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So much of life is like an awkward blind date. When we meet people for the first time, we know nothing of their story. Generally, we want to make a good impression, but we don’t know their tastes or the scars that conceal their tender places. All we have for a point of reference is our own past, and yet, like it or not, we share the history of a country, a culture, and a world that was set spinning long before we were born. Even our smallest encounters carry the weight of that history. During the COVID pandemic, I drove across town to pay my rent. It was an early morning in June. The city was showered with sunlight and gentle breezes. Lavender and geraniums were abloom in landscaped yards and sidewalk planters, but it was not long into my journey before I noticed the boarded-up store fronts and the city work crews cleaning up debris from Black Lives Matter protests. When I arrived at the real estate office I noticed a worn ladder propped up against the side of the building. It was blocking the path to the drop box. I stopped on the sidewalk and looked up. A slender, graying man looked down: a black man in a vulnerable position looking down on a white woman. Instinctively, we both felt the weight of America’s history of race. I looked back down to study the space around the ladder. Could I safely squeeze past? I looked up. “I just want to drop my rent payment into the box.” He looked back, “Okay, then,” even as he kept his eyes on me. For a moment we were both afraid. His fear was that I would kick down the ladder and leave him stranded on a hot roof. My fear was that I was causing him discomfort and that he would see me as someone dangerous—not a person I wanted to be. Each of us was just trying to do a normal activity: he was trying to earn a living; I was trying to pay my rent on time. I wanted to say, “You don’t need to fear me.” I wanted to offer to stay there and keep watch over the ladder so that he could work without the distraction of ensuring the ladder’s safety, but our words of reassurance can be shallow to people shaped by a different history, people who have lived their entire lives prepared for the worst in people. And would that offer have embarrassed him? Reminded him of the very things he most feared? It seemed like an awkward, no-win situation. The encounter affected me, and I worried about the man for the rest of the day. Driving home, I was reminded of another situation many years earlier. I was a graduate student in Pittsburgh working part-time in a treatment program for adolescents. The teens came to our program every weekday after school and spent the afternoons and evenings attending groups, sharing meals, and participating in therapeutic activities. Many of the youth were from inner-city neighborhoods. Part of my job was to drive each of them home at night. One night I headed out into the dark in an old station wagon filled with teenagers. With the last two remaining passengers, I proceeded to the housing project where the young man lived. As I started to slow down in front of his unit, a warning light began to glow on the car’s dashboard. I could see from the rearview mirror that the young man had seen the light too. He became alarmed and said to me, “DO NOT get out of the car! They don’t like white people here. I will get my dad.” I and my last passenger waited in the car as instructed. The young man’s father came and lifted the car’s hood. He peered inside with a flashlight. Slamming the lid, he said, “I think you will be all right.” Thankfully, all went well, and I dropped off the last teen and returned to the treatment center and parked the company car. All of these years later, I still wonder about that young man and the dissonance he had to live with daily growing up in an environment of hurt turned to hate. He was a young black man, and I was a young white woman. Clearly, he was filled with concern for my safety on that dark night even as he understood the anger and hatred that existed in his neighborhood. I wondered, how do people go about developing normal relationships when we grow up with such different and frightening messages about groups of other people? How do we keep hurt from becoming hate from becoming revenge? I hope that sweet young man found a way to navigate his circumstances without being destroyed by them. I have not suffered the insults or the fears that either of these black men in our culture has endured, but I am a woman in this culture. I have my own set of fears and my own flames of outrage. In that, we have much in common amidst much that is different. We each have known the pain of being vulnerable and the dangers of trying to defend ourselves. We know that standing up for ourselves often means more labels and being dismissed as an “angry ____.” You can fill in the blank with the stereotypes. Going into the workforce right out of high school in 1974, I experienced the blatant sexual discrimination and harassment that was common then. I went to work for a large, well-respected law firm. All men. It was common for them to make inappropriate sexual remarks or jokes that made the women who worked there uncomfortable, or to try to touch or kiss…When the first female law clerks were hired, they were told openly, “If you plan to have children, don’t even think about working here.” It was a point of pride that no woman had ever sat in the boardroom. To complain likely would have meant the end of employment for women during that time. We endured, and we had each other. And, eventually, things did change. The women law clerks hung in there. Years later, some became partners and had children too. I worked at the law firm to finance my way through college. After graduation, I went onto graduate school where I saw that white men benefitted from diversity and inclusion efforts too. Social work is and has been a predominantly “female” occupation. To attract more men to the program and to the profession, my graduate program offered many generous full scholarships to men while I and the women I knew did not receive the same substantial financial assistance. We befriended our male colleagues and lived with it. We understood that white males were not generally attracted to the jobs held by women and other minorities because the reality is those jobs just didn’t pay as well as the jobs more typically dominated by white men—at least back then. And back then, men may not have had the same freedom to pursue careers in fields dominated by women because of the social scorn they might have received. After graduate school, I went to work in a community mental health center. While I was working there a professional position opened at a prestigious university’s Child Study Center. I was very interested in the job, the university, and that part of the country, and so I applied. I received a phone call from a woman at the university inviting me for an interview. She ended the invitation by saying, “We are looking to hire a minority candidate; so if you are not a minority candidate, I wouldn’t invest the money in travel.” I did not schedule an interview. Though a woman, I was no longer a minority candidate in the professional community…much had changed since I left high school. Even now, all of these years later, with so much anger about race and diversity, I cannot be angry about the lost interview opportunity. I felt it was someone else’s turn to have a chance. I accepted that this was the road that led to change. I always assumed the person hired would be both a minority candidate and a competent individual. It would be lovely to think that after all of these years, it would be unnecessary to have quotas or to make such direct efforts to hire a more diverse work force, and yet…And maybe so much of the current anger about DEI efforts has to do with the opportunities technology has taken away from humans not what DEI has done. We are fighting over the scraps of the remaining good jobs, and we blame each other… In this time of rancor about DEI programs and efforts to further social equality, people quickly jump to conclusions, and so we can fear speaking at all because we might be accused of being some “ist” or “ism.” The only way to win this war of confusion is to go out on a limb and assume that most people are well-meaning even if naïve—good at heart but with different experiences. Every person has a point of view and their own scrapes with culture and history. No one wants to be belittled. All sides want to be heard and understood. We can choose interpretations that fuel anger and hostility widening the divides in our country, or we can choose interpretations that educate and lead to insight and understanding. We need to keep talking with compassion until we find the eloquence to express what is true. Like blind dates, we can expect that the first encounters will be awkward, but good and lasting relationships can be built between hopeful strangers with good intentions.
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 In one diabolical final attempt, Hitler reached back from his grave to get them. They were aging Holocaust survivors in their eighth and ninth decades of life. Some were patients in nursing homes, frail and in need of both personal and medical care, each traumatized anew by being made so vulnerable to someone else’s hands. Some were experiencing dementia with new memories vanishing as soon as they appeared and terrible old experiences becoming their lived reality once again. A noisy truck outside on the street would send them cowering beneath tables or hiding in closets. They hid food and refused showers. Others who were still of sound mind began experiencing the normal life-review process of old age. Some found they could not sleep at night. In the haze just before sleep the memories became vivid and real again. The heartache choked their breath. The events played over and over again in their minds like an old LP on repeat. They couldn’t seem to move the needle. Shame and regrets overwhelmed any hope of sleep. One man told me how he feared facing his departed family members should there be an afterlife. He feared living this way but he feared dying too. For him, there would be no relief in this life or in the next. Despite the fact that he had been just a school boy himself and went on to live through terrible torment, this beautiful man was guilt-ridden for having survived when his mother and sister were the first of his family to go to the gas chambers. “What will I tell them about why I survived and they didn’t,” he asked me. He relived the morning line-ups in the camps and those too-frequent moments when open wagons drove past, wagons overflowing with the lifeless bodies of loved ones fresh from the gas chambers, limp arms and legs flapping against the wagon’s wooden sides. “We were an emotional people, but we were so traumatized, so empty, we could not even cry.” He wept in grief and in shame and relived the memories of the suicides after the war was over, the additional losses of extended family members who could not live with what they had seen, could not live with the grief, the fear, the anguish, could not live with their survivor’s guilt. Over the months that I helped to care for these remarkable and suffering people I asked one man, “Why wasn’t their more resistance when there were still six million more of you?” “We thought that if we were good, kept our heads down, did what we were told, didn’t make any trouble, it would be okay.” Until it wasn’t. Until it was too late. The entire world is on edge right now. Authoritarianism is on the ballot all over the free world. Coups are taking place in countries where democracy is fragile or non-existent. There is a growing lawlessness and sense of chaos bordering on anarchy even in our own country. Just this week, a political candidate, a convicted felon, called for a military tribunal to publicly try a former Congressional colleague. One of his chief henchmen was ushered off to prison promising the reporters that he would see them all in The Gulag upon his release from prison. For the past week, I have felt like I’ve been beaten, on edge, ready to weep. I have asked myself over and over: How? How can this be happening when I know so many good people? During his 1867 inaugural address at the University of St. Andrews, John Stuart Mill said: “Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends than that good men should look on and do nothing. He is not a good man who, without a protest, allows wrong to be committed in his name, and with the means which he helps to supply, because he will not trouble himself to use his mind on the subject.” It is time to take off our sunglasses and stop looking on the bright side. It is time to hold up a flame in the darkness and tell ourselves the truth. This will not get better on its own if good people do nothing. We are the six million still standing. We must do something. We live in a time and in a country where degrading and humiliating our fellow citizens and institutions, our neighbors and allies, other suffering citizens around the world is all that is on the mind of many in power. That is not leadership. That is psychopathy. And too many of us are becoming willing accomplices sacrificing own humanity for the personal gain of cultish leaders, authoritarians, and fanatics. In my mind I can hear Patrick Henry convincing the Second Virginia Convention to deliver troops to Virginia in the American Revolution. “Give me liberty or give me death,” he said. Maybe our new cry should be “Give me dignity or give me death.” Supply the dignity, and liberty will be assured for all people. I beg you today to re-commit to dignity for all people whether or not you like them or agree with them. I beg you today to re-commit to law and order even if it is as small an act as obeying the speed limit. I beg you to take care of what you have. Do not be careless or mindless with your resources, the resource of others, or the resources of the earth. Set about each day with the intention of doing right even if it costs you something. Lawsuits and insurance don’t resolve anything. They make companies and institutions more careless when insurance companies can settle claims for large sums. In this system of no accountability and no consequence, doing wrong becomes lucrative. Let the media know we don’t need or want our eyes filled with horrible sensational stories that do not need to be shared, stories that make human beings look like feral animals and turn us into voyeurs. Ask your local officials to take action against landlords and property owners who allow buildings to fall to ruin and leave people homeless and defeated with their possessions destroyed. Pick up the litter when you see it. It doesn’t matter if you were not the one to drop it. We all have to live here. Be an example to others of what can be, what should be. It all matters. Freedom of speech, freedom of living is not saying or doing whatever I want. It is about living in community and supporting the common good so that the system works for all of us. If you think freedom is tearing through a STOP sign because you want to, just wait until you are laying in an ICU permanently disabled. Technology will easily strip us of the higher powers of our minds: insight, empathy, and self-control. Don’t be so willing to give it away. PUT DOWN YOUR PHONE. Hold an actual conversation that takes time, patience, listening skills, and empathy. Right makes might. Do what is right. Ask that others do it too. It has become a comedic joke that nothing works. Well, why doesn’t it work? From politics to health care, we expect broken and expensive systems. We no longer expect things to work. We shrug our shoulders and say, "Oh, well." EXPECT MORE. If you want to make America Great Again, stop demeaning it, stop humiliating your fellow citizens. Do things with care and grace. Make America good again and the greatness will come. Presently, it feels like we are in a shit-show with no intermission. The bad guys are taking encore after encore expecting our applause. Why are we still watching? TURN IT OFF. The answers lay in the space between helplessness and outrage. One of our presidential candidates is hocking Bibles. Perhaps he should open the cover. I have learned that the Old Testament of the Bible is about the law. The New Testament is about grace. Law and grace. We need them both. Let us encourage one another and build up one another through law and grace. Write to me and share your efforts and the efforts of others to make America good again. Let us fill our eyes and ears with hope that invigorates. Don’t let us be another aging generation that lives to cower under tables and inside closets filled with shame, and pain, and regret.  A nurse met me at my office door: “Can you keep Stella company? Her mother and brother are in with the doctor.” “Of course!” How could I say no to a child? The petite preschooler let go of the nurse’s hand and approached the office chair across from my desk. The chair must have looked like a mountain, but without hesitation or request for assistance, Stella succeeded in the climb. Once in the seat, she turned to face me. Bracing her hands against the arms of the chair and mustering all of her strength, Stella extended herself into a full body stretch. With her feet planted against the seat and her back arched, it seemed she might make herself large enough to fill the giant chair. Despite all of that effort, the heels of her black patent leather shoes did not reach the edge of the seat. Stella centered herself on the roomy cushion, smoothed her skirt, and gracefully crossed her legs at the ankles. Narrow bands of lace adorned the cuffs of her tiny white socks. Stella placed her hands in her lap and looked straight into my eyes. “Why have you come to the clinic today, Stella?” “It’s my brother. He’s resturbed.” Stella spoke earnestly, like a concerned colleague providing a case review. I felt a sting in my chest. This precocious child should have been at home watching Sesame Street and memorizing the words to nursery rhymes. Instead, she was hanging out in a mental health clinic and learning the jargon of psychiatry, the words necessary to explain the odd thinking and behavior of a six year old brother with schizophrenia. The condition ran in her family; Stella’s mother was “resturbed,” too. Thoughtful in her every move, Stella seemed intent on distancing herself from the condition that held her brother and mother captive. Stella and I shared a few moments on a busy morning long ago. Now, I am the one trying to cope with the fear and chronic fatigue that comes from living in a world gone mad. Symptoms of severe mental illness have spread faster than the coronavirus: poor reality testing, delusions, chaos, confusion, suspiciousness, prolonged anger and hostility, lack of insight, poor judgment, increased violence, rigid thinking, poor impulse control, hypersexual speech and behavior, excessive anxiety, peculiar beliefs, inability to form or sustain close relationships, self-importance and attention-seeking, inability to consider the needs of others…Many days it is a struggle to hope, to believe that the world is not irretrievably broken. That is when I think of her. How did Stella do it? Despite her growing awareness of the mental illness that surrounded her, that tiny, precious child was still so innocent, so whole. She was graceful and well-mannered, intelligent and articulate. She waited patiently for the experts to do their work, and she followed their advice. Somehow, she remained capable of trust. Stella gave maximum effort to taking the seat assigned to her. It didn’t matter that the seat was too big; she sat up straight and tall and held on to her dignity. Though it took effort, Stella stretched and planted herself firmly in the middle of the space afforded to her. Character added to her beauty; she was the delicate lace around the rough edges of life. Stella was brave enough to hear the truth and to tell it to others. She was cautious but open. Stella could separate herself from the odd behaviors of her people and love them anyway. She was willing to make the effort to be extra good, to help balance the cargo so that her capsizing family ship did not go under. And somehow in the chaos, she found what she needed to grow and develop. Like Stella, many us are feeling weary and outnumbered. We are trying to be extra good to balance the load, to find what we need to sustain ourselves, but the problems seem so big and so numerous. Leadership is, at best, disappointing, at worst, terrifying. Each day brings something new and disturbing. I have been disturbed so many times that maybe that defines me as “resturbed,” too. I long for peace, the restoration of dignity, the practice of common courtesy. I want the world to work again. I don’t think we can count on politicians to get us out of this crisis. I do think it will take another epidemic, an epidemic of decency--simple, persistent, contagious goodness. Perhaps a child should lead us. Are you out there, Stella?  our It has been a stressful week. Our citizen-selves seemed fully engaged. With all eyes on the presidential election results, it was difficult to get any shut-eye. We all rejoice when we our team wins, but every American can relate to the agony of defeat. Each of us has a history of disappointments, losses, and experiences that wound and hurt. For all of us, it begins in childhood, and we navigate those waters throughout our lives. No matter our age or accomplishments, a loss can makes us feel like that scolded child who could never do anything right in the eyes of his father, or like the rejected school girl who never got picked for the teams, or, perhaps, like the humiliated teen who wets his pants as he runs from a snarling dog while his friends stand on the sidewalk and laugh. We each have our defining stories. I can’t say we always get over them, but most of us get through them. Some keep reliving those experiences to feed their anger, hatred, and retaliation. Others become paralyzed with self-doubt, anxiety, and withdrawal. For most of us, the hurts eventually lead to insight, empathy, and resilience. Thankfully, most of us lick our wounds in private. Our losses are not on public display for the entire world to see and exploit for entertainment value. I have heard President Trump poke fun at empathy, and yet, I imagine he could use some today. The agony of defeat can cloud our thinking, but losing the game does not make us losers. Sometimes we have to put on our magnanimous hats to restore normalcy and reach for greatness. Each of us would like to be remembered not for those silly moments when we were real characters, but for the important moments when we revealed our real characters. Most of us survive our falls by getting up before the bus runs over us. Even with our legs broken, we eventually find a way to put our best foot forward and keep walking. As Dr. Claire Weekes once counseled an anxious client who was afraid to cross the street, “Even rubber legs will get you there.” That has been my mantra in the thirty years since I first read those words. I have tried many things in my life. None of them made me rich or famous. By objective assessments, many of them were failures. But all of them made me friends. That is the currency with which I measure my success, and friendship is the ointment that has healed all of my wounds. If you are suffering some agony, Dr. Weekes would say, “It is never too late to give yourself another chance.” * * * * Some other tips for coping with anxiety from Dr. Claire Weeks in Hope and Help for Your Nerves (1990):
 It’s a good thing poor old Mr. Whipple isn’t here to see this. That man ran a dignified, orderly, well-stocked, and well-patrolled toilet paper aisle. Even before Mr. Whipple, toilet paper had an interesting history. In the process of evolution and elimination, our ancestors used whatever was available. The earliest humans turned to nature utilizing rocks and sticks and leaves. Later corncobs and wood shavings came in handy. Much later, people began to use paper, and the hefty Sears catalog was prized for more than the merchandise pictured on its pages. Eventually, a separate paper emerged for toileting purposes. By 1928, a soft, attractively-packaged toilet paper on rolls came to market helping the parent company survive the Great Depression. Apparently, toilet paper has a history of significance in national emergencies. Oh, the things we cling to in desperate times! In the past few weeks, I’ve heard many puzzled people asking, “What’s with the toilet paper?” With it rapidly disappearing from store shelves, even the well-stocked have become suggestible to fear and doubt wondering if they have enough. We’re Americans, people of action—and of shopping. If we can buy something to solve a problem, well, that’s downright patriotic! Stocking up on toilet paper helps to relieve our feelings of helplessness. It is something we CAN do. We feel prepared and in control of something. But seeing this common item disappear from the shelves has also added to uncertainty and fear. No one wants to be the only fool without toilet paper! As we face the potential horrors of this pandemic including loss of jobs, loss of money, loss of health, and loss of loved ones, something inside us screams into the dark abyss, “We will not surrender our dignity!” Toilet paper has become the universal symbol and a rallying cry. People are on a roll. Not only are folks buying toilet paper by the truckload, they are engaging in numerous noble deeds as well. Thankfully, we are not hoarding our dignity; we are exercising it and finding that the supply is endless when we share. No one wants to run out of toilet paper. Or dignity. Not in a pandemic. Not ever. So, enjoy the go, but please, don’t squeeze the Charmin supply. |
AuthorLilli-ann Buffin Archives
April 2025
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