anarqueso (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} anarqueso) wrote,@ 2006-01-07 12:45:00 |
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Community.
This one is for me, eight months ago, when Formaldehyde had just broken his back and I begrudgingly “asked for help” without ever saying what or how much I really wanted. This is for M*, whose kid is such a pain she won’t let me try to watch him. This is for all of us, including you. We’ve lost loved ones, worked too much or not at all, discovered tumors, moved up four flights of stairs. We’ve grown up to be people we never wanted to, coupled with people who are suspiciously similar to the last person, or worse, to our parents. Our relatives may be intolerable, but we still have to deal with them. We’ve spent a mint on our health, and our health, perhaps has merely bared its teeth at us. We spend hours or days or years telling ourselves horrible stories. We don’t know what to do, now or next, or what we should have done in the first place. We’re raising our own difficult children, or others’, or maybe we blew it and M’s raising our stinky kids instead. We’ve got a host of troubles.
This one is for those of us who deal with it alone, or only let a few of our closest people touch our pain.
Why?
Take me, for example. If you’re in trouble, I’m usually glad to offer my help. I’m flattered if you ask me for something, and I’m often exasperated if I see you not asking when you’re clearly needing. I believe strongly in community. Mutual support. So why the hell would I rather remove my face with a cheese grater than admit that I want someone to clean my kitchen during the month that my life goes to shit? Do I believe that community only goes one way, flowing magnanimously outward from me? Is Formaldehyde the only person who gets to see me when I’m bitter and desperate? Is my need such a rare and precious thing that I have to keep it crushed in my chest?
I think not.
Let’s talk about community. While we’re at it, we might as well talk about pride and independence and isolation.
Who or what is your community? How did you find it? What role do you play? What prevents you from participating? How can we create or improve community, and what impedes us from doing that? What’s your vision?
If you feel that we, the LJ people who are paying attention right now are part of your community, is there anything you’d like to ask for? Do it now; I’m listening. Is there anything you’d like to offer? Now, most of us are far-flung strangers, often poor, or busy, or overly-troubled, and we may or may not be able to give people what they ask for. Is there anything we can collectively do to make that fact less hard? Can we offer references or suggestions? Create a problem-solving LJ community? Just write our comforting words and hopes?
And let’s not assume that community just means sharing burdens. We’ve got a lot to celebrate. Formaldehyde’s back is healed. Someone’s going to college, someone quit a bad job for a better one. You’re in love, getting married. New babies, new homes, new friends, new hopes. How do we share our luck and accomplishments? How far can and should we spread our pride and happiness? How do we do that? Can we afford it? What does that do for others, and what does it do for us?
Yesterday I sat with a bunch of warm, loving, laughing people who'd cared for someone while he died. The line between sorrow, support, and celebration wasn't very clear.
Existential hoohah aside, why is it that we feel so alone? There are jillions of us, packed together, and we’re not all that different when you come right down to it.
What do we have? What do we need? What can we do?
*M, how will he ever learn to burn bridges other than yours if you don’t let him out? For someone with such a non-traditional family, your insistence on doing it all without “outside” help looks suspiciously nuclear!
This one is for me, eight months ago, when Formaldehyde had just broken his back and I begrudgingly “asked for help” without ever saying what or how much I really wanted. This is for M*, whose kid is such a pain she won’t let me try to watch him. This is for all of us, including you. We’ve lost loved ones, worked too much or not at all, discovered tumors, moved up four flights of stairs. We’ve grown up to be people we never wanted to, coupled with people who are suspiciously similar to the last person, or worse, to our parents. Our relatives may be intolerable, but we still have to deal with them. We’ve spent a mint on our health, and our health, perhaps has merely bared its teeth at us. We spend hours or days or years telling ourselves horrible stories. We don’t know what to do, now or next, or what we should have done in the first place. We’re raising our own difficult children, or others’, or maybe we blew it and M’s raising our stinky kids instead. We’ve got a host of troubles.
This one is for those of us who deal with it alone, or only let a few of our closest people touch our pain.
Why?
Take me, for example. If you’re in trouble, I’m usually glad to offer my help. I’m flattered if you ask me for something, and I’m often exasperated if I see you not asking when you’re clearly needing. I believe strongly in community. Mutual support. So why the hell would I rather remove my face with a cheese grater than admit that I want someone to clean my kitchen during the month that my life goes to shit? Do I believe that community only goes one way, flowing magnanimously outward from me? Is Formaldehyde the only person who gets to see me when I’m bitter and desperate? Is my need such a rare and precious thing that I have to keep it crushed in my chest?
I think not.
Let’s talk about community. While we’re at it, we might as well talk about pride and independence and isolation.
Who or what is your community? How did you find it? What role do you play? What prevents you from participating? How can we create or improve community, and what impedes us from doing that? What’s your vision?
If you feel that we, the LJ people who are paying attention right now are part of your community, is there anything you’d like to ask for? Do it now; I’m listening. Is there anything you’d like to offer? Now, most of us are far-flung strangers, often poor, or busy, or overly-troubled, and we may or may not be able to give people what they ask for. Is there anything we can collectively do to make that fact less hard? Can we offer references or suggestions? Create a problem-solving LJ community? Just write our comforting words and hopes?
And let’s not assume that community just means sharing burdens. We’ve got a lot to celebrate. Formaldehyde’s back is healed. Someone’s going to college, someone quit a bad job for a better one. You’re in love, getting married. New babies, new homes, new friends, new hopes. How do we share our luck and accomplishments? How far can and should we spread our pride and happiness? How do we do that? Can we afford it? What does that do for others, and what does it do for us?
Yesterday I sat with a bunch of warm, loving, laughing people who'd cared for someone while he died. The line between sorrow, support, and celebration wasn't very clear.
Existential hoohah aside, why is it that we feel so alone? There are jillions of us, packed together, and we’re not all that different when you come right down to it.
What do we have? What do we need? What can we do?
*M, how will he ever learn to burn bridges other than yours if you don’t let him out? For someone with such a non-traditional family, your insistence on doing it all without “outside” help looks suspiciously nuclear!
