JulieLeung.com: a life told in tidepools

My friend Bernadette appeared in Saturday’s Bainbridge Island Review

Sometimes half the battle is understanding what you face.
Children with Tourette Syndrome, a neurological disorder characterized by involuntary motor and vocal tics, are often misdiagnosed for years.
TS sufferers can be misinterpreted as “troublemakers” who want to draw attention to themselves. But that’s the last thing they want, explains islander Bernadette Witty.
Witty knows; she was not diagnosed with TS until age 32.

Today I overheard Abigail telling Michaela during playtime that they were going to the “Geek Meeting for Women”. Where they got that idea, I have no idea. When I tried to ask them about it, they didn’t want to comment….:)

When I went to BloggerCon last month, I had a list of people I had planned to meet. I had looked forward to being with these friends I’d made through blogging, and I was glad we got to see each other face to face.

But then there were others whom I met because we happened to be in the same place at the same time. Coincidence. Serendipity. Fate. The best description that comes to mind is “Unexpected Surprise”. As if a surprise is expected. A bit redundant but still the phrase seems appropriate.

Lenn Pryor is someone who fell into my “unexpected surprise” category. After I came home from the conference, I told my husband about all the great people I met there, including Lenn. I wished Ted could have been there too.

In Seattle yesterday Lenn got to meet Ted and the girls when we had dinner dopwntown together. It was fun. I was glad to introduce him to the rest of my family. It’s great to meet people at conferences, but even better, I believe, to share with them your daily life, little kids and all :). Blogging is good but flesh and blood is better. We brought the girls along so that they could meet him too, and so that he could see all the seedlings and sprouts for himself. It was good to hang out with Lenn again and to get to know him better.

I realized that getting to know someone is simply a series of unexpected surprises… like unwrapping little packages…whether it’s time spent together sharing a conference session or reading each other’s writings (I like what Lenn posted today on Learning How to Live Again) or enjoying a meal and conversation around a table. As we unwrap the packages, finding what lies beneath the paper, we find what we have in common: experiences, stories, feelings, beliefs, values, heart. We find friendship.

Thanks, Lenn, and thanks to all my friends, “new” and “old” and for all the unexpected surprises we’ve shared, and all the ones still to come…:)

Shephali Sharma through her weblog Share to Heal has encouraged me this past week. I found Shephali when she found me here. What she says stays with me through the day and I think about her stories. Such as An unforgettable day

I thought what if the car wouldn’t have stopped? She could have got hurt or may be worse. Would I have been responsible for it in some way? Did I know the woman so much in a few minutes of observation that I felt so much for her?

I’ve also appreciated her posts on Iron needed for memory and thoughts on co-pays.

I like her poetry, her recipe and her cute baby boy. Thanks for refreshing me with beauty!

She’s also practical. Here’s a snippet from her essay on cooking

Now the question arises – DO I ENJOY cooking? Well, I have a very diplomatic answer for this. I love cooking special recipes on special occasions. Hmm…so the bottom line is, I don’t enjoy cooking everyday! Doing the same meal (the staple diet which consists of rice, pulses and vegetables) is really monotonous affair for me. Anyway, you have to live and for that you need to eat and for eating you need to cook. 🙂

Thanks to Bob V’s comments, I’ve been thinking through the day today about what I posted last night. Sometimes I need to re-examine what I wrote. Taking another look is always good (in the morning light!) and I’m grateful to those who hold up the mirror to me in dialoguing!

Another way to look at both the stroller and jeans issues is to see them as different kinds of conversations. Ted wrote an essay this week about Us versus Them. Us versus Them happens when community and conversation are not in common.

Fashion to me feels Us versus Them. I feel I am at the mercy of whatever stores want to sell. What I want doesn’t matter. “The look” is what counts.

But this article about Ella Gunderson and her letter reveals that conversation can occur. The girl was the one who initiated. Perhaps it would be better if the store somehow started or invited the dialogue directly.

I believe conversation is crucial in every relationship of life, including the business of buying jeans. It is true that there are other options such as chinos or skirts. But leaving the store with a pair of chinos, when what you wanted was a pair of jeans, is not best for the customer and ultimately not best for the company either.

Being willing to participate in dialogue, to take another look at what their clerks were saying and what their stores were offering, shows that Nordstrom’s wants to have conversation. They were willing to admit they had made a mistake and that they wanted to change. I like that too. Dialogue destroys the Us versus Them gulf.

The article about strollers also reveals the possibility for dialogue. A dialogue between cultures across continents. Reading what Africans think about strollers caused me to reconsider how I see them. It lead me to wonder whether what we think may be an improvement or a help is always that way. Another perspective can help illuminate the reality I am living or show me something I hadn’t realized.

Hearing another culture’s perspective is someone holding up the mirror to me in a new way. Or to use Jeff Sandquist’s example, it is like someone coming and examining my fence, showing me where I’m missing paint and boards. It challenges what I believe, and lets me examine what I thought was true. It helps me learn from mistakes and grow. It shows me how I can listen and love better. I need to hear it. I want to know!

Conversation doesn’t mean we have to agree all the time about everything. Conversation doesn’t mean I implement (or perhaps even accept) everything someone else says.
Conversation doesn’t mean a person, company or culture has to do what I tell them to do.

What I think conversation means is that I consider what is said to me. I listen. I think about it a few times. I turn it over in my mind and examine the facets of it, as a jeweler examines a jewel. I wonder what it means. I’m willing to let what is said change me and the way I live. I respect what is said and who is saying it. I take it seriously. I pay the price to invest time and energy. For it to be a two-way conversation, this has to be true on both sides.

There isn’t a recipe for relationship and I can’t completely define what conversation is and isn’t. But I think that it’s something that can be sensed inside, in the soul: I know it when it happens and the other person does too. Conversation takes place on an individual level. Sometimes learning to communicate takes time and practice. It requires making mistakes and living humility. Yet the community and conversation are worth the price paid.

We need to dialogue across cultures. We need to have these conversations to cross the barriers. Whether that is bridging the gulf between pre-teen jean customer and Nordstrom’s executive, or between people separated by oceans and continents, languages and history, on different sides of the world. Between the two people on either side of this wall where I sit. Or between two individuals reading this weblog. 🙂