Freedom's Just Another Word for Nothing Left To Lose

In my early 20s, Janis Joplin was one of my all-time favorite heroes.  Yeah, I know, I know - she embraced the lifestyle that led to her inevitable destruction, boozing it up, taking God knows what, engaging in all sorts of hell-raising.  I hear she even had an illicit affair or three, although she never thought much of herself.  In her own opinion, she was too fat and too ugly to be a vessel of beauty.  But maybe her cloud of poor self-esteem had a lining of silver for the rest of us:  recognizing her limitation in one area, she sought to compensate for it in another, and Janis sang her heart out.  The icing on the cake was her love for the blues, probably stemming from her ability to relate to the heartache and sadness that are the foundation of the genre.  Singing along with the cassette (yes, I am that old) while Janis belted her lyrics with the passion of a believer was the perfect way for me to rebel against life, every time I felt it knocking me down.

But lately, I've been thinking a lot about freedom, a topic that Janis was more than happy to incorporate into her repertoire; all you have to do is listen to her song, "Me and Bobby McGee," to get a sense of her opinion of what "freedom" really means.  (I would be remiss if I didn't point out that the song was actually written by Kris Kristofferson for a male to sing about his lost lady-love, but for my sake of argument, let's just assume that Janis whole-heartedly agreed with Kristofferson's lyrics.) Because of my recent experiences, I have to say that my ideas on freedom definitely diverge from those of the defiant diva of yore.  

Finally, I'm beginning to see.

Dare I say it?  I think that we, as Americans, take our freedoms very much for granted.  I realize how trite that sounds, but please stay with me.  I'm not pointing fingers and calling names; my goal is not to preach or instill guilt.  I am merely making an observation based on my recent travels, and conversations with good friends.  I am as guilty of this as anyone, but my goal is to be more aware of myself, my good fortune, the idea that freedom is a finite quality in many parts of the world.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I traveled for three weeks in Egypt this summer.  While a number of things were exactly as I expected, many were not.  Everywhere we traveled, there were posters of the current president, Mubarak, who has filled his position since Sadat was assassinated.  For all you young folks out there, that was in 1981.  I hear Americans speak of recent presidents who stole elections, and as a historian, I know that it's not uncommon for a U.S. president to receive the majority of the popular vote, but not the electoral vote.  However, no matter what opinion you hold, as long as you have reached the age of majority and are a U.S. citizen, you have the right to vote, and you have a choice.  True, it may not seem like the candidates are all that different any more, but you still get to pick your poison.  The current political joke in Egypt centers around what will happen when Mubarak dies or steps aside:  Egyptians will then get to choose their new president - either his older son, or his younger son.

Poster of President Mubarak, with mosque in background.

Now, before I go any further, I want to mention something.  I started this post several days ago, and realized it was going down a path that I didn't want to travel.  I wanted to share what people told me about their experiences, and how their words made me appreciate what I have.  But for some reason, I couldn't stay on track, and what I had written beyond the few paragraphs you see above sounded like a lecture.  Oh, man, did I cringe when I read my own "you-should-do-this-and-not-that" little speech.  So forgive me for delaying the post - but I PROMISE, you would have been getting a mini-workout from all the eye-rolling and heavy sighing had you read the post as it was.  Thank you for bearing with me, and giving me your ear, because now I want to talk about a couple of very recent conversations that I've had, with two very different individuals.  They were, after all, the inspiration for this post, and I believe they had something important to say.  In the end, I promise to tie it all together, even if it seems like I'm being a little circuitous for the present.  

This statue is located in one of the many busy intersections in downtown Cairo.  In the past, it has been interpreted to signify Egypt's unveiling as the nation-state gained independence in 1952.  Now, it is seen to signify the "re-veiling" - as a modern Muslim nation, many citizens are turning back to more traditional practices, such as women wearing the hijab.

Conversation One happened a few months ago, when a friend was explaining the circumstances of her husband's arrival in the U.S.  He's Japanese, and we have several Japanese manufacturing facilities in this area, so I always sort of just assumed that he came over with his business, and just decided to stay when he got married.  I was partially right - he does work for a Japanese company, and he did decide to stay here after marrying my friend, who is of obvious European-American descent (yes, I hate these hyphenated labels, too, but in this case, I feel like I just can't avoid using it).  BUT, the real reason that this couple remains here stems from the freedoms we have that aren't necessarily a part of Japanese culture.

Hitachi Building, located along the Nile River in Cairo.

That was a bit of a revelation for me.  You see, I once worked in one of those local Japanese facilities that I mentioned above, and most of the Japanese guys - there were no Japanese women working there, because that would mean that their husbands were very poor providers - were scheduled to live stateside for a certain number of years or months, and most of them looked on their time here as a necessary evil tolerated for the sake of showing loyalty to their employer.  As soon as their time was up, they went back home.  Not so for my friend's husband, even though his wife has spent a year in Japan, and is fairly comfortable with both the culture and language.  He likes the idea that he can buy a house with a nice big yard, and not have to worry about the neighbors shaming his future child for something that we would consider a trivial matter.  Believe it or not, the concept of minding one's business is inextricably tied to freedoms of choice, and I'd never seen the matter quite like that.  The whole conversation opened my eyes a little, and I was glad for her candidness.

Conversation Two occurred when we were packing up on the last day in Egypt.  The professor who organized the trip is married to an Egyptian woman who grew up in Cairo.  I asked her if she got homesick after traveling to Egypt because she shared so many wonderful things with us about Cairo, and I could tell it was very dear to her heart.  Her response to me was not as straightforward as I had expected.  "Of course I miss Cairo the minute I get on the plane to leave," she told me, "but the U.S. is my home.  It is where I can dress as I please, and do what I want to do."  Based on all we'd seen and heard, I understood her point.  She felt like the U.S. was the place where she had the freedom to be herself.  Her husband/father/brother wasn't going to choose her wardrobe for her, nor limit her activities to those involving household chores.  Even in the U.S. of the past, women had more say in their lives than many Egyptian women of today, and I'm so grateful to all those women and men who've gone before me, fighting for issues such as women's suffrage and the ERA, regardless of its failure to become a part of our constitution.

Sufi Whirling Dervish, aboard a dinner cruise our last night in Egypt.  The religious ecstasy is evident as these gentlemen are able to "whirl" for prolonged periods.  This sufi danced for about 30 minutes, but the others that we saw on a different night danced for much longer.

Since my return, I've settled into the groove of my daily activities, and I've thought a lot about both of these people and what they shared.  It humbles me.  To grow up with so much freedom, with people telling me that I could be anything I wanted to be made me blind to the million little restrictions other cultures place on personal freedoms.  I know we have some of that here, too - I am not so naive to think that all women have the same access to jobs (or pay) that men have, nor do I believe that people of color can walk through "our" world in the same way whites do.  We still have a way to go before we have a truly level playing field when it comes to freedoms and rights, and if I'm honest, I think these two go hand-in-hand.

So what would Janis say about all this heavy talk and deep thinking on the topic of freedom?  I'll let you decide for yourself.  But for my part, I'm pretty sure she'd say that it's all in the concept of how you interpret freedom, especially in the context of relationships and personal connections.  But I like to look at the bigger picture, the one where freedom can be the opportunity to decide something seemingly unimportant, like the color of my hair, or something much larger, when I participate in choosing our national leaders.  However I look at it, I feel like I'm finally seeing what it means for the first time in my life.  Thank you, my two dear friends, for your openness and sharing.  You've given me a gift that I didn't even realize I had the freedom to accept.

Collecting Vintage - My Thoughts on Why We Do It

Lots of people collect vintage pottery and glassware, and for more reasons than I can count.  I am drawn to it primarily for two reasons, and I think they are fairly common with most collectors:  first, it reminds me of my childhood (sort of), and second, it takes me to a "better" time in our national history.  Both feel legit at first blush, but when I consider each, I have to ask, how true are either of these?  Probably not very, but in the end, it really doesn't matter.  Maybe you have something to say about it as well - if so, I invite your comments.  Who knows?  You may have a different reason that  I haven't yet recognize within myself!

Now, about that memory of childhood thing.  I should probably mention that I grew up in the 70s and 80s, so Elvis ruled as The King of Rock and Roll during my early years, and Madonna rose to Queen of Pop as I traveled through middle and high school.  Quite a gap between the two in some ways, but maybe they're more alike than we really give them credit for.  That's a blog topic all on its own, and maybe I can come back and revisit the subject again in future.  But for now, back to my original topic of how vintage pottery, our perceptions of childhood, and the past all intersect.

Cobalt Vases.

Maybe you didn't grow up in the same era as I did - that's okay.  Just take a little trip down your own constructed or reconstructed memory lane of the 1970s.  Do you remember lots of cool aquas and pinks in bird or fish-shaped pottery, with a hint of cobalt, evergreen and ruby red glass thrown in?  If I actually think about the items in our house - or in the houses of friends' parents or my own grandparents - I have to say no in almost every case.

Aqua or Turquoise Grouping of Vintage Pottery.

We bought a new (to us) house in 1978 or so, and it had an avocado bathtub, sink and toilet in the bathroom.  Ugly, flat gold carpet covered the floor throughout, with the exception of the kitchen and bathroom, where - you guessed it - there was avocado-patterned linoleum.  To make our house oh-so-elegant while matching the ubiquitous cheap brown paneling, my mother added darker tones to all of the public rooms and an avocado dishwasher and double oven in the kitchen.  Hideous, chocolate-colored drapes of a fabric akin to lined burlap graced the windows in both the dining and living rooms.  And to top it all off, my parents went and bought new furniture right before we moved, and it was of a heavy, brown wood and vinyl, accentuating all the rest of the ugliness that we called home.  I would be ashamed to admit to such utter atrocities, except they really weren't uncommon.  And there were worse decorating schemes left over from the 1960s, but I won't get into that.  I think I've made my point:  my childhood was a drab world of dark, ugly, heavy spaces.  So this pottery doesn't really remind me of those "good old days," as much as I would like to lie and say that it does.  Maybe, just maybe, the cool pieces that I find allow me the pretense of a lighter, prettier space for my childhood than the one I experienced.

But perhaps that second reason holds more validity:  vintage pottery, in all its wonderful "Americana" shapes and styles may bring to mind the thought of happier times for the good, old U.S. of A.  Lots of the pottery pieces that I come across and bring to my etsy shop for sale were manufactured in the 1930s and 1940s, so it's hard to say.  In the early 1930s, half the population still suffered from the sluggish economy and by the end of the decade, wartime tensions led to "Buy American" campaigns which continued throughout the first half of the 1940s.  Do poverty and wartime really equal a better place for us in our collective memory?

Bird and Birdbath Planter.

I think it definitely relates to the "rose-colored glasses" view of the past, which may be good for us.  As a group, we need a positive narrative to act as a framework in which to place our grandparents and great grandparents - even our moms and dads.  All in all, prohibition had ended so people didn't have to break the law when they were "thirsty," train and automobile travel were coming into their own, and even though many still suffered from the poverty brought on by the stock market crash of 1929, the price of many pottery pieces at Woolworth, Kresge and Co., and other five-and-dimes generally ranged between ten and thirty cents.  In some cases, pottery and glassware didn't even have to be bought - it was given to patrons as a promotion, for going to the movies, or for buying their favorite brand of oats.  So maybe when collectors pick up a cute little kitten planter or a piggy-shaped set of salt and pepper shakers, they see a time when patriotism was expected and buying something at the five-and-dime meant supporting the U.S. economy instead of the dreaded enemy.

Ruby Red Rose Dresser Box.

For me, it's nothing so concrete.  I am an educator and historian by training, and I have a strong love for the past.  Even though we never had any McCoy or Shawnee Pottery filling a bookcase or display shelf when I was growing up, I know those pieces were there to witness other people's childhoods, as silly as that may seem.  To pick up a piece of pottery and imagine its creator at work, painting and glazing, getting the details just so, is no hardship for me.  Nor is it difficult for me to picture a piece, wrapped in special paper and a big fat bow, passing from one friend to another, signaling the significance of a special day.  Just thinking about all the personal triumphs and failures - the individual narratives that sometimes don't seem to make up the "real" history of our shared past - witnessed by vintage pottery and glass reinforces my belief that their collection is a worthwhile endeavor.

Pair of Kitten Planters.

To think, I didn't even mention "going green" as a reason for collectors to amass large quantities of vintage pottery or glassware.  Maybe because deep down, I know that greening up is something we do with our heads and not with our hearts.  And collecting is all about how something makes us feel good, excited, enthralled - but not necessarily smart.

Eat, Pray, Love

Has anybody out there seen the previews for this new movie with Julia Roberts?  Better still, has anyone actually read the book?  One of my doctors recommended it to me a few weeks ago, and I thought it strange.  I mean, I don't have a life-threatening illness or anything, so I didn't understand why she would suggest a book with pray in the title.  Until now.

The Nile River, from the Cairo Tower.  Downtown Cairo.

During the month of June, I went to Egypt for three weeks with a group of students and other alumni from my alma mater.  I was supposed to be finding a new teaching job during that time frame, going to a reunion picnic with former classmates at my other alma mater (grad school) to make contacts, and writing my thesis in my current endeavors (grad school again - different master's program, but worthwhile if you teach in Kentucky and want a pay raise!).  Instead, I had this opportunity come across my plate and I snatched it.  I'll probably never go to Egypt again, and I may not even get the chance.

So where am I going with this?  Well, a bit of marketing went a long way for me - as I was clicking to see what Chef Eric Ripert said about last week's challenge on Top Chef (yes, we're foodies in this household), I got to watch the trailer for Eat, Pray, Love first.  And suddenly I got it.

Various forms of transportation on the Giza Plateau.

Julia Roberts' character went on a trip of a lifetime, because this was her life, and she was going for it.  I remember saying almost the same words, and I knew exactly what her character felt.  I've been there.  But it's both more complex and more rudimentary at the same time.  Since I haven't read the book - no time for fiction this summer! - I can't say what spurs her to take such drastic action as booking a trip to parts unknown.  But I know that feeling of letting your life pass you by.

The complexity?  We somehow get the notion that life doesn't really start for us until we're on our own, finished with school, living in our own digs, signing up for our own utilities, etc.  And that's just not true.  So society's rules teach us one thing, but we have to learn to ignore them:  just because we don't have that all-important career or that "grown-up" car, we're still living our lives.  There are no do-overs, and that's where the rudimentary part comes in.  You don't have to get it perfect the first time around, but you do need to be present, because you will never be here again.  You only get one shot at life, so better to make it count than worry about the things that don't matter.

One of the ancient Wonders of the World, in all its glory.

And now that I've gotten that all-important wisdom down onto the page, perhaps I will get down to business and get busy living my life.  Today's all-important task, historical research, definitely demands that I be present in what I'm doing!

Stick-to-it-ness for Life

When I was working on my undergraduate degree, I had this job on campus at the audio-visual services office.  The woman in charge was pure hell on wheels, with a kind of Pat-androgeny about her that made her all the more intimidating.  I had never had any other job before this one, unless you count the baby-sitting and camp counselor roles, so I was pretty naive in a lot of ways.  But this woman - we'll call her SB (short for Scary Boss) - took a liking to me for some reason that I still don't understand to this day.  This was a very good thing, because I saw many of my fellow employees, who were totally cowed by her biting sarcasm and quick wit, come and go with such speed that it's a wonder we managed to keep the place running.

So what, you're probably saying about now, but I promise you there is relevance to this tale.  You see, SB felt one of the biggest issues we faced as a nation was my generation's lack of stick-to-it-ness.  I think maybe that's why she treated me with a modicum of respect that I didn't see her bestow upon many of my peers.  Without even realizing that my stubbornness could be an asset, I refused to quit that job, no matter how hard I had to work, or how many times I failed when doing a basic AV setup.  This wasn't merely tenacity on my part - it was sheer fear.  In all my naivete about the world, I still understood that sometimes the devil you know is better than the one you don't.

My point?  Even though I was acting out of fear, I still refused to give up and kept plugging right along, no matter how terrible I saw SB act when she decided that others (lesser, stupid-acting, mere mortals) were no longer worthy of any sort of consideration.  Recently I was reminded by a dear friend that even when I feel like I'm failing in so many ways, I still have one thing going for me:  stick-to-it-ness.  I could call it stubbornness or tenacity, and it will probably continue to get me into trouble occasionally, but regardless, it's that drive to keep going and not give up (give in??) that has helped me get where I am today, and that's not such a bad place.

Now, if I could just apply it to my graduate studies and my etsy shop . . . equally.  Somehow, it seems like one or the other is getting all the attention while the other is being neglected.  But I'm too stubborn to  lessen my commitment to either!

Collection of vintage cobalt vases, soon to be uploaded to my etsy shop, www.beezuscomplex.etsy.com.