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The shredder’s whine and engorgement of previously valid documents reminds me of the ego’s painful process of letting go—Certainly, the experience, for most of my life.
My collection of paper caricatures of who I thought was began with baptism and communion and confirmation as drawn up by the parish church, followed by signatures on vow formulas, as a nun, and later, on its dispensation granted by the Vatican in Rome. I was also collecting paper degrees, with corresponding certifications as teacher, as social worker, and as hospital chaplain, each of which substantiated my identity. Outside of what I did for a living, I had no identity.
With the early onset of rheumatoid arthritis came more reports from internists, rheumatologists, and surgeons, results of lab and x-ray work-ups, and a spiral bound notebook for notes, remembered from office visits.
Then, came the three-year marriage: with more signatures at City Hall, at the church, followed by the divorce decree and the subsequent annulment. The bottom drawer of my desk housed these documents; it remained shut until the next change. Never did I ever know whom everyone was describing. It seemed like someone else.
And it was. Only after a series of painful dreams did I seek Jungian analysis in 1988. Thus began close listening and study of my unconscious that was desperately seeking to be heard. Imperceptibly, I began to change: the fruit of daily recording my dreams and their meanings, enclosed within thirty-two loose-leaf binders that lined my bookshelves.
With my 2001 retirement, I began serious writing and Twelve Step work on my character defects. The rest is in print.
The shredder’s power to re-constitute whatever it was fed is like another Power who has reshaped my past: it is me and not me, at the same time, with conscious contact of my Higher Power.
Greed has horrific expressions but none so despicable as found in the novel Before We Were Yours (2017) written by Lisa Wingate, based upon an actual child trafficking case that continued, undetected, for three decades, until its exposé in 1950.
The abuse took place at one of the boarding homes of the Tennessee Children’s Home Society in Memphis, Tennessee; its director, Georgia Tann. Widely touted as the Mother of orphans and unwanted children—even drawing the notice of Eleanor Roosevelt—she was far from that—cunning, manipulative, and money-hungry. Her accomplices were ever on the lookout for stray, unwanted children; lovely ones were ripe for adoption with lucrative fees.
The story stood by itself until the author fleshed it out with Depression-era river-rats snatched from a houseboat moored at Mud Island near the Mississippi River. Only after having been subdued and driven to Memphis were the Foss kids locked inside the sprawling white-columned home, in great disrepair, and forced to comply with the mean-spirited staff, including the sexually abusive janitor, and stinking accommodations.
Suspense glistens on every page of this novel, Before We Were Yours. Seasonal changes, so integral to the plot, waft authentic colors, smells, and sounds into the southern panorama. Silence has never been more silent, nor sinister. Only an intrepid heart can follow the abrupt emotional and physical changes as the Fosses work out their destiny; their cat-and mouse stratagems with their jailers left me breathless.
Never having been involved with a child-victim of trafficking, I was deeply moved by Lisa Wingate’s brilliant handling of this material. Before We Were Yours is a must read.
Doors—Every day we open and close them, seldom noting their materials, their purpose their mechanisms: hinged, folding, sliding, rotating up and over, some with locks and some without. Perhaps with the advent of consciousness came doors: for specific rituals, for protection of homes from enemies or predators, and for so much more. Crossing their threshold alters energy, either positively or negatively.
Even tomb builders in the Nile Valley fashioned hieroglyphs of single and double doors to cordon off sacred space for the grieving. In later centuries, ornamental doors were hung on mosques, monasteries, cathedrals, and temples, bespeaking their mysteries within. From a first century AD estate in Pompeii, a set of Roman folding doors is exhibited in the Naples Archeological Museum. We could go on and on.
Many view their front door as sacred. Above mine is taped a medal of St. Benedict to ward off those with whom I’ve no business.
Yet, there is another door closer to the home we live in—the door to our hearts; its challenge is to pause before opening it to who or whatever attracts us. With instincts activated, discernment is critical. In the in-between space, questions surface: Are lesser motives involved? Is neediness demanding to be satiated? Who will benefit? What will I learn if I act? Or give in? Perhaps “No”—the closed door—is the wisest response when clarity is an issue. Such practice deepens humility and opens the psyche to spiritual guidance, without which we stagnate.
Thus we thrive in our flawed humanness and bring our unique gifts to fruition among others—often behind closed doors.
Heart Whisperings 