An Aurora for Democracy

The Aurora Borealis blasts from Skagaströnd’s defining mountain. September 2020.

She’d never witnessed the northern lights. Oh, she sort of saw them once, swirling in the distance at a northern latitude. But that weak show didn’t prepare her for a sky lit by pale green smoke. Trembling vapors of ghostly spirits. Ribbons filaments pulses of light.

She craned her neck until it cramped. Pointed her camera at the sky and snapped picture after picture. Exhaled frigid breath that snaked into heaven, merged with the light, arced across the star-dusted ceiling of the planet.

She hopes to make it back to Skagaströnd, crosses her fingers for a clear, cold night. She will pick her way along the sea cliffs, stand beneath the swirling souls of arctic friends, and let tears freeze on her skin.

I look forward to being writer-in-residence at NES Artist Residency. Skagaströnd, Iceland. February and March 2021.

Since this post is going up on Inauguration Day, let me shout at the top of my voice:

HOORAY FOR THE USA!!!!!!!

To celebrate, I share one of our happiest recent pictures. We both voted blue to save democracy. We voted blue for empathy and compassion and sanity. And even though this country has much work to do, we are relieved to watch Joe Biden be inaugurated our 46th President. As a woman, I’m ecstatic we elected our first female Vice-President and woman of color, Kamala Harris.

Do you see our happy faces? Those genuine smiles? I’m also grabbing MTM’s crotch in this shot, but that’s a story for another time.

Here’s to the power of democracy and the audacity to hope.

She sat here the first time he saw her.

July heat burned as red as the bar behind her. He sat in a chair at the next table. Smiled. Said hello as he lowered himself into his seat. She looked up, grinned, said hi.

They didn’t occupy the same table until he asked her to marry him.

No ring on her hand. A diamond bauble sprung on her after this shot. When he took the seat opposite her. Dropped a Tiffany blue box on the table. Asked her to marry him. His hands shook as he grasped her fingers. She said yes before she even saw the ring.

It was the last time they would sit in this spot. The restaurant closed the next day. Same thing happened with their rehearsal dinner restaurant and the romantic Italian place they dined after they wed.

With the pandemic wreaking carnage over favorite spots, they’re grateful to grasp the vital importance of making memories.

Recent Reads Friday: The Green Road by Anne Enright

Winner of the Man Booker Prize

Travel back to Ireland in this immersive novel of family secrets. Beautifully written, each character leaps from the page, captures the imagination, and clutches a reader’s heart. I was especially appreciative of the multiple perspectives, the way characters shifted from rich to poor to gay to straight to repressed to free. A gorgeous write.

Get your copy HERE.

➡️ I purchase every new book featured with my own funds. I do not offer endorsements in exchange for a feature. My opinions are honest assessments of books I read, enjoy, and believe worthy of your time. Creators cannot create if people fail to support their work with actual money. I am doing my part to support worthy writers in many genres and career stages.

Nothing stretches the IT band like twisting pigeon pose with straight leg.

Another contortion I didn’t think my body could execute until I did it! Our hips are the body’s basement. Full of moth-balled, mildewed, forgotten junk we think we might use someday but probably won’t. Yet we throw it down perilous stairs, hear it hit the concrete floor, and close the door, convinced we may wander into the abyss for retrieval someday.

Deep twisting poses like this one help me jettison trauma. Sometimes, I lean into my mat, I let the cruddy bile flow, and I cry. And I arise fierce and light, proud of myself for squeezing out round of poison to make way for loveliness and grace.

A picture of what an evangelical upbringing can feel like. Staring up from darkness. Bars blocking a tease of blue sky.

You want experiences, but you’re ordered not to question. Long to see the world, but worldliness is the worst kind of sin. Instead of marking one as well-rounded or cosmopolitan, worldliness means a believer has fallen away from the one true faith and embraced Satan’s lies.

I’m grateful for the dips and folds of landscape beyond the bars. To know the richness, the glorious color and wonder stretching above heavy lines and shadows. Not because it’s wrong to accept what’s offered between the lines. Many souls crave structure, a sense of black and white, right and wrong, yes and no.

But don’t condemn fearless beings because they have wings and you can’t understand their longing to fly.

American democracy is in crisis. Many experts believe it is past the point of saving.

I grew up in an environment of conspiracy. The media was evil. Government existed to suppress my religious freedom. College professors and educated people were snobby elitists who looked down their noses at me and laughed. Persecution was everywhere. Liberals were communist socialists out to destroy our country and imprison the godly.

Guess what? The preceding paragraph is bullshit.

It took almost a decade of reading, study and life experience to help me understand how brainwashed I had been. And that’s not to say some media outlets lack bad intent. Some elites really do laugh at bumpkins like me. As infuriating as those things are, I’m grateful for the tools to separate fact from fantasy.

If a majority refuse to agree to a common set of unassailable facts, democracy cannot exist. Truth is the foundation of any democracy. Facts like covid is real and vaccines are safe and Bill Gates is not the anti-christ and Joe Biden is President because he won the election. The earth is round and climate change is happening and science is the way and masks and distancing are ways to end the pandemic.

Guard your sources of information. Fact check everything, even from outlets you believe. Don’t share links and memes on social media until you have read and vetted them for accuracy. Be diligent with the truth because it is the only thing that will save our democracy.