We had months of almost no rain until mid-October. Now, the storms of November are upon us–including lots of rain and tree-bending winds. That’s our prayer–trees bending, not breaking. We’ve moved the vehicle out of the path of falling limbs and started the debate over which end of the house to sleep in tonight. Our closest “neighbors” are a row of Douglas firs 100+ feet tall that are, at the moment, whipping against the night sky like manic dancers in the mosh pit–and we hope their roots are holding firmly on the earth as any one of them could crash across the yard and into the south side of the house. (Assume this did NOT happen–unless I write about it in the next blog posting–or unless this is the last blog posting!)

I have just returned from an annual retreat with a circle of women friends and we naturally started by reviewing where we were last year and where we are now–both in our private and more public lives and thoughts. I dug out the volume of the journal where I serve as scribe to our circles, writing down the statements of how we arrive to each other and our intentions as we depart. Last year we were full of the election elation–this year we are full of questions about how to support the need for deep societal shift–whether it comes from the White House or Congress or from diverse populist movements… We are disturbed to witness the unrelenting polarization around political process, certainly here in the US, and also in so many other places in the world. And we found ourselves asking how to practice effectiveness under these circumstances–and how to influence the parameters of our lives for greater common good.

One thing that continues to intrigue and frustrate us is the question of how to bring people with widely divergent points of view into a dialogues where we have the opportunity to influence each other in positive ways. I am ruminating on this when at 10:15 PM the lights go out. Not a flicker of warning, just an instantaneous plunge into darkness without a single friendly LED glowing anywhere in the house. We brush our teeth by candlelight and head for bed—nothing else to do.  Winds howl in gusts up to 70+ MPH until the early morning hours and when I wake at dawn I know that somewhere out there are crews of line workers trying to put the grid back together.

At the entrance to our neighborhood a large alder tree has fallen across the road and is hanging on the low swoop of power lines. The men say it’s going to be several hours—maybe the day, go home, make a fire. We do.

This is our image of ourselves as Americans—and perhaps this is true in other countries as well—that we are the kind of people who will go out in the storm and do what needs to be done to sustain the community. We believe that ordinary men and women will put everything they have into their work, pull alongside each other for common good. This collective self-image reminds me of the lines in one of my favorite Marge Piercy poems, “To Be of Use,”

“I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.”

That is how I think of the men at the end of the road, straining in the mud and muck to move things forward… and I am guessing out there in the wind and rain they are not fighting over health care policy—just counting on the utility company to cover them if they get hurt. They are not debating the efficacy of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, though they may have sons or daughters in the military. They are not debating the agenda of the Global Climate Summit next month, though they may be comparing the strength of storms and wind now versus their early years on the job. And if religion comes into the conversation, it may be a muttered half-prayer, “Sweet Jesus, don’t let that limb buck up in my face!” as they fell the tree the rest of the way to earth and off the lines. And that’s the point—they are working together, whatever their differences. They have a clearly defined task, role, and responsibility. They have the skills needed to be doing what they are doing, and the appreciation of the rest of us who don’t have those skills.

They are not doing silly things–like only restoring electricity to the households that agree with them politically or religiously–and they probably don’t agree with each other about these things: they are getting the work done and moving onto the next piece of work that requires their skill and effort. I have a cousin who sends me far right-wing and fundamentalist statements and this is the point I try to make with him: that on in the dark and stormy night of these times there are things we must pull together and do whether or not we agree on anything else. And his point back seems to be that if we don’t agree on faith and politics there is nothing else we can work together on. I don’t want this to be true!

As I live through a week of unrelenting stormy weather, I am wondering if we will finally pull together as a human tribe only when the earth is blowing back so hard we cannot ignore any longer ignore our collective and immediate peril. And the irony is, I believe this is already happening–and I am eager to live into this urgency for exactly the kind of energy it has the potential to release in us. I want to join the line crew–to be able to contribute my strength while I still have it to offer and before our planetary ship is sunk beyond repair. And it is the time of year I start to think about all this again–because the story is raging outside my door. No–that’s not a typo, it is the story that is raging as strongly as the wind. My story is rooted as firmly as the neighboring trees in the belief that in spite of all the violence we do to each other, there is an ancient and universal sense of ethics that resides in the human mind. It is this taproot I am counting on to hold us in the thrashing storms, and though limbs of confidence may be torn off by the daily news, by the stupidly and slowness of our response to crises, I continue to base my life actions on the presence of this ethic.

I came across this quote via a writing student coming to December’s The Self as the Source of the Story seminar and it expresses what I believe: “There is the hidden presence of others in us, even those we have known briefly. We contain them for the rest of our lives at every border we cross.” (Michael Ondaatje, Desidero)

I enter the winter and my island time at home after an incredibly busy year savoring that presence of others inside myself– noticing the ways that I am touched and changed by everyone who has crossed my path or walked even a few steps of life journey alongside me. I am trusting that others find me inside of them–and that eventually we will understand the mystery of our containment of each other.

I would welcome your thoughts and stories about how you are reaching out to people of divergence and how you are noticing the presence of divergent people residing in your own mind and heart and daily life. Let’s light that fire of sharing.

Written by candlelight on a far northern night.

Blessings, Christina