The Less Nosy Life: Further Notes on Anosmia

Mountian nose-gay.  I cannot confirm or deny its gaying effects, 

   Just finishing a tasteless fresh egg/sharp cheddar sandwich.  It's a little late for dinner, but I realized at bedtime I'd forgotten to eat it.  When nothing tastes like much, it's way easier to do.

I noticed today that I was doing a lot of acceptance talk in the office.  It's not really that unusual that what healers are addressing in their own lives creeps into their work.  Luckily we are talking universal themes here, so no harm done.  But I do want to pay attention when it happens.  That's part of the code of the field, to make sure we aren't just working out our own stuff instead of focusing on our clients'.  So I spent some intentional time thinking about how resistant I have been to this adventure in smell-less-ness.

Social worker and author Thom Rutledge sums it up nicely:  the mathematical formula for pain is the difference between our expectations and our performances.  If you substitute experiences/reality for performance, the equation is equally profound.  As teacher Byron Katie puts it, "When I resist reality, I suffer, but only 100% of the time."

The Buddhists refer to this discomfort of resisting experience as three poisons, aka causes of human suffering:  greed, anger, and ignorance.  When I want what I cannot have, rail against the God/gods because of it, and don't understand the nature of reality, I suffer.  Ruttledge, or was it  DBT theorist Marsha Linehan, or maybe Buddha (there is truly nothing new under the sun) said that pain is inevitable.  But suffering, which occurs out of resistance, is optional. 

Resistance equals grasping. When we try to hold on to what is not there, or attain what is unnatural, or maintain what is transient, we are grasping.  And it causes suffering.

But when we have a loss, it is human nature to grieve.  Whether it's a missed goal, a death, a function-- we are here in these human bodies with these human minds and egos, and it is natural and fitting to give notice and due to what has gone.  And then, sooner or later, we make a choice.  We can continue fretting about what isn't, or we can move forward with this present reality of what is.  When we start that--- when we move a little out of ignorance and anger and greed for what we want but can't or don't have-- we can start integrating an experience and seeing what is valuable and what merely must be tolerated/accepted.

I'd like to claim I do this at least occasionally with grace and dignity.  But truth be told, I often enter into unpleasant realities with kicking and moaning and resistance. 

Last night walking'  I passed a neighbor just as she was sniffing a rose she'd cut.  Immediately tears came into my eyes.  I was a little embarrassed when she met my gaze, but also able to be a compassionate witness to what was true for me in that moment.  I know that anosmia is not a big tragedy on big life terms, so I have gone back and forth about expressing it as an important loss.  But I feel it, and feelings-- well, they are what they are.

What's been sweet:  I've gotten some notes from folks who've read this blog, expressing understanding for what has felt true.  We need witnesses.  It helps to have somebody confirm our experience.  Here are some excepts:

."It feels insufficient to say I am sorry, but I am ..sorry that your olfactory life is on a hopefully brief hiatus.  I imagine your sense of smell is in a safe place, tucked away and protected for its eventual return to you."

"I'm sorry. This isn't whining or trivial in the least.  You talk and think about how things smell more than anyone I've every met.  You must feel a great sense of loss."

"Wow...I'm so sorry to hear about your olfactory tragedy.  I'm going to choose that it will come back."

OK, me too.  But if not, I hope to use it for some sort of growth.  I am currently focusing on increasing mindfulness and appreciation to textures and nutrient value of food rather than flavor.  I've long claimed big interest in the latter, but in a sort of martyr-y way unless it tasted fabulous.  I tolerated for the cause rather than appreciated things like raw radishes and kale.  But since not much tastes much at all, when it's healthy there's more sense of reward in eating it.  And some foods that were ho-hum to me (wheat berries!) have become much more interesting to my newly 2-D palate based solely on texture.

Other perks:  I no longer cringe when someone wears perfume/fragrant cosmetics or cleansing products.  Remember, I was a super-smeller, so what was appealing to others was very infringing to me.  I can concentrate a little better in restaurants and outdoors, because one source of constant stimulation is now quiet.  I am hoping this will take my pinball-like mind down a notch of activity.

Speaking of pinball, I decided to celebrate a deliberate move to more light-heartedness with an evening of same at our local Life-Long Learning Establishment, Squirrels.  I found two willing companions who agreed to let me beat the pants off them (ok, at least the first several games, and yes, J & L, I am still being cheeky about that).  When I was a kid visiting my aunt in Pawnee Rock KS (population 300-odd, depending on if there was something interesting happening down the road), she'd give me rolls of nickles to keep me out of her hair while she ran the county's sole tavern/restaurant.  It would be pitiful to say those were glory years, but I was indeed a wizard for a while.  Being much too schooled in the psychological I am well aware my desire to go beat up a machine was a regressive move to a simpler time, but it's less ridiculous and permanent than getting something extra pierced at my age.  With full acceptance entering my intent, I had a ridiculously delightful time, and my heart lost about 6 pounds of pouty puffiness in the process.

Here's to more fun, and since it's at least the current reality, less smells.  I'm going to stop railing a against it (poisonous anger) and get into it a while (decreasing ignorance and letting go of graspy greed) and just be a curious observer for what's new in this different world I've plunked down into.

Today's assignment:  when life gives you lemons, build a dopamine model using licorice sticks for bonds, and call it Good Art.  Or at least have a blast in the process.

I think I'll stick with the sensory deal for a while.  Coming up-- SUPERTASTERS EXPOSED:  Excellent Artists and Poets, Annoying Dinner Companions ---Especially if you're cooking..

Ill be smelling you in all the old familiar places (or at least imaging)...
Jana

Song of the day, a paean to times gone by (with buried reference as to why I'm not quite on my game).

The Less Nosy Life: Further Notes on Asnosmia

Just finishing a pretty tasteless fresh egg/sharp cheddar sandwich.  It's a little late for dinner, but I realized around 9 I had forgotten to eat it.  Those of you that know me--or at least have seen me in the last decade or two-- know I seldom miss a meal.  But when nothing tastes like much, it's way easier to do.

I noticed today that I was doing a lot of acceptance talk in the office.  It's not really that unusual that what healers are addressing in their own lives creeps into the office.  Luckily, we are talking universal themes here, so no problem, but I do want to pay attention.  That's part of the code of the field, to make sure we aren't just working out our own stuff instead of paying attention to our clients'.  So I spent some time thinking about how resistant I have been to this adventure.

Thom Ruttledge, a social worker who I believe I've quoted on these pages before, sums it up nicely.  The mathmatical formula for pain is the difference between our expectations and our performances.  I don't know if he says this part, but I substitute experiences/reality for performance, and the equation is equally profound.  As Byron Katie puts it, "When I resist reality, I suffer, but only 100% of the time."

The Buddhists refer to this discomfort of resisting experience as three poisons, aka causes of human suffering:  greed, anger, and ignorance.  When I want what I cannot have, rail against the God/gods because of it, and don't understand the nature of reality, I suffer.  Rutledge, or maybe it was DBT theorist Marsha Linehan, or maybe it was Buddha (there is truly nothing new under the sun) said that pain is inevitable; suffering, which occurs out of resistance, is optional. 

Resistance equals grasping. When we try to hold on to what is not there, or attain what is unnatural, or maintain what is transient, we are grasping.  And it causes suffering.

But when we have a loss, it is human nature to grieve.  Whether it's a missed goal, a death, a function-- we are here in these human bodies with these human minds and egos, and it is natural and fitting to give notice and due.  And then, sooner or later, we make a choice.  We can continue fretting about what isn't, or we can move forward with this present reality of what is.  When we start that--- when we move a little out of ignorance and anger and greed for what we want but can't or don't have-- we can start integrating an experience and seeing what is valuable and what merely must be tolerated/accepted.

I'd like to claim I do this at least occasionally with grace and dignity.  But truth be told, I often enter into unpleasant realities with some kicking and moaning and lots of resistance. 

Last night, walking to meet a friend, I passed a neighbor just as she was sniffing a rose she'd cut.  Immediately tears came into my eyes.  I was a little embarrassed when she met my gaze, but also able to be a compassionate witness to what was true for me in that moment.  I know this is not a big tragedy on big life terms, so I have gone back and forth about expressing this as a profound loss.  But I felt it, and feelings-- well, they are what they are.

What's been sweet:  I've gotten some notes from folks who've read this blog, expressing understanding for what has felt true.  We need witnesses.  It helps to have somebody confirm our experience.  Here are some excepts:

."It feels insufficient to say i am sorry, but i am ..sorry that your olfactory life is on a hopefully brief hiatus.  i imagine your sense of smell is in a safe place, tucked away and protected for its eventual return to you."

"I'm sorry. This isn't whining or trivial in the least.  You talk and think about how things smell more than anyone I've every met.  You must feel a great sense of loss."

"Wow...I'm so sorry to hear about your olfactory tragedy.  I'm going to choose that it will come back."

OK, me too.  But if not, I hope to use it for some sort of growth.  I am currently focusing on increasing mindfulness and appreciation to textures and nutrient value of food rather than flavor.  Truth be told, I have always claimed big interest in the latter, but in a sort of martyr-y way unless it tasted fabulous.  I tolerated for the cause rather than appreciated.  But since not much tastes much at all, when it's healthy it's rewarding in a bigger way to eat.  And some foods that were ho-hum to me (wheat berries!) have become much more interesting because of the sensation of texture they bring to the 2-D palate.

Other perks:  I no longer cringe when someone wears perfume/fragrant cosmetics or cleansing products.  Remember, I was a super-smeller, so what was appealing to others was very infringing to me.  I can concentrate a little better in restaurants and outdoors, because one source of constant stimulation is now quiet.  I am hoping this will take my pinball-like mind down a notch of activity.

Speaking of pinball, I decided to celebrate a deliberate move to more light-heartedness with an evening of same at our local Life-Long Learning Establishment, Squirrels.  I found two willing companions who agreed to let me beat the pants off them (ok, at least the first several games, and yes, J & L, I am still being cheeky about that).  When I was a kid visiting my aunt in Pawnee Rock KS (population 300-odd, depending on if there was something interesting happening down the road), she'd give me rolls of nickles to keep me out of her hair while she ran the county's sole tavern/restaraunt.  It would be pitiful to say those were glory years, but I was indeed a wizard for a while.  Being much too schooled in the psychological I am well aware my desire to go beat up a machine was a regressive move to a simpler time, but it's less ridiculous and permanent than getting something extra pierced at my age.  With full acceptance entering my intent, I had a ridiculously delightful time, and my heart lost about 6 pounds of pouty puffiness in the process.

Here's to more fun, and since it's at least the current reality, less smells.  I'm going to stop railing a against it (poisonous anger) and get into it a while (decreasing ignorance and letting go of graspy greed) and just be a curious observer for what's new in this different world I've plunked down into.

Today's assignment:  when life gives you lemons, build a dopamine model using licorice sticks for bonds, and call it Good Art.  Or at least have a blast in the process.

I think I'll stick with the sensory deal for a while.  Coming up-- SUPERTASTERS EXPOSED:  Excellent Artists and Poets, Annoying Dinner Companions ---Especially if you're cooking..

Ill be smelling you in all the old familiar places (or at least imaging)...
Jana

A life of non-scents: Anosmia

If asked which of the five senses they felt they could most easily give up,  the average American will say smell without much thought.  

But if you are one of the estimated two million with a smell disorder, you may be thinking differently.

A (naturally) scentless sedum blooms on Iron Mountain

Goodbye to All That

Anosmia is the scientific name for loss of smell (dysosmia refers to the distortion of smell and is no big ball of fun either).  It may not seem like a big deal.  We take olfaction for granted.  But the sense of smell is interwoven in the most minute and profound details of our lives.  Memory, mate selection, pleasure, nutrition, safety:  the nose knows and informs all of it.

There are lots of ways to lose your sense of smell.  Aging is up there, and it's common for people after 60 to have a decline in ability to differentiate odors.  The decline is gradual, and may not even be fully perceived.  A sudden loss of smell indicates something more troublesome.  A good bonk on the head (frontal head injuries) can result in permanent loss of smell as connections between the nose and brain are sheared. The prognosis for recovery from this type of anosmia is not great. Medication can be a factor.  There have been lawsuits and FDA warnings against a popular nasal spray implicated in anosmia.  Some medications will temporarily alter the sense of taste and smell, but it's possible that the infections that induced the use of these medications caused the injury.  Sinus infections can cause temporary and rarely, permanent loss of smell.  And acute viral infections may result in either, when the virus attacks and kills off cells responsible for interpreting the olfactory world.

When the nose becomes just an appendage for holding up those Raybans, the effects are myriad.

The Scent of Yesterday

"When nothing else subsists from the past, after the people are dead, after the things are broken and scattered· the smell and taste of things remain poised a long time, like souls· bearing resiliently, on tiny and almost impalpable drops of their essence, the immense edifice of memory."
                                     -Marcel Proust, The Remembrance of Things Past

Catching a whiff of red cedar, I immediately "see" my grandfather on his porch in Tennessee, whittling branches he'd cut from the aromatic tree.  The scent of lilacs bring to mind my mother in her garden, and roses my 7th grade piano teacher (she wore an Avon brand rose perfume).  Patchouli recalls Oregon County Fair, high school, Eugene Market.  The smoky saddle-leather smell of Lapsang Souchong tea takes me back to long philosophical talks with an early mentor.


Smell is a powerful link to memory.  From an evolutionary perspective, that makes perfect sense. Olfactory activity is directly linked to that brainy seat of emotion, the hippocampus, which mediates learning and memory.  Other senses make a more indirect meander to storage, and thus retrieval, of what has been important to our history.  But with smell-- we know right away what we are drawn to, and what we really, really want to avoid.

Something Stinks

kelp guy smelled:  not good

Cesspools, rotting food, festering wounds, dead animals and people:  it takes a lot of exposure to get over our instinctual revulsion to "bad" smells.  Again, natural instinct serves us well, and we want to get the heck away from what stinks.  Our nose is located front and center on our face, in between our eyes and mouths, for a reason-- to keep that bad stuff out of our bodies.  Sickness has a scent, and we don't like it.  Visit a hospital or hospice, and underneath the disinfectant, you can smell it.   The smell of decay, whether of food or living beings, has a "get away" force on us, and it's much more physical than psychological.  Since odor is processed directly through the hippocampus, brain urges straight to flight mode-- sometimes stopping to vomit, in case we have ingested anything that might send us to a similar state.

People with anosmia face safety issues when deprived of this primary warning system.  If you don't smell the smoke, you may lose precious time to escape the fire.  If you can't smell rot, you may eat food that's turned the corner from life-giving to deadly.  You don't smell the odorants in gas, the mold in the shower. These are the more alarming aspects to living with anosmia.

Scents and Edibility

beet tart, Gathering Together Farm

But it’s not just the bad stuff the nose makes important.  Olfaction is intimately involved in eating.  Odors don't just notify us of spoilage, they comprise the majority of what we come to know as taste.  Without scent, our palate is limited to identifying only the hint of the most rudimentary flavors: salty, bitter, sour, sweet and umami (savory).  If you've recently had a cold, you may remember that food just wasn't that interesting.  That's because most of what we call taste is really our brain processing odors.  Blindfolded and with your nose pinched shut, you won't taste the difference between a carrot and an apple.  People with sudden onset anosmia often lose interest in food, because they cannot taste it.  It's all various stages of cardboard:  gluey, pulpy, crunchy, chewy but in the end tasteless.  An exception is fiery foods, such as chilies, which at least provide a physical sensation in the mouth as they trigger the trigeminal nerve.

You May Sniff The Bride

Smell is involved in much more than alerting us to danger, retrieving memories, or helping us differentiate and enjoy tastes.  From the time we are born we begin processing and storing olfactory information.  Babies hardwire early on to their mother's scent, and lovers often fixate on the smells of their partner.  Our sense of smell actually helps us chose an appropriate partner with whom to procreate: studies have found that people prefer the scent of those less genetically related.  Because a disparity of genes means less gene-linked disease, such partnerships result in more viable offspring.

But science is a poor poet, and lovers simply say "you smell like home."

A Less Dimensional World

Until lately I never thought twice about the scentless world.  But three months ago I checked out a book by garden writer Bonnie Blodgett about her experience with sudden anosmia.  In her case, it started with phantom smells.  Her nose was trying to make up for all the sensation she wasn't receiving, and she was tortured by olfactory hallucinations of the stinkiest sort. It was fascinating reading, but I didn't finish it before the two-week library loan was up (I'm the reading equivalent of a channel surfer, and had five other books out).  Meanwhile, local author Keith Scribner’s latest novel was released.  I probably would have bought it anyway, but it helped that Keith had been holing up the last three years in an office 20 feet from mine while he wrote it.  I was curious to see the results.  The novel opens with a literally sensual drive through into Willamette valley, and the protagonist's wife, a "professional nose" (fragrance specialist) who’d gone asomniac catches fresh mint scenting the night air—her first clue that she may be regaining her grieved sense.

All of this was trivial synchronicity until June.

Of the five senses, smell has always been my home-run best.  I was born a super-smeller, one of those people who knows what you ate for breakfast if I visit you at dinner.  Ask my dear friend and walking partner Lisa.  Many of our late night strolls have been punctuated with my running aromatic narratives:  "Sewer's backing up!"  "I smell dryer sheets".  "Ah, jasmine blooming!"  There was definitely a down side.  Moldy oranges, Axe bodywash, cat piss-- I couldn’t help attending to it, blocks away.  But the upside? A summer day on Mary's Peak had me rhapsodic: chamomile and fir on the breeze.  And while I may lack fancy-ass oenophile terms, I could really enjoy a glass of wine; could taste everything from concrete to kiwi in a sip of stainless barreled Riesling.  I'm a bit of a synesthesiac, and smell and taste were a multi-layered sensory pleasure.  Fragrances had heft and texture, from velvet to burlap to silk.

sniffing the subway

All that disappeared in June.  I came down with a kick-your-ass virus, the first I've had in years.  I ran a fever, went through a couple of boxes of tissue, took to my bed, took sick leave from my private practice for the first time I can remember.  It was grass season in the valley, a time when I get pretty stuffy anyway, so it was a week or two of feeling better before I realized that even though I felt fine, something pretty radical was going on.

I could smell absolutely nothing.  Not rubbing alcohol, not the cat's litterbox,  not a campfire.  And taste very, very little.  Making pesto with fresh basil from my CSA box, I toasted $20/lb pine nuts and ground the basil with young garlic:  nothing.  Went to Country Fair in early July, and for the first time didn't notice the marijuana, the patchouli, the food booths, the 10,000 unwashed and very sweaty humans.  A bonus gift?  Walking past the Peacock outdoor smoking lounge to get to Magenta's-- no problem.  Of course, when I got there and ordered my pricey ginger martini, I might have been better off sticking to the water.  If it hadn't been for those floating fleshy bits and yuppie bar tab, I'd have been hard-pressed to notice the difference.

At first I thought it would clear in a week or two.  Two months later, I'm not so sure.  Sparky The Head Doc, (aka "Dr. Babe-to-you"), my neurologist sister, is pretty sure the goose-egg I grew after trying to relocate an old growth cedar branch with my forehead could also be involved in my troubles. It happened around the same time I was sick.  (Warning:  don’t garden in big hats if you are going to get lost in your fevery thoughts).

My son made a rich bread pudding tonight, which my usually taciturn sweetheart pronounced "incredible”.  For me, it was like eating school paste, and I gave it up after a bite. The fresh fruit salad with mint from the garden had guests exclaiming they’d smelled it from the driveway, but I couldn't identify a single component by taste.  Not even the raspberries I’d picked fresh and melting with juice only hours earlier.

Beginnings of the Bad Gooseberry Pie

I have taken to declining offers to dine out.  Why pay for food that gives no pleasure? And anosmia has certainly not improved my cooking.  I made a fresh gooseberry pie several weeks ago, so sour and salty it was barely edible-- but I couldn't taste it to know.  I still reflexively eat.  Sometimes I don't finish it, disappointed.  Sometimes I overeat, trying to find something that pleases--chasing an elusive gustatory high.

 I went to my doctor, pretty much figuring what I already knew, that there was nothing to be done.  But I wanted to do something.  She ran a few tests, then acknowledged either it would come back, or it wouldn't.  Meanwhile I am trying to get into textures instead of tastes with food, and the occasional sensation. But frankly I am pretty down about the whole thing.  It's as if a third of my world has vanished.  I suppose in the scheme of things it's a small tragedy, but it's a whole lot bigger than I would have imagined.

Earlier this evening I thought I caught a whiff of that bread pudding baking.  A slight hint of the butter, or cinnamon.  It made me hopeful.  I was really, really sad when I tasted it later-- or rather, didn't.

If my sense of smell doesn't return, I suppose I will learn to compensate.  I'll remember to check the burner instead of waiting for my son to run up from the basement to tell me the house is filling with gas.  I'll get more into colors and textures with food.  I'll give up cooking, or at least try to follow recipes rather than making it up as I go along.  Maybe now that I can't be a foodie, I'll lose a few pounds.

But I hope those memories-- the ones profoundly linked to scent-- will remain.  I worry about that.

Further reading:
Remembering Smell:  A Memoir of Losing--and Discovering--the Primal Sense, by Bonnie Blodgett
The Nose That Never Knows:  The Miseries of Losing the Sense of Smell, Elizabeth Zierah, Slate.Com
Smell and Memory, by the awesome Jonah Lehrer
Failing the Sniff Test:  The Nose, Ruined.  Paul Lucas, New York Times 2005. 
Yahoo Anosmia Support Group:  help and information from fellow sniff failers.
The Oregon Experiment, a novel by Keith Scribner

The Right To Love and Commit

This month, New York became the most recent and most populous state to allow same-sex marriages.  The Senate vote was close, 33-29, and is already being challenged in court.   Republican Senator Mark Grisanti, who ran for office on an anti-gay platform,  came in with late support.  “I cannot deny a person, a human being, a taxpayer, a worker, the people of my district and across this state, the State of New York, and those people who make this the great state that it is the same rights that I have with my wife.”  "I was wrong" to oppose those rights, he said.
    It takes courage to admit that.  Even former vice-president Dick Cheney has come around to publicly stating that "freedom means freedom for everyone" when asked his position on gay marriage.  Would that Obama be so brave. 
     We are a country built on slowly figuring out and correcting our mistakes-- slavery, child labor, women's rights to name a few.  We talk a big talk about equality, but we are easily threatened by change.  
This week I am missing the wedding of a dear friend.  She's in Canada, and her celebration occurs on the tail end of my already-spent vacation, and as much as I regret not being part of it, I couldn't make it.  She'd asked me months ago if I could be her celebrant, but while gay marriage is legal in Canada, my officiant credentials aren't.  I spoke with her last week and asked her to tell me something about her beloved.  "She was my first love, and is my forever love".  Although they'd met many, many years ago, it hadn't occurred to Lois at the time she could ever be with the love of her life.  How things change.  How good that they do.  
     I don't get the fear over gay marriage. What's so scary about love and commitment?  I've heard some arguments that frankly seem ludicrous to me.  It threatens straight marriages?  I don't see how.  I've seen a lot of straight marriages threatened by other heterosexuals, but not gays.   Marriage is for procreation?  Then I guess we should nullify all couples who can't or choose not to have children.  In the New Testament, Jesus says nothing against homosexuality.  While there's a few (6-7) verses against homosexuality in the Old Testament, there are also admonishments against engaging in everything from shellfish ingestion to mixing fibers in fabric. (For a humorous take on this, see the infamous "Letter to Dr. Laura").
I do fear angry, constricted people who impose their agendas on others.  I am much more threatened by the Anders Behreing Breiviks of the world than the couple featured in the video below. Love expands.  Fear contracts.  Let's grow.
       "We need more light about each other. Light creates understanding, understanding creates love, love creates patience, and patience creates unity." 
— Malcolm X
 

Sermon: "The People That Scare Us: Getting Beyond Tolerance"

Every once in a while, I give a sermon at the local UU, usually on some topic I've been thinking about a lot the previous months.  If you've read my blog before, you might recognize a few of the lines in this sermon-- I was on the tail end of a nasty virus, and company from out of town, so I cheated a little and lifted a bit from previous entries.

It was a delightful morning.  My friend Chareane had graciously agreed to be the supporting speaker and do the opening and closing words and the meditation.  Chareane is my personal inspirational hero.  After raising kids, she's taken up accordian, mastered ceramics, and learned salsa.  Although I knew she'd do a fine job, she completely rocked a reading of Maya Angelo and quotes from Malcolm X and the bible.  When I expressed my admiration, she said she'd been taking a class on "the teacher as performer".  Wow.  What a life-long learner she is.

Friend, fiddler and vocalist Willeke Frankzerda had been the musical guest at my last sermon two years ago, where she brought the congregation to tears.    At 13, her voice and artistry has blossomed even more.  She has a pure and beautiful voice and presence.  It was an amazing performance, and even more remarkable since she had returned only hours before from traveling in Idaho and California at fiddle camps.

Here's the sermon if you'd like to read it. Wish I could include the video of Chareane and Willeke.  I am truly blessed to have such talented friends.

THE PEOPLE THAT SCARE US:  MOVING BEYOND TOLERANCE

Jana Svoboda; Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Corvallis, July 10^th, 2011

Opening Words:  (read by Chareane Wimbley-Gouveia.):  "We need more light about each other. Light creates understanding, understanding creates love, love creates patience, and patience creates unity."   — Malcolm X

Opening Song:  “Soul Meets Body”, by Death Cab for Cutie, performed (vocals and violin) by Willeke Idzerda

(Audience participation music:  “Hail to the Chief “ as introit to UU ATTACK AD)

(with movie-trailer voice-over voice)

“Unitarianism:  Is it a cult?

YAHOO says yes.  At least that was the best answer, chosen out of many, to one man’s concern about his children’s exposure to UU beliefs.  “Pagans can worship next to Christians who can worship next to wiccans who can worship next to atheists or whatever.”  

Do we really want our children exposed to “whatever” worship?

Not scared yet?  Try this on for size:  Unitarians, who gave up the Ten Commandments for the Seven Strongly Held Suggestions, think YOUR CHILDREN should THINK FOR THEMSELVES.  Don’t believe it?  It’s right there, Number 4 in their little pocket brochure:

“A free and responsible search for truth and meaning.”

Free?  Then what is that basket they send around during the service?  

But wait—there’s more.  And don’t just take it from me—here’s a response from a SELF-PROFESSED Unitarian:

“We take ‘The inherent worth and dignity of every person" seriously. That means even if he is black, white, brown, red or yellow; even if he is poor, or gay, even if she is a lesbian or homeless, or she used to be a man, or he stammers because he has an IQ of 140 trapped in an 80-year old body that suffered some strokes, or her legs don't work. ‘

Got it?  ANYBODY can attend.  These people have  NO STANDARDS WHATSOEVER  as to who can sit in the pew and worship.  Mixing it up right there with YOUR CHILDREN.

Another cultist gave this response, which I’d say speaks for itself:

“Ours is one of the most difficult religions to put into practice. We are charged to seek the truth, not just sit passively and accept blindly that one small group has a corner on the truth because they say so.”

What kind of UNI-VARIBLE is that?

And how about THIS?

Number 6 in the UU agenda:  The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all.  If you thought the GAY AGENDA was scary—well, there’s a word for No. 6.  

COMMUNISM.

 “WHATEVER” WORSHIP.  NO STANDARDS.  “DIFFICULT”.  

Is THIS what we want for our impressionable youth?

UU: Mixing it up in pews in YOUR town.”

------------

Homily:

That ad was a farce.  You knew that, right?  But if you watched any television during the fall, it may have sounded familiar—because it was based on the political ads from recent elections.

Welcome and thank you for joining us on this beautiful summer day in your individual searches for truth and meaning—one of the seven principles serving as the foundation for the UU faith.  Though plain and straightforward in language, these tenets are anything but easy in practice.  Today’s sermon is about three other UU prinicples:  The inherent worth and dignity of every person, justice, equity and compassion in human relations, and the goal of world community with peace, liberty and justice for all.  In other words, getting rid of the concept of the “other” and getting to WE.

Who could argue ?

Frankly, plenty of people.

The history of Unitarianism is one of being the Other, in Europe during a conservative Christian time.  Many of the founders were put to death as heretics because of the threatening ideas they espoused, such as thinking for oneself, without relying on an external, appointed spiritual authority.  As recently as 2008, Unitarians in Knoxville were murdered by a man who stated he had targeted t the church because of its liberal beliefs.

So Unitarians should know something about being an “other.”  

But we’re human, and humans when scared start to batten down into either/or thinking.   We go to that “You’re with us, or you’re against us” place.  We slip into our reptilian brains, especially if we think our piece of the pie is up for grabs and we may not be the only one in line.  

Last year,  I had a terrible dream.  There had been a murder in an area I was vacationing, and when I came back from hiking to the home where I was staying, the door was ajar. The house was ok, but as I went to secure the back door, the murderer came in, and made clear his intent to harm me.  At some point I remembered what I did for a living, and started talking him down, buying time.  I'll spare you the long winded details, but what was interesting to me in the dream was that as we talked, and I listened to him with genuine curiosity and compassion, he grew smaller and smaller, and I realized I didn't need to fear him at all.

Jung says dreams come to us in service of of Psyche, as letters from the unconscious.  My webmaster pal Hal might say some dreams come in reaction to the pastrami we had for dinner.  This particular dream may have been symptomatic of too much CNN.  But since I'd seen Don Quixote in Ashland the previous weekend-- well, I saw a different possibility.  It seemed a representation of how our fears can become gigantic, hold us hostage.  How they can cause us much more trouble than they are actually capable of inflicting, with our help.  And about how when we face them, with curiosity and compassion, they shrink and lose their power. 

Even those who consider themselves exceptionally open-minded can get drawn into “other-ism”.  It only takes a name drop.  Michelle Bachman.  Sarah Palin.  Newt.  O’Reilly.  As Anne Lamott put it,  “You can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.”

That’s not how I want to be.  I don’t like it.  I can fall into it, but I don’t like it.  

When my oldest daughter was quite a bit younger, she would skip into rants about people who she found difficult, intolerant, un-justice-fiable.  I would get after her for her tone, her intolerance. 

This week we talked about that.  She’s dating a Muslim, and it led to a conversation about learning about the Other.   She said, “You know how you always said to me, don’t speak hatefully, even in jest, because it puts more hate out there in the world? “

“ Did I ever tell you how when Leigh and I moved in together, and both our boyfriends moved to Japan that same month,  so we fake-hated Japan because it was an outlet?  And it was all a big joke, until one day I was at Safeway and this Asian woman walked by and I automatically went UGH and sneered?  And I was like WOAH!  What the HELL?”

“And yeah, I thought you were full of BS growing up.  But that moment I got it.  I really got it.  And now I try to practice that.  It isn’t just that we should speak well because we don’t want to offend others, but because it really does shape the way we view the world, and I think this is a very important piece of the puzzle.” 

She’s right.  The software—speech—informs the hardware—thinking.  The more that we accept that Other-ism is a reasonable way to think, or just practice it thoughtlessly, the more it ingrains and shapes us.

And there are so many ways to be an other.  Even though we are so genetically similar that the concept of race no longer makes any biological sense (that’s a whole other sermon, but ask me for references),  there are millions of ways to be different.  Even “identical” twins show subtle variations in their genes due to minor, spontaneous mutations occurring during gestation.  

 That’s in our genetic interest, because these differences will sometimes be adaptable to environmental and socio-political differences occurring at the time.  So the anxious person, hyper-alert to tiny details in their environment, will anticipate and avoid threats their fearless brethren will not--  and the fearless will leave the safety of home to seek food and opportunity when home cannot provide them.  Sometimes these variations are boons for a few generations and then become hindrances.  Long ago, a few African children’s blood developed a strange sickle shape to some blood cells, providing protection from a plague that would have killed them before reproductive age.   That’s not as handy when life spans double, other options for Malaria protections are found, and the blood change results in a post-reproductive but early death.

Other-ness covers all sorts of variables.  Hair color--  did you know that only 1-2% of the world’s population is red-headed?  Skin color.  Politics.  Religion.  Philosophies.  Class values and differences, socio-economic circumstance.   Gender, including all the blends within.  Learning ability.  Education.  Sexuality.  Age.  Physical challenges and variants.    And it’s not only the underdogs that get “othered”.  As a clumsy, bookwormish nerd kid whose family never owned a new car or went to Disneyland, I was skeptical and frankly prejudiced against jocks and rich people.  

That’s a telling point, because prejudice tells us much more about ourselves than those we believe to be the other.   It’s often our shadow stuff emerging.  For those of you unfamiliar, therapist and philosopher Carl Jung spoke of our Shadow as being all the parts of ourselves or our conceptions we felt were unacceptable or disallowed.  And we either fear is part of us, or wish we could have a little part of.  A poster boy of shadow stuff was Ted Haggard, former prayer partner to Bush/leader of the Evangelical Association of the US and a ringleader in the anti-gay rights movement last decade.  He was busted in 2006 by a gay man, whom he’d paid for sex for several years.  Although he was declared “completely heterosexual” after some initial therapy, he’s recently come out as bisexual.  If he’d been able to admit it initially, Colorado might have not passed its anti-gay initiatives.   

Think of it like this:  you are in a body of water, brushing your arm along the surface, when your elbow hits an icecube and breaks.  Why?  It’s because you’ve bumped up against something big, deep and dangerous in yourself you’ve not dealt with.  When we have an iceberg reaction to the other—there is work we need to do.  And our personal work becomes community work.  Because it ripples out.  The collective conscious needs to be:  CONSCIOUS.  Of what we are putting out there.  And how it effects the world we claim to want to live in.

How do we mend our separations?  By remembering that we are all, as some author put it, looking at the same world through separate, tiny little lenses—and thinking we have the same view.  To enlarge the view, stretch your vision.  We’re scared of what we don’t know.  And when we align ourselves only with like minds, we reinforce the belief we are the norm.  Research on dealing with fear tells us the best way to reduce fear is through exposure.  Kierkegaard put it this way—to grow, move toward what makes you anxious.  Expand, don’t contract.

Which leads to this challenge, offered by Omega Institute founder Elizabeth Lesser:  TAKE THE OTHER TO LUNCH.  

 (The following are direct excepts from the talk, available here:  http://www.ted.com/talks/elizabeth_lesser_take_the_other_to_lunch.html)

She goes on to say:  “I’m deeply disturbed by the ways in which all of our cultures are demonizing the other—by the voice we are giving to the most divisive among us.”

“Listen to these titles of some of the best selling books from both sides of the political divide here in the US:  Liberalism is a Mental Disorder.  Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot.  Patriotics and Pinhead.  Arguing with Idiots.  ….They’re supposedly tongue in cheek, but they’re actually dangerous.”

“Now here’s a title that may sound familiar, but whose author may surprise you:  'Four and a Half Years of Struggle Against Lies, Stupidity and Cowardice'.  Who wrote that? That was Adolph Hitler’s first title for Mein Kamph, My Struggle,  the book that launched the Nazi Party.”

“The worst eras in human history, whether in Cambodia or Germany or Rwanda, they  start like this, with negative otherizing, and then they morph, into violent extremism.”

So who is the other?

Lesser says:  “Anyone whose lifestyle frightens you or whose point of view makes smoke come out of your ears”.  

Take someone to lunch.  Get to know one person from a group you may have negatively stereotyped. Let them know what you’re up to.  Use her guidelines: Don’t persuade, defend or interrupt.  Be curious, be conversational, be real, and listen.

I’d add:  make it your goal not to “tolerate” them, but to KNOW THEM. To understand them.

Try her three questions:  “ Share some of your life experiences with me.  What issues deeply concern you?  And what have you always wanted to ask someone from the other side?”

We are ALL somebody else’s OTHER.  Lesser quotes the wise words of Mother Theresa:   “The problem of the world is we draw the circle of our family too small.”

I hope you take this challenge very, very personally.  And as Gandhi says, become part of the change you wish to see in the world.  I look forward to hearing your stories.

Music:  Mother Nature’s Son, John Lennon/ Paul McCartney, performed (violin, vocals) by Wileke Frankzerda.  

Meditation:  We The People, by Maya Angelo, read by Chareane Wimbley- Gouviea

Closing Words, from the Book of Hebrews:  Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.  

Shades of a Typical Life

 A mixed bag week started 7 days ago (as weeks are wont to do), when the closure of Mary's Peak summit road changed a spur-of-the-moment .7 mile walk up into a fullish-day's hike on a lower ridge trail.  Having lazily foregone a water bottle and Sensible Footwear, I bitched my way up the first several hundred feet of elevation until the tranquilizer of natural beauty shut up my monkey mind.  Late-bloomer trilliums, pink and white, scattered themselves prettily amongst the yellow clusters of Oregon grape and wood violets.  A few dozen orange peel fungi, including this one shaped like a heart, marked the left hand side of the trail for a half-mile.  When we finally arrived at the parking lot, a view of every major peak in the Cascades, from Diamond to Hood, greeted us -- as well as this amazing iridescent cloud!

I pointed it out to a young couple, deep in romantic talk and looking the other way, and had them peer through my polarized sunglass lenses for a better view. My companions and I went back to our picnic, and they to their swooning.  As we packed our repast the man came up and said, "I'm getting ready to propose to her.  Would you take a picture?"  He left his camera, went back and knelt, withdrew a tiny sheet of paper and brought her (and at least half of the onlooking audience) to tears.

It was a beautiful day.  At the top of the peak, a meadow of glacier lily and other wildflowers colored the fields.  A small patch of snow provided a manic treat for the three displaced Minnesotan dogs to cool off.  Late spring means the lupine and tiger lilies are still to come-- get there while you can!  The road should be open the 7th, but the forest hike is well worth the extra 5 or 6 miles.

The rest of the week held a different tenor.  One of my sisters has been sick-- really scary sick with what now seems to be a particularly nasty virus but for a while seemed much worse, playing havoc with her blood cells and liver enzymes and keeping her down and fevered for nearly two weeks.  Now this particular sister's level of General Life Enthusiasm and Energy makes me look like a snail on Valium by comparison (we call her "Barbi on Speed"); the fact she'd actually taken off work and laid down a few days completely freaked us out. By Monday, day 11 of her still feverish, I showed my ultimate codependent empathy by feeling peaked myself.  It certainly wasn't contagion, since she lives a couple time zones away.  By Tuesday, I was having a lot of trouble staying awake; by Wednesday cancelling clients and full on in bed with chills and fevers.  I don't have my sister's stamina, but it's been years since I cancelled for being sick.  But the body has its wisdom, and  I had a virus that wanted its attention.

Here's what happens when you get a foreign invader of the respiratory viral type. Itchy thoat and runny nose.  Virus work by inserting themselves into cells where they first find a foothold, where they take over and multiply.  Your white blood cells run to the rescue to route them out, clumping together and gumming things up; the irritation causes runny noses, sneezes and other symptoms that help expel the virus.  Being no dummy, Virus uses these exits as a chance to find a new home in a fresher body.  Fevers and Chills:  I  alternately burned or shook fiercely trying to warm up.  Viruses prefer temperate climates, so when things heat up, it's bad news for the multiplying invaders.  The body gets that, and does its part.  General Malaise:  When we're sick, we have a physiologic urge to take to our bed.  Psychologically, that sure wasn't happening.  But the body wants rest, and it doesn't care an iota what Mind wants at this point.  I fought it the first couple of days, but by Wednesday the enormous feat of walking the garbage out left me swoony. I saw more of my pillow in three days than I had the previous two weeks.  Time took on the quality of a weirdly diluted watercolor wash.  And guilty as I felt calling in sick, I found out the world ran just fine without me. 

I don't know that this is a typical week.  But I'd say it has shades of a typical life.  The beautiful and the ugly (you should see my Kleenex piles), the rare and the tedious all thrown together.  I got to practice giving help, and asking for it (thanks to my sweetheart, for blowing up the air mattress so I could nap in the sun this afternoon!).  There was a whole lot of amazing I could've easily missed.

Get well soon, dear sister;  and congratulations and best wishes to summit sweethearts J and M.
Onward to another week with all it will bring--
Jana

Opening Your Heart Will Crack it a Little

love on the riverside-- rocks from today's walk

Nothing says Friday night middle-aged fun like watching an animated video in the basement.

For some reason no one in the house will own, Toy Story III arrived via our mail-vid account a few weeks ago.  Tonight my sweetie announced he was sending it back since apparently nobody was going to watch it.  I'm a child of waste-not parents and decided we better pop it in the machine.

We exchanged several sideways glances the first twenty minutes, trying to figure out if anyone was enjoying it.  It was typical Pixar goodness-- funny, with snappy writing, brilliant animation and the reasonable semblance of that Quest Tale/Hero's Journey plot essential to all good stories.  But something was obviously missing, and I finally narrowed it down:  utterances of the F-word, or a person under 12.

We bravely persevered, and it was a good antidote to a long work week.  I love my job, but it's neither mindless or light-hearted, so that's exactly what I want for entertainment.  No Oprah Book Club tearjerkers for me, thank you.  Give me Buzz Lightyear dancing the tango and Ken doll as the Original Metrosexual.

But even kiddo comedies tug my heartstrings. (Caution:  Spoiler Alert!)  I was in full on tears along with Andy's cartoon mom when she entered her son's room and saw it packed away for college, his boyhood toys in a box.  It was just a few months ago I played that scene.  Life's changes are bittersweet, with each advance a goodbye of some kind.

There are some things we say goodbye to unnecessarily.  I hope to never lose a sense of play, wonder at the natural world, and a love of learning.  Yet even as I type those last words I think of how reluctant I have become about adapting to new technology.  I don't even try to figure out how to turn on the television--why the hell one should need four remotes to watch a show is beyond me.  I feel young enough, but as I watched the animated tango scene I realized I will not be learning how to do that dance, because my sexy can no longer trump my clumsy.  I don't mind making a fool of myself most of the time, but I have my limits.

On the other hand, age has brought its benefits.  I grew up hearing people get more close minded as they age, but that hasn't been my experience at all.  The more I know, the less I know I know, and the less black and white the world becomes.  Judgement is replaced by compassion and certainty by a softening of the heart.  As a young idealist, I had lots of (self)righteous anger.  Although I talked about love and connection,  the world was full of "thems".  I can still get my Crank on, but I see how complicated things are, and how easy it is to become hoarding of the little piece of pie you think is available, or to make lousy choices based on resources that are or you perceive to be limited.

Wendy, from her website

And I get how life's sweetnesses are all mixed in with its sadnesses.  How you don't get one without the other.  You can have the kid you lovingly raise to be independent, and s/he will leave you.  Or maybe you have a child that can never leave you, and that brings a whole nother truck of sadnesses and joys. If you love someone enough to let them in all the way, they're in deep enough to cut you.  Most won't, at least not on purpose.  But it will ache some when things change, even when it's what's supposed to happen.
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Postscript:

This blog was lost in the shuffle after I wrote it last month.   Tonight it has a new meaning for me.  One of the first friends I met in Corvallis is moving with her family several hundred miles away, to be closer to her widowed dad.  Wendy's welcome helped our family know we'd found a home here.  She's been a source of creative support, gentle spiritual teaching and inspiring mothering. Take a look at her art at divinebitsofbeauty.com. I'm one of many who will miss her luminous smile and beautiful spirit, even as we wish her happiness on this new adventure.   Godspeed, Wendy, Peter, Ella and Buddy!
    
"You will lose someone you can’t live without,and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp."   -- Anne Lamott

Accidental Picnic

"The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance; the wise grows it under his feet."  -James Oppenheim

There's been a little more June and a lot more tiny adventures this week in the heart of the Valley.  Certainly there were plenty of opportunities to continue avoiding the laundry and weeding. Sunday afternoon seemed ideal for a drive out to a secret garden.  Dr. "Babe To You" and The Brit-- (aka my sister and bro-in-law)  immigrated from the Frozen Central Plains last fall and are enthusiastic explorers, so off we went. 

If you've not been to Dancing Oaks nursery, it's a treat and well worth the long country drive.  You're likely to be greeted by a fat cat or a three legged dog on the winding paths through lush shrubberies and flowers.  Giant cardoons spill out of statuary on water gardens, exotic vines trail over split beam trellises.  The staff is knowledgeable and friendly and the porch inviting for a rest.

But Sunday we never got there.  As we headed down Suver Road, the skies started clabbering up and a sprinkling of rain hit the windshield.  We saw the sign for Airlie Winery and took a quick turn down 2 miles of nowhere.  Moments later we were being nosed out of our open car doors by the resident Irish Setters.  Owner Mary followed and set us in for a flight of some incredibly tasty local libations.  

Mary is an inspiration.  After 20 plus years working at the telephone company, she went for her dream of owning a vineyard.  "If I'd had a clue about what I was doing, I would have been to scared to do it."  She's an ideal hostess;  down to earth, funny, smart as hell and laid back.  She plied us with tastings and wine trivia as we sheltered from the rain.  The covered table on the patio looked out over the pond and grounds and the dogs ran guard duty chasing rabbits while we talked.  Mary told us about the 2008 dry Gewurztraminer.  "Gewurz is German for Spicy, and the rest refers to the region where it originated.  But Julia Child said it meant 'Spicy tears,' and I like that explanation better."  I don't usually care for Gewruzts myself; they can be cloying.  But the spice was evident in this one, as were the hints of fig and apricot referred to in the tasting notes.

Midway through the reds, a car drove up and out came locals with a platter full of treats, telling Mary, "We worried you'd be hungry out here."  We were strangers until then but they joined our table and shared stories and their food.  Matriarch Betty was recently widowed and had moved from her isolated home to a place on her daughter's land. She'd moved to Oregon years ago from what was then small town Santa Cruz. Ken told a great tale about burying cookies around fellow scouts' sleeping bags when he was a child in the hills of the John Muir.  His dad had told the boys about the feral hogs in the area, and they didn't believe him.  They did when they woke up to snouts rooting around them.   Daughter-in-law Jan works in county mental health and we acknowledged the challenges of the current system and lack of funding.  We chatted and snacked and tasted the day away.  It was a great afternoon, and though the rain never let up we were completely content.  The Brit, who'd worried he'd feel obliged to buy a bottle if we stopped, happily walked out with a case-plus assortment of everything we'd tasted.  It wasn't the afternoon we'd planned, but it was the one we needed.  

Keep your eyes open.  You never know where you'll stumble across a great time.

Things you may have missed in the valley if you weren't paying attention

I think I'll start a new blog about all the wonderfulness that occurs in this burg. In the past several days,  I have enjoyed a great documentary that closed at the Darkside due to lack of attendance, a sold out concert with a recent Austin City Limits headliner  (accompanied by a true hometown boy, talented Alex Hargreaves), a box of tasty fresh-picked produce from a local farmer, an art auction/benefit by Engineers Without Borders, an amazingly complex salad eaten al Fresco at a long-time vegetarian restaurant, breakfast at a cafe' I'd seen for years and never tried with a great colleague I've known of for as many and sat with only once before.   There was more, but that's all I can recall this late on a Friday night.

True, I left a lot of laundry undone and weeds untended.  But i think it was worth it.  And trust me, they'll be here tomorrow.  Not true for the documentary, which I watched as 50% of the audience on closing night.

Coming up,  I can check out the annual rose show, go hear scientists talk about vegetable breeding while sipping a locally made brew,  see more live music, watch a dance recital,  tour a family farm, sit in my lawn chair in Central Park and see the community band, dance salsa, or see a local author read.  Heck, I can do the latter three times:  novelists Keith Scribner and Katy Kacvinsky are both on board, though Keith's all the way in Portland; and Marjorie Sandor 's giving a workshop on memoir writing Sunday at Grass Roots Bookstore.  And that only gets us through Tuesday.

We have a wealth of local treasure to explore, gifting all of our senses and attracting all manners of sensibilities.  For a town of our size there is a heck of a lot going on.

The last few posts have talked about paths to increased happiness.  Some key common factors are community,variety of experience, learning and play.  If you are tired of too much Have To and not enough Want To in your life; if you are hungry for community and stimulation-- go try something new, right here in the heart of the valley.

See you out there,
Jana
Here's a vid of a previous performance by Sarah Jarosz, Nathaniel Smith  and Alex Hargreaves, who sold out one of the biggest lvie venues in Corvallis tonight.  If you like what you see, check out their recorded concert on NPR.

The Stiff Upper Lip's Guide to Happiness

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/happiness_formula/4785402.stm

Click the link for an info-dense page of articles, quizzes, more links on that inevitable right we Americans are always nattering on about.

How do you score on the happiness measurements?  What can you glean from the research on ways to improve it?  You'll see the old familiars-- smile, connect, move your body--

Whatcha gonna do to make it good for you?
Jana