Again, so strange these flights of memory. I remember years ago Bessel saying that trauma is a looping cycle, a carousel of remembering and forgetting, both in the micro and the macro. I have not thought of that in a long time either…
I was pondering some of the Oxford Trauma Conference highlights and stand-out sessions. For me, one was a panel called Erasing Identity for Survival. Rock stars all: Janina Fisher, Frank Anderson and Linda Thai, in informal conversation about visibility and invisibility, specifically as a variety of minority identities are involved. Although I am customarily compelled by anything relating to the visible, curiously what popped into my mind, was a word I never use: indivisible. And with it I was surprised by a memory.
Starting when I was in Kindergarten at PS 152, the public grammar school I attended through second grade in New York City, we all daily had to stand up, and face the national flag, which was prominently placed in every public school classroom. Then, with our right hands over our hearts, which to my addled and sexually supercharged young brain, seemed decidedly erotic, in unison we recited the “Pledge of Allegiance.” We all seemed to know it from memory, although I don’t remember learning it; surely some of the kids were mumbling, faking it, I don’t know. It was essentially, to me, a bunch of big words in gibberish. I had no idea what we were saying, every single morning for years. It ended with the words “Indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” I don’t think I have ever thought about it again, let alone the word indivisible, until now. I did look up if the public school kids in this country still have to say the pledge. Back in my day, it was national law. Now apparently it is within the jurisdiction of states and counties. What on earth would bring that to mind now? I imagine it does bear on the subject of differentness, and visibility, in a country that once prided itself on being a melting pot, with the Statue of Liberty welcoming the “huddled masses yearning to be free.”
I remember the mixed messages we got in those early years in New York. My parents were both refugees and immigrants. Relieved and grateful to be at least allegedly welcome and safe, they were also suspiciously aware and not unafraid about our differentness. Fresh from the experience of having “countrymen,” even friends turn against them on a dime, it was bred into us to both “fit in” but not too much. And certainly, don’t trust. I remember repeatedly hearing the story of my mother’s first heartbreak, when her best friend, the little girl from next door, suddenly rejected her, having joined the Hitler Youth. Knowing the feeling of longing I always had about even having a best friend, the pain of that loss seemed unimaginably unbearable to that little girl that I was.
We grew up with such stories, and a tangled mandate, familiar to many kids of immigrants and refugees I’ve since met…This country received us and so we must admire and appreciate it while also holding a certain contempt for the culture which seemed so superficial and commercialized, and in many ways “fake.” Certainly, my mother’s side of the family, upper middle-class intellectuals, never lost their erudite sense of superiority, even after losing pretty much everything else. I learned the word “assimilate” at an early age, although I could never figure out if I was supposed to or not. Certainly not too much. Linda Thai’s story, however different, and a different part of the world, a different genocide, a different looking ancestry, resonates deeply.
Apartheid
When Tariq joined our team, I was in many ways intrigued and curious. Our team, I must add, is the little band of angels that does everything to keep me on track with all my various neglect informed activities – all the many essential infrastructure type things I am worst at. In effect they are “the mother I never had,” and I love them all. Tariq is one of two new “kids” on the team. And I say kids because with immense gratitude I notice that so many of the important people entering my life these days could be my kids and grandkids. I guess that I am really getting up there. And although “seniors” in the US are becoming a majority in terms of numbers as the Baby Boom generation ages out, we are also increasingly aware of how the aging, if not neglected, are becoming another group discriminated against, consciously or unconsciously. Certainly, in the recent Joe Biden debacle age became a perhaps controversial political football or scapegoat for “incompetence.” That is a huge topic that I won’t touch now. Suffice it to say I wish for more grace in facing my own, although finally I am taking pleasure in my 10% senior discount at my beloved health food store, and my lifetime senior pass to all the National Parks in the US!
Tariq being from South Africa, I wanted to talk with him. I was/am curious about the different experience of African and African American people, having had more than a few African American clients over my many long years in practice, but only a handful of African born clients who came over as children and mostly grew up here. Invariably they did not identify with the African American population here, at least the few that I have known. I wanted to understand this better.
My knowledge of South Africa was minimal. I knew about the heroism and the remarkable resilience and compassion of Nelson Mandela, who after 27 years as a political prisoner, became a heroic and charismatic freedom fighter and unifying national leader. I also heard an interview once with his tragically neglected oldest son, talking about the not unfamiliar irony of being the child of a massively loved leader of communities. I had a wonderful conversation with Tariq, and got to know him a bit. Also got to know about his anti-Apartheid freedom fighting parents and grandparents, (who reminded me a lot of me!). But the one thing that I did learn, that stood out, was that being of Indian descent, Tariq was/is of a particular “caste” or strata in the social hierarchy, who have historically been treated perhaps better than the categorically Black South Africans. As with so many other places, even those touting equality, there is a stubbornly persistent pecking order. What is wrong with us?
Linda, Janina and Frank had a fascinating discussion: Linda having the experience most like mine, walked around with a certain amount of shame and hiding around her identity and her story, essentially erasing not only her identity but herself. Janina described what it was like for her evolving from successful, “raised with privilege” white professional married to a man, to a lesbian partnered with a woman of color. Janina for years kept the change a secret, as outing herself would have completely disrupted her professional reputation and probably her expertise. From being a renowned international expert on trauma and dissociation, she would have become a referral for lesbian or inter-racial clients: a risk she did not want to have to take. Frank, who at least appears to be a white male although his birth last name is Guastella and he was born and raised in a family of rageful, poor Italian immigrants. By the time he came out, he was well established as a psychiatrist, running Bessel’s Trauma Center clinic, and found it a smooth and rather natural coming out for him. He could proudly wear his designer suits and pearls as he elegantly did in Oxford.
Being a minority and refugee of many an ilk, resonates in so many ways with the neglect experience. It is a very big subject I will have to come back to. For now, both Tariq, and the panel at the conference, inspired many new trains of thought for me.
Melting Pot
My husband being a well-studied and encyclopedic reader of history, remembered the intent of the word “indivisible” in the pledge. He said it was to declare a unity of the states, that none would fracture or secede from the then newly formed union. It was in effect to guard against the dissociative split between “red” and “blue” in the US. I remember hearing the term “melting pot” bandied around a lot when I was a child. I don’t remember if it was a wishful thing or if my dad really believed it. As a cheesemaker, I of course love the image, the world as one great Fondue meal is a lovely ideal. Interestingly I got at least a whiff of that in Oxford – no, not a cheesy smell, but rather a sense of it being a metropolitan and harmonious home to people from all over. I noticed many store and hotel employees in full burkas; and I made it a practice of asking whomever I met speaking with an accent, from where their accent and they hailed. They were from everywhere. Many from Eastern Europe, but some from Africa and the Middle East. Many had been in Oxford for quite a while, and when I asked about diversity and equality there, they all seemed to agree that it was a harmonious and comfortable home for them and for many the families they raised there. I even met one young man from Brasil. As it happened, I had heard on the news that very morning, that sadly Sergio Mendes had died the night before. Sergio Mendez was one of the first to bringing Brazilian music, most notably Bossa Nova to the English-speaking popular music world. Not surprisingly, our young man, only twenty, had not heard of Mendes. We looked him up on the computer and found a greatest hit. Ironically called Mas Que Nada, (More Than Nothing.) Perfect! And a wonderful song!
On the way home on the plane I watched a documentary about one of my heroes, Carlos Santana, who with his exquisite and unique hybrid mix of classical and mariachi music, brought Latin Music blasting to the English-speaking popular music world. Again, an unspeakable contribution! So many reasons to make this a safe and equal world for all!
Today’s song: