Contradictions

This week I made certain that I got to UU. I find that I am enjoying our interim minister's style of expression so much that I don't want to miss any of it. Besides the fact that he can construct some pretty amazing sentences, I find myself relating to his forthright, no-nonsense manner and down-to-earth sensibility. I devour the message, then think about it long afterward, just what I hope for in a Sunday morning outing to the church-house.

On Sunday, music, rhythm and words combined for a powerful treatment of class and tribe. I've been gnawing on it  ever since. I have very often, over the course of my lifetime, felt marginalized and isolated, either by my own choice or by others. It was no secret that we had to move every year or two, even though my father was a teacher and worked steadily, because he (and by extension, the family) failed to live up to the moralistic expectations for educators in the 1950s. We moved from one small Iowa town to another, as his contract failed to be renewed. In his off hours, evenings and weekends, he played in jazz bands, a highly suspect activity. It was never possible to sink down roots. Not until he was hired to teach overseas in military dependent schools, did we have the stability of continuous employment. Jazz and drinking were not a problem in a military environment. We became the stable ones since we didn't have to rotate, with everyone else coming and going around us. Still no roots.

I continued to move, long after I left home when I was just turning 18. Every few months I would get the itch to make a change. Often it was only a new apartment, sometimes a new town or state, once it was another continent. I was not in the habit of staying put. I wouldn't want someone to know me that well. In terms of tribe, I was nomadic.

I am more settled now than ever before. On good days, I'm sure that I've found my tribe(s), but there is still within me the girl behind the curtain of dark, falling hair who is certain that I don't have a place in this world.