The Onion- Anxiety-Ridden Man Rightly Ashamed Of Every Single Thing He Does -
This is hysterically funny.
Yes.
Make your password something you want to tell someone and never are able to, so you must type it several times a day and change it slightly every few months. It gets out of your system a tiny bit and something (that can hardly be considered a someone) “reads” it safely. Why use your cat’s name when you can be so much more cathartically productive?
Last year, I did a full time volunteer service program and then began a full time master’s program and tutored twice a week. Still, I feel pathetic when this refund check says, “You gave the government exactly five dollars based on your pitiful income… just take it back.” Especially considering all my ideas about what the government did or did not do with my borrowed five dollars.
Being positive is good for the heart, says my Spanish newspaper with unnatural clip art, but sometimes it is so much easier than other times. When St Vincent sings live while wiggling majestically, that is an easy time. Goodnight, healthy heart.
A few months ago, I wrote a grant connected with the Attorney General’s Office and (since we got it!) one of the events was today, informing the Latino community about resources for victims of violent/sexual crime, particularly children and the undocumented. We also had an alternative medicine specialist test participants’ energy, facilitate healing meditation, and so on. I was the only person there with “balanced energy” throughout my whole body, which led me to believe something was off with those scanning rods, which should have crossed with such a smack they chipped. I’m so exhausted that I get jealous of inpatient clients who are not allowed to do anything but lie there, which is grossly inappropriate. This week, I finally went on a couple dates and was told I was the most independent or tough girl both guys had met. What? I am a failure blob and half my friends are marrying, birthing and doing all the traditional things that I semi-secretly want more than all my current crusades. I don’t read anything without internal citations anymore and I can barely find my own soul some days. It makes me wonder how many other people drown in their own variation of the rat race. I want out. Someone tell me how to get out safely without becoming my neighbor downstairs who spends life smoking potent pot and painting with his cats (whose little lungs are really holding up).
Someone at my church began a tradition of saying “stand in body or in spirit” instead of “stand if you are able”. When I hear it my social work radar heartily approves this language and the recognition that we all “stand” differently in honor of the same forces. The next phrase to conquer is “voice for the voiceless” because all people speak even if they are ignored by the whos and hows of the matter. I’ve probably already rambled about that.
The Mexican consulate’s mobile unit made their quarterly visit to Columbus yesterday, so I was involved in the pleasantly organized bureaucracy ensuring that everyone got their passports, matriculas, etc. In the transition between lowly roles of survey-administer and impromptu interpreter for a local low-bono immigration attorney, I somehow got mistaken for someone much more important. Soon after, I was offered a substantial job with a sponsor organization. It felt good, too good, borderline wonderful. I was taken aback by my own yearning for power and recognition when those forces are so corrupting and so far from my highest values. So what if my supervisor recently turned on me (and robbed me of promised training I have anticipated for months) when I said I would not stay on as an employee because of professional/ethical obligations? Can I not forgive and move on? Do I need to prove to him that others know my true worth? Do I need to complain until everyone is on my side? Did I actually feel justified when my OSU instructor cried over my being so let down? It should be enough to be anonymously faithful to righteousness, yet I find myself craving compensation. It is really interesting how a person can generally think poorly of herself but feel like she deserves to be treated like royalty.
I forget that I believe that it really is worth something to simply look everyone in the eye and acknowledge that they have incredible strengths and expertise that I do not. That is not a passive action, nor is it natural for most of us. Insofar as they embrace me into their community, my clients are my people, as well. Some undocumented survivors/victims of violence are in many ways better allies than my clones are. These women (and occasional men) are not just a “population of interest” and certainly not just “illegals.” Yeah, they broke a law entering the U.S. Did you indirectly contribute to them doing so? I think I did, and I think I need to set about making it right. The people in “the shadows” have at least as much to teach us as many professors, although they might not know the DSM-IV-TR inside out.
Truthfully, it was just a performance. But never JUST a performance.
Today I literally ran the blocks between the courthouse with my clients (who were testifying in hearings today) to the Ohio Statehouse for the NASW (National Association of Social Workers) Advocacy day. Whoa contrast.
8:00am- Here are victim advocates in the Courthouse and prosecutors dedicated to protecting survivor rights. Sometimes they get too busy or tired and then I become miraculously pushy about matters like getting interpreters that actually can interpret or not forcing survivors to speak with perpetrators visibly present. My job is a wonderful privilege.
10:06am (Whoops I run slower then I hoped) Here are mostly undergrad college girls at the Statehouse who are trying to talk to legislators about human trafficking and going off on tangents about how porn makes men want to do “gross sex things” so they suddenly start raping kids. There are ways that porn relates to trafficking, but this is not it. The Safe Harbor Bill in Ohio makes tons of sense, and I hear mostly nonsense.
It is really interesting who feels proud of themselves for having time to “advocate” in isolated, obvious instances versus who “advocates” through daily life engagement, purchases and other choices. I have worked alongside incredible advocates and none of them were worried about putting a picture of themselves on Statehouse steps on a website.
And really, why can’t I just love everyone in whatever way they contribute to the world because life is grand and everyone is at a different point in their journey? They named me Grace, yet this is what I lack in moments such as these.