Blog Posts - trish hermanson

Where's Your Refuge?

6/15/2020

A six-foot-long alligator growled and flashed his teeth at Duane and me from a pond on an Island off the coast of Alabama recently. If he’d attacked, I’d have scrambled up a tree, which is what this magnificent oak tree is known for. Locals call it the Goat Tree, because in the island’s past, wild goats scrambled into it to take shelter from roaming alligators.
     Don’t we all face “alligators” at one time or another? Health issues that sneak up on us. Bosses that growl at us. Money problems that threaten to bite us. None of us are immune from problems. So where do we run to?
     I may be going out on a limb with what I’m about to say, but trust me, it’s as sturdy as an oak. We know this world isn’t what it ought to be (racism, pandemics, the IRS). And we know we’re made for much more than we experience. I’ve come to believe that this deep yearning is the voice of our creator beckoning us for something more. He’s in the process of taking all the brokenness and remaking it - and us - for a better world. In the meantime (and it can get pretty mean), if you can’t picture yourself scampering up a tree for shelter, then visualize running to a rock as Whitney Houston sang here.
  Whatever alligators are nipping at your heels, I invite you to take refuge.

Will My Sand Castle Survive?

6/12/2020

As Duane and I strolled along an Alabama beach, leaving our footprints in the sand, we came upon this elaborate castle. Someone expended great energy building this treasure. Yet it will all be swept away with the turn of the tide, just as our footsteps behind us already were receding into the restless sea.
     I recently received an email that two people I knew in our community died. What a shock. They were glorious castles in life. Now they’re swept away, leaving behind a moat of tears among those who knew them.
  Their passing reminded me of author Rick Warren, who says that life is a test, a temporary assignment, and a trust. I’ve experienced tests in life, and I’m pondering how temporary life is. Now as I think about life being a trust, I want to take my steps carefully, expending my energy building something more durable than a sand castle, because life is short and precious. A spirited song that speaks to me about this is here.    ***
   Please share. Previous bits are here.

Let Confederate Myths Be 'Gone with the Wind'

6/10/2020

I’ll be honest, the first time I read “Gone with the Wind” as a youth, I was overcome by the pageantry of Southern plantations with their knights and ladies served by contented “darkies.” I was angered by those mean-spirited Yankees who destroyed this idyllic way of life.
     My myopia grew worse when, as a reporter, I interviewed the woman who played the photographic double for Scarlett O’Hara in the movie version. She stood in for leading lady Vivien Leigh for long-distance shots. I reveled in her memories of Leigh and Clark Gable.
     But my misconceptions vanished when I read “Lies My Teacher Told Me.” In it, author James Loewen describes how “Gone with the Wind” propagandized the myths of the Confederacy. He says the novel, written by Southerner Margaret Mitchell during the Jim Crow era, sweeps under the carpet the oppression of African Americans and demonizes Yankees for their “Northern aggression.”
     Yet that myth continues today, bolstered by Confederate flags and monuments. It’s easy to call out these overt racist symbols, but it’s harder to recognize when I unfurl my own banner of discrimination or memorialize prejudiced thoughts. For instance, what about when I secretly think I’m smarter or better than others because of their race or ethnicity? That’s cultural racism.
     It’s time to take down Confederate flags and remove Confederate monuments from the landscape of our nation and the landscape of our hearts. And as for “Gone with the Wind,” perhaps we should view it with more levity like comedienne Carol Burnett did here.
     ***
   Artwork: screenshot from “Gone with the Wind” movie trailer.

Paradise Has Termites!

6/8/2020

Duane and I are visiting family members on what we thought was an Alabama island paradise with swaying palms and white-sand beaches strewn with shells. But then a pesky cockroach showed up in our flatware drawer. And we dodged biting ants when hiking. And a swarm of termites slipped through a crack under our bedroom window and infested the room. Even after swatting, smashing, and vacuuming I found termite body parts inside my laptop the next day.
It’s paradise lost. Humanity out of harmony with nature. And I think about how much worse it is in parts of the world where malnutrition, filthy water, and pollution rob people of health. And where justice and mercy have washed down the gutter of corruption. On this planet, we live in the “shadowlands,” writer C.S. Lewis said, a dim reflection of what the world is meant to be.
     Do you ever relish the world’s beauty, yet ache about what is marred? About the rawness of racism, the horror of hatred? I do. But I’m hopeful. In “Ecclesiastes," one of my favorite books, an ancient teacher wrote that the Creator of this world has lodged eternity in each person’s heart. We long for the paradise that’s lost. But it’s coming again! Our yearning is well expressed in this innocent song here I invite you to listen to.
  ***
Image from Insight Pest Solutions.

Racial Wisdom from 'To Kill a Mockingbird' for Today

6/4/2020

That’s me at the Monroe, Alabama, courthouse that served as the inspiration for the setting of an appalling scene in the book and movie “To Kill a Mockingbird.” It’s where white lawyer Atticus Finch defended an innocent black man in 1930s Alabama. In that prejudiced culture, the man was found guilty of rape.
     As we search our hearts about race these days, I’m drawn back to the wisdom of Atticus. When his young daughter wrestled with discrimination, he said, “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view … Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”
     That fits with the recent advice of African American pastor Marcus Doe from Providence Bible Church in Denver, Colorado. He says that the solution to eradicating systemic injustice is not found in gathering more voters in either major political party. “These avenues will NOT solve racism and systems of injustice in America. Political leaders are way too dull a scalpel to cut out systemic racism from the American body.”
     It takes something much harder, Doe says. “Let me urge you to find friendships with African Americans.… I urge you to pursue knowledge through reading. Read authors who are black, both male and female.”
  That’s a challenge. No matter what our race, are we willing to reach beyond our cultural comfort zone into someone else’s? As Atticus Finch said, are we willing to “climb inside of his skin and walk around in it?”