Why I Still (Occasionally) Wear Pink: The Messages Our Clothes Send

Posted on March 25, 2014 by Melissa Otterbein

Here’s a question for you:

If pink was the designated color for baby boys, and blue the color for baby girls,
would blue be the so called “girly color”?

Like many girls, I went through a phase where I refused to wear pink, especially those obnoxious shades of “bubblegum pink,” and “hot pink.” If you’ve never been to a cosmetic store, you’ll quickly learn about all sorts of shades that you didn’t know existed, ranging from fancy dinner menu items to erotica: “raspberry sherbet,” “wineberry,” and yes, “deep throat.”

Photo: MO 2014

Last spring, I was met face-to-face with one of those shades of pink when I won a free pair of running sneakers. The running representative showed me the two options I could choose from: a purple pair or a pink pair. Those were the only colors this new model was being sold in by this particular company. I was disappointed to once again see the “pink or purple only” dilemma that perpetuates the intense marketing of “pink products” chosen to be synonymously associated with girlhood. That’s why I’m grateful for organizations like UK-based Pink Stinks which seeks to “run targeted campaigns aimed at creating positive changes in the products, messages, labeling, categorization and representations of girls.” Their goal is not to do away with the color, but to do away with the damaging messages girls receive from products that are often packaged in pink: pretend make up, dolls that would clearly have an eating disorder (and breast implants) if they were real, and even cleaning supplies like vacuums (who came up with the idea that this is a toy?!).
Faced with the pink or purple shoe choice, I opted for the pink sneakers, snapping out of my initial frustration to be grateful for a free pair of shoes. Privilege, I know, to be able to fuss over colors in the first place. The next thing I picked up that night after the shoes, however, was a red permanent marker. When I went home, I traced every pink outline with the red permanent marker as meticulously as I could, only it didn’t go so well. Now not only did I still have pink on my shoes, but I did such a bad job of coloring that it looked like I regressed back to middle school, when drawing on shoes was considered really cool.

After several runs in my now ridiculous-looking pair of sneakers, I realized the colors didn’t look as dreadful as I once thought they did. I also realized that in the process of eschewing pink, I was feeding into the notion that things designed for girls are inferior to those designed for men. Think back to my earlier example of what would happen if pink was the boy’s color. Let’s expand that one step further: What would happen if men were the designated care providers and women, the breadwinners? Would bread winning be looked down upon, while child rearing, praised?
Is me not wearing pink out of spite contributing to the notion that things associated with women aren’t as good as men’s? Am I continuing to let men set the tone, be it colors to stay away from, or careers to stay away from? Is it more beneficial to change pink from being a “girly” color to shun, to a color that one can wear irrespective of gender without hesitation?

To take this even one step further, we can relate the concept of changing the connotations associated with the color pink to address the ways in which some African American and many LGBTQ communities have reclaimed words that once were considered inferior (dyke, queer, nig*^%). A friend of mine recently shared that her daughter came out as “queer.” The mother told her daughter that, “It’s ok to be gay, but must you call yourself ‘queer?'” The daughter explained to her mother why she chose to self-identify as “queer” and the two of them realized that from generation to generation, words can mean different things. Images can be mean different things. And yes, perhaps even colors like pink can mean different things.

I ponder these concepts of self-identification, reclaiming words and images, and gender as I lay out my clothes for work tomorrow, a task that’s rather innocuous, but teaching me to consider what messages or statements we can send with our clothes, bodies, and words. The decision becomes clear. I decide to wear the shirt with my preferred shade of pink (magenta) and not feel guilty about it. And hey, I may even ditch the pants today for a skirt, too.

Happy World Down Syndrome Day (Thoughts on Growing Up With a Sister With Down Syndrome)

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Melissa Otterbein

Today is March 21st— World Down Syndrome Day. For those not familiar with Down Syndrome, Down Syndrome is a congenital genetic disorder in which a baby is born with three copies of the 21st chromosome (hence why it’s celebrated on 3/21). One extra chromosome sounds rather innocuous, but results in several physical differences, such as small ears, eyes that slant upwards and poor muscle tone, to name a few of many listed by the CDC. One thing the CDC forgot to add to their list, though, is that people with Down Syndrome seem to have some of the most joyous smiles. There are often times behavioral differences too, as many people with Down Syndrome face obsessive-compulsive, oppositional, and inattentive behaviors, to name a few listed by the National Down Syndrome Society. One thing, though, that NDSS forgot to add is that people with Down Syndrome tend to be very affectionate, resulting in some of the best hugs and “I love you’s” imaginable.

Photo: MO 2012

So now, I want you to meet who I’m celebrating this World Down Syndrome Day: my sister Lauren. In case you have any doubts about her age, she is quick to remind anyone that, “I’M the big sister.” Side by side, she at 4’9 and me at 5’4, it’s easy to mistake Lauren as my younger sister. But I’m the baby, and both she and my brother used to make fun of me for that. They even tried to wrestle with me growing up, and, like the picture to the left shows, Lauren still does.

Growing up with Lauren has helped me to see a spectrum of life so rich and big that leaves me in awe of the Image of God in every person. But it wasn’t always that way.
I confess, growing up, Lauren and I went from best play pals to me feeling somewhat jealous of the sisterhood my friends with older sisters experienced. I thought it would be cool to have an older sister to talk about boys with, share clothes with, and who could show me new places, especially since she would get her license before me. But we had our fun, too. We liked putting as many stuffed animals as we could onto my bed then jumping up and down as high as we could on Saturday mornings. We’d dance to loud music in the room we shared and play with chalk outside. I didn’t notice any differences then. She was my sister, and I was her sister.
Then, in elementary school, I remember being in public with Lauren and sometimes kids would stare at her. I would intently glare back at them, hoping they would see how good that doesn’t feel either. But two wrongs don’t make a right. We need to have grace with people who don’t understand, or who are not ready to understand. We need to recognize that there are people who are curious, but aren’t sure what to ask when they don’t know why someone seems so much different than themselves. We need all people to know that respectfully asked questions are always welcomed, and they lead to a special understanding of each other as humans. It’s easy to huddle in groups of your own gender identity, sexual orientation, race, age, and ability level. But something beautiful happens when we spend time with those whose gender identity, sexual orientation, race, religion, age, and ability levels are not our own. I have a feeling a lot of walls could not only come down, but come down with a beatific, thunderous crash that opens up the sky with refulgent rainbows welcoming audacious freedom to dance, dance, dance beneath these wide open spaces.

But let’s be real, here, too. Not everything that goes on in a home with someone who has special needs is rainbows and dancing. I watched my parents cry, throw their hands up in the air, and then use those hands to hug each other as they got through challenge after challenge. Around the time Lauren was seven, her speech was very far behind. She would try to tell my parents what she wanted or needed, but my parents couldn’t understand what she was saying. They would try to talk to her, but she couldn’t understand them. After months and months of feeling misunderstood, anyone would get frustrated and maybe even have a temper tantrum or two, or thirty two. Sometimes when my sister’s routine changes, she gets so upset that she starts yelling and crying at the top of her lungs. It can be hard to understand what exactly causes her to become so distressed in the first place. She’s even thrown things before. But who am I to call her out on this, when just last week I used very colorful language to describe my frustration in not being able to find my cell phone, that lo and behold, was simply hiding behind the one part of the couch I overlooked on the previous 20 search attempts. Oh, and yes, I threw the couch pillows that time when I got mad. No matter how mad my sister or I got, I was fortune enough to grow up with a dad who has the patience of a saint, whose unphased resiliency consistently gives her space and time to breathe in order to calm down, while he goes back to creating Special Olympics track and field practices, or folding laundry, or simply relaxing as though nothing happened. He and my mom teach me just as much as my sister has.

I’m so thankful for my parents’ persistently loving examples. Because everytime I make a trip back to visit, no matter how late at night I get home, one of the first things I do is run upstairs, hop in Lauren’s bed, and give her a big hug. “Sister! You’re home!” she’ll exclaim, half awake, forgiving me of waking her up at 11 PM some Friday night (at which point she’s already been asleep for three hours). She’ll fill me in on how work was and any other important events of the week I missed. It won’t be long before she’ll say, “Alright, Sister, I have to go to sleep. Goodnight.” And usually I honor her request, but sometimes I stall and we get in an extra five minutes that usually consist of us laughing late night giggles over something that probably wasn’t that funny if we were to have talked about it earlier in the day.

Photo credit: SO 2013

When my sister was seven years old, our family got involved in Special Olympics. In 2003, my dad became involved as a track and field coach and introduced me to their team. Sometimes I get to run with them, and meet amazing people like my friend Rob, pictured here. Rob is one of the most joyful people I know and he’s taught me so much about how to love life. His great sense of humor teaches me not to take life so seriously. I love every minute of being around his positive presence.

Photo: MO 2012

One October weekend in 2012, my dad took a van full of Special Olympics athletes and I to Rhode Island where we competed in a long distance running competition. We all ran fast, earned medals, stayed up a little too late, and laughed the car ride home (once one of the athletes stopped asking my dad every five minutes, “Where are we, Coach Scott?”). On that trip, I captured this picture of my sister’s laugh and I can almost hear her hamming it up as I smile at her face.

Life with Lauren has taught me so much that when I stop and think about all I’ve learned, my eyes well up with tears, seeing how every challenging memory my parents experienced was recycled for something more beautiful and compelling. She taught me patience. That going on walks is more fun when you tread slowly, unlike me, who always seems to be in a hurry. My mom calls her “my pokey puppy.” She’s my pokey puppy, too, and I would never want a race horse instead. She taught me that you can never say, “I love you” too much. And to take people by surprise every once in a while by shouting “cheers!” to life, chugging a glass of wine or beer (She limits herself to one small glass, though. Promise.) She taught me how much more awesome the world is when we practice inclusion, and that parties are so much more fun when everyone has a seat at the table. She gave me eyes to see the Image of God in every single person, and my eyes, heart, the lens with which I see the world are forever tinted with a shade of tight embrace, sanctifying the everyday and turning every moment into the perfect time to laugh.

Happy World Down Syndrome Day.

I love you, Sister.

Photo: SO 2013

Gender Equality: Not Just The Promotion Of Women

Posted on March 19, 2014 by Melissa Otterbein

“In order to do this,
we must see men as our allies,
our partners through thick and thin.”
-Ana Ake, Tonga, Africa

Photo credit: UN

With the 2015 target deadline fast approaching, many NGOs are evaluating how far we’ve come in reaching the Millennium Development Goal benchmarks. These are 8 goals officially established on September 8, 2000 at the UN Headquarters to set an action plan in place for international development. Of the 8 goals, the goal that I feel most passionate about is Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 3: Promote gender equality and empower women.

This goal has come a priority for me to carry out in my personal life. I’m still sorting out what it looks like—- and what it doesn’t look like.

For most of my life, I’ve viewed gender equality as focusing on changing the stereotypes of women and ensuring women equal opportunities outside of the home. However, as public policy expert Anne-Marie Slaughter points out in her “Can We Have it All?” TED talk,

“I still think we should do everything we possibly can to empower women, but that’s only half of real equality. I now think we’re never going to get there unless we recognize the other half…”

To share a personal example of how I see this in my professional life, let me share some of my thought processes in working with men and women living with HIV and substance abuse. In this particular grant project, I am assigned to both male and female patients for a six month behavioral intervention focusing on empowerment to achieve health and social goals, including HIV care and substance abuse. When I would be assigned to partner with a woman, I’d get really excited at the prospect of seeing a woman empowered to live out personal, economic, and health-related successes. When I was assigned to work with a male, I would feel an initial sense of disappointment because I thought that somehow I wasn’t living out my passion for women’s empowerment. But to stick with this mindset is a narrow-view of gender equality. As USAID notes, “Gender equality means that males and females have equal opportunities to realize their full human rights and contribute to and benefit from economic, social, cultural, and political development.” In my work context, I now see how healthier men, free of substance use, who become elevated to greater personal, health-related, and economic prosperity turn into allies in the journey towards gender equality. When men can be healthy, whole, expressive people without mountains of societal expectations placed on their shoulders, women can also be healthy, whole, expressive people without having to see “work OR family,” but instead, the both/and: “work AND family.” I learned to change my perspective and now, whether working with a man or a woman, I realize that I am contributing towards gender equality when I view the larger picture of the societal impact of healthier women and men. For some, this is a no-brainer, but for me, it took some time to connect the dots between male and female empowerment.

Though I still feel convicted that more energy, capital, and social will need to be given towards advancing the promotion of women and girls, as partners and allies, we also need to see that part of gender equity is highlighting non-traditional roles of males in the media and in our lives. When men are portrayed as fathers, caregivers, educators, and participators in home and family life, we alleviate the burden of women being pigeon-holed into these roles. We offer women and girls a larger perspective of parenting- that not all of the responsibilities of parenting will inadvertently fall on one parent simply because of their gender. Girls and boys see that men and women truly can become and do anything. 100 years ago, it was hard for some to imagine a world where women could vote. 50 years ago, it was hard for some to imagine a world where interracial marriage was legal, let alone socially acceptable. 10 years ago, it was hard for some to believe that any more states would come alongside Massachusetts to instate marriage equality. And today, thought it might be hard for some to see men as care providers and other “non-traditional” roles, history has shown us time and time again that,

“the moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
(Martin Luther King, 1965)

Photo credit: UNFPA

“I. Choose. You.” Brief Thoughts on Marriage From An Unmarried Feminist

Posted on March 13, 2014 by Melissa Otterbein

Photo: MO, 2013

“I wonder what I’m locking myself into,” a friend shared recently when we were talking about marriage. I laughed an understanding laugh, because I got it. “Yeah! It’s hard for me to imagine seeing the same person over and over again every day and night. ‘Aw man, you again?'” I (half-jokingly) shared. A natural introvert, I annoy even myself sometimes. A partner is bound to get annoyed at me, too, and hey, that’s ok.
It’s just that the closer I get toward the possibility of marriage, the more I seem to take a step back from it. Critique it. Question it. Recognize its historical and political roots that have nothing to do with love and everything to do with legality. And I haven’t thought about marriage the same way since reading things like Commited by Elizabeth Gilbert, in which I learned about things like “coverture” for the first time.

But lately, I’m recognizing the cyncism with which I view something that’s inheritently good and beautiful, allowing myself to ponder the beauty of marriage too. I’ve been watching, studying, inspecting long-standing couples who’ve been through adversity. Who experienced beautiful things that wouldn’t have been possible had they caved when things got hard. Had they given up before seeing the redemption and beauty part of the story. Because whether a relationship ends or is unending, every story can experience the kind of resolve that makes you wander out to a lake all by yourself, sit on a log, and tear up at the thought, “I know the journey is hard. But it is good too.”

I experience that kind of beauty and resolve when I think about the first couple most of us can observe firsthand in our own lives: our parents. Of all the memories of my parents that I treasure most, the moments that stand out the most viscerally come from four weeks in October 2013 when my mom was in the ICU. She was protesting that she wanted to go home, tired of the hospital. And instead of pushing against her resistance, my dad took out a comb, sat down on her bed, and gingerly started brushing her hair. He made small talk with my sister and I while the sun shone through opened window blinds. Later on that hospital visit, he pulled out a picture of the two of them when they were engaged and showed it me. They were high school sweethearts, and their picture captured what it means to be “young and in love.” As things in the hospital worsened, my dad sat by her bedside three times a day to do nothing but simply be next to her. Those moments in the hospital are precious to me. My parents’ marriage hasn’t been easy. I do not think their story is mine to tell. But I do know that there have been many beautiful memories and laughs that didn’t seem possible in periods of challenge several years ago.

When I look at my grandmother and grandfather arm-in-arm in photos taken of them in places all across the world, I experience similar beauty when I look at their smiles. Smiles that say, “things haven’t been easy. But I am for you, and you, for me, and together, we make a choice… I. Choose. You.” I think of the last wedding I attended of two friends whose love has taken them through every shade of emotion possible. There’s just something different in these couples. Because these couples want to give out of their utmost.

Perhaps this is what I’m most amazed by. The every day choices that married couples willingly make to affirm their commitment to one another; to look someone in the eye everyday and say, unwaveringly, “I choose you.” For years, Evangelical Christians tried to tell me “a woman is supposed to submit to her husband, who is the leader of the home.” That imbalance of power always made me cringe in fear of watching my identity disappear. Some other Christians I know use the world “yield,” which sat a little better in my (very independent) heart. Because the kind of “yielding” they described was irrespective of gender. It’s one person yielding to another’s needs or requests as much as you can because you love them. Because everyday, you want to find ways to say through your actions, “I. Choose. You.” And after the arguement—the one over something stupid, and the one that really wasn’t; the one that required the two of you to make life-changing decisions—- after those kinds of fights, to return again in love: “I. still. choose. you.” The other partner does the same exact thing. It’s not tit-for-tat. It’s not some assignment where everyone gives and takes in methodic equality, each paying the other back in detailed increments like credit card statements. No. It’s more like loan forgiveness. It’s sincerely wanting to do all you can for someone you love so much. You still can have your most imminent needs be met and your preferences preferred while all the time doing this giving over and lending to and loving sacrificially.

In my dating experiences, I’ve come to find that this “yielding” is the hardest part. I’ve discovered how selfish I can be. How much I want to ensure that I, as a feminist female, am heard by my partner, a man. How reluctant I am to provide deference because I can think back to an entire history of humankind in which women have been deferential to men. And the terrible repercussions of unreciprocal deference speak for themselves. But it’s a lonely road when your only reason not to give to someone is because they’re of a gender that’s historically been the recipient of privilege. It’s a lonely road when you try to stratify independence and intimacy, instead of accepting the harmonious synergy of interdependence and partnership. A love that doesn’t bend as much as it breaks doesn’t create an inspiring story. No beauty. No real love, anyway.

Real love is found when women and men are allies. When we’re for each other, not against each other. When we forgive the thorny path of past actions and inactions throughout the centuries that both genders have done to oppress or diminish the other- because we both have. I’ve always known this in my head, but it wasn’t until my first serious relationship came and went that I realized my heart is sluggish on my contribution towards being an ally. Heck, it wasn’t until my first serious relationship that I even noticed how all this gender stuff plays itself out.

So one day, when I’ve processed this stuff, developed a framework of feminism that’s empowering for both genders-because that’s what true feminism does-, and stopped being afraid of the commitment and unknowns that marriage entails, I plan for these words to be read aloud at my wedding. More clear than any passage of scripture I’ve read, more real than any marriage book that’s been written, it encompasses to me what “I Choose You” means:

“I will give you this, my love, and I will not bargain or barter any longer. I will love you, as sure as God has loved me. I will discover what I can discover and though you remain a mystery, save God’s own knowledge, what I disclose of you I will keep in the warmest chamber of my heart, the very chamber where God has stowed Himself in me. And I will do this to my death, and to death it may bring me. I will love you like God, because of God, mighted by the power of God. I will stop expecting your love, demanding your love, trading for your love, gaming for your love. I will simply love. I am giving myself to you, and tomorrow I will do it again. I suppose the clock itself will wear thin its time before I am ended at this altar of dying and dying again. God risked Herself on me. I will risk myself on you. And together, we will learn to love, and perhaps then, and only then, understand this gravity that drew Her, unto us.” -Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz (God as female emphasis my own, not author’s)

But until that day, I’ll practice this giving over, in all of my relationships with people I love. And though at times it feels unnatural, I know there’s no other way to look someone in the eye to say “I choose you” with sincerity.

“I. Choose. You.”
It’s a beckoning, hard call.
I dare to say it’s impossible.
But all around me, I see couples who are willing to do the impossible.
I hope I can live up to it.

One of my favorite couples that inspires me to love well: Anastasia and Joe June 2013

One of my favorite couples who inspire me to love well: Anastasia and Joe
June 2013

Audacious Freedom: Screaming YES ‘Til We’re Breathless

Posted on March 12, 2014 by Melissa Otterbein

Photo credit: http://huff.to/1iyOHek

Susan B. Anthony once said about the bicycle, “I think it has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world. It gives women a feeling of freedom and self-reliance. I stand and rejoice every time I see a woman ride by on a wheel…the picture of free, untrammeled womanhood.” I get that feeling every morning and afternoon as my feet touch pedals, epitomizing that freedom she talked so wisely about in 1896. And tonight, two days in from the dawning of Daylight Saving Time, I’m delighting in this audacious freedom again and again as fresh air fuses with endorphins. A smile creeps up inside of me that simply cannot be held back.
And so tonight, as I’m about to go into my house and say goodnight to another beautiful day of freedom and bikes, something catches me outside for the umpteeth time. Maybe it’s the clear sky above me. Or the fact that I am out here in a t-shirt for the first night after a long winter that developed its own vocabulary (“polar vortex:” who can forget that, and what it feels like).
But I lay here.
I should be preparing for an interview tomorrow.

But I lay here.
I should probably go inside and get proper rest.

But I lay here.

All I can see above me is the moon, this ever present wonder in the sky that shows up night after night to remind us that life moves on, moves forward.
Stars scatter the sky daring us to notice them, not to show off, but so that we will show up. To be here now. To stop missing the beauty that’s above you, watching over you day after day, night after night.

So I will lay here.

Freedom and life surge through my veins, a restlessness that can only be quelled by uncharted territories and taking chances and by the story that comes from when you start doing the things you’re scared of. When you stop waiting for feelings of confidence and reassurance and do it anyway, unarmed and unfettered.

There’s no time to waste when all around you, the stars, the birds, the infantile crocus pecking its way through once snow-covered ground each beg your soul to awaken.

And so just for tonight, I won’t care about what time I go to bed.

I won’t frantic over tomorrow.

All I will care about is filling my heart with this Earth, overjoyed by the ability to walk, skip, and jump on it, along with all these beautiful people that inhabit it.

I look up at the moon once more. It’s traversed a part of the sky and moved what looks like just a few feet to the left, but indeed it has moved so many more. I try to picture it in the exact spot where it was an hour ago when I first came out here, but it begs me to let it go and stop trying to rearrange life and all of its pieces the way that I want them all to turn out.

I’ll let go.
And stay up too late.

And binge on open sky that opens hearts which open mouths and together, we’ll speak from bodies standing tall, hands outstretched screaming “YESSSS!” until we’re breathless.

40 Days of Sustainability: An Environmental Justice Lenten Practice

Posted on March 4, 2014 by Melissa Otterbein

Yesterday I wrote about my love for Lent, but not of murder on a cross. I believe these 40 days of spiritual reflection can greatly draw us closer to our Maker.

For the past three years, I’ve especially found meaning in this spiritual season by choosing to take up a practice. Last year, I found myself in tears and laughter commuting by bicycle, taking cold showers, and putting coins in the “Suck it up or Shut up” jar each time I caught myself complaining. I kept up with the cycling, take cooler (but not cold) showers, and occasionally throw some coins in the jar, hoping to build up my wellspring of “sucking it up.” The year before that, I got in the habit of taking Sabbath walks. And in 2011, I went vegetarian for forty days. While I didn’t sustain the practice that particular year, I began doing so in 2014, grateful for the connection I feel to the Earth and creatures living in it.

This year, I hope to experience this same kind of Heaven-on-Earth connection and invite you to join me or take up your own spiritual practice. I chose the theme of sustainable living because, as Jack Kerouac once said,

“The closer you get to real matter, rock, air, fire, and wood, boy, the more spiritual the world is.”

I’m breaking up the next 40 days into sets of ten. The first set are ten things to do just once over the next 40 days:

Do once:
1) Stop credit card offers by going to www.optoutprescreen.com
2) Buy a house plant. Indoor air is commonly 2-5 times more polluted than outside air. Plants help alleviate this by manufacturing fresh oxygen and removing carbon dioxide.*
3) Recycle old plastic cards that I no longer need (used gift cards, expired health insurance cards, etc.)
4) Call facilities when I see a leaky faucet at work. (Being that I work in an old building, it’s bound to happen at least once over the next 40 days).
5) Recycle my old pairs of eye glasses.
6) Compost components of feminine hygiene products when that “time of the month comes.” (Ok, TMI, I know, but it’s interesting to see how much waste can come from this bodily function). Don’t worry; it’s just going in my backyard.
7) Buy a reuseable mesh bag for produce, as to not need to use the produce plastic bags at the store.
8) Get off mailing and telemarketing lists by registering online at www.dmaconsumers.org/consumerassistance.html and www.donotcall.gov
9) Conduct a free step-by-step personalized Go Green plan.
10) Save foam I come across and take it to recycling at 2840 Sisson St.

The remainder are things to do once per day, three times through, for a total of 30 practices:

Do three times through:
1) Turn off modem at night. Only turn back on when I need it.
2). Go to the farmer’s market to get all my produce for the week instead of buying copious amounts of frozen fruits and veggies, which albeit last a while, causing me to take less trips to the grocery store, but are packaged in materials that will produce waste.
3) Pick up a piece of litter I encounter. BONUS for taking home any recyclable litter.
4) Call a company/non-profit that I don’t patronize and ask to be taken off their mailing list. ESPECIALLY GEICO! I will never fall for your snarky gecko, no matter how much mail you send!
5) Turn my office overhead light off on sunny afternoons. BONUS for going the whole day with natural light from my window.
6) Read a chapter of one of the many books I have on sustainable living, beginning with: The Zero Waste Lifestyle by Amy Korst and The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan.
7) Take a navy shower to use water for 2 minutes or less while bathing.
8) Unplug anything in my room outlets before leaving the house in the morning.
9) Make a list of every chemical I come across in my food as well as hygiene and cleaning products for that particular day. Use this to drive home a conviction to choose natural cleaning and hygiene products as well as eat whole, fresh foods.
10) When I drive, make sure to drive 55 MPH on the highway instead of 65 to improve gas mileage between 10-15% and don’t speed on residential roads.

Looking forward to sharing this Lenten season with you.

COMMENT BELOW:
Do you choose to observe Lent? Why/why not?
How will you observe this Lenten season if you decide to do so?

*Renee Loux, Easy Green Living, pg. 71

Ashes of Hope: My Love of Lent but Not of Murder on a Cross (PLUS 40 Days of Sustainability coming soon)

Posted on March 3, 2014 by Melissa Otterbein

Even the winter won’t last forever. We’ll see the morning, we’ll feel the sun.
We’ll wake up in April, ready and able, Sowing the seeds in the soil.
Even the darkness cannot disarm us. We’ll see the morning, we’ll feel the sun.
-Audrey Assad

Easter is what many would argue to be the quintessential turning point of the Christian faith. The crux. The climax of the story. The thing that you must be able to articulate into carefully formed sentences depicting your belief, as though words and theology solely define your spirituality and very existence. Perhaps from all of this lies the basis for the trite messages that I, along with so many others, have heard about the Christian faith. “Jesus died for your sins.” “Jesus paid the debt.” “Jesus stood in your place and died for you so that you might have life.”

And if those words bear truth and meaning to you, I have not come to take them away, nor discredit them.

It’s just not the Jesus I’ve come to know, face-to-face in my human spiritual struggle.

The Jesus I’ve come to know didn’t die at the hands of a blood-thirsty, vampire-like God who needs to see someone murdered in order to forgive people. The Jesus I’ve come to know, and the God to whom he points, is a rebel. A revolutionary who challenged the privileged and elevated the marginalized. Who spoke out of turn, unafraid to make people think harder about themselves and the world around them. Who taught us to slow down long enough from our exhausted minds to “look at the birds and flowers,” and to be a visionary in whatever issue your culture is facing.
Direct from the mouth of this revolutionary contains the most gripping parts of the Eastertide story, in my experience. The pieces that I rarely heard pastors and Bible study leaders quote. The part where Jesus, our supposed role model, screams up at God, “My God, My God, Why have you screwed me like this?” Because that’s life, that’s reality. That’s the affirmation I look for when I’m stuck in the mud and mire and all around me are hope-depleted apertures crying out for just a flick of mercy from a kind and loving God, begging for auspices that come from this Divine Light. And to hear Jesus utter these same words gives me confidence that I am in good company when I am in the thick of the squall and my once blithe heart feels incapable of coming back to me. When I’m a low that low, that’s when I know I’m only a few steps out from mercy. Because we, like Jesus, get to experience the surge of joy that is the resurrection, ashes of hope that sing of redemption.

I think these ashes of hope are what the soul longs for. Beyond a good love story, a good hope story. To know that all of our troubles will not be squandered, but used for fodder to keep these tales of beauty-from-pain alive. To give us the fortitude to know, anchored in our core, that it doesn’t matter what comes our way, for it won’t last forever. But the feelings of hope and the aftermath of beauty will hit us so viscerally that we tear up at the thought, “I didn’t know life could be this good.”

This is why I haven’t given up on Lent or Easter, despite some of my theological wrestlings and frustrations with the traditional teachings of this spiritual season. Lent draws out the heart’s ability to draw nigh to your Creator. A 40 day season containing strong, beautiful symbolism. Death from life. Life from death. The two are inseparable. Hope is reborn, recycled out of crushed pain and heartache. The timing of this season enhances the meaning all the more to me, as we begin Lent in the waning winter, in which it is still snowing as I write this. But we end Lent well into spring. During those 40 days, shoots on trees develop, buds blossom to form magnolia flowers- my absolute favorite tree on this planet that reminds me there is no cold that cannot be endured to eventually give way to life. The sun graces us for 2.5 minutes longer each day, until we’ve accumulated some 177.5 minutes of additional daylight come Easter evening, thanks, largely in part, to Daylight Savings Time. (Can you tell yet that spring is my favorite season and consumes many of my thoughts?)

And so I don’t know where your heart is this season. Maybe it’s hiding in guilt and shame, underneath a veil of many coverings, because you feel it has gone so far awry from any sort of “straight and narrow.” Maybe your heart is parched, longing for a bit of this hope story. Or maybe your heart abounds in a joy so full, that it might cry droplets of gratitude onto baby seedlings that will soon lean their faces toward the sun for the first time. But one thing I do know, as we forge into spring, is that all around you, life begs your soul to awaken, and if it cannot awaken on its own, let its colours take you to places unknown until hope uncovers and your soul sees vibrant hues ablaze in beauty.

But there will come a time, you’ll see, with no more tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.
Get over the hill and see what you find there
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.
-Mumford and Sons

Coming tomorrow: My 40 Day Sustainability Plan- Come observe Lent through environmental social justice

“In order to do this, we must see men as our allies, our partners through thick and thin.” -Ana Ake, Tonga, Africa