You Are In Integrity

“You are in integrity when the life you live is an authentic expression of who you are.” — Alan Cohen

 

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What Makes Our Kids Distrustful and Angry?

 

“A child miseducated is a child lost.” – John F. Kennedy

So much money is spent on bombs and missiles and so little on education. With so many children in crowded classrooms and old buildings, with ill-trained and ill-paid teachers, it seems easier to destroy life than to nurture and strengthen it. I’ve thought a lot lately about what it was like for me as a child.

“Education” means leading out from … away from ignorance, defenselessness, anxiety and fear. In my childhood, I was educated in an environment which included neglect and abuse.

Childhood especially should be a time of growth and hope. When memories of childhood are tarnished, bitterness and resentment follow, and these in turn can lead to erratic or addictive behavior. I know what it was like to be pushed away, exploited, even seduced and abused. I hated it and it made me distrustful and angry.

Now that I’m on a path of personal growth and allowing more spirituality into my life, I feel the power of “education” as I learn to leave behind the ignorance, fear and pain of my childhood. I have come to feel the joy of nurturing myself and caring deeply for those around me. I want to be concerned with education as a way of overcoming ignorance, mistrust , isolation and fear.

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Christmases Past and Christmas Present

For my entire life I have anticipated the holiday season with joy.  Never have I before felt anything close to a hint of dread when it comes to Christmas.  Every year, my mother would spend literally, weeks, deep cleaning every room of the house, decorating each and every room in the house, trimming the trees; one fettered out completely in Hallmark ornaments, one upstairs trimmed in her prized and ever so delicate hand-blown antique glass ornaments and of course, baking cookies.  My mother would bake countless varieties by the dozens. Especially, her beloved “bird turds” as we called them.

My mother’s children were basically enrolled in a basic training camp for holiday preparation and style just because we lived under the same roof with her.  Each of the four of siblings seemed to have inherited those special genes necessary to pull off a holiday with tradition, whimsy, and flair.  Surely, the world would have to be in its last stage of demise should my mother not carry on her decorating traditions.  That is, until the last Christmas or two that she spent in our world, when she just didn’t have the strength to do it all.  But even still one of her children or in-laws managed to pick up just enough of the slack to make it all seem so seamless.

My last holiday spent “Mom’s way” was in 1994.  That following Thanksgiving, 1995 found me in a Camaro driving to Phoenix, Arizona as that would become my home.  Christmases here in the desert are so much different from what I traditionally experienced in the Midwest.  Sometimes it’s hard to convince yourself that it really is the holiday season; warm sunny weather, lazy lunches eaten outdoors, grilling out on the patio most any night, all trick the mind into an endless Summer.

Dutifully, I would call home on Christmas Day and talk with my Mom mostly, and any of my siblings that happened to be close to the phone.  I carried on my form of guerilla style holiday decorating adapted  to our warm Phoenix climate.  Because both my mother and her mother knew I valued cherished items kept in our family for years, and that I wouldn’t be the type to disrespect the handing down of “heirlooms,” I was given many wonderful decorations, which I still treasure today.  My own decorating style may be influenced by a little Southwest sizzle, but much of my European heritage remains.

The cookies however, never found their way into my traditions, though I must say, my sister put out some very fine efforts of her own!  To this day, those “bird turds” are baked each year by at least one former sister-in-law. What are bird turds?  They are a raspberry meringue with little mini chocolate chips inside.  The recipe is this:

Patricia Schubert’s Raspberry Meringue Kisses aka Bird Turds

3 Egg Whites ¾ Cup Sugar

1/8 tsp Salt 1 tsp Vinegar

3 ½ Tbl Raspberry Gelatin

1 Cup Miniature Chocolate Chips

Beat egg whites with salt until foamy.  Add raspberry gelatin and sugar gradually. Beat until stiff peaks form and sugar is dissolved.  Mix in vinegar; fold in chocolate chips.  Drop from teaspoon onto ungreased cookie sheet covered with parchment paper.  Bake at 250 degrees for 25 minutes.  Turn oven off and allow cookies to bake an additional 20 minutes longer.  Makes 9 dozen. (Originally adapted by Patty Schubert from “The Electric Company Cookbook”)

This cookie recipe has always seemed to be one of those constants in life, when everything around us was changing.  For me, the end of relationships and the beginning of new relationships created different though just as special traditions.  Retro, vintage 1950’s, 1960’s, mid-century design brought me back to my earliest memories of Christmas as a child.  eBay held the same adorable angel decorations my mother had, and today I coveted!  My grandmother had one of those spectacular, head-turning aluminum Christmas trees.  Of course the stand rotated, played Christmas carols, and the tree itself was lit by a rotating color wheel.  Within weeks I had new traditions and new treasures delivered to my door via UPS.

Christmas Eve dinners spent away from the family back home evolved from lasagna to chili and cornbread, to today’s tradition in our home; a variety of cheese and crackers, peel and eat shrimp with cocktail sauce, grilled tenderloin and gourmet style baked potatoes with a green salad.  The later menu is of course the priciest of the presentations made over the years, but one nonetheless carried out.  I am on a fixed income, and there have been several lean years when I thought it impossible to keep up tradition and that surely I would have to lower my expectations.

My past three partners found out early in the relationship that holidays and traditions were so very important to me.  I was delighted to know my most recent partner’s mother, Dorothy enjoyed tradition as well.  She enjoyed learning about and experiencing for herself, the traditions maintained by other families.  For our own traditions, if ever it I had to stretch too far to make the necessary purchases, Dorothy would either join me on shopping day to pick up the tab directly, or sometimes offer the cash needed to make up the shortfall.  She may have turned up her nose that first year to the thought of eating cold, cooked shrimp that weren’t even removed from the shell at the store. “Imagine that the store would think that all that work of cooking and cleaning should be left to the customer!” Dorothy complained.  Eventually, she grew to love and appreciate my traditions as much as I did, no matter how it tasted!

Christmas, 2007 was the last I enjoyed with Dorothy.  She transitioned into her next life on January 23, 2008.  Thinking back to that series of “holiday firsts without Dorothy” still brings about huge waves and channels of emotion for me.  First, the feeling of impossibility; that there was in no way I could sustain myself through a holiday without her.  There are sometimes oceans of tears and my throat can hurt from crying so hard.  Each decoration of hers I bring out to display, imagine was still maybe last touched by her, giving me a quick and close connection I crave.  As I march through my tears and maneuver my way through the days that approach Christmas, I find myself reminiscing in my mind and even laughing out loud over past holidays we shared. Finally, if even for a moment, I begin to feel my holiday space is once again shared with me by loved ones, even if departed.

Space is always opened for others to contribute to my traditions and I find enjoyment in sharing in my celebration if even from a distance.   Today, I had some thoughts in my mind and I found myself allowing me to “free-fall” into a cavern of depression, all the while fantasizing about taking every last holiday decoration I have put up, down. I would vow that, “Christmas will live here, in this house no more!”  But things change so quickly, and again appear brighter.  I decided today to rework this blog post from an earlier version, updating it and then will share it with my new friend, Dorothy’s sister, Betty.

After I finish this post and see that it looks nice on my weblog, I will play more holiday music, send a copy of this post directly to Betty with an email and then begin making dinner.  Perhaps a friend or two will stop by for a visit tonight, or maybe I will just turn off all the lights except for the color wheel beneath the tree and watch my beautiful 1961 aluminum tree dance and glow for hours.

I wish you and yours the safest and most joyous holiday season, and thank you all for the many gifts that have been given and received by me this year: gifts of love, feedback, patience, understanding, a safe space and openness making it OK for me to share my fear and confusions and any other thought in my head I have needed to get out, and our unified goals of bringing more peace and joy to all of our lives.

Love,

Mark Schmitz

 

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Hugging and Holding

 

“I’d never seen men hold each other.  I thought the only thing they were allowed to do was shake hands or fight.”  —Rita Mae Brown

Like many men, I grew up without knowing the warmth of lovingly touching one another.  Some of us had fathers who trapped themselves in a stereotypical male role, afraid to hold us and show their love for us.  We may have learned to be independent, competitive, and even separate.  We often fall into awkwardness and isolation.  As men especially, we become afraid to reach out, hug, and hold someone of our own sex. So many of us, whether male or female, have lost touch with ourselves and with others.  We have been alone far too long.

One result when pursuing personal growth is the awareness and beginning of healthy and proper holding of one another and giving hugs.  At first, we may find it embarrassing and keep our distance.  As we learn to loosen up and reach out, we look forward to the warmth and strength that comes from giving and receiving a friendly, caring hug.  It is good to learn to touch in a fearless and nonsexual way.  I am glad to be in touch with other people through hugging and holding.

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But I’m ANGRY!

“Don’t hold to anger, hurt or pain. They steal your energy and keep you from love.” — Source Unknown

Perhaps we were brought up in a family where anger was unthinkable and never mentioned; voices were never raised. Perhaps everything was bottled up because we were afraid of anger. But we were angry!

It’s hard to be angry appropriately. It needs to be learned, like so many things in our emotional life. If we haven’t learned to direct our anger in proper ways, we may find ourselves flying into sudden, inexplicable and unfocused rages that scare us and people around us. Or else we behave sullenly and irritably for no clear reason. Or, we get mad now for something that happened long ago, maybe even years ago.

As we try to better ourselves through personal growth, we learn how to direct our anger and get angry in a justifiable and right way. It’s good to get rid of our anger for the past, so that we can concentrate on living fully in the present.

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