Lanterns to find myself...

 

This is not a memoir and it is not a diatribe. It may be a strange kind of hybrid of both although that is not really my purpose. The other day I came across a quote from Emily Dickinson. To verify, here it is

The phrase, "I am out with lanterns, looking for myself," is a famous quote by the poet Emily Dickinson. While it has a deep metaphorical meaning about self-discovery, its literal origin was a casual remark in a personal letter.

That really hit me and since I had just written part of this a day or two ago, I continued thinking. Who actually am I and why? How did I get to where and how I am today?

In short I have re-found a person or viewpoint that has been an essential part of me for close to seven decades. I have now relocated a philosophy and belief system that fits, feels right, and may clarify many things I have said in my blog, on my FB page and elsewhere. I have a ‘home’ or a ‘tribe’ again. What did I find? I call myself a Libertarian and I blend fiscal conservatism and liberal social standards. It really isn’t so hard,

Fiscal conservatism means I do not respect or honor throwing gobs of money at anything to allegedly ‘fix’ whatever is wrong. It is foolish to try to bribe a person or group of people, much less other nations or the world at large by pouring a constant stream of aid which assumes no worth because it is free--they do not have to do anything to earn it. It merely breeds contempt and a sense of entitlement. , I abhor the Nanny State and the weird idea government at every level exists to “take care of us” and basically handle every citizen like a small child who must be bundled in bubble wrap and ‘protected’ 

Socially liberal means keep out of my medicine cabinet whether I choose to use Tylenol or THC, stay out of my bedroom since who I choose to be intimate with is not your business (unless it is a minor child of any sex), and  firm belief  my body is my sole property and every aspect of its care or even misuse is NOT anyone’s concern.  Worry about exactly what equipment is contained in anyone’s knickers is also NO concern of any allegedly governing  or quasi-religious entity. In a way this is old conservative but also liberal. 

I am fiercely independent and have always resented authority but with maturity I realize there is a hazy line dividing an individual’s rights to be or do anything and where that infringes on the good of all. We are allegedly civilized and short of living off grid in a very remote place, we are constrained to live and basically get along with other folks, often in close proximity. My freedom to swing my arms vigorously must end just before my fist hits your nose.  It is that simple. Judgment and some empathy is needed.

So how did I get to this point? For my first decade, my male parent was my hero and I almost felt he could do no wrong. He was a paragon of what a male adult should be and had a ‘right’ to demand obedience and set rigid standards of behavior.  That started to crumble as puberty approached and I began to see where his standards and his “do as I say, not as I do” were not working for me. If at about age nine I had suddenly said “I think I want to be a boy,” were it possible at that time, he would have been willing. Then my brother came along when I was 8 1/2. The new child was a brief joy or pride but then seemed to become extraneou,  not even the common spare heir. He already had a ‘son’ though DTBL it happened to be female. Well, no matter; we will just ignore that, and poor Charlie got the short end of the stick from then on.  Then as I grew taller and developed feminine curves, I decided I wanted some other heroes who were not nearly as demanding and strictly patriarchic. Ooops, not in the plan.

About that time, I also realized that the Divine Entity I chose to honor, pray to and follow was not the harsh, demanding and absolute ruler (much more often as portrayed in religious text despite the “loving father’ clap trap) but was instead more of a mother than a father. From then on my “Christianity” essentially died.  I was basically pagan or heathen but in a rather amorphous way for a long time. She had many names over those years but ultimately simply The Mother. The True Mother, perhaps

I expect the changes came gradually and I realize now much later that my father had serious mental health issues but he was also a classic narcissist with the habits and traits typical of that personality disorder. He could be charming and very appealing, but he could never accept blame, fault or admit to an error. He simply could not say “Hey, I fucked up and I am to blame.” Not even “I am sorry” or simply  “this did not go as I intended.” He made up clever but nasty and rude nicknames for people and developed an ‘enemies list’ that grew geometrically as more and more plans, schemes and efforts went bad andt had to be someone’s fault, someone else's. Before long, it was often mine, also.  I watched this and slowly grew bitter, cynical and very rebellious but that mostly quietly because I was afraid. I learned the pain of emotional and verbal abuse when I ceased to be the adoring and obedient child-pet anymore. That was a hideous sin!!

Those memories, so deeply entrenched in my psyche and spirit,have been a burden for all my adult life. Gaining confidence, courage and the strength to create and build my own personal rules and trust them has been a long struggle. Too easily I became a chameleon to blend and fit and get along, especially in my relationships. In the end that was always self-defeating, but I am immensely grateful I never fell into a truly abusive or vicious relationship. My Goddess and Guardian Angel steered me toward basically decent men who may have been flawed or broken in some ways but were never cruel, brutal or even really uncaring. 

To backtrack a bit, I realize now that my father was an “influenccr” long before that term or idea was recognized as modern technology made it possible. He was a writer and a skilled one. The part I most recall was men’s outdoor adventure and sports magazines but then gradually shifted into several political subjects where words approached diatribes. Influenced by famous botanist, L.N. Goodding (**note follows) a contemporary expert on arid land flora, he turned "Green".  Picture Ayn Rand, George Orwell, Upton Sinclair and others of that era melded together and you get a vague idea. While a lot of it  leaned conservative, it also went deep into the developing progressive/environmental ethos and issues.  He was always a Democrat but at odds with the  developing liberalism at times. He especially wanted independence for himself, at least. Responsibility not so much...

 Both my grandfathers were Republicans and mom was too, though quietly. When I married, my husband and father-in-law were Republicans as well,  though all more in the traditional pattern than the new version. I did slide into the conservative agricultural camp and was active in People For the West etc. I admired Wayne Hage and Helen Chenowith Hage, Julie Smithson and many others in that group. This was a way to oppose what I felt was damaging to my family in my father’s peculiar Don Quixote complex that created real and serious enemies. Its time had not yet come.  I even steered my since deceased youngest brother to a unique woman and her law practice (Lana Marcussen ) after he got his degree and license and he did get involved in property rights issues etc.

But then about the turn from the 20^th century to the  21^st, the “New Conservatives” emerged, taking what had begun with the John Birch Society and the rise of the so called Christian Right and suddenly there was a new slogan and a new face behind the Flag and Cross.  This new figurehead gave me major PTSD. Another control freak narcissist who coined ugly names and said mean and vicious things to anyone who opposed him!  This second term is really much worse with Project 2025 and it’s blatant white supremacy, quasi "Christian"Taiban doctrine and clear idolatry of the Nazi and Fascist past and brutal thoritarian methods.  I have said Charles M Morgan, my male parent who wrote mostly as Chuck Morgan, was almost a flawed prototype of DJT, just not rich, though of course he wanted to be!  

Both philosophically and emotionally there was NO WAY I could support and endure what was happening. I still can’t. But I still do not support the extreme progressive path which will never work well either. So where was I going to fit? I went back into my memories and found the tribe, the clan and the party where I had always really belonged. To my view, taking the best of both extremes and tempering the rest with the Libertarian philosophy of personal responsibility, accepting and using the valid parts of actual socialism where they made sense. Should we really do away with the post office,  the interstate highway system, law enforcement at all levels but under control and hunane rules, municipal services such as garbage, often water and sewer connections and even public schools?  Socialism is nta cuss word, deadly curse or a fast toxic slide to actual  Communism! That is such a limited and naïve a view. 

The USA has functioned almost its whole existence as a mixture of capitalist and socialist practice and patterns. As such, it has worked pretty darn well. And as a Libertarian, I not only condone but agree with this mix, not really a dichotomy. I have fought the idea of "working together"' with the current adminsitration which I find almost totally abhorent and actually evil, but realize the chasm between extremes MUST be bridged and mended if the nation is to survivce. I recently came across the Builders Movement and think perhaps that is the way. There are a fws others.  The "Youing Republican"s are NOT one!!

There is much more I could say but I think this is enough. I am who and now what I am, basically what I have always been inside. I am more emotion based than logical but always pragmatic. Will it work? So I value people much more than ideology and 'polytix'  at any level. Empathy and humanity are not sins or stupid!! We truly are all PEOPLE and we truly MUST accept this and never relegate any part of the Human Species to the trash pile for any imagined inferiority or lack of worth! No group/race/gender etc. is inherently better or worse although individuals certainly can be. This I believe. This is my bottom line and the immovable one where I will stand fast if it takes the rest of my life.A rarely mentioned hero is Ulysses Grant with whom I share a birth date despite intervening years. I too will "fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." It is a Taurus thing, perhaps.

 NOTE ! Leslie Newton Goodding (1880–1967) was an American botanist who was considered an expert in the flora of the Southwestern United States. | Show results with: LN

Photos are my motehr with L.N. Gooding and one just of him. He was an incrdible man and very wise and sincere but not yet aware of much that has happened since his day.