Add to the Beauty (what began with Writer's Almanac)

I'm sending you to this link rather than pasting in, in order to avoid violating copyright problems.

http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/

You have to read today's to see the bit about Grace Paley. I found bits of how I feel about myself when I read the description about her work.

A good friend of mine is involved in some important work that might be considered social action. On a day when she was aggravated with the system, she tried to get her mind off of things by reading my blog. During that season the blogs were particularly trite and ordinary-dayish, and my ordinary days are really about nothing more powerful than sweeping and mopping. At the time I recorded some thoughts about church, then wrote about a garage sale. Nothing very monumental, as you can see. I wrote nothing that would change the world or make a huge difference politically or socially.

She hadn't been there for a while, so she caught up on several entries. At some point, she pulled up an email and tapped out a visceral response. She said she knew people were reading my blogs and wished I were writing about things that really mattered: what about children who are dying, people who are hungry, oppression, programs that aren't working and people who are suffering as a result? Shouldn't I consider using my blog for something that can really make a difference?

I felt pretty stupid. My life seemed trite and meaningless. I'm not making much of a difference at all, when you look at it that way, it's true. She was frustrated with some walls she was hitting in her own life's calling. For her to read her friend's entries about broken sugar bowls and puppy house training and garage sales seemed like a ridiculous waste of Internet space. If people are actually reading my blog, then why not write things that matter?

The thing is, I agreed with her. I never have quite figured out what this blog should be. Generally, it's a storehouse of the random ideas and experiences of my life. That's it.

There are so many things that matter--really important things I could be writing about. And yet my life is still--at least for now--mostly about broken sugar bowls and homework monitoring and garage sales and such. After nearly 4 decades, I think I'm still trying to discover what I should be doing. I love my family and am trying to be the best wife and mom I can be. I love to think and read and write. I love to learn and enter into discussions with people about ideas. None of that sounds like a plunge into social action. It sounds more like a plunge into academia, higher education, grad school, which is what I've been pondering. But you can't change the world when you're studying for the GRE, so I don't know.

The Grace Paley portion of today's (December 11, 2005) "Writer's Almanac" quoted her as saying that she was pretty sure she wouldn't be writing "the important serious stuff." She said, "As a grown-up woman, I had no choice. Every day life, kitchen life, children life had been handed to me, my portion... [Now] people will sometimes say, 'Why don't you write more politics?' And I have to explain to them that writing the lives of women is politics."

I don't know if what she says is right or true, but it sure does sound close to my "portion." My everyday life is just what she said: kitchen life, children life. That's what's been handed to me as a grown woman; no, it's what I've chosen.

You'll see in that section that during an illness she had to arrange full-time childcare, and that's when she started writing a short story. Hmmmm....maybe I need to get a little bit sick and find myself some childcare? Maybe then I could write, and maybe I could figure out how to write stuff that matters. Is it enough to write about women? Does that impact the world "politically"? If so, how?

I believe that caring for my family is an important calling. I find it humbling, however, to look at my friend's life. She does so much, makes so many sacrifices, and is really changing the world a few kids at a time through her work as a foster mom. I don't know how a short story could do something as meaningful as that.

Sometimes I think about Oprah. She really tries to make a difference with her millions and her international influence. She still invites movie stars on the show and in her magazine to talk about their projects and relationships and whatever else they have to talk about. She still oohs and ahhs over cute shoes and lipgloss and gives away goodie bags to her audience-fans.

But she also tries to get people to think about AIDS in Africa, genocide in Darfur, poverty in America. I appreciate that. It makes me understand my friend's comment that I should try to do more with whatever influence I have. Oprah could just keep doing her show and hang out in her mansion and have parties and play with her dogs. She doesn't need to to more than that. But she recognizes her power and influence in our society, and she's trying to use it for projects and ideas that she feels are good and will make a difference. She's generous. She's creative in her generosity, and while we may or may not do the same if we were in her shoes, she is at least doing what my friend was challenging me to consider.

When I went to that Sara Groves www.saragroves.com concert two years ago, she paraphrased Bono, from U2. I had read the same interview as she, and Bono said something like, if fame is a commodity, then I'm going to spend it in a way that makes a difference. Of course he's done just that. He's an activist trying among other things to put pressure on the United States and other countries to forgive Third World debt and raise awareness for the AIDS pandemic in Africa. www.data.org Sara used that concept of "spending" her fame--conceding her limited fame compared to Bono's--to promote a child adoption program. I think it was www.compassion.com

Sara's new album is "Add to the Beauty." Regarding the album's theme, Sara wrote (on her website) "The kingdom of God doesn't just come in the rally or worship event. It comes when we speak respectfully to our spouses, and refrain from letting our anger spill over onto our kids or friends, when we have an opportunity to gossip and refrain, when we open up our homes, when we mess up royally, and have the stuff to go apologize, when we refuse to blame everyone else for our own problems. In the everydayness of the kingdom, we are invited to be brilliantly beautiful, all of us moons with no light of our own, invited to shine."

For now, with no big important social action to undertake, I think I'll just throw away the clementine peel that's drying up on the plate next to me, left by a quick snacker. I'll empty the popcorn kernels from the big bowl over there. I need to hang up the snowsuits to dry, put away the bread bag and mop the muddy melted snow puddles from the doorway and kitchen floor. I hope I can add to the beauty literally and figuratively in my everyday life. Grace Paley, Oprah, U2, Sara Groves, and my friend the foster mom are doing it in bigger and more important ways. I may be doing it in everyday ways. No matter how big or small, "add to the beauty" is a simple summary and a working phrase to remind us of our choices.

If you'll excuse me now, I've got to pick up a few things and get out a cleaning rag. My kitchen table is definitely not adding to the beauty.