Meme: the Interview

After Danny interviewed Amba, and seeing as I was once delegated as the poddess of this particular pod, I decided, "Hey! I want to be interviewed too!" and so I asked Amba to interview me.

Amba wrote to me, "Your blog's honesty sets an awfully high standard for this assignment. You ask yourself such great questions. But here are mine." [so saying, the standards are set even higher, Amba. I hope I won't disappoint you]

Here goes - Amba's questions to me:

1. Is there a place on earth that feels like your soul's home? Where, and how did you find it?

Well, well, Amba. This was my hardest one. I left it until last and still I struggle. I do not think my soul has found its home yet. Oh yes, I feel at peace on any sea shore, wild or tame, stormy or calm. I love the smell, sound and feel of the sea and its beaches, cliffs or shores. I always feel really good when I visit the Garden of Gethsemane Church in East Jerusalem or the Garden Tomb where some say Jesus was buried. My soul felt at home with Charlie and Mar-Mar as they died - so much so I almost felt like I wished they had taken me with them - so, perhaps, in hospice care. Sometimes when I do yoga and always when I hold a child in my arms. Sitting on the floor watching the birds through the window with Ada as she chirps sweetly at them. Oh, and Paris! Ah, wonderful, beautiful, intelligent, ancient, artistic, aesthetic, the food, les mille feuilles - any and everywhere in Paris. The heat and rains in Africa, especially the pungent smell of the earth after the rain in Zimbabwe ... or, singing around a campfire ...

No, I really do not think my soul has found its home yet and, quite honestly, I have no idea how to find it.

2. It's hard to live without at least one beloved vice or addiction. What's yours?

This question reminds me of The Actor's Studio: "What turns you on?"

Love and acknowledgment as a vice or addiction came in the form of feeling or thinking I was sexually attractive, and mistaking it for love. Not only would I get a real high on that, the worst part about it was I would feel worthwhile because of it.

Wanting to be acknowledged is a terribly painful addiction. Last night I saw the movie: Something the Lord Made. At one point Vivien Thomas' father mumbles in passing that a person should never wait for thanks for doing what's important or meaningful in ones life. I thought about that. So much of what I have done in my life has been to please or be recognized by the imaginary, internal, significant adults of my childhood. These, of course, have been transferred later in life to colleagues, people I work with or admire, friends, lovers or husbands.

In my self-alteration work through the years, I learn to feel worthwhile without all that. It's not easy ridding oneself of an addiction. Becoming older certainly forces me to realize that I am worthwhile without being sexually attractive! Oh dear! But I do achieve a tremendous amount of satisfaction in doing things lately just because they interest me or I want to, and not for the thanks or acknowledgment I used to crave so pathetically, desperately. And thank goodness. Because it just never was forthcoming. It was always an illusion.

Oh yeah, and talking of addiction: I still crave and enjoy a really good cup of coffee, of course.

3. What was your biggest "road not taken"?

Okay. My answer here is going to be really boring. I have wracked my brain around this one. Sure, it could have been my abortion. It also could have been a couple of guys I "should have" married. And then there was the opportunity to complete my doctorate at Urbana-Champagne after I was invited by one of the top experts in my field. I chose to stay in Buffalo to please my then adviser. Big mistake in OH so many ways.  But, and here's the big but, the boring but: quite honestly lately I am done with regrets. I really feel that what I have done in the past was pretty much the only way I could have done it, with who I was, knowing what I knew, feeling what I felt, at the time. I have learned so much from it all. Indeed, the main lesson for me has been that I made those choices then and I am able to make different ones now.

And so, my answer to this question has to be that I could not have taken any other road and no longer regret the past. In fact, I believe all those mistakes and painful choices have made me who I am. In fact, they have given me the opportunity to learn how to make different choices. Of course I do not for one moment think that I am totally in control of my life or choices even now! Life, circumstances, events, situations, interactions, accidents happen (even as we are making other plans), ever intersecting, interconnecting, inter depending. However, I do think, or at least hope that I will approach life or choose to handle situations differently from how I used to.

4. If there is one work of art (of any time, in any medium) that you would most love to have created, what is it and why?

A large family home, estate for orphan children from everywhere. When people used to ask me what I would do if I won a million dollars this was my answer. My dream creation would be to gather the best care and education people I have seen work with children, and together we would live on a large estate. The environment would be child sensitive and friendly with beautiful, aesthetic gardens and animals.

We would have two rules for the children in our orphanage: I want everyone to be safe here, and nothing you could do would be so bad that we would send you away.

In 1990 I read a book called You are My Brother, which told the tale of Father Wasson's Nuestros Pequenos Hermanos. It was exciting for me to read that someone had already created what I had always dreamed of. I based my two rules on one "basic condition" for the children:

... the sense of absolute security - which every child at Nuestros Pequenos Hermanos has, namely that he [she] will not be dismissed for any reason whatsoever. This principle is really the principle of unconditional motherly love. A mother loves her child unconditionally. If mothers loved their children only because they performed well or they did what the mothers liked, most infants would die.

Inherent in I want everyone to be safe here, for me comes I expect you to make an effort to be responsible for yourself and our community.

Why do I wish I could have or still would create this orphanage?

Because I believe to the depths of my being that many, many people, orphaned or not, are or have not been given a safe emotional environment nor have received unconditional love. Instead, education for socio-emotional behavior always seems to start out with labels, stereotypes, conditions and ostracism, and become eventually cruel and violent, including all forms of punishment and threats, isolation, exclusion and, even, in the extreme ... death. As Bruce Perry says, our society is child illiterate, we invent our socio-culture - it is not genetic, and every generation has choices about what gets passed on.

Oh dear, I have so much to say about all this. Making connections between early childhood and our global socio-emotional systems. Talking of perpetuating violence as socio-cultural solutions, I love Doris Lessing's five essays, Prisons We Choose to Live Inside about how we are influenced by our "savage past." For example, she describes how our leaders start using the word "blood ... [to] raise our temperatures [and then] ... this is a sign that reason is about to depart"

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure." ... "The blood shed by our soldiers will inspire us in the time of peace." "Only through blood can we be reborn." "The blood of our martyrs shall be our inspiration: never shall we forget the blood that has been shed for us all."

Oh well, lest I go on and on ...

In essence, I would like to create my dream orphanage for all children because basically I would like to live in an environment where I could practice what I preach.

And, if I am brutally honest with myself, it is really because I need to live and act out unconditional love in all its forms in order to rebuild my own inner child who suffered so much without it.

5. Describe a favorite childhood game that you made up and played alone or with a friend.

There were two.

I describe in detail the one played alone in my post: I Dream of Dali.

The second is the game "notes" I played with my friend Mimi described in Child Bloggers.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Amba, thank you so much for these questions. They sure got me thinking, searching out sources and squirming with honest self-divulgings!

Dear readers, if you have had the patience to read to the end of my ramblings and navel-gazings, and would like to participate in Meme: the Interview:

The rules of the game are as follows:

1. Include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.

2. E-mail the blogger of your choice or leave a comment saying "interview me please."

3. Your chosen interviewer asks five questions of his/her choosing.

4. Update your blog/site with answers to the questions.

5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, ask them five questions.

Comments

[amba]

Tamar!!! Do you realize that the shoebox with the rescued dolls is an early image of the orphanage???

How coherent a life is -- like a piece of music!!

Thank you. I also deeply love your answer about the "road not taken." I had thought when I asked the question that that was one of the possible answers. It's a good topic for Ronni when she comes back -- how growing older at its best is outgrowing regret.

[Tamar]

Amba, I just got goose bumps from your comment and many tears sprung to my eyes. Yes - the shoebox with rescued dolls is the orphanage. How wonderful. Thank you so much for that.

And for the interview and for your comment.
Love,
me

[Danny]

Wow, such fascinating questions and answers! I love this game! I'm sitting outside right now at L.A.'s old Farmers Market where I come every day to work on manuscripts and I'm looking around at the dozens of people I see here all the time. I want to go up to half of them and give them five questions to answer and then get five questions from the other half. But I won't, of course, because they'd think I was a psychopath. Why do I feel such intimacy with the people in my online life but I can barely make eye contact with strangers in my physical space?

Ah well—meet you on Boulevard St. Germain for a couple of mille feuilles??

[amba]

And, I love the thought that you were blogging as a child before there were blogs. "Born to Blog" . . .

[Tamar]

Ah, Danny - you're on! Boulevard St. Germain and those mille feuilles! YES! Just name the day and time.

Hmm, Amba, I like the idea that I was "born to blog." Yes indeed.

[Natalie]

Can I join that meeting on the Boulevard St Germain? But I'll have a croissant instead of the mille feuilles. Or maybe a croque monsieur. Anyway, when do we do it? Tamar, I love this interview and identify with much that is in your answers.
Now Tamar...erm... can I ask you to interview me? Is this the right way to ask? Do I understand the rules?

[Tamar]

Natalie,
Of course you may join the meeting at Boulevard St Germain. But are you sure you won't have any mille feuilles?

As for the interview - how grand! I will contact you via e-mail with 5 questions within the next day. Hurrah!

[Tamar]

Natalie, For some reason my e-mail provider is not allowing me to reply to your e-mail address. Therefore I will post these questions here and on your blog site.

Here is the content of my e-mail to you:

Hi Natalie,

I am honored that you would like me to interview you! As Amba said to me I feel it with you too: "Your blog's honesty sets an awfully high standard for this assignment."

But anyway ... Here are the questions:

1. Describe one (or more) thing that you would really like to see/do/get done/experience before you die.

2. Who were/are some of your emotional and/or spiritual influences? Tell us about as many as you need to name/describe.

3. Share how you learned about your gender identity. What are your earliest memories? What was fun or painful as you learned about these aspects of your identity?

4. How did you first become interested in blogging? Has it met your expectations or how does it meet your needs lately?

5. What are some of your favorite sayings?

[Natalie]

Tough questions, Tamar, but OK, you're on. I need a little time to mull this over. Thank you.

[Tamar]

Take all the time in the world, Natalie.

These are not tough enough for you! I am so looking forward to your answers.

Am wondering if you will illustrate some of them ... just wondering ... and ... perhaps ... hoping?