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About The nugget. (Sisters, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (April 10, 2019)
4 Wednesday, April 10, 2019 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon In the PINES By T. Lee Brown Trying harder <I yell at my daughter sometimes,= a woman recently mourned on her mommy blog. Then she proceeded to flagel- late herself. Her inability to remain 100 percent cool and calm all the time, with a small child con- stantly pushing her sanity and stress levels, caused the mom great discomfort. She won- dered about the emotional effects on her own small self when she9d been yelled at by her mom. I appreciated how she pro- cessed it all publicly, with thoughtful, engaging writing. What I didn9t like was her conclusion. After some in- depth emotional wrangling, she decided this: she must <TRY HARDER= [sic] not to lose her temper or raise her voice. Ever. Sounds great 4 except it is the usual, self-defeating lesson women are taught. Our culture shows us that emotions like anger are, at worst, wicked things that deeply traumatize children for eternity and pre- vent <shrews= and <bitches= from rising in politics and business. At best they are an embar- rassment and inconvenience. Emotions, and the chemi- cals that cause them to ebb and flow naturally, provide an excuse to dismiss 51 percent of the population. A dozen years ago I was at a business dinner with executives in an old-school industry where historically women worked only in secretarial, maybe accounting. Now women had been hired to sell heavy equipment, mostly via phone (where pre- sumably they wouldn9t chip a nail on a rusty bearing). A president, a CEO, and an oper- ations guy shook their balding heads over their sumptuous steaks. Yep, they agreed, their new saleswomen were doing great work. They weren9t rising in the company; they weren9t expected to. <Too bad about the hormones,= one man said. This would9ve been an excellent time for me to stand up, knock the table over, and holler, <Wanna see some f&*^%$# hormones, gentlemen?= But hey. I didn9t want to rock the boat. I didn9t want to wreck the deal we were work- ing on 4 the deal that would allow my dad to retire and my parents to pay off their home. Anger arose, along with shame and frustration at not expressing it. I kept all those inconvenient feelings out of the steakhouse. Like a good girl. Like the Stepford Wife the mommy blogger expects herself to be. Where do you suppose those feelings went? Where do yours go, when you repress them for the sake of keeping the boat level, the business moving forward, the children happy? After dinner my tears of frustration flowed, and I had a good conversation with my dad about the whole thing. He learned something, and the deal went through. If my client hadn9t been a thoughtful and compassionate man 4 and my father 4 my truth would9ve had nowhere to go. Here9s the thing. <Feeling our feels= is gloriously hard work. To genuinely experience and express emotion requires deep stores of courage, hon- esty, and trust. Trust that your fellow humans aren9t going to exile you from the tribe for crying, yelling, or occasionally kicking an inanimate object. As for children: they have big emotions that move fast. It9s useful for them to see that grownups, too, ride those wild waves. Should they be exposed to endless conflict or berating? No. That9s abuse. But it might be nice for them to know that if someone yells, it9s not the end of the world. Maybe it just means Mom lost her cool. Soon the cool will come back. When Mom apologizes and talks about emotions, the child learns tools that my generation mostly didn9t get from our parents. I have an Irish temper, a mood disorder, and hormonal swings. Like the mommy blog- ger, I used to feel enormous guilt about my emotional self. I thought that somehow, while raising a small child and caregiving for an injured hus- band, running a household and working as a freelance writer and teacher, I should maintain preternaturally steady moods. Meditation, medication, therapy, exercise, creative outlets like music and writing 4 these helped me surf the moods, but they didn9t change my underlying emotional reality. Instead of becoming per- fect, after a few years I simply became more human. More compassionate. I gave myself a freakin9 break. So I raise my voice some- times? Big deal. What mat- ters is that I follow up with information, vulnerability, and conversation. I even gave the awful, irritable side of myself a name: <Cranky Mama.= My son makes jokes about my moods and understands they can change with the moon9s cycles. He asks intelli- gent questions about feelings, rather than viewing them as mysterious negative forces. He knows some folks have bigger and different emotions (and neurological wiring) than others, and is able to judge people less harshly as a result. Maybe those pesky emo- tions have some use after all. Instead of beating ourselves up, maybe we could <TRY HARDER= to feel, express, and understand them. PHOTOPROVIDED East of the Cascades Quilters held a sew day at The Stitchin’ Post last month. Quilters support kids in Central Oregon The East of the Cascades Quilters held a sew day to support Quilts For Kids on March 27, at The Stitchin9 Post. Twenty-seven quilters par- ticipated in making quilts and pillow cases that are provided to Central Oregon children. (Quilters Susan DeGroat, Jill Miller, and Janet MacConnell are shown making a quilt and pillow case above). Last year Quilts For Kids donated 140 quilts to the Black Butte Police Department, Deschutes County Sheriff, Sisters FAN, MA Lynch Head Start (2 classes), SPRD Preschool (2 classes) and Sisters/Camp Sherman Fire Department Toys for Tots Program. Fifty pillow cases were donated to Sisters FAN and Ryan9s Cases for Smiles at the St. Charles pediatric ward. The quilts and pil- low cases serve to provide comfort and reassurance to children in need and who are going through difficult times. DINING & TAKE-OUT until midnight every night Menu at SistersSaloon.net 541-549-RIBS 190 E. Cascade Ave. New for spring! Cotton Concentric Yarn 541.549.6061 3 311 W. Cascade Ave. Sisters, Oregon