I know what Hillary is doing wrong. And before I get knee-deep into this, let me state for the record - I voted for Barack Obama.

There is no denying Hillary is smart, gutsy, driven and experienced. She probably would make a fine commander-in-chief. But she just doesn’t inspire. I don’t swoon with hope when she talks. Half the time, I feel flat out bored when I listen to her.  I agree with the CNN analyst, it’s like eating a bowl of gumbo but something just ain’t right. No punch to it. Bland.

After watching the Texas debates this past week, I know why she doesn’t move me. Only twice in the whole 2008 presidential campaign have I felt even remotely close to liking Hillary. Once, in New Jersey, when she broke her reserve and emoted about how ‘hard it is’ and talked about why she was in public service. Then again, in the Texas debates,  when she spoke more openly about what really moves her to run.

Most democrats know Obama and Clinton have similar ideas. And, we’re reasonable enough to know that after Congress sticks their hands in the pot, those ideas might or might not still retain the uniqueness that keeps Obama and Clinton’s plans from sounding identical. What we really want to know is why they are running for president. And going further than that, we want to know if that motivation will push the candidate to move beyond partisanship and actually work to get stuff done.

Americans are tired of watching their elected officials prance, preen and pose. We’re tired of dealing with the same crap we’ve always dealt with while nothing gets accomplished. We’re tired of reading foreclosure and denial of care letters while we hear about members of the senate trouncing through public bathroom stalls. We just want to know that after November 4th, both sides will come together and work to get the job done.

So, when it comes to Hillary Clinton, we want to know how she is going to be different from the status quo. Those sold on Obama are sold because we are moved when he speaks. We believe things can be different and he will lead the Democrats and Republicans to make change domestically. We believe he has the temperment and people skills necessary to build bridges of diplomacy to our enemies and our friends worldwide. We believe he has enough experience and intelligence to do a good job. Plus – he gives us hope.

But with Hillary? We hear the same bullet-point list of accomplishments and are fearful that maybe she could get the job done, but won’t have the motivation or ability to stop the in-fighting that is now the legislative branch of government.

So Mrs. Clinton, if you are out there spending a Saturday afternoon reading low-level blogs (as if), let me give you a bit of advice from someone who makes a mean gumbo. Spice it up! Add a kick of flavor to your resume-driven speeches and let us know what moves you. Tell us why you care so we can figure out if we should.

Welcome back!

Pacifism. What is it? What does it really, truly mean to be a pacifist? Is it holding a sign declaring opposition to war – to violent acts against other humans? Is it a passive resignation to not participate in the military, to never use a weapon for destruction? Or, is this a narrow definition?
As I sit in front of my keyboard, my heart is heavy. I am stirred. I have learned, for the first time, of a woman – fierce, undeterred, relentless – who is spreading peace and optimism in a country torn by war, raped by terrorists and drained of hope.
Suraya Sadeed is a rebel. Ms. Sadeed, native of Afghanistan, has lived in America for over 20 years, yet she has not forgotten, nor is she blind to, the cause of the Afghan people.

 In the face of the Taliban, she secretly educated girls in Afghanistan. Risking her life, she smuggled money, food and supplies to the poor of her homeland. She posed as a pregnant woman, strapping the valuable contraband to her stomach, hoping to make it past the Taliban guards, hoping to get supplies to the Afghan children. For in Afghanistan, it is not uncommon for children to go blind from lack of proper nutrition. It is not uncommon for them to freeze to death in the cold.

Suraya Sadeed started Help The Afghan Children (HTAC), a non-profit, non-partisan, charitable organization, after witnessing the plight of children throughout the country. As Afghanistan focuses on rebuilding, HTAC’s primary goal is in educating the children, with the mandate of establishing high quality schools throughout the country. HTAC is introducing new pilot-programs into the curriculum, such as peace education, computer literacy, basic health, teacher training and environmental awareness.

With one statement, Ms. Sadeed affected my world. While being interviewed on the Oprah Winfrey Show, she spoke of the effect education is having on young people across Afghanistan.

 “We are taking children who once had guns and are giving them books and pens, ultimately giving them a hope for peace.” (paraphrase mine)

Suddenly, I was no longer seeing Afghan children, but millions of children across America. Children whose lives are torn apart by violence, gang wars, drugs and poverty. Children who think the best they will ever have is Section 8 housing and food stamps. Children who think mommy’s needles in the drawer are ‘normal’ and yet new school clothes and supplies to start the year are a luxury they live without.

My heart aches. I hear of young people – 12, 14, 16 years of age, killing each other and I wonder where these people have been failed. Is it because their home life is in shambles? Or, is it because society often overlooks the poor, believing them to be hopeless and unreachable? At this age, the reasoning part of the brain isn’t even fully developed. They haven’t even finished growing. Their toys should be dolls, trucks, basketballs and CD players, not guns and knives. I believe Ms. Sadeed truly understands where the seeds of peace should be planted – in the hearts and minds of children through quality education.

Is this a criticism of our teachers? No. Many of them do the best they can with what they with what they have. Do I have all the solutions? No. But I am stirred and I do want to make a difference. It’s a shame on our government and our national values that teachers make such low wages. We spend billions on a war to put a dictator out of business in the name of ‘peace’, but we can’t afford to pay teachers an acceptable wage or provide supplies for the classroom so they don’t have to buy their own. We spend billions to pay for no-bid Halliburton contracts to re-build a country that never asked for our help, yet we cut music and art from a child’s education. It’s a shame that in an economy where a college diploma is necessary to get a decent job, many cannot afford to do so. For those who pursue it anyway, comes the hefty student loan that, despite low interest rates, consumes a good chunk of their post-college monthly budget.

So what does pacifism have to do with education?

If we want to build a better future, a better economy and a more peaceful world, we have to focus on our children. They are the hope for our future. When they graduate, they need to know how government works. They will elect our leaders; they will lead us in decisions of ‘to war or not to war’. They will determine our foreign policies and our economic strategies.

We need to insure that not only can they pass standardized, ‘No Child Left Behind’ tests, but that they also have an understanding of geography, culture, sociology and science. We need to insure their ability to communicate effectively and diplomatically. It is they who will be developing our technologies, pioneering our medical breakthroughs, leading our military and creating our modern works of art.

We need to inspire children. We need to show them the limitless possibilities within themselves. They need to know that a scholarship to Harvard, NYU or even the local community college can be a ticket to a better life. We need to show them how an education can open doors to their future. They need to know their brain, not their gender, race or some other category, can be the ticket to a better life. They need to know they have power to do good or to do evil and they need to be instructed with the knowledge and wisdom to make the best choice. It is in planting those seeds that we plant the seeds of freedom and peace, not only our children, but for generations to come.
 

I call the year I turned 30, the year of awakening. Something about turning 30 and becoming pregnant with my third child ‘birthed’ a realization that my entire life up to that point had mostly been lived with the purpose of pleasing others. Every decision I made, every turn in the road I had taken, for the most part, had either been chosen within the framework of what would make others pleased with me or what was the ‘safest’ choice, the one less prone for risks or errors.I realized it wasn’t the way I wanted to live the rest of my life.

In fact, if my teenage self could see how I had behaved after high school she would have been surprised. I was the bohemian, artsy girl in class; the girl who wore bell-bottoms when no one else did and expressed herself with jaded, dark poetry and quite talented sketches, considering I had never taken art at that point. 

But somewhere in the twists and turns of life, I had gotten married, gotten pregnant and gotten married again and realized I had lost myself in the process. I lost myself somewhere in my college years. I never realized my dream of an art degree at NYU. I had not yet written the many books I had planned.

Basically, I had stopped living creatively. I had stopped being true to the spirit of who I was and had started worrying more about how I appeared to others. And like all moms and most wives, I had stopped caring for myself and had focused solely on the existence and care of others.

I had accomplished quite a bit in those years between 18 and 30. I earned my Masters, owned my own business and even taught for a short while at a local college. I volunteered in the projects of Texarkana, hoping to be an inspiration to a child who might otherwise have none.

But along the way, I had stopped being the girl who lived for expression, who became misty-eyed in a museum while looking at a Van Gogh, who wrote poetry and composed music. I had stopped being the ‘full’ me.

Since turning 30, I have attempted to live my life differently. It hasn’t been an overnight 180 degree turnaround. But I have attempted to live life in a fuller, more abundant way. Before the awakening, I was a programmer. I was a good programmer. I also owned a business with my husband where we designed websites and created Internet marketing plans. (More about this experience later.) I even started a grassroots club in the good ol’ Bible Belt of America working to accomplish change in things that I truly cared about, such as health care and education.

But with recent life changes (a major move cross-country to Silicon Valley and the birth of my third child), I realized it was time, risk or no risk, to start living the way  I always dreamed of living – the life of a writer.

Through all the phases of my life, and there have been many, the one consistency has been my desire to write. So, I’m breaking out the pencils and going to work. I hope you find something here that will bring you back and my writing will be worthy of your intentions. 

I’m reposting because of all I’ve written on this blog, it is the closest to my heart. If you read about my ‘repreive’, you will know I’m coming back to post in a different format. In the meantime, read something that means a lot to me.

The Jena Six. For most Americans, it is a news story – apalling, repugnant – but just a news story. For me, it hit a little closer to home. My father’s family is from Jena. My octagenarian grandfather was superintendent of the school district for many years.  My father played with the current Jena High School principal after school when he was a kid. It’s a place I visit periodically for Christmas or Thanksgiving. And as sad as the story makes me, I can’t say I’m surprised.

Actually, my dad grew up in Summerville, a place so small, you could literally pass it if you happened to sneeze when you drove by. Other than the Free Methodist Church, which is close to extinction, and Rooster’s, a gas station that sells incredibly tasty boudain balls, it’s hard to tell you’ve made it to town. And going to the city means driving 20 miles to Jena, which by comparison is almost cosmopolitan. 

I love my family. Flaws and all. I love my great-aunts. Women, who would give the shirt off their back for someone they loved. Literally. But these same women would stun me when visit after visit, they spewed off-hand comments about how Black people were to blame for most societal ills and petty crimes of the neighborhood. It made me uncomfortable and I blamed it on their age – in their 80s, they were living as though the civil war might still be won by the south. When they’d get started, I often left feeling dirty, disgusted and thankful my parents raised me with a different set of values.

Having said all this, I was not surprised at all to hear that one of the biggest stories of the year involving bigotry and racism was in Jena, Louisiana. As an American, it shames me that we haven’t progressed farther in race relations. As a white person, I’m even more ashamed and feel driven to do my best to stand up for freedom, civil rights and equality for everyone. As a mom, the story inspires me to teach my son right from wrong, to show him in action and word that all are created equal, to tell him the struggles of so many who have gone on before us that gave their lives so that their children and their children’s children may drink from the same fountain, ride in the front of the bus and attend the same schools and have the same opportunities.  I want him to know of their courage, bravery and strength and how it has enriched our lives today.

And that is why I’m writing this post, in a blog about women and balance and parenting (previous blog theme). Because balance isn’t always just about what goes on in our own little sphere of the universe. Balance sometimes involves doing our little part to stamp out prejudice and hate. Teaching our children who Martin Luther King, Jr. was. Teaching them about Ghandi. Teaching them about civil disobedience and the struggles of minorities and how their struggles have impacted our world for the better. And hopefully, by teaching them these things and living life respectfully towards others, we will leave a mark that will continue to inspire love, peace and balance in this world. Because, as the human race, we are all connected – we are all one. And when one part of the body hurts, the entire body feels pain with it. The eye is not separate from the nose, neither the finger from the elbow. They cannot exist apart from the body and likewise, we truly cannot exist in the fullness we are meant to, when we are divided by hate, ignorance and prejudice. We cannot feel removed from Jena, removed from the injustice of 6 teenage boys that are facing ridiculous charges for their circumstances. We cannot feel distanced from these 6 teenage boys that faced the shame of not being allowed to hang out near the ‘white tree’ and feel the hatred of lynching nooses displayed in broad daylight.  Why? Because we are human – it is our race – and this is our shame and pain. And it is our action that will make the difference. It is our duty as parents to train our children in the way of peace.

I’ve obviously not posted in a while. I’m taking a break from things that don’t bring me joy. While writing is my passion, I’ve realized the format I started in was entrenched in my mindset I had while self-employed. I was writing for the wrong reasons. Thus, I didn’t enjoy it. I’m taking a break and will be back soon to start writing for me, for my joy, for the passion I find in it.

When I do, the format will be different. I will be writing from my heart. Hopefully, you will like what you find.