Failure

Does saying “I’ve failed” have to be so hard? I’m wondering....
I recently read an article in Newsweek about privileged white males out of work, some of them pretending still to be employed. Hard for me to feel empathy for them, as they have the privilege of pretending; their wives or savings are still supporting them, and I’m wondering then at what price comes the privilege of saying “I’ve failed?” The empathy I feel for them, is not for their career or economic situation, but their inability to face the reality of their situation. The poor and un-privileged are not 'blessed' with this ability to hide; the homeless have no where to pretend that everything is just peachy.

I wonder what is it that we’re holding onto when we hold out from saying, “I’ve failed.” A sense of ourselves as only good, only capable of good things, of not being capable of doing harm, or living in a world where no one can handle the dark sides of ourselves, really? Where if we say, “I’ve failed” everyone will desert us, or mock us, hurt us? What if saying “I’ve failed” means I don’t have a clue? What if saying "I’ve failed" means I don’t understand what’s going on around me? What if saying “I’ve failed” means that I’ve trusted in everything I’ve been told and in my privilege and never figured out how to live for me? What it saying “I’ve failed” means I may have to learn how to do new things, think new thoughts and be humbled in the face of those I’ve let down by my inability in the past to say, “I may be wrong”? Failure, and our ability to admit it, in itself, might be a type of grace. Grace that lets us begin again.

I’m still wondering, and wondering what can we do as humans to make it safe for us to say to ourselves and to each other, “I’ve failed.” To know that to fail is to be human, not to be a ‘failure.’ To live in our frailty and to be sure of forgiveness, from ourselves and others. To live in the security of love, not accomplishment or cash.

Bus Stop

my bedroom window is a bus stop for birds
I am already unhappy with my mostly dark condo
too few windows and those that I have face the dark building next door

when I moved in there was a small old air conditioner in one of the bedroom windows
it looks like it is there permanently
I don’t want to try to remove it and I need it on hot summer nights
when all the heat rises into my space

now birds have decided that this air conditioner is some kind of bus stop
they flock to my window chirping clawing
every so often a squirrel and I feel like a sad sad Snow White
these small animals make me sad and tense not like singing

then I feel guilty that I should dislike these creatures
their incessant chirping
the nightmare I had that a bird finally broke through and flew through my room

take out the air conditioner some say
live with the nightmare I say
this stop may just be my own bus stop

My New Mantra is Enough

Caught between the polarity of abundance and scarcity, I’ve lived with both. More scarcity than abundance, depending upon what we’re measuring. And in the scarcity, I was hungry for more. Leaving small town Owatonna, hungry for adventure, hungry for new friends, and hungry for a chance to live a life that felt authentic to me. A life not constrained by the role of single mom, although that is still part of my identity. A life not constrained.

It’s been nearly five years now, since I left Owatonna to return to Minneapolis, my home town. Have I head enough? In some ways, I miss the quiet of Owatonna, especially when a ruckus in my alley on a Saturday night wakes me at 3:00 am. But not enough to make me go back and leave the ever changing landscape of my city, or the quiet and awe that comes upon me when I drive around Lake Calhoun at dusk.

To be honest, however, during this transition, I have been quietly scared. Scared that I wouldn’t ‘make it’ that I wouldn’t have ‘enough.’ And I think now I need to not focus on scarcity, looking back to how isolated I felt in Owatonna, nor look toward the unknown future, hoping for abundance, but to be in the present, in enough.

The Singing Bowl

the singing bowl sings

gonggggggg

the g lingers, sings on

and I am able to resonate within

all the ways of being that I was

manipulated into being

fall away

into the song

of my heartbeat

my breath

my being

singing