I have vivid snippets of memories from my early childhood
education: singing in kindergarten chapel at Kingsport, Tennessee’s Episcopal
Church; dreading recess because no one would play with me or even let me on the
jungle gym; a very large deciduous tree in the far corner of the fenced-in
playground that dropped wildly interesting nuts; something about Three Blind Mice in the basement of that
ancient stony place; naps on a mat in warm, filtered afternoon sunlight.
But these strong memories pale in comparison to the time I
insisted on wearing just a shirt and leotards to school. And my mother letting
me.
Oh J. Alfred Prufrock, if you only knew.
In your “Love Song,” you ask if you dare disturb the
universe, noting that there is time in a minute for decisions and revisions
which a minute will reverse. That’s one minute I might wish to reverse. I can
still feel my awkwardness: the realization dawning on me that I was only
half-dressed in a room full of laughing boys and girls, and tugging at that
shirttail as if I could somehow stretch it enough to cover my embarrassment.
And I have known the eyes already, known them all—
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and
wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
The memory of my own pinning and wriggling—standing in line
to go to chapel, and art, and recess, and myriad other activities that day that
required me to stand up and be caught not with my pants down, but with my pants
completely absent—is forever burned into my frontal lobe where personality
hides. There is no spitting that out. There is only living with the scar from
the pin’s incision.
Oh but it’s the same tired tune, J. Alfred--the one all
inwardly-driven types sing--quietly, and to themselves so that no one else can
hear. I made a bold choice that morning, and I stuck to my decision. My mother
allowed me that autonomy, never realizing of course that it would scar me so
deeply. Who can know these things? Certainly not my five-year-old self, who,
knowing what I know now, might have done as instructed and put on a pair of
britches.
But looking back on my kindergarten experience I realize I
learned—or rather, taught myself—that God’s crayon box contains primary colors
only. We are free to stay the color we are born. Or we can allow our
experiences, decisions, and sometimes sheer will to mix in a neighboring color.
Although the boundaries between the three basic, pure colors cannot be breached,
we are free to experiment, to soften our edges. We can choose to mix in
experiences that change our hue within our primary boundaries. This is our
limited palette; there is no changing that basic crayon God wields on each of
us. But some change is possible, if we choose to change. How much is entirely
up to each individual, and the experiences they draw.
That early event was scarring, but it moved me—for better or
worse—just a nudge along my color wheel. I’ll always be an introvert, but that
doesn’t necessarily mean I must always be a pure, primary introvert. I chose
not to wear pants one day when I was 5, and it affected me. But I lived through
it. I could have retreated into my shell like ragged claws scuttling, but
instead I chose to poke my head out and move forward. My choice. My palette.
Do I dare disturb the universe? I do commiserate with you J.
Alfred, my wriggling friend. It’s so much easier, and way more harder, to just stay
on that primary color swatch. But there really is just one answer to the
question: yes. Yes, let’s.
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