One of my first memories is sitting on the bed, watching my father play guitar and sing. His voice was deep and strong and full of emotion. He was an incredibly talented musician, singer, and artist. He drew images of horses and cowboys, sometimes riding home slowly, other times riding into storms or against the blizzards and wind.
He and my aunt made an album in the 80s, and some of their songs were on local radio. They each wrote songs for their children, and there is a song there for me. I will carry his words and that part of my father in my heart forever. He was full of dreams, and some of them never came true. I pray that my siblings and I can carry on all the best parts of his dreams and make him and our mothers proud. May we walk this earth with grace and love.
I am not good with this. I don’t know what to do or how to be right now, and so I do what has often held me: I listen to music even though it hurts, and I pick up a pen.
Sending my love to my family, those near and those far away.
Daddy, I hope there are horses and music where you are.
***
image by White-M-T-Wolf at deviantART.
Yesterday, I tweeted “Really debating whether or not to get the H1N1 vaccination. Thoughts?” And the tweets and emails sent back to me were exactly divided down the middle, from Canadians, Americans, and International folk. At no point in my life can I remember a vaccine being such a hot issue. At no point in my life have I thought so much about getting a shot.
I have to consider many, many things — on a personal level and on a group level. We have to treat our bodies and each other responsibly and respectfully, so there are many factors to take into consideration.
I have some autoimmune issues, so my immune system is not as strong as it should be. At other times, it is too strong and attacks my own body. I get sick easily, and when I get sick I fall hard. With this immune system of mine, I need to be vaccinated against certain things, but my body also reacts negatively to many vaccinations, especially flu shots. I often struggle with fever and nausea after the fact. Then there’s the hidden dangers — the mercury and other toxins that are used to create vaccinations. Over time, these build up in the body, leading to cancer and other illnesses.
At the group level, we have to think about passing illness on to each other, and to those who have weaker immune systems especially. Passing on an illness is invisible, so we are never aware of who we’ve infected. We have to take this into consideration. Not all those creating the vaccine are profiting from it, nor are they trying to poison us. Many of them are working for the greater good. We have to be wise with this one. As with everything in life, there will always be those out to profit. But we can’t be so afraid of this that it rules all of our decisions. We are all — each and every one of us — trying to sell ourselves in some way.
A vaccine has never been created so quickly, which is shown in this TED talk given by a friend of a friend:
So much national and international collaboration has gone into tracking the H1N1 virus and creating the vaccination, which is succinctly shown in the video. I am impressed that so many have worked together so quickly, and that social media has had such an impact on the spread of information and warnings related to the virus and the vaccine. That said, I am confused by all the media coverage on the vaccination, for and against it. In the United States especially, people seem to have an incredible fear of the vaccination.
About 250 people have died from H1N1 in Canada. That’s the official reported number. Who knows how many people’s lives have been saved because of vaccinations. That is even more difficult, if not impossible, to track.
No one knows when the third wave of the pandemic will hit, nor do they know how bad it will be. So far, it’s known (see video above) that the virus has not mutated or become resistant to the vaccine.
I am fairly confident, regardless of my autoimmune issues, that if I get H1N1 I would be able to fight it without too many complications. That said, if I pass on the illness, I have no idea whether or not the people I infect will be able to do the same.
Thoughts???
***
image from Health Freedom Alliance.
On my way to the grocery store I’m not concerned that strands of my hair, going one way initially, start going another in this pent-up autumn wind. I pull the strands across my head to the wrong side and behind the wrong ear – like a balding man covering his bare patch. He is trying to trick us into thinking something is there – See I am young, I still have hair. He makes the most of each strand right down to the last millimetre. We laugh, but he is being innovative.
It is just a body I walk around in. I’m warm and I’m wearing good shoes with barely any heel. I know my way home still.
I select grapes that are full and ripe, and deep purple like the robes of old-time royalty. When I take the grapes home they will taste like vaguely-flavoured water, and nothing more. When I eat them, my stomach will churn trying to make sense of the thick skins.
In the checkout line a man waits behind me. He is the same man who bashed my leg with a stroller as we tried to maneuver the aisles. I could break something like last week, the laundry detergent packed in save-the-earth glass containers. Crashing sounds as my ass brushes by and then into them. Women are cursed with these things, these jutting parts. But I’m getting better at gliding along, knowing when to let someone pass by, and knowing when to take my opportunity to bolt. This is the city; wide lanes and wide aisles are hard to come by. Wide asses on the other hand.
The man eyes me and then my grapes. His eyes are darting too quickly – a sign of impatience, post traumatic stress disorder, or drug overdose.
“Grapes,” he states.
I smile and make a vaguely annoyed but polite hmmmm sound.
He sighs. I look down. His young daughter in the stroller has picked a large scab off her arm. She stares at it, transfixed, holding it up to the buzzing fluorescent light.
“Emma!” the man squeals, followed by a desperate moan. More huffing and impatience as he scrambles for something in which to handle the scab in a society-appropriate way. There really isn’t one. A scab has no place in this world.
© Kristen Michelle Håvet
***
image by sukhumvit at deviantART.
I can’t handle slow music these days. Not even slower Radiohead. I can’t look at maps of my country. And here I’m thinking of the Northmost. I have photos on my fridge of my mom and I. Not from these days–I’m two or three. They make me smile but tear me up inside. As a teenage version I read that memories grow stronger the older you get. Memories do more–they march beside you, talking to themselves. They whistle sad tunes and spit at you. They reach their jangly hands into storybooks and songs, and most especially into photos, even when the photos have been torn apart. Even when the insides have been torn out of cassette tapes and come undone in the midwestern wind. Memories use these as twisted tightropes and, laughing, they point at you and taunt and call you the nicknames you hated most. Then, laughing, they might hold you for awhile and beg forgiveness for their ways and mostly for their awful power.
© Kristen Michelle Håvet
***
image by toy-camera at deviantART.
Badlands by Bruce Springsteen always makes me think of the Badlands back home. I’m back riding horses and watching for rattlesnakes as the rain moves in. My father finds one and crushes it with a stick. My father becomes a god to me then because he’s killed the snake that haunts my dreams. The way he talks of the kill, he’s a hero, a cowboy god. I watch for arrowheads, something to make me a warrior, too. There’s a smell of grass so dry it warns of fire that could start spontaneously. This is cowboy country, and it’s light years away from where I am now. It’s magical land, but you don’t think about that when you’re on the saddle. It’s only magical in its distance, with a song that plays on random. I was planning an average evening on an average day, waiting for the rain. Instead I get Badlands at 6pm.
© Kristen Michelle Håvet
***
image by chamois-shimi at deviantART.
There are prophets who educate the world on its evils
then go home and spread plagues and misery from their own beds.
There are men who scream peace from the rooftops
then return only to beat their children or sling words as harsh as fists.
There are kings who cry on camera over injustices done to them
then slink away to warm castles far from the people’s cries.
There are prophets who are prophets only because they fashion themselves this way.
They should know…
…you are no prophet if you can’t see the most simple truth
that the smallest action is also the greatest.
Every small seed planted will be seen again.
© Kristen Michelle Håvet
***
image by gromyko at deviantART.
My students have grown old.
They have cars now
their first eye wrinkles
and they’ve mastered that look
of boredom and anger
at having to work hard
for what they don’t want.
Their parents
on the other side of the world
tell them to be grateful
and they’ve mastered the scowl
of wanting to give a shit
but not.
I remember them
a room of class clowns
telling me I had a “man brain”
in a “very woman body.”
They gave me a foreign name
while I learned to mouth hello
rolling their words over my tongue
like a toddler learning to speak.
© Kristen Michelle Håvet
***
image by gEistiO at deviantART.
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