This is the newsletter version of Sara by the Season, where I explore a little bit of everything that’s on my mind as I try to lean into nature’s wisdom and rhythms. You can listen to me read you the newsletter by hitting play above - or you can click the little link above and to the right to play in your favorite podcast player. If you know someone who would like this sort of thing, I’d be so grateful if you would share it!
First, two stories:
The neighbor. This is a much longer story, but I’m trying to stick to the basics for the sake of brevity (never a strength of mine!). Over the course of several weeks, our neighbor’s friend’s dog who visits often had snapped or snarled at me, Wendell, and Maeve at various times. It seemed pretty harmless, but the snarling was scary. Then a few weeks ago, the dog ran up behind me and Wendell. I screamed. Probably a bit more loudly than the situation warranted, but I scare easily. Grant went into protector-mode and yelled at the dog to go home and in the direction of our neighbor and his friend to keep the dog away. We continued our walk into the “back 40,” as we call it. Shortly after the confrontation, our neighbor came zooming up on his golf cart. Grant and I assumed he would apologize and try to set things right. Instead, he shouted at us for several minutes and things got quite intense. Eventually, he calmed down, we explained the backstory, and things ended up as resolved as these kinds of situations can get.
The trail rockstar. I was running on the trail earlier this week. I don’t enjoy running so much as I enjoy having run, so I am not one of those happy runners you pass on the trail. I was slugging along the other day and came up behind a guy who at first I thought was on a very animated phone conversation, but then as I got closer, I realized that he was listening to music and playing along with air guitars, air drums, and also part of the audience with copious fist bumps and cheering. As I got closer, I could hear him singing very loudly; I didn’t recognize the song, but I could clearly make out all of the lyrics even with my own head phones in. And because he was quite loud and because I’m a slow runner, I could still hear him for several more minutes down the trail. I laughed to myself, happy to see (and hear) a person enjoying themselves so much seemingly without a care in the world. I turned around where I usually do, so I met him again on my way back. Or rather, I started hearing him still singing very loudly minutes before I saw him, still air guitaring and jamming with enthusiasm.
And.
This was where the connection between these two stories hit me. While I think our neighbor was pretty far out of line to jump straight to verbally attacking us, I also found myself strangely jealous - or at least quite curious - at our neighbor’s ability to own his position with no apologies or second guessing. It seemed to me like he was pissed at how Grant had handled the dog situation, and instead of even a minute of self-awareness, rode back to unleash his anger all over us. He didn’t seem to wonder if there was more to the story, or how his anger would affect our neighborly relationship, or any number of other hang-ups that regularly keep me from confronting people or situations that piss me off.
At first, I found myself appreciating trail rock star guy’s unabashed and unashamed enthusiasm for his playlist. In a similar way that I recognized from the neighbor situation, I even found myself a bit jealous of how he obviously didn’t care how he looked or if he was interrupting the tranquility of anyone else’s walk (the trail is always busy the time of morning that I was running, so there were lots of people that he had to have passed). But trail rock star guy’s antics reminded me of our neighbor, albeit in a far less confrontational way obviously.
What is it about these men that allows them to take up so much space with no apology or self-awareness? I guess part of the answer is toxic masculinity, but I’m not sure that is all of it. What is it about these two interactions that weirdly made me both angry and a little envious?
I don’t want to go around being an insensitive jerk, but I’m wondering if more of us should worry less about hurting people’s feelings as we advocate for the people, places, and causes that we care about. It seems to me that the assholes of the world aren’t walking around worried if they are being the asshole. It’s the rest of us tiptoeing around what we really think and feel so that we don’t hurt anyone’s feelings who spend our precious energy worried about what we said or how we said it.
The danger, when I set it up like this, is to think that the only two options that are available are for me to be the asshole or to be the doormat. But I don’t think that is the case: I think there is an entire continuum of options available to us. And I think that means that perhaps I have some things that I could learn from the men in the stories above.
I could give less caveats when I am standing up for something I care about. I could let myself be angry or passionate without apology. I don’t have to go full-tilt to the jerk side of things, but maybe the world needs more of us willing to lean into a little bit more unapologetic feistiness for the things, people, and places we care about?
Look, I even made us a very sophisticated drawing of some of our other possibilities:
Rants and raves
👍 The Secret to Superhuman Strength. Someone recommended this, but I can’t remember who. I put it on hold at the library, not knowing anything about it and obviously forgetting who had recommended it or why. Grant picked it up for me, and, honestly, had I been at the library, I probably would have reshelved it because I didn’t think I liked graphic novels (which it isn’t - it is a graphic memoir). BUT. I decided to give it a few pages. I got totally sucked in and finished it in an hour or so. I loved it, and I plan on reading all of her books now.
👍 Dopesick was really well done and heart-wrenching. I think everyone should watch it, especially since it appears the opioid crisis is just getting worse. I can’t believe Richard Sackler isn’t rotting in jail, and I say that as someone who has a ton of problems with incarceration in this country.
👍 Grant and I watched Happiest Season last year, so this year, we asked if the kids wanted to watch it with us. They both loved it, and Maeve declared it her new favorite Christmas movie. Dan Levy gives the best speech on coming out of all time (IMHO).
👎 The conservative Supreme Court justices, but especially the comments from Coney Barrett and Kavanaugh. When anti-abortion advocates have all of the foster parent needs filled in the communities they live in, I’ll be willing to listen to them. Until then, the hypocrisy, especially in light of so many of these same advocates’ actions during the ongoing pandemic, is almost too much for me.
Stuff worth sharing this week
The Supreme Court news this week had me revisiting this piece tracing how the Religious Right played Christians into single-issue voters. (Alternately, if this interests/maddens you and you want to dig in more, you have to read Jesus and John Wayne).
I’ve written many times about the importance of naming things. In that spirit, the conservative columnist for the WaPo is absolutely right.
I’m leading a winter solstice retreat of sorts and would love to practice and celebrate with you!
Cheers to leaning into your unapologetic feistiness in the week ahead!
Sara
the jerk or the doormat