Have you turned into your Mother yet? It happens. After all the times you said, “When I have children, I’ll never…” haven’t you found yourself doing, saying just the things you swore you’d never do or say?

Once when my youngest son was leaving the house after dinner, going back to his so-called apartment, back to a day job where he wasn’t making a living wage, back to night classes he hoped would lead to a living-wage job, I found myself stuffing food in his pockets, in his hands, in his jacket hood.

When he said “Mom, puhleeze!”-what a moment! It was me talking to my mom, telling her I was going to be just fine, to let me make it on my own.

Well, mostly I did-let him make it on his own-but it’s a jungle out there and a few packets of dried soup mix couldn’t hurt, right? I mean it’s not like I did what I wanted to do which was to go tell his landlord he was overcharging and his boss that he was underpaying. And I wasn’t so sure about that night school instructor-the paper he put a C on looked like a B plus to me. I didn’t say a word to any of them. The kid is on his own.

But I understand, Mom. Now, I really do understand. It is very, very hard to see your fledglings flapping their wings as hard as they can-and sort of sinking more than they’re rising.

Every bone in your body wants to whip out there and give them a lift. You stay put, you keep quiet-but you stuff their pockets with apples and baking potatoes.

I work everyday with the stories of people who are sticking their necks out to make the world a better place. And since I realized that I have become my mother, I’ve seen in the stories of the women-mothering. Women who are taking all those urges to nurture, protect, counsel, to make things right no matter what they have to give up or go through, women who are using that mothering stuff to fix the world.

They’re chasing johns and drug buyers out of neighborhoods so the streets can be safe again.

They’re hiding abused kids from their abusers. They’re taking control of run-down housing projects and making them real communities. They’re teaching ex-cons how to live honestly, non-violently. They’re feeding, clothing, sheltering, encouraging-way beyond their own kids, way out there-mothering the world.

It took turning into my own mother to get me to recognize what I was looking at. And to value its place in the world. We may get “Mom, puhleeze!” from our kids, but when we put those instincts and that energy to work in the world, the ripple effect is astonishing.

Happy Mothers’ Day.

PS: Yes, there are hundreds of male heroes in the files as well, but this is Mothers’ Day, so…

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The Giraffe Heroes Project sent a team to the five-day Seeds of Compassion conference in Seattle. We talked with hundreds of teachers and parents who had assembled there about Giraffe ways to foster compassion in the young.

It was an extraordinary opening for giving people all we’ve learned; thanks to some generous grants, we gave educators thousands of dollars worth of materials.

But let me tell you about some benefits I got from those five days.

A quarter century ago I listened to the Dalai Lama talk with a small group of people in Manhattan. Now he was in a football stadium, surrounded by over 50,000 people, his face projected on gigantic screens that normally show huge Seattle Seahawks trying to disable other large guys wearing different colors.

Now, below the benevolent smile of Tibetan Buddhism, the screens presented a giant lotus with a heart at its center. The visual dissonance between the stadium setting and the message was stunning and deeply moving.

The sounds too. Instead of the voices of Seahawks fans roaring a demand for victory, here was a Nobel Peace Prize winner calling for an end to war, an end to competition, for more policy control by women. Women are not, he suggested with a laugh, as prone to troublemaking as men.

As to competition, here’s a delicious tidbit: the Tibetan translator got stuck trying to translate “Nice guys finish last” into Tibetan. It can’t be done.

Security was intense, given the current uproar over Tibet, China, and the Olympic Games. On the ground, at the gates, in the stands, hundreds of security guards were on the lookout for anyone who might want to harm this gentle man.

But in the sky, a small plane was circling, beyond the reach of security guards. It was trailing a banner that said, “Dalai Lama Pls stop supporting riots.” As if he ever had or ever would. (He has in fact said that he would resign as head of the Tibetan government in exile if the rioting doesn’t stop.)

Maybe it’s impossible for some people to believe that the man is not moved to anger himself, despite extreme provocation. I got a clue about that from a quote on the T-shirts for the conference: “Be kind whenever possible.” So far so good. Four words that are easy to take, and to follow.

Then the kicker: “It is always possible.”

Oh no. Always? I started playing scenes in my life that I was sure had called for reactions other than kindness. But none of them came close to what this man has endured without breaking his own two-sentence admonition.

Even when your country has been invaded and occupied, your people killed by the thousands–it is possible even then to be kind.

But of course it’s not “normal.” So I’m ditching normal. I’m thinking of tattooing the eight words on the palm of my hand so I can flash them at myself the moment I’m tempted—which is all too often—to do something that’s anything but kind.

There’s another thing that I will now carry with me for the rest of my days. After a forum with Washington business leaders and politicians, the Dalai Lama went from one panelist to another putting white prayer scarves around their necks. One of them was Ray Heacox, President of KING broadcasting, a man who walks with two canes. The Dalai Lama put the scarf around Heacox’s neck, held his face in his two hands, then went to the floor to get the canes and hand them to him.

It was a magnificent gift to everyone present—a fleeting, unstaged, unselfconscious connection between two men who did not know each other, who did not share a culture, a race or a religion. It was a snapshot of pure, loving kindness.

Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.
–the Dalai Lama

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I don’t know about you but I’m already saturated with campaign news. Given the 24/7 coverage by thousands of voices and keyboards, from here to November is looking like an eternity.One problem is the teeth-grinding effect of watching and reading too much “news.” Because of the writing. I’m a writer to the bone. I love this language you and I read, write and speak. It’s called English. And I’m seriously doubting that it’s known to some of the unseen people who write the news.

I don’t seem to have much effect when I throw shoes at the television screen during a news broadcast, but perhaps I can at least urge a few citizens to resist taking up the absurdities of language that are being thrown at us-as if they were viable English.

OK consider “war on terror.” I know that’s an Administration-manufactured term, but there’s nothing that says anyone else has to use it. Terror isn’t a nation, or a cause, or a faction. It’s an emotion. You can’t wage war on an emotion. It’s like saying “war on fear,” which would actually be a lot more productive an idea. Given the odds on your being harmed by a terrorist (see Necks Out, Chins Up) it would behoove all of us to stop letting Authorities rattle our cages with that one.

If the term has to be short, just add “ists,” and make it “war on terrorists.” And none of us should follow the government’s lead in using the term for peace activists-”domestic terrorists” according to a succession of benighted Administrations, include thousands of good people who object to government policies and actions, like pre-emptive wars and the sanctioning of torture. (It’s not a new story. Look at what happened to Brian Willson and Jack Ryan back in the 80s.)

Another one to watch for and never use is “claim responsibility” when it means admitting guilt. For-real terrorists may be proud of blowing things up and killing people, but we don’t have to describe their warped pride with what is an admiring term. I claim responsibility for the good things I may have done in my life; if/when I’ve done something awful, I admit guilt.

I’ve fussed quite a bit about “Jewish Americans,” never having heard of “Methodist Americans” or “Catholic Americans.” It seems a dangerous way to describe religious affiliation. I know Judaism isn’t the only factor in being a Jew, but this one looks like a slippery slope to me.

More frivolousy, how about “used housing”? I actually heard the words come out of Katie Couric’s mouth, put there by a so-called “writer.” Couldn’t believe my ears. If (in my wildest dreams) I put in a bid on a five-bedroom, pre-war apartment on Park Avenue, would I be trying to buy “used housing”? There’s a world of attitude underlying such a term, perhaps written by someone from the metastasizing suburbs around our cities, where mile after mile of brand new houses are built and sold, no one wishing to live in a place with a little history and solidity.

Those came quickly to mind. What strange uses of English have you heard or read lately?

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“They got Pinky!”

I was calling out to my husband after turning on the radio to news that Bhuto had been assassinated. No, we’re not among the seeming hundreds who are now writing about their personal relationships with her. We encountered her just once, in 1989. She was giving a commencement address and receiving an honorary LLD. Harvard was welcoming her home, with fond memories of the days when she’d been known to all there as Pinky.

I don’t even remember the speech. What I do remember is seeing her moving along a path in the Yard. Alone, small, beautiful, smiling, “Pinky” seemed enchanted to be back at this place where she’d come at 16, putting away the salwar kameez for sweatshirts and jeans. Now she’d been killed. Public figures die all the time. Political leaders are assassinated. I had to understand why this feels so different to me.

I see that tiny, vulnerable woman, walking along a path in the Yard. A woman. That picture is quickly joined by one of an American soldier crawling under live machine-gun fire as part of her basic training. Her basic training. She looked so small in the combat fatigues. Another image roars in, the Newsweek cover of a wounded Iraq-war veteran, a woman—with her legs blown off.

I’m embarrassed by the emotions all this evokes in me. Seeing any young person, male or female, in harm’s way triggers maternal alarm bells—gotta help, gotta protect. Girls or boys. I’ve raised sons. It is agony to see them in danger or pain.

But. Girls. Women. My emotional wiring may never adjust. No matter that it’s been decades. Over 20 years ago Indira Gandhi was gunned down. (Her son took her place, and shared her fate.) Women have been in combat now for years. And I’m still not armored against these realities.

As an early and heartfelt feminist, I knew this was coming, knew—still know—it is right and fair. If the women of the world are to have equal opportunities, we must also have equal responsibilities. Including that of serving in combat. Including becoming targets for assassins, if we take on great power. Why should men be the only ones to face such dangers? Unlock the doors and we’ll accept the consequences. It was a deal.

Thirty years on, young women soldiers lose limbs to IEDs and female aspirants to power—no matter how small and fragile—are shot. I understand. It’s just this mom thing that roars up in me and yells No! as I dive to snatch them all out of harm’s way. The girls. The boys. All of them, when their wild and precious lives are at risk.

May the deaths and maimings of our American daughters shock us into remembering how precious all our children’s lives are, never to be spent recklessly or venally. Our children are not cannon fodder. Not a single one of them, male or female. ###

Postscript: Now Pinky’s son has stepped into her shoes. Her boy. All of 19. Like so many a soldier—vulnerable, scared, brave. Oh damn. Somebody please be sure that kid has a first-rate security team.

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