A dream about marriage and community

This piece is from the Friends Family Feast blog, where I occasionally wrote about dreams. The first part focuses on a personal dream, while the rest discusses a book I read about poverty. I plan to share old writings and dreams, because I love to illustrate how dreams fit in to a fully lived life. 

My, or anyone else's day, is not just about the dream. There are a number of thoughts, concerns, passions, ideas that pass through our heads. In some ways, I consider myself a gifted dream interpreter. In other ways, I know I don't have the advantage of knowing the fine details of one's life. Only the dreamer knows what s/he's going through and where s/he's been. You are the best interpreter, I like to think, of your dreams.

 

 

Monday, January 7, 2008

a village rant

Last night, I awoke from a dream and was then unable to sleep because of it. In the dream, I performed in a sort of acting troupe with two other girls and a guy. The guy's wife nagged him every time we had a rehearsal or performance. She always claimed that that date was the most important date of their lives, why was he doing this to her/them/the family/etc? I was clearly annoyed by her presence, but I fumed silently. Another girl, who seemed to be an alternate version of me, nudged him. Her attitude was like, Oh, not again. What's up with her? This is not OK. She never said, You need to leave her, divorce her or anything so severe. Her message was only to inspire change.

My feeling after this dream was clearly that the outspoken friend was the better one. It seems in our culture, people prefer to remain silent in matters of others' relationships. I'm a village girl myself and find it unacceptable for a "friend" to tell me it's not their place to take part in giving me feedback on my relationships. It's unacceptable for a friend to struggle silently in a difficult marriage, when she might benefit from the support, encouragement and council that such intimate relationships require. I believe it takes a village to raise a child, support a relationship, launch a career, anything. This dream had me contemplating the role of village in relationships for the next two hours.

It also brings me back to the book I recently read, Criminal of Poverty. Despite working their tails off and surviving unimaginable abuse, Tiny and her mom, Dee, struggled with poverty and homelessness. They had no village. As citizens, voters, whatever we are, we expect the government and other agencies to support struggling families. The truth is, they can only offer so much support. Families still go hungry, go without heat and power and other basics and get treated like criminals on top of that. It made me sick to read this story. These women did not stop working, creating, hustling to make enough to pay their rent or buy lunch for that matter. Tiny left school around sixth grade. How she wrote one of the most beautifully written stories I've ever read is beyond me. I finished sixth grade, college and even a writing workshop or two, and I only wish I could write as well.

I recently blogged that I would never experience their kind of suffering. While I am certain I could be broke, my village is too strong to allow this kind of despair.

But Tiny managed to find her voice, became an activist, or poverty scholar, as she called it and founded a magazine called POOR. In the midst of her success as a publisher, she continued living in poverty. I'm not even sure that she ever truly overcame it, tho she has become connected with other activists and rooted herself in community. She wrote of her life, caring for a disabled mother and how in other cultures, this is normal. In American culture, it's an anomaly to live in a multigenerational home. What a concept for a family to share resources and care for each other, rather than acquire individual houses, cars, etc. for each family member.

This book made me face judgments I've made in the past. I've ranted before about littering, which Tiny referred to as a crime of poverty. It made me consider why people litter in the first place. And while I like to see nature in its tidiest form, I was able to see the other side. It even made sense to me why my homes were burglarized twice in the past five years. In both instances, I wondered why on earth anyone would rob me. I always imagined burglars like the duo in Home Alone, staking out a rich neighborhood, where they could walk away with bags of jewelry and silver. Whether in Seattle or the outskirts of society, where I'm stationed now, I feel vulnerable to people trying to survive.

Jesse reminds me that his parents, in their day, survived by living off the land. I like to imagine people getting back to that, learning to harness the power of their land, if they have any and pull resources with people in their communities. Tiny suggests that there is no village or community mindset these days, because we have become so wrapped up in our capitalism. A lot to think about, especially with elections to come. I have come to a point, tho, where I feel like voting is only part of the solution. I no longer trust politicians to solve such problems as poverty. I believe that people--families and communities--have a lot more power than they think.