On the Far Side of Revenge

Or how to hold a candle while the fire wants to burn

So hope for a great sea-change

On the far side of revenge.

Believe that a further shore

Is reachable from here.

Believe in miracles

And cures and healing wells.

— Seamus Heaney, from The Cure at Troy

I lay awake the other night listening to the wind howl. Checked my phone in the dark: gusts of 33 knots. Ordinarily I find this comforting – this reminder that I live on a rock out at sea. I feel safe here with the owls and the swaying oaks outside my bedroom window. I know that in the morning there will be a thousand bunny tracks criss-crossing the remaining snow. Maybe the otters will be back, fishing off ice floes down on the pond. And the hellebores, bashed about as they are, will still be blooming, frosty pink dusted with powdered sugar.

Ordinarily I am comforted. But not this night. I tossed and turned. My teeth hurt (bridge work). I thought obsessively about the plane crash in Washington, my childhood home. Checked my phone again in the dark to see if there might be any survivors.

Mostly I couldn’t sleep because I was on fire. Still am.

Here I’ve been doing everything that I possibly could all these years to carefully shape and hone my sobriety, to manage my own unique set of challenges, to keep things simple and avoid drama, to let go of resentments that are the number one enemy of serenity. And now I find out that I’ve got a spark of anger inside me that wants to leap into flames.

I’m not worried that I’m going to drink; I’m worried that I’m going to explode.

And here is where I say, with all the love and compassion I can muster for those of you reading who, just like me, have a right to your own beliefs and ideologies which might in fact not be the same as mine, I will understand if you stop reading or disengage from Sixburnersue.

I’m not interested in talking you out of your worldview or trying to impose mine on you. I’m simply trying to work through the anger I have felt this week. It is my anger, I own it, and it cannot be taken away from me by debate, argument, or well-meaning rationalizations. It just is.

I kept my mouth mostly shut and my ears open in two telephone conversations the universe saw fit to deliver to me this week — conversations with two people I care about (from different realms of my life) who happen to have voted for President Trump (I did not) and who therefore (presumably) support, like many Americans, policies and ideologies and methodology that I happen to find odious – actions and words that I think are deceitful, self-serving, egoistic, cruel, conniving, untenable, archaic, racist, cavalier, obsequious, unmerciful, dangerous and deliberately destabilizing.

I have listened as best I could and I will continue to love and listen to these people as I am able. I understand that they (maybe you) have a different vision of the future than I do. Maybe they wish for a smaller government and less bureaucracy, maybe they want change and recognition and prosperity, or maybe they find liberal values anathema, even threatening. I say “or” because I also know that lumping everyone into one big “they,” as both “sides” tend to do, is a form of reductionism that only promotes divisiveness. Each of us has our own unique set of values and concerns.

But I am also angry – at people. And I have a right to feel that anger. It isn’t comfortable and it isn’t good for my serenity, but neither is letting it smolder inside of me.

I have discovered this week that I react viscerally to injustice, and my reaction is not coming from my brain – it is coming from my gut. I can’t just turn it off.

I need to repeat that: I react viscerally to injustice.

I don’t like when people get picked on. I don’t like it when individuals or whole groups are falsely blamed for things they did not do – especially when the blamer, a supposed leader, will not accept responsibility for anything that goes wrong, ever. I don’t like it when someone uses tragedy for political posturing. (To hear the president politicize the plane crash, throwing blame around like piñata candy, was stomach-turning.) And I really don’t like it when people write off this kind of behavior as just a personality tic, or worse, stand next to said leader and support his preposterous accusations.

I don’t like it when an avowed anti-Semitic billionaire who aligns himself with white nationalists is given the power to play around with thousands, maybe millions of people’s lives (not to mention the federal payment system) like a cat with a mouse between its paws. I don’t like it when cavalier, impulsive, egotistical behavior results in the interruption of humanitarian aid, life-saving research, and programs that prevent abuse of women.

And I don’t like it when a powerful person with a megaphone – a person who is supposed to be not only an adult and a leader, but also the leader of our country, uses lies and distortion to feed red meat to haters – thereby empowering them to act, increasing the possibility that they will harm others.

The fact that vulnerable and innocent people may be harmed by this behavior enrages me.

There may be an explanation for my feelings. According to Kurt Gray, a professor of psychology and neuroscience, and director of the Deepest Beliefs Lab at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, my reaction is based on an evolutionary response to fear. In his new book, “Outraged: Why We Fight About Morality and Politics and How to Find Common Ground” (reviewed by Elizabeth Kolbert in The New Yorker), the author suggests that moral outrage is directly linked to a perceived threat, and that we therefore react with gut instinct as opposed to rational thought.

He goes on to explain that even though we all have this type of moral outrage, we have different ideas of who the vulnerable are or who the victims are, and that sets up the conflict. Who is the oppressor and who is oppressed?

Up until now, it has been difficult for me to share my outrage. I am not generally an activist, and my goal in writing Sixburnersue has been (and still is) to share ways that I find beauty and meaning in life – especially in nature, to share how I manage sobriety and work on my well-being, and to occasionally explore how my roots and personal experience influence my life and outlook today.

But I realized this week that I don’t get to make a decision about speaking up. That decision has been made for me. No matter how much I want to stay inside my little crab shell (and believe me, I am most comfortable there), my constitution will not allow me to tolerate injustice. I may be safe for now, but I have friends and neighbors who are not. Today the streets of Martha’s Vineyard were empty and quiet while many in our Brazilian community (20 percent of our year-round population, many born here, many legal immigrants, some not) stayed home or kept children out of school as rumors circulated of the arrival of ICE on the Island.

I have friends with transgender children. Many LGBTQ friends. Black friends. Jewish friends. Friends with disabilities. And, uh, female friends – those of child-bearing age, those who are older and on fixed incomes, those with compromised immune systems who are particularly vulnerable to infectious diseases. Friends who work for NGOs that provide aid to millions. Many friends who work for or volunteer for one of over 100 nonprofit organizations on Martha’s Vineyard that are the literal backbone of our community. They provide care for children before and after school, bring food to homebound seniors, counsel addicts, run animal shelters, protect and preserve our land and waters, provide emergency and standard medical care, create safe havens, operate museums and art programs, raise money for scholarships, preserve Island history and more.

Most of these organizations exist thanks to the generosity of year-round and seasonal Vineyard residents, but many are also sustained by grants, both state and federal. Yes, I understand we need to reduce government spending. But using chaos, intimidation, and discrimination to achieve that goal isn’t going to work out well in the long run, I don’t think. And it will certainly do much harm.

And all of it stems from the fact that people are willing to support and rally around a narcissist who prioritizes revenge, defamation, and self-affirmation over collaboration, support, and justice.

What do I do with my anger so that it doesn’t eat me up? I think I have taken the first step by owning it, by writing about it. By telling myself it is okay to have it. I don’t have to remain in the polite box of my upbringing that discourages me from “improper” behavior, from speaking out. Next, I can offer support to those who are vulnerable when I’m able. I can look for other opportunities in my community to participate in solutions. I can continue to read, read, read to stay informed.

I can continue to look for beauty, to celebrate good and simple things.

And I can pray – and hope. As Jane Goodall says:

People think hope is about wishful thinking, and actually hope is about action. Humanity is at the mouth of a very long, dark tunnel. Right at the end, there’s a little star – that’s hope. But it’s no good sitting at the mouth of the tunnel and wishing the star here. We’ve got to roll up our sleeves and climb over, crawl under, work our way around all the problems between us and the starlight.

And I can believe, as poet Seamus Heaney wrote, that a further shore is reachable from here. It is going to take a lot of rowing, I think. 💚

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Note: I am sorry I inadvertently shut off comments last week. But this week, though this is a free post, open to all to read, I am intentionally restricting comments to paid subscribers, due to the nature of this post.

The Long Goodbye

Cracked Open

My Vineyard