The Messy Middle

From managing the side effects of being 56 (chin hairs and waist line and stiffness--oh, my!) to trying to find the right tone for voicing my concerns, you could say that I’m living life in the messy middle right now.  I’m not complaining.  It’s the place I generally prefer to be, even though--as the name suggests--it can be a bit of a wreck.

When it comes to finding the right balance for my voice, that messy middle can also be a lonely place.  Especially these days, when the bellicose bookends tend to get all the attention.  

With so much discourse now framed against a “with us or against us” backdrop (as though we can only be one or the other), we are overdue for a societal shift back to that messy middle, despite its current unpopularity.  It is there, I believe, where we will find the best (the most human, most honest) versions of ourselves and each other.  

But it ain’t no picnic.

In her new book “Braving the Wilderness,” Brene’ Brown explores the importance of that messy middle (what she calls ‘the wilderness’), as well as our need to be connected to each other.  She acknowledges, though, that there can be great discomfort when we meet each other in that wilderness, especially when we vehemently disagree with each other.

My favorite chapter is “Speak Truth to Bullshit.  Be Civil.”  The first is a challenge that requires some courage.  But the second?  Speaking civilly to the bullshitter?  Well, now you’re just talking crazy.

Herein is the scary darkness of the wilderness.  But herein also is the path that will get us through it.

In the past year, I’ve felt anger more often than I’d felt it in all 55 years before it. So much indignity, so many offenses, such cavalier dismissal of truth . . . at times, I’ve been disheartened and exhausted. What’s gotten me through is my willingness to spend some time in the messy middle, looking for threads--however tenuous--that connect me to them.  And you know what?  I can always find a thread.  

Always.

And what do I do with these threads when I find them?  I weave them into a letter to a congressman, into a phone call to the governor's office,  I walk them up with me as I stand before a legislative committee to discuss something that concerns me.  Without these threads, without that common ground and some civility, I'm certain my words would fall on deaf ears.  And I am looking for ears and eyes wide open.

If we’re going to meet in the middle, then we're both going to have to move a bit.  No doubt, it’ll be messy at times, but I’m counting on those threads to make it a little less scary.  

Yes, Indeed, I'm Walkin'

It was during the summer of 1984 when I first realized that I could just . . . walk somewhere, if I wanted to get there.  I was living in a bit of a hovel on S. 13th Street, and one morning, I woke with a hankering to visit my mom, who lived across town, maybe 5 or 6 miles away.  Because I had the time, and the legs, and the curiosity about what it would be like, I walked to her house that day.

It was wonderful.

A succession of dogs--coupled with a few decades of summers off--have made sure that I would keep up that tradition.

Lucky, lucky me.

Yesterday, I relished two terrific--and very different--walks.  The first, at Holmes Lake, was a quiet and welcomed return to snowless paths and warmer temperatures, two conditions that Finn's Portuguese paws required.

We headed up the dam, Finn sniffing the grasses for skittering voles, and me scanning the leeward side, hoping to see a fox or a coyote.  Halfway across the dam, my monkey mind now silent, I started to find my groove. That's when I noticed a lone ice fisherman inching across the lake, pulling a sled behind him.  And I began to think about the ice and walking on the water and things both biblical and scientific.

My thoughts were interrupted by the mournful call of a solitary goose, the sight of seed-speckled scat, the smell of cold, clean air.  They were exactly what the doctor had ordered, especially following a student-and-stimulus-heavy Friday at school.  I was hungry for something that did not involve humans and I found it, in spades.

By 2:30, though--revived and relaxed--I was ready for my peeps.  And I found them, in droves, just north of the Student Union.  Not a goose or a vole in sight, my afternoon walk was filled with passionate people who spanned a beautiful spectrum of age and culture and identity.  We walked and laughed and chanted together, eventually making our way to the steps of our stunningly beautiful capitol building, where, we hoped, equality really is before the law.

---------

I have lots of friends who run and every one of them tells me how awesome it is, pumping legs and blood and air in equal measure.    I hate to think of them as liars, and I suppose it is possible (though not probable) that something pleasurable comes from all that work.  But, every time I put feet to ground and saunter along a path, I am certain that walking is the ultimate way to see and experience this wonderful world, my heart rate low and easy, my senses happily working overtime.

Twelve Reasons Why

I admit it. I was more than a bit befuddled, come Dec. 31.  I mean, it's not like 2017 was the year I got cancer or the year my mom died.  So how on earth could the end of 2017 feel worse to me than the end of the previous year?  Why did the end of it feel so . . . exhausting? 

. . . yeah, you don't need to be a genius to figure it out.

So let's go a different route instead.  Below are 12 photos that represent 12 awesome moments for me in 2017.  Because, I need to focus on the wins.  They are the things that'll feed me for years to come.

JANUARY: THE WOMEN'S MARCH

Millions of women from hundreds of countries speaking in dozens of tongues stood up and said "Enough"  Thank God my friend Mary Anne nudged me to join her that afternoon.  It was, it turned out, a crossroads moment for me.  I would go on to attend 4 or 5 other marches this year, each time, my voice growing stronger.



FEBRUARY: A FROZEN LANDSCAPE

Let's hear it for Cuddleduds and goose feathers!  One frigid Saturday in February--thanks to Doug Wells and the Nebraska Master Naturalists--I was at Platte River State Park, getting schooled in its cultural, economic and natural history.  We meandered to the far corners of that land and, while the cold was intense, the experience was amazingly warming.

MARCH: PILEATED WOODPECKER
My March moment was a hard one to choose, thanks to a great visit with family in Indiana.  The journalist in me is disappointed I didn't count my sighting of a Gutenberg Bible as the highlight--so many people liberated by that danged device of his!  But the bird nerd in me had waited 55 years to see my first Pileated Woodpecker, so perhaps I could be granted some kind of forgiveness for losing my cool on a dirt road just outside of Bloomington, while a  nearby tree was getting the bejeezus pounded out of it!

APRIL: NEIGHBORHOOD SHENANIGANS
How lucky am I to live on this short street in the middle of Lincoln?  Filled with kind and funny people who keep me on my toes, this is a good place to live.  And the fact that Randy owns a garbage-collection business and keeps his eyes out for jewels to plant in everyone's yards?  Yeah, pinch me!

MAY:  STAR POWER
Granted, I literally housed Allison Holt for nine months in '95, but I'd like to think that I'm an unbiased observer of someone who clearly possesses grit and creativity, in equal measure.  So, when she won Best Director and a butt load of other awards for her film "Up River" (click the link!), I was delighted that she'd gotten a nod from other, less-chromosomally connected individuals than I.

JUNE:  HAWAII SIX-O!
Perennial cheapskates, Mark and I came out of 2016 with a willingness to live large, if only once!  So we invited our kids, along with Kate and Zach, to join us for 7 magical days in Kauai, where we said 'no' to almost nothing.  It was an unbelievable experience.

JULY:  BUGMASTER NATION
Two full days on East Campus, learning about bugs both beloved (think bees) and despised (think ticks and bedbugs) was just what I needed this July!  And my time with the bees was especially impactful, given that I went home and built the first thing I'd made since I put together a CD rack in 1992.  Bee Hotel chez Holt is open for business!

AUGUST: SWOONING AT THE SKY!
This was a top-ten day for me, despite the fact that, in my absence, I was on tenuous grounds with my employer!  My childhood friend Julie came from Boston to join the gang in Cortland, just to stare at the place in the sky where the sun was supposed to be.  That millions of people all across the continent stared up into the sky, gape-jawed, renewed my faith in our species.

SEPTEMBER:  PAINTED LADIES!
Nature is a master teacher.  I know this because, before this fall, I couldn't have cared less about Painted Lady butterflies.  Bo-ring!  But, when they showed up by the hundreds in our humble garden?  And when Denver radar actually picked them up on its satellites?  Well, yeah.  I'm not stupid!  I know a beautiful thing when I see it!  How many days in September did I rush home from school and head directly to our garden, to count our lovely visitors?  Fingers crossed they remember us, come Fall 2018.

OCTOBER:  LITTLE FREE LIBRARY FUN
One night in October, 30 East High Spartans spent the evening playing with and handing out candy to hundreds of Everett Elementary students and their parents.  I think that, when I retire in a year and a half, I will count the East High Little Free Library project as a highlight of my 30+ years in education.  So many people, young and old, coming together because reading rocks. . . What's not to love about that?

NOVEMBER:  FOXY FUN!
One day before my favorite holiday (Thanksgiving--duh!), two wonderful things happened.  I saw a fox in our backyard and I found out that an Everett neighbor was willing to have a Little Free Library in their front yard.  By midmorning, I was simply beside myself, in love with this wonderful world of ours.

DECEMBER:  HUSKER VOLLEYBALL!
Between being a mom and a public educator, it's no wonder that I fell in love with the Husker Volleyball team this year.  A rag-tag collection of women who, through love and grit and crazy plays at the net, took home the gold.  As though they hadn't already won the gold . . . .

Land, Holt!

Weird things occasionally come to mind when I’m on my morning walks.  Once, I imagined an animal family living in an unoccupied house on M Street, right down to an elderly squirrel reading the paper by lamp. Another time, I saw Christmas ornaments covering a bare tree.  And more than once, I’ve imagined the razor-thin outline of a new moon as God’s toenail clipping.  

Yeah, I know.

On a recent Sunday morning, under a noisy sky of freezing rain, I started to think of my body as a microhabitat and me as its land manager.  And it kind of made sense.

Think about it.  Our guts are home to trillions of microorganisms, harboring 500 species of flora, and that’s before I sit down with a skunky German beer.  While it’s not always fun living with all those microorganisms, it is thrilling to imagine the wild west atmosphere down there--tiny gunfights and feuds, sultry affairs and children born out of wedlock, and all of it happening just behind my belly button! 

This time of year, despite my better senses, I invariably ponder the need for a new sheriff in my town.  Someone who is more disciplined, a person less prone than me to sugar-coated cereals with plastic prizes crammed halfway down their cardboard maws. 

My land, after all, has expanded a bit, while my eyes aren’t as sharp as they once were.  And, despite notching 56 years on this earth, I don’t think I’ve become even slightly more discerning than I was when I was a 13-year-old kid obsessed with Space Food Sticks.

What do I do, then, with this land of mine?  Where do I put up fences to slow the erosive power of wayward winds?  How do I encourage the wetlands to take hold once again?  

As a land manager, I’m constantly pressured to find a balance between doctor-ordered pesticides and my more organic tracts, to say nothing of outside pressure to expand ecotourism opportunities.  I know, for instance, that I should clear the underbrush from my overgrown trails, but it’s so cold outside and I’m not good working hunched over for long periods of time.  Just typing this makes me verklempt. 

I’ve got all those microorganisms to consider, though.  They depend upon me to seek balance, to set aside and till in the proper proportions.  They need me to embrace diversity while keeping a wary eye on introduced species.

It is a massive job, managing one’s land.  And I’ll do it best only if I learn to love it completely--a hard task for a not-quite post-modern woman. 

So here’s to a new year of tending to me.  To embracing my biomes--from tundra to taiga, temperate forest to desert lands.  To loving my neighbors inside and outside my gut and learning, along the way, how to better tend to this greater world, as well.

I Never Imagined. . .

"I never imagined . . . . "

How many times this year have my sentences started with those three words?  Well, basically, every morning that I picked up the newspaper. 

Who could have imagined all these dunderheaded politicians, the endless parade of  piggish men, such evil and rampant greed?  Who could have imagined so much rain, such horrendous fires, so many idiots drawing imaginary lines in the sand, as though this beautiful, precious life were some kind of a spitting contest?

Honestly, who could've imagined this world right now--at once aflame and under water? 

And yet . . . . 

. . . who could have imagined 8 million people from 81 countries walking out of their homes on Jan. 21 to gather with strangers in protest?

. . . who could have imagined 13,000 women expressing an interest in running for office?

. . . who could've imagined six transgendered Americans winning political seats this November?

. . . . who could've imagined Alabama voters--many of them black--saying "enough" to white men behaving badly?

. . . And, while it required no imagination among women to explain the tidal wave of #metoo moments, who'd have imagined the swiftness with which that testosteroned tide has begun to turn?

In my own small life, who could have imagined I would march for women and immigrants and science and education and aquifers?  Who could have imagined I would call and write and email Congressmen?  Who could have imagined I would wait 8 hours to talk with the Education Committee about charter schools?

When my tired and beaten imagination began failing me this year, it was in facts and faces, courageous stories and stunning push backs that I found myself once again imagining something new.  Something better than this.

As for the future?  I imagine a long-overdue revolution, much of it led by women.

I imagine that won't sit well with some . . . .

Food For Thought

About a dozen years ago, Thanksgiving supplanted Fourth of July as my favorite holiday.  And that says a lot about the November event, considering I used to tap into the kids' college funds, come July 3rd.  

(Did you know that it's possible to flip a Burley filled with a young child, if you are riding your bike furiously enough towards the fireworks stand at Hinky Dinky?  I am not proud that I know this.)

Yeah, I needed a new favorite holiday, and, aside from Flag Day, I can't think of another that is more basic than Thanksgiving--cook, eat, nap, repeat.  Like shampooing, only more delicious.

Still, for about five minutes Monday, I cursed the holiday.  Four days and four iterations later,  I wasn't sure I could do the same bird, seventh verse, a little bit fatter, a little bit worse.  And yet, at lunch that day, I bemoaned the end of our beautiful brined bird, the last slivers of its savory breast tucked between two slices of bread, transfigured by a dollop of sriracha mayo.

Bird aside, though, what's best about Thanksgiving is eating with people I love.  And therein is the real lesson: if we are going to survive, we need to eat with people--at every moment possible.

If you have never worked in school, then you don't understand the importance of lunch in a work-free staff lounge.  It is a place to gather--gallows humor and silliness in hand--where our motley crew can take a breather, break some bread and say some stupid things, often without reference to the work day itself.

In that most magical space known as the East High lounge, I have peed myself--happily--because of something funny someone said.  There, during my 30-minute duty-free lunches, I have made prank phone calls, learned about fat quarters (look 'em up!), giggled at a corny pun and been moved by an original poem that my friend Linda wrote the weekend before.

Staff lounges and my dining room aren't the only spaces where we can be transformed, of course.

Just last night, in my neighbor Lisa's lovely home, several of us gathered to eat and drink and laugh and bemoan the things that break us.  We also celebrated the things that we have in common.  And all of it was framed with food.  . . . and maybe a little alcohol, if I'm honest.

Always, it seems, where food is present, there is laughter and love and coming together.  Maybe, then, the thing our country needs most right now is a plate of nachos and an open door, a place where we can gather and be glad for those who are in the room with us, framed in a glorious outline of dripping cheese and jalapenos. 

Friendly Fire

I have often wondered--often in a state of wonder, if I may reuse a few words in this sentence--how I've ended up with so many great folks in my life.  Take the folks in this photo, for example.  And Cathy, the one who took the photo.  This photo represents the beginning of a fine chapter for me. . . although, when I recall its origin, it's possible it also kind of sounds like a bar joke.

"So, three chaplains and a school librarian are sitting in a Prius. . . "  Definitely, a small, independent movie, at best!

Anyway, that really happened.  And, boy, am I glad that it did.

Because my pal Jeanne (left) offered to drive me to the First Plymouth Church Women's Retreat at Spring Creek Prairie that morning a handful years ago,  I got to meet Jen Davidson (east of me) and Cathy Regush (now way north but then, behind the camera) and learn about thin spaces, to boot.

That said, it was a bit intimidating to realize that I was the only person in the car who wasn't a chaplain.  Unless Charlie counts. . .

Who knows?  Maybe it was an intervention and I'm just now realizing it.

Flash forward to this afternoon, when I attended Jen's most awesome ordination into the United Church of Christ (Midwest chapter).  And then back up into yesterday, when I ate pho with recently retired minister and current friend Nancy Erickson.

Yeah, any way you look at it, I'm keeping some pretty great company these days.  And they are definitely earning their keep.

But these holy rollers are hardly the end of my fortunate story.  I am surrounded by terrific friends and family--religious and irreligious, warts and all--each of whom makes my life infinitely richer.  To a person, they are stunningly tolerant of my annoying habits.  In addition to overlooking my outfits, my hair, my ill-timed laughs, they are also funny and smart and patient in a way that Job could not even imagine.

In a time when scanning the headlines feels dangerous and disheartening, it's good to remind ourselves of the peeps we've gathered into our corners, those patient, good, brave folks who call us "family" or "friend" and keep showing up, despite everything.

They are, it turns out, our superpower.  As for me?  I am swimming in wonder, woman.