The Dark Side of Organizing

The very first post I wrote for this blog outlined the issues my Third Third had raised. The second post was about de-cluttering, and included eight thoughts on de-cluttering. Here I am years later, and all those are still big issues.

In the first blog, I asked, “Why is this Third Third such a big deal?” I gave ten answers, but the first one began, “It’s colored by mortality.” So now, get ready for a pandemic-influenced, dark-outside, morbid blog.

This is how my Third Third began: with organizing! I loved organizing/de-cluttering! It meant things that were strewn all over the place found their preferred location in my now-orderly universe. That new place was more attractive, aesthetically pleasing, neat, accessible, tidy. So, for instance, my hundreds of Anchorage Daily News columns found their way into my handmade books. Books were donated and only favorites held prime spots on the bookshelves. Videos became DVDs.

Organizing made my present and future more pleasant, cleansed of clutter.

It’s not that organizing itself was always smooth and pleasant. Every project suffered from setbacks and lost momentum, but when they were finished, it was terrific!

But lately, some other feeling appeared. After finishing the glorious collection of family recipes in my exquisite, artful, photo recipe book, friends called it a “legacy.”

How lovely! In that first blog, the fifth point in “Why is this Third Third such a big deal” was “What legacy do I leave behind?” Wow, now I had a legacy!

One I’d leave behind. After I was dead. (Cue the dark and the pandemic.)

Then I tackled the photo albatross: I culled, I tossed, I labeled, I mounted in a photo album for easy viewing. I actually finished it! Victory! … Not really. It seems I went from De-cluttering Reason #1 (“You have to toss some of your old life to make room for a new life.”) to #8 (Your kids don’t want your shit.) In other words, my organizing stopped feeling like I was making a new life, but rather packing up my old life for posterity.

My sister says, “Yeah, but as you went through the photos, you were reminded of each fun time and enjoyed them all over again.” Yes, all those fun times in the past.

Here’s another example: Tim and I have been meeting with a financial counselor, as we have every now and then over the years. Previous visits were like: Is this the best way to save? What can we do now so we can REALLY do something big next year or in two years? And how big can it be? Now, our financial plan has this big word in it: Estate. We’re not just looking at bank accounts or mutual funds; we’re looking at our estate.

Estates are for dead people.

Oh, I am getting very morbid. Instead of feeling like every paper I put in its proper file is clearing my desk, I feel like it’s making it easier for my survivors to find.

My siblings, who have no children, have different reactions. My sisters worry about where it will go; my brother happily says, “In the trash.” “But who will sort through it? Who will handle it?” the sisters ask. “No sorting. Whoever gets the house just throws it all out.” And he sweeps his hand across the Zoom screen.

Just today, my friend Chris asked, “What if all your photos, all your saved stuff, just vaporized? Isn’t it just … stuff?” She’s right. My files of community projects, places we’ve visited, high school yearbooks, appliance warranties – those can all vaporize.

But I have a different feeling about my writing. My mother used to write stories – she called her collection “Chicken Every Friday.” I read them once as a teenager, and they were really good. But they’re gone. Just gone. I would have liked to sit with her innermost thoughts. I would have liked to remember her that way.

So every time I encounter another piece of my writing, I don’t think happy organizing, clear-the-clutter, how-clean-how-tidy thoughts. I think of being remembered. Isn’t that what we’d all like, to be remembered well? Isn’t that a part of our Third Thirds experience?

In the dark of Covid winter, some thoughts are too bleak to entertain. But in the dark of Covid winter, some thoughts just sit and sit. That’s why this post has been so long in coming. I gave you a warning sign!

(I have heard that opening the door at midnight is supposed to help put 2020 to bed. And for extra insurance, I’ve Googled how to make a hot toddy to toast the arrival of 2021.)

Back to School (Reunion Version)

I drive onto the university grounds, following the signs for the parking lots on the grassy fields. The first lot, the closest one, says “50+.” Oh, whoa, I think, I can’t park there. That’s for the old people.

Wait a second: I’m here for my 45th reunion. Next time, I’ll be in the 50+!

Nothing like a reunion weekend to bring up the issues of time, aging, memory, way back when, and what next. The place you lived for four years and whizzed around on your bicycle in your sleep is now so full of new buildings – and even a whole new quad – that you are hopelessly lost and disoriented enough to feel disconnected from your own history.

And the class book is filled with so many people you never met that you wonder, Did I really go here? Or did I just inhabit some little insignificant corner?

Nothing like a college campus to generate an identity crisis.

Cindy says, “I worked for Congresswoman Bella Abzug the summer after you.”

“You did? That’s amazing! Why didn’t I know that?”

“Barbara, we know that. We’ve known that. We’ve talked about that.”

Candy is in the photo the night Bella came to dinner. “Candy, I didn’t remember you lived in that house.” “Barbara, you were there???”

The question of identity is time-sensitive. We were who we were once, and some part of us lingers and endures, but what if it’s a part we can’t remember?

Well, then, you still have a great time meeting new people. They have all come back because something interesting beckons, some learning, some exploration, some mystique. I meet Jan (whom I never knew) walking from the parking lot, Ann in a long conversation over lunch, the two aerospace engineers as we discussed the 737 MAX.

And then, there are The Friends. We met freshman year, and we endure. Dennis in from London, Debbie from D.C., Bob from Mill Valley, May and Bet from Oakland. Gayle from Las Vegas, Joy and Jeff from southern California. Neil hurt his hip, so he and Lee Ann can’t make it. Even Jon makes his appearance! We are like Shangri-La: we reopen every five years and we know we’ll always be there. Until, we don’t, and then we’ll miss them each year, like we miss Sally for the first time for always.

There is a class on climate change, a class taught by an ambassador to Russia, a computer musician who built a laptop orchestra, a class on poverty-stricken cities that can no longer even provide 9-1-1. I love all this learning, engaging, access to great thinkers!

But in a class participation session on post-retirement, everyone else seems to have found their rhythm while I’m still … experimenting. I tell them how, in search of something I could repair that wasn’t getting fixed, I couldn’t even get the goose poop cleaned up from a park! I’m looking for my legacy, and it’s elusive. “I’m Barbara, and I waste time.” Everyone laughs.

Afterwards, I hear from LOTS of people: they relate! What a surprise! We are all – always – feeling our way. That’s it. We are all – always – just feeling our way.

Meanwhile, I’m reading Kurt Vonnegut’s Timequake. He writes:

Still and all, why bother [writing]? Here’s my answer: Many people need desperately to receive this message: “I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people don’t care about them. You are not alone.”

We are all – always – just feeling our way! We are not alone.

One of the classes is “Cultivating Calm: Spiritual Practices for a Healthy, Whole Life.” How could I resist? She talks to us about The Tree of Contemplative Practices, and I didn’t know storytelling counted! And volunteering! And marches! So instead of focusing on how I don’t have the patience to meditate, I can see the benefits of what I am doing.

But this is what she says. She says the best thing she can help a student do is to get that student to wrestle with this question: “Who am I and who do I seek to become for the sake of the world?”

That question never ends! That is my question forever. It was my first identity crisis, and it will be my last, and wrestling with it is the point.

I have gone back to college, and I have learned something.

Aha!

Is leisure something we have to earn?

If after leading his country’s fight against apartheid, after spending 27 years in prison, after serving five years as his country’s president, if after all that, Nelson Mandela had just wanted to retire and relax; would he worry that he was lazy and unproductive? Would his legacy remain intact?

Tuesday, I wrote about the wonderful, accomplished, generous Sharon. But now I’m going to add a little more to the story. When Sharon saw the post I’d written about Shirley Mae, this is what she said, “She is such a force! I am now feeling completely inadequate to even being interviewed by you. I do nothing in retirement but sew, have dinner parties, a little gardening, and make gifts for people.”

Do you recognize yourself in a headset like this? I do. Almost every woman I know does.

There are two directions my mind goes when I think about this. There’s the general legacy question – and why I added the Nelson Mandela example: when can someone rest on his or her laurels? In retirement, do the accomplishments of our previous Thirds give us a pass to just enjoy our Third Third? If we work hard, do we get to play? (Listen to me! I know I sound like some rigid Puritan debating whether we’ve earned enough points for heaven, but it’s a real question.)

And then there’s the self-esteem question, which is particular: do I feel like I’ve personally done enough, contributed enough? If things count, do my things count? Did I earn my play time? And if my things don’t really count, that means any leisure on my part is just an excuse for deep and unrelenting laziness.

Yes, even I know this sounds very hair-shirt-ish – I’m starting to think these last two paragraphs are grounds for seeking therapy – but that’s the extreme version. I think the question goes to our sense of “ought” and “should” and worthiness.

It reminds me of the annual Women of Achievement Awards, an annual YWCA event. Hundreds of women would listen to the stories of the awardees: they saved lives, started businesses, raised kids who got Ph.D.s, baked their own bread, won elections, and – oh, by the way – built their own houses. These are incredible women and we applauded them … and then walked away feeling mediocre (at best).

We are supposed to be inspired by these stories, and we are. But … then we catalog our deficiencies.

My friend Connie and I were noting how we are so generous when we look at other people and their value in the world and so un-generous with ourselves.

As my friend Linnea was preparing to travel overseas – as she was hustling to get it all together – she took the time to write me a note. I’d been in one of my “I am a value-less time waster” phases, and she wrote a note to tell me how I’ve made a difference in her life. My reaction? Delight and pleasure and … why wasn’t I as thoughtful as Linnea in showing appreciation?

We have to stop doing this!
    (Uh, oh – has everyone else already stopped and I really do need therapy???)

A long time ago, a friend was into enneagrams, which (near as I can tell) are like some new age Myers-Briggs personality categories. I was a 4. She said I could see how something would be really terrific … if just this change was made. Fours look at a room and say, “It’s decorated beautifully; it just needs a lamp over there.” Supposedly, we notice what’s missing.

We can’t all be 4s when it comes to ourselves!

When I was pregnant, I thought about what life lesson I would want to impart to my daughter. I summed it up as “touch the world with care and when you leave, leave love behind.” I haven’t been a good poster child, but I still get shivers when I think the thought, and I see it clear as day when I reflect on Sharon and others who demonstrate kindness in their lives.

So maybe today’s thought is to extend that same kindness to ourselves.

I will make a will!

Here I am, looking for purpose, meaning, and simplicity in my Third Third. Fretting over it, writing about it, thinking it to death. Making plans, researching options, supposedly leaving no stone unturned.

But now I am embarrassed to admit – yes, even more embarrassed than being caught peeing by the side of the road:

I do not have a will.

Didn’t hear that? Let me try again: I do not have a will.

The universe screams in outrage: How did you get to be this old without a will?!? And with a daughter?!? How could you have left her care so unprotected?!? What were you thinking???

I didn’t get around to it.

Mostly, I just kept putting it on the back burner. Procrastinating. Tim and I did visit a lawyer and start the whole process, but it kind of derailed over the choice of guardian. I kept observing the changing life situations of assorted family members and I just couldn’t be sure. They kept moving in and out of most favored guardian status. Observing this, Tim went ahead and made an interim will, but I kept dodging closure on the subject.

It’s not like I couldn’t face the Death Thing. I have very clear and thorough Advanced Directives. I’ve covered every base in my attempt to avoid a miserable end of life.

But as to the end itself? I’ve got nothing in writing.

Well, that’s going to change because now there’s Wills Week – this week, May 9-13. Starting Tuesday, there are free community events to guide us through the process. Take a look: www.alaskawillsweek.org. On the website, we downloaded a really useful workbook.

Here I’ve been writing about de-cluttering and clearing out stuff so our daughter wouldn’t have to face a houseful of junk, and we leave a potential legal and financial mess for her. What kind of legacy is that? Just when she’d be grieving, I’d give her headaches?

Nope, not anymore. We’re doing this. You, too?

They shouldn't have had to wait till their Third Thirds

Yesterday, Jay and Gene were married for the fourth or fifth time. But only now – finally, finally! – is it legal in all its details. Their first marriage in Anchorage was commitment-only, not legal. The Portland marriage was nullified by the State of Oregon. In between there were Canadian and South African weddings, but those were either missing some certification or only led to civil unions. (I may be inaccurate on some of these; it’s very confusing.)

So a love that blossomed in their Second Thirds had to wait till their Third Thirds to finally be legal. It’s a terrible shame … and yet finally, a fabulous victory.

I can’t remember exactly how we met. Probably theater. Not only did Gene offer me my favorite role of my acting career (Janice in Italian American Reconciliation by John Patrick Shanley) – the role responsible for the present color of my hair) but together we staffed Out North. In fact, if Out North were their only legacy, it would have been enough.

Right off the bat, I must have met Jay, too. As one woman put it, you learn very quickly they’re a package deal.

Jay and Gene were married in a Quaker wedding, which was a New Thing for me to experience. As weddings go, it’s between eloping and hiring the hall, but a lot more meaningful. It’s silent. Everyone thinks about marriage, about Jay and Gene, about commitment, about things. And when they feel moved to share, they speak up. Then everyone silently thinks about what was said. Until the next person feels moved to speak.

Tim and I eloped. I’m uncomfortable with being the center of attention (unless I’m on stage) and so I’m not very good about celebrating life passages. Someone once told me that attitude doesn’t give the community a chance to celebrate with you, and I guess I never understood that until Gene and Jay’s wedding. We all wanted to be there. We wanted to witness this finally-have-the-opportunity event.

This is what was right and fitting about this whole milestone: Jay and Gene were the first step in the quest for same sex marriage in Alaska. They were the actual pioneers, the ones who filed the first lawsuit after their marriage license was rejected. When the battle became too wearisome over the years and years and years, they moved to England.

Only at the wedding, when Taylor spoke, did I realize the hurt that went into leaving. Somehow I’d always thought of it as another political statement. Somehow I’d missed the emotional toll. But Taylor reminded us that Jay was raised here, that they were embedded in the fabric of this community. Only now, when I’ve looked at relocation, at how wrenching it would be to leave where you’ve built a home, do I understand how hurtful the process of feeling you have to leave could be.

It was a right too long delayed, this marriage of their Third Thirds. Who knows what else they could have done if they hadn’t had to expend energy on this hard-fought, well-won road to legal marriage? But Gene and Jay crossed one off the “to do” list. That’s a capstone for anyone’s Third Third.

Second Wave Feminist Meets Riot Grrrls

While in Portland, I went to a curators’ walk-through of an exhibit titled “Alien She,” a look at the art and artists of women who’d been involved with Riot Grrrl in the ’90s. I didn’t know anything about Riot Grrrl except that it was sort of punk feminism, which puts it right up my alley.

A giant banner of the “Riot Grrrl Manifesto” talked about women fighting violence, sexism, homophobia, negative body image, and labeling; reaffirming their value as women with the power to express themselves and make change. It sounded like me in a real out-loud way. I liked it.

The exhibit was full of wonderful art: a giant pink knitted barbed wire cage, women-created videos, lots of zines of print-it-ourselves writing. When it was all done, the curators asked if we had any questions. I raised my hand.

“I’m part of that old ‘second wave’ of feminism, and I really notice how much we agree here, especially about violence, but I’ve looked all over and don’t see anything about reproductive rights here, about a woman’s control of her own body. In the ’90s, did women think that battle was won? Now it’s under assault even worse, but was that not the feeling then?”

A few heads nodded, but one young woman spoke up: “That’s because the second wave of feminism was all about white, heterosexual, middle-class women from the suburbs. Poor women and women of color have other issues and reproductive rights don’t affect them. It’s not their issue.”

Disclaimer: I was so blown away by her remarks that I can’t guarantee that I’ve got it down exactly right. I gaped at her. She was a young woman of mixed race, I’d guess, and I wasn’t going to say anything in that moment.

The curators said they remembered workshops held at Riot Grrrl conventions teaching women how to do abortions in case a woman couldn’t get one. That there’s a Hot Pantz zine, Do it Yourself Gynecology, that’s included.

“Thank you,” I said. “That’s what I was hoping might be the case. I just hadn’t seen it.”

Afterwards, three older people approached me (including two women of color) to say they appreciated my remark. One liked the way I “deflected that response” I’d received.

So what exactly is so unsettling about all this?

1. I moved to Alaska from San Francisco partly thinking it was time to live in mainstream America again, to know what was going on in the rest of the world.


2. After 30 years, I am tiring of the “real” America. In Alaska, for instance, the response to my question could have been “Here we go, another baby killer shows up.” Okay, this is not fair, but the main thing is, I’m used to attacks from the Right, not the Left.


3. I have been an active feminist since I was a teenager. I have worked in a health clinic and taught women how to do pelvic self-exams, staffed a Women’s Center, co-wrote a women’s guide for survival resources, worked in D.C. for Bella Abzug, mentored other women, written plays about women’s experiences. I believe in women and a world women can make possible.

4. When I first moved to Alaska, I found it startling that there were only two genders here. In San Francisco, gender is sort of … fluid. We all pass in and out along the spectrum. I embrace this.


5. I believe that in America, class and race are the main issues, the usually-denied but horrible underpinnings to inequality. Racism is part of America’s fabric.


6. Yes, I know that Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique was about the “click” that suburban housewives felt when they realized they were sidelined in life.

Why am I saying all this? Is this some sort of “radical cred” I feel I have to put out there? Why did I find the remark so disturbing?

Because I felt discredited. Maybe that woman didn’t mean this personally towards me, but I felt repudiated. Like, “you old women got it all wrong.” I admired Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony; we’ve stood on the shoulders of pioneering women. They didn’t do it all, but they got us the vote. We women of the ’70s made mistakes and failed miserably to get it all done, but does that make us Bad Guys?

My friend Shirley, who is Black, said when she participated in a reproductive rights event, protesters yelled at her “Black babies are being killed,” and she turned to them and said, “How many Black babies are in your home? What are you doing to take care of the ones born?” (Yay, Shirley!) But Shirley also said “control over your own body” is a larger issue for Black women, going all the way back to slavery. That it’s way more than reproductive rights. I get that.

If my Third Third is anything about a legacy, I like to think my work on behalf of women will be part of what I leave behind. And here it was so sneeringly put down – by someone I thought might have called herself a sister.

Maybe it’s a stage in her personal evolution. Maybe she’ll grow older and wiser. Maybe I look like her mother. Maybe she’s just a negative person. It’s no use. I’m not old enough or wise enough to stop stewing over it.