January 1, I’ve got a lot of things on my mind.

Drop the last year into the silent limbo of the past. Let it go, for it was imperfect, and thank God that it can go. [Brooks Atkinson]

The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective. Unless a man starts on the strange assumption that he has never existed before, it is quite certain that he will never exist afterwards. Unless a man be born again, he shall by no means enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. [G.K. Chesterton]

I’ve been thinking about it a bit and I think there are a lot of things for me to choose from. I’m not really into the New Years resolution scene. At all. At all. I think, for me, it would be better to just work on one thing at a time, and not worry about making something my goal for a year, just to do it. Some interesting options:

-The elimination of polarizing labels from my vocabulary, as McLaren’s pondering. I wouldn’t mind dropping words like “liberal” and “conservative”, but there are some I would rather not give up. There are some movements that I am proud to align myself with. I am a feminist, for instance, and that’s a very divisive word in the spheres I generally run in, and I’m not interested in going all Palin and saying “Oh, I’m not going to label myself either way.” It’s something I’m committed to. Some things you either are or you aren’t. Which brings me to a second, sort-of similar option:

-No more name-calling. Which would mean no picking on “liberals” or “conservatives” or whatever group of people. It would also mean I couldn’t call people idiots, which is sometimes a very convenient thing to do, for instance, when you’re driving down the road and these people let their trash can fall over and roll down the hill at you, or when you feel like remarking on the alarming amount of people who engaged in political party-motivated vandalism and destruction this fall.

-Radical Honesty, which is something I did not make up but instead stole out of Extras. This character opted for brain surge (surgery) that made it impossible for him to lie. He couldn’t even pretend anything. It made for some awkward times when they were being kidnapped and pumped for information by aliens, but the interesting thing about it was that whatever he said, you knew it was the truth. But again. It made for some awkward times occasionally. I think just regular honesty would be a better and more truthful choice. I suppose if you don’t have to tell the truth, it can mean more when you choose to do so. But even so, I’m not really talking about truth-telling, I mean some kind of soul-honesty. Very few people at any given time know what’s going on in my head and in my heart. It is kind of funny since I am also what is termed a rather “emotional” person (meaning I cry a lot) but I don’t talk about it. I tend to shut that kind of conversation down pretty quickly, especially if I sense that the other entity envolved is not likely to understand. It’s hard for me to make friends. I’m a really loud person, once you get to know me, but that’s the thing of it, it takes forever for me to really get to be friends with someone, and not so many people care to stick around that long. 

-Loving other people. Everybody says they love other people, but I think most of us clearly don’t. In his book Blue Like Jazz, Donald Miller talks about this guy he met who was so annoying to him and he felt like he needed to let him know it, so he treated him like crap, sort of subtly. And then God was like WTF? and Don realized what he was doing, that he was really trying to change this other person because he couldn’t love and accept him the way he was. Once he figured out (the kind of figuring out that involves real work, not just knowing something in your brain) that his only interaction with this other person was supposed to be one of love and kindness, he could fully embrace the other person for who he was and he found that he even enjoyed his company. He even liked him. He just decided to be delighted about this guy’s existence.

-Peacemaking, which is something that gets talked about a lot, and it generates protests against wrong and pig-headed policies, which is good, but other times I think we don’t actually do much to put peace forward as an actual, viable option for all of us living together. Peace on Mother Earth starts with peace with you and peace with me. How are nations ever going to get along if individual people can’t do it?

-Just listening more, just trying to…understand people, I guess, instead of making snap judgments about them. I suppose you could also call it empathy.

I think I’m not going to choose one, I’m just going to work towards them all. They’re all summed up right here. Maybe someday I’ll get there..

Having trouble Thanksgiving/Christmas/Hanukkah/whatever shopping?

Here’s some neat things. :] All of these sites are either Fair Trade, organic or vegan–many are more than one of these.<3

The Fair Trade Federation has an enormous amount of categories you can browse, including but not limited to Africa, Asia, children, chocolate, coffee, custom orders, fabric, Latin America/Caribbean, organic, pottery, toys, woman-owned business, wood, worldwide, yarn and yoga.

The Hunger Site is offering tons of gifty items for sale, such as Peruvian sheepskin slippers, recycled rice tote bags, Afghan Pakol hats, Guatemalan coffee, handmade journals, and nativity scenes from around the world.

Fair World Gallery sells some really unique and fun things. Like gift bags and cards made out of elephant dung (I’m not kidding. There’s also a company called The Great Elephant Poo Poo Paper–they donate a portion of their profits to elephant welfare and conservation programs), AMAZING musical instruments from places like Peru, Kenya and Chile (*jealous*), really beautiful toys and games and yes, they sell Putumayo cds! 

Mercado Global has some gorgeous jewelry and scarves and…

Taraluna has all sorts of things: winter sets, Christmas ornaments (apparently featured in Good Housekeeping), teething toys, Hairy and the Xeko Eco-Pals, really beautiful shawls and scarves, children’s clothing and furniture, picnic supplies, organic pet toys..

Perfectly Natural has eco-apparel, safe toys, sippy cups..

Organic Fair Trade has everything: food, decor, clothing, jewelry, teething toys, organic supplements. My favorite items here: African girl doll from Uganda, “my worries” notepad, animal puppets from Brazil, “don’t worry” dolls :], organic veggie toys in a wooden crate, haha, and CIVIO, the civil rights card game.

The Groovy Mind hurts my eyes a little bit but they do have some fun things. They’ve got Kenyan finger puppets, a loooovely scarf/hood (“In the Hoodie”), bags made from recycled tire inner tubes and trash bags, license-plates-turned-purses-and-cd-holders, and gift boxes full of themed goodies.

And of course, everybody’s favorite coop: Frontier! Basically you can buy anything here. You can buy all the food you want. You can buy clothes, shopping bags, Glad Rags, makeup, gift baskets, cds of chanting monks. :]

Tea: Stash Tea, Art of Tea, Ambassador Organics, Equal Exchange, Mountain Rose Herbs, Friends of the Third World, Spotted Leopard Teas,  Coffee-Tea-Etc., Harney & Sons, Sacred Grounds, China Mist, Cafe Moto, Enchanted Teas, SerendipiTea,  Arbor Teas, Honest Tea, Steaz, Octavia Tea, Numi, Sympathy for the Kettle, The Groovy Mind, Taraluna, The Republic of Tea, and oh my lord, Zhena’s Gypsy Tea, which I must with my totally unbiased opinion proclaim as The Best. But okay, I like Stash and Steaz and Republic of Tea too. But oh my heavens. Zhena’s!

Chocolate and cocoa: check out Theo Chocolate, Equal Exchange, Dean’s Beans, Sweet Earth Organic Chocolates, Ithaca Fine Chocolates, Sojourn, The Groovy Mind, Nspired Natural Foods, La Siembra/Cocoa Camino, Omanhene, Yachana Gourmet, Divine Chocolate, Fair World Gallery, Nirvana Chocolates, Shaman Chocolates, Taraluna.

Coffee: check out Global Exchange, Equal Exchange, Cafe Campesino, Peace Coffee, Dean’s Beans, Larry’s Beans, Higher Grounds Trading Company, Cafe Moto, Cafe Mam, Just Coffee, American Joe, Higher Ground Roasters, Thanksgiving Coffee Company, Grounds for Change, Fair Trade Coffee Co., Intelligent Nutrients, Cafe Canopy, Morning Glory Coffee and Tea, Pura Vida Coffee, Coffee-Tea-Etc., Nectar of Life, Fair World Gallery, The Groovy Mind.

Beauty products: check out Ecco Bella, Wild Earth, Taraluna, Refreshingly Free, The Organic Makeup Company, Global Exchange, Perfectly Natural, ONEwithEarth, Mmmm…Handmade Soaps and Lotions, Origins, Mineral Fusion, Hard Candy, VeganStore, Different Daisy, Saffron Rouge, Afterglow Cosmetics, All Natural Cosmetics, Pink Quartz Minerals, Lavera.

Other socially conscious gift ideas: Bead For Life sells beautiful jewelry made by Ugandan women–when you support them, you’re supporting entire villages. Sojourners offers beautiful handmade cards crafted by orphans in Rwanda, handbags made from recycled materials by women who used to live on the world’s largest garbage dump, and journals made by men and women in a fair trade co-op in northern India, supporting remote villages and empowering women. And here’s a grand list of other companies that support social justice.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAND here’s some lovely coupons for you. :] Good deals for EO, Spirit Beauty Lounge, The New Green Company, Nimli, The One Eyed Turtle, Sweet Organics & Naturals, Hip and Zen, Bring Your Own Bag, Udderly Kid, Green Nest, Eco Lips, Imagiplay and more.

To all my Christian friends who are despairing right now: DON’T despair.

I know some of you (okay, actually most of my friends and acquaintances..) are still hyperventilating from last night’s results, so I would just like to e-hug you and remind you that everything is going to be okay. Even if your candidate lost. Observe this exerpt of the book we hold so dear:

Be a good citizen. All governments are under God. Insofar as there is peace and order, it’s God’s order. So live responsibly as a citizen. If you’re irresponsible to the state, then you’re irresponsible with God, and God will hold you responsible. Duly constituted authorities are only a threat if you’re trying to get by with something. Decent citizens should have nothing to fear.

Do you want to be on good terms with the government? Be a responsible citizen and you’ll get on just fine, the government working to your advantage. But if you’re breaking the rules right and left, watch out. The police aren’t there just to be admired in their uniforms. God also has an interest in keeping order, and [God] uses them to do it. That’s why you must live responsibly–not just to avoid punishment but also because it’s the right way to live.

That’s also why you pay taxes–so that an orderly way of life can be maintained. Fulfill your obligations as a citizen. Pay your taxes, pay your bills, respect your leaders.

Don’t run up debts, except for the huge debt of love you owe each other. When you love others, you complete what the law has been after all along. The law code–don’t sleep with another person’s spouse, dn’t take someone’s life, don’t take what isn’t yours, don’t always be wanting what you don’t have, and any other “don’t” you can think of–finally adds up to this: Love other people as well as you do yourself. You can’t go wrong when you love others. When you add up everything in the law code, the sum total is love.

But make sure that you don’t get so absorbed and exhausted in taking care of all your day-by-day obligations that you lose track of the time and doze off, oblivious to God. The night is about over, dawn is about to break. Be up and awake to what God is doing! God is putting the finishing touches on the salvation work [God] began when we first believed. We can’t afford to waste a minute, must not squander these precious daylight hours in frivolity and indulgence, in sleeping around and dissipation, in bickering and grabbing everything in sight. Get out of bed and get dressed! Don’t loiter and linger, waiting until the very last minute. Dress yourselves in Christ, and be up and about! [Romans 13, The Message. Emphasis mine.]

So yeah. If you feel like you need to take a little time to mourn or whatever (if this isn’t you, don’t laugh, there’s a ton of people even just in my pretty small circles who feel this way), do it. And then jump back in. No matter who you voted for, we’ve got something new going on and this country belongs to everybody.

In other news, this right here is what I was waiting for from both parties this entire campaign. I was waiting for graciousness, generosity, agreement to disagree and to work together. And every time it seemed like some sanity was about to come into play, they’d launch another commercial.

“The Star Money”

There was once on a time a little girl whose father and mother were dead, and she was so poor that she no longer had any little room to live in, or bed to sleep in, and at last she had nothing else but the clothes she was wearing and a little bit of bread in her hand which some charitable soul had given her. She was, however, good and pious. And as she was thus forsaken by all the world, she went forth into the open country, trusting in the good God.

Then a poor man met her, who said, “Ah, give me something to eat, I am so hungry!” She reached him the whole of her piece of bread, and said, “May God bless it to your use,” and went onwards. Then came a child who moaned and said, “My head is so cold, give me something to cover it with.” So she took off her hood and gave it to him. And when she had walked a little farther, she met another little child who had no jacket and was frozen with cold so she gave it her own. A little farther on one begged for a frock, and she gave away that also. At length she got into a forest and it had already become dark, and there came yet another child, and asked for a little shirt, and the good little girl thought to herself, “It is a dark night and no one can see you, you can very well give your little shirt away”; and took it off, and gave away that also.

And as she so stood, and had not one single thing left, suddenly some stars from heaven fell down, and they were nothing else but hard, smooth pieces of money, and although she had just given her little shirt away, she had a new one which was of the very finest linen. Then she gathered together the money, put it into the shirt and was rich all the days of her life. [from Grimm's Complete Fairy Tales]

I read this fairy tale last night before I went to bed and I thought it was interesting. And a lovely little story. When speaking of the Brothers Grimm, you have to understand that Jacob and Wilhelm didn’t really write bedtime stories for children–the Disney versions you’ve seen of Cinderella, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty have all been cleaned up and G-ified. Here’s what really happens: Cinderella’s stepsisters chop their feet up. Snow White suffocates to death in a corset. If anyone’s wondering about Rapunzel, her prince took a suicidal leap from the tower and his eyes were gouged out with thorns..Anyway, the point is, they often seem to be more about the consequences of stupidity or laziness. I love them anyway. They’re hilarious. But this one sticks out because it pretty much just radiates positivity.

Where was everyone? Why didn’t anyone help her? My guess is they were all at home watching Jeopardy, reading their newspapers, grocery shopping. In church.

This little girl had nothing. When she met people in need, she didn’t give what she could afford–she gave what she could. She could afford nothing.

What if the reason she was so extravagantly generous is that she knew first-hand the value of receiving such a gift? She knew how it felt to be overlooked, denied and turned away and what a difference such a small gift would make in these childrens’ lives.

What would happen if we were so generous? If we gave what we could instead of what we could afford? Would the stars fall? Who knows? And if stars did fall every time someone gave deeply from the heart when they saw a need, what does it say about us that there are so many stars still in the sky?

Mother Teresa was not a superhero.

Mother Teresa was born Gonxha (Agnes) Bojaxhiu in Yugoslavia on August 27, 1910. It didn’t occur to her until she was 18 to become a nun, but she had always been captured by stories of missionary life and service. At 18, she joined the Loreto Sisters of Dublin, missionaries dedicated to the education of young girls. A sister novice remembered her as “very small, quiet and shy”. Another member of the congregation defined her as “ordinary”. Even after leaving them, she valued her beginnings with the Loreto sisters and remained close to them.

In 1931 Gonxha chose the name Teresa for herself and became a high school history and geography teacher in Calcutta for the next 15 years. The poverty she saw outside the convent walls impressed her so deeply that in 1948 she requested permission to leave the school in order to work in the slums. She had no money, but when she started an open-air school for slum children, volunteers and financial support showed up. In 1950, Mother Teresa received permission to start her own order, The Missionaries of Charity, whose goal was to love people nobody was prepared to look after. (Today the order includes Active and Contemplative branches of Sisters and Brothers all over the world, providing effective help to the poorest of the poor in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, as well as tackling natural disaster relief work, shut-in invalids, alcoholics, the homeless and AIDS victims.) Mother Teresa died on September 5, 1997, after more than 50 years of tireless service.

One biography describes her spirit like this: “Mother Teresa was always her own person, startlingly independent, obedient, yet challenging some preconceived notions and expectations. Her own life story includes many illustrations of her willingness to listen to and follow her own conscience, even when it seemed to contradict what was expected.”

I am not Catholic, but when people ask who inspires me, Mother Teresa’s pretty near the top of the list. I can’t think of anyone who was Jesus to the world as well as her. So when they announced her journals were going to be published, I wasn’t quite sure what to do with that. How could they disrespect her wishes so blatantly? She wanted her journals destroyed unread. But how could we destroy the tangible thoughts of such a woman when, by publishing them, we can all learn so much from her? Her journal entries reveal her own struggles and problems, her loneliness and her heart’s desires, and her feelings that God was far away from her and that whatever good she was doing, it was nothing compared to what she could be doing and therefore not enough. That’s one reason they’re so valuable to me. It’s important for me to know that Mother Teresa was not, is not, will never be a superhero, regardless of her canonized status. Mother Teresa was a person who caught a glimpse of God and spent her entire life chasing desperately after the rest of him.

No better way to say it than the way she said it herself:

“Joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls.”

“Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier.”

“The most terrible poverty is loneliness and the feeling of being unloved.”

“If you can’t feed a hundred people, then feed just one.”

“What we do is less than a drop in the ocean. But if it were missing, the ocean would lack something.”

“If you judge people, you have no time to love them.”

“It is easy to love the people far away. It is not always easy to love those close to us. It is easier to give a cup of rice to relieve hunger than to relieve the loneliness and pain of someone unloved in our home. Bring love into your home for this is where our love for each other must start.”

“There are many in the world dying for a piece of bread, but there are many more dying for a little love.”

“If you find serenity and happiness, some people may be jealous. Be happy anyway.”

“The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow. Do good anyway.”

“Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin.”

“Like Jesus we belong to the world living not for ourselves but for others. The joy of the Lord is our strength.”

“When a poor person dies of hunger, it has not happened because God did not take care of him or her. It has happened because neither you nor I wanted to give that person what he or she needed.”

“A clean heart is a free heart. “

“There is a terrible hunger for love. We all experience that in our lives–the pain, the loneliness. We must have the courage to recognize it. The poor you may have right in your own family. Find them. Love them.”

“Before you speak, it is necessary for you to listen, for God speaks in the silence of the heart.”

“Give yourself fully to God. He will use you to accomplish great things on the condition that you believe much more in his love than in your own weakness.”

“I pray that you will understand the words of Jesus, “Love one another as I have loved you.” Ask yourself, “How has he loved me? Do I really love others in the same way?” Unless this love is among us, we can kill ourselves with work and it will only be work, not love. Work without love is slavery.”

“Do not think that love, in order to be genuine, has to be extraordinary. What we need is to love without getting tired.”

“Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person.”

“Each one of them is Jesus in disguise.”

“Every time you smile at someone, it is an action of love, a gift to that person, a beautiful thing.”

“I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world.”

“It is a kingly act to assist the fallen.”

“It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.”

“Let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love.”

“Let us not be satisfied with just giving money. Money is not enough, money can be got, but they need your hearts to love them. So, spread your love everywhere you go.”

“Many people mistake our work for our vocation. Our vocation is the love of Jesus.”

“One of the greatest diseases is to be nobody to anybody.”

“The success of love is in the loving–it is not in the result of loving. Of course it is natural in love to want the best for the other person, but whether it turns out that way or not does not determine the value of what we have done.”

“There is always the danger that we may just do the work for the sake of the work. This is where the respect and the love and the devotion come in–that we do it to God, to Christ, and that’s why we try to do it as beautifully as possible.”

“We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature–trees, flowers, grass–grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence…We need silence to be able to touch souls.”

“We shall never know all the good that a simple smile can do.”

“Words which do not give the light of Christ increase the darkness.”

“There should be less talk; a preaching point is not a meeting point. What do you do then? Take a broom and clean someone’s house. That says enough.”

“The poor give us much more than we give them. They’re such strong people, living day to day with no food, and they never curse, never complain. We don’t have to give them pity or sympathy. We have so much to learn from them.”

“I see God in every human being. When I wash the leper’s wounds, I feel I am nursing the Lord himself. Is it not a beautiful experience?”

“People are generally irrational, unreasonable and selfish. they deserve to be loved anyway.”

“When you don’t have anything, then you have everything.”

“The person who gives with a smile is the best giver because God loves a cheerful giver.”

“You should never lose heart. God is merciful and kind–he has endowed you with the best gift–smile, which can make millions happy.”

“It hurt Jesus to love us. We have been created in his image for greater things, to love and to be loved.”