The voices in my head have picked up the noises in the atmosphere. I have signed a barrage of petitions resulting in a deluge of pings, tings, and emails announcing the latest news out of Washington. I feel like the kiddo on the playground chosen to be the guy pegged to the wall in a game of Dodge Ball – the target of an entire elementary school sending volley balls flying at me from every direction – there is nowhere to jump, to duck, to run.

Enter, wabi-sabi, the Japanese word with a tea cup story.

Once upon a time, in the 15^th century, a man had a precious tea cup break. The first attempt to mend it did not work. Then, a system of melting gold known as kintsugi, was applied, gluing the chards of the tea cup together. It was not the same, but stronger and artistically enhanced. The wabi-sabi philosophy believes things are imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete, like the broken tea cup.

Enter my wabi-sabi life. Many things that I relied on, had faith in, and, frankly, expected to be there, are being broken. Like the Dodge Ball game, I’m jumping all over the place. The phone, the radio, the conversation in the waiting room at my mechanics yesterday – exemplify the imperfections, transient and continuous changes of the days.

I hoped my time in the car appointment lounge would be a quiet hour of writing and waiting. However, when I entered, the tables and multiple chairs were full. As I jostled my coat, laptop, and drink container, rethinking my plan, a man along the wall offered to move over explaining, “You can put your stuff there and sit here, so there’s room to work.”

That seems a small act, but something in me changed. My hunched shoulders softened releasing the tension gathered in my back from the attacks spewed into the ethos for weeks. I was literally keeping my head down. Like a suspicious tortoise, I eased my head out of my protective shell and smiled.

The large T.V. across the room blared politics. He pointed to it and whispered, “We are in big trouble.” Whew. We were on the same side. Then, I cringed. What? When did I start thinking in those terms?

The news show continued until another man entered and asked if we minded if he turned it off.  “Please do!” we agreed again, noting how nicely he asked. Cordial. Polite. Not like T.V.

Now, in the quiet, I turned to my seatmate and asked, “Do you have any good news to share?”

“Yes,” he declared, “It’s going to be 50 degrees on Wednesday!”

We laughed. My “tea cup” was again mended, with a smile of gold!

~~~~~

Another momentito, little moment. But there have been monumental shifts this week.

A friend became a U.S. citizen, a time of celebration after a long-awaited goal following the studying, the test, some intrusive questions by Customs agents, enduring belittling attitudes and finally, an enthusiastic welcome by the Judge pronouncing a room full of world inhabitants, the what. . . honor. . . of being a citizen of the United States. Yet, a fog surrounded our conversation.

She wanted assurance that she held dual citizenship. Yes, she does! A few days later, I received a text showing her U.S. Passport and a new tattoo on her forearm – a map of Mexico. Allegiance to home country and adopted land.

Meanwhile, other hispanohablantes/Spanish speakers wonder out loud if they should be speaking Spanish in public. “Hell yes!” was my knee-jerk response. “People will gain a lot by getting used to hearing other languages in these backwater towns.” Then, I reflected on the fear running rampant when even churches, schools, and hospitals aren’t Sanctuaries. Me? I started a Spanish-speaking MESA in the 1990s. We meet once a week. Should I be concerned?

An answer came in another kintsugi moment – pure gold melding my chards back together.

As recyclers, we have a collection of slips of paper cut-up from incoming mail that to reuse for chore lists. Recently, I grabbed one to note our grocery needs. There was writing on one side that stopped me cold. It read,

“Our dreams are big – – our hopes high – – our goals long-term – – and the path is difficult.  But the only failure is not to try.”  Jimmy Carter