+ Her Barefoot Heart
i am surrounded,
almost to the point of suffocation, really,
with boxes of family history and herstory.
photos out the wazoo.
birth certificates
death certificates
marriage certificates.
family documents,
legal documents
all carefully organized
and stored in archival quality boxes,
these papers
that prove somebody existed,
but not that they lived.
“I can see your brush strokes,”
he harumphed
this man who wanted me to pay
his people to repaint what I’d just finished painting.
More and more
I am showing my brush strokes.
And when I’m using metallic paint,
yes,
the strokes will show.
Some people don’t like seeing the strokes.
Some people find the visible strokes
offensive or uncomfortable,
preferring an all-concealing, even coating.
Shoot, sometimes I don’t even like the strokes.
When I was sweet,
when I was a nice girl,
when I blended in
and caused no trouble
and agreed appropriately
and stroked and cajoled
and said only things I knew would be
accepted – occasionally even lauded,
when I couldn’t even tell you what I
wanted or needed or was even all about,
well, truth be known: that was easier for me, too.
I knew the rules,
the parameters.
I know how to play that game
and it became so second nature to me
that I didn’t have to think about it.
It was,
in what now seems
a warped sort of way,
comfortable.
///
But let me be clear:
The days when I remake myself
into an image you find pleasing
is over.
Done.
History.
If you find my words offensive,
if you don’t agree with me,
if you don’t like seeing
brush strokes,
there’s a solution that’s easy, simple:
Don’t read.
Don’t look.
Don’t listen.
Move on.
Instead of contacting me
and asking that I remove a post,
instead of contacting her
and demanding that she take down her words,
hide.
Defriend.
Unfollow.
Stroll another lane of the internet.
It’s
just
that
simple.
///
I spent a lifetime
contorting myself into images
they would find pleasing.
Then I spent another lifetime,
telling my daughter to do the very same thing.
Why?
Because I wanted her to be safe.
And now I know:
Safety is not found in becoming
somebody other than who you are.
///
As for those brush strokes . . .
It is no longer okay
to say
“This offends me, so I want you to remove it.”
It is, however, perfectly okay to say
“This offends me, so I will
read elsewhere.”
It’s easy, once you get the hang of it:
Don’t like a particular stage show?
Don’t buy a ticket.
Don’t like a certain kind of music?
Change the dial.
Don’t like a particular television show?
Watch something else.
Just so you know.
one day
you get an offer you can’t refuse
and you say “yes”
and start packing
and in that short, one syllable exhale,
you turn your life upside down.
for two straight weeks
day in and day out,
your family
and strangers alike
come in and help you
put your belongings,
both public and private,
into liquor boxes.
then into trucks
then into the new space.
and when all the boxes
are brought in
and stacked
and stacked
and stacked,
and stacked
and stacked
and stacked,
they leave
to go back to their
orderly abodes
and you wave bye
and go back inside
to try to find a place to
sit and rest.
for just a minute, though,
because
you’re only
part way through this journey.
you’ve thrown out
and shed
and given away
many, many, many things
because the reality is
that you only have
half the space now
and
there’s still so very, very much
to situate.
you open boxes
packed by other people
and you’re surprised
to find things
you didn’t even remember
you had.
and sometimes,
many times,
you remember where
you were when you got it.
and though you remember the appeal
it had at the time,
you put it up for
adoption
because
there’s simply not room for everything.
you sift through,
sometimes tempted to
send things away
if they can’t
justify their existence,
if they can’t earn their keep
with obvious, undeniable function.
and other times you come across
something that just makes you smile
or even laugh out loud
and you realize that
laughter may not
dry you off after a shower,
but it can cleanse
nevertheless.
you spend
every day
wondering where to put things
and eventually you find a place
and the satisfaction of knowing
that this thing
fits right here
and will stay here forever and ever
is immeasurable.
but you open more boxes the next day,
and you prioritize all over again,
sometimes moving the things placed
so carefully the day before
to make room for something that now
seems more essential.
after a week,
people say things like
“i trust you’re settled in by now,”
and you feel like a
failure
or worse
because there are
still
unopened boxes
everywhere
and storage shelves
in the kitchen
and suitcases
in the bathroom.
things get broken,
though not as many
as you might expect,
and it’s funny
how pillowcases
still elude you,
but you can put your hands on the tiniest
little oddball
wire support
for the lamp
that you never used all that much
because it lived in the guest room.
and when you produce that
tiny little oddly-shaped wire
moments before you husband
tosses the seemingly-broken lamp
on the truck, sealing its fate,
his “huh”
is dressed in surprise
with maybe
just maybe
a splash of admiration.
there’s more to come – so much i want to tell you about this move – but for today, just take a peek at my writing table . . . and chair (once belonged to my paternal granddaddy, the banker. i’m researching a book about him now.) . . . and muse:
and my view:
for reasons we’ll talk about later, my writing space has been relocated and reduced to this:
into which must fit this:
and this:
and this:
there is some serious magic-making in my immediate future.
i rounded the curve
and spied a gorgeous sculpture
in the middle of the greening field.
i blinked
and the captivating sculpture
became
a mule
grazing.
from captivated and elated
to
disappointed and deflated
all in the space of
a few hundred feet.
then i remembered
something read
years after i left
pews and classrooms . . .
michaelangelo
said he created his
david
by removing all that
was not david.
and just like that
i was once again
captivated.
///
i’ve been pondering lately what it means to think independently.
and to value feeling as much as thinking.
and every now and then, i wonder what my life would be like
if i hadn’t been so strongly conditioned
that science rules,
that there is only one right answer,
that a mule eating is merely a mule eating
and not a work of art.
my mother
and my grandmother
and her mother before her
churned.
up and down
down and up
they’d send the paddle,
until the sweetness rose to the top . . .
my beloved friend and writing partner
julie daley
has posted some remarkable
things on her blog,
but the past few weeks,
she’s really outdone herself
with her posts on oppression
and silence.
this is a conversation i’ve
longed to be a part of.
this is a conversation
i’ve loathed being a part of.
///
the day julie posted silences one,
my dream:
i was part of the underground railway
there was a passionate quickening
throughout the dream,
a full-body smile.
i sat at an uncluttered table
way up high
and wrote and wrote and wrote.
then i wrote some more.
the words spilled out
and rained down
and it was good.
it was so good.
wait.
i’m a southerner.
i can’t say
“underground railway”.
///
the morning after a phone lunch
with my beloved angela,
i can’t
for the life of me
remember
if she said she’s
a conservative
or
a liberal.
and that makes me smile all over.
///
oh, i want to sit in this circle
i really, really do
but
i don’t know how to talk.
if i say “you”
i’m preaching.
if I say “i”
i’m egocentric,
stuck-up,
self-centered,
calloused,
unfeeling
navel-gazer.
or worse.
when i went to graduate school,
i knew
in the way the feminine me knows
things unspoken
and unseen
that i should buy some
birkenstocks
and wear either
long, flowing skirts
or camo pants
from the army/navy surplus store.
i’ve tried awfully hard
to be a good friend
in the ethers
just like i did at graduate school
hoping that once you got to know me,
you’d like me.
hoping that when the differences
inevitably appear,
our union would be
strong enough
safe enough
to have space enough
to survive the differences.
you, my digital tribe, have been my tour guide,
taking me to places
i’d never have been able to go
on my own.
you’ve shown me different
ways of being,
and that enriches my life
immeasurably.
///
yes, i’m from the south.
fluent in english and southern, i say.
i love being a southerner
i loathe feeling like i should apologize for it.
///
does
victim
equate
with
oppressed?
maybe
it’s only a
semantic
mixup.
maybe
i
haven’t
really been
oppressed.
maybe
i
should
excuse
myself
from this
table.
i don’t want to be
oppressed
any more than i
want to be
an oppressor.
actually, what I really, really, really want
is to help women.
but that feels so
condescending.
that feels so
privileged.
that feels so
oppressive.
i want to
support women.
i want to stand
arm in arm with women
without
comparison
without
judgment.
comparison
trips us up,
keeps us from moving forward.
comparison
is a tool of a system
that builds and maintains the
safe (for the system) and suffocating (for us)
divide and conquer scenario.
we’re women.
we’re alike,
and we’re different.
imagine us
walking on the lush green fields
we were told not to step foot on.
that’s where i want to be,
not sitting at
an assigned seat
at an assigned table
in an assigned room,
poking at each other
with forks.
the field is
open
and expansive
and green
and lush
and the moist earth
feels solid and supportive
of our bare feet.
natural.
we smile there
we chortle
we revel.
the tables are
separated into rooms.
with angles
and walls – thick, insulated, impermeable walls.
the tables are
constructed,
and designed to keep us
small
and insulated
and from being able to
hear and see each other.
///
don’t you oppress
when you
dismiss
my experience,
my stories?
///
is it
acceptable
fashionable, even
to be oppressed?
do some people
grow comfortable
in the oppressed seat?
it is
oppression
when I walk into the room
wearing pink
or blue
or anything but black or camo,
wearing lipstick
and nail polish
carrying my
new iphone4
and my ipad
and you
judge me
as
the oppressor
or
as one who
has nothing
of worth
to contribute
to the conversation?
isn’t judgment
a form of oppression?
it sure feels like it.
///
doesn’t cattiness
and don’t cat fights
feel like tools
the system uses
to keep us distracted
and in our place?
///
can we really
talk about oppression
without the conversation
degenerating into
comparisons
and
blame?
///
i have been
oppressed
by
judgments
stereotypes
comparisons
class warfare
religion
an abusive male
and
governments.
but
is this really about
proving that my oppression
is worse/bigger/more obnoxious than yours?
is this really about
earning a totebag
or a badge
or a yard sign?
///
i do not like writing this
i do not like thinking this
i do not like feeling this.
this is not my native language.
///
what if
we lay our measuring swords
down on the table
not pointed at
any other person
yet
within reach
for when we need to
cut through
the bullshit
or
carve an
opening
into
a new way
of being.
what if
we listen
i mean
deeply listen
to each other’s
stories of
oppression?
could it be
that the
comparisons
and judgments
are the first
steps out of silence –
like stumbling
when we flick on the lightswitch
in a room that’s
been dark
for eons?
could it be
that the
comparisons
and judgments
are
testament
to
wanting to be
seen –
really, truly, deeply
seen?
what if
every woman
felt
not pitied
or trivialized
or commoditized
or devalued
or invisible
or dismissed
but
validated
and worthy
and seen?
how would that change
her?
how would that change
us?
how would that change
the world?
what if
bearing witness
is the salve
for the soul,
the balm
that’s needed
to
heal us
through
and across
and over
and into?
could it really be that simple?
do i seriously
think that just
listening
can make
profound
changes?
well,
yes.
yes, i do.
when women
feel safe enough
to be honest
with themselves
and others,
they gain
confidence
and
assurance.
and when women feel
strong enough
and safe enough
to live
from a position
of confidence and assurance,
things will never
be the same.
i mean, shoot,
why should the oppressors
be the only ones
living
confidently
and with assurance?
///
i’m nail-biting angry
at the oppression
heaped on women.
i’m nail-biting angry
from others
and
at the oppression
i’ve heaped
upon my self.
///
when i wrote my thesis,
i used all female
pronouns
and it was
positively
liberating.
liberating.
hmmmm.
is that the opposite
of victimhood?
the goal
for ending
oppression?
sovereignty
is the word
i carry in my
heart’s pocket,
you know.
i read
Reading Lolita in Tehran
years ago
and it still lingers
in the dark
crevices,
the passion pockets.
i long to
go forth
and liberate
women
who are completely
covered
save for their eyes.
women
who are not allowed
to read
or congregate.
but
who am i
to liberate them
just because
i see that as oppression?
isn’t that arrogance?
isn’t that judgmental?
isn’t that what religions
and
governments
do –
impose their belief systems,
their political systems
on others?
why don’t i just wait
till they ask?
because
not everybody
has my phone number.
///
i resist looking at privilege
because
i have authority issues.
serious authority issues.
looking at privilege
feels like something
i am forced to do
if i want to be
considered a good girl
if i want to get that bright, shiny A.
my authority issues are so damn big
and dense
that i resist
discussion of privilege.
oh, don’t get me wrong:
i’ve got it.
privilege, i mean.
yep, i’m privileged all right.
“uncle”.
i’m also a woman who was
molested as a child
by a man who worked for my dad.
right there in the shop
in front of all the other men.
“doesn’t it feel good?”
he asked in a way that let me know
i was supposed to say yes.
convincingly.
as a teenager, i was in an abusive relationship
where i heard on a daily basis
“you are so ugly and so stupid,
who else but me would go out with you?”
along with a plentiful assortment
of other punches,
both physical, verbal, and emotional.
as a young adult, i was raped at a party
in front of all the other couples
who watched quietly,
none of them saying anything.
once it was over, the
music started again,
conversations resumed
and it was as though
nothing had ever happened.
///
i can’t stop crying.
i don’t have time
for such luxuries,
that pesky part of me says,
but the rising jeanne says
bunk.
i don’t have time not to cry.
so the tears
that have been held back
and squished down
and told “no”
gush forth.
and every tear –
every single tear –
has a different woman’s story on it.
this could take a while,
so i’m using handkerchiefs
that have been handed down
to me
and handkerchiefs
purchased in antique shops
because
they’re softer
and stronger
and experienced.
an exhausting day, mentally, physically, and emotionally. an hour and fifteen minutes before the movers are to arrive, the truck rental place announces they don’t have the truck we’d reserved and offer little – very little – empathy. i’ve learned that staying calm works best more often than not, and it works again, albeit slowly. the two women (lisa and leslie) at the moving company are fantastic to deal with – i feel like angels are helping me move. they just keep assuring me that they will get me moved today, and they do. had i been close enough, i’d’ve had to use every ounce of self-restraint i could muster to avoid kissing them on the lips.
we eventually get a truck, arriving home about 7 minutes after the movers. my mother, my sister-in-law, and my daughter are busy beavers as they pack, move smaller things, and help me stay on top of things. eventually there is no more room in the truck, something that still makes me feel ill – but i just keep telling myself that like meredith, i’ll purge as i unpack. i mean we needed to completely fill the truck to prevent things from falling and flopping, right?
were it an olympic sport, i’d own the gold in justification.
all the hubbub upset the cats who pee and slink and hide once they are let out of their apartment (a.k.a. the garage), and as much as the cats wage battle against me, i feel quite loved as friends offer guest rooms, house keys, and even girl scout cookies.
hubbie, daughter, and i see everybody out and headed out for a margarita – something we’ve done three days this week, something we’ve never done before now. you know, that’s the one thing i’m enjoying about all this – how we shove work and chores and other miscellaneous to do’s aside to gather and see the day out together, laughing and talking and enjoying the company of each other. and i can’t help but wonder why we haven’t been doing this all along . . .
we are moving.
didn’t plan to.
didn’t really want to
– at least not just yet –
but we are.
moving.
and i am struck
once again
with the undeniable fact
and weightiness
of accumulation.
accumulation
of the
emotional
and
physical variety,
i mean.
as we fill more and more
and more and more
and still more and more and more
empty liquor boxes,
i long to streamline
to carry only what i can fit in my car
or better still
in a single backpack
and okay, possibly a suitcase.
(albeit an extra large suitcase).
i remember the days
when i covered empty cardboard boxes
with contact paper
to create nightstands.
i remember the delight
of making do
with what we had on hand.
and honestly,
i kinda’ want to go back to those days.
that kind of resourcefulness
builds confidence
and character
and creativity of the first order.
most of my boxes are filled with
family history and herstory.
photos
documents
and such
from a grove of family trees.
i will resume operation scan ’em up and roll ’em out
hopefully in the foreseeable future,
even though my daughter worries just a tad
about ever-advancing technology
eventually rendering them
inaccessible.
ah, my daughter.
my son moved away years ago,
so i’m kinda’ used to
the way loving him
comes with a side of pain,
but it’s shocking how much
i already miss my daughter.
we are close, you see,
geographically
and otherwise.
but hey,
the good news is:
she’s able to take possession
of some special items
without me having to die
for her to get them.
dying.
interesting that i’ve been thinking about death
a lot
lately.
and here we are moving.
now i know that i can create a home
wherever i go,
but
there’s a kind of grief that
occasionally breaks through the barriers
i’ve hobbled together.
this whole scenario
came about just last week,
and though my son
worries that we are living
more impulsively
than waldenly,
when the couple appeared
and asked,
we said yes
and immediately began packing
because
a four-week turnaround
flies by quicker than you
can touch your ear.
as a little girl, i loved dressing up in frilly socks and ruffled panties and petticoats that made my skirts stick out like a tabletop. i liked patent leather shoes and dancing in the grocery store and creating private nests for myself where i could get away from it all and create. one thing i did not like was getting dirty. dirt just did not interest me at all . . . which for some reason, disturbed my mother to the point that one day as i sat quietly working on a new book, she picked my 5-year-old self up, carried me outside, and sat me down – ruffles, lace, petticoat and all – in the middle of the biggest mud puddle she could find. she still loves to tell that story, and i declare she sounds embarrassed that i didn’t like to get dirty and smugly satisfied when she gets to the part about unceremoniously plopping me down in the mud. i can just see her wiping her hands and laughing as she walked back to the house to watch me from the window.
now i may not have liked mud then (and i still don’t like to get stuff under my fingernails, so i’ll not be making mudpies any time soon), but in some ways, mud is kinda’ growing on me. not that i want to spend time in a mud puddle, mind you, but i do like holding clay in my hands and shaping it into something or other. and i love not having a clue what i’m going to write but picking up the pen anyway and just watching the words spill out on the page.
my precious friend and writing partner julie daley (jewels, i call her with very, very good reason) recently asked me a most excellent question: what does writing from the feminine look like to me? that question captivated me for days, and the mud story kept tugging at my sleeve pointing out that writing from the feminine can sometimes be muddy. muddy in the sense that i don’t always know where i’m going when i start to write. it’s not always clear, and there’s not always an outcome – intended, expected, or otherwise. when i write from the feminine self, i write from (including myself, my vulnerabilities, my feelings) instead of about (reporting, answering the 5 questions of who, when, where, what, and why).
when i write from the feminine, it’s more about process than product, and quite often, i don’t even know what i have till i get to the end and can see patterns and threads and word crumbs. when writing from the feminine, i write from the body, and often there’s a lot of space in what i write – space enough to crawl into and get comfortable while things incubate. writing from the feminine, it’s more about following than questioning, intuition than the cognitive. writing from the feminine uses dreams, metaphors, and imagery, relying on intuition and an inner knowing that can’t always be explained (nor does it need to be, actually) more than giving ink to what others think and write and theorize.
. . . as i sit here writing this, my resident owl serenades me under the glorious full moon, and i swear she’s urging me on, telling me that writing from the feminine is natural and needed and even necessary . . .
you know how when cars get stuck, little flecks of mud go everywhere as the tires spin their way forward and out (“out” if all goes according to plan, anyway)? when writing from the feminine jeanne, little flecks (and sometimes big flecks, too) get slung out, often without segues or outlines or even capital letters. there’s seldom a nice, tidy, linear structure, and often as not, there’s not even an
No Academy Award was ever more of a surprise or more appreciated than the various honors and awards i’ve received from my friends in the ethers over the past few weeks . . .
Tracy Brown and Gordon Simmons allowed me to sponsor the Daily Gratitude Journal over at Happiness Inside where there are multiple ways to discover, well, happiness.
///
My darlin’ Jewels honored me with the Beautiful Blogger award on The Awesome Women Hub on Facebook.
///
Susan, Abigail, and Noel dropped a Stylish Blogger Award on me, and with that award comes a request to tell seven things about yourself . . .
1. I am named after my uncle (my daddy’s brother) who was killed at age 18. My mother and daddy met in third grade in a most unfortunate eraser-to-the-back incident while doing long division at the blackboard. It may not have been love at first sight, but they dated each other exclusively throughout high school, then enjoyed over 50 years of marriage . . . except for that one weekend in high school when a little spat found Daddy taking their classmate, Jean, out on a date. When Uncle Gene was killed, Mother saw a chance to solidify the affection of her mother-in-law, but oh the dilemma when her firstborn turned out to be female. G-e-n-e, short for Eugene, is a male, so that wouldn’t do. And she didn’t want to go through the rest of her life being reminded of That One Awful Weekend, so Mother tinkered around with various spellings until she decided on J-e-a-n-n-e.
2. I met my sinuses while flying the wind tunnel in Denver. It was fun, though – the wind tunnel not the sinuses.
3. As a child, I loved potato chip sandwiches.
4. I still don’t drink bathroom water.
5. I don’t wear a watch – haven’t for years.
6. I don’t like strawberries . . .
7. Or tomatoes.
~~~
“I need 5 more quirky things about me. I’m struggling here. Can you think of anything?” I asked my husband.
In less than 5 seconds, Hubby rattled off all sorts of things to me (almost before the question mark was out of my mouth). “That’s enough,” I told him. “I have my 7.”
“Are you sure?” he asked. “Cause I was just getting warmed up.”
~~~
While I am loathe to thank my husband, I am not at all hesitant to say Thank you again to these lovely, talented folk who have seen fit to bestow a little spotlight on me, though I deliver it red-faced with embarrassment for my tardiness.
This work by Jeanne Hewell-Chambers is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at http://www.TheBarefootHeart.com.
© 2026 Jeanne Hewell-Chambers
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