Brian and I watched a new Hannah Gadsby special a couple nights ago. She spoke of the fits she would get into, panicked by the question “What should I do?” repeated in her head. Her wife (also-producer) learned to jolt her out of panic with a different question, “Who do you want to be?”
I sat in the Princeton University chapel this morning, attending the seminary graduation of a mentee of my husband, though she is also a woman for whom I have held some conscious-feminine-spaces. Our presence here, for me, was for him. It mattered a lot to him to be here for this. While our married way is not to force the direct ask between us, it was as close to it as we come. I had nothing but reservations, no desire to be here, though I wish her well. Just as I yearn to be as useless to capitalism as possible, I also yearn to participate as little in “anything Princeton” as possible. Without disrespect or dishonoring, but also without accord or acquiescence. It was an uneasy day of going-along, being kind, yet also staying in my own center amidst activities and conversations I find little value in anymore. He is grateful; I am pleased to have been able to do this for him.
And now I sit in a familiar haven–Small World Coffee. A pot of Earl Grey rests next to me, like it always did, for the decade I was here. I have paused with gratitude at the tombstone of James E. Loder, of blessed memory. I cried belly tears at the singing of “The Call,” always the Choral Prelude, feeling deeply David A Weadon (z”l). I got to sit on the porch of a friend here, Clift Black, enjoying the last of a bottle of Scotch (though I usually do not like Scotch). It was a sweet, real, relational space I was genuinely sad to leave. I even got to sit with Brian in a marvelous restaurant last night, enjoying the piano artistry of Bob Egan, the gentle soul-artist who played our wedding dinner nearly 23 years ago. He has a stunning ability to get strangers to gather around a piano, sing show tunes, making sweet communion, community. It has been a beautiful trip, full of memory and surprise, with deep satisfaction for what I’ve advocated, pursued. I do not feel panicky, but I do feel the press of the question: who do I want to be?
I want to be the woman who
can rage at the dehumanizing, even traumatizing things here while weeping, drenched in gratitude in the sacred beauty of what I’ve known here
can speak plainly of the pain doled out by unthinking, emotionally-unaware professors refusing responsibility for the shadows we create in higher education
can show up for the man she loves while not losing herself or disregarding the realities within which we travel…
Which is who I am here, now.
Deep gratitude.
Time to go home.