Paper Planes

Oh, my. I never seem to have any time anymore.

I haven't really had a day off in two weeks. My part-time (HA!) job gave me another forty hour week and the fall semester just started. I am going full time and then some, trying to knock out the least fun part on my undergraduate work. My big box stories aren't as fun this week- bad attitudes in hot weather and entitled people working out their issues on the underpayed.

John is still looking for work, at home and abroad. He had an interview in Boulder, CO last week and a call from a firm in Dubai today. Gods, if ANYONE will hire him I will dance a bloody jig.

School isn't too bad, actually. Anything that isn't work is starting to feel like vacation. Beyond that, I have good teachers, a few interesting classmates, and good work for my head to do.

Also, I have awesome friends. My best, most trusted friends are more valuable to me now than ever. What little time I have to spend with them now feels intensified, more condensed and rich.
So, since I have very little time and not much to talk about, here's some music I really love right now.

Big Box Blog #2

So, a group of kids came in to my store the other day with a busted skateboard. They were patient, courteous, and so helpless. One of them had broken a truck and they knew we could fix things and sold stuff to fix things, so they wandered in. They didn't have the .08 to buy the part they needed, but somebody bought it for them. A super-sweet guy sat with them for twenty minutes, completing the repair with a rubber mallet and some advice.

Today, I was glad I was at my Big Box job.

Later, the funny part.

I have a co-worker who has an unfortunate deep-South twang to his voice that makes him sound like a bumpkin during the best of times. I laugh a little when he says "Hay-low." So, when he retreated to an office and started bawling, I could not contain my gale of giggles. Imagine, in a slow stretch of afternoon, from somewhere offstage you hear shouting. "GawdDAMNIT! Who the HAIL put SAWLT in mah DRANKEN WAWTER?!?!? AGAYIN?!?!?

Even now, I can't stop laughing. He still doesn't know who's doing it. (It's not me. This started before I did.)

Big Box Blog #1

This isn't my first big box job. The big boxes are where the jobs are; they pay for mine and my husband's tuition and I'm not apologizing for where I work. I'm good at my job and I don't let it eat my soul.

That being said, I see over 1000 people every day. I have conversations with the lovely public and HI-larious things happen. This week's highlights are coming at you.

1. A contractor came in with his 10 year old son. The son had kickass Bay City Roller hair and I told him so. His eyes slid away and he mumbled "mmmmkay" like a proud pre-teen. His father leaned across my desk and leered at me and said, "Now son, when a lady like this gives you a compliment like that, you got to pay attention." The he drops me a wink that portends many decades to come of being a dirty old man and they mercifully leave.

2. Three emo-tastic kids came in and bought a small everyday object. I don't know if you've all noticed, but everyday objects are being styled in increasingly individualistic ways. So, this object was hot pink and studded with rhinestones. I asked if that was all he needed and he tossed his dyed black flatironed hair out of his disaffected face, straightened his "I wasn't even born when the lead singer of this band died" tshirt and said, "You know, a lot of guys like pink. Pink is really versatile, it's like something new and different. Pink is the new black." To which I replied, "No, kiddo. Irony is the new black." Punctured, he left the store.

3. Two gentlemen approached my desk. One was short, fat, bald, and old. The other was rail-thin, exceedingly tall, and young. Young Guy said he was buying. Old Guy said, "You always have to pay, 'cause you're the tallest. I get stuff for free because I'm handsome." I studied them both for a second. Then I said, "Hey, Handsome? Your shirt is unbuttoned." He looked down and feigned buttoning it for a moment, then thought better of it and ripped his shirt open to flash me his hairy old fat man belly. I stared in horror. Young Guy looked down, rolled his eyes and said, "Your taco meat is fucking HOT."

WARNING: For those of you who don't live in Hemet, let me break it down for you. Hemet is a desert retirement community full of older folks with varying degrees of mobility issues. Consequently, we see people using scooters as though they are cars, modifying them to look like motorcycles, and generally pimping them out to monstrous proportions. Now, I would never make fun of a person who needs help getting around. It is only when they become a menace to traffic or decent society that I would say a thing. So, ladies and gentlemen, I give you: Scooter as Towtruck.

4. One of my co-workers and I were talking the other day, when suddenly she became preoccupied with something happening behind me. Her face contorted and she said, seemingly out of nowhere, "What the HELL is that??!?!?" I turned around and saw one of our oldest, fattest, meanest customers yelling at a store manager because we don't carry a product line that has NOTHING to do with what we sell. Confused, I continued to watch. When Mean Old Fat Man was done yelling, he turned his power scooter on and executed a U turn. As soon as he turned around, I could see that tied crudely to the back of the scooter was a wagon. Piled into this wagon, with lumps of ass falling out over the sides was a wreck of humanity I could only assume was his wife. I'm not sure what else would convince a woman to ride around tied to the back of a man's scooter besides legal entanglement and holy matrimony.

Ahh, retail...

Congress shall make no law...

Has anybody heard about the new license plates proposed in a handful of southern states? The custom plate features a large cross and the legend, "I Believe."

What's wrong with this picture?

Apparently, other faiths are free to do the same. Floridians might be allowed to order Star of David plates someday. The trouble is, the plates depicting images associated with any other faith would be restricted from using any words in the place of "I Believe." That right, that privilege, like so many in this great land, is reserved only for Christians. If the display cannot be equal, one faith is favored above the others, simple as that. Florida and South Carolina are working to deprive their citizens of their rights.

The part that really bothers me here is that the government officials in favor of this plate becoming available seem to have followed the sterling example of our current President in that they have never bothered to read the constitution. According to CNN, the feeling is merely this:"I think it allows people of faith to profess that they believe in a higher calling, they believe in God," said Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer. Only what the Right people believe is important. Making second-class citizens out of everyone else, making a doily out of the Constitution is not.

Any opposition to this plate is being labeled discrimination. I don't want to get off on a rant here, but Christians in this country seem to scream OPPRESSION faster than Al Sharpton at a lynching contest. Anyone who dares oppose the God-given right of Christians to homogenize this nation and ram their faith down the throats of anyone who has the misfortune to be behind them in traffic is a BIGOT. Christians are such the victims of prejudice. Give me a break.

Christians are not maligned as terrorists or murderers. Christians are not kept out of jobs or housing by a silent majority that fears their interaction. Christians in the middle east are oppressed. Christians in Asia are oppressed. Here, in the land of the two-month long Christmas creche madness, Christian government officials, Christian police, and the Christian standard imposed on the behavior and life events of everyone, they are not. America's Christians, you are safe. Try to act it out gratefully.

Being deprived of the ability to oppress other people is NOT discrimination. Being stopped tooth and nail by the minority from dragging this nation into hegemony is NOT discrimination.

All Americans have the right to believe or not believe. And to say so. It's high time we stopped acting like there's only one game in town.

Forget. Remember.

I'm back in school.

Three weeks ago, I was overjoyed at this. Possibilities opened wide before me and I fantasized about the homework I would have. Oh, the great things that might occur!

Now, as previously mentioned in my blog, I am grateful. I am so grateful that I live in a country where I am allowed and encouraged to pursue my education. I'm grateful that I can almost sort of afford to go to school. I'm grateful that my husband and family and friends fully support this idea.

I stopped going to school seven years ago. I dropped out of the community college where I was majoring in administration of justice and toying with literature and French. I left the country, came home, and got a job. I started a long stint of wasting my youth and teaching myself things from books and Teh Intertubes. Somehow in that seven years, I forgot a lot of things.

I forgot how tiresome it is to be lectured for six weeks on something I could have picked up in eight hours. I forgot how grating it is to have an instructor who posesses neither feeling nor flair for the subject he teaches. I forgot how I used to lose myself in any bit of minutiae in the classroom in my boredom. (Holes in the ceiling tiles, ripples in the carpet.) I forgot how much I appreciated art on the walls of the the classroom to give me something to think about and still look studious. I forgot how unapologetically, vocally ignorant many of my fellow students were and still are. I forgot that my generation forgot how to read, and subsequent generations are out to make us look like ravenous bibliophiles. I forgot that I have not really learned anything new from any teacher since I was 12.*

So, what's different now? Now I'm too old to screw around. That's the long nd the short of it at this point. I'm not 18. I can't give up and fly to Europe and dismiss the idea of ever having a degree. No matter how dull these next few years prove to be, I have to slog through it. I have to do well and in many cases feign interest in order to do well.I have to bide my time, pay my dues, and play the game.

Funny that; in high school those exact phrases made me screech about the purity of the auto-didact and the corruption and bias of the system.

Now, it fills me with a sense of grim, determined dread. I'm back in school.

Now I remember.



*Rich Herold, my art history teacher in 1999-2000 is the notable exception to this rule. I learned more in his class than I ever picked up on my own. His was my favorite class in all of high school and since.

The Spirit of Elijah

The Elison family reunion this weekend was a great success. Amy and Phil came bringing their charming kidlings along with them. Tiana and Ryan brought baby Quin to meet much of the family for the first time. Cousins flew in from far-off states and people we haven't seen in years came out of the woodwork for the event. We all had a great time.
The theme was "The Apple Doesn't Fall Far from the Tree." Amy designed a large apple tree with branches representing the branches of the family. Individual names were written on the apples and arranged in family groups. It was a very cute idea. All the kids got to run like mad through the stake center and play with each other. I met people John is related to that I hadn't met before, and got to see quite a few that I hadn't seen since my wedding.
I had a couple of long moments of Other. John's family is wonderful to me and always has been. They have gone out of their way to include me and I really love them. However, I just never quite belong. I come from a totally different planet than these lovely people. I was really struggling with feeling out of place the first few days, and Amy and Phil were very helpful with that. When we cut out and labeled the apples, I sat thinking that maybe I shouldn't be an apple. I had this image of a lone pineapple sitting on the branch next to John. Different shape, different color, different part of the world. We put my name on an apple anyway, but I felt foreign just the same.
Amy coordinated the whole reunion this year, passing it off to her cousin Sharon for 2011. Amy spoke with tears in her eyes when she described what it had been like to plan this event. She said that the spirit of Elijah had been in her house for a year. Elijah, the Tishbite. Elijah, the prophet. Malachi 4:6 said that Elijah would "turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers." To Amy, this is what Elijah could do. Elijah, the uniter of families.
As a Pagan, the name Elijah doesn't ring this way for me. When I think of Elijah, I think of 1 Kings 18:40: "And Elijah said unto them, Take the prophets of Baal; let not one of them escape. And they took them: and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and slew them there." Elijah had the priests of Baal and the prophets of Asherah put to death for no other reason than they dared to worship their own gods in their own land. Elijah, the murderer. Elijah, the zealot.
I cannot escape my fundamental differences here. I can only seek common ground and love my in-laws. I can only make sense of history and interfaith one moment at a time and enjoy the complexity of the culture into which I've married.
I drew a tarot card on the day of the reunion dinner. I pulled the Apple Branch, one of the fey gift cards in the deck. A gift. The fruit of the Garden, cut it crosswise and it's the fruit of the Goddess. I watched our nieces and nephews eat apples and reach out to one another. I saw my name hanging on the tree.
It is beautiful to be part of this family. It is more than enough.

Author! AUTHOR!

I was inspired recently by my best friend Di. When she truly loves a book, she will often track down the writer and send them a nice email. I resolved to try it the next time I read something that really moved me.

The occasion came sooner than I thought with Wicca's Charm by Catherine Edwards Sanders. I was moved, but not in the happy-fun way. Below is my hastily typed letter to her webmaster. I don't suppose I need to elaborate on my not reccomending this book...

Ms. Sanders-

I borrowed your book this weekend from the Santa Monica Public Library. I am feeling more and more fortunate that I didn't buy it.

In your book, you point out how displeased you are that Pagans stereotype Christians as ignorant, Bible-thumping, Evangelical southern hicks. You then cleverly combat this stereotype by portraying Pagans as drug-addled, ill-educated teenage slackers. You then follow it up with a "Jesus is panacea!" cautionary wail that falls just a little short of original, but hits somewhere near the borders of the Land of Irony.

Your scholarship is poor. Your interviews are badly planned, chosen, and conducted. Your preconceived notions bleed through the book like the smell of library air. Your Christian sense of charity stays your hand before the edge of outright insult, but just. This book is a pathetic attempt at a grass-roots ethnography and a failure.

It fails to inform anyone of what Pagans are truly like. It fails to impress me, a Pagan, that a Christian writer is capable of anything like fairness on the subject of religions not their own. It failed to teach you anything, it seems.

Thank you for continuing to assassinate the collective character of a minority faith. Thank you for ensuring that I will be asked, again and again if I worship the devil or harm children. Thank you for your bigotry and small-minded lack of insight.

It galvanizes smart Pagans like me to do this work ourselves. We need puppet journalists like yourself to remind us how much ignorance is still out there.

Blessed be,

Meghan Elison
Pagan Meghan
youtube.com/pagantv