prepare yourself: this is eventually a post about politics

"we read to know we're not alone."

i watched shadowlands tonight all the way through for the first time (skinny, are you proud? thanks for loaning it.) i need more time to process before i'm really ready to talk about it, but i sure did like joy, c.s. lewis's wife. he calls her the truest person he's ever known, and i think that's one of the best compliments i could hope for.

to me, truth is beauty. i want to be authentically beautiful on the inside. i want to be a beauty collector. here's a start:



to politics. i feel very conflicted lately, and every time i read the news, i come away depressed. anyone else? (let me be clear: this sensation is caused primarily by people, not policies.) before i go any further, you should know that i bounce between being a cynic and an idealist but spend most of my time as an idealist. so call it naive, but i think things can be different. i think we can listen to each other. i think we can LISTEN to each other, not just give the appearance of listening. i think we can talk about each other with respect.

i'm not just talking about political celebrities--i'm talking about you and me and the way we can't understand the meanness that comes at us when we support something we believe in even though we dish the same petty divisiveness when we don't get our way. is there another choice? i'm speaking vaguely because even though this is a post eventually about politics, i don't actually want it to ever be about politics. i want it to be about people. (though what is the point in separating politics from people?)

i understand that people have strong feelings (understatement: people feel like their lives are at stake, and in some cases, that's probably true) about what happens in the senate and the house--i do too. can we be worthwhile participants in the political process and still be kind to those who see differently? can we have intelligently reasoned, vigorous debates without attacking one another? if you tell me no, i just might believe you. that's the state i'm in. i'd appreciate any thoughts.

"it is a way of saying, i want you, too, to have this experience, so that we are more alike, so that we are closer, bound together, sharing a point of view--so that we are 'coming from the same place.'"

--lyn hejinian, my life

i will continue to have faith in the power of sincere dialogue.

PS (if you haven't had enough):
the irking thing about this whole post is that i'm not sure dialogue deserves the praise i give it. i wonder if dialogue is a western ideal (i read this somewhere, can't remember where) and not really as "good" as i think but simply what i'm used to. i wonder also if there isn't a point where differences are so fundamental that talking won't help at all. (ie samuel huntington's "the clash of civilizations" and stanley fish's "boutique multiculturalism.) on the other hand, i wonder if the flaw of the dialogue paradigm is assuming that the result of dialogue should be shared beliefs instead of greater civility.

a friend read the above hejinian quote and expressed shock at my support of homogeneity. this is my ultimate question:
can we understand each other if we have fundamentally different values, desires, lives, experiences, etc.; or does understanding necessarily result in sameness?