World Mental Health Day... and the scary world we live in

Today is World Mental Health Day. A bunch of months ago I said I was going to write more. I lied. I always think about writing, especially in moments I'm really fired up or moved, but then I get stuck about how to share, especially because my work is so intense and confidential, I worry about what people want to hear and also if its worth it to put it all out there. The world is intense and scary right now, and the conversations I am having everyday feel so relevant it hurts and for that reason it scares me to share. There's a way that by not bringing the clients that I meet with to the public eye I can let people's hate and misunderstanding stay a little distant- but if I share real stories of real people and people STILL don't change how they act/treat each other/vote/see the world- that just feels painful.
But today feels like a ripe time to share some of the things that are moving through my heart, my office, our world, etc, etc. And writing this is good for my mental health too, so hopefully it's a win-win situation.

This morning I was listening to The Daily (my new favorite podcast done by the NYT that does a deep dive into relevant topics). The topic was the Kavanaugh confirmation, and the conversations that women are having about it across the country. First he sat with a group of high school girls and talked to them about their experience, then two women in the town in Mississippi where Trump mocked Dr. Blasey Ford and engaged all his familiar performative and incredibly unaware tactics that somehow engage his brand and tribalism that lead to people saying "I thought he was hilarious" and "I totally agree with what he is saying about her". It was an intense roller coaster of emotions for me. The high schoolers were so articulate, they shared about their own experiences of assault and intimidation by men, and how it felt for them that he was confirmed. They said that it felt like "men can do whatever they want" and the government "doesn't really care about our experiences". They also said that of course they and their peers should be held accountable to their high school behaviors. Then the Mississippi lady talked about how Dr. Blasey Ford cannot have PTSD and she's taking it too far and plenty of women experience sexual assault who "forgive and forget and move on with their lives". And that we should look at service men who "actually have PTSD".. can you feel my blood pressure rising?

Everyday I sit in this office with high schoolers. Is the goal of high school, of the student's teachers, coaches, therapists and parents, anything other than forming morally astute teenagers? Are we not telling them everyday to think about the consequences of their actions, treat others kindly, make good decisions and set themselves up for the rest of their lives. Do you see how damn confusing this must all be to high schoolers who are getting it drilled into their heads how important every action is and then see this dude just get away with assaulting a woman in part because "that was high school". I'm so very proud of the teens who sit in my office and try to make sense of their own history of trauma, their friendships, their hopes for the future and their desire to be the best version of themselves. So while our government tells highschoolers two things 1. teenage girls' experience (and all women for that matter) don't matter and 2. teenage boys can get away with whatever they want, I will keep sitting here trying to make sure they know otherwise. I really think it comes down to us all being in touch with our own dignity and humanity and that being the impetus to care for and respect ourselves and the people around us. Despite the world trying to strip it away in so many awful awful ways.

SO many of these teenagers I sit with have been sexually abused. And SO many of the women I sit with have been sexually abused. As they get older the percentage gets higher and higher. And to the lady in Mississippi who doesn't believe that Dr. Blasey Ford could have PTSD from this incident.. She absolutely can and very likely does. We are learning SO much about the brain and trauma, and we code these traumatic events in a different part of our brain that DOESN'T have a narrative memory but remembers snippets and sensorial things like roaring laughter, like the way the lights flashed, the smell of the perpetrator, so many different things that stick in our minds but cannot be processed because our narrative memory shut down in our fight/flight reaction. Then our brain spends years and years trying to make sense of it, getting triggered and re-traumatized and making life incredibly hard. I recently had someone tell me about an older man (a friend's grandpa) touching her inappropriately with her clothes on and kissing her on the mouth. And I simultaneously wanted to throw up imagining it and felt RELIEVED that it wasn't worse. Let that sink in a moment- sexual abuse is so common that I feel relieved when a teenage girl tells me all this creepy old man did was kiss her and not more. There is something wrong with the world when that is a relieving story to hear.

These experiences of having your body invaded, your dignity and voice denied, your safety and sense of your self threatened stick with you forever. The power that men of all ages use to take advantage of women has daily and life long effects on us and the statement our country just made about that is really scary, really invalidating and will continue to have real impacts on people's mental health and behavior. Judith Herman, a brilliant psychiatrist who wrote the book Trauma and Recovery talks about how much we deny the existent of trauma and PTSD because its too hard for us to acknowledge how scary the world is- it seems to me that that is happening so intensely right now. Especially among women who want to deny what Dr. Blasey Ford experienced. It makes sense in some ways; we lose power and our sense of safety if we acknowledge how common these incidents are and how detrimental the effects are, but it's never going to change if we don't start calling it what it is. I am SO grateful for all the people in my life and in our country as a whole who are doing that, and overwhelmed about what to do with the huge number of people who are not. I recently read an article about how women often don't tell their dads about their experiences of assault because they are trying to keep them from feeling the pain of their daughters being hurt. The article talked about the ways we continue to protect men's feelings which leads to men not knowing the truth of whats happening in the world. We must keep speaking up, we must stop protecting men's feelings and we must acknowledge the lasting impact of trauma of all kinds.

So now Kavanaugh is confirmed. FOR LIFE. On the highest court in our country. This is a huge deal. I'm really worried about the outcome of him being there. I'm really worried about people's mental health. I'm worried about women like so many I've met who have SUCH extreme trauma, are so poorly cared for in this country, have fled their own country because of violence and fear and then because of the patriarchy and machismo end up pregnant with babies they know they can't care for with father's who they don't know well enough to trust that they will be there to help carry the burden. I am worried about how much more depressed women will be when they don't have options. I am worried about women taking their own lives because they are stuck. I met someone who was verging on this not long ago, and the option to chose what would happen with her own body saved her life. Gave her the chance she needed to get help and support and bring a baby into this world when she feels ready to love and care for it.

I could keep going and going. About the family I met who was separated from their mom for three months because of this administrations insane policies. Two of those girls were sexually abused when they were young. Their mom experienced years of domestic violence, then they get ripped away from her when coming to our country trying to get to a place that this man who has hurt all of them won't be able to get to them. How do you think their mental health is? Or about the kids who witnessed murders in their countries. And come here and live in fear of being sent back. Or barely get to see their parents because they have to work three jobs to make ends meet. There are so many stories, but the point is, our government, our policies, these people making decisions with so much power in their hands and all the trickle down of it have huge impacts on people's mental health. And despite what the world has taught us our mental health may be the very most important thing. It's SO important for those of us who are lucky enough to have good jobs, full fridges, roofs over our heads and supportive friends and it's even more important and life threatening to those who don't have all that. The woman in Mississippi who thought Trump mocking Dr. Blasey Ford was funny also said that we should just keep experiences of assault to ourselves, these are personal. This argument about keeping things to ourselves and keeping the personal and political seperate keeps survivors in silence for years, it keeps us from thinking about the very real ways that politics affect us, and frankly it's a load of bull shit that lets people in power feel ok about themselves.

I'm aware that I am overly inundated in the world of trauma and mental health, and figuring out how to hold that in a healthy way is an important part of my journey as a Social Worker. But it is the lens through which I see everything. Every time I hear more horrible news about how we are treating kids on the border, every time I see powerful white men deny the experience of women, every time another black person is killed by the police, all I can think about is mental health and trauma- both on an individual and collective level. Our government is causing trauma through their policies and then multiplying it by their complete lack of awareness.

So- today, on Mental Health Awareness day do me a couple favors.
1. Check in with yourself- how are you really doing when you let the noise and busy-ness of life settle, what do you need? When was the last time you went for a walk, had a meaningful conversation with a friend, or let yourself relax and watch your favorite show? Take care of yourself so that you can be a kind, intentional and engaged human being.
2. Check in with your friends and family- sometimes we think everything is ok because it looks that way on the outside but we each have a universe in side of us and every single one of us has moments/experiences/relationships that are deeply painful and we all could use a little extra TLC every now and then (or always).
3. Because you have done all that, and chosen to be a little more in touch with the hearts of the people pulsing around you, try to see the world this way. Think about the way the people feel who you hear about in the news. Think about all the things you don't know about them but all the ways you can connect with them- the things we all have in common like wanting to be safe, loving our family and children, needing moments to breathe deeply, etc, etc. And then lets live from our hearts, vote from our hearts, interact with the people around us from our hearts.

This past weekend I had a really challenging therapy session. I cried the whole way through. Then went home and cried on the phone with my best friend. And I noticed that evening and next day how open I felt to the world. How my friendships felt all the more important and the sweetness of life was even sweeter. Its not easy to let ourselves feel and share our pain but I truly believe it lets us feel all the goodness in the world even more. And I think when we feel, and we take care of ourselves and each other, we are all such better people.

The world is hard to engage right now. We gotta take care of ourselves and each other. And the first step is acknowledging that we have beating hearts that feel pain and are affected by the world. And so does everyone around us.

Recuerdos del Pueblo Salvadoreño

Seven years ago I went to El Salvador for the first time bright eyed and bushy tailed and absolutely clueless as to what would come from my time there. At some point I changed the title of this blog to Abre Mi Corazon, something I was reminded of by a photo book my sister in law made for me with the same title. This week I had the chance to go back yet again, but this time to celebrate and commemorate the end of the program that brought me there in the first place and back again for an entire year. And this week I was reminded exactly why that phrase, that petition asking El Salvador to open my heart, was so poignant then, and is still just as poignant today.

A few weeks ago I was having a conversation about my work. I find that sometimes I get wrapped up in the high paced, busy, and even medical model of my clinic and my work becomes "just a job". When truly, for me, this work is so much more. It is a vocation. It is a calling that is rooted so deeply in the ways El Salvador has opened me, changed me, and propelled me into a life committed to something more. In this conversation I reflected back on the ways I felt so open hearted, so present, and so deeply connected to the people of El Salvador. I remembered sitting in plastic chairs in the homes of people I had never met, conversations while we helped cook and over lunch with the people who became like family, and then an entire year of this way of being with the staff, with my students, and in the multiple communities who had welcomed me in. I felt so full of life after every conversation, even when there was so much tragedy and so much of what we talked about was painful. There was a texture to my presence, to those relationships and moments that was so sacred and moved me into this work. Yet too often I feel distant from that. In a glimpse of momentary wisdom in this conversation a few weeks ago, I reflected "I think I doubt my ability to open my heart in that way again and again, day after day"

I paused, surprised at the truth in that statement. When I see 5 sometimes 10 clients in a day I doubt my ability to be present and open with every single one of them. But when I allow myself to be fully present, to let down some walls, and not think about all the other things I need to do, there is a palpable difference in our conversations.

Then this week I went to El Salvador. I walked off of the plane into the shocking humidity, the smell of burning trash, surrounded by people asking me if I wanted a taxi. And right away I felt different in my entire being. Again and again I spoke with other people about the same feeling, there were 85 alums of the Casa program gathered to celebrate its nearly 20 years of presence in El Salvador, and every single person I talked to noted this "special thing" about being in that country. I automatically feel my heart expand, no longer doubting my ability to be open, present, vulnerable and loving with every single person I encounter. The Salvadorans model this openness and invite me into it. I walk right into conversations and instead of performance and fake smiles and trying to be something people say things like "things are really bad, I wish I could say they are good but they are really hard" and tears stream freely from peoples eyes as we acknowledge situations that are not what anyone would hope for, yet are only inviting greater resilience and strength. As I am surrounded by people who live with their hearts wide open, mine simultaneously follows suite. I feel everything deeper: sadness, joy, fear, frustration, excitement. And most importantly, I feel so much more deeply myself, which allows me to love more fully, dream bigger, and walk through the world with a completely different posture.

Part of me feels frustrated and sad that feeling and living in that way in my daily life is so challenging. Yet another part of me completely understands why and was acutely aware of the ways individualism, capitalism, and all sorts of values and stories of this country work on me, making it hard to live out the values that come so naturally in  El Salvador. But mostly, I feel so overwhelmed with gratitude for the reminder. There have been many times when I go to El Salvador and all I want is to move back, feeling like that is the only way to live in the unique and amazing way the country allows me to live. And that was absolutely still present in my mind, dreaming of ways that could be possible, wondering if that is actually the call. But I don't think it is, I think the call is to be here, to keep working hard to live those values, to feel that openness and authenticity more present and to do so with the support of people right here.

I came back feeling so inspired. So very reminded of the goodness of the Casa program, el pueblo Salvadoreno and totally clear how my year there led me to where I am now, and full of desires and dreams about how to keep being the bridge.

One of those ways is to write more. As a practice of attention, self care, spiritual reflection, and prayer. Yet also as a way to share stories of pain, trauma, and injustice that I have the privilege of hearing while uplifting the values I so deeply admire that rise above the pain and suffering.  My Salvadoran family reminded me yet again how important it is to be in touch with the reality around us. So- with the inspiration of this past week, some encouragement from a dear friend, and something that has been nagging at me for a while, I am hoping to get back to this being a regular practice. In the meantime I am dreaming up some big ideas for more concrete, real life ways to bring some of what the Casa has taught me home. Stay tuned.

For Dorothy, Ita, Jean and Maura: In light of the Catholic vote for Jesus' Antithesis

The theology school recently hosted an open mic night to celebrate the lives of four Church women who were killed while serving the Salvadoran people during the Civil War. It felt like the perfect time to put words to some of what I have been struggling with since the election. And really since I returned from my year in El Salvador. Sharing these words there was an important and powerful experience after a year of renegotiating that community. Below is the poem that I shared

I fell in love with this Church in that country

Breaking hot tortillas in communion

With people who barely knew me

But loved me and invited me in.

Stumbling through conversations

In clumsy Spanish

They shared their deep faith with me

They taught me about God’s tears

Knowing She cries for their pain

I listened in awe to their faith

and their commitment

To walk up the volcano

Day after day

To keep fighting

Honoring the memory of those who came before them

Of Dorothy, Ita, Jean, Maura

And so many others who committed their lives to justice

To open their doors, make space at their tables

To live their faith, day in and day out

Easter means something different there

Where life sometimes feels

Like a perpetual Holy Saturday

And the people keep getting crucified

By our greed, our apathy ,our walls

But somehow they still see resurrection

They bring each other down from their crosses

They follow Jesus

Feeding the hungry, advocating for the voiceless

Inviting people in who are tired, sick afraid and alone

I fell in love with this Church there

And it led me here

Where I came in search

Of a community, a voice

An education to build the foundation under my passion

To take it with me and make change

To bring the faith, commitment that I found there

Into the Church I so struggled with here

She told me it might be hard

To sit in these white walled classrooms

“Remember your time here” she said

Over beans and rice

Surrounded by

Walls painted with martyrs faces

Bright green hills, blue rivers, memories of war

“Remember the people you walked with”

“Remember what brought you there”

I came to find a way to make change

To continue being nourished by a Church committed to justice

To be an active player in the creation of God’s dream

Reminding our church that it is Jesus who we follow

Yet so often I am disappointed

Inside and outside of these walls

Because hierarchy, “tradition” and comfort

Seem to be more important

Than following Jesus

Again and again I leave mass feeling drained

Thirsting for messages of justice and action

A call out of comfort into global solidarity

Thirsting for a voice or even pronouns that sound like mine

Thirsting for community, challenge and nourishment

I keep going back, hoping maybe one day I’ll find it

But I keep crying

Leaving feeling isolated and hopeless

Questioning how I can I stay in this Church

That chooses comfort and hierarchy over following Jesus

Over justice, over the call to solidarity

my Salvadoran siblings first invited me into

More than half our Church

Just voted the antithesis of Jesus

Into the highest office in our country

They voted for exclusion

They voted for violence, walls, racism and homophobia

They voted for white supremacy

They voted for sexual assault

They voted for hate

Jesus didn’t preach hate

And we are failing

If we think following Jesus

and voting for Trump

Can fit in the same box

In my isolation, through my tears

You remind me

To hold onto the Church that I fell in love with

In the country that soon will be flooded

With people who fled to our country

In desperate search of safety and life

Half our Church just told them they are unwelcome

And soon they will be sent home

And the disconnect feels insurmountable

This is our call, this is our Church

Our God is sobbing at the state of our world

She is begging for us to stand up to hate

To take action, to follow Jesus

In creating the world She hopes for us

She is pleading for us

To challenge comfort, individualism and fear

Calling us to fight for justice

To be radically inclusive

To ask for more

From our Church and our world

This is our Church

The responsibility is in our hands

To look closely at what Jesus asks of us

To listen to the laments of the most marginalized

To use this education, our privilege

Our call to be our God’s hands on this earth

I came here to find companions on the journey

And somedays I feel so alone

Like my presence in this Church is irrelevant

Walk with me, stand with those who are not here to ask

Our God, She is Sobbing

This is our call to work for justice

This is our call to heal our broken world.

Dear Future Daughter(s)

I wrote this months ago and it has just been sitting on my computer getting rusty. After a conversation with a dear friend, who is so committed to making this Church better for women, and a small crisis about how I can keep fighting when I'm no longer in theology school- I thought it would be a good time to share. 

Dear Future Daughter(s),

Yesterday I sat in mass watching the Alter boys and I thought of you. I heard you so vividly asking me "why can the boys do it and we can't" and my heart broke. I spent the rest of the hour angry, wondering how I was going to bring you to a place that yet again denied you of your right to be all that you will be put on this Earth to be. I imagined how I would explain this to you, felt frustrated that you too will have to keep fighting and felt even more fearful of the unasked questions. I know what happens when you see the inequality playing out over and over again throughout your life. I know how this is digested, this idea that you are less- less capable, less worthy and less seen and known. Unfortunately, there are so many places that you will get this message. No matter how hard we try to protect you- advertisements, school, books, movies, everything around you will tell you that because you were born with a different biological makeup, you are not enough. We will fight that, every single day and I will tell you that all of those advertisements and messages are wrong, it will not be easy, but I think there are enough voices that are stronger than those to remind you that you are so very worthy.

Yet, sitting in the pew, watching the boys sit up on the alter, next to the priest in his King like chair, physically above and separate from us, holding the readings for him, supporting him in doing the sacraments, being groomed to someday take his place if they so please, I was so very angry that in this place too, I will have to try to find louder voices than those. I felt angry imagining that fight in this very institution that is supposed to connect you to a God that knows you are just as worthy, capable, and sees you for all that you have to offer this world.  My fear is not you asking the question, or even being able to answer- I will answer, I am so sure that this institution has it so very wrong and as I prayed I knew that God too thinks it is so very wrong. I am worried about the unspoken ways this will affect how you understand yourself.  The Church is failing us, failing women and men alike, and truly failing God. I sat with my head in my hands so very frustrated wondering how I will possibly be able to bring you, my future daughters, who I want nothing more than to know your goodness, to a place that denies this to you. In a place that is supposed to show us the way in bringing about the Reign of God, the place of God on this Earth, the messenger, the bridge, however we want to understand it, it's messages are so strong. They cut so deep, the gender of who is up there and who can become a priest, the actions of this Church they function in so many hurtful ways.

Overwhelmed with anger, questions and a fear of bringing you here, I realized this deep anger is of God. God wants me to be angry, because God too is so angry that there are only men on the altar. God is angry that the young girls who brought up the gifts found such joy in having the priest come down from the altar and take the gifts from them, because they so deeply want to be involved, invited to stand on the alter,  and so rarely are. God needs us sitting in those pews angry, aware, asking all the questions. It pains me to imagine you feeling the hurt of being told you are less, but we will talk about it. You will ask, we will answer, we will dig, we will cry and scream and express how not ok it is that you are not included. And eventually dear daughters, we will be heard. Eventually, sweet girls, you will stand on the alter if you so please. 

Sunday's Gospel was the annunciation, (reminder that I wrote this months ago) Mary finds out she is pregnant and hurries to tell her cousin Elizabeth who is also pregnant. We are told there is celebrating, Mary is highlighted for the ways she goes to share the good news and the two are lifted up for "helping one another". It is advent, the Church is waiting for baby Jesus to be born and the message we get about Mary is that she is a helper. In my anger about alter boys I found myself angry about Mary too. We speak so often about God coming to us in the flesh as Jesus, but we forget that the flesh that grew Jesus was Mary's. The flesh that stretched and tore and bled was Mary's. We hold Mary up as a Virgin, obedient to God's word, quietly taking on this surprise, yet she is so much more than that. Mary is strong and brave and courageous. And maybe even a little bit pissed, shocked and terrified that she has been given this burden, and expected to just take it as her own. I don't think she just smiled and nodded. I don't think Jesus coming in the flesh as male provides any reasoning for only men to be priest, only boys to be alter servers, and for you to feel the deep pain of being less than. Your very sex is the only way that we can know and follow Jesus in this life- a way of living that is so very good and worthy. Jesus brought such life, fought for justice, showed us the way we should all be living today, but Mary- Mary brought Jesus to life. And we must not forget that.

So in this season I will remember you, I will dream of you, and I will remember Mary. I will hold tight to the fact that the institution is wrong, and there is so much good in this tradition to reinterpret to you. Questions that I hope you always ask, pain you always express, so that together we can look at the ways this Church, like the rest of the world, is failing you. And failing your brothers alike. We will make sure you know a God that knows you and your worthiness, we will look closely at the ways you digest this, and when we cant do it all, we will trust that in your life you will find the space to know that you are being failed, and together we will stoke in you the flames to fight back, to stand up, to claim your worthiness, and look for the places where you are treated, seen and celebrated for who God knows you are. 

Backlogging posts. Because I want to be writing again. I want to use my voice again. This from a few months back...

News flash: The world is broken.

Its crazy these days how the only place you need to go for most news is Facebook. And in the past week my feed has been full. Full of people I admire who are on this Earth fighting the brokneess with everything they have posting about tragedy, hurt, brokenness, ugliness... and also about courage, love, community, strength and action. I've been quiet. No post about the amazing woman who shared her incredibly courageous statment with the world, or about her perpetrators ignorant dad who screams rape culture. No post about the lives lost in Orlando. I have a lot of feelings. And thoughts. But I have no words.

I cant wrap my mind around the fact that the amazing letter this woman wrote encaptualtes so very well the experience of countless women across the country and even more across the globe. She said it all so perfectly. And in her perfect explanation of the bull shit that is our world I feel overwhelmed. Overwhelmed with how big and strong and invasive rape culture is. How much it has affected me and all the people I know in my life. How much work it will take to teach my sweet nephews something different, and eventually my own kids and even how much work it takes for me to shift the ways its gotten in my bones. How much body shaming, slut shaming, patriarchy, talking down to, relationship expectations, innocent parenting, etc, etc, etc, that we sometimes don't even notice feeds the disgusting culture that leads to Brock Turner only getting three months in prison, his father saying he cant eat steak and the life of pain and triggers and healing that courageous, brave, strong, wonderful, amazing woman whose name I do not know has ahead of her. I love her. I love her so much for writing those things. I want to hug her. And then I want to scream with all the other women in the world about how screwed up of a world this is. How mad I am that we have to have conversations about a friends option of staying at someones house she didn't know that well or getting in an uber alone and being afraid because shes had a couple drinks. Its every where. And I am so mad about it.

Saturday we went to the Pride parade in Boston. Felt joy and pride and celebration of all the love in the world. Because love is so so freaking good. Then we woke up to the worst news. And I looked into my sweet roomate's eyes and saw how deeply this thing hurt. It took me a while to wrap my mind around it. I couldn't read everything, I couldn't watch videos, I felt the same sort of resistance that I did to reading Brock Turner's dads statement. And I know that actually I could have I just didn't want to and avoiding the real is something that I hate. But I was afraid it would knock me down. So many people read it all, watched it all and kept standing, though shakey. And I wiped tears and hugged people tight who were just barely standing still, but I couldn't read it myself. I'm overwhelmed by the conversations I've had, the "it was amazing to not worry about who was homophobic there", the gross responses Bob is reading as he summarizes the Catholic response, the fear in people's eyes, the way this hits so close to home and just imagining these families who lost their loved ones- so young, in the most horrible way. I'm mad. I'm mad that these shootings keep happening. That while this one shakes us in hard, new and the same ways it's not alone, it's not rare, and while none of us can even comprehend how someone could kill so many people- we also should be able to. When there is hate everywhere. And there are guns so easily accesible. And violence and power struggles and toxic masculinity. Something has got to change. And we keep saying that, over and over and over again.

I started writing this two weeks ago. And today there is more violence. More pain. More loss. And still so few words. My privelege screams in my ear. White. Heterosexual. Cisgender. Middle Class. Educated. Etc. Etc. Etc. How many times have I been stopped and how many times have I not even gotten a ticket? How many times has it even crossed my mind that I could lose my life in a moment like this. NEVER. My privelege stops me in my tracks and I feel scared to speak- afraid of messing up, knowing that I dont get it. I will never get it. But I also know that silence is lethal. And I and we cannot be silent. Because I and we ARE THE OPRESSORS. We are the ones that keep these horrible systems in place. We are the ones who can continue to be stopped by cops without fear. Continue to be naive of the fear and trauma and pain and loss and extreme injustice that our siblings our experiencing everyday. Today I want to hug everyone I pass. I want to tell them I love them. I want ot tell them we are family and we must stand together and protect each other and we must protect our black siblings, our LGBTQ siblings, all of our siblings who are marginalized and opressed every single day. I dont know what to do. And I am humbled by my not knowing. I am looking to people around me for wisdom and feel so grateful for all the wisdom there is in the community of people who make up my facebook feed. So many people finding words for things that I cannot, so many people searching for answers, so many people trying to hold their privelege at the very forefront of their view and do something about how incredibly screwed up this country is.

I will keep trying. I will keep listening. I will keep looking to people who know more. I will look at myself. I will educate myself. I will share words and knowledge and hopefully I will create spaces for these conversations. Hopefully I will embody what I believe. Hopefully I will be surrounded by people who can tell me when I mess up. Hopefully I will find more answers, more action steps, more words.

Because They Took the Old One

A few weeks ago I accompanied a group of students on an immersion trip to Chiapas, Mexico. It was an incredibly trip full of learning and heart moving and reflecting together about our place in this world. So many things moved through me- but this poem I wrote after driving away from one of the most impactful parts of the trip.

Today we sat in a circle on the floor of Casa del Migrante
Five Salvadorans sat with us
They left home four days ago
And will walk for at least a month more

"The risk to stay in our country
 is greater than the risk of this journey"
They tell stories of robberies, kidnapping and sexual assault
"But in my home I can't work, I can't go to school"
"They told me January wouldn't come for me,
that they would kill me over Christmas"

Tears streamed down my face
That country I love so deeply
Is no longer a place fit for living.
Their home can no longer be home.
Yet those words don't do justice
To the depth of pain in their eyes.

"It's hard to decide to leave your family
But I think you're country will be different
It will be different there"

More tears fall as I imagine sweet Arely in the U.S.
Yes she will be safer.
She will not receive gang threats
Or be afraid to step out her door.

Yet so many things will threaten her.
ICE. Discrimination. Isolation
A continued struggle to find work and survive.
But- she will be safer.

"We are trying to make a new life
because they took our old one from us"

"We'll stay a couple days until her feel heal"
"We met on the camino, we didn't want her to walk alone,
Donde vas mija?"
"Somos una familia"

They will protect her and each other
But who knows what the road holds ahead
Someone could die
She may be raped
They could get caught or sent back.

The road ahead is so unknown, so dangerous,
so full of risk.
Yet they reminded us the risk is worth it
because the risk to stay home is greater.

How did we get here?
How are we in such pain that gangs control our homes?
And then migration police control our choices, dreams and desires for a better life?
Our attempts to take care of our children and families
Our attempts to stay alive?

God. We are failing
We are failing so miserably

And listening to their stories
I am so overwhelmed,
Lost in a world of questions
About what we can possibly do
How will it get better?

My heart breaks so many times entering this reality
But I never want to stop letting it break.
My tears feel meaningless compared to hers
But I will keep crying them

Help me find a way to fight and walk and be with the people of our world
Who are forgotten, who are hurting, who keep fighting for their lives.

Give me the strength to engage with the hurt.
The courage to imagine something different.
And help me find the path to live into some answers.
Or even just one

Coming Home, Going Home, Finding Home

These last two months have been some of the hardest months in a long time. A time of questioning so many things about my community, about systems, about justice and about the goodness of people. Watching someone I love hurt so deeply, and getting swept up in that hurt in ways that are both mine and not mine. The home that I have created here has been turned upside down and in the midst of that so many more questions about home fill my mind. Who am I? What matters to me? How do I trust and listen to my instinct that knows so much more than my anxious, running mind could ever think to know? How do I find a home within myself, hold on to my voice in an experience that has silenced me and pushed me out? How do I trust that I will find my space again, I will continue to recreate my communities, my home, myself- in the midst of felling like I am stuck in the muddiness of this situation?

Meanwhile my mom's house sold in a matter of minutes and suddenly what we had been talking about for years was happening in the blink of an eye. We flew home to pack, to go through things, to be with her and to spend one last weekend together in the house that has held SO much over the past 40 years that she and we have lived in it. There has been loss, there has been hurt, there has been so much love and togetherness and community in the space. We have fought and come together, we have cried and laughed so very hard. It is the single physical space that has held the very most of my life and in that space we were formed into who we are today- through ups and downs we could have never expected. I was worried the last weekend there might be tense, overly emotional or complex, but it was so very sweet.  With Cooper running around making us laugh, boxes of old clothes and pictures being sorted through and some surprise tears, we felt so united, saying goodbye to a place we love, and excited that we are stepping forward with our mom into a new chapter- that she deserves more than anyone I know. I got a break from all this yuckiness there, was held by my family, and reminded of my roots and the people who love and know me so well. There were lots of tears as we drove away for the last time, and have been many conversations about the intensely emotional memories that were made there, and how we will carry them with us. Spaces are sacred, but memories, identities, family and a sense of home transcend those spaces and go with us wherever we are.

On Saturday I am getting on a plane to El Salvador for a week. And I could not be more excited. Things are really hard there right now. They are always hard but the violence has increased and I have had a few hard conversations with worried loved ones about my safety. First of all I will be safe and second of all I need to go. I will be safe because I will be surrounded by people that are family, that care about my safety so very much and know the situation better than any news story or worried university group can possibly know. I need to go because it is home, because in that space, surrounded by el pueblo that I love so dearly, I am the deepest, truest, best version of myself. I know what matters when I am there, I can see past all of the mudiness, the drama, the brokenness and remember why I am in this world and feel the humanity and love of people like no where else. It is my spiritual home, the place that I became Michelle and that altered the direction of my path to lead me here. To a place that is really hard and confusing right now, but that I am in for a reason. And will come out of strong and connected to myself and those who are most important in my life. I have been so excited dreaming of being there. Excited to see the families I love so dearly, get some space from here, reengage in that reality and let some of this go. I keep seeing myself on the beach in tears... feeling the pain of all this but finding hope and faith that I have felt distant from lately. Yet in the midst of my excitement and joy I know that it is going to be so hard. There are incredible amounts of pain there right now and they cannot stop me from going but rather make me want to be there even more. To do what started this all, be with people I love, hear their stories and sit with them in their pain caused by a world that is not ok.

There is a lot of fear in this world right now. Fear that is making us shut people out. Forget about people's dignity and humanity and close in to ourselves and our comfort. I'm pretty sure that's not what we are here for. And that it actually causes a lot more suffering and a lot less healing and liberation. So in this time where things are muddy and confusing I am holding onto the people and places that remind me who I am, that help me find a home in myself, and that are bringing true hope and healing into the world. My heart is broken, this world is broken, but running away from all of that rather than searching deep within it for love and life and resilience is not what we are called to do.