V-Day Ruminations

(Originally posted: February 14, 2006; http://www.myspace.com/azginamarie/blog/87709974 )

V-Day Ruminitions

Friends of mine were in this year's Vagina Monologues here in Flagstaff.  I tried to go see the show, but totally forgot that it sells out every year...so, I didn't get to see it!  So, I went and sat in the Zane Grey, drank a beer (then a Gila Monster...."It's orange vodka, cranberry vodka, some other vodka, and a splash of something else"...that's what I remember the bartender saying...it was good)  Anyway, I sat there contemplating life, and suddenly realized I had something to write but nothing to write on (and no pen).  I asked the bartender if he had paper.  He gave me some of the register tape and a pen.  I wrote on both sides of it and asked for a bit more.  I wrote on both sides of that one too!  I found it pretty funny!  ANYWAY!!!  Here's the thoughts that were going through my head as I contemplated vaginas.  ... 

We always hear about the angry vaginas.  But, what about the happy ones?

I was molested when I was 4-ish-years old by a 12-year old neighbor boy.  And this was a full on penis touching me molestation (no penetration, though).  Was it violent.  Not at all.  Was I ashamed of it?  For many, many years.  I knew it was "wrong" (we were by a window to make sure we would see if/when someone came into the house & I was admonished to "not tell anybody".) 

For most of my life I felt somehow responsible for that time.  I felt guilty for the sexual awareness that the experience awoke in me.  I felt guilty that I never told anyone.  But, I'm not angry.  Neither is my vagina.  Maybe I was at one time.  I can't remember.  Instead, I've decided that it's a part of who I am--it's an experience that has shared in the shaping of my life.

Am I happy it happened.  Not at all.  Am I angry that my childhood innocence was taken?  Not really.  A little sad, but not angry.  I've made my own peace with that experience.  

Life is too precious to give away my power by being angry.  Yes, there is power in anger, but there is a much stronger and more enduring power in forgiveness.  I won't forget what happened.  But, neither will I wrap myself around it in guilt and fear.  Nor will I nurture it while it festers into an all-consuming seed of anger that would eventually blossom into an all out self-righteous hatred of sensuousness, sexuality, and passion.

I will strive to make a world where NO CHILD has to fear for her safety; for a world where mothers don't have to think twice about who their daughter is with; for a world where men and women don't view themselves as combatants striving for supremacy but as caretakes of each other. 

Our lives are what we make of them.  We can choose to see the world as a place to fear, a place to hate, a place to be angry.  

Or not.  

Me?  

I choose to be happy. 

I'm Dying

(Originally posted: March 26, 2006; http://www.myspace.com/azginamarie/blog/102367977 )

I'm dying....

I remember the first time I was consciously aware of my mortality; the first time I truly knew I was facing death; the first time I felt the passage of youth.  It wasn't brought on by any fantastic escape from death.  It wasn't while confronting some looming fate.  It was something very small.

I was out with a friend that evening.  She was meeting with coworkers to listen to a colleague of theirs sing.  Some of them I'd met before.  Some, I didn't care if I never saw again. 

As I sat watching, listening, occasionally interacting with them, I felt detached from them.  There were those in the group who were comfortable with just sitting, drinking a couple of drinks, talking, laughing, just enjoying being out.  But there was one lady in particular who seemed like she needed to be the center of attention.  Every increasingly wild gesture seemed calculated to draw attention to her need.  For some reason, this made her seem much older than her 36 years.

I'm not sure what triggered it, but suddenly I knew that I was watching my life go by and I knew that I would someday die.  I knew this with as much certainty as when I was seven and knew I was going to live forever.
Was this my passage--finally--into adult hood?  Maybe it was the ghosts of the bar, reaching out their dry fingers, caressing the outer skin of my soul.

I looked at my hands.  34 years had written a bit of their story across the backs of them and etched hieroglyphics into the palms.  How had those stories gotten there without my realizing they were being written?  What were the hieroglyphics symbolizing?  Was there some message that was being given to me?  If I interpreted them correctly, would revelation come to me?

And then it seemed as if Life loomed all around, with the being that was me but a small, small, infinitely small piece of the whole mechanism.  I knew, without any doubt, that I would pass through the machine, maybe touching a few lives, maybe sharing a few stories.  I also knew that I didn't want to be like the lady who wasn't satisfied unless she had the attention of everyone in the same vicinity as she.  I want to be able to step into the spotlight when needed and yet step out when it was time for someone else.  I want to live my life with joy, adventure, and passion.  I don't want to be the one who watches everyone else dance and is too self-conscious to dance myself. 

That was a month ago, when I sat inside my own head and watched my little universe bump against others'. 

Today, I found a white hair.

(3/5/12 Note: When talking to my mom about this, she reminded me that I'd had that white hair off-and-on since I was about 12 years old.  I had totally forgotten that until she mentioned it!  It still comes and goes.)

WWJD?

(Originally written: March 2009)

WWJD?

What would Jesus do?

Today there are Christians who try to live by the mantra, "WWJD?". Instead of asking "What WOULD Jesus Do", christians need to start asking, "What DID Jesus do?" Until christians are willing to lay down their lives for the very people that they commonly condemn, they are not doing what Jesus did.

By Christianity's own teachings, Jesus did not tell the sinners and outcasts that they were wrong and curse them for living a way he thought they shouldn't, nor tell them they had to change. He didn't revile, rebuke, or condemn them--he saved that for the self-righteous and religious of the day. The people that the religious shunned and looked upon with contempt--the poor, the lowly, the "unclean"--were the friends of Jesus. He spent time with them. He fed them. He cared for them. He DIED for them.

What would happen if a christian said, "Today, instead of fighting against homosexuality, I am going to fight for all people to have the privileges that I have; to strive for all people to live with dignity and respect; to stand up for the right of ALL people to have life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?" That Christian's life, in his christian realm, would be done. He would be reviled. He would be denigrated. His "christian credibility" would be shattered. And in so doing, he would have laid down his life, taken up his cross, and followed Jesus.

Instead of asking "What would Jesus do?" then militantly insisting that they are right and everyone else is wrong, christians should ask, "What DID Jesus do?" Then, go and feed the hungry, take care of the underprivileged, get involved in the larger community. If they are willing to give up their life for someone they don't even know, willing to give up everything so that those who come after them have a better life, THEN they are willing to do what Jesus did.

What did Jesus do?

WDJD?