Working as a shop girl at the store on Main Street has helped round out my view of things here in Duncan-confirming much of what I remember as an accurate representation of my childhood including the religious indoctrination I got at home. Gosh. I just reread that last sentence and it sounds a bit cold and clinical. Basically, now that I've been back here for a while, I've found that my memories still seem pretty accurate. I'm feeling a lot better about myself, the mistakes I've made, and the ways I've gone about trying to figure out how to function in this life. I'm learning to forgive myself for being such a fuck up. And...there it is. 

    I'm NOT a fuck up. I know that. What I meant to say is that I'm finally able to forgive myself for the choices and decisions I made that didn't fit in with or result in the more traditional path toward wholeness. There I go sounding all clinical again. I guess it's the unrealized diagnostician in me. I always loved meetings with the diagnostician when I was teaching. I attribute that to a diagnostician named Freddy. 

    Freddy always wore a brightly colored dress suit, but my memory sees her in yellow, with reading glasses hanging from a pretty chain, pens and pencils at her ears, and always a giant lapel pin of what may have been a bee or a dragonfly-I just know it was a flying insect. She was exactly the sort of professional Texas woman I enjoyed observing during my early years of teaching in Granbury. I loved going to the meetings that everyone else hated simply for the experience of watching Freddy in action. She was gregarious and had an infectious spirit. She'd describe a student's "little IQ" using those exact words, and somehow no one was ever offended or "triggered." It was a term of endearment and had nothing to do with the kid's intelligence. Sure. It's reprehensible, NOW. I do think it was eventually brought to her attention and she stopped. I don't know. It was a different time. Back then, Granbury was just a little lake town south of Fort Worth with one hanging stop light across a two-lane highway. You know, the good ole days in the mid 80s when you could still refer to a child's "little IQ" and get away with it. Freddy wasn't perfect. No one is. But she was learning just like we all are. Learning brings new awareness, and we go forward in that knowledge. I'm so thankful that she was one of the many wonderfully unique and intelligent women I was lucky enough to work with during those Granbury years.

    I guess I say all that as a way of saying that I think the most important thing is to keep learning from whatever place you find yourself. Living here has reminded me of where I was at the beginning. The prehistoric years of my life. When I reflect on my decisions with a full knowledge of my upbringing, I'm reminded of the words of Dr. Phil (who I don't think I'm supposed to like anymore), "I don't ask why, I ask why not?" I moved forward with the intel I was given. And here we are. It could always be worse. 

    I do sense that a higher power has guided me along. I've not become such a heretic as to let go of my belief in some form of eternity. Being a heretic, like everything else, is on a spectrum, and I willingly embrace the fact that I am one. And that's why it feels uneasy to live in a town like Duncan. This is the place where the indoctrination happened, and from what I've observed, the plague of fundamentalist religious thinking has only gotten stronger in the 40 years I was away. They're everywhere. I'm talking about people who see the world ending,-and it could happen at any moment- with Jesus showing up on that horse my daddy's taking care of and obliterating anyone not covered in the blood of the lamb. They take that literally.

    But, it's all in their head, and I can function quite nicely thinking and believing whatever I want. Right? I mean, isn't that what our country is all about? Let's hope so. I guess we'll see. Like I've said before, I keep my head down and go about my business, and I've very much enjoyed working as a shop girl on Main Street for the last year and a half. It was a great way to exorcise a personal demon, I made great friends, and I've confirmed that, in many ways, things are pretty much the same as they always were in Duncan, Oklahoma. 

Thanks for reading!

Peace and Love,

grace

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