Carn[e]-age

They want cogs 
for their machine 
or cattle 
for the slaughter.

I make a squeaky wheel 
at best,
jagged and spent 
on human error 
and overuse.

En este pais 
se vive 
para trabajar.

Out to pasture
your worth is measured
in pounds of corn and wheat.
Carn[e]-age.

A hammer in the hand
of the new proclaimed goD,
to smooth the cog
or
tenderize the meat.

Formas de ir

I've been struggling. Early this morning Abuelo visited me in a dream. This comes on the heels of resuming my healing trauma work and engaging more intentionally in ancestral work. I was standing in the kitchen of my childhood home in Madrid, marveling that it was still there and he was still there, while I washed dishes. I let my head drop feeling the weight of my unspoken words. Then, with a breath, <Abuelo, no me quiero ir>. 

He responded, <Hay muchas formas de 'ir'>.

I haven't written anything personal in so long. Even when I started this blog, I felt somewhat disconnected from the words I was putting down. Because to put these words down is to bind and limit complex feelings that (for me) live outside the realm of the verbal, rational, and even linear, world.

When I consider que no me quiero ir, I know in my heart of hearts that that's the Evita me, who was never given the choice to stay or go. Also the Evey me who struggled with knowing she had to go. Now the Mama Eva me who is caught between the coming and going in a place both and neither physical and/or ether.

As usual, Abuelo is right. Hay muchas formas de ir. Él ya se ha ido, pero también me ha venido.

The concern is el dónde. Because there is no question que aquí nunca he pertenecido. Evita me was Madrid and Evey me was Miami. The rest is lost in color, feeling, and this insubstantial place that can't be home. Truly, how can I just BE any me---but particularly the Mama Eva me--- without something that fundamental?

I keep drawing the devil tarot card-- prison of my own making--buying into the lie we are sold about what we need to prove our worth. El sueño Americano es un quiste ovárico y el éxito es el adiposo tejido que rodea el corazón de un amante.

De aquí, si me quiero ir. 

On becoming beautiful

On July 24, just a month after my 28th birthday, a former coworker of mine died of a brain aneurysm. No euphemism needed. I'd had maybe two conversations with her in the few years I'd known her, but they were meaningful conversations about identity and culture. We both shared Caribbean heritage. The agency she last worked for held a service for her. I knew from the moment I heard about it that I'd attend; I've never shied away from death. Once there I allowed myself to embrace the result of that death.

I realized how much time we waste talking about things we want to do instead of just doing them. M's life was an incredible journey. Along the way she touched many lives. Many of the people she knew happen to be people I have also had the pleasure of crossing paths with. One of those people was a former supervisor of mine, K, who I had not seen in close to two years. In the time we worker together we developed a kinship that I still hold dear. Although she always treated me like an equal I always picked up a very nurturing vibe from her and embraced her as a mentor. She was there during the difficult months when I began to face the reality that there might be a problem with my fertility. All around me there seemed to be women who took their motherhood for granted, and here I was, after having waited so long, unable to get pregnant (I was later diagnosed with polycystic ovarian syndrome).

We've kept in touch through Facebook mostly, always making abstract plans to see each other. She knows I had a baby, although she has yet to meet her. Anyway, I was fine until I spotted her there. I went to greet her, and in our customary Miamian way, we hugged. Not one of those squeeze and release type hugs that are customary in the "South." This was the real deal, where you hold each other and even rock a little because you're so excited to be around one of yours and you're almost afraid the moment isn't real. The hug reaffirms and tethers you to the truth. If you're from Miami you know what I mean. My eyes immediately watered and a tear trailed down my face. I know M didn't die so that I could see K, but I silently thanked her for that gift. Then she said, "You look so beautiful." I made a comment about how surprised I'd been about being able to lose all my baby weight to which she replied, "Don't you know? It's becoming mothers that makes us beautiful." And I know what she meant. She didn't mean the physical aspect of birthing, but rather the ability to care, fight for, and put others before yourself come what may. She did that for me and all her staff when we worked together. And I know the kind of person it takes. The kind that values people over a paycheck.

M had a baby at about the same time I did. The person she spent her last day with told a story about how M had gone to put the baby to sleep. She was gone a long time and her friend thought that maybe she'd fallen asleep. She came back and asked, "Didn't you wonder where I was? I just sat there watching the baby sleep. Isn't he beautiful?" M was beautiful and understood what to value with her time. I can only hope to honor her memory by doing the same.

Summer of the Attachment Mother

 I took social psychology as an undergraduate and one of my most vivid memories of the course was the day our instructor used a clip from the Daily Show with Jon Stewart to drive home the point about sensationalism and its use to create fear in the public. The segment, called I Know What You Did Last Summer of the Shark, was a parody about the previous year's media focus on a handful of shark attacks. As I've watched the momentum gathered by Time Magazine's May cover and article on attachment parenting, the images of that segment have replayed over and over in my head.

Personally I am not offended by the cover. There is something about its defiance that I find appealing and almost necessary. I am mother, hear me roar!

 (Comic Credit: Heather Cushman-Dowdee)

However, I can't say I am not offended by its intended purpose or the hyperbolic picture it paints of parents who practice attachment parenting. It feels a lot like prostitution to allow someone to "buy" what is and should be a beautiful and natural part of life in an effort to exploit and own it for their own purposes. Yuck. Time, as a magazine, had a purpose in mind: to put something controversial on the cover and by doing so increase readership and media attention. Mission accomplished. Even that doesn't bother me so much though. What bothers me is that people are so willing to buy into what they are fed without so much as questioning it or questioning themselves. I think at best a title like "Are You Mom Enough" is an invitation to evaluate your parenting and perhaps change the things you're unhappy with. At worse it is an invitation to judge others, based solely on the information provided, and to conquer and divide by heightening fear of the unknown or different. I am only one of many people responding to this, and definitely not the most eloquent. But I think my point is sound. Live and let live.

Recommended reading: Mama Solidarity and Are You Mom Enough, The Questions is for what.

Creepy People

I had an interesting dialogue with a mom at work yesterday. Keep in mind that I work for a "feminist, empowerment based, nonjudgmental, and culturally sensitive" agency. The conversation went something like this:

Unnamed person: Can you believe they're almost 1 year old?
Me: No, I really can't. I feel like all I've done is blink.
Unnamed: When was she born again?
Me: April 24th.
Unnamed person: Are you still breastfeeding?
Me: Yes, Galicia has started solids but she's still mostly on breast milk.
Unnamed person: Oh my god! How long do you plan on continuing?
Me: I don't know. I don't really have a set limit. I guess until she stops. I'm going to let her self-wean.
Unnamed person:What! What if she doesn't stop until she's 5?
Me: Then she'll breastfeed until she's 5.
Unnamed person:That's creepy.
Me: Ok. Maybe it's creepy to you.
Unnamed person: No that's creepy.
Me: The U.S. is one of the only countries that sees that as being creepy. The World Health Organization recommends moms breastfeed for 2 years or more. It is the American Academy of Pediatrics that recommends at least one year. Dr. H (she's the doctor who runs a free clinic at our agency) breastfed her daughter for quite some time.
Unnamed person: Yeah the 1 year is what I am familiar with. I just don't get what they get out of it at that point.
Me: Well, the composition of your milk changes with your child's needs. There's so little research on women but what they're finding is that the child's saliva sends chemical signals to make milk that has antibodies and etc. So they still benefit no matter their age. But yes, some of what they get is also comfort.
Unnamed: Yeah, it's mostly comfort nursing at that point if you ask me.

Note: Ignoring that "at least" part. Selective bias? Internalized oppression?

Somehow it felt monumentally more painful to have this coming from another mother of color who knows how difficult breastfeeding can be, particularly in our communities. Instead of mutually supporting, praising and recognizing each other as full-time working moms who are committed to breastfeeding/pumping as an act of love for our children, we are taught to criticize and shame each other.

On a positive note, it doesn't have to be this way. I went to a training on human trafficking last month and asked for an accommodation so that I could pump and the response from the Florida Council Against Sexual Violence (FCASV) was amazing. We were at a hotel and two of us were provided with a private hotel room in which to pump. I wrote a followup thank you note to Jennifer Dritt, the Executive Director. Her response was, "We’d be feminist in name only if we didn’t support working mothers." So unnamed person, let's make lack of support for women's choices and needs creepy.

(Pictured: A Yanomami mother breastfeeding both her child and an orphaned monkey. Remember that we humans also drink other animals' milk ourselves. Photo credit:Mark Edwards/Hard Rain Picture Library).