Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now - Maya Angelou [4]
While I know myself as a creation of God, I am also obligated to realize and remember that everyone else and everything else are also God’s creation. This is particularly difficult for me when my mind falls upon the cruel person, the batterer, and the bigot. I would like to think that the mean-spirited were created by another force and under the aegis and direction of something other than my God. But since I believe that God created all things, I am not only constrained to know that the oppressor is a child of God, but also obliged to try to treat him or her as a child of God.
My faith is tested many times every day, and more times than I’d like to confess, I’m unable to keep the banner of faith aloft. If a promise is not kept, or if a secret is betrayed, or if I experience long-lasting pain, I begin to doubt God and God’s love. I fall so miserably into the chasm of disbelief that I cry out in despair. Then the Spirit lifts me up again, and once more I am secured in faith. I don’t know how that happens, save when I cry out earnestly I am answered immediately and am returned to faithfulness. I am once again filled with Spirit and firmly planted on solid ground.
Is Anyone Ever Too Much?
There are a few misguided wits who think they are being complimentary when they declare a woman is “too much.” While it is admirable and desirable to be enough, only masochists want to be “too much.” Being, claiming, or accepting the status allows others to heap responsibilities upon the back of the “too much” woman, who naturally is also referred to as “super.” “Super Woman” and “Earth Mother.”
The flatterer, for that is what the speaker means to be, exposes himself as a manipulator who expects to ingratiate himself into “Earth Mother’s” good graces, so that she will then take his burdens upon her and make his crooked ways straight.
When the complimenter is confronted, he will quickly disavow any scurrilous intent and with hurt feelings will declare, “I meant ‘too much’ to be a sign of my appreciation. I don’t see how you could misread my meaning. You must be paranoid.”
Well, yes. A certain amount of paranoia is essential in the oppressed or in any likely targets of oppressors. We must stay vigilant and be very careful of how we allow ourselves to be addressed.
We can too easily become what we are called with all the unwelcome responsibilities the title makes us heir to.
What’s So Funny?
Some entertainers have tried to make art of their coarseness, but in their public crudeness they have merely revealed their own vast senses of personal inferiority. When they heap mud upon themselves and allow their tongues to wag with vulgarity, they expose their belief that they are not worth loving and are in fact unlovable. When we as audience indulge them in that profanity, we are not unlike Romans at a colosseum battle between unarmed Christians and raging lions. We not only participate in the humiliation of the entertainers, but are brought low by sharing in the obscenity.
We need to have the courage to say obesity is not funny, vulgarity is not amusing, insolent children and submissive parents are not the characters we want to admire and emulate. Flippancy and sarcasm are not the only ways in which conversation can be conducted.
If the emperor is standing in my living room stripped to the buff, nothing should prevent me from saying that since he has no clothes on, he is not ready for public congress.
At any rate, not lounging on my sofa and munching on my trail mix.
Death and the Legacy
When I think of death, and of late the idea has come with alarming frequency, I seem at peace with the idea that a day will dawn when I will no longer be among those living in this valley of strange humors. I can accept the idea of my own demise, but I am unable to accept the death of anyone else. I find it impossible to let a friend or relative go into that country of no return. Disbelief becomes my close companion,