Transcending
Today I had a total paradigm shift. Certain people in my life who love me, and tend to see the best in me, and are not at all objective, have told me that I should write more. I’ve definitely walked all the way away from this blog by now. My usual response to “Melissa, you should write more” is “I don’t have anything to say.” I don’t know if that’s true, or if I haven’t valued what I had to say very highly. I’m definitely someone who likes to sit back and observe and absorb. As Aaron Burr says in Hamilton, “I am not standing still I’m lying in wait.” I think 2017 might be my moment to pounce.
So my realization this morning was that I have a valuable and unique perspective. For the past year or so I’ve soundly rejected the concept that people live in bubbles and that they are to blame for our divisions in this country. I think that’s because I have lived in both bubbles. If I live in one now it’s because I chose to propel myself out of another one and formed my own like some sort of cultural cephalopod.
Me leaving Florida.
So here I stand as the nearly perfect, only slightly biased now, conduit between two bubbles. One of the most offensive things ever said to me was that I used “Republican” like a curse word, but I see now that it was 100% motivated by self loathing and overcorrection (and I maintain that wasn’t true). I grew up in a pretty conservative home. I think my dad was a union buster at some points despite being a pretty blue collar guy himself for a while. I revered Ronald Reagan for most of my life. I was raised as a fundamentalist Christian and attended private Christian school for all of my 13 years before college. I lived in suburbs or rural areas until I was 30.
I’ve also been a public school teacher for nearly 12 years. I’m a liberal independent (left of Democrat - maybe Democratic Socialist). I’m a member of a union now, and I vote how they tell me to usually. Jimmy Carter is my favorite president. I’m a progressive Christian now with days of agnostic humanism. I nearly have a Master’s Degree and have exceeded the educational level of all of my direct ancestors. I live in one of the most liberal cities in the country, and have fully embraced my car-free composting lifestyle.
With all of that said, I think that makes my viewpoint necessary and in fact IMPORTANT in the current cultural and political climate. I can see both sides (even though I agree with one more than the other now). I can personally speak to the pros and cons of both private and public education. I recognize both sides live in a bubble (the suburban/conservative bubble was basically ignored in the post-election think piece fervor). Anyway I’m here. I have something to say.
