Dreams in the Time of Fear

In 1998, Zapatista women in Amador Hernadez demanded daily that the Mexican military leave the village communal landholdings. (Photo by Tim Russo)

Dreams in the Time of Fear

The sterility of the bourgeois world will end in suicide or a new form of creative participation.  This is the “theme of our times,” in Ortega y Gasset’s phrase; it is the substance of our dreams and the meaning of our acts.

Modern man likes to pretend that his thinking is wide-awake.  But his wide-awake thinking has led us into the mazes of a nightmare in which the torture chambers are endlessly repeated in the mirrors of reason.  When we emerge, perhaps we will realize that we have been dreaming with our eyes open, and that the dreams of reason are intolerable.  And then, perhaps, we will begin to dream once more with our eyes closed.               --  Octavio Paz, The Labyrinth of Solitude, 1961

I am probably way out of my depth here, but I am going to plunge ahead, anyway.  After all, I am in Mexico, I am a Zapatista and a kind of Catholic, and despite everything, I am a believer.

Believer in what, I expect you to ask.  Well, not in only reason, certainly.  It has its place, I am sure, in the scientific laboratory.  But as Octavio Paz said almost 60 years ago, this path of reason we have been on since the Enlightenment has not brought us to a better place in terms of our social structure, or happiness, or well-being, or ability to simply live without destroying ourselves and the planet.  That’s a pretty monumental failure in my opinion.

I don’t really care who is to blame, and thank god I am not an academic or a philosopher so I don’t have to say all of this is a certain way which will be convincing to someone who will write articles and books and then maybe we will all come to understand this.

No, that is not my job, thankfully.  I am a simple person, highly educated in a certain way, but I know that I know nothing, really, except what I feel in my heart.  And that’s OK with me.  

One of the joys and afflictions of aging is memory loss.  I can’t always readily call up to mind the word or fact I want.  I’m not really interested in debate though I like to hear others well-thought out arguments.  I detest being lectured to, but enjoy giving my opinion to those who are truly open to listening.  I try to understand what my heart is telling me, and work with my shadow self, all while trying to stay present in the Now.

I am a minister by training and experience and calling.  It is what I do and who I am anymore.  I can’t imagine anything else.  And what I do as a minister is listen; I travel and people tell me things; I work as a chaplain and people tell me things; I do what I can for social justice and people tell me things.  And what they say is that we want a better world for ourselves and our children.  That is universal. 

We want adequate food, water, clothing, housing, education, healthcare and the ability to make a living.  We want to have hope for the future.  We want to worship in our own way, and live free from fear of oppression and bodily harm.  We want our children to live and thrive.  We want to fall in love and have a fiesta or two.  We want to laugh from time to time.  

Is that so much to ask?

It seems that it is, for the many people who struggle in poverty conditions in the United States and elsewhere.

Love from Oaxaca

Blessed in Oaxaca, Mexico

January 15, 2020

updated January 19

One thing leads to another on the internet and I may have an explanation for what is happening to me here in Oaxaca, but maybe just in general, too. “Jerusalem syndrome” or in my case, “Oaxaca syndrome” or maybe “Goddess syndrome,” where suddenly people become overcome, even psychotic, while visiting foreign places of holiness and great beauty, or in the case of the Goddess, being a person in whom she sees an opening to “play and create” (in the words of Octavio Paz) with me and boy, does she ever go to town.

This could explain why I can suddenly understand more of the spoken Spanish, and as the days go by, I even am able to speak it better and better. Also, this could explain why I seemed to merge into the flow of humanity during the Saturday evening paseo around the zocalo, though I was sitting on the sidelines, and why this Zapotec necklace leaped out at me and now everyone comments on it, though only one person, an old man at a restaurant, knew the symbolism.[1] Why I stumble around and have the most fantastic time.

This is the fourth time I have visited Oaxaca, but it is really the first time I have experienced it on a deeper, personal level. That is probably due to the fact that I was with other people on the other three trips, tending to their needs and even having to play tour guide which was a complete distraction from experiencing my own feelings about the people and the place.  

Now that the air has cleared, I find that I really love it here.  I love Mexican colonial cities which is where I want to spend my time in Mexico anymore, avoiding the beach scene which I find mostly obscene and soulless, unless there is a quiet little place somewhere that someday calls to me. 

Oaxaca is much bigger than another of my favorite colonial cities, San Miguel de Allende.  Oaxaca has many more indigenous people and a more authentic Mexican feel as the norteamericanos and other tourists are far outnumbered and tend to disappear in the crowd, except for the tallest ones who tower over these short people.  

It is a life of exquisite privilege for me to be among them.  My hotel, Las Golondrinas, The Swallows, is gracious with small, basic and clean rooms clustered around the lush inner courtyard.  We have our breakfast under a roof of bougainvillea, with colorful birds darting in and out.  It is quiet and serene; the other guests do not speak loudly if they speak at all, and for that I am grateful.  I am not in the mood to chit chat so after the first courteous Buenas dias, I sit by myself and write.  

Happy New Year 2020

Love from me, hanging with the sea turtles on Jekyll Island, Georgia

December 31, 2019
updated January 5, 2020

I told everyone I was leaving Portland to spend the winter in Mexico.  That’s mostly true, but what I failed to say is that first, I am spending 2 weeks on Jekyll Island, Georgia.

I guess I didn’t disclose that part because 1) I love the quiet here and I don’t want everyone in the world to come here and ruin it for me; and 2) West coast people are blissfully unaware of the South, it seems.  The few times I mentioned it, people looked at me blankly, as if I were talking about Soviet Georgia.  No, Georgia, USA, you know?   Jekyll Island, formerly the haunt of the rich, is now thankfully accessible to us ordinary people, and much much more down to earth than say, Hilton Head.  And home to the Georgia Sea Turtle Center which provides medical care and rehabilitation for sea turtles whom they name and display their story of catastrophe and salvation on each of their individual rehabilitation pools.  Who can resist donating or just loving them up?*

I have new turtle earrings, a turtle necklace and a greeting card of turtles from around the world.  I guess turtles are my thing, come to think of it.  I had a tragedy early in life involving a turtle, which I won’t go into here.  Maybe they are my totem; I did see a quite large turtle on the side of the road last June in Wyoming while I was on my way from Custer, SD to Devils Tower National Monument.  What in the world was he doing there?  Although there weren’t many cars on that particular stretch of highway, I worried that he just wouldn’t make it across, if that was where he was headed.  (Later, someone said I should have picked him up and escorted him across the road.  Really?)  Actually, I would have liked to have taken him home, but I don’t really have the means to care for him properly.  But he blessed my life, for sure, and I pray that he is all right.

So, 2019.  My god, what a year!  I guess every year is momentous in its way; but this year was sheer grace and miracle.  It started in 2018 when a Man at Church asked me to house a Speaker he had invited to our church.  Sure, I said.  I have space.  Happy to help out.  A week before the event, Man at Church said, “I hope you’ll be all right, Connie,” alluding to the Speaker being in my house overnight.  Massive PTSD ensued for me; what was he implying?  That I would be raped and murdered in my own bed, and by a highly educated white man and national figure in the progressive camp, someone YOU asked me to house?  What the, what the f---?  

In a Dark Time

Reflections on 2017

The year began with me grieving the loss of my friend Jan, who died on November 9, 2016.  I spent New Year’s 2017 at a wonderful retreat at Pendle Hill, a retreat center in the Philadelphia area, made famous by Parker Palmer who lived and worked there for many years.  In the mix of silence and sharing and speaking and listening to the deep longings and intentions on our hearts, I gained some needed strength to face the new year without Jan, and to do what I could to counter the storm the new administration was sure to bring to our country.

I know it has been a hard year for many of us.  We are, as Parker Palmer so aptly said, brokenhearted.  Brokenhearted, and angry, and questioning how and why, but most importantly asking, “What can I do?” I am glad that so many have heeded the call to be the peace and justice makers and keepers that we long for.  It is up to us; we are the change that we long for.  The work is hard because we have to be in it for the long haul; for some of us, change will come after our lifetimes.  It is easy to feel that things are hopeless, that my little contribution will not matter.  But history tells us that change can come, and does come, when people come together across divides, to make life better for all, but especially for those who suffer through poverty, discrimination, illness, and neglect.

I have been fortunate that my ministry has allowed me to make friends with people who suffer.  I know that personal relationships are the key to love and understanding and supporting those who are not “like me.”  This year, I became the co-President of Farm Worker Ministry Northwest, part of the National Farm Worker Ministry.  We organize the faith community to support farmworkers and their labor unions/organizations. 

Farmworkers in this country have always been exploited workers, which the current tactics of Immigration & Customs Enforcement have made much worse.  It is unconscionable that the people we depend on for our food are not only suffering through poor wages and working conditions, but they are also denied legal status and can have their families torn apart.  Because of the new administration and ICE tactics, we have seen a rise in people who now “get it” and can connect their daily sustenance to abuse and exploitation! 

“Did you eat today?” our slogan goes, “Thank a farmworker!”  Better yet, demand justice for them!

In June, there was a major success as the berry pickers at Sakuma Bros. were able to get their first contract!  I went up to celebrate with them in Mt. Vernon, Washington with Debi Covert-Bowlds, my colleague co-President.  The celebration was marred by a death of a girl at the labor camp (circumstances we never found out about), and in early August, the death of a worker at a different berry farm in Washington. 

And so the work continues.  In July, I organized a visit and tour for about 50 people to Woodburn, Oregon, hosted by our Oregon farmworker labor union, PCUN, and their very faithful president, Ramon Ramirez.   In October, I was part of a panel with Ramon, and Leecia Anderson of Western Farmworkers Assn., at my own church, First Unitarian.  In November, I testified at an Oregon OHSA hearing asking that farmworkers be given the same considerations we give to salmon – a 300 foot “no pesticide spray” buffer zone – OHSA feels that 150 feet is sufficient!

I pray that the ending of this year finds you at peace.  At the end of a hard year, I find sanctuary in the silence, and gratitude for the gift of friendship.  The poet Theodore Roethke wrote, “In a dark time, the eye begins to see.”  Who knew at the beginning of the year that sexual abuse would finally come out of the closet?  It gives me the courage, finally, to say, #MeToo.  Our stories matter.  Truth matters.  Solidarity matters.  May it be so.

Copyright 2017 Constance B. Yost. All rights reserved.

On Friendship

Ministerial Meditations

by The Rev. Connie Yost 

March 10, 2016

Jan and Me

On Friendship

My friend Jan recently gave me a birthday card, which perhaps doesn’t sound very remarkable except for two things:  1) it wasn’t my birthday and 2) she thanked me and said “I love you very much.”

I have known Jan for about 40 years, and though I moved away from Seattle where she continued to live, I tried to keep in touch with her when I came back to visit.  In the beginning of our friendship, I wasn’t aware that she had a neurological condition.  But over the years, she became progressively more unable to take care of herself.  For years, she lived in a little rented house near Seward Park.  She enjoyed cooking and gardening and her cat, Baby.  She had help that came in a few times a week.  Then she started to have falls, and surgeries, and a stroke.  On the phone one day she told me that she had had to move from the little house into an adult family home on Beacon Hill.  Though it was hard to give up the independence that she had had, the worst thing was that she couldn’t take Baby with her.  A cat person myself, I grieved for her.

Jan lived in that first adult family home for about 5 years, then was told she was moving one morning.  She never did know why.  The new adult family home was visually unappealing to me, located next to an auto repair shop with a dump of tires visible in the back yard.  But Jan became quite attached to the older woman who cared for her, and she had a large room to herself.  All seemed well for a couple of years until her caregiver went to the hospital for back surgery.  A new, younger couple took over as the caregivers.  Jan thought this was temporary until the older caregiver recovered enough to come back, but as the months went on it became clear that the younger couple was there to stay. 

Pre-Birthday Ruminating

 

Ministerial Meditations

by The Rev. Connie Yost

July 22, 2013



Annie Oakley "Little Sure Shot" age 28, 1898



I recently flew to Los Angeles to meet with one of our Chalice Oak Foundation clients, the nonprofit 20KWatts, which brings solar lighting to desperately poor communities in Central America.  As I boarded the small commuter plane in Long Beach to return home, I found my seat next to a young girl who was sitting next to the window.   I settled into my seat and asked her if she was travelling alone.  Limpid blue pools looked straight at me and she kindly but firmly announced that she was.  "I'm old enough," she told me.  "People don't think that I am, but I am.  I'm fourteen."  Impressed with her self-possession, I struggled with what to say next.  Certainly I would NOT say that she didn't look fourteen.  She knows that; everyone always says that.  And I remember how much I always hated people telling me that I didn't look my age (when I was younger, mind you!).

So I said, "Well, that's very good.  I know how annoying it is when people think you're a lot younger than you are.   They treat you like you don't know anything.  I always hated that."  "Yes," she agreed.  "It is annoying," she said and calmly went on reading her book.

I didn't start travelling alone much less on an airplane until I was much much older than fourteen.  But then, I was raised in the pre-feminist dark ages, discovering my own womanpower well into my thirties and with little support from my parents or society.  I wondered how my life might have turned out had I been as empowered as she when I was 4'7" and weighed 80 lbs.

Hildegard and Viriditas

Ministerial Meditations

By The Rev. Connie Yost

April 6, 2013

Hildegard's Illumination All Beings Celebrate Creation

            I am home from my trip to Germany which, like all the best travel experiences, was much more and much less than I expected.  The less part was that I expected to experience the "greening" of Spring that Hildegard of Bingen wrote so much about.  That was not to be as there was a huge blizzard in the area just 2 days before I arrived.  So instead of green, I looked out my hotel window and saw various shades of white and gray for the first few days.  I never imagined that we would be running around in the snow at Disibodenberg where Hildegard lived until she was nearly 50 years old (just ruins now, but still a wonderful site, even in the snow).  I was on retreat with 30 other people, visiting the sites where Hildegard lived and did her ministry.  She left Disibodenberg to found the monastery at Rupertsberg (the only original part of the structure left is just a cellar now), and if that wasn't enough, at age 67 she acquired the damaged buildings of the Eibingen convent and restored them for 30 of her Benedictine sisters and thereafter, crossed the Rhine twice a week to supervise her two monasteries until she died at age 81.

            Part of the "more" part of the trip was all that I learned and experienced about Hildegard.  She was a pistol in her time, influencing the pope and cardinals and gaining audiences and respect in high places despite her criticisms of the Church (Catholic, of course, in those days).  She continues to inspire us today.  In fact, there is an incredible surge of interest in her ministry today.  She even finally made it to the top of sainthood in the Catholic Church, being declared a doctor of the church just last fall, taking only 900 years to get there!  (A lesson in patience, for sure.)