Deer in Headlights

We say hello. They look at us funny. We try to make polite conversation. They give polite responses paired with blank stares. The well-known "deer in headlights." Who are we? We are From Away. Who are they? They are Real Mainers.

I've lived in the Midwest, the South, and all over the East Coast. I've visited other parts of the country as well. The styles everywhere are different; the regional languages aren't always easy to decode. After several years, I never did learn how to talk Texan. However, only in Maine have felt I speak an entirely foreign language.

We've been here over five years and it still happens. I think I'm being friendly and I feel as if they think I'm totally offensive or insane. This happens in brief exchanges (paying for gas or at the market) and even still sometimes with people I've known casually all these years (fellow CSA farm shareholders, my husband's former coworkers).

Is it me? Is it something I've said? I've been trying to understand the puzzling dynamic. In the process I've needed to disentangle the social awkwardness I’ve known my whole life because of my uniquely outgoing personality. In Minnesota, my sociable personality seemed sometimes to surprise the generally shy folks. But even when it was a bit uncomfortable, I could sense they, too, were trying to make the conversations work. So when I arrived here, I thought the deer-in-headlights response had to do with my own personal style. As the years go by, though, I come across more and more people From Away who say, "oh my gosh, yes!" when I ask them if they've had similar experiences.

We (From Away) are chatting away enthusiastically, trying to find common ground where we can all have a shared positive conversation. They (Real Mainers) seem to retreat into their shells with facial expressions bordering on contempt.

I’ve become convinced people From Away and Real Mainers must frequently have different meanings ascribed to our shared social interactions. Sociologist Herbert Blumer believed, as I do, that people interpret each other’s actions and interact with each other based on those interpretations. In The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, Erving Goffman offers a theatrical metaphor to describe social interactions. For Goffman, our interactions depend on our presentations to each other and our interpretations of each other’s performances. That is, I have my set of cultural values and expectations and you have yours. When we are together, our most successful interactions happen when we have an unspoken shared agreement about how to appropriately react and fit in.

What is especially puzzling, though, is the varied backgrounds of those From Away I speak to about this phenomenon – we come from entirely different worlds, different cultural languages, different socio-economic roots, but all have the same deer-in-headlights experiences with Real Mainers. How can this be?

I’ve witnessed Real Mainers interacting with none of the deer-in-headlights response. It seems so free and convivial. Their conversation dance moves smoothly from one to the other, there are no retreats into blank stares. It’s like they are a part of a super-secret club and know the handshake. Only a few times have I tried to participate in these conversations. And when I do?

Blank stares.

Until I extract myself from the situation (finish paying for my gas, for example), everyone stumbles. I get the paranoid feeling that as soon as I’ve left they quickly return to back slapping and speaking in that mysterious foreign tongue.

I used to kick myself over this. I used to try and figure out where I went wrong. These days, I’m not as surprised. I’m less fearful that I’m just making huge mistakes. It’s very clear there are communication patterns here I don’t yet grasp. Until I find some good local sources (Real Mainers) to help decode the situation, I’ll keep on chatting away knowing my conversation partner might stare at me with wide open eyes showing what I can only assume are part surprise, part judgment, part puzzlement, and mostly, a part of a world I don’t yet understand.


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A Woman's Right to Kill Her Baby

My friend won’t let me kill my baby. Or, to be much more accurate, she wants politicians and laws to decide when or if it’s okay to kill my baby. I’m 23 weeks pregnant and I've had a human life in me since the day I got the first positive pregnancy test. Now, we’ve named her, she’s a she, she wiggles like crazy, she’s about a pound and a half with almost all fully functioning organs (just her lungs need serious continued growth). She’s been “viable” since 2 weeks ago. Still, she’s inside of me. My body. Not someone else’s. If I wanted to kill her, that’s my right.

The language I’m using is provocative. If anti-choice and pro-choice believers want to come to any sort of agreement on the issue of personal choice in abortion we need to be willing to speak or at least hear each other’s language. I’ve written my description in horrifying terms: killing a baby. It makes my skin crawl just reading the title of this essay. But I realize that’s how my friend would see it. And, in my own case -- for me -- that’s how I see it, too.

Since I can remember, I’ve known in my heart I couldn’t have an abortion. Of course we can’t ever know what the future holds, but I went to extraordinary measures to avoid pregnancy. I didn’t have intercourse until I knew I would be able to care for a child. Then I always used birth control. No matter how wasted I got (those were some challenging times, the 90s) I never had sex without birth control. Because, as I’ve said, as soon as I know I’m pregnant, logic or science aside, I feel I’m carrying my child inside me. Immediately I begin the relationship that will last for both of our lives where I will care for that child forever.

My position as a pro-choice woman is just as strong, however, as my personal choice not to have abortions. There are several facets to this position. The first, and the least digestible for the anti-choice movement, is that I believe knowing when life begins is a personal and spiritual decision. I have friends who believe life begins with the quickening (feeling movement of the fetus). I have friends who have had multiple abortions who still aren’t sure when life begins. I also have friends who believe life starts at conception, but for personal reasons have had abortions. This aspect of the pro-choice movement is typically pointless as we debate with the anti-choice believers. To most of them, abortion is always murder.

Carrying a fetus, a baby, inside our bodies is an exclusively female ability. It is this fact alone that makes abortion different than all other laws governing our bodies. We have laws that say we can not physically beat each other up. We obviously have laws against murder. We have laws that try (in vain) to prevent self- or other-harm through drug use or acts like drinking and driving. And, as soon as an infant is outside of its mother, we have laws protecting that child. Thankfully, infanticide is illegal in our country. There is no comparable situation, however, where men or boys have a life growing inside of them.

When we begin legislating decisions for one gender and not for another, we say one gender has fewer rights than the other. Therefore, no matter how difficult it is for some people to accept, no laws should govern what happens to a life inside a girl or woman. Until my baby is born, what happens to her is entirely my decision. And I will fight for every woman's right to control her own body as fiercely as I will fight to keep my own baby safe and healthy.

Tuning In

When my mother sang me to sleep, her voice was the most beautiful in the world. Now, when I sing Maya to sleep I wonder if she'll think the same thing. I used to be a very good singer. I still get enthusiastic kind comments when I sing, but I'm quite sure that's because I sing confidently even when I miss the notes.

My voice was never super-star strong. But I did make it into the audition-only groups in school, and those were quite competitive. Madrigals felt like a waste of time as a teen, but the jazz choir performed in the annual "Pops and Jazz" show with the jazz band that was really, really good. I remember sitting in a semi-circle with the other jazz choir members with the slighty-insane director shouting at me to sing a series of two or three notes over and over and over again, perfecting the pitch and the tone. People who weren't very musical often thought I had perfect pitch (never did, but could stay in key).

Because that's part of who I was, I was someone who sang, I was always in the choirs. And, because I sing strongly I was often a favorite of directors (especially in our tiny church choir where I was a strong singer who was also the preacher's kid). It was part of who I was. I never really considered if I enjoyed singing, enjoyed the music, or enjoyed being a singer.

In college, I auditioned for a capella groups like The Accents and The Sonneteers. I ended sticking with The Sonneteers. We had some superstar voices in there and overall did a nice job with the music we made. I was content to be someone who could carry a tune with a pretty voice still never questioning why I was doing it.

Then, in the late 1980's I had surgery on my sinuses. This seriously helped my health (no more sinus infections for years), but completely screwed up my voice. After the surgery I became anxious any time I sang in public. I'm still entirely freaked out that I can hear what I'm singing, I can know it's wrong, and I can't fix it. I can't just sing a little tune without concentrating hard.

Friends suggest if I were to return to voice lessons, I might be able to re-learn the skill. The question has become, do I want to? Why did I sing in the first place? Did it give me pleasure, or was it just what I did because I could? I can't stand musicals, I have no desire to sing in a band, I still cringe at the thought of booooring choir rehearsals. So, why re-learn it if I'm not drawn to singing?

Every night, I sing Maya to sleep. I have a small repertoire of songs, most from my mother's own selection. It's in those moments when maybe my mind is wandering to "when will she ever fall asleep" and back to enjoying the experience of creating the music that I wonder about this. There are only a few activities in my life where I can lose myself and find myself at the same time. Creating art is one of those times. And, I'm beginning to remember, singing does it, too.

Would I enjoy voice lessons again? Would I take the time even if I didn't want to join a choir? I know I'd like to not fear the sounds coming out of me, I'd like to get that control back. I enjoy vocal music (chamber choirs, madrigals, other choral groups). Before I put in any effort, though, I need to know what my goal is. For now, I'll remain content knowing it's quite possible my daughter thinks I have the most beautiful voice on the planet.


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