Saturday, August 25, 2012

A Letter to My Younger Self

I've been doing a lot of reading lately, about people who are different. I've found that there's a lot out there about being on the receiving end of different kinds of prejudice, and I am very grateful for those who do that kind of writing. It has inspired me to answer somehow. Today I reached some important revelations about what I was doing when I was younger and I was so fascinated by the stories of the people who were the targets of such behavior. In response, here I write an open letter to the little girl I was around first or second grade.

To the little girl who wants so badly to be different,

It isn't just your imagination. The prejudice you're sensing is real, and it has real causes in things that are just under the surface of who you are. Your mind really does work differently, and there's a proper name for it. It's called Asperger's Syndrome. In third grade, you will meet a boy who has it and doesn't like you, so you won't have much to do with him, but your class will be taught about what it is in ways that you'll hear but not understand until you look back and remember about him four years later. In fifth grade, there will be a boy who identifies you before anyone else does, and you'll feel a little sorry for him because he claims it as his own identity even though it's obviously a medical diagnosis.

And then, in sixth grade, you'll get the diagnosis for yourself and realize that you know exactly why he did.

You've been bullied all your life, little girl, and it will get better, but it will never go away completely. Your mommy will try to teach you how to deal with it and ignore it, but that isn't what you're looking for. This is:

Your concerns are real. Your worries are real and have good reasons for being there. You aren't just undergoing some twisted rite of passage--you're being attacked because your classmates can tell that you are different and want you to change. And your job, which will be hard but very much worth it, is to hold on to yourself.

You are going to be persecuted, just like you'll find out in fourth grade that Jesus promised--and the other half of that promise will be fulfilled too: the rewards will be great.  Hold on to that promise. It'll help you survive a lot of trauma in fourth grade, and seventh grade, and tenth grade, and twelfth grade, and also in the spaces between the hardest fights. Pray, even when it's hard to find the words. Ask for help, but don't believe anyone who tells you that your senses are lying. The funny high-pitched noise that comes out of the TV is real too, and anyone who can't hear it just doesn't have hearing as sensitive as yours. You are different because you can see things, hear things, and do things that other people can't. You are different because you can't help these things. 

There are other people out there who are different for other things they can't help, like where their families are from or what they look like or how they understand themselves. You're already fascinated by them--good. You're looking to their histories because you want to identify with them--to see your own life mirrored in what they have to face--and because you want to do something to make up for how other people have treated them. Keep listening to their stories and learning from their struggles, because you can learn a lot from them. You'll learn how to treat them with the respect everyone deserves, and you'll learn how to demand the same from the people who are hurting you when your turn comes to tell your own story. The most important thing you'll learn is that people who are supposed to be big and responsible and powerful can be wrong, and that they need to be challenged when they are.

I know you're looking at these stories because you're so desperate to see some kind of truth that will explain what you're seeing in the world. Keep looking. The truth is in there, even though some of these stories aren't about "your" people. Oppression is a real thing, and because you see it you have the responsibility to fight it. Because you are of a few of those groups, you have a story in there yourself. You don't know what you are yet, but when in due time you will find out what identities are in your blood and heart and mind. Value your own identity, and the ones that you can only watch and fight for. Don't forget that for every one you aren't a part of, you will one day know and love someone who is. Don't forget that, as Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." All kinds of bullying are wrong, and if you can you should stand up to the bullies.

There is no forbidden knowledge. Don't worry about what the teachers say--it's okay to sit down and study everything you want to learn about. Learn about science, and when two books disagree ask questions about why. Immerse yourself in history, and you will have lived over a hundred years' worth of questions and culture and growth by the time you are old enough to look out at the present day. No matter what anyone tells you, this is worth learning about. You have the ability to be more than you are expected to be, and that is how you get there.

People will hate you for who you are. People will threaten and insult you for daring to exist. Worse, people who mean you well will try to make you hide yourself and harm yourself because your safety is uncomfortable to people who will hate you no matter what. If you realize taking that advice is hurting you, draw the line. Your safety is important, and your body belongs to you. By the time you reach seventh grade--as you'll calculate in second grade because of books you're reading and liking, that's the first year of junior high school and the year your body will start changing to look more like an adult--you will need to know that how you look to other people is less important than simply being able to navigate life without being hurt. If performing the woman-act interferes with your ability to do everyday things like going to school, the first priority should be to be able to do your everyday things. Mommy will talk a lot about priorities. You will set your own, and it's okay if they don't always agree with hers. Existing is the first priority.

Don't let anyone tell you that being different is bad, or that you aren't different. You are not capable of everything that everyone else can do, because you are capable of things that other people can't even imagine. You will know what you can and can't do before you are old enough for people to believe you. Keep telling the truth as you understand it, no matter what. They will come around. And--as you will understand instinctively--it will pay off.

When your feelings tell you something that doesn't make sense in the world you're told you live in, stop and think about it. You are living in a world that isn't fully real, that has been made for you to have a childhood in. The books you find will give you doors to other worlds--some are real, some are not, and all are worth exploring. You'll learn a lot of things about people from them. But the world you are living in is missing some important information that will come back to hurt you later in life. There is a part of your heart that the people creating that world want to erase from existence. They want you to follow a straight line through life that won't necessarily work out for you, without ever looking at the fact that you are designed to be able to do something else. They've already taught you to be confused by it, even though you're already seeing it. You can--and you do--fall in love with girls, the same way that you have been told it is only possible for girls to love boys. You already have had one girl you loved that way, and although you will never see her again after the first week of second grade, there will be others. They will make you wonder--she has made you wonder--if you are a boy on the inside, but don't worry: it doesn't matter whom you love; you can be a girl anyway. There will be boys, too, but that side of yourself is already accepted and you will never have any shortage of help in growing that way. Some grown-ups, even Mommy and Daddy, have tried to force you to ignore the other side of yourself. They think it is healthy for you to believe that that kind of love does not even exist, because they have been lied to and told that it is wrong to love another girl that way. It is NOT wrong. It is part of who you have been all your life, and it is not any different from how Mommy and Daddy love each other. As you grow up and the false world slowly falls away, you will see that you are not the only person ever to ask these questions; far from it, there are many. We are a minority, and one that is often fought against, but we exist and always have. We make people uncomfortable, by existing as girls who can and do fall in love with other girls--just like we make people uncomfortable by existing as people with Asperger's who look at the world and see things that most people don't notice instead of things that most people do. It's the same thing, really: seeing things and people differently.

 You are different, and you see the world differently. Never be ashamed of that. The greatest commandment in the Bible is to love God, love others, and love yourself; never let anyone take that away from you. Never lose your will to learn, either; you will become a better person if you pay attention to everything. When something doesn't feel right, stop and think about what's going on. Ask questions. If someone tries to shame you and shut you down for asking a question, ask more questions. Learn how to forgive and whom to forgive, and watch people until you understand why they do things. Ask more questions about that. And always tell the truth, even when you're shivering with fear--as I am writing this now. Honesty is worth any cost, any shame, any harm.

As Mommy will tell you many, many times,

Honor. Courage. Commitment.

Our core values, in the Navy. Learn what they really mean, and live them.

With love and great good wishes,
 Iuliana Amata
 Your future self

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Teaching Versus Learning

A few years ago, I wrote a story about the adventures a character of mine had when she was in second grade from the perspective of her teacher. In the middle of a lesson, my character asks the kind of question I always wished I was brave enough to ask in school--pointing out a gap in a lesson, specifically asking why they didn't ask the people who knew the recent historical figure they were studying about the "mysterious things" that had just been glossed over--and the teacher has a moment of resenting the question because she was hoping to avoid getting into the place where her lesson plan was pretty flimsy. The little girl wants to bring the conversation to a higher level, and the teacher is invested in keeping it down to simple things.

That's not necessarily what I would want in a teacher, but it's what I've usually gotten. And I've had some wonderful teachers who did go above and beyond what's on the test, but not many. There haven't been nearly as many as I wish there had been, and that comes out in my writing even when I don't think about it.

College, they promise, isn't like that.

I'm going to start college classes on Monday, and when I do I'll be looking for what was promised: real conversations, real questions, real learning. Finally, classes where I can be engaged. Asking questions, looking for answers deeper than just the obvious, I might be able to succeed.

Because it's when I'm bored that I fail.

Sunday, August 19, 2012

Projecting My Voice

I've been in a succession of church choirs for a long time, since probably fourth grade. And there are certain things that you hear all the time, when you're in a children's choir--most commonly some variant on "I can't hear you!"
The technical term for singing or speaking to be heard by the people listening from the back pews is "projecting your voice," or just "projecting" for short. I've always been good at it. And so, my mom frequently reminded me, the admonishments to "sing louder" and "project more" never meant me.

I wanted to be heard. I love my voice, and it felt good to sing out loudly, but I was always chastised for it, because even though I was so often the only one with the will and the voice to be heard, I wasn't supposed to be so loud. It was worse because there were often microphones, so I would have to quiet my voice further so as not to overpower the amplification systems.

In choir, that kind of point is fair enough, since a choir is meant to be comprised of voices in harmony rather than one loud singer surrounded by a bunch of quiet voices. (That's called a rock band--a valid technique, but not the goal here.) If it had only been in choir, perhaps it wouldn't have left such a mark on my memory. Unfortunately, everywhere else I looked, the same tensions were in effect, repeated over and over again. Don't sing so loud. But I love the way it feels. Don't attract attention. Why not? It's more interesting. Don't sing here! But I sing everywhere else--I communicate better in song. You're supposed to be quiet and obedient. My voice is just loud like that. Children should be seen and not heard. I want to be heard more than seen.

I recognize now, it was all of a piece. I was supposed to grow up to be "normal," or at least easy to ignore. I wasn't supposed to be loud and opinionated, and especially not with unpopular opinions like "I like the body God gave me." (Side note: it's crazy, how much it's discouraged for girls to be happy with how God designs them. Apparently I'm supposed to hate all the little advantages I'm so grateful for, that make simply walking around and existing in my body easier, but why in the world would I?)

 Last year, I acted in a play at a Shakespeare theater--one that didn't have microphones on the stage. And, finally, during rehearsal, the director told me, "Project louder! I want to be able to hear you from the back row."

At first I was shocked and almost offended, but then I realized what she was saying. I was allowed to use the full power of my voice--in fact, I needed to. Be loud. Be yourself. Be heard. Use your gifts, the way they were meant to.

I think everyone needs to hear that, in their own way:

Be who you are, and use what you have, and don't limit your talents because they're too big.

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

A Sketch

It's five in the morning, but I still can't get to sleep. There's a half-dreamed image in my mind, one that I'd draw if I had the skill, but since I'm still working on the basics and this is far beyond that, I'll draw it with words instead.

There are three women in the scene, against a curved wall of dirt marking an enormous pit in the ground. One is deep in shadow and difficult to make out, further down than the other two, her hand reaching up in desperation the clearest thing about her. In the center, a young woman with light brown curls is clinging to the end of a long tree root by one arm, and with the other cannot quite decide whether to reach down to the one in shadow or up to the third woman. That third is blonde and holding a fiery torch in one hand, providing most of the light in the scene, while her other arm is wrapped around the same root higher up. All three are frightened and the one in the middle is deeply conflicted. She wants to save the one down further and yet wants to join the one up higher in safety; it is all but impossible to do both.

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Things That Make Me Less Shy

Normally, I'm very nervous around people. I can't even talk to people in terms of ordering lunch if I don't know how to explain what I want. That said, there are a few things that make it easier...

I can always talk to someone who is walking a dog. Animals have always made me feel safer, and there's something that breaks down barriers about loving another creature.

People's T-shirts also tell me things about them. If I see someone go by with one of the four Hogwarts Houses' crests emblazoned on their chests, or a shirt that says "I <3 <3 Gallifrey," or a "BRONY" shirt like my brother's, or any other sign that they share my nerdly interests, I can compliment their shirt. It's a moment's worth of sharing something of meaning with another person.

Eximus

So it's the last night my family's going to be spending in Hawai'i. I'm not really sure how to feel; on one hand, I really love it here and I've missed living here, but on the other I really miss having a bed to myself that isn't on the floor, and on a foot we're going to have a(nother) funeral for my grandpa before we get home for which I'm going to sing.

Grief is a strange thing for me. It's always kind of dull and distant, because I've grown up in a military family and had to lose touch with everyone I knew every year for a long time. Between that, the fact that I'm largely lacking in most kinds of time sense, and my faith, I actually don't see the difference between temporary separations or permanent ones. Or maybe I just don't believe in permanent separations at all anymore. There's little sense in the back of my head that firmly believes, and cannot be convinced otherwise, that sooner or later I will come back to Hawai'i, and that someday I will see Grandma Jan and Grandpa Bob again and ask them the questions that I never knew to ask until after they died, and that someday I will get to meet my natural grandmother on my dad's side and see if I really do look that much like she did.

And, yet, I cry over war memorials, now that I begin to understand how much pain and horror they represent. I visited the USS Arizona today. She must have been beautiful, just like her sister ship the Missouri still is, and unlike the last time I visited both--when I was much younger--I understand now what kind of destruction took place at Pearl Harbor in World War II. The Arizona is still commissioned, I found out yesterday, even though she has been sunken and a tomb for her crew for seventy years. The flag over the memorial is attached to the remains of her mast. It flies at half-staff to honor the dead, the same as at Arlington and Punchbowl cemeteries.

After seeing so much this week, I feel like I should do something about it. Something to honor the sailors who died at Pearl Harbor, and the survivors like my great-granddaddy. Something to show respect for the Hawaiian culture that I know too little about and have so much interest in. For the former, I know what I can do. I can tell my family's stories, and sing in honor of those people.

For the latter, all I can do for the time being is shut up and listen. But maybe, if I listen hard enough, perhaps I could learn to speak Hawaiian properly.

Maybe if I listen hard enough, I could begin to deserve to learn.

Monday, August 6, 2012

A Brief Parody

(To the tune of "Look Down" from Les Miserables comes a splendid moment from our vacation)

My ears, my ears are suffering because
The wind outside goes THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP

My brother's camera's really neat
He likes to take good photographs
Out of the window of our Jeep
Highway speeds sure are really fast

My ears, my ears are suffering because
The wind outside goes THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Too Small

I've always had a fondness for small things, especially when people say that they are too small. My laptop (currently convalescing--get well soon, Jossie!) is a Netbook, allegedly too small and weak to do most of what's demanded of a computer in this day and age. Every year I go on a mission trip to build houses, and every year in pride of place in my toolbox is a six-ounce framing hammer that has gotten me some strange looks from those wielding huge hammers meant for the kind of work we're doing.

All my life, I've had the sense that I wasn't good enough. I hear rumors that that is a common thing for people who are different, especially those with disabilities. Our needs and wishes are treated as somehow less important--to be attended to only if it doesn't inconvenience anyone--with the attitude that we are only a little bit removed from the practices of ancient Sparta and Rome. "Be grateful that we let you breathe OUR air," is the attitude I've sensed too often, as if air and light and love were things you had to earn by conforming closely enough to everyone else's ideals of who you should be.

I was always different, starting in preschool. The playground games my first year of preschool were always the ones that you won by being the biggest, the strongest, the fastest, the one with the best stamina--and I was the smallest, weakest, slowest, and shortest-winded, without even factoring in my bent for the cerebral and the fact that I was the only girl, simply because I was half the age of any of my classmates.

In some ways, I still see myself that way--as that lone toddler just shy of three, surrounded by boys preparing to go off to kindergarten--and so in a way I empathize with small things. Wilbur at the start of Charlotte's Web, or the Netbook in a family of full-size laptops and big desktops, or a framing hammer when everyone else is carrying power tools: these are my favorites, the ones I identify with and root for.

And my little hammer and I, we showed them. We showed them carriage bolts.

Concerning My Favorite Author

It is half past five in the morning local time, and after being awoken by a phone call from someone who didn't know I was in a different time zone, I can't get back to sleep even though I really want to. So here I'll write down some of what I can't sleep for thinking and see how that turns out.

When I was in seventh grade or so, one of my friends introduced me to the work of an author named Tamora Pierce. (This was actually my second introduction to her work, but I had been in first grade and forgotten all about the first time.) I wound up reading everything this author had ever written, which was already a pretty big selection, and which has grown by two lovely big books since then.

See, these were the books I'd been wanting to read for a long time. I had spent my entire life being irritated by how few books there were about girls; if I wanted to read a good story with a strong main character and meaningful plot, I would have to just accept the fact that it was about a boy (or a tomcat or a male owl, in the animal stories I preferred for a while). Which meant, to my young mind, that it wasn't about me. Now here was an author who was writing the books she'd wanted to read when she was my age--the strong fantasy novel about a girl--and here I was with a taste for exactly that. As an added bonus, these books were pretty hefty, and as you get into the newer ones you find that the editors were giving her more and more pages in which to write.

It has been twenty-five years since Tamora Pierce published her first book, and her most recent book has only been out since November of last year.

That considered, the continuity is fairly impressive; she's pretty good about including callbacks to the events of previous books to give returning readers a sense of reality and some way to get oriented in the space the story exists in. Corus is always the capital of Tortall, and it always has a magnificent palace; after the events of Lioness Rampant it is always inhabited by the king and queen who were installed in that book. Characters assume roles and stay in them until something happens to cause them to leave. There is a consistent calendar and a consistent map, frequently referred to, and the reader may check the story against the map or elapsed time against the year numbers. Ages are consistent: it is very possible to establish a definite year of birth for nearly every character in the series and they age realistically. This probably sounds pretty basic--the mechanical underpinnings of world-building, the boring stuff--but I miss it very much when authors omit it (ever read a book like that? it's like swimming through mud sometimes), and this one does it very well.

Another aspect that I'm fond of is how clearly the message of each story, the "salient truth" as my Creative Writing teacher called it, comes through without obscuring the story itself. Why go off on a long Author Filibuster (thanks, TVtropes!) about how war is horrible when you can show a young knight wandering through the pillaged remains of the refugee camp she was assigned to protect and mourning every one of the dead she sees? Why make the narrator talk about philosophical questions when you have a twelve-year-old girl whose mentor/father figure/sole positive adult influence is a scholar and she has tough questions arising from her own life? Characters think because they are put in places that force them to think, and the author lets them have their own thoughts. Characters come to conclusions that the author obviously disagrees with sometimes, but all she does is advance her position through another character--and let later events sort them out. It's a tool of good writing, and one I admire.

Yes, this is the kind of thing I think about early in the morning when I can't sleep. I'm getting tired again now, and so is my phone. Sadly, my poor laptop has died, so I may have some issues until I get home.