Once upon a time, I – and perhaps the vast majority of human beings who have ever lived – thought if people could just see things my way, the world would be a lot better.

I’m a tree-kissing liberal, pantheist (as in, it’s all holy), well-wishing, pro-education, art-loving person.  To me, my views are so obvious, they nearly feel like common sense.

What a life lesson to learn that my fellow human beings – some of whom describe themselves as conservative or right-leaning or pro-gun or a million other things – feel exactly the same way.

Guess what?  There is a streak in every one of that says, more or less, “I know the answer here and if you’d just do it my way we’d finally have peace.”

And honestly, nothing could be further from the truth.

 

My neighbor, Jerry, is a policeman.  He drives an SUV with a bumper-sticker that says, “I Pay Taxes Because Someone Has To.”  He owns guns.  He identifies, not surprisingly, as conservative.  His posts on FB sometimes include pro-cop, pro-gun, anti-Obama sentiments.  When my ex-husband and I moved here, Jerry said to us once, “You guys are really nice.  When we heard who was moving in, we thought you were a couple of liberal hippies from the city.”  We of course answered, “We ARE liberal hippies from the city!”

This difference in our politics doesn’t stop us from waving as his SUV passes my Prius on the road or chatting over the back fence.  It didn’t keep Jerry and his wife from asking me to look after their kids while they went to the vet’s to have their old dog put to sleep.  We’re not in each other’s pockets, but for the most part there has been good feeling and cooperation between us, and that’s the way I like it.

(There was that time, though, when one of his kids slipped and said, “Dad says you’re not just a nut-job, that you’re actually pretty smart.” Ah, well.  We take our validation where we find it).

Once, after yet another young black man was killed, Jerry posted a comment on FB and against all my better judgement, I responded.  I felt riled up.  I felt I needed to speak up for the young man.  But all that really happened was we got into a verbal wrestling match that left a bad feeling between us for a while.  Neither of us changed our views one iota, either.

The truth is, I like Jerry, I like his wife, and I really adore their four children.  They’re good neighbors.  It’s true that we disagree about the majority of hot-button topics but we agree about many other things:  loving our neighborhood, wanting to see the kids flourish, wanting to do our best and to be helpful in the world.

Jerry and I are unlikely to ever agree about the best response to what’s troubling in our world.  There is no irrefutable argument on either side.  If we gave in to our temptation to try to convince each other, we’d be arguing until Doom’s Day.  And even then, we’d both feel pretty much the way we did when we started – only more tired.

 

The idea of “No Consensus” holds true for the individual, too.  Everything is open to comment and opinion.  Dress, mating, speech, food, religion, family, body, health, home, travel, education, behavior, art, finances, leisure, and pretty much everything else involved in being a human being all elicit strong opinions by people who know what’s right.

What color to paint your kitchen wall, what music to play at your son’s wedding, the best way to decline an invitation, what to eat and what never to eat – the tidal wave of opinion and conviction never ceases its endless work of washing over us, whether that’s on social media, on the telephone, or at the supper table.

Even things which you’d think would be dead-ringers for consensus – cute children or animals, charitable and selfless acts, outstanding artistry – still miss the mark.  Check out YouTube comments on what you innocently think is a beautiful piece of music that anyone could enjoy or at least respect.

But no.  There is YoYo Ma, for instance, playing as brilliantly as ever, and some guy contributes his perspective, “That effin guy needs a style upgrade. Seriously, dude.”  Someone else passionately admires Yo Yo’s bowing technique, while another guy thinks this was OK, but he much preferred X’s performance in Vienna, 1973.

A whole slice of life in just three comments.

 

A few months ago, my friend Kathleen brought me to visit Brigit’s Garden, a garden-cafe-community center set just outside Galway city in Ireland.  I was utterly enchanted.  I was inspired by the blending of myth, folklore, landscape, community, spirituality, and education.  I wandered through the place in a trance of appreciation, assuming that any visitor would be as enraptured as I was.  At last, I came to the The Wishing Trees, where visitors were invited to write a wish on a piece of colored paper and tie it to a branch.  Most of the wishes were pretty much what you’d expect – for health, love, prosperity, world peace, grandchildren…

But one stood out.  It read:

I wish I never went to Bridget’s Garden.  Awful!

Beside the words were an angry face drawn in pencil by a young hand.

I laughed out loud.

No Consensus – ever, about anything!

 

Again and again, I am forced to admit that other people are having a different experience than I am.  About everything.

That shade of mauve that says loneliness to me says elegance to someone else.

That piece of music that whips me into a joyful froth leaves someone else unmoved.

That conviction that no one needs an assault weapon?  Another person fears that curbing this right will lead to other lost rights.  And I have to admit when I’m not reeling from another tragic death that their view is not altogether unreasonable even as I still wish we’d do away from these weapons.

(Though I must add that some of those who speak of the danger of losing rights in this area seem to overlook their compunction when it comes to other rights, like a woman’s right to choose.  So a corollary to “No Consensus” must be “No Consistency.”  And that goes for all of us – including this animal-rights lady who never met a lobster she didn’t like… With a lovely dish of butter).

 

You might think that the upshot of my “No Consensus” mantra is that it isn’t worth speaking your mind or sharing your views.  This, too, is a subject about which there is “No Consensus” – mainly because we are all operating on different value systems.  If I value my own peace first and foremost, I will probably keep my views to myself.  If I feel that being a good citizen/person/mother/teacher/cat-owner means telling it my way, I’ll tell it my way.  If I believe we need a balance of voices on any one subject, I’ll interject my voice to provide that balance.  If I think speaking up will just make things worse and that’s the last thing I want to do, I’ll stay mum.

(Think of the range of views on a starlet’s dress at an awards show.  “That’s very daring!” says one person.  “Can you say tramp?  That rag’s cut to her belly button,” hisses another.  “Well, I think women should wear whatever they want,” opines someone else.  “I do, too, but with less skin showing,” says another voice.  “The color’s nice but they went overboard with sequins.”  This could go on – this WILL go on – forever).

 

For me, “No Consensus” reminds me that it’s not my job to convince anyone of anything.  I will do and say what I believe is right, and I’ll make mistakes of judgement about this even as I try my best.  I’ll learn some things while I do this.  I might even become more effective and more helpful over time (or at least less unhelpful).  And I will notice that my fellow creatures are all, unanimously, doing exactly the same thing.

Likewise, the million opinions other people hold of me (though truthfully, 993,000 of those are held by my mother) are just that:  opinions.

In a world of “No Consensus,” we can be ourselves.  We can believe what we believe.  We’re freed up to act on our own conviction, less hampered by a need to create uniformity (or conformity).  And we don’t have to wait or yearn for some fantastical time when everyone else will think exactly as we do or confirm that we’re doing everything right because that is never, ever, ever in a billion billion years going to happen.

 

But what about what’s right, Kate?  What about the innocents slaughtered and the planet desecrated?  What about falling standards of decency – and literacy?  What about kindness?  Is that up for grabs, too?

Brace yourselves, my friends:  Yes.

All of this is up for grabs.  All of this is open for discussion.  And yes, it will be messy, loud, disorienting, ire-raising, disheartening, and often fruitless.

But sometimes it will be a light that shines right onto the bull’s eye and shows us a way forwards.

And sometimes the words or actions that unlock the puzzle or at least a piece of it will come from someone in the other party or from the hippies or from the gun people.  Sometimes they’ll come from my mother.  Sometimes they’ll come from you or from the guy who’d like to dress Yo Yo Ma.

 

The best thing we have in a “No Consensus” world is respect for one another.  A commitment to treating each other like people instead of as walking ideologies.

When we do, we realize that we are not red people and blue people.  Or beer people and Chardonnay people.  Or parents and non-parents.  Or artists and non-artists.  Or one percent-ers and the 99%.  Or hippies and cops.  We are simply people.

And because we’re always changing as individuals throughout our lives, throughout the day, even,  there truly is “No Consensus” even within a single person.  All of our “selves” have their views, desires, and convictions – and rarely do they agree.  (Think of the self that wants to collect a pay check this month and the self that wants to get in the car and keep driving until next week comes and goes).  In this way, we are more kaleidoscopic than kaleidoscopes.

 

I like people in all their color and quirk, surprise and complexity, even as I’m sometimes appalled and frightened by all of us.

I like living in a world of people.  In a neighborhood.  One neighbor sits on her Fairy Rock and listens to stories told by the Wind, while the other one takes his daughters to the rifle range to teach them to shoot.

They both love the world.  They both want to help.

I love it when we can be firm in our conviction AND be good neighbors.

I believe with all my heart that this is possible – even as I know that each person who reads this will quite rightly have his or her own opinion and that even about this there will be “No Consensus.”

Some will say that we MUST argue vociferously for what we believe is right.

Others will say that this essay is obvious or insightful or helpful or not helpful.

Someone, doubtless, will think I’ve used too many words to say something quite simple:

No Consensus.

 

And who knows?  They might be right.