Remember Your Neighbor
When you go to the polling place
And you’ve confirmed your name,
Your address,
Your signature.
Remember your neighbor,
Your neighbor’s child or grandchild that cowers during lockdown drills
Hoping to never hear the echoes of gunshots off locker doors
Because the trauma of imagining is more than enough.
Remember your neighbors who have a mixed citizenship status.
Remember that we took their land.
White power is the thief in this story.
Remember your neighbor that just watched their neighbor’s house float by,
And don’t know if their children are alive,
Or how they’re going to get to work
Determination doesn’t matter if rivers wash away roads.
Remember your neighbor that has only ever wanted to be a parent,
That has been told time and again, “Don’t worry, try again next month,”
As they bankrupt themselves emotionally and financially
to try to build a family.
Remember your neighbors who have families that look different than yours:
Grandparents caring as guardians for grandchildren,
Aunts and uncles stepping in,
Foster parents forming families
All of these working to be the sacred space called home
Even when government and social measures offer less support.
Remember your neighbor who is queer or trans,
Who spends lots of energy trying to both live authentically
And stay alive and safe in a world where hate is cool
Wondering if they will lose rights and protections in coming years.
Remember your neighbor who has family overseas
And waits each day for updates when phones can get a signal between bombings
“Hello, we’re still here, we love you. Kiss grandma.”
Or silence. Then wails. God help us.
Remember your neighbor.
And your neighbor’s neighbor.
For God’s sake and for all of our sake, remember your neighbor.
What I said at Pride
Handmade heart shaped ornament with glass mosaic design. Tiles are diamond shaped with rainbow stripe across the middle.
[These remarks were shared at the Valley Wide Pride Festival (Hudson, WI) on June 22nd of this year. They were adapted some for this post.]
Good morning, friends! It is my privilege to help kick off the 2nd Valley Wide Pride. I am going to start with a brief story because stories connect us and speak to our souls. I have number of titles in my life including: pastor, artist, queer woman, partner, sister, friend. One of my most cherished titles is, “Auntie.” So last weekend, I made a trip to see my goddaughter, Lola. She will be turning 6 this week so clearly, we needed to party. This year, the party was mostly adults: parents, grandparents, aunties, a few family friends. Lola specifically asked that her friend, Matt, be invited to the party because they are “chosen family,” in her words. Matt is the kiddo of close family friends. I remember them being at all Lola’s previous parties.
Well, Matt showed up with their parents and was spectacularly dressed in a black mini-dress with a sash and black heals. As far as I could observe, Lola did not question Matt in anyway-though this was the first time Lola saw them in a dress. In short order, both were off to play. My favorite moment was they pulled chairs up side-by-side and were reading something together away from the adults gathered at the food table. Matt took a break from heels at one point when they played lawn games but announced the heels were needed again later as one must, “Enter and leave in style.”
Friends, (I know I am biased) but we need more Lola’s in the world. I also appreciate the courage and trust Matt had in their friend, Lola. We need more gentle souls who don’t insist on asking prying questions, who welcome preferred names and pronouns, who pay more attention to the contents of one’s heart and character rather than the outer wrappings and other details.
As of (this past) Tuesday, the ACLU is currently tracking 522 anti-LGBTQ+ bills at varying levels of government legislation in our country. To bring it closer to home, they are tracking 14 bills in Wisconsin and 18 in Minnesota. Regardless of whether they pass or are defeated, ALL of these bills are harmful to our LGBTQ+ community and are motivated by hate. Pride is needed now more than ever. I dream of a world where my goddaughter Lola’s compassionate and gentle welcome is the norm. However, I am painfully aware that is not the world we live in. Until the world is this consistently caring and kind to the queer community, we very much need Pride to keep celebrating and uplifting each other.
There is a verse in the book of Psalms, made up primarily of poems and prayers which I think speaks to this Pride moment. The writer in chapter 30 is addressing God and says, “You changed my mourning into dancing. You took off my funeral clothes and dressed me up in joy.” To me, this sums up Pride. There is plenty to celebrate--we no longer live in the years of the Stonewall rebellion and early gay rights movement. There is also plenty to grieve and organize against--we will not let our community be made invisible or criminalized simply for existing.
In the end, Pride is more than the glitter, rainbows, outfits and parades.
Pride is the conscious decision to be wholly one’s-self in community.
And welcome all others as wholly them-selves in community, too.
I offer this blessing for our on-going Pride efforts:
When the glitter and paint have faded,
The rainbow garb has been tossed in a heap on the floor
And June yields to the harsh midsummer, Remember this:
You are loved, you are enough, you are beautiful in all your queerness.
You belong here. You make the world a better place.
And remember, Pride is a noun but also an action and a way of being in the world.
Be Pride wherever you go, making safe space for others and uplifting queer joy and voices.
Embody Pride on the inside and out: extending welcome and grace to yourself and others.
With that, Welcome to Valley Wide Pride! May our day together be filled with joy, welcome, and community. Happy Pride to you all!
a poetic reflection on grief
What is life but a storm
Of joy and grief
Smiles and tears
Triumphs and tedium
Mountain-top moments
And months of hanging on by fingernails
Waiting for a break in the rain
And respite enough
To patch the roof
And mend the fence
Because the truth is
None of us gets to choose
When the storm comes
Or when it breaks
At best we may choose
Who weathers the storm with us
Who we walk alongside when darkness comes
And who we dance with when
A rainbow appears in the sky
Do not waste a minute
All of it is a gift
started on April 20, 2024
Thoughts on Life
Time is strange
Days fly by
I thought this month
this year it will settle
I’ll know what day it is
In which month and year
Maybe life is just a series
Of competing whirlwinds
Some dodge the house
Some barrel right through the front door
Scrambling the living room
Then smashing through the kitchen
Upending pots and spilling drinks
Before pulling up the garden
And toppling fruit trees as a final punctuation
To its destructive and uninvited festivities
Maybe life rather than structures
And morning coffee mugs
In a well-ordered house
Is a million small actions
That place flowers in vases
Square up family portraits on shaken walls
Sharing from their own kitchens
When yours has gone to pieces
Maybe the very ground we stand on
Is the bits of love grown up through cracks in patio bricks
Holding our feet steady
Keeping us from tipping over
So we may see when the storm has taken its leave
The ones we love the most are still with us
Even if only in memory
And sunsets call us every evening
To stop and stand in awe
To admire the glory and chaos of it all
Being grateful for another day
In which we had a chance to participate in
The grand adventure that will surely take us all eventually
But until then: pause, be still,
notice all the love and life
That filled this day
Written on my way to see a dear friend in January 2023.