Life Through Lilies

Starting a couple days ago, I am experimenting with life with Lilies. It is an experiment, yet when I say "experiment" it just doesn't seem like the right word, but perhaps it is what the word ought to mean. Despite the scientific sound of "experiment" and all the connotations that accompany science (objectivity, manipulation, control, unbiased) it is quite the opposite. I am doing a subjective study of a powerful gift to nurture and grow that simultaneously exist somehow with a lack of control. And I am more than biased in the outcome of this study, I have invested much in it, and I am committed.

I suppose mine is an experiment in the way that life itself is an experiment. I would venture to say that all of us lose our curiosity life and forget to see life as a sort of experiment. Yeah, sure, we want answers, but we don't even know life well enough to ask the right questions. The best studies are those that involve a living with and engaging with the topic at hand, and they usually lead to better questions. But, we, unfortunately often get attached to certain outcomes. And therefore are haunted daily by the fear of loss and failure. What if, instead, we were committed to life instead of attached to it? To be committed to life creates a sense in me that life is something that is wise in itself, something we can learn from, and something we act for the sake of because it is worthy of it and good in itself. And I think it also means that you commit to all that life means and stands for (sometimes getting to know life means getting to know death). To be attached, on the other hand, gives me a sense that life is a thing to be possessed, controlled, and that life should act for the sake of "me" because I am all that and a bag of chips by myself.

I love that when I google searched committed, this picture came up. My letter to Life:

So like I said, my Lily Experiment with Life is one in which I am committed to the life of the Lilies, and yet, not attached. Should life leave, I may indeed be sad because I miss it, but I will treat life's decision with respect and find what it is trying to intimately teach me. I may even find that as I am committed to it, it never really leaves. Perhaps Life is kin to Joy - able to exist among its shadow.

I have two different experiments within my study of Life. And I want to tell you about them.

Experiment 1: 

I was having one of those "I miss em" days and I just couldn't take it anymore- I needed some life, something alive I could care for and that needed me at my apartment. I needed something I could be intimate with without the fears that so often new people elicit in me. I needed an Easter Lily. They are my favorite. I went to the store and I asked them if they had any Easter Lilies left. "No, we only carry those for a few weeks in April." said the young lady in an orange vest.

"Why is that?" I asked.

"That's how long they last. Very short."

"Do they only live that long?!" I was shocked.

"Well, no, that's just only how long they bloom." she admitted.

"So you only sell the living things when they look their prettiest?" I questioned.

"Yeah, that's the only time people buy. No one wants plain old green! They just want the beautiful colors! Don't you?" she said and quickly turned around and continued counting a flatbed of 2X4s.

"no... not really. I want an Easter Lily." I mumbled, frustrated that the balm I was hoping for was unavailable.

And then I thought, "how true that is." Don't we often treat other people the same way that Home Depot treats their stock of plants? We only hang out with the interesting and colorful people. We look to that one guy that everyone is crowding around and say, "man, he's who I want to hang with." And we sometimes treat the quiet plain person or the one who lacks one social skill or another with pitty at best, "I hope he finds a friend someday" or "If he'd just change in this way, he'd have more friends."

Additionally, we treat ourselves the same way. We only sell our prettiest parts. We just assume that this is all that will sell, all that people want. Why would they want to see our plain green leaves or our dried up blooms? Who would possibly want us just for who we are? Why would anyone take my wilting leaves or crooked stem home with them? Who would believe us that we are more than we seem? And maybe we have good reason to assume that. But we miss out on the few people who may just want us for who we are. All because we are afraid to sit on the shelf next as customers come, maybe point in dismay, maybe ignore... yeah. That is pretty scary... But I so wanted an Easter Lily. I didn't want the blooms, I wanted the life. Maybe there are people out there who just want You. But when they come to the store, they learn that you're out of stock, because you're not in bloom right now. Maybe someone just needs YOU like I needed an Easter Lily.

So I settled for an Asiatic Lily, an orange one much like the wild ones that grow on the side of the backroads at home- ones I pulled up and planted at Gar's grave. It had lots of buds but none of them were out and all of them still very green. It was the only one without a full bloom. So you bet it was the one I bought.

I was so proud of it, I set it in my lap the whole ride home, the green buds tickling my chin as I drove.

One day later, in the evening, one of the buds was already starting to turn orange and one petal began to unfold. I was elated. Man it grew fast! Then, this morning I woke up and there were two flowers in full bloom, all the petals out. I felt as if it had been deciding whether it was safe enough to come out all night. I liked the idea of it peeking out in the quiet of the night and watching me sleep. And I looked so harmless lying there, so it had finally decided to open its eyes wide and to get a good look at me when I opened mine.

Interesting, Lilies bloom in darkness. 

Experiment 2:

In checking out what needed to be done in the flowerbeds and garden at my grandma's house, she pointed out to me that someone who weeded last had completely trampled one of her Asiatic Lilies- a pink one. It was flattened, just a stick with what looked like seaweed wound around it, only 6 inches long. It reminded me of one of those awful ASPCA commercials where they show the emaciated puppy with those eyes... Sarah McLaughlin sounded in my head "in the arms of an angel, far awaaaaay, from here..."

I scooped it up. "What are you gonna do with it?" Grandma asked.

"I'm gonna see if I can save it." I said. And I took it inside and got the clippers. It was terribly dry, brown, and dead in the middle. So I clipped out the middle. and stuck the root and the stem of the "wick" Lily in a little pot side-by-side and took it home. I had to disentangle it from its own leaves, long since dried up and split. I cut off all the dead leaves.

"I don't know if Lilies can grow like that. I don't know if they have bulbs or seeds...I don't know much about Lilies." warned Grandma.

But this was good news to me. If I knew more about lilies, I would already have deduced which of my pieces of lily would not survive. My beliefs, I am sure, DO have an effect on the life around me. Ever had someone treat you a certain way and suddenly you become it? The "baby" in the family understands this well, at every family gathering, long after they've grown taller than all the other siblings, they're still the "baby" and suddenly they find themselves going right back there. I do not think we understand how our beliefs about each other affect each other. We think we are so isolated, independent, and the same from context to context, but we are just afraid of the idea that we are intricately and necessarily in each others care at all times in some way. Being blind to what "science" says, I can have genuine hope for both the stubby Lily root and rootless and naked Lily stem. Both of them have my vote.

Secondly, despite feeling like my belief may have a more profound effect on life around me (yes, even a Lily), I also became acutely aware of also how little power I hold. I have seen plants grow in the most unlikely places under the most hostile conditions. And I've seen some die there. I've seen opportunist plants that shut down to survive and then leap and bound suddenly when opportunity glances its way. I've seen plants that never take the opportunities given to them, afraid the summer won't last long enough, so they stay in survival mode. I have also seen the same species of plant in the most fertile soil and with the perfect amount of sunlight and rain suddenly wither and crumble. I've also seen very very happy plants in the same conditions. "Science" might tell you that it's all in the genes. But what if it was in the soul? Just because science can't comment on it, doesn't mean it can't be encouragingly true. What if there is some life in a Lily that, under certain constraints, has some level of choice in its own fate? Inside these two pieces of Lily is a will, I believe, to live or to give up.

 

Granted, I don't think that the root and the stem can simply just decide to live. They are most certainly constrained by its biology, or even perhaps by God's will. But somewhere in that mess of constraints, it has some choices about how this all will go down. It may have very limited options, but it has options.

Thirdly, as I consider that this little hurting plant has a will of its own, I start to feel that this experiment is not an experiment of all Lilies, but an experiment of this Lily. It is not an experiment of all life, but this life. I am eager to learn about this Lily's life. I'm highly invested in it's growth, and if it dies, I will be highly invested in that process as well, being with it all the while. This Lily may have many things in common with others, I may even relate to it myself as we share some aspects of our life. I have felt like a naked stick, without roots, shoved into new soil. I too have been constrained and limited. I too have chosen. But in the end, I learn about a particular Lily in a particular context at a particular time. Interestingly, this is all that science is, the study of many different individuals in different contexts and yet we say it tells us something about life as it "should be." The individuals that don't fit the mold are chalked up as "error" or "abnormal." What if they were simply really quite perfect at just being themselves in their particular contexts?

And the study will continue... these are just my observations so far. This is me, publishing my findings.

Love Still Is

           Warning- this post contains difficult material. Stemming from the pains of the Holocaust and my struggles with understanding how it could have happened, and still happens. But it also contains light at the end. Hopefully this post won't throw you into depression. But I hope it throws you. I hope it changes how you see people and what is really right and wrong.

            The hardest part about reading in my holocaust class, besides the pain and joy of "suffering with" AKA "compassion", is when it brings up other things in my life. We talk about the dangers in assuming that the Nazis were genuinely evil people. When we assume that, we assume it can't happen again. And yet it does, all over the world and even in small ways in our own homes. So we see perpetrators in ways that try to normalize them, NOT EXCUSE them. But in ways that we can see similar tendencies in ourselves to avoid responsibility, to go with the flow, to leave authority unquestioned, or to control, blame, or dislike others to combat our own fears.  If we don't see the potential in us, we may be turning a blind eye to the hurt we cause others and not even see it until it is too late, or worse, we may never see it. We also study to see the potential to save, rescue, and stand up. But we aren't there yet in our class. That will be another post.

            Today I read about a policeman who shot only children after his partner shot the mothers. He could not stop the war, but he could shoot the children, was his attitude. He truly felt he was doing the right thing, principally. This is tough stuff, and like a holocaust victim, I'd rather spare you details that I have read and seen and heard. But the point is that he truly felt he was doing a good thing. He had convinced himself that since the mothers were gone, he was saving them from a motherless life. Part of me cannot excuse him in the least and feels he ought to burn in hell and hunger and thirst and never be satisfied. He cannot come back from that, cannot repent. This is because of something powerful that it brought up for me.

It brought up my last experiences with my very best friend in all my life. Garcelle, my service dog, was by my side for 6 years, 24/7, from the moment I got out of bed to the moment I fell asleep, that fuzzy red lab was by my side – even in school, and work, church, and the store…everywhere. She was part of me, spirit and body. We were one being. She got melanoma a year and a half ago and it killed us both. She eventually broke her leg where the tumors were crowding and we knew it would not heal and she couldn’t walk. I took her to the vet. He missed the vein and he had to do it again, only the second time, she struggled. The vet asked me to hold her down while she fought for her life. And then I carried her to her grave. I fell it the hole with her and sobbed. I still question occasionally if I did the right thing. I still question if I killed her or if I saved her. It haunts my dreams at night and even turns my daytime into a nightmare sometimes. I know this is different from Nazi killings, but this chapter played on all my fears, pointing out the similarities. Forgive me for needing to talk about that. That’s what this brought up for me. I still struggle to live with it and maybe I will for the rest of my life. Sometimes, in weak moments, I wonder if I were put on trial like that policeman if I would not deserve to be hanged. Maybe then it would be enough. No, it would not be enough to make up for what I did- a dark voice tells me.

But Hold on, keep reading. I have saving grace.

            I cannot live with that darkness. If there was ever anything I am learning from the Holocaust, it is that where there is the deepest depths of despair, a light ten times brighter will shine through. Here’s where the light is- my heart was only with her and God. I prayed. I begged. I suffered severely to make that decision I did. I sacrificed my desire for her to stay with me whatever the cost for her to not be in pain, and for me to be with her until the end. Even at the end, she was willing to give her life for me. She fought. She was willing to live with severe pain in order to stay with me. And in setting her free from the suffering in my arms, I gave up my life for her. I am no longer that girl I was before. That is love.

And that is what is different between me and that policeman. I did not make up this story of love so that I could feel better about what I was doing. The love was real and deep and I was connected to the death. The Nazi policeman felt he was doing something good for that child whom he shot- but for him, they were separate, individual, beings. He and that child were not connected by anything more than principles of wrong and right (however true they may or may not be). Gar and I were one and we gave each other our lives. Her death was not separate from mine, and we knew from the beginning that our lives were not separate either. We were connected at our very souls. Principle was not the voice that guided us then. Principles still failed the policeman. They might have failed me, too. And maybe that is the real difference between right and wrong... Love was the voice that guided us. Love still is.

Bread Alone

This spring semester I am taking a tough class. Not in work load, but tough for the emotion and the irrationality contained in the topic: Psychology and the Holocaust. I am taking it from my favorite professor, Dr. Jeffrey Reber.

I love Dr. Reber's teaching philosophy. He believes that every class is a community in which all are obligated to the other. Students to students, students to professor, and professor to students. We have special obligations to each other, and as we go through his classes, we inevitably find the deep obligations that we have, as a class, to the world around us. And the fun part is that Dr. Reber believes that an important part of community is food. Communities eat together. In other classes I have taken from him, we have had weekly lunch hours as a class in which we just eat, laugh, and hang out. Once we even left class a little early to walk down to JDogs and eat there together.

However, we all agreed that we don't feel right eating together when our community discusses topics like the Holocaust. It seems quite disrespectful to talk about starvation with your mouth full. So, Dr. Reber decided to do something else involving food to unify us in our obligations to each other and to the world. It has to do with Bread.

Bread has constantly been used to symbolize life and the sustaining of it. Interestingly, it was the Jews who received the Manna from God to sustain them in the wilderness. In the Holocaust, it was the Jews who had bread withheld from them them. In fact, in the camps, that was the common meal each day, a slice of crusted bread and something they called soup - which was more like a broth. People would do whatever they could do to make their bread last longer. Some hid it in the ground, others under pillows at night, still others ate it a crumb at at time, and others stuffed pieces into their cheeks for hours until it disintegrated.

Victor Frankl, a psychologist who survived a concentration camp experience, noted the incredible meaning that bread can have and the effect of starvation on the mind. He told a story of a man who was in his camp with his son. The man knew that his son stashed bread underneath his pillow at night. In the middle of the night, this man stole bread from his own son. He watched as another man gave up his own bread to another man in poor shape - but no poorer than his own.

The potential for good and evil are within all of us. As Dr. Reber says, studying the Holocaust is like looking at yourself and the world through a fun house mirror. Parts of us are exagerated severely. We see what we never imagined we could be in front of us. Don't think you could ever be a Nazi? You don't know that. You've been a perpetrator before, and even scarier, you probably weren't even aware of it. No one is immune to the propensities that are within us for evil. Don't think you could have the courage to be a risister or rescuer? You don't know that. You've stepped up before, and even more impressive, you may not have even noticed the deep goodness of a simple action or comment you made. The minute you don't believe you could be a perpetrator is the minute in which you let your guard down. You may not notice until it is too late.

There was a lady in a camp who survived. She actually married her rescuer, the first US soldier to enter the camp. She moved to Boston with her husband after the war was over. However, although the war was over, life didn't become easier for the Jews and other displaced persons. Many returned to find that their homes had been taken over by others who would not give it back. They still could not go into many places. Anti-semetism was still in full swing. Many families or remaining members, lives shattered, became homeless an starving in the street. This lady, however was safe in Boston, and recovering quite resilliantly from the trauma of life in the camps.

She loved to go to the supermarket as often as she could. When others asked her why, she told them that it was to help her English, as the labels in the grocery stores had pictures with the words for an easy way to learn vocabulary. The truth, she said later, was that she had to go to the grocery store to reassure herself that there was enough food, that there would be more food the next day and the next. One day, she brought in her groceries from the store and grabbed a loaf of bread from her sack, and sat in a chair in her living room. As she ate from her very own loaf of bread, she felt incredibly depressed and in despair. As she looked out the window she thought, "Oh how I dreamed that I would one day sit in the safety of my living room with my very own loaf of bread. But I never dreamed that I'd be eating alone." From that day, she dedicated her life to an orginization that went back to Europe to aid starving and homeless Jews. Never again did she allow herself to eat alone.

It was after this story that Dr. Reber took out a loaf of French bread, tore off a chunk, and passed it around the class. To me that chunk of bread I ate with my classmates was a solemn promise. That bread represents six million Jews. They will not suffer alone, I vow to listen to their stories so they don't have to feel alone. Even in their mass graves or ashes in a burnt down barn, I will hear them. It is a promise to learn the uncomfortable truths of the Holocaust - the potential for humanity to be horrifically cruel and immensely beautiful even in the same concentration camp and often by the same person. There are those out there who are without bread (literally, and symbolically-as discussed earlier).

Man cannot live by bread alone. Read that differently now. What does it mean to truly live? You cannot truly live (in the existential sense) by eating your bread alone.

I vow to never eat my bread alone.