Til Death Do Us Part

As someone with manic-depression, I find myself wondering, at times, whether part of my illness stems from an inability to accept death. Certainly, mental illness is inherited genetically, but I also believe it is, in part, a maladaptive response to life stress. I feel I have to be careful not to blame myself for my illness, and I work hard to take care of myself by avoiding alcohol for the last seven years, get enough sleep, try to workout on a regular basis, eat right, and continually challenge myself intellectually. That last bit is an important, often overlooked element of mental well-being.

Nevertheless, I find the basic human condition painful in that it inevitably involves loss, at the very end that loss including the loss of self. As I drove on vacation to northern Wisconsin yesterday, I heard on the Wisconsin Public Radio a program talking about the new phenomenon of lasting tributes to Facebook users who have died. That number now includes over one million people with Facebook pages who have died.

People have long communed with the dead in ways as varied as going to the cemetery, praying, even, for some, holding seances, but Facebook offers a new way for people to communicate with those who are no longer able to respond directly. More than just in memoriam, this is an active way for people to grieve and continue to celebrate the presence of those who have passed on. I like to think that people who continue after me will still celebrate my life. I like to think that my life has mattered, both to me personally and to others around me.

It’s nice to think that the world is a better place for my having been here. With that, I wish you a happy holiday season.

Michael

The measure of success

About a month ago, I celebrated my forty-fifth birthday, vastly different from my twenty-fifth. I remember I ushered in my mid-twenties with a drunken night that started out at my house, but migrated to the bars so as to be seen by as many people as possible. I used to count my level of success based on how many people I knew, and how many people I could cajole into coming to my birthday celebration, but the times, they have changed. In April I celebrated seven years sober, and though I threw myself a birthday party this year, it was more about the quality of friends I had in attendance, not the quantity.

There’s a great little independent bookstore near me that hands out bookmarks with your purchases, and on that slip of paper is a saying by someone named A. Cowley, “May I have a few friends and many books, both true.”

I’ve also been reading a book by the Chicago Tribune critic Chris Jones about the history of Chicago theater, titled, “Bigger, Brighter, Louder, and it said, “We make a great stir upon our individual ant-hills, and try to convince ourselves and our fellow ants struggling along with their burdens that there never was such an ant as we, but somehow, when some bright day we go out of sight under the hill we have piled up, the other ants don’t mind it much, but go trudging along over us just as usual.”

I think one of the very hardest things we have to reconcile ourselves to is the inevitability of our own mortality. For me, I believe we are only truly dead when no one no longer remembers us. It’s important that we make our time matter in ways that are individually meaningful. And if we can live our lives with a sense of style in the process, all the better.

Christmas Sneer, Christmas Jeer, Christmas Cheer

All right, I admit it. I started listening to Christmas carols in the car, shortly after Ellen DeGeneres advertised her new Christmas cd, available only at Target, aptly titled, The Only Christmas Album You’ll Ever Need, Volume One. After listening to Stevie Wonder’s rendition of One Little Christmas Tree a number of times, I branched out and bought the new Motown Christmas cd as well as the Mary J. Blige Christmas cd, featuring a great rendition of Mary Did You Know?

I have friends who consider me a bit of a simpleton to still believe in God. To them, the concept of God is similar to Santa Claus, something you outgrow as you mature. It’s kind of frowned upon by some intellectuals who seek an answer within rational determinism. One acquaintance considers people who put their faith in a power greater than themselves weak for their lack of self sufficiency.

I find, however, that what matters in the grand scheme of things is my interconnectedness and interdependence on others, and I still find myself startled into silence by a starry night. I feel blessed to have been given the gift of life, and blessed to have others with whom I can share my joy.

It may be a little early to crank up the Christmas tunes. It’s even possible, according to some individuals, that Jesus was born in April, not December, and that what has been co-opted is a pagan mid-winter festival holiday, adopted by Christians to better mark the season leading up to Lent, and to better differentiate Christ’s birth from His resurrection.

Frankly, it doesn’t matter too much to me whether we have the exact day correct on our calendar. What matters most to me is that we enter the winter season with a spirit of generosity in our hearts, and that we are open to receiving the grace of God, and the many blessings of the Christmas season.

Surviving Versus Celebrating

Almost without even knowing it, yet another holiday season is upon us. I could have sworn, just last week, that we were in the midst of the American orgy more commonly known as Thanksgiving.

We had a rehash of, A Christmas Story, Thanksgiving, based on the much more profound book by Jean Shepard, In God We Trust: All Other’s Pay Cash. I felt I was doing well to avoid the inherent drama when an aunt who is a lawyer (who I love despite her career) made known that she was not getting quite her share of the dark meat. Being health conscious the way I am, I had loaded her plate with white meat, thinking that, though it may be a bit more dry, white meat is allegedly more healthy (have all the ads and Weight Watchers been lying all this time?). And, of course, I was looking out for her best interest because she is diabetic after all.

This thought process leads me to the somewhat illogical conclusion that “like seeks like,” but that, my friend, is for another blog, another time.

At any rate,we watched the games, and if memory serves, the Green Bay Packers played and beat the Atlanta Falcons, even without the effort of Aaron Rogers, but I finally had enough, and as a light snow fell, I took the car for a ride, and where I live, the streets aren’t plowed with any regularity so I may indeed have taken my life in my hands just heading to Starbucks to find out if indeed they may have remained open long enough so I could get a Vanilla Rooibos tea, just to calm my frazzled nerves. By that time, Starbucks had indeed closed for the day so I let the car drift along, guided simply by the half tank of gas left. Two hours later, I pulled back in the drive and was informed, walking in the door, that our two dogs had devoured the leftovers from the feast, dark meat and all. My aunt announced that there was too much chaos and that she needed to check into the nearest Best Western.

Flash forward to New Years, no wait–not just yet. Flash forward to the approaching Christmas season. Normally we set up two trees, one real, one artificial, but maybe because of the many grey days in the Chicagoland area, I could only manage the artificial, and couldn’t be bothered with scouting out and hauling home a real tree from the Xmas tree lot.

Naturally, last year some of the pre-lit lights burned out at the end of the holiday season last year so, feeling especially virtuous, I cut them off and was forced to restring the entire tree this season. Hence: the one tree rule. Lucky for us, we have a hybrid fireplace (don’t ask, don’t tell what that means, exactly, but it involves a carefully calculated combination of gas and wood burning capabilities).

This brings me to the very important question as to whether I, or any of us for that matter, approach holidays with a sense of anticipation and joy or dread. It’s been many years since I toasted New Year’s with an adult alcoholic beverage, but I’m painfully aware that many of us need the kind of crutch that Budweiser is certainly willing to deliver. One thing about being sober, however, is that I have to guard against a feeling of superiority, a feeling that I have mastered stress without drinking myself into oblivion. I suspect that many of us have a hard enough time dealing with life on life’s terms without having that third or fourth glass of wine, or even heading to a bar for a shot of Doctor Feelgood.

So without a drink in hand, I nevertheless steel myself to celebrate Christmas. Counting blessing helps, folks, and indeed I am blessed to have my two parents both still alive, and a lovely home with a cousin who is dear to me. But for those friends caught in the miasma of a depressive fog, I’ve learned that simply asking them to count their blessings can even cause them to sink deeper into what Winston Churchill referred to as his “Black Dog Days.”

So in an effort to notice time passing, to find a reason to enjoy each moment as it passes, I treasure the gift of life. I make time to journal, to drive to a new coffeehouse, to hand write Christmas cards, to wander seemingly aimlessly through a bookstore.

The past is gone, the future is yet to be, why do we think today is a gift, why do you think we call it the present?

Shooting For the Stars, Part Two

My philosophy is to aim high. You may not hit the bull’s-eye, but you’ll have a better chance of hitting the target. In terms of my religion, I try to be faithful, but as a gay man, it can be a challenge. Today, when it came time for the announcement of what the faithful should pray for, we were instructed to pray for the preservation of family values and the definition of marriage as between a man and woman. For this very reason, I consider myself a freelance Catholic, what some would term “a cafeteria Catholic.” These kinds of prayers and admonitions tend to leave me feeling left out, and I am considered by those in the Church to be saddled with a special burden to bear in reconciling my sexuality with my religion. No wonder Reform Judaism seems especially appealing!

I am a hypocrite in the sense that as I sat through Mass, and said the revised version of the Mass (which if you’re Catholic and haven’t been to Church for a while–Church with a capital “C”–you will notice things have changed, sometimes subtly and sometimes dramatically), I kept thinking, “Well at least I know the new liturgy,” unlike my neighbor sitting next to me. I took special pride in speaking out all the new parts, secretly gloating while trying to keep my face pious.

In many ways Catholicism is more than a religion. It is almost an ethnicity, something so indoctrinated in your soul as to become a very part of your Being, much like Judaism is both a religion and an ethnicity. It would be hard for me to leave my religion behind for this very reason. It’s a part of who I am, for better or worse.

Speaking of shooting for the stars, and aiming high, I strive to be the best person I can, yet one particular moral failing haunts me. I fear the future, in particular I fear poverty. My very own financial cliff. At one time I was on disability, Medicare, and Social Security, and lived in what could be politely termed a hovel with a man who has both cerebral palsy as well as a mental illness. I hid my impoverishment from friends, didn’t dare date, and grew ashamed of my life circumstances.

Later, my mother’s cousin moved to the area and helped me rebuild my life. I have even gone back to school, grad school at Northwestern for a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in creative writing, but somehow, in some ways, have continued to resent my past. I still take Eric, the man I lived with, out to see movies, but sometimes his behavior embarrasses me, especially when he starts talking to himself, often quite vocally (it’s a part of his mental illness). I even, at times, grow embarrassed by my mother’s cousin’s condition. She’s practically incapacitated, and can no longer walk on her own. I take her to church, out to eat, and to movies in her wheelchair, and I love her greatly, yet at times I find myself praying selfishly, “Please let her live until I graduate,” since I could not afford school on my own. Fear of financial insecurity and impoverishment rules my very being.

I pray in the year to come for greater faith, to accept whatever comes my way. This is not an easy prayer, even for someone who went to a small, liberal arts Catholic school as an undergrad. To whom much is given, much is required (this is not something which I naturally consider). I also pray not to resent those around me or the services I perform for them. For the last six years, I have changed my cousin’s bandages, and I hope to be more like Jesus in washing others’ feet, without expecting accolades for my service. I also pray not to be embarrassed by my circumstances, by the fragility of the life I have constructed. Anne Lamott has written a new book: “Help Thanks Wow: The Three Essential Prayers.” She comes from a place of gratitude, but doesn’t whitewash her struggles, most especially her struggle to be grateful.

Please, Lord, make me more grateful this coming year, and maybe just a little neater and organized, and maybe more creative as well, but if you can only make me grateful for my blessings, so be it.

The Man Who Invented Christmas

My cousin and I just went to the Goodman Theater’s production of “A Christmas Carol,” originally written as a novel by Charles Dickens. The highly imaginative production featured colorblind casting, meaning that an actor’s ethnicity would not figure into his or her consideration for a role, and in fact, Bob Cratchit’s wife and the Ghost of Christmas Present were played by black women. To me, this further universalized the story, and heightened its appeal, not only to people of all ages, but to people of all colors as well.

After getting home from the theater, I picked up a little book my aunt gave me last Christmas, called “The Man Who Invented Christmas: How Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol Rescued His Career and Revived Our Holiday Spirits,” by Les Standiford. Kind of a long title for a short, small tome, but it really heightened my appreciation for the holiday season.

The book starts with a quote from Walt Whitman: “Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity, When I give I give myself.” That’s the very lesson “A Christmas Carol” teaches. Ebenezer Scrooge is a pitiless miser, not giving in generosity to anyone else or even himself, but, after being visited by his old, seven years dead business partner Marley, and three ghosts, the Ghost of Christmas Past, the Ghost of Christmas Present, and the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, Scrooge has an epiphany and changes his whole manner of dealing with the world around him.

Charles Dickens, author of “A Christmas Carol,” grew up in poverty, and it informed his very being. As the book, “The Man Who Invented Christmas”, points out, “All art grows out of its makers loss, it has been said—and if that is so, Dickens’s loss of his childhood was to become the world’s great gain.”

Dickens became a literary superstar, yet remained afraid of becoming impoverished. He wrote feverishly, in monthly installments in literary magazines, publishing one chapter each month. Like my first creative writing instructor once told our class, “There’s nothing like a deadline to inspire creativity.” Despite Dickens’s fears, he remained resolute that Christmas should be inviolate, and held in our hearts all year long. Dickens once told the world, “The more a man learns, the better, gentler, kinder man he must become.”

And in “A Christmas Carol” Scrooge’s nephew Fred tells his uncle, “I have always thought of Christmas time as. . . the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. “[Christmas] has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it.”

Many have said, many times over, that we don’t know Christ’s actual birthday, and many feel he was actually born sometime in April. According to these people, the Catholic Church wanted to draw in as many nonbelievers as possible, and Pagans celebrated the winter solstice when the day was shortest, December 21st or 22nd, depending on the year. These individuals believe that December 25th was coopted to represent Jesus Christ’s birthday since the shortest day of the year, representing the death of the old and the birth of the new, embodied in Christians that change that Christ brought to the world.

In addition, plants and trees which remain green yearlong held special meaning for many. Pagans believed that evergreens would keep away evil spirits, ghosts, and even illness, and so Germany introduced the Christmas tree to the holiday celebration, and Queen Victoria’s German-born husband, Prince Albert, popularized the decorating of the Christmas tree in England.

Charles Dickens grew up in this era, and especially loved the Christmas season. He wrote his book to celebrate goodwill among men, and peace to all. Many of his books moralize more explicitly about the need to care about others, but “A Christmas Carol” continues to touch people deeply in the way few other books have. The strength of this little book is that it makes people feel more than think, and the way they feel has changed the way many conduct their lives. It’s quite a legacy.

I guess the lesson during this 2012 Christmas season is that our thoughts and actions matter, and that we must show generosity in spirit to our fellow men, especially the less fortunate. As Tiny Tim says at the end of A Christmas Carol, “God bless us, Every One.”

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all!

Starting Anew

January 1st always seems to usher in a whole slew of resolutions, but then there are also those folks who’ve tried resolutions on the first of each year, but found the system wanting.  Many people still believe, however, that the new year is a great time to start fresh, leaving the old year behind.

I myself am a bit leery of announcing my resolutions.  Kind of like birthday wishes, I don’t want to jinx myself by letting everyone know my intentions for the year 2012.  I am starting school at Northwestern University’s Master of Fine Arts (MFA) program in creative writing January 5th so I suppose people will be able to guess one resolution regarding writing the first draft of a novel.  I like to excel at whatever I undertake.  Desire to be the best propels me forward.

But I must mention that I spoke with a good friend earlier today, and when I sheepishly told him about another resolution to learn Italian, he cautioned me gently, saying that I do have a bit of a habit of taking on too much with too many competing interests and goals.  Much as I hate to admit it, I do tend to pursue many goals in contradictory directions so I’m shelving the intention to learn Italian until I know how difficult my coursework will be for grad school.

It does strike me as somewhat arbitrary and odd to begin anew right in the midst of winter.  Logically, I would think March or April might be a better time for resolutions, but the powers that be must have had access to knowledge that I don’t have.  It does seem a propos to kickstart anew right after Jesus’ birthday. 

There remain some questions, however, as to when Jesus’ birthday really was.  Many say the wisemen wouldn’t have travelled afar in winter, but would have come to meet their Savior sometime in the early spring even though the angel who came to them announcing Jesus’ birth in a stable might compel them to take on such a journey.  Even if his birthday were in the winter, however, there is also the question of the change from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar in terms of how we count time.  When the last of those adherring to the Julian calendar switched over, they had to drop thirteen days so that accounts for some confusion over the exact day of Jesus’ birth. 

The winter solstice was traditionally celebrated in late December by pagans, and it is theorized that the early adherents of Christianity wanted to convert pagans, and it seemed easier to do if they drew in one of the pagan holidays.  Even the Christmas tree was co-opted from its origins in early German festivals of mid-winter.

I guess the point may be that it must a good thing to start fresh in the midst of one of the most challenging seasons or we wouldn’t do it.  If we are tough enough to survive winter, then perhaps our goals won’t seem so unreachable.  Regardless, let me wish everyone a happy, peaceful new year with the promise of newness.

First Snow

I remember the magic and wonder associated with the first snow of the season in Chicago.  As a kid, it was a time to build snowmen and make snow angels.  There’s a saying from the bible which, roughly quoted, says, “When I was a child I thought as a child, but when I grew up, I put away childish things.”  My question:  why?  Why not dream big, wish big, live big!

The author of The Last Lecture recommended that we excavate our childhood dreams, and pursue them again with all our heart and soul.  Upon first reading this, I thought, “Yeah, right.”  I had wanted to be a dancer, an actor, a policemen, and a priest (Not necessarily in that order).  In reality, I wanted to be famous in some sort of way.  That impetus has since died away a bit, but I still thirst to leave my mark on the world, showing that, yes indeed, I’ve been here, and my short time here has mattered. 

I’m now a writer who’s been accepted into Northwestern University’s Master of Fine Arts program in creative writing.  My dreams have morphed, but are still there.  I define myself as a writer in a Tony Robbins way of imagining your way into what you will become.  The power of positive thinking, or something like that.  It also helps to live in a small town, almost a village, where everybody knows your name, wishes the best for you, and keeps cheering you on.  It’s an adage that it takes a village to raise a child, and though I’m no longer a child, I find inspiration in everyone around me telling me that wanting to be a writer is a good goal to pursue, and not some silly whim.  One drawback, however, is that as people encourage you, they often volunteer to read your writing which, according to Stephen King, is a bad idea.  I worry about tailoring my writing to what I suspect other people want rather than pursuing the story itself and letting it lead the way.  At the very least, I realize I need to keep from showing family my embryonic efforts at putting pen to paper.

One other problem about living in a small town is that there is also prejudice against people who don’t fit in the mold, and, as a gay man, I’m a bit isolated.  The librarians and other people cheering me on are very sophisticated, but not everyone shares their belief system that everyone has a place and purpose under the sun.  I did attend one library board meeting, and one woman stood up to protest the appointment of an interim director, and mentioned that the temporary director is a lesbian, as a way of dismissing and discounting the director.  I sat right behind the lady in the audience in shock.  Others were quick to reassure me that not everyone feels the same way as the woman, and that she had spoken out of turn.  Still, once the words are circulated through the universe, they are impossible to take back.  The same principle applies to what you say to your family and friends.

Our longterm library director was abruptly let go after 20 years of service for no particular reason.  The board said they wanted to go in a different direction, but even though Bev had overseen the library’s transition from very small town to a much more progressive space, that had apparently not counted for much.  She had been named “Citizen of the Year,” but that didn’t help much either.  Remind me not to be nominated as “Citizen of the Year.”  I’d hate to suffer the same fallout, even with a book under my belt.  I hope Bev is still able to find magic in the season, and is able to excavate her childhood dreams to lead her in a new direction.

I guess my point about living out your dreams is that imagination is important and a good guide.  Let’s all look on this season with fresh eyes, and experience everything as new, just like a child playing in the snow, excited for Santa Claus and the whole Christmas season.