The Legacy of Time

It has been interesting, over the course of the past few years, to see the downfall of some of our politicians over their sexual infidelities. Here is a partial roll-call:

Newt Gingrich

John Ensign

John McCain

John Edwards

Gary Hart

Jim McGreevey

Elliot Spitzer

Gary Condit

Rudy Giuliani

Mark Sanford

David Vitter

Bob Livingston

Mark Foley

Jesse Jackson

Barney Frank

Tim Mahoney

Mike Duvall

Gavin Newsom

Arnold Schwarzenegger

… and many, many more!

Notice anything about the list? No, they are not all Republicans… They are all MEN! Power is, evidently, an aphrodisiac. Power also seems to provide access to a wider range of folks than one might find at home.

It is interesting that one doesn’t see women politicians similarly implicated. Perhaps this is because the field of female politicians is smaller than that of their male counterparts. It has also been suggested that female power is a turnoff to men; that may well be true.

What I find interesting is that all these folks are involved in policy making, and a lot of the time, while they have talked about family values and morality, the policies they have advocated do not support families, family life, children, or the environment. And then we find out the truth of their family values and moral fiber.

We elected these men (perhaps they should no longer be called gentlemen), sometimes based on speeches made during campaign tours, posing with spouses and children. Like homes that are professionally staged before being put for sale on the market, this is an advertising ploy. And we fall for it, in a big way… in fact, almost every time. Part of the “marketing” and “packaging” of a candidate is called Moral Credentialing, whereby a person establishes (or has established for him) a moral image. Once someone (male or female) has an established moral image, studies have shown that person may subsequently feel free to behave less ethically.

Now, let’s take a look at religion for a moment. Here again, there are a lot of men at the top of the heap of religious leaders. Many of these leaders have helped to maintain male domination over women in matters of work, culture, politics and religion. There seems to have thousands of years of mythmaking around the notion of a male god who created everything at the beginning of time. This, even though it is clear that there were ancient female divinities. Future generations, moving forward from the beginning of time, of male leaders were evidently turned off by the idea that feminine power could create, and so these ancient myths about female divinities were hijacked or obliterated, as far as possible.

Many people don’t realize that a universal element in creation stories is family. Everything may have been created by something divine (female or male of inclination, or both), but after that, there are children who procreate. We are a human family, however it was our species was created and has evolved—and isn’t it interesting that most of the stories have humans listed as the last of the creations?

Life is about family, revolves around family, promotes family. God should be firmly about family and about life, shouldn’t it?

Yet, we continue, as humans, to be embroiled in the constant need, even desperate desire, to have pecking orders and supremacy and authority and control over others (whomsoever others may be). And, I hate to say it, because there are a lot of terrific fellows out there, but the major players in this are men.

There is this moral image being pushed at us all the time, and over it is superimposed the false notion that the Divine is male only. To which I reply, if the Divine had been male, rather than female or even androgynous (which circumstance does appear in some creation myths), then why would there be the any need at all for female energy? If the male energy were so important and so special, why create two genders?

But, ladies, I'll let you in on the joke. The men can't handle the awful truth that women bear the children. Men can talk any kind of game they want to about creation and about the divinity being male, but they cannot change the fact that women bear the children and women hold the family together.

Women bear the legacy of time. Men have never been able to compete with that.

Maybe if men start getting pregnant, the landscape of things will change. I don’t see this happening, in either the foreseeable future or beyond.

But here is another question: What if the Divine were male and as unfaithful as some of our politicians and our religious leaders have been? Would or should anyone follow an unfaithful god? Taking it farther, would or should anyone follow policy made by unfaithful leaders? Further, should nice people (men or women) follow unfaithful men (or women)?

If the answer is not clear, then there is something wrong. 

Meanwhile, a better focus for one’s attention and energy might just be the notion that human beings, male and female, were created to be. The human family universal ought to honor the family, in all gender presentations and combinations, and in all children. Why? Because family is the evidence of the continuance of life, and life is the Holy Divine (male and female and neutral), from generation to generation. Family is the most inclusive group in the world, not that that always makes it an easy group to be in—but the point is you cannot choose your family; you come into it, whether it is your nuclear family, your community family, your regional family, your continental family, your world community. However you got here, you came into this world—to be—and wherever you are in this large picture, you have a place and a role to fulfill within this family, and that is holy!

I firmly believe that if we, as a species, could have faith in our human family as evidence of the sacredness of life, the landscape of attitudes, ethics and morals, religion and politics would truly change. Who knows, some of it might be rendered useless and go away forever. And wouldn't that be nice?

Meanwhile, the end of the world is supposed to happen on Saturday.

But, this is the way of enlightenment: I will be among the cleanup crew on Sunday.

(sigh)

Someone has to bear the legacy of time.

Meditation

In the dream that opens
from inward out
the heat of the day
cools all possibility of thought
like a sudden rain in the garden
falls upon the printed page
rendering the imprinted characters
a sodden and murky pulp mural
that tells me nothing now
if ever it did

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Songstress

Never had there seemed so many hours
as lately there had been, like flowers,
all requiring music, by turns and towers.

The map of the head of the point
is convoluted,
possibly even polluted,
but in any case, inside out,
so a call came in from the tenor section,
requiring the sort of response,
by way of melodic line,
from one tonality to another,
or at least to the needed destination.

This, but one line in a fugue,
muddy, and instrumentally Moog,
guiding arrivals and departures
for all the birds of the sky,
as well as the cleanups, nigh,
of their minor mishaps,
evident all over the tarmac.

The phone rings again,
introducing yet another part,
and so the counterpoint thickens, thins
waxes and wanes into a sticky wicket thicket
—Ah, only a desperate sales call;
they had tried a dozen times before,
but perhaps the thirteenth time
will be the charm,
and the hapless caller
thinks to disarm
my brain.

Meanwhile, the music unravels
into a rubble-like rumbling gravel,
and seeks to go bounding along,
like a steam calliope,
to the circus,
as if that is truly
what should happen next.

From her cheeks to her hair,
the flames rise beyond care,
threatening to set curtains alight,
not to mention the folded laundry,
but thankfully in time to warm the dinner,
hopefully before the call goes out,
not at all for the fun,
to 9-1-1.

Please quell the flare,
and give this songbird flight
from the musical madness
of chairs in pairs,
lines and signs;
find resolution on your own,
ye dogs, cats, cars, cans and kin!

This girl needs a biscuit, some flan,
and a warm, soothing tisane.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Working Well With Others

My children are working on a collaborative construction project, in their respective classes. The class is divided up into working groups of students, each of whom has been assigned one or several roles in the assignment: to design and construct a load-bearing bridge with toothpicks. The assignment sounds like a lot of fun, and a chance to work with a real-life construction project on a small scale and with a hypothetical budget. Once the projects are complete, there will be a contest between the classes, for best- and greatest-load-bearing design.

My daughter was complaining to me that the child on her team who is supposed to be engaged in management and oversight, in addition to make sure that the “job site” is clean and “safe” has been shirking these responsibilities. Normally, my daughter would just shrug and make sure things were handled, but in this case, two other team members have been out. So, in essence, my daughter feels she has been carrying the project, and she told me it seemed unfair.

She said that she had tried to communicate to the person in question, only to be put off or growled at.

I had to laugh.

How frequently do we find, in our lives, in our lives, that gate keepers, managers, people entrusted with the work of oversight and management seldom live up to their job descriptions or pay?

How often do we try to keep it all going, on our own?

How much stress does this add to our daily lives?

Does this affect our love of work?

Cooperative effort requires team players. Teachers in our schools work hard to teach our children to work together in problem solving. What do we adults model? Do we model best practices in the areas of cooperation? Or will it be marked on our life report card: “doesn’t work well with others?”

I suggested that my daughter speak to a higher authority about her grievances, namely to her teacher. I even advised seeking arbitration.

“Well, I don’t want her to get in trouble; then she’ll really get mad at me.”

I then suggested that I would make some small signs, to put into the hands of some action figures. The plan would be post the action figures around “the job site,” as if there was a strike picket line. The signs would proclaim:

                  “MANAGEMENT UNFAIR TO LABOR!”

My daughter was appalled. “Oh, MOM! That is not going to stop her!”

I said, well, perhaps not, but it would bring public attention to a situation that really comes up in the world of work. Such events can even delay or shut down projects.

“You just want to embarrass me!”

“No, I want to embarrass her into doing what she is supposed to do,” I replied.

“Ah, mom.”  She dismissed this entire notion as being ridiculous.

“If you don’t talk to your teacher tomorrow, the action figures hit the picket line on Friday!”

“Mom, you have no respect for me!”

“I have every respect for you, and your best interests at heart—you are a laborer and you are being oppressed by management!”

“Hmph,” she said, “well, maybe you should have a little less respect for me…”

Forest or Trees

Deeper into the forest of books go I,
but less seem to learn of them;
the thickets of words, veritable mazes,
of which depth is oft proclaimed,
soon wear out their glib welcome
and inevitably thin to the same weedy patch,
wet and reedy, murky and muddled,
that I have explored before
--but I desire more.

The in-depth studies, the colorful analogs,
the structured cases resemble less
the actual beauty of the forest or the tree
--and I desire more.

The universe smiles wearily at my dilemma,
the untamed wilderness yawns lazily at my feet,
and the wild unknown beckons me toward its reality
--and I desire its shore.

Didn't she know? they sigh, sharing their inward smile,
experience trumps book-learning, every time;

Desire, bared upon the open shore,
shall most surely find more.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

Reflections on Reality, Love and Family

There have been so many things, lately in the news, that have made me reflect on the concept of "reality."

For example, when you read an entire arc of written history and find that the ancient notion of Trinity has been purposely derailed from being Father-Mother-Child to Father-Son-and-[(female in name origin only) Holy Spirit], you tend to suspect that the proper order of things has been usurped to fit a human agenda that can often seem less evolved and fit for holy work than one would hope for humanity (which claims to want peace even while raising their weapons to conquer).

The historical model Father-Mother-Child really needs a more modern amendment to  acknowledge the actually exisiting model of [Responsible&Committed Parent(s)-Grandparents-Guardians-Villagers]-Child(ren—history reveals this to be the reality of what has actually happened, through times ancient and modern, in thick and thin, in times of war and peace.

I just wish that reality what actually happens didn’t have to constantly obscured, diminished, denied, denigrated, fought over and legislated, so we could all get on with the actual (and more important) holy business of loving each other—from within the sacred choices we have made about our identities—and caring for each other and our beautiful planet, which is, after all, supposed to be the whole point of this existence.

Maybe someday there will be a holiday called “Stipulation Day”, where everyone could remember the day we all said, Okay, we’re ALL so COOL! Let’s CELEBRATE that we’re all taking care of each other, and that this is the way it should be!


(sigh)

But, the problem with holidays is that we have parades where we all line up in separate groupings. We reduce everything to sentiments that are printed on cards and balloons. Over time, we forget what the holiday was ultimately all about, and why it was needed.

Perhaps a better solution is to make everyday a Sabbath day, where there is time for work, time for play, time for celebration, time for reflection and time for rest. Is it possible? Could life be like that?

Meanwhile, I feel so VERY LUCKY to live in a part of the world were there is so much more consciousness about the multiple definitions and dimensions of family and neighbor--and life.

The Vine

You didn't choose me, but I chose you, and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain.                    ~ John 15:16

Showers of tears,
the fruit of the vine
touched by a raging sun;
yet, still she reaches out,
season after season,
ever onward and upward.

Despite such daily assault,
no bright flames
shall singe nor harm her;
and her fruit shall nourish
the nations with the sweetness
of a love like no other.

© 2011 by Elisabeth T. Eliassen

This poem has been set to music by Carson P. Cooman,
in his cycle of songs for solo voice entitled Brief Vibrations, Op. 870