mormon women. What's hilarious is that, after Joseph Smith's murder, Emma Smith and her Smith sons, broke away from the traditional Mormon church to create their own version of the religion. That fact seems lost on the Church marketing machine. (Personally, I think her descendants ought to sue for royalties.)

And, as for other women role models, the Church has moved a bit on the concept of Mother in Heaven. Turns out Father in Heaven does have a wife, but, as one friend told me at school, "she was not to be spoken of...because if she were people would take her name in vain the way they take God's name in vain, and so Heavenly Father tries to protect her from this." I came home and announced over dinner that Mother in Heaven was clearly a wuss. A deity who needs to be protected by another deity from mere mortals?

These last few years, I've been trying to remove myself from all this baggage of my childhood, to gain some kind of intellectual and emotional distance--maybe even disinterest--my loyalty still lies with the women who fight for the priesthood. But if you get it, sisters, every time you pick up a Book of Mormon, may you remember that when the angel appeared to Joseph and brought him a gospel, for all intents and purposes, you weren't important to the story.

And, if they write you into it, keep a vigilant watch, or they'll revise you out of it when you're not paying attention.

Insomnia: A Chance to Analyze My Relatives

Lately, I've been having more trouble than usual sleeping and that's saying something. I've never been a good sleeper and, before you start posting sleep remedies, I've tried them. All of them. What's worked best for me  has been Ambien, though lately that hasn't worked, so I dutifully went to the doctor and we decided to try Ambien CR. The only catch was that it turned out my insurance wouldn't cover it until I'd used up the rest of the last prescription. It didn't matter that the current medicine wasn't working and my doctor wanted me on another. My first reaction to this was an expletive. My second was to remind myself how lucky I am to have insurance at all.

That reaction is what I call the "Grandma Buhler" effect. My mom's mom was incredibly optimistic and grateful for everything she had. Give her a bad situation and she'd find a blessing in it...or two or three. A number of life experiences shaped this. One was when, as a child, she sat too close to a woodstove and caught on fire. At first, she was not expected to live, and then she spent months in a pre-WWII pediatric burn unit, enduring skin grafts and other medical tortures. I figure when you've been in a pre-WWII pediatric burn unit, most things in life seem pretty damn minor. In fact, one of my mantras for when everything seems awful is "at least it's not a pre-WWII pediatric burn unit."

This does not mean she was a Pollyanna. You know, Hayley Mills' character who asks for a doll and gets crutches and gets over her disappointment by being glad she doesn't need them. In that situation, Grandma would have been disappointed, eventually glad she didn't need them, (but still disappointed,) but she also would have realized that somebody didn't get the crutches they needed (which never seemed to occur to Pollyanna) and that would have really bugged her. She probably would have tried to track down the child who had needed the crutches. And she would have lost sleep over it.

My Grandma Roberts, my great-grandmother on the other side of the family, would have reacted differently. She would have been furious about not getting the doll, but she also would have kept the crutches, knowing with the instincts of a great--uh, packrat--that you can never have too many pairs of crutches stashed away. She also might have wanted to make sure that no one on the block had better crutches.

I remember being a small girl and finding a cane in a closet at Grandma Roberts' house. I believe it belonged to Aunt Pearl. What I can't tell you is how Aunt Pearl fit into the family or if she was even anyone's aunt. That family is kind of loose about things like that. People called "aunt" or "uncle" might really be cousins and people called "cousins" might really be nephews. Uh, yeah.

At the time, I thought it was sweet that Grandma Roberts couldn't bear to part with the cane and proof of how much she loved Aunt Pearl. Now I realize it was only part sentimental. Mostly it was the "They don't make good canes like they used to and you never know when you need one so it would be a sin to throw one out" mentality. It was like walking past a penny and not picking it up. Grandma Roberts used to tell my dad that "If you don't see the pennies, you'll never see the dollars."

Then there was my great-aunt Chick. Once, when Mom and I were living in Arizona, someone called and asked for her. I told them she wasn't there and offered to take a message. She said, "Tell her her Aunt Charlette called." (I hope I'm spelling that right...I know it was an unusual spelling. Someone remind me if I  have it wrong.) I took the message and when my mom came home, said "Since when do you have an aunt Charlette?" She said, "Oh, that's Chick. Chick hates being called Chick." I said, "Does the family know that?" and she said, "Yes, but everyone still calls her Chick anyway."

Anyway, it turns out that my great-aunt Chick (Charlette) had decided to write a book about her battle of weight loss, so called her niece the author for pointers. While I don't still have the manuscript and wish I did, it contained several hysterical stories, including one which my mom swore was "All you need to know about Aunt Chick...I mean, Charlette."

It seems one summer she and a friend decided this was it, they were losing the weight. They joined an aerobics class and twice a week they'd drop all their kids off at a babysitters, go to class, pick up the kids and then, "as a reward" go to Snelgrove's (famous Utah ice cream shop) for root beer floats. Chick (Charlette) said to my mom, in all seriousness, "Linda, I didn't miss a class that summer, and I didn't lose a pound, either." Next time I insist chocolate is a health food, remember this story. It's genetic.

Why I remember all these family stories and quirks is beyond me. Maybe part of it is because I come from two families of storytellers who also remembered them and found value in retelling them. Maybe the part of my brain that keeps track of family stories is dominant while the part that regulates sleep clearly isn't.

I can tell you that Ambien or no, I wouldn't have gotten to sleep Christmas night until all my thank you notes were done. In fact, as I crawled into bed that night, I thought, "Susan, I hope you noticed I did all my thank you notes. Ok, some were emails, but I did them all." My aunt Susan had many fine qualities, but absolutely no tolerance for late thank you notes, and she wouldn't mind waking me to get them done.

Of course, first I'd have to go to sleep....

Fragment of a Dream

in the dream, it seemed
that you were back,
trying to reclaim donated clothes and books

as you stomped your feet and shouted,
I haggled with the store owner
and with you

"I tried to warn you," I said,
"We both knew you wouldn't stay away."

"I meant to stay away," you said,
"but now I want my things."