Vulnerability

My little joke amused me greatly until it backfired. An astonishing number of people actually seemed to believe that I could and would do this in order to get myself to Market. I even got lectures. It stung.

As a single person whose child has recently flown, I enjoyed a year of wonderful, enriching solitude in which I could relax and refine my personal style and choices, and not have to endure the judgment and scrutiny of anyone...though of course that was an illusion, a sweet one.

I felt very powerful in my ability to do for myself: to haul my quarter-ton of goods down to the Market on my bike and trailer, to endure the 12-hour day, to pay my bills and improve my life in so many ways. I expanded my writing and art adventures on my own terms, did less for money and more for passion, stepped up to volunteer for OCF and SM and worked on my house and yard and life in the most satisfying ways.

Then in one misstep I pretty much lost it all. I now have to ask people to drive me everywhere I need to go. For a month I couldn't do my dishes or feed my cat or prepare my food or even get myself bathed and to bed without some kind of assistance and preparation. My door had to be constantly open to both arranged helpers and drop-in visitors, and I had pretty much zero control of my life, and zero privacy. I fought for it, of course, offending people and worrying them and doing a fair amount of reassurance as I gradually reclaimed my power.

I'm nowhere near there. I won't be putting my foot on the ground until June. No driving, no biking, no walking, no independence. I grew so quickly tired of having my laundry done I resumed hanging my raggedy underpants and sheets on the upper cabinet doors to air dry in my over-heated house. I can't hobble out to the lines in the backyard but when the weather gets more reliable you know I will find a way to do that. (I got rid of my electric dryer years ago.) I can do pretty much every domestic task now, figuring out how to sweep and mop and reach the cobwebs and carry things around, thanks to the long-handled grabber lent to me and the scooter I rented. I accepted a lot of help and I am very, very grateful for it.

I won't be planting my garden as usual, but I did such a good job of weeding and fertilizing and mulching this winter that the ornamentals will all be fine and the fallow beds won't suffer. All of the trees got pruned except the few branches of the heritage Gravenstein that I was attempting to finish when I fell. Squirrels will have the fruit this year; nothing I can do about that. When the produce season picks up I will arrange with a farmer or two to trade or deliver some fresh veggies to me so I can at least eat in my usual style, if I can afford it.

I have no financial security, as a self-employed crafter who can barely, with a full-time assistant, manage to still do her craft. I'm a screenprinter: I do it standing up, for hours, and it is strenuous. Try doing that balanced on one foot without the ability to walk the shirts back and forth to the dryer. Try making screens without the full use of your arms and hands since you have to manage crutches. Remember that you can't fall down. I also paint silk scarves, big long ones that need perfect control of the process. I had to just set that aside indefinitely. Making Jell-O art has almost lost its charm as the stuff never did sell well enough to really make a profit, plus the wackiness of it just increases my vulnerability.

I try hard not to complain. I just realized after the reaction to my joke that people really don't understand how things are, and all my positive reassurances that *everything will be fine* don't help. I'm gotten past the painkiller seduction, with the attendant sense of well-being and painless drift, but developed a toothache and have a very uncomfortable cast. I still have to keep my foot elevated and pay for every activity with a few hours of discomfort and annoyance.

I'm one month in; I have two more months of this: April with the start of my beloved Saturday Market, and May with my 62nd birthday and the beginning of Tuesday Market. All that wonderful spring weather, all those wildflowers and birds, all of the burgeoning life that is my favorite season, all of the promise and hope and joy, all are compromised by my situation.

All of which I get to watch from my windows or my short ventures onto the porch or yard. All of which are usually filled with work getting ready for all of the retail, the Fair, the custom work that is usually substantial this time of year. I even scored a 1500 shirt job that I really, really want to do well. I had plans. I still have plans. I just don't have the ability to easily carry them out.

The reaction of people to my joke reminded me that I make things look too easy. My vitality and positive attitude make it look like a simple thing to bike my load to Market, when in reality every time I do it I feel Herculean. Every time I make it through the 12-hour day I feel triumph. I make it seem that I am happy to live my voluntary simplicity and relative poverty, don't care about the inability to purchase things, eat in restaurants, travel, take vacations. I even convince myself. I push myself over into the realm of self-sacrifice, trying to shore up what shores me up, the Market issues, the Tuesday Market difficulties, the OCF political struggles, the continuing child-raising that offspring in their twenties still need. I navigate the aging process with charm, even though the fragility of my 86-year-old mother, 3000 miles from here, terrifies me.

I put on a hell of a good front, and I give myself a lot of credit for that. But the front itself, while it protects and separates me and provides me with an illusion of security and safety, is easily cracked. When I cracked my calcaneus (heel bone) I really crashed through my polished window of well-being. No longer do I have the resources to help others; I can barely think of anyone else's needs, though I do try. I don't see how I will manage the April and May markets, especially Tuesdays. People say they will help, but the level of help I need is way too much for me to ask.

I feel opened up and raw. I usually feel some level of ridiculousness wearing my Jell-O, biking that prodigious load, selling my humor and thoughtfulness to a sometimes dull public who don't even know my vocabulary words. I know some people look at me and shake their heads from the safety of their affluence, their partnerships, their new cars and their affordable health care. They think I am a silly old woman, and some people looked at the photo of me and the cart and just shook their heads in the same way.

They were right in a way: if there was any possibility that I could hook that 500 pound load to that scooter and haul it downtown, I would! I am not afraid of the absurd. But folks, really, think about it. See that bungie, one of the most dangerous tools of the crafter on the move? See those little wheels on that lovely and fortunately built sidewalk? See that glaring white plaster that encases the remains of my glorious independence?

When you look at the big world, at the Trayvon Martin story, at the Occupy efforts, so dedicated and noble, at the difficulties of gaining respect of the organizations I'm in from the powers-that-be, that 40+ year struggle for legitimacy of our alternative culture's finest achievements, my little situation is trivial. I'm having a little tiff with my self-respect.

But I think the lesson here is the notion of how true compassion is formed. All these people wearing hoodies all over, in the courtrooms over their suits, in the streets, everywhere, are a poignant symbol of how we don't see each other deeply. We see the hoodie, and whether or not it is covering the face, keeping the head warm or hiding the criminal. We have a split second to make our judgements, to categorize and dismiss. We don't feel that we have the luxury to really look, to really care, to really help, because all of us are raw and too open and putting up a brave front.

That's the human condition. We like to hide it, with our alcohol and our nights watching cop shows, where justice can prevail in an hour. We keep it to ourselves, our diagnoses of diabetes and cancer, our dying relatives and our shame and our fear. We try to protect ourselves and each other whenever we can, from the intensity of our fragile existence.

There's a very fine line between bravery and foolishness. Heroes often die, diving into a river after a child, jumping into traffic to help an old woman with a walker, or a drunk, cross the street.
Ordinary heroes are everywhere among us, suspending judgements and doing the right thing again and again. They give haircuts for free. They take all of their political books, hard cover, down to the Occupy library for the next generation of activists. They do people's mending at the GA's. They carefully palm Womenspace literature to crying women in parking lots. They go to meetings to achieve consensus to work for the greater good. They think of others whether or not they have the resources. Then they disappear into the crowd.

They do not want approval or recognition. They just want life to be easier, sweeter. They just want to make a little bit of difference, to push things a bit to the positive side, to safety and care, to happiness and love. They want us to be able to laugh when things are rough.

I am no hero, just a sometimes brave/foolish old lady. So many people have stepped up to help me that I have been humbled out of my hermitage even as I am longing to climb back into it. I posed the picture to get a laugh, to embrace the absurdity of my position. I think my secret wish was that about 20 people would message me to offer me rides to the Market, support while there, strong backs and arms to arrange my shelves, hang my hats, to take me home when my two hours of endurance were up, to sell my goods and make my money because I can't do it.

That's the raw truth. Despite my best efforts, I can't resume my life until the cast is off, and my poor deflated right leg builds back up some muscle mass, and my poor traumatized body gets its strength back. All the brave fronting in the world isn't going to change the reality that I will be, at best, uncomfortable for the next long while. My challenge is to live without being buried in the mountain of debt that is coming because I live with the $5000 deductible insurance, the minimal care, the screeching halt of the income of the self-employed with a disability. I am one of dozens in our community, of hundreds, of thousands and probably millions who suffer fear and dread on a daily basis.

All we want is your compassion, your ability to see, to take a long look and not make a quick judgement. Believe me, I am as much a master of judgment and dismissal as anyone. I dismiss the uneducated, the crass, the disadvantaged, the addicted, the foolish, even sometimes the brave. I have very little idea of what people are really going through, even when it is as plain as the pain of their gait, the frown on their forehead, their measured words, their furtive shuffle to hide. I'm just as afraid of them as you are, afraid of their need, their unpredictability, their bad decisions.

Fear and love. I can always make it that simple. Fear less, love more. That's the daily struggle. That's the one challenge, the big lesson. Open your eyes, and open your heart. Just a little, just as much as you can. That's the best way you can help: seeing, and hearing. Look. Listen.

Then go ahead and be foolish and brave. You can always get a good laugh, or a good cry out of it.