Today's news.

It's been a bit of a ride as of late. I've traveled to Sacramento for work, to Santa Cruz for Masao and Kim's wedding, have come home to inches of snow and hints of a very cold winter. Can I just say, I'm not ready for winter? Not only in the emotional, winter is a lot of work, takes diligence and vigilance kind of way, but also in the simply practical, my wood isn't split much less stacked way. I came home from Santa Cruz and the split wood I do have, my only source of heat, was soaked from the rain that came before the snow. This meant, in the dark and cold, I had to move a quarter cord or so of the waterlogged heat source from the drive way, where it needs to be during the fire hazard summer months, to the porch, where it lives during the needs to be out of the elements and away from the snowplow months. So is the life of having to do things even though you might be tired from driving more than 8 hours to get home, some of which is in the dark (the worst time to be driving when the deer are migrating).

Anyway, I've been a little obsessed with noticing the daily tasks involved with this life I lead. From the way I make tea to how I choose what wood will go into the fire and what gets put aside for making kindling (not to mention that which Mavis tries to bring on our walks, into the house, and so on). This attention to detail provides me with much pleasure, but also helps me to calculate and measure how much I do in a day. In the world of "too busy" I enjoy the exercise of noticing. Noticing what I know, what I am afraid of, where I come up short. Most of all, noticing the threads that are my life; how I cook eggs, the special and unique whistle I've created (without thinking about it at all) for each dog in my life, how completely satisfying it is when I take the lint out of the dryer's trap.

And, more than usual, I've been feeling too close to the veil between me and the terror in our world. I'm not sure why, really, but I feel the world and the pain of the people on this planet more than I normally might. It's not that I forget about all the crazy shit humans do to their environment and the beings that live in it, but it has been quite awhile since I've felt it so deeply. Maybe it's being around the increase in crises at work (happens this time of year, when it gets cold and the first snow falls, because those who live in the woods realize they need to get inside and cannot afford to); being witness to such raw, real, excruciating need is daunting and I'm not sure I have the skills to manage it sometimes.

How do we meet human pain? I know it's an age old question, but is there an age old answer? Before I moved to the Sierra, I used to come to the eastside to manage the stress of being a witness. I came here a lot and once I discovered winter camping (and how to build a snow structure for sleeping) it added to the time I could spend in my beloved mountains. I used to crave the expanse and openness, the pure wildness of the wilderness that is here. And now that I live here fully, I still am drawn to the same feeling of Place and I still feel the relief that comes with walking on frozen ground and seeing the aspens exploding in their fall colors. And then there are these times, where I feel a combination of hopeless, helpless and fear.

The recent media attention to gay suicides and hate crimes is what really set me to thinking, to feeling the weary stretch in my well constructed veil. Of course it feels personal. The danger and the reality of life as someone different. These events call on my argument against gay marriage. Not the marriage rights per se, but the co-oping of gay culture and the comments, the complacency that comes with it. "What's the problem, now you have marriage, we're all the same, right?" It reminds me of when Obama was elected and that night the pundits on the news had the audacity to say, "this proves we are past racism in our country." Really?

Since I live in a rural area, I live in a place where the majority of folks didn't get the memo telling them that saying hate filled things about whomever is wrong. More importantly, I live in a place where difference is seen as dangerous. FoxNews is the main news source here and it is taken seriously; it is treated as fact and the fear that it mongers is absorbed without question. I work with the poorest people in the county, the people who would benefit from the dreaded "social programs" they think "others" shouldn't have, the people who get their information from television, who have come to believe that they are not "the other", the people who vote. This FoxNews deal is working. And when we "liberals" rail against it, those who see it as truth become even more entrenched in their beliefs.

Television is the opiate of the people. And, my spell check, which I rely on tremendously, didn't underline FoxNews. Maybe this is the scariest thing of all?

Am I digressing? From toast and eggs to the frightening social narrative?

With clients we are taught not to be "political" in our work. We are taught to let clients have their belief system, and we therapists shall have ours. But what of the ethical dilemmas regarding the poorest folks voting for policies that will make them poorer? Is it therapeutic for me to point this out, or is it me imposing my political agenda? When someone cracks a gay "joke" in a group I'm doing, how do I separate my life, my belief from my work? What if it puts me in danger? Is it still my responsibility? Is the danger a projection?

This I know: there are many questions. There is the grey area, the unknown, the need to be visible. There is danger, there is change, there is the human heart. There are peppers and garlic and fresh greens in my kitchen that were grown in my area because a group of hearty people believe in sustainable agriculture even here in place where the season for such things is teeny. There is poverty, there is hate, and there is lint in my dryer's trap. Today there is some fear to walk with, some leaves to scatter on the frozen ground, some ice in a creek no one has yet discovered. This is what it's like, right, to live? Right?

Answers welcomed.