Comments on: The cliff of the unknown: desire, tolerance, and identity

By: mamasteg

mamasteg — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 01:00:49 +0000

Personally, my tolerance for “otherness” is lowest when I step off that cliff, expecting (at a minimum) to be heard, and am shut down. Hurt and confusion lead to anger. Historically the walls thrown up against me in that valley are because I am female, or perceived as liberal—opinions guaranteed to set me off. Invariably I interpret the opposition as patronizing and bass-ackwards.

What I love is the number of conservative-minded friends in my life, who step off their cliff as I step off mine, for a caring, significant conversation. Small acts of great love.

So glad you guys are on! Much love….

By: Elzy Cogswell

Elzy Cogswell — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 16:32:51 +0000

I’m also considering individual identity. I tend to melt into everything and everyone around me most of the time. The paltry parts of me I keep inside don’t impress me much. You know that I only care about serious poetry, so here’s the most serious poem I could find on the subject:

Compliments of a Friend

by Ogden Nash, from The Best of Ogden Nash, edited by Linell Nash Smith (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2007), p. 424-425.

How many gifted pens have penned
That Mother is a boy’s best friend!
How many more with like afflatus
Award the dog that honored status!
I hope my tongue in prune juice smothers
If I belittle dogs or mothers,
But gracious, how can I agree?
I know my own best friend is Me.
We share our joys and our aversions,
We’re thicker than the Medes and Persians,
We blend like voices in a chorus,
The same things please, the same things bore us.
If I am broke, then Me needs money;
I make a joke, Me finds it funny.
I know what I like, Me knows what art is;
We hate the people at cocktail parties,
When I can stand the crowd no more,
Why, Me is halfway to the door.
I am a dodo; Me, an auk;
We grieve that pictures learned to talk;
For every sin that I produce
Kind Me can find some soft excuse,
And when I blow a final gasket,
Who but Me will share my casket?
Beside us, Pythias and Damon
Were just two unacquainted laymen.
Sneer not, for if you answer true,
Don’t you feel that way about You?

By: Marylou Sheils

Marylou Sheils — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 14:59:14 +0000

Martin and Heather… what a lovely Easter gift… the gift of both of you!!! So glad to have my Free Range Fridays full of you both!