Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer · 2 Comments

Natural Consequence

There’s the basics and the extras.

That’s how I’m breaking it down to Jeb these days. Of course, it’s all relative, too.

A few posts ago, I was grappling with the statistics that showed three billion humans living on less than $1000 a year. So by saying that putting Jeb’s dirty plate in the dishwasher is a ‘basic’, is already an ‘extra’ for nearly half the planet.

That said, since I’m giving you a glimpse into our little reality bubble, the extras here are things like riding with his friends at the skatepark. Using his iTouch. Watching a movie on a school night.

And the basics are just the usual. Take care of your body (wash it and brush your teeth), clean up after yourself, do your homework, be respectful.

These fundamentals are supposed to be our guiding compass. Something solid. A foundation from which the bonuses can then blossom.

And this last week, Jeb and I delved into his nine-year old world of add-ons. He stepped up with the basics and reaped the rewards, reveling in the feel-good place of supplements. He got an extra helping of ollies and pop shuvit’s at the skate ramp, and more time with Maroon 5 crooning on his iTouch.

Things were smooth. Our infrastructure secure. All was well in this perfect equilibrium of checks and balances. It was all so streamlined I should have known a seismic shake-up was just around the corner.

Simply put, yesterday was a debacle.

I’ll spare you (and our family’s public profile) the rattling of details on how the basics just weren’t met yesterday. But here’s the gist of me, in all of my lost, self-command of cool.

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“No extras without the basics.”

My words meet air in an exasperated shrill.

I hear myself. I am some strange kingpin who’s invented her own language. If I wasn’t so vexed, I’d be laughing at myself. Words leave my mouth as Mother, but I am alienated from the woman who utters them. Who is this lady? Her hands move in exacting gestures, iterating the importance of her point.

My husband – the Bohemian – sits on the couch watching the scene. Ever-patient, ever-supportive, he agrees with what I’m saying, yet for now, he is quiet.

In this moment, I am far from sexy. In this moment, I am far from the calm, enlightened parent I want to be. In this moment, I am irritation embodied. And right now, I think I hate homework more than Jeb does.

The whole thing is embarrassing. This admission that often I am not the parent I wish to be.

Contemplating the family model of 100 years ago, it seems parents didn’t question themselves. Five-year olds were on the farm, feeding livestock right along side their moms and dads. Home life conditions may have been more harsh – not quite so warm and fuzzy – but the basics seemed to be quite clear. Undisputed.

Today, we are no longer in the 1900’s. We have evolved, right? (right?)

I do my best to live a conscious life, and so that means I make attempts at parenting with awareness, too. I’m trying. But the worst is when I’m in the limbo. Not old-school “stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about,” but not the Cesar-Millan-of-child-rearing with “calm-assertive” energy, either.

No, just the convoluted mix of neither, which finds me in the hell realms, wavering in an amorphous midland of second-guesses steeped in aggravation.

So what’s the point of dragging you into this inferno with me? I don’t think this sharing is just about the vent.

Perhaps it’s the practice of being transparent. Admitting that there are times when, not only am I a conscious parenting failure, but I fall short of my human potential, too.

During yesterday’s disaster, you could glimpse inside the living room to see a family of three, dealing with dirty clothes on the bathroom floor, an overflowing compost bucket, and a misplaced spelling list.

Take a look outside that little room, and you’ll see the extras were coming on in spades.

Just beyond that family’s front door, exotic fruit ripened on the trees, with names like sugar-apple, chiku, and surinam cherry. Mother nature does not hold back. The basics of rain, sun and fertile soil are enough to illicit the sweetest nectar of bumper crops.

Far from the negotiations had about age-appropriate apps to be downloaded on electronic devices, the life cycle of a tree roots in the simple. It’s not complex. No second guessing. All compass points align with True.

Extras, just a natural consequence.

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Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer · 2 Comments

Time to See

Leave it to nature to take care of the big picture. Which, for me, is often zooming in on something small in the natural world. Like a flower.

Yesterday’s post, Among the Seven Billion, was a bit heavy. A reflection of what was weighing in my mind with those hefty statistics on humanity’s health and well-being (or lack, thereof). I don’t think the problem of poverty in the world can be solved with the mind alone. Certainly my worry won’t help.

But in the garden, all is well. The moist, loamy soil lifts to the air, blending with a waft of fresh chlorophyl from the ginger and turmeric stalks. My body is renewed with reminders, grounding me in the here and now.

Looking down, I am gifted with the gem of a treasure. A flower that signals medicine to come.

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Turmeric, or olena (in Hawaiian) was one of the approximately two dozen plants brought to Hawaii by the Polynesian voyagers. With a canoe, a mighty sail ahead, and only the stars to guide them, any item in these ancient navigators’ boats had to be necessary. The healing root of olena was among one of those chosen.

Medicinally, it is anti-bacterial, a blood purifier, and it alleviates inflammation in the body. Its purifying effects are used in spiritual ceremonies, as well, where the crushed root is mixed with sea water in a calabash, and sprinkled by a ti leaf with prayers.

We all can use a little purification, some good medicine.

I’ve kept a quote from Georgia O’Keefe at my desk for years. I think about my reference to her Calla Lilies yesterday. My turmeric flower today.

I may not have any answers right now of how to help the billions in this world that are in need. But I can can take the time to look at what’s before me.

“Nobody sees a flower really; it is so small. We haven’t time, and to see takes time – like to have a friend takes time.” ~ Georgia O’Keefe

Here’s to really seeing…

Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer · 6 Comments

Among the Seven Billion

If you’ve flipped on a light switch in the comfort of your home, and are sitting before a computer screen with the ability to read these words, you are among the lucky. Relative to the majority of humanity, you are in the top-tier of the fortunate.

This morning I’ve got statistics rolling around in my head, mulling over everything.

Facts like these:

Almost half the world – over 3 billion people – live on less than $1000 a year. (Think about this in relation to your own monthly income).

80% of humanity lives on less than $3700 a year.

Of the 2.2 billion children in the world, 1 billion live in poverty.

2.6 billion people on this planet lack basic sanitation.

1.1 billion have inadequate access to water.

As I sit here, connected to the internet, sipping my organic coffee and conjuring words to share on the laptop that costs nearly as much as the annual lifeblood of over half the planet, I feel paralyzed. These numbers dig into me with a post-blissfully-ignorant-reality-bite.

Of course, one response could be gratitude. Count the blessings I’ve (somehow) luckily landed, that gives me more than the basics to live. Though I’ve had what I thought to be lean times – times when I struggled to make the rent or buy food – I’ve always had clean water, shelter, a war-free zone in which to live, and the ability to read and write.

As an artist, creatively expressing myself, I’m left to question what work matters. In light of these statistics, what reflections of my small struggles or triumphs mean a thing, when half of the world’s children are living in squalor?

In this information age, this world accounting is readily available for anyone that cares to learn. But there was a time when the knowledge wasn’t so instantly available. People lived and reflected upon the world within their physical view. Artists drew upon the influences of their immediate surroundings.

In the time of Georgia O’Keefe, did she question whether to bother painting bones and blooms, when so many on the planet were starving? And if the knowledge would have second-guessed her to the point of stopping, then the world would not have had Calla Lilies on Red.

I’m far from the artistry of O’Keefe. Not even close to that beauty that I am so glad was shared. No, I’m just a privileged American woman who takes the extravagances of her life for granted. A human consuming more than my fair share. An artist that wants to express herself in a way that serves the betterment of all, but is not sure how.

I’m a person, who, this morning, just can’t do more than try to fathom the number one billion. Try to perceive myself among the seven. Someone with the luxury to berate my blessings while wondering what to do.

courtesy of www.postersofsantafe.com
courtesy of http://www.postersofsantafe.com