I'm Okay with Intimidating

I put my proverbial pants on one pant leg at a time just like everyone else.

But, after the second pant leg slides on, I hit the ground running, and for that, I refuse to apologize.

In the last several years, since my divorce 7 years ago really, I have been on a journey of the self. I can’t say I was completely naïve before that about the world and about life, but I hadn’t really ever taken the time to figure out ME, to figure out who I was, who I wanted to be. My newfound singledom along with events that preceded and followed it were a jumpstart on that lifelong adventure to growth, self appreciation, and purpose.

In those 7 years, I went from someone who thought she knew everything to understanding that I had to look at the world with curiosity and awe like a child to learn even a tenth of its secrets. I learned I had to be humble and modest. I began to see that there was a time to be open and malleable and a time to be firm and unforgiving. It took time, but I learned that I could be an individual and embrace my rebellious spirit without being angry and in-your-face about it. Individuality doesn’t have to sacrifice and forsake community. And when I learned that, I figured out that the people I admired most were those that cared about something bigger than themselves. I admired people who worked for others, who cared about the big picture while embracing the detail and the individual lives affected by a problem, who wanted to make a difference even if it was only in one life or two lives. I wanted to be the kind of person who recognized inequality but worked to rectify it one step at a time.

So, I went from being a girl who had no real informed opinions, who only cared about things in my immediate vicinity, to being a woman who took on and championed for cause after cause.

It wasn’t an easy transition. It’s still not an easy transition to be completely honest. For whatever reason, being the kind of person who cares about more than what’s inside her own personal bubble really rubs a lot of people the wrong way. I have lost a lot of friends because the person I became along the way is “intimidating.” Their word, not mine.

Intimidating.

When I see that someone has been unjustly imprisoned, I don’t just share an article, I write that person and say, “how can I help?” And then I do it. When I know that someone is going to be executed, I sign

petitions, I email senators and representatives, and I pass along information. I vote. I give money or items to kids in need when I can. I message people and tell them exactly what their stories have meant to me. I rescue animals that need homes and give them a happy one because I have the space to share even though I am rapidly running out of room. I write people in prison because I know that support can make all the difference in the quality of their lives once they come home and share information about social issues and politics and help them grow as much as they help me… I share articles with them, books, photos, stories. We laugh and cry together. Learn together. I reach out to people that society otherwise deems unworthy of human contact and make them feel human again.

So, yes, I am the kind of person who shares article after article on facebook about any number of important issues. I rant. I argue (not just debate), and at times I get heated. I do a lot of talking. But for all the talking, I am also doing.

For a long time, I thought maybe I was supposed to hide that part of myself to make other people feel better since it seemed, so often, to alienate friends and piss them off to the point where they turned on me. Along that self-journey I have come to realize it wasn’t ever really me they were angry at but themselves for their own lack of doing, for their lack of passion and caring. The problem wasn’t that I was the pretentious bitch I was made out to be. Sometimes it takes seeing ourselves as a reflection in someone else to realize what we’re lacking. It’s an inevitable process of self-awareness. If we don’t like that reflection, we either resolve to make changes or we shatter the mirror. The people I knew tried to shatter the mirror—me—by tearing me down, but it was our friendships that were the only real casualty of the violence.

Why should I hide myself to make their position in life more comfortable? We both put our proverbial pants on one leg at a time. If they would rather sit on the couch in theirs, it’s not my problem. I’m still going to hit the ground running, and these days I am far more loud about it than ever.

_________________________________________________________________

Sunday Confessions today! The prompt is Pant. Join in if you want and be sure to check out the More Than Cheese and Beer facebook page on Wednesdays for the prompt announcements! 

An InLinkz Link-up

On Writing

I write letters to people in prison.

I do this to offer friendship to people who don’t often have it but also to be a help where I can in legal matters or counseling matters or just a good influence in a life that often has far too few of those. Most of the people I write are in for life, so you can imagine the sorts of things these individuals have been found guilty of doing, but I don’t think a person can wholly be defined by the worst thing he or she has ever done or been accused of doing. I think, instead, that there are lots of factors that often lead up to a split second decision that a person would give their own life to take back, and that we, as a society, can’t just throw those people away. In fact, for many of the people I have come to know over the years, being thrown away was part of the problem to begin with…

It really is a gamble every single time I make the decision to do so. I put myself out there with a person who has often been accused of doing a terrible thing that can never be undone, and even though I do extensive research on the case and the person and try my best not to write someone who committed a crime for the sake of the thrills involved, it is still a huge risk to take. My information—address, age, name—is going into a prison where anyone could get their hands on it if the person I write isn’t careful. And, ultimately, as I have learned over the last 8 years of doing this, all the research in the world doesn’t always indicate what kind of person will appear in the letters I get back.

Whenever you take any gamble especially one that involves human interaction, you have to weigh the potential rewards you may reap against the risks, the potential losses, involved. Are the potential negatives worth the chance to experience the positives? Does the payout, so to speak, make the risk worth taking?

It’s a tough question to answer and one that I have had to continually ask myself. I’d be a liar if I said this was always easy, that I haven’t met some of the most trying individuals I’ve ever come into contact with in my lifetime this way, or that I haven’t been hurt over the years. But, in the end, because of the strength of the friendships I have made both through my letters and by meeting other people who write, it has been more than worth the gamble, worth the risks.

Part of it has to do with being able to reach out and help another person. It’s in my personality to get obsessed in a way with a cause and be an advocate for a group of people (I’m an INFJ). The longer I have done this—writing-- the more I have learned how often people in these situations, in prison, lose everything including friends and a good percentage of their family, and while a good percentage of the population seems to think it’s deserved, I don’t think that works. All the available research, for one, has proven that social support prevents violence within prison and lowers recidivism rates as well. Prison should rehabilitate, but it doesn’t. Not even 1/3 of the people in prison who need counseling and substance abuse treatment actually get it despite evidence showing these services cut recidivism rates in half. In the end, for me, it’s kind of amazing to see what a few letters from a person who has no familial obligations can do to build someone back up and get them on the right track/keep them on the right track. Being a party to that feels pretty fucking good in a way that truly isn’t comparable to anything else Ive done in life. Motherhood gives me the feels for different reasons. Donating, volunteering, or even giving a homeless person some money or help all feels great but it doesn’t compare to really being to reach out and connect with a person in a way that helps them find themselves. Not to mention, I learn as much as I give—about myself, about other people, about how I am perceived and what to look out for when I embark on my future career counseling inmates.

But that’s not the whole of it either. It isn’t some completely altruistic endeavor because I do forge real friendships that keep me afloat when I’m down or stressed. I have friends who make me laugh reading through letters, who let me vent, who—even when they cant give me advice—will do their best to dig through a situation with me and help me see something that I didn’t see myself. I have people in my life that I’ve met through letters that support me in a way that I don’t usually get elsewhere, because it isn’t a friendship based on 140 character snapshots of my life placed on social media updates. It’s authentic in a way that I don’t often get. There are still some (and I stress some) good people beyond prison walls who may have, yes, done an incredibly fucked up thing that can never, ever be reversed, but it doesn’t make them any less human, any less capable of change than anyone else.

At the end of the day, writing has added people to my life over the last 8 years that have brought me immeasurable joy that far surpasses any frustration, negativity, grief, or hurt I have experienced. The gamble has paid out in ways I never could have calculated, and I am far richer for having taken it.

______________________________________________________________________

This might be a bit of a controversial topic, but it's still one that is important to me and close to my heart. And, in the interest of authenticity which I have strived for since day one on this blog, I felt I needed to write about it. Thanks for reading!! check out the other contributions on More Than Cheese and Beer