2025.11.02 ALL SAINTS? Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

I woke up this week with a question on my mental screen. Am I really who I say I am, or am I a phony? I’m not racist. How did I learn that? Certainly not in school where everyone was white, and not on the neighborhood streets where I grew up in NYC, and not from any lectures from my parents. No, I learned how not to be racist from the very ones I was supposed to fear—black-skinned people. 

While having my haircut yesterday, I tried to articulate what my latest book, WHITEOUT is about without this belly-deep fear that I was actually a social snob and even racist myself. Obviously racism, alongside many other -isms, is deeply embedded in the culture I live in, even in Alabama where I lived for a brief time. 

*  *  *  *

I learned to love and live free of racism from Dinah, a black-skinned laundress and her daughter Lou, and sometimes a visiting cousin. They showed me how to love myself without guilt, and how to be loved, how to be free. They did not care what color my skin was or wasn’t. I played wildly and freely running about the basement, playing hide and seek around the luggage and storage items of wealthy white people.

I learned not to be racist from black people!  From them, too, I learned how to be white without shame or fear, how to be free and beloved at once. How to look at myself without shame or judgment. I learned how not to be racist from the race I was expected to hate and fear and reject. Dinah and Lou taught me not to be racist, without doing a thing but being themselves. They were the way I learned NOT to be judgmental of blacks OR whites. I learned to love people as human beings without noticing or reacting to their skin color. It might be analogous to Jungian psychology insisting on self-love as the base of being able to love others as you love yourself. 

I learned how to love myself and whoever my neighbor turned out to be from the very ones I was trained to hate and fear.  

2025.10.26 I KNOW NOT WHAT TO SAY. Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

One of my sons called yesterday to tell me that one of his frat brothers had just received a fatal diagnosis. Nothing to do? Nothing more to do? No more treatments?  No more specialists. 

Nothing? 

Nothing.

I lost my voice and envisioned my son with all his frat brothers gathered round their brother, all crying together. They got together every year to laugh and catch up. This year they cried. 

I called my husband to tell him, and we cried on each other's shoulders and remembered sleepless nights of worry. 

I remembered.

My son called back to say: "Mom, also pray— just in case. . . . ."

2025.10.18 BIRTHING AND BLOOMING. Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

When I was born it happened to be Sunday BUT there was a silly rhyme about being the “SABBATH CHILD” who is “blythe and bonny and good and gay”.  My mother was sure I was just like that. She nearly ruined my life with her projections, so I struggled greatly AGAINST being blythe, bonny, good and gay”…………   I grew up OVERobserved!

BUT there was nothing I could do about being born on a Sunday—nothing! Oh well, there might be something I realized after some time of playing the game of  NOT ME. 

I went church shopping to see if this Sabbath god could make me not be me. There I found some success, because no religions or their sanctuaries wanted me as me anyway!  No women, no vaginal bliss, no sex, and no ME, except for my uterus. 

To be over-observed as a child is terrifying, but for me it helped, because it drove me to spend so much time finding ME, bearing children especially SONS, and then getting ME to stand right up behind the altar saying prayers that turned simple elements into holy food, so they said. The Sabbath was MY day! I had to steal it back for myself, my maternal, mothering, sexy, authentic self—womb and all, standing behind the altar 

* *  * *

I married a man because I needed one to complete my image. Also, I loved  him and he loved me and we had children we loved. But he too had to struggle to live up to expectations to make money and make sons. What got lost for us both was the ability to know, yes, who you are as YOU. My second husband also was over-observed as an only/boy-child. He was “saved” by the faithful company of his mother, and the respect he received from the Episcopal church where he sang in the cathedral choir, and was eventually ordained priest. 

*  *  *  *

Oh yes, I know all about dysfunctional families, and as far as I can see ALL families are. We waste valuable yet necessary time to, yes, get real!  What anyone learns in time is how to be a self, while managing to sort out all kinds of emotional pain along the way.  (It amuses me to recall being a family therapist and witnessing one family session at which a young boy dashed into the room and announced: “I am issue-free!” I recall congratulating him and telling him he could always return whenever he wished. He did.) 

Never mind that this kind of self-authentication process is common to us all. It’s damn near as impossible for Divinity as it is for Humanity.  (No, Christians, you don’t get the last word here either!) 

CREATING AN IMPRESSIONIST PAINTING. Lyn G. Brakeman, blog post, spirituallemons.blogspot.com

WHO? Some 50 “painters” of varying ages from 50 to 99. Some in wheelchairs, others on their own feet, all seated, all with bright eyes awake, alert.  I was privileged enough to moderate this process—lightly.  The principal “painter” was a daughter. 

WHAT?  A portrait of one woman named Ikey who had recently died, one we all knew and loved in our different ways, familial and professional. She had resided in all the different areas of care here. Some of us knew her well and some only a little. STILL, if you ever met her even just once, you came away with a brilliant multi-sensory portrait behind your own mind’s eye, of the clear tones of her standout laughter ringing in your ears, perhaps the scent of her last meal, and definitely the vibrations of her whole lively personality stirring each and all into life.

WHERE?  In the Chapel, a beautiful mid-campus space used spottily by varying groups from outside. OUR group were all insiders, some by residence and some by familial ties or through friendships. 

WHEN? From 10:45-11:45 a.m. Imagine creating such a painting in such little time. COLLECTIVELY!  AND ACCURATELY!

WHY? Because we all knew and loved Ikey.  And because it was NOT a religious, church-sponsored event, even though I moderated it, BUT NOT from a pulpit and NOT in a clerical collar. 

*  *  *  *

I know this is hard to believe, and yet I promise it happened!! It could be like pointillism, the method of impressionist painters, like George-Pierre Seurat and Paul Signac, who did NOT mix their oils on the palette first, as was customary, but instead dotted the canvas with distinctly colored dots—until slowly, slowly the apparently meaningless dots formed an image—dots formed by unmixed oil colors—unmixed! When applied, the dots are separate. BUT soon an image emerges from the array of dots. LO and BEHOLD.

This we did today as we gathered to remember our friend’s vibrancy. I told about the hilarity of going shopping with Ikey at the cheapest places we could find and returning with new earrings, or a new sweatshirt or some other cheesy “treasure”.  Also the time we snuck out for pizza following a craving and breaking curfew rules. We brought Ikey back LATE 8 p.m.to face a very annoyed  nurse who came to open the door to let Ikey in. I laughed hysterically recalling college days when we all had to be back in our dorms by curfew or else! I understand the need of such rules. I also laugh uproariously at such rigor at the age of 100! OK I know all about liability. Laughing is more fun. 

Who would have thought that this small community of Ikey fans could share so many varied impressions of her and come up with a perfect portrait in an hour!!!???

May we all always walk together in peace, bound together in LOVE, the only universal force strong enough to hold us—all at once. 

2025.10.05 THE ARTS, BOOGALOO AND ALL. Spiritual Lemons, Lyn G. Brakeman, blog post

We went to hear the Hartford Symphony Orchestra concert last Sunday. The conductor, Carolyn Kwan, literally jumped up and down on the podium in intimate relationship with the instruments—each and all—as well as with her embodied energy. Kwan always invites the player whose solo work is featured in this concert to join her for the pre-concert talk. She knew the personality of each instrument and likely each player. She jumped quite literally into the music itself. 

This latest concert featured a concerto for the tuba. Just the idea of a tuba featured as a soloist made me laugh. It’s such a clumsy instrument, huge, not very portable, and lacking the delicacy of the flute or oboe, or the charm of the cello. 

Still, onto the stage at Kwan’s bidding came Jarrod Briley lugging his enormous tuba.  When Kwan invited him to say something about his beloved instrument he said; “It’s heavy.”  The audience laughed. Briley explained  his instrument as “clearly a background instrument.”  And here he was bearing his tuba’s bulk and playing it with the utmost grace and affection of a lover. When the other musicians are playing along he takes the time to clean out his tuba with a clothe, as he sings lightly into its horn. When a wild contemporary pieces like Bartok or Gershwin come up, the whole ensemble joins in, and the big old tuba vibes. All of us now are already  jazzed up by Marsalis’s second movement called “Boogaloo Americana.” 

*  *  *  *

Carolyn Kwan is a graduate of Smith College, my alma mater. Going to the Hartford Symphony Orchestra Concerts brings me back to my college music course. I had to select a course in one of the fine arts to fulfill graduation requirements in 1960. I chose Music 101, because my maternal grandfather worked for an NYC company that imported classical music from Europe. Curiously and cautiously, I fell madly in love with classical music —even opera. 

I continue to believe in the Fine Arts because they have potential to save the world, to liberate us all from stuffiness of mind, heart and body. Did you know that St. Francis of Assisi as a young and rebellious youth stripped himself of his fine clothes and, in front of his shocked father, ran naked in the town square for all to see. Today we would call it streaking—or maybe future sainthood.  

I admire this behavior although I’m hardly a saint, and I promise not to streak. My own aging skin might just flap and fly away! Still, at all ages there is a time to stand up to authority figures and unjust systems wherever we are and however we can, whether it be playing a tuba or crooning an off-key aria anywhere, immodestly.   

2025.09.28 ARE YOU RACIST? Spiritual Lemons, blog post, Lyn G. Brakeman

 Racist? Not me! Many cry out. There is no racism advocated in the Bible, after all! Or is there?

Focus a bit more closely on the particulars, then wonder again. Sometimes an extraordinary truth smacks you upside the head like the proverbial rake and forces you to draw back and forward all at once—startled and intrigued?  

In the early 1960s, my small daughter was standing up on the back seat (pre-seatbelt time) of our car. I was driving up the street to deliver a mis-delivered package to the neighbor’s house. I parked, ran up to their door and rang the bell. The door was opened by their live-in Black maid. My daughter loudly exclaimed: “What was that?” I was shocked that my little girl had made such a racist statement. 

She wasn’t racist, but we lived in an all-white town—neighborhood, schools, churches, stores. Our small daughter had never seen a Black person before. Thus was born my own shocking personal question: Is it toxic, that is soul-poisoning, to live all the time in an all-white society, a blinding blizzard, a whiteout? Would it not be equally blinding for Black people to live in a blackout?

From neither perspective could anyone see the world or themselves accurately. Blizzard and Blackout are equally blinding and binding to ALL races, ALL cultures, ALL creativity, and ALL religions. Shocked, I wrote the painful truth about my own slow awakening to this blindness, AND about the value of being clear-eyed and open-hearted toward the whole world, not just those who looked like me. I invited divine help into this process along the way at every turn, using loud little words like HELP!

Is racism real, or is it some high falutin ideal? Is it inborn? Could someone be racist without even knowing it?  Are we trained by circumstances, or, like my daughter’s innocence, simply exposed to it, shocked by it, wounded by it?  I strongly and increasingly believe that Racism is a symptom!  It is NOT inborn. We learn it as a way to survive, perhaps thrive. Survive what?  I leave that to each and all of you. 

*  *  *  *

Divinity created the whole schlmiel—and with it enough common sense and freedom to CHOOSE love everywhere towards everyone/everything all the time, including yourself—not hate. 

God did NOT CREATE racism—only FREEDOM.    

DANGEROUS TERRITORY. Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post, 9/21/25

Honestly, I despise some of the impossible choices this supposedly “good” Divinity imposed on the starving people of ancient Israel: choose money/wealth or me. It’s a merciless, manipulative, and dizzying choice. I would definitely, like Abraham, try to bargain. I’m very good at nagging, and less good at trusting God to provide as promised.

* * * *

The retirement community where I now live showed the movie “Barbie” recently. I wanted to go. I wanted to go enough that I debated trying to reschedule my appointment for physical therapy to strengthen my legs and spine. My husband said he’d buy the movie so we could view it at home together. Then I thought, What the hell are you thinking, girl? You’re back in junior high school! 

NEVERTHELESS……………..

In the Old Testament there is a story of old Abraham’s relentless bargaining trying to get God to say just exactly how far one could carry on with sin before encountering divine wrath.  The scene in Genesis is hilarious as Abraham pursues Yahweh relentlessly. Would the Great Divine Creator actually break the covenant and abandon Israel to their own devices?

I actually felt sorry for God with Abraham’s nagging. As a parent of course I identify. You’d do anything, even indulge in sin yourself,  just to shut this or that kid up. 

I had made a solemn vow never to allow the latest doll creation into our house. I remember that I’d banned this best selling “toy” from our house.  I don’t even recall being nagged about the latest specimen of doll. All I recall is that I despised this latest icon of how I should look. 

ENVY!  

ENVY is one of the seven deadly sins. Within ten years I’d birthed four children and my flesh sagged and bagged—no perky boobs or waspish waist—ever.  But did I really want to look like this doll? 

DAMN! Am I still plagued by the sin of ENVY, a green-eyed monster or a small slim icon from the 50’s?  I felt foolish, tears forming in my eyes. Still, I am sure of one thing, and that is that the man to whom I have plighted my troth in marriage would just give me a hug and, yes, call me silly without joshing me—much.