28 years ago this winter I stood on the banks of the Elwha River, watching the waters rush along in the hurried mode of high flood, my belly high as well with my Amery. The day after Christmas we celebrate his birth, another wistful winter, to remember other years, and the passage of time.
This has been a year of challenges and good work. Here are a few of the highlights:
*Everyone in my family has good health. It is my intent to remember gratitude for this simple fact. For anyone of my readers who does not have this, my heart goes out to you. We have clean water, fresh food in summer, and good air. It is a gift to live in the fertile hills of Northwest Oregon, where wine and water flow as do the fish in the rivers.
*All my kids live nearby. Arlyn in NW Portland, working at Paley's Place around the corner, teaching at Pacific U and George Fox, Playing with Tacoma Symphony, and working on a secret invention.
* Amery and Kirsten in Sherwood, 14 miles from me. Taking on a new pup pal for Tahoe - Meeka, with all the energy I wish I had. Kirsten, having passed the Oregon Bar exam this summer now practices as an attorney in downtown at Smith Freed. Amery has had the opportunity to work there in marketing, and now is doing part-time consulting in college athletics, and making sure the dogs are walked and dinner is on the table.
*Curtis shares my space at the 'Villa', and makes sure there is lots of firewood and plenty of presto logs, which I appreciate very much tonight. We get to take bargain basement trips about the region...and work in between at our various economic pursuits. The trips are in the older blog posts, as are descriptions of work. I enjoy having his help and companionship with all there is involved in a place like this in the country.
* My Mom and Dad are hanging on in the same house, making their way into an uncertain future, as Mom becomes more disabled from Parkinson's Disease. They are very mentally alert and still totally interested in what everyone is doing. I visit them about once a month to be part of the caregiving team. I am so grateful for the learning experience, and that they are still here with us.
* I have wonderful neighbors, Deanna and Steve, with whom I trade work for garden vegetables and massage. This past year I was part of their garlic cash crop project. From the planting, cultivating, harvesting, drying, cleaning. braiding and selling I found enlightenment. It was the culmination of a dream I've carried for many years. My facebook photo is me at the Beaverton Farmer's Market at the best garlic booth around, Mountain Top Table Lands. (The beautiful little Russian woman who knows garlic through and through came every Saturday, each time with a bigger smile on her face).
There is so much good in life. There is other stuff too, and anyone who knows my politics probably can guess that the world economic situation does not make it easy for me to sleep at night. Inequity abounds in our world, even at Christmas when we spend more money and there are bright lights to make things cheerful. It is a wonderful time for some.
My prayer is that the new year 2012 is not the end of the world, but the end of selfishness, greed, and the trend away from empathy. My prayer is that all of you, the people I love, continue to have good health, continue to be creative, and continue to keep well connected to me.... you make life worth living. Namaste!
Friday, December 16, 2011
Saturday, December 10, 2011
I love How Walnut Shells Burn
I love how walnut shells burn
as I practice, morning light frozen
over a December Saturday.
In the stove window, the fire dances.
I watch the flame, from a years growing
oils formed, giving way
today,
for me -
heat and light.
as I practice, morning light frozen
over a December Saturday.
In the stove window, the fire dances.
I watch the flame, from a years growing
oils formed, giving way
today,
for me -
heat and light.
Monday, December 5, 2011
The Feast of St. Nicholas Choreographed by My Mom
My mom says, when she was about 3 years old, she had the pivotal childhood Santa Claus experience. Her uncle Walt (a dentist with a great sense of humor) had a friend who would dress up as Santa Claus and go to people's houses. This Santa came to their house as holiday 'entertainment for the children'. She and her brother were both so frightened by the character they hid behind the couch, and would have nothing to do with the spectacle.
So when her own kids were little, she decided to separate the saint from the commercial image. Mom really loves children (she had 9 of them on purpose) and the fact that St. Nicholas is a revered Catholic Saint, as well as the patron saint of children made her want to create a tradition outside the commercial one. Bully for her! Mom was counter-culture long before it was fashionable.
She refused to tell us that Santa came down the chimney, and left the gifts. In our house the gifts all had tags, with names on them showing exactly who the giver was. I remember being surprised when I witnessed my friend's homes, and the elaborate story of Santa giving gifts to every child in the world all in one night. I remember wondering what he did for the children who had no chimney.
Mom's counter-tradition worked like this: On December 6 she got out the stockings... funny odd socks from each of our own pasts. Mine was a thick, knitted knee hi I'd outgrown. The socks probably morphed through the years, but my old knee-hi is still in Mom's Christmas box. It is 50 years old by now.
The stockings were hung at the fireplace, how fortunate that we always did have a real fireplace. Mom put nuts, a tangerine, a chocolate marshmallow Santa, chapstick, little mini kleenex and chocolate kisses in each one. After dinner we got to take down our stocking, which became the desert portion of the evening. To this day I have a real thing for chocolate and marshmallow. Now Russel Stover makes them with dark chocolate, wow, too much!
We would all go through our stockings, (anywhere from 7 to 10 of us at the table) exclaiming at each little gift. As we got older my siblings would get little gifts for each other, and then it got to be even more fun. One year Brama, Mom's mother, put a lottery ticket in each stocking. I did not realize till then that she secretly liked gambling. It was great fun to scratch off my very first lottery ticket. I loved the slightly mischievous smile on her face. I can still see her delighted grin as she watched her grand kids excitedly scratching off their possible millions.
After the stockings had been emptied we opened the chocolate kisses and someone took the foil and molded a little sculpture of a Christmas donkey, or a stocking, or a tree. I don't exactly recall, but it pleased Mom so much, she rewarded the creativity with another chocolate kiss. As children, eager to amass a candy arsenal, we all began to intently fashion our little foil wrappers into fantastic shapes. By the end of desert we had a small gallery of foil artwork, which covered the middle of the dining room table, and was left there for days, even weeks to enjoy. We have continued that tradition for over 45 years now. We did that same game last Saturday. It made Mom laugh. She is fun to laugh with and it is pretty easy to get her going.
I fashioned Schwartz Peter's sack, with which he might gather bad children to throw into the river. I am not making this up... this was all written on Wikipedia. Santa has a dark helper, very "Grimm's Fairy Tales", in many European traditions, especially the Germans, our forebears. If nothing else besides BMW's and the autobahn, the Germans really know about 'discipline'.
The laughter flowed as we read all the funny traditions of St. Nicholas, and of the history. He is the patron saint of unmarried women, pawnbrokers, sailors, carpenters, children.... the list goes on. Look it up, and you will never see the fat red and white commercial image the same way.
This is an homage to you, Mom, for being a wonderfully and magically creative person. You encouraged your family to be creative. I am forever indebted to you for helping me see the world in all its color, diversity and silliness.
So when her own kids were little, she decided to separate the saint from the commercial image. Mom really loves children (she had 9 of them on purpose) and the fact that St. Nicholas is a revered Catholic Saint, as well as the patron saint of children made her want to create a tradition outside the commercial one. Bully for her! Mom was counter-culture long before it was fashionable.
She refused to tell us that Santa came down the chimney, and left the gifts. In our house the gifts all had tags, with names on them showing exactly who the giver was. I remember being surprised when I witnessed my friend's homes, and the elaborate story of Santa giving gifts to every child in the world all in one night. I remember wondering what he did for the children who had no chimney.
Mom's counter-tradition worked like this: On December 6 she got out the stockings... funny odd socks from each of our own pasts. Mine was a thick, knitted knee hi I'd outgrown. The socks probably morphed through the years, but my old knee-hi is still in Mom's Christmas box. It is 50 years old by now.
The stockings were hung at the fireplace, how fortunate that we always did have a real fireplace. Mom put nuts, a tangerine, a chocolate marshmallow Santa, chapstick, little mini kleenex and chocolate kisses in each one. After dinner we got to take down our stocking, which became the desert portion of the evening. To this day I have a real thing for chocolate and marshmallow. Now Russel Stover makes them with dark chocolate, wow, too much!
We would all go through our stockings, (anywhere from 7 to 10 of us at the table) exclaiming at each little gift. As we got older my siblings would get little gifts for each other, and then it got to be even more fun. One year Brama, Mom's mother, put a lottery ticket in each stocking. I did not realize till then that she secretly liked gambling. It was great fun to scratch off my very first lottery ticket. I loved the slightly mischievous smile on her face. I can still see her delighted grin as she watched her grand kids excitedly scratching off their possible millions.
After the stockings had been emptied we opened the chocolate kisses and someone took the foil and molded a little sculpture of a Christmas donkey, or a stocking, or a tree. I don't exactly recall, but it pleased Mom so much, she rewarded the creativity with another chocolate kiss. As children, eager to amass a candy arsenal, we all began to intently fashion our little foil wrappers into fantastic shapes. By the end of desert we had a small gallery of foil artwork, which covered the middle of the dining room table, and was left there for days, even weeks to enjoy. We have continued that tradition for over 45 years now. We did that same game last Saturday. It made Mom laugh. She is fun to laugh with and it is pretty easy to get her going.
I fashioned Schwartz Peter's sack, with which he might gather bad children to throw into the river. I am not making this up... this was all written on Wikipedia. Santa has a dark helper, very "Grimm's Fairy Tales", in many European traditions, especially the Germans, our forebears. If nothing else besides BMW's and the autobahn, the Germans really know about 'discipline'.
The laughter flowed as we read all the funny traditions of St. Nicholas, and of the history. He is the patron saint of unmarried women, pawnbrokers, sailors, carpenters, children.... the list goes on. Look it up, and you will never see the fat red and white commercial image the same way.
This is an homage to you, Mom, for being a wonderfully and magically creative person. You encouraged your family to be creative. I am forever indebted to you for helping me see the world in all its color, diversity and silliness.
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Ophelia and Valentine in Guanajuato
Ophelia's kitchen is the place where students and other assorted guests can eat breakfast - desayuno, and converse - platicar in Spanish. Ophelia laughs easily, and speaks very slowly - despacio. Her guesthouse sits on the upper hills within the city of Guanajuato, Mexico, designated a " Pueblo Magico"
Below the house there is a hillside of trees and a nice stone stairway down to the callejon below, sort of an alley. Guanajuato is built into the canyons of a hillside below mountains where a huge vein of silver was discovered and exploited by the Spanish around 1522. Of course the native peoples were the miners and builders who did the work in creating the churches, mansions and haciendas of this very lovely city. The Spanish took so much silver though, that they flooded the world market, which brought the price of silver down, and eventually bankrupted their country. Karma.
Now the city has universities, a large music school, and several other private schools of higher learning. Most of Ophelia's guests are students. We were lucky, as we landed in Guanajuato between sessions at the nearby colleges. We had our pick of rooms, and then our pick of beds within the room. I made Ophelia and her daughter Juanita laugh when I commented that the rooms were so big that "necesitamos hijos" -we need children.
Our mornings in Ophelia's kitchen sharing stories of our families, our work, and our homes were not anything which could be duplicated by having spent 5 times as much money on a fancy hotel. We found the guesthouse through the hard work of Curtis, and a nice bit of luck. (Our karma was good that day). We found a little haven to spend 3 days and nights exploring the old, very European looking city in its rarefied mountain altitude.
Ophelia's husband, Valentine, was born on Valentine's Day, like my Dad. Valentine is a musician, so he and Curtis could talk instruments. He was fun to talk to, even if I understood far less of what he said, because he didn't speak slowly like Ophelia. I liked to just look at the lines of his face, and watch his expressions. He has a beautiful countenance.
By the time we packed up to leave, it was necessary to get photos and share email addresses with our hosts. This posting is for you, dear Ophelia, amiga mia... who agreed with me that motherhood is una camino grande - a long road, who gave me a ladder to climb onto the rooftop to practice yoga, who proudly showed us the world of magnets on her refrigerator from the guests who stayed and were touched by her careful words, bubbling laugh, warm food and open heart. To you, who made us feel at home, we look forward to our return again someday. For now, I must decide on a magnet to send, so you will think of us in your kitchen.
Below the house there is a hillside of trees and a nice stone stairway down to the callejon below, sort of an alley. Guanajuato is built into the canyons of a hillside below mountains where a huge vein of silver was discovered and exploited by the Spanish around 1522. Of course the native peoples were the miners and builders who did the work in creating the churches, mansions and haciendas of this very lovely city. The Spanish took so much silver though, that they flooded the world market, which brought the price of silver down, and eventually bankrupted their country. Karma.
Now the city has universities, a large music school, and several other private schools of higher learning. Most of Ophelia's guests are students. We were lucky, as we landed in Guanajuato between sessions at the nearby colleges. We had our pick of rooms, and then our pick of beds within the room. I made Ophelia and her daughter Juanita laugh when I commented that the rooms were so big that "necesitamos hijos" -we need children.
Our mornings in Ophelia's kitchen sharing stories of our families, our work, and our homes were not anything which could be duplicated by having spent 5 times as much money on a fancy hotel. We found the guesthouse through the hard work of Curtis, and a nice bit of luck. (Our karma was good that day). We found a little haven to spend 3 days and nights exploring the old, very European looking city in its rarefied mountain altitude.
Ophelia's husband, Valentine, was born on Valentine's Day, like my Dad. Valentine is a musician, so he and Curtis could talk instruments. He was fun to talk to, even if I understood far less of what he said, because he didn't speak slowly like Ophelia. I liked to just look at the lines of his face, and watch his expressions. He has a beautiful countenance.
By the time we packed up to leave, it was necessary to get photos and share email addresses with our hosts. This posting is for you, dear Ophelia, amiga mia... who agreed with me that motherhood is una camino grande - a long road, who gave me a ladder to climb onto the rooftop to practice yoga, who proudly showed us the world of magnets on her refrigerator from the guests who stayed and were touched by her careful words, bubbling laugh, warm food and open heart. To you, who made us feel at home, we look forward to our return again someday. For now, I must decide on a magnet to send, so you will think of us in your kitchen.
Friday, November 11, 2011
11*11*11
Leaving Mexico city is an adventure in itself. I hope the binary date is suerte - luck.
Yesterday we marched with the "Indignato" group, indignant that 7 million youth between the ages of 14 and 26 have no employement and no ecucation. They are asking for a mere 2% of The Mexican GDP to be allocated for free public university education.
The winds picked up as we marched down Avenue Chapultapec, closing it to afternoon traffic -5 pm! Many horns answered the march. The rains increased until I thought I was back in Portland. When we finally left the march and gained shelter at the Sanborn's cafe, I was grateful to find a hearty warm vegetable soup, sope de verduras.
,
Our friend, Almendra, one of the young occupiers and organizers of the march gave us hearty good bye hugs in mid-march. We promised to keep in touch via facebook. What a beautiful young woman, who radiates her ideal... working to better the human condition.
I googled Edur Valesco, the professor who is today on his 31st day of a hunger strike, His story deserves a whole separate blog. He is the inspiration for many of the youth who are living in tents in the center of the Mexican financial district. As I depart, I leave part of my heart with them. No matter how hard life gets, there will always be humans who work for justice, without desire for wealth and comfort. This informs my journey, as it winds back to my wonderful family and the green hills of Chehalem mountain.
Yesterday we marched with the "Indignato" group, indignant that 7 million youth between the ages of 14 and 26 have no employement and no ecucation. They are asking for a mere 2% of The Mexican GDP to be allocated for free public university education.
The winds picked up as we marched down Avenue Chapultapec, closing it to afternoon traffic -5 pm! Many horns answered the march. The rains increased until I thought I was back in Portland. When we finally left the march and gained shelter at the Sanborn's cafe, I was grateful to find a hearty warm vegetable soup, sope de verduras.
,
Our friend, Almendra, one of the young occupiers and organizers of the march gave us hearty good bye hugs in mid-march. We promised to keep in touch via facebook. What a beautiful young woman, who radiates her ideal... working to better the human condition.
I googled Edur Valesco, the professor who is today on his 31st day of a hunger strike, His story deserves a whole separate blog. He is the inspiration for many of the youth who are living in tents in the center of the Mexican financial district. As I depart, I leave part of my heart with them. No matter how hard life gets, there will always be humans who work for justice, without desire for wealth and comfort. This informs my journey, as it winds back to my wonderful family and the green hills of Chehalem mountain.
Saturday, November 5, 2011
Dreaming of the Dead
Going to towns in Mexico to see the elaborate celebrations for "Day of the Dead" has always been on my list of things to do. During the past week we saw everything from the night bike ride, in costume, in Mexico City, to the extravagant graveyard decorations in the small town of Tzintzunzan near Patzcuaro, in Michoacan State.
The profusion of marigolds, baby's breath and cockscomb flowers endeared me to the culture which can decorate the graves of their loved ones so beautifully. The families often sit all night at the grave site, sleeping or sitting by a little campfire. It made me want to curl up next to them and think about the people I have lost in my life.
It felt strange to be watching something which is held to be private in my own culture. Our friend we were staying with that night told us the locals expect guests to come, and do they ever get them. The highway was backed up for a mile, giant tour buses maneuvered through seas of cars, all this on small roads built in villages for an ox cart to pass. It is hard to describe.
Last night we were treated to a visit with our dentist, Antonio, and his wife, Gabi and her Mom to the grave of a dear school pal of Gabi's who died of cancer at 17. We drove across the busy traffic choked town, to a Panteon on the hillside. There was music, flowers, food vendors for blocks, and 2 giant trampolines especially set up for the children.
It was very sad to watch the greiving, but as we walked out of the Panteon, I was able to ask, in my funny Spanish, if Gabi dreams of Claudia when she is asleep. She said she often does, and agreed that dreaming is a comfort. She told me that her sisters and Claudia's sisters are now a very close knit group because of the death, and that is bueno, a good outcome from sadness.
We ate baked sweetened calabasa at the family table afterwards, and I showed photos of my own family. The women especially were very interested. I think women are the visual ones in the world. They did not ask me what anyone did for a living, or where they lived, but they loved seeing the faces. My most recent family picture of Arlyn, Amery and Kirsten has the Huskies, Tahoe and Meeka front and center. They loved the 'perecitos' and when I said the word "Huskie", one sister, Laura, nodded her head and replied in a very well enunciated tone -"Alaska".
Today I had my teeth cleaned and 2 small fillings done. Antonio is so gentle, quick, and easy going. He does hilarious impressions of an American accent as he pronounces certain words. Even his facial expressions when he does it entertain me as many comedians fail to do. It is good to have a funny dentist, and he can sing "Flor de Canella" in Perepecha and Spanish both.
Not the least of what Antonio has done for us is to let us stay at his home. All the hotels were full because of the holiday, and we needed to remain in town to get our dental work, so here I am, writing from the little row house home that the family stays at when they are not with the extended family in town... which they are tonight.
I joked to them (at the risk of offending certain sacred concepts) that we are like the couple at Christmas when there was no room at the Inn.They made a place for us, shared their table and made us feel at home. They have the beautiful hearts Christ would like to see in the world.
The profusion of marigolds, baby's breath and cockscomb flowers endeared me to the culture which can decorate the graves of their loved ones so beautifully. The families often sit all night at the grave site, sleeping or sitting by a little campfire. It made me want to curl up next to them and think about the people I have lost in my life.
It felt strange to be watching something which is held to be private in my own culture. Our friend we were staying with that night told us the locals expect guests to come, and do they ever get them. The highway was backed up for a mile, giant tour buses maneuvered through seas of cars, all this on small roads built in villages for an ox cart to pass. It is hard to describe.
Last night we were treated to a visit with our dentist, Antonio, and his wife, Gabi and her Mom to the grave of a dear school pal of Gabi's who died of cancer at 17. We drove across the busy traffic choked town, to a Panteon on the hillside. There was music, flowers, food vendors for blocks, and 2 giant trampolines especially set up for the children.
It was very sad to watch the greiving, but as we walked out of the Panteon, I was able to ask, in my funny Spanish, if Gabi dreams of Claudia when she is asleep. She said she often does, and agreed that dreaming is a comfort. She told me that her sisters and Claudia's sisters are now a very close knit group because of the death, and that is bueno, a good outcome from sadness.
We ate baked sweetened calabasa at the family table afterwards, and I showed photos of my own family. The women especially were very interested. I think women are the visual ones in the world. They did not ask me what anyone did for a living, or where they lived, but they loved seeing the faces. My most recent family picture of Arlyn, Amery and Kirsten has the Huskies, Tahoe and Meeka front and center. They loved the 'perecitos' and when I said the word "Huskie", one sister, Laura, nodded her head and replied in a very well enunciated tone -"Alaska".
Today I had my teeth cleaned and 2 small fillings done. Antonio is so gentle, quick, and easy going. He does hilarious impressions of an American accent as he pronounces certain words. Even his facial expressions when he does it entertain me as many comedians fail to do. It is good to have a funny dentist, and he can sing "Flor de Canella" in Perepecha and Spanish both.
Not the least of what Antonio has done for us is to let us stay at his home. All the hotels were full because of the holiday, and we needed to remain in town to get our dental work, so here I am, writing from the little row house home that the family stays at when they are not with the extended family in town... which they are tonight.
I joked to them (at the risk of offending certain sacred concepts) that we are like the couple at Christmas when there was no room at the Inn.They made a place for us, shared their table and made us feel at home. They have the beautiful hearts Christ would like to see in the world.
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Yoga: A Great Way to Make Friends
Today four of us met to practice in the morning at Tlatalolco Park, in El Plaza de las Tres Culturas, Mexico City.
My local friend, Liliana, her cousin Malaina, and Curtis joined me in the Mexican sunshine, at the kiosk where I first practiced with Liliana and Diego nine months ago. (see blog entries from January)
Liliana goes to school, works full time, and lives in the city with her grandmother. We connected here on this visit to the City, and I was finally able to give her a decent, thick, brand new yoga mat. She practices in her small amount of spare time and space. We are yoga sisters. How fortunate then, that her cousin Malaina lives in Portland, so we have made connections which make a circle.
After our practice we had tamales at Cafe Tacuba, where the waitresses were all dressed like nuns for Day of the Dead. The setting is a gorgeous old mansion, converted into a huge, beautiful restaurant.
The friendship circle began with their cousin Diego, who I met on the street while waiting for a free yoga class. He asked me if I would teach at the park because the free class was not meeting for the holidays. My Spanish is like a blanket full of holes, and he was very forward... I almost said "Lo siento.. no....I'm sorry, I can't." Instead I said " Si..yes, I will meet you later." I thought myself crazy at the time.
Now I am grateful to have a bit of a wild enough nature that I could take the risk of involving myself with a stranger, in a foreign country, on the street, alone and with the most minimal of communication. That is what yoga can do, it becomes a human language which can transcend the many human barriers which divide us and keep us from knowing and trusting one another.
Today in the park, while people strolled around the kiosk, the sun shone on my friends, and we were, indeed, finding and sharing our sacred selves. In a 16th century church yesterday, I saw the word 'sagrado' under a saint, and had to look it up. Sagrado means sacred. Why were we taught, in traditional Christianity, that only God, his Son, and the saints were sacred? We are each sacred, our bodies and our souls. We have our own sacred hearts which beat the rhythm of our lifeblood. We are Sacred like our sacrum, the center of the body, the place of movement, back aches and nearness to the creation of new life.
As we approach the Day of the Dead, Dia de los Muertos, it is a fitting time to appreciate our aliveness, even as we honor and remember wistfully those we have loved and lost.
" Make new friends, and keep the old....... one is silver and the other is gold."
My local friend, Liliana, her cousin Malaina, and Curtis joined me in the Mexican sunshine, at the kiosk where I first practiced with Liliana and Diego nine months ago. (see blog entries from January)
Liliana goes to school, works full time, and lives in the city with her grandmother. We connected here on this visit to the City, and I was finally able to give her a decent, thick, brand new yoga mat. She practices in her small amount of spare time and space. We are yoga sisters. How fortunate then, that her cousin Malaina lives in Portland, so we have made connections which make a circle.
After our practice we had tamales at Cafe Tacuba, where the waitresses were all dressed like nuns for Day of the Dead. The setting is a gorgeous old mansion, converted into a huge, beautiful restaurant.
The friendship circle began with their cousin Diego, who I met on the street while waiting for a free yoga class. He asked me if I would teach at the park because the free class was not meeting for the holidays. My Spanish is like a blanket full of holes, and he was very forward... I almost said "Lo siento.. no....I'm sorry, I can't." Instead I said " Si..yes, I will meet you later." I thought myself crazy at the time.
Now I am grateful to have a bit of a wild enough nature that I could take the risk of involving myself with a stranger, in a foreign country, on the street, alone and with the most minimal of communication. That is what yoga can do, it becomes a human language which can transcend the many human barriers which divide us and keep us from knowing and trusting one another.
Today in the park, while people strolled around the kiosk, the sun shone on my friends, and we were, indeed, finding and sharing our sacred selves. In a 16th century church yesterday, I saw the word 'sagrado' under a saint, and had to look it up. Sagrado means sacred. Why were we taught, in traditional Christianity, that only God, his Son, and the saints were sacred? We are each sacred, our bodies and our souls. We have our own sacred hearts which beat the rhythm of our lifeblood. We are Sacred like our sacrum, the center of the body, the place of movement, back aches and nearness to the creation of new life.
As we approach the Day of the Dead, Dia de los Muertos, it is a fitting time to appreciate our aliveness, even as we honor and remember wistfully those we have loved and lost.
" Make new friends, and keep the old....... one is silver and the other is gold."
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
D.F. in the Fall
Today Senor Cortez and I walked the streets of D.F. Not mean streets, maybe sometimes a little torn up, and teaming with people, La Gente, but familiar and welcoming.
We met Alvaro at the favorite coffee shop. Curtis was bringing him a flute. They met through a musical string selling transaction. It is good to have an international business.
We took the metro to The Condesa, an area I've not seen yet. The park there is large and green and quiet, opposite of the Centro Historico.
For breakfast we had real quesadillas with squash flower and mushroom. Real quesadillas are made with a hand patted maize flour patty then filled and deep fried. It was funny to compare the quesadilla that Alaska Airlines gave us in flight yesterday.... made with white flour tortilla filled with some amorphous bean, cheese, chicken, green pepper mixture. It is such a pleasure to eat authentic food, and for 13 pesos.
There is an art exhibit, of giant paper mache monsters on display near the Reforma. They are huge, colorful, fantastical and fun. We happened upon it after a lunch meeting with 2 musicians Curtis knows, again because of string sales... yeah Aquila U.S.A.! - which is the name of his business which sells Italian Nylgut (tm) strings within the U.S., as well as on the internet globally.
Is it not a good time to live with global connections? If only the economics could be fair. The connections among peoples are so fascinating. Sergio, the violist at lunch, invited us to his recital at The Belles Artes this Saturday. Imagine, the government here pays musicians to hold periodic recitals free to the public.
In my dreams I live in a country which spends it's billions on funding artists to make music, or weird monsters for Halloween, or subsidized public transport (35 cents to ride the metro) It is not my dream alone, I know. The resources are there, as Buckminster Fuller pointed out... it is only a matter of how they are allocated.
I watch other blogs and see lots of photos. I hope to post some, soon, but for now it is only words...
and as the BeeGees sang : It's only words, but words are all I have.... to take your heart away...."
We met Alvaro at the favorite coffee shop. Curtis was bringing him a flute. They met through a musical string selling transaction. It is good to have an international business.
We took the metro to The Condesa, an area I've not seen yet. The park there is large and green and quiet, opposite of the Centro Historico.
For breakfast we had real quesadillas with squash flower and mushroom. Real quesadillas are made with a hand patted maize flour patty then filled and deep fried. It was funny to compare the quesadilla that Alaska Airlines gave us in flight yesterday.... made with white flour tortilla filled with some amorphous bean, cheese, chicken, green pepper mixture. It is such a pleasure to eat authentic food, and for 13 pesos.
There is an art exhibit, of giant paper mache monsters on display near the Reforma. They are huge, colorful, fantastical and fun. We happened upon it after a lunch meeting with 2 musicians Curtis knows, again because of string sales... yeah Aquila U.S.A.! - which is the name of his business which sells Italian Nylgut (tm) strings within the U.S., as well as on the internet globally.
Is it not a good time to live with global connections? If only the economics could be fair. The connections among peoples are so fascinating. Sergio, the violist at lunch, invited us to his recital at The Belles Artes this Saturday. Imagine, the government here pays musicians to hold periodic recitals free to the public.
In my dreams I live in a country which spends it's billions on funding artists to make music, or weird monsters for Halloween, or subsidized public transport (35 cents to ride the metro) It is not my dream alone, I know. The resources are there, as Buckminster Fuller pointed out... it is only a matter of how they are allocated.
I watch other blogs and see lots of photos. I hope to post some, soon, but for now it is only words...
and as the BeeGees sang : It's only words, but words are all I have.... to take your heart away...."
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Economics 101 - For the Humanities Major
In Mightier Than the Sword, author David S. Reynolds gives a scholarly, in-depth portrayal of the life and times of Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of the famous and infamous Uncle Tom's Cabin. What a fascinating look into American history by way of work of fiction, turned mythic.
For whatever else one may think of Uncle Tom's Cabin , published in 1850, it did raise popular consciousness about the grisly, perverted, sickening aspects of slavery in the United States - slavery happening in what we now call 'real time'. Up until the advent of this epic novel, slavery was viewed as an economic institution, protected by the laws and force of the U.S. government.
I read Stowe's book as a young idealistic teenager, and other books, by Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass and other former slaves. What I was left with, because I am a woman for whom motherhood and family are the highest aspirations, is the brutality and injustice which is inherent in the system of owning humans as chattel. I did not yet make the connection to economics, which is the strongest link in the chain.
Now, with #Occupy Wall Street, and many solidarity occupations in other U.S. cities happening in real time, I can see that 'economics' is still at the heart of human suffering and exploitation.
When Harriet Beecher Stowe began to form the seeds of her famous characters, it was through hearing the stories of morally good black women servants in her kitchen who told the tales of being 'owned' by a master, who then became what they referred to as a 'husband'. Their bodies were co-opted for gratuitous sex, and as slave producing vessels. They did not want this life, but they managed to live and have children they dearly loved. Children for whom they wanted a different life, but who were, often as not, 'sold' away from them when the child reached working age.
So slavery is an economic model. The people who enforced it were protecting the 'investments' and the 'assets' of white business men. One epic novel, written by a housewife and mother of five, read by thousands, maybe millions, was able to turn the hearts of at least part of a nation. The pen vs. the sword, a human story vs. esoteric dogma.
History is fascinating, and right now we are seeing it play out in the form of people taking to the streets, many of whom have not much left to loose. Economics might be framed in any way which benefits the rich and powerful. Human suffering might only be understood on the street.
For whatever else one may think of Uncle Tom's Cabin , published in 1850, it did raise popular consciousness about the grisly, perverted, sickening aspects of slavery in the United States - slavery happening in what we now call 'real time'. Up until the advent of this epic novel, slavery was viewed as an economic institution, protected by the laws and force of the U.S. government.
I read Stowe's book as a young idealistic teenager, and other books, by Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass and other former slaves. What I was left with, because I am a woman for whom motherhood and family are the highest aspirations, is the brutality and injustice which is inherent in the system of owning humans as chattel. I did not yet make the connection to economics, which is the strongest link in the chain.
Now, with #Occupy Wall Street, and many solidarity occupations in other U.S. cities happening in real time, I can see that 'economics' is still at the heart of human suffering and exploitation.
When Harriet Beecher Stowe began to form the seeds of her famous characters, it was through hearing the stories of morally good black women servants in her kitchen who told the tales of being 'owned' by a master, who then became what they referred to as a 'husband'. Their bodies were co-opted for gratuitous sex, and as slave producing vessels. They did not want this life, but they managed to live and have children they dearly loved. Children for whom they wanted a different life, but who were, often as not, 'sold' away from them when the child reached working age.
So slavery is an economic model. The people who enforced it were protecting the 'investments' and the 'assets' of white business men. One epic novel, written by a housewife and mother of five, read by thousands, maybe millions, was able to turn the hearts of at least part of a nation. The pen vs. the sword, a human story vs. esoteric dogma.
History is fascinating, and right now we are seeing it play out in the form of people taking to the streets, many of whom have not much left to loose. Economics might be framed in any way which benefits the rich and powerful. Human suffering might only be understood on the street.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Fall Planting
Today I gather up garlic cloves, fat and healthy, to become next years bulbs. I plant them as my teachers down the hill taught me, 2 inches deep, and 6 to 8 inches apart... well, I fudge, and maybe go 5 inches, because this is a bed, not a field. I also plant daffodil bulbs along the outside of the garden fence. Next year this should look very spiffy!
While I plant, between rain showers, I can hear a flock of geese flying south. Ah, I bid them goodbye, and safe travels, just as I say goodnight to the bulbs I've left to winter's storms.
Our actions are like cloves, they take root somehow, and much later when the time is right, they grow into some sort of plant. What kind of plant do I want my today actions to create? Ah, if only I had the recipe for the peace and love clove. And, then I would want the equity clove too. When the sun came back around to longer days, I would have the fat bulb of a new world sprouting in my dirt.
While I plant, between rain showers, I can hear a flock of geese flying south. Ah, I bid them goodbye, and safe travels, just as I say goodnight to the bulbs I've left to winter's storms.
Our actions are like cloves, they take root somehow, and much later when the time is right, they grow into some sort of plant. What kind of plant do I want my today actions to create? Ah, if only I had the recipe for the peace and love clove. And, then I would want the equity clove too. When the sun came back around to longer days, I would have the fat bulb of a new world sprouting in my dirt.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Occupying Portland Solidarity
At 11 am last Thursday, I walked from the light rail stop in downtown Portland, city of my birth, to Tom McCall Waterfront Park. I went to join "Occupy Portland".
At the Park hundreds of people gathered with signs, or just stood. We listened to the organizers in the center of the crowd do a form of public speaking they call "mike check". No megaphones were allowed, so the group, mirroring the same procedure done in New York, spoke a short phrase loudly, which the people nearby repeated as a group. This phrase then echoed out to the farther reaches of the crowd. This allowed that anyone taking the floor would speak with succinct brevity. It also encouraged careful listening on the part of the crowd. It was a nice touch.
I stood at the edge of the gathering, which quickly became the middle within a few minutes. The woman next to me was my first connection to a human story:
Carol: Mid 50's, holding a homemade sign with a picture of an impoverished mother and her children in a dust bowl setting. The caption read: "The New Middle Class". Carol does container planting for a living, is from Beaverton. She and her husband have one adult child who is gay. When asked by a reporter why she was there she answered: "For the next generation."
Julie: 62, from Vancouver. She was raised by parents active in the ACLU. She told the story of having worked in an insurance company in 1969. She attended a feminist meeting during her lunch hour, returning to work exactly on time, only using her allowed hour. When she returned to work she was summarily fired. We spoke of how this is a situation which would never occur today, and no one would take it lying down if it did, yet our rights are slowly eroding, slow enough that the next generation may not even imagine how recently it was that freedom of thought has been legally protected.
Heather had open heart surgery last year, and her insurance did not cover it. Right now she owes the hospital 250, 000.00 and she feels lucky that they have not taken her home.
Aaron- mid 50's. He has a vegan raw food business. He makes wheat-free crackers with sauer kraut, and his sales are booming. He knows all the food activists around, and they are on the edges of this crowd, like "Food Not Bombs" who offers us hummus, carrots and apples as we start to march.
A young woman, maybe 20, standing behind me. She says "I've never seen anything like this in my life. I didn't think there was anything to do, even though things are so bad." She choked up. I hugged her.
Shelly has a husband and 3 young children. She lives in the suburbs and has the normal life of a stay at home mom. She had to make lots of arrangements to come today, not the least of which was that her husband did not understand why it was so important for her to attend this unpermitted 'occupation', in solidarity with the Occupy Wall street movement going on for 3 weeks now in New York. She felt so strongly about the corruption in our country that she risked the negative opinion of her husband of 16 years. She was glowing with a warmth I could feel as she stood near me in the packed crowd. I know we could be great friends.
A march, especially done alone, offers these little snippets of humanity. We felt so powerful standing together, and by the time we walked through the city I think our numbers were at least five thousand.
To know this can happen, in any city of our country, should give solace to anyone who truly believes in a Democracy. Lastly, I want to say that there was no anger that lashed out, the tone was love, and strength. This does not mean there was not sadness and deep frustration with the resolve not to take this corruption lying down any longer, not to remain the slaves of the super rich. The young people danced in the street, and when I left, the core occupation was headed out to camp at a park, no one seemed to know where.
The cold rain began to fall within the hour, and I worried for the activists, who all were so well spoken and dedicated. I worry for them, just as I worry for my country, which is shafting the common people in greater and greater numbers. History tells us that when the wealth becomes concentrated in the hands of a few, and the balance is gone, the delicate scaffolding of a society rocks and shakes, and many things happen that are not predictable.
I feel honored to have spent that afternoon walking with Carol, Aaron, Julie and Shelly. They all represent hard working, play-by-the-rules Americans who want a better world.
At the Park hundreds of people gathered with signs, or just stood. We listened to the organizers in the center of the crowd do a form of public speaking they call "mike check". No megaphones were allowed, so the group, mirroring the same procedure done in New York, spoke a short phrase loudly, which the people nearby repeated as a group. This phrase then echoed out to the farther reaches of the crowd. This allowed that anyone taking the floor would speak with succinct brevity. It also encouraged careful listening on the part of the crowd. It was a nice touch.
I stood at the edge of the gathering, which quickly became the middle within a few minutes. The woman next to me was my first connection to a human story:
Carol: Mid 50's, holding a homemade sign with a picture of an impoverished mother and her children in a dust bowl setting. The caption read: "The New Middle Class". Carol does container planting for a living, is from Beaverton. She and her husband have one adult child who is gay. When asked by a reporter why she was there she answered: "For the next generation."
Julie: 62, from Vancouver. She was raised by parents active in the ACLU. She told the story of having worked in an insurance company in 1969. She attended a feminist meeting during her lunch hour, returning to work exactly on time, only using her allowed hour. When she returned to work she was summarily fired. We spoke of how this is a situation which would never occur today, and no one would take it lying down if it did, yet our rights are slowly eroding, slow enough that the next generation may not even imagine how recently it was that freedom of thought has been legally protected.
Heather had open heart surgery last year, and her insurance did not cover it. Right now she owes the hospital 250, 000.00 and she feels lucky that they have not taken her home.
Aaron- mid 50's. He has a vegan raw food business. He makes wheat-free crackers with sauer kraut, and his sales are booming. He knows all the food activists around, and they are on the edges of this crowd, like "Food Not Bombs" who offers us hummus, carrots and apples as we start to march.
A young woman, maybe 20, standing behind me. She says "I've never seen anything like this in my life. I didn't think there was anything to do, even though things are so bad." She choked up. I hugged her.
Shelly has a husband and 3 young children. She lives in the suburbs and has the normal life of a stay at home mom. She had to make lots of arrangements to come today, not the least of which was that her husband did not understand why it was so important for her to attend this unpermitted 'occupation', in solidarity with the Occupy Wall street movement going on for 3 weeks now in New York. She felt so strongly about the corruption in our country that she risked the negative opinion of her husband of 16 years. She was glowing with a warmth I could feel as she stood near me in the packed crowd. I know we could be great friends.
A march, especially done alone, offers these little snippets of humanity. We felt so powerful standing together, and by the time we walked through the city I think our numbers were at least five thousand.
To know this can happen, in any city of our country, should give solace to anyone who truly believes in a Democracy. Lastly, I want to say that there was no anger that lashed out, the tone was love, and strength. This does not mean there was not sadness and deep frustration with the resolve not to take this corruption lying down any longer, not to remain the slaves of the super rich. The young people danced in the street, and when I left, the core occupation was headed out to camp at a park, no one seemed to know where.
The cold rain began to fall within the hour, and I worried for the activists, who all were so well spoken and dedicated. I worry for them, just as I worry for my country, which is shafting the common people in greater and greater numbers. History tells us that when the wealth becomes concentrated in the hands of a few, and the balance is gone, the delicate scaffolding of a society rocks and shakes, and many things happen that are not predictable.
I feel honored to have spent that afternoon walking with Carol, Aaron, Julie and Shelly. They all represent hard working, play-by-the-rules Americans who want a better world.
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
October in My Heart
It was only last week,
sun so hot, I wore only sandals
and my favorite summer dress.
Today I found the big wool sweater,
hauled it out of the drawer,
while the farmer across the road,
plowed under all his strawberries for good.
The pathogens have ended it.
You can still barely detect,
the sweet red berry smell
lingering over the fields.
I will miss
evenings in summer,
walking through those rows with a glass of wine.
Tasting the Bentons against the Hoods, the Shucksans against the Firecrackers
Never the sensation will leave me
of walking up the hill, arms heavy with berries,
so ripe they are dripping red juice,
through the slats of my grandmother's basket.
Farmer Joe,
you have managed to plow before the rain,
working methodically, steadily as I wander into and out of
my housework.
I want to run down and tell you I think it all stinks,
lawsuits against people who dare to grow a little food
Every effort is a risk
For days now the young people
dare to "occupy Wall Street".
Soon it will get colder, and I worry like a mother.
I watch the rain and ponder, putting on the right gear
to walk down the hill for more tomato harvest.
I'll think of those in tents, being kicked around.
I'll send them a red ripe sweet tomato in my thoughts
I'll keep the fires burning
As winter closes in...
sun so hot, I wore only sandals
and my favorite summer dress.
Today I found the big wool sweater,
hauled it out of the drawer,
while the farmer across the road,
plowed under all his strawberries for good.
The pathogens have ended it.
You can still barely detect,
the sweet red berry smell
lingering over the fields.
I will miss
evenings in summer,
walking through those rows with a glass of wine.
Tasting the Bentons against the Hoods, the Shucksans against the Firecrackers
Never the sensation will leave me
of walking up the hill, arms heavy with berries,
so ripe they are dripping red juice,
through the slats of my grandmother's basket.
Farmer Joe,
you have managed to plow before the rain,
working methodically, steadily as I wander into and out of
my housework.
I want to run down and tell you I think it all stinks,
lawsuits against people who dare to grow a little food
Every effort is a risk
For days now the young people
dare to "occupy Wall Street".
Soon it will get colder, and I worry like a mother.
I watch the rain and ponder, putting on the right gear
to walk down the hill for more tomato harvest.
I'll think of those in tents, being kicked around.
I'll send them a red ripe sweet tomato in my thoughts
I'll keep the fires burning
As winter closes in...
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Wilderness
A few nights ago we watched the movie "Monumental: David Brower's Fight for Wild America", released in 2005. It was one of the most inspiring documentaries I have ever seen. It reminded me that there is so much I don't know about the history of the wilderness preservation movement in my country. There have been decades, centuries, of passionate work which happened long before I, this tree-hugger-hippie child, was even born. I call myself that tongue in cheek of course, just to make light of the fact that each generation seems to carry the perspective that we create the world we know.
It is an auspicious time to be celebrating wilderness, as the fall equinox has just passed, the harvest is in full swing, the air smells like warm flowers, ripe fruit, dry grass... what else? Memories?
While I am out blackberry picking other years come back to me. I can hear the school bus coming down the road carrying my boys home. I am out in the patch near the house, picking into my big tupperware bowl. They climb off the bus, and wave to me, maybe walk over and pick up an apple off the ground to eat for snack. We had eight old apple trees which always bore every year in the rich aluvial soil of the Elwha River Valley.
David Brower would be elated to know that the Elwha dams, both of them are in the initial process of removal. Twenty years ago I was involved in testimony concerning the community impacted by those dams, as they were directly above our home, and a failure could have been catastrophic. Yet, the very worst aspect of them was that they destroyed an incredibly large salmon habitat. The Indians were wronged immeasurably by their construction.
It seemed like a long shot that we could secure a government decision to remove them. There was a crack in one of the dams, and it was up for being recertified according to safety standards. It could not be certified to codes, and it could not feasibly be repaired. The time to start the process of lobbying for it's removal was seized. Twenty years later, removal begins. It has taken this long, and I thank those who stayed with the process. Maybe in our lifetime we will see the return of the legendary "Elwha King" salmon. I dream about that fish, even though I only know it through stories my Indian neighbors told me.
I will go out to pick more berries, to make the seedless jam again, remembering when it was for the kids' peanut butter and jelly lunch sandwiches. I can still bring them jam, even though we are all in different homes now. We remember the Elwha, and watch the news unfold. The largest dam removal project ever undertaken, a reason to celebrate the equinox.
It is an auspicious time to be celebrating wilderness, as the fall equinox has just passed, the harvest is in full swing, the air smells like warm flowers, ripe fruit, dry grass... what else? Memories?
While I am out blackberry picking other years come back to me. I can hear the school bus coming down the road carrying my boys home. I am out in the patch near the house, picking into my big tupperware bowl. They climb off the bus, and wave to me, maybe walk over and pick up an apple off the ground to eat for snack. We had eight old apple trees which always bore every year in the rich aluvial soil of the Elwha River Valley.
David Brower would be elated to know that the Elwha dams, both of them are in the initial process of removal. Twenty years ago I was involved in testimony concerning the community impacted by those dams, as they were directly above our home, and a failure could have been catastrophic. Yet, the very worst aspect of them was that they destroyed an incredibly large salmon habitat. The Indians were wronged immeasurably by their construction.
It seemed like a long shot that we could secure a government decision to remove them. There was a crack in one of the dams, and it was up for being recertified according to safety standards. It could not be certified to codes, and it could not feasibly be repaired. The time to start the process of lobbying for it's removal was seized. Twenty years later, removal begins. It has taken this long, and I thank those who stayed with the process. Maybe in our lifetime we will see the return of the legendary "Elwha King" salmon. I dream about that fish, even though I only know it through stories my Indian neighbors told me.
I will go out to pick more berries, to make the seedless jam again, remembering when it was for the kids' peanut butter and jelly lunch sandwiches. I can still bring them jam, even though we are all in different homes now. We remember the Elwha, and watch the news unfold. The largest dam removal project ever undertaken, a reason to celebrate the equinox.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Gravenstein Apples to a Legendary Wedding Dress
This morning I am with my folks. We crunched into cold, freshly cut gravenstein apples for our first part of breakfast. I watched them close their eyes for the first bite, and I could literally see childhood memories flowing out like an aura around them. We had a gravenstein tree in the first house I lived in, from 1956 to 1967. Now that I think of it, that was the first home they purchased with their growing family. They moved in with four children, ( I was 5 months old) and they moved out with Eight.
The apple tree bordered our alley, and was large, but not prolific for some reason. We waited all summer watching those apples form, not picking them green to toss them for sport as kids love to do. That tree has made it into a song my brother Tom wrote called "If You Don't Like the Rain, Go Back to California". It was our island when the backyard flooded during winter rains. It was the site of our Barbie gardens ( our Barbies liked to get dirty). It was the place a kid could climb up and hide when the world became too much.
While Mom ate her apple slices she began to talk, " I remember when I first saw an Apple in California that cost 10 cents. I was so shocked. When we were little we lived around orchards and had all the apples we could eat." I asked about when that time in California was, which took us on a little journey into her young adult life. I could feel the magic of the fruit bringing forth memories which were so strong, at times she had to stop and breath through a sob.
She told of being in San Fransisco after college, living at the YWCA, and then in a rooming house as she worked for the Veteran's Administration. Dad was finishing college at Santa Clara in San Jose, a year behind her in college at that point because of his time serving in WWII. The year was 1947. Mom chokes up when I ask her how she decided to stay in the Bay Area, even though her hometown was Portland. She wanted to be near my Dad, and they would walk the streets of the city on weekends, dreaming of the life they would have after they were married.
Mom's mind shifted to a girlfriend she had who was a co-worker. .....had just gone to a fashion show and saw a gorgeous wedding gown, she told mom she had to see it. It had been the finale of the show, with matching bridesmaid's dresses too. Mom and her friend went to the store together where it was being sold. It cost the huge sum of 138.00. That was the fabulous dress she ended up wearing, and it lies preserved in a cedar chest now. She spoke of wanting to write a note with the dress history and leave with it with the dress in the box. She has been doing this these days, leaving notes on her projects, in 'case'.
Three of her daughter's wore that dress, feeling like princesses. Not every marriage lasted, but wearing the dress was a great thing all by itself. Slipper satin is what the cleaners told me it was made of. I hand repaired the cream colored lace around the sleeves and the bodice, feeling the history in my hands. Kate Middleton's dress resembled it very much, yet Mom's dress is far more elegant. I'm sure you would agree if you saw the two side by side.:)
We went from the taste of old fashioned apples, ones which are rarely grown these days because they don't keep, to a string of memories of my Mom's life when she was in the prime of her youth. I could see her eyes brighten while she recounted the various jobs she had, and all of this before I even existed. The wedding dress was the precursor to my being ushered into the world. Inconceivable, really, to think of how it all happens. How people fall in love, and then make children and then grow old, and watch their grandchildren begin the whole dance again.
I shall make applesauce, and fill their house with the smell of cooking apples. We will eat our memories, breath them in, laugh about the past, and catch a little sob here and there too.
The apple tree bordered our alley, and was large, but not prolific for some reason. We waited all summer watching those apples form, not picking them green to toss them for sport as kids love to do. That tree has made it into a song my brother Tom wrote called "If You Don't Like the Rain, Go Back to California". It was our island when the backyard flooded during winter rains. It was the site of our Barbie gardens ( our Barbies liked to get dirty). It was the place a kid could climb up and hide when the world became too much.
While Mom ate her apple slices she began to talk, " I remember when I first saw an Apple in California that cost 10 cents. I was so shocked. When we were little we lived around orchards and had all the apples we could eat." I asked about when that time in California was, which took us on a little journey into her young adult life. I could feel the magic of the fruit bringing forth memories which were so strong, at times she had to stop and breath through a sob.
She told of being in San Fransisco after college, living at the YWCA, and then in a rooming house as she worked for the Veteran's Administration. Dad was finishing college at Santa Clara in San Jose, a year behind her in college at that point because of his time serving in WWII. The year was 1947. Mom chokes up when I ask her how she decided to stay in the Bay Area, even though her hometown was Portland. She wanted to be near my Dad, and they would walk the streets of the city on weekends, dreaming of the life they would have after they were married.
Mom's mind shifted to a girlfriend she had who was a co-worker. .....had just gone to a fashion show and saw a gorgeous wedding gown, she told mom she had to see it. It had been the finale of the show, with matching bridesmaid's dresses too. Mom and her friend went to the store together where it was being sold. It cost the huge sum of 138.00. That was the fabulous dress she ended up wearing, and it lies preserved in a cedar chest now. She spoke of wanting to write a note with the dress history and leave with it with the dress in the box. She has been doing this these days, leaving notes on her projects, in 'case'.
Three of her daughter's wore that dress, feeling like princesses. Not every marriage lasted, but wearing the dress was a great thing all by itself. Slipper satin is what the cleaners told me it was made of. I hand repaired the cream colored lace around the sleeves and the bodice, feeling the history in my hands. Kate Middleton's dress resembled it very much, yet Mom's dress is far more elegant. I'm sure you would agree if you saw the two side by side.:)
We went from the taste of old fashioned apples, ones which are rarely grown these days because they don't keep, to a string of memories of my Mom's life when she was in the prime of her youth. I could see her eyes brighten while she recounted the various jobs she had, and all of this before I even existed. The wedding dress was the precursor to my being ushered into the world. Inconceivable, really, to think of how it all happens. How people fall in love, and then make children and then grow old, and watch their grandchildren begin the whole dance again.
I shall make applesauce, and fill their house with the smell of cooking apples. We will eat our memories, breath them in, laugh about the past, and catch a little sob here and there too.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Movie Reviews
Sweet Land - 2005
Sweetly inspiring to this wanna be farm wife. No steamy scenes, or violence, it left me feeling peaceful.
I wanted to take it immediately to my parents, and sit with them as we imagined our own great grandparents coming to farm the land and having to somehow learn English in the process.
I have never seen a film which so accurately depicts the shear exhaustion of work by hand at harvest time.
The Grocer's Son - French., subtitles, but worth it. Contemporary and still very French, the life of a family in a rural area, who run a small grocery store. This is a perfect statement on why small business is important to community, and the complex family dynamics are darn real.
Thank goodness for netflix, eh? It has never been so easy to get little Indie films as it is now.
Sweetly inspiring to this wanna be farm wife. No steamy scenes, or violence, it left me feeling peaceful.
I wanted to take it immediately to my parents, and sit with them as we imagined our own great grandparents coming to farm the land and having to somehow learn English in the process.
I have never seen a film which so accurately depicts the shear exhaustion of work by hand at harvest time.
The Grocer's Son - French., subtitles, but worth it. Contemporary and still very French, the life of a family in a rural area, who run a small grocery store. This is a perfect statement on why small business is important to community, and the complex family dynamics are darn real.
Thank goodness for netflix, eh? It has never been so easy to get little Indie films as it is now.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Letter to a Writer Pal at Hedgebrook
I find myself in the landscape of simplicity - yellow flowering rabbit brush, seepweed, sage brush. Five or eight black cows laying in the corner of their field, which is on the other side of the fence to my corner in the campground. They take the heat without complaint, watch me with their slow, bovine eyes.
The Eastern Oregon desert sun beats out it's afternoon rays, mating dragonflies dive about my camp chair and the Stinkingwater Mountains rise calmly in the distance, This is her, me, this girl in a body with graying hair, wishing to write, thinking of Tamsugah, the 'Shug', pal from my Puget Sound life, sleeping tonight in Willow Cottage at the Hedgebrook Women's Writing Retreat Center. Tam, writing her heart out there, for the month of August, writing and being out in the wilderness too. I am thinking a letter is in order:
Dear Shug-
You, your sonorous laugh, your penchant for biting commentaries punctuated with snappy street girl slang, slick one line descriptions, the agile ability to change the subject at just the right time, your giant heart, I am thinking of you.
You are in Willow Cottage, or at the beach, or soaking in the tubs in the bathhouse - or playing hooky with the wildest girl in the area.
Whatever you are doing, it is better, healthier, more high class than that terrible High School PE teacher jock who made you and your friends bend over and hold your ankles for the disciplinary swats. You made it out of the sludge, the mediocrity of American midsize towns which lie too close to big military bases. You are proof positive that there is a tide rising - a tide of women who won't take the same shit, and who have the words to tell the real stories, who love fiercely and realistically and passionately all at once.
Women who write, and write with courage. A whole bunch of shit's been buried you know ( you do).
The buried shit, some of it is too awful to dredge up, but some just needs the light of day, to compost and become fertile ground for new life. You, I am confident, will give it the light of day. The old and the new, mix it up sistah.
If you had been my sister in childhood, you would have taught me fearless being, you would have taken me to the right places and showed me what is what. Instead I met you when I was 52 years old, and you 39. You asked me to read some poetry with a group for Women's History month. I can't imagine what luck it was to find your writing group during my lonely lost winter in a new town.
Today I sit writing this at Crystal Crane Hotsprings in what you might loving refer to as B.F. nowhere, Southeastern Oregon. (The road sign last night said 'Winnamucca, NV- 222 miles'). From this desert I write this love letter up to the islands of Puget Sound, on this gorgeous August day.
Write girl! Write like you are on fire. Write like no one's watching. Write for women throughout time who never had the time or opportunity because they were enmeshed in a patriarchical world which did not want their stories to travel. Write like a dance that moves to a perfect rhythm.
You are my beacon as I sit writing this, trying to put words to life.
From my camp spot with the funny, stolid cows, we all salute you!
The Eastern Oregon desert sun beats out it's afternoon rays, mating dragonflies dive about my camp chair and the Stinkingwater Mountains rise calmly in the distance, This is her, me, this girl in a body with graying hair, wishing to write, thinking of Tamsugah, the 'Shug', pal from my Puget Sound life, sleeping tonight in Willow Cottage at the Hedgebrook Women's Writing Retreat Center. Tam, writing her heart out there, for the month of August, writing and being out in the wilderness too. I am thinking a letter is in order:
Dear Shug-
You, your sonorous laugh, your penchant for biting commentaries punctuated with snappy street girl slang, slick one line descriptions, the agile ability to change the subject at just the right time, your giant heart, I am thinking of you.
You are in Willow Cottage, or at the beach, or soaking in the tubs in the bathhouse - or playing hooky with the wildest girl in the area.
Whatever you are doing, it is better, healthier, more high class than that terrible High School PE teacher jock who made you and your friends bend over and hold your ankles for the disciplinary swats. You made it out of the sludge, the mediocrity of American midsize towns which lie too close to big military bases. You are proof positive that there is a tide rising - a tide of women who won't take the same shit, and who have the words to tell the real stories, who love fiercely and realistically and passionately all at once.
Women who write, and write with courage. A whole bunch of shit's been buried you know ( you do).
The buried shit, some of it is too awful to dredge up, but some just needs the light of day, to compost and become fertile ground for new life. You, I am confident, will give it the light of day. The old and the new, mix it up sistah.
If you had been my sister in childhood, you would have taught me fearless being, you would have taken me to the right places and showed me what is what. Instead I met you when I was 52 years old, and you 39. You asked me to read some poetry with a group for Women's History month. I can't imagine what luck it was to find your writing group during my lonely lost winter in a new town.
Today I sit writing this at Crystal Crane Hotsprings in what you might loving refer to as B.F. nowhere, Southeastern Oregon. (The road sign last night said 'Winnamucca, NV- 222 miles'). From this desert I write this love letter up to the islands of Puget Sound, on this gorgeous August day.
Write girl! Write like you are on fire. Write like no one's watching. Write for women throughout time who never had the time or opportunity because they were enmeshed in a patriarchical world which did not want their stories to travel. Write like a dance that moves to a perfect rhythm.
You are my beacon as I sit writing this, trying to put words to life.
From my camp spot with the funny, stolid cows, we all salute you!
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
A Centuries Old Practice
Driving down the dusty hills this morning, in the dark, preparing my mind to lead an early morning yoga class, the radio told me more than I wanted to know. The stock market fell 2000 points. Immediately I switched the station, and my head, back to the present. I refuse to be drawn into the negative emotions of the money world, even as it is all too apparent that my IRA's will be of questionable worth, if and when I need them. My yoga practice is still worth millions though, and gaining each month. My practice is my health plan, my retirement happiness plan, my being a grama someday plan, and my staying creative and inspired plan.
One of my students today pointed out that yoga has survived worse historical times, in it's 5,500 years. It will prevail on, and those of us lucky enough to come together in the 6 am dark to share it are reaping the benefits.
What can we do when things look tough? Breath first, that is a natural place to begin. Secondly, we can do our homework, what ever that is. Today my homework is writing, because I've been away from that part of my practice.
I just spent 3 days out on the North Santiam with a group event called "The Fishing Trip". We noted this year that it seems to be more about wine and food than fish. Of course most sport fisherman on the rivers now don't keep the fish, they throw them back to keep the populations growing. Grapes, however, are becoming plentiful, and wine is our consolation prize for being human.
The Fishing Trip consists of 50-75 people camping out in an old growth fir grove along Whitewater Creek. It has been happening for 44 years, always in early August. The regulars work to create the campsite kitchen, showers, sanitary facilities, trails, bridges, food, firewood, and so many more things too numerous to list. Every year I am amazed, and every year I learn something about the power of human cooperation and altruism. The camp goes up in a day or 2 and in 2 weeks it is gone, only the trees and the cold flowing snowmelt fed creek remain.
In camp, after a day of hiking, swimming, a group baseball game, even a golf tournament, folks sit about the fire in the evening. This, after some lovely healthy dinner, like stir fried veggies and salad, not many sugary or processed foods around camp.
We sing into the night, the same songs shared every year, and some new ones. The old and the young sing together. The trees I'm sure listen, I can feel them telling me they remember when my kids were little, and came here with their Uncle Tom to play with the other camp kids. Now all those children have graduated from college, and are part of the working world. The trees remember for me though. When I find my way back to the tent in the dark, I can feel the years, and the trees show the way.
One of my students today pointed out that yoga has survived worse historical times, in it's 5,500 years. It will prevail on, and those of us lucky enough to come together in the 6 am dark to share it are reaping the benefits.
What can we do when things look tough? Breath first, that is a natural place to begin. Secondly, we can do our homework, what ever that is. Today my homework is writing, because I've been away from that part of my practice.
I just spent 3 days out on the North Santiam with a group event called "The Fishing Trip". We noted this year that it seems to be more about wine and food than fish. Of course most sport fisherman on the rivers now don't keep the fish, they throw them back to keep the populations growing. Grapes, however, are becoming plentiful, and wine is our consolation prize for being human.
The Fishing Trip consists of 50-75 people camping out in an old growth fir grove along Whitewater Creek. It has been happening for 44 years, always in early August. The regulars work to create the campsite kitchen, showers, sanitary facilities, trails, bridges, food, firewood, and so many more things too numerous to list. Every year I am amazed, and every year I learn something about the power of human cooperation and altruism. The camp goes up in a day or 2 and in 2 weeks it is gone, only the trees and the cold flowing snowmelt fed creek remain.
In camp, after a day of hiking, swimming, a group baseball game, even a golf tournament, folks sit about the fire in the evening. This, after some lovely healthy dinner, like stir fried veggies and salad, not many sugary or processed foods around camp.
We sing into the night, the same songs shared every year, and some new ones. The old and the young sing together. The trees I'm sure listen, I can feel them telling me they remember when my kids were little, and came here with their Uncle Tom to play with the other camp kids. Now all those children have graduated from college, and are part of the working world. The trees remember for me though. When I find my way back to the tent in the dark, I can feel the years, and the trees show the way.
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Hot Springs, Montana
These days, when it is common to make internet hotel reservations for places one has never visited, there is a small amount of gambling to the traveling experience. How lucky we found The Alameda Motel, which is not fancy, but there is a lovely vegetable garden, to which Paul, the owner, immediately gives you free access. Baby carrots, the real thing, still covered with the silt of the Missoula flood soil of this western Montana land.
We hiked up to the hill above, where a view of the snow covered Rockies rises in the east. The little town, struggling for years after it's main resort closed, lies in a a bowl below.
The Hotel owner tells us about the town, while we eat honey sweetened, no sugar, whole wheat cinnamon rolls in the breakfast area. There are lots of organic slow food lovers here, so unique for such a tiny community. There are no franchises. Paul wants to build geothermal greenhouses, and have his hot spring water drain off to have a double use. I practiced yoga in his dome tent, which has a clay floor heated with hot spring water. Lovely!
We imagine the day when this town will come back, as it slowly is. The Zen Cafe will be the lunch spot, and The old Symes Hotel will carry the history. What a cool experience this is, being in Hot Springs!
We hiked up to the hill above, where a view of the snow covered Rockies rises in the east. The little town, struggling for years after it's main resort closed, lies in a a bowl below.
The Hotel owner tells us about the town, while we eat honey sweetened, no sugar, whole wheat cinnamon rolls in the breakfast area. There are lots of organic slow food lovers here, so unique for such a tiny community. There are no franchises. Paul wants to build geothermal greenhouses, and have his hot spring water drain off to have a double use. I practiced yoga in his dome tent, which has a clay floor heated with hot spring water. Lovely!
We imagine the day when this town will come back, as it slowly is. The Zen Cafe will be the lunch spot, and The old Symes Hotel will carry the history. What a cool experience this is, being in Hot Springs!
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
The Montana Baroque Festival
Since I have been with my partner Curtis, 2 and a half years now, I have had to hear every summer about his week long venture out to Paradise, Montana, where he plays with The Portland baroque Orchestra in a small music festival at a little hot springs resort.
'Paradise" is located in a little valley inside the Bitterroot Mountains of Western Montana, where the Clark Fork River flows along in it's slow green glacial advance toward the North. How fitting for me to be blogging on 'Heaven Now' from 'Paradise'. Fortune sometimes smiles on the least of us.
This year I was invited to go along, so I cleared the calendar for months in advance to make it work. One never knows what to expect when tagging along as the girlfriend, yet I am finding this trip a lovely and unique series of experiences and opportunities to be truly 'away'.
The drive here from Portland was long, we left at 4 am so we had time to stop along the way in Spokane, at the only Independant bookstore within hundreds of miles. Aunties in Spokane is a fabulous place, highly recommeded.
The subsequent drive through Idaho on I-90 is all winding up and down high mountain passes. Huge climbs and long downgrades where one can only hope the brakes are all in order. From Idaho into Montana the mountains continue, and then the turn off, left toward St. Regis and Glacier National Park.
We arrived at Quinn's Resort by 2:30, narrowly passing through a small forest fire which later caused a temporary road closure.
The weather is warm, and there are cherry trees all over the place! The first thing I did after we dumped our stuff in the room was to walk out to see the river. I passed a pie cherry tree loaded with fruit. A rare type of cherry these days. The cherry of my childhood. That reminded me of Trog, the cherry picker I met on the ferry to Alaska back in 1976. He picked cherries in Montana. ( Trog, short for 'troglodyte' hitchhiked with me and we got a ride from 2 guys in a big RV, all of us bound for Fairbanks. We played poker at night in those huge Alaska valleys with barely a sunset and dusk in June.)
Traveling I guess does this, conjures up memories of the distant past. Well, I don't want to digress from being here now. How lucky that life goes on and 36 years later, after my gypsy youth, I am still doing little gypsy things.
The musicians are out warming up at dress rehearsal, I can hear the violins. Monica Hugget, the reason this festival exists, has arrived in her dusty rented Subaru. My own dusty Subaru sits in the parking lot. A strong mountain wind has kicked up, and the outdoor stage is set.My man has gone to work, making music. I get to watch, and hope the rainstorm coming in is kind to this diligent, talented group of interesting players.
Music in the mountains... more later!
'Paradise" is located in a little valley inside the Bitterroot Mountains of Western Montana, where the Clark Fork River flows along in it's slow green glacial advance toward the North. How fitting for me to be blogging on 'Heaven Now' from 'Paradise'. Fortune sometimes smiles on the least of us.
This year I was invited to go along, so I cleared the calendar for months in advance to make it work. One never knows what to expect when tagging along as the girlfriend, yet I am finding this trip a lovely and unique series of experiences and opportunities to be truly 'away'.
The drive here from Portland was long, we left at 4 am so we had time to stop along the way in Spokane, at the only Independant bookstore within hundreds of miles. Aunties in Spokane is a fabulous place, highly recommeded.
The subsequent drive through Idaho on I-90 is all winding up and down high mountain passes. Huge climbs and long downgrades where one can only hope the brakes are all in order. From Idaho into Montana the mountains continue, and then the turn off, left toward St. Regis and Glacier National Park.
We arrived at Quinn's Resort by 2:30, narrowly passing through a small forest fire which later caused a temporary road closure.
The weather is warm, and there are cherry trees all over the place! The first thing I did after we dumped our stuff in the room was to walk out to see the river. I passed a pie cherry tree loaded with fruit. A rare type of cherry these days. The cherry of my childhood. That reminded me of Trog, the cherry picker I met on the ferry to Alaska back in 1976. He picked cherries in Montana. ( Trog, short for 'troglodyte' hitchhiked with me and we got a ride from 2 guys in a big RV, all of us bound for Fairbanks. We played poker at night in those huge Alaska valleys with barely a sunset and dusk in June.)
Traveling I guess does this, conjures up memories of the distant past. Well, I don't want to digress from being here now. How lucky that life goes on and 36 years later, after my gypsy youth, I am still doing little gypsy things.
The musicians are out warming up at dress rehearsal, I can hear the violins. Monica Hugget, the reason this festival exists, has arrived in her dusty rented Subaru. My own dusty Subaru sits in the parking lot. A strong mountain wind has kicked up, and the outdoor stage is set.My man has gone to work, making music. I get to watch, and hope the rainstorm coming in is kind to this diligent, talented group of interesting players.
Music in the mountains... more later!
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Grandmother pies
Are there grandmothers now who will give the children buckets, and instruct them to go out and pick some berries, bring them home, and she will make a pie for dinner? Grandmothers who will let those children wander the dirt roads between the cottages, even if they might fall into the brambles sometimes, and come home scratched but proud to have gathered part of the family dinner?
I visited the ocean today, where my Grama cared for us as children. I walked the beach, past the twin sisters rocks where my sister and I would stand while the tide came in. The beach was filled with people but no crabs in the pools around the rocks we used to call 'crab holes'. It has been 20 years since my grama died, even as she lived to be 96. It has been 10 years since I lived near this beach in my fourth life.
After my walk, I went to the little lot I own, south of Cannon, my last connection with the coast. Blackberries overtake it like a plague. I cut vines and stacked them up for over an hour. Any work I do seems to never be enough. I left plenty of long uncut berry vine tentacles behind in order to make it back inland in time for dinner. On the drive home every blackberry thicket called out to me, those wild boisterous, audacious Himalayan blackberries, covered with white blooms which will be berries in a few weeks. They were usually ripe for my mom's birthday on August 17.
Today I marked again my luck in having Amy, we called Brama. I called her only daughter on the cell phone and held it up to the waves at Silver Point, so she could hear her Mama's ocean once again. She may never see it again because she is failing in health and can't travel anymore. The sound of the sea on a cell phone may be the last she hears. This felt strange, and not strange at once. It is where I find myself now, where she finds herself. We all do the best we can.
I want to be a grandma who gives the child a bucket and says "Here, pick us some berries, and I will make a pie for dinner. We can go for a walk in the sunset later, and watch the moon rise over the ocean."
I visited the ocean today, where my Grama cared for us as children. I walked the beach, past the twin sisters rocks where my sister and I would stand while the tide came in. The beach was filled with people but no crabs in the pools around the rocks we used to call 'crab holes'. It has been 20 years since my grama died, even as she lived to be 96. It has been 10 years since I lived near this beach in my fourth life.
After my walk, I went to the little lot I own, south of Cannon, my last connection with the coast. Blackberries overtake it like a plague. I cut vines and stacked them up for over an hour. Any work I do seems to never be enough. I left plenty of long uncut berry vine tentacles behind in order to make it back inland in time for dinner. On the drive home every blackberry thicket called out to me, those wild boisterous, audacious Himalayan blackberries, covered with white blooms which will be berries in a few weeks. They were usually ripe for my mom's birthday on August 17.
Today I marked again my luck in having Amy, we called Brama. I called her only daughter on the cell phone and held it up to the waves at Silver Point, so she could hear her Mama's ocean once again. She may never see it again because she is failing in health and can't travel anymore. The sound of the sea on a cell phone may be the last she hears. This felt strange, and not strange at once. It is where I find myself now, where she finds herself. We all do the best we can.
I want to be a grandma who gives the child a bucket and says "Here, pick us some berries, and I will make a pie for dinner. We can go for a walk in the sunset later, and watch the moon rise over the ocean."
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Broken Hay Balers and Garlic Scapes
The life of a farmer is intense during the height of the summer. My neighbor Steve's hay baler was malfunctioning. The hay is cut and laying in the fields drying nicely, but one never knows when rain will come. My dear mechanic, Curtis, went with me on an errand down the hill to return potluck dishes to our neighbors. I told him about the broken baler, so he went over to Steve's shop.
Yesterday afternoon and on into the evening the two guys worked together to find the problem. Curtis cannot be deterred from a mission, so by about 8:30 they had the 1967 Massey Ferguson Baler ready to go for the morning. The boys and girls then got together to toast with beers and dinner at 10:00 pm.
Today I went out to cut garlic scapes. I didn't know the flower part which turns into a seed pod was called that, but farmer Steve told me. You see I had delusions of selling these tender little green garlic shoots to any of the fancy restaurants nearby... fresh, organic, unique, local - what more could a discerning palate ask for? I made my calls, (maybe too close to the lunch rush?), left messages, and have heard nothing since. Oh well.
You can fix things sometimes, and sometimes what you have to sell is not wanted. Life in farm country.
The strawberries are ripe, I've tried several. It is hard to enjoy them when I see in my mind's eye the farmer driving through those picturesque green rows all spring spraying and spraying. Finally I saw him and asked what the name of the spray was. He told me 'Switch'. So there you have it. My mechanic, musician, lover looked up 'Switch' to find that it is indeed harmful to living things. Sigh.
The farmer tells me he has $20,000 into these fields by now, and he has to spray to keep the berries from rotting against each other. The spray is an anti-fungal. He is a nice guy and he lets me pick berries to bring for my Dad's waffle breakfast with out asking for any payment.
I learned the name of the garlic tops today, and also how to program my new cell phone. I also learned that I must be conscious of my posture when I am doing repetitive tasks like trimming garlic scapes.
Being conscious, I realize, will always be my practice.
Today in the background is the milestone that 22 years ago I became a widow. It was a terrible day, and since then no day has ever compared, and so I consider myself fortunate. Fleeting images of that time cross my thoughts like movie scenes. I have always felt the greatest sadness for my sons on this anniversary. We were all so young, how could we know death would visit us so instantly and ruthlessly?
It reminds me anyway, to stay conscious and to embrace and appreciate life.
Yesterday afternoon and on into the evening the two guys worked together to find the problem. Curtis cannot be deterred from a mission, so by about 8:30 they had the 1967 Massey Ferguson Baler ready to go for the morning. The boys and girls then got together to toast with beers and dinner at 10:00 pm.
Today I went out to cut garlic scapes. I didn't know the flower part which turns into a seed pod was called that, but farmer Steve told me. You see I had delusions of selling these tender little green garlic shoots to any of the fancy restaurants nearby... fresh, organic, unique, local - what more could a discerning palate ask for? I made my calls, (maybe too close to the lunch rush?), left messages, and have heard nothing since. Oh well.
You can fix things sometimes, and sometimes what you have to sell is not wanted. Life in farm country.
The strawberries are ripe, I've tried several. It is hard to enjoy them when I see in my mind's eye the farmer driving through those picturesque green rows all spring spraying and spraying. Finally I saw him and asked what the name of the spray was. He told me 'Switch'. So there you have it. My mechanic, musician, lover looked up 'Switch' to find that it is indeed harmful to living things. Sigh.
The farmer tells me he has $20,000 into these fields by now, and he has to spray to keep the berries from rotting against each other. The spray is an anti-fungal. He is a nice guy and he lets me pick berries to bring for my Dad's waffle breakfast with out asking for any payment.
I learned the name of the garlic tops today, and also how to program my new cell phone. I also learned that I must be conscious of my posture when I am doing repetitive tasks like trimming garlic scapes.
Being conscious, I realize, will always be my practice.
Today in the background is the milestone that 22 years ago I became a widow. It was a terrible day, and since then no day has ever compared, and so I consider myself fortunate. Fleeting images of that time cross my thoughts like movie scenes. I have always felt the greatest sadness for my sons on this anniversary. We were all so young, how could we know death would visit us so instantly and ruthlessly?
It reminds me anyway, to stay conscious and to embrace and appreciate life.
Monday, June 20, 2011
Dancers
On Saturday evening we drove down the hill, under a green gray tornado colored sky. Four of us, looking into the middle years and beyond. We went to see the dancer's recital, on the Elementary school gymnasium stage, the dancers of all ages, and my two yoga students.
I cannot prove it with any scientific facts, but I do believe, my yoga pals, both over 55, shone the brightest, had the most artful, easy grace, danced with the finest posture - even over the teenagers.
You might say I am biased, and that I will admit to. Yet, there can be no mistaking the fact that these two women have endured breast cancer, the usual challenges of aging and work, the fatigue factors of time, and their faces shone that night. They each stood out - the ballerina leaping, the tap dancer clipping. Serene smiles, clear eyes, they had a light from within.
Making time for our practice is lighting a candle from the inside out. On days like this, when it is gray and cold, and the solstice is here, making one feel disoriented, the candle needs more than ever to be lit from within.
I cannot prove it with any scientific facts, but I do believe, my yoga pals, both over 55, shone the brightest, had the most artful, easy grace, danced with the finest posture - even over the teenagers.
You might say I am biased, and that I will admit to. Yet, there can be no mistaking the fact that these two women have endured breast cancer, the usual challenges of aging and work, the fatigue factors of time, and their faces shone that night. They each stood out - the ballerina leaping, the tap dancer clipping. Serene smiles, clear eyes, they had a light from within.
Making time for our practice is lighting a candle from the inside out. On days like this, when it is gray and cold, and the solstice is here, making one feel disoriented, the candle needs more than ever to be lit from within.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Write Like No One's Watching
A funny thing about writing things that will appear publicly, is that there are a whole lot of little mental stops which come up over ideas.
Like today I was feeling the usual sadness which Father's Day brings, and I thought I should write about it, but then I couldn't. It is too raw, and not easily made eloquent.
My writer pal Tammy put out a Father's Day writing prompt, on FB, which got me thinking of the emotion inherent in these kinds of holidays. So many of us do not have the traditional linear nuclear family... Mom and Dad married, biological kids all in common, everyone normal, affluent, sane etc.
Not to say my own family is not really fabulous, we just aren't 'linear'.
I am lucky to have my Dad, with the palindrome name - Bob. He is first class.
For all of us with the various relationships to fathers living and dead, we are left with a forward looking, jumping off, somewhere -to-go place - we can feel grateful to all men in the world who are nurturing people - men who care about children and youth in general. It is because of them that we can celebrate fatherhood tomorrow. Fatherhood is so much more than biological, padrisimo!
Like today I was feeling the usual sadness which Father's Day brings, and I thought I should write about it, but then I couldn't. It is too raw, and not easily made eloquent.
My writer pal Tammy put out a Father's Day writing prompt, on FB, which got me thinking of the emotion inherent in these kinds of holidays. So many of us do not have the traditional linear nuclear family... Mom and Dad married, biological kids all in common, everyone normal, affluent, sane etc.
Not to say my own family is not really fabulous, we just aren't 'linear'.
I am lucky to have my Dad, with the palindrome name - Bob. He is first class.
For all of us with the various relationships to fathers living and dead, we are left with a forward looking, jumping off, somewhere -to-go place - we can feel grateful to all men in the world who are nurturing people - men who care about children and youth in general. It is because of them that we can celebrate fatherhood tomorrow. Fatherhood is so much more than biological, padrisimo!
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Summer Yoga and Writing Combined
Here is the class info I promised. I am so excited to be offering this combination, and hope you will give it a thought and share it with other writers.
You are warmly invited:
Summer class offering with the Tolovana Arts Colony:
Yoga~Writing with Margi
Three Sunday mornings to explore the physical connection to the mind.
July 10, 17 and 31~ 10:30 - 12:30
Tolovana Community Hall
3779 S. Hemlock
Cannon Beach, OR
~Combining contemplative yoga practice with writing time~
For this class no prior yoga experience is necessary, although some knowledge of yoga philosophy is helpful.
Class fee: $80 for all 3 classes
$30 per class drop-in (1 day advance notice required for those wishing to drop-in)
Materials:
* yoga mat
* writing notebook
* writing pen
* sitting blanket and/or pillow
For more information, RSVP or registration contact:
Margi Shindler
margishindler@yahoo.com
21685 SW Ornduff Rd
Hillsboro, OR 97123
503-440-7412
( Opportunity to carpool with me to the coast is possible with advance RSVP!)
Sponsored by The Tolovana Arts Colony
Valerie Manes Mcgee, Program Coordinator
Jeff Womack, President
Summer class offering with the Tolovana Arts Colony:
Yoga~Writing with Margi
Three Sunday mornings to explore the physical connection to the mind.
July 10, 17 and 31~ 10:30 - 12:30
Tolovana Community Hall
3779 S. Hemlock
Cannon Beach, OR
~Combining contemplative yoga practice with writing time~
For this class no prior yoga experience is necessary, although some knowledge of yoga philosophy is helpful.
Class fee: $80 for all 3 classes
$30 per class drop-in (1 day advance notice required for those wishing to drop-in)
Materials:
* yoga mat
* writing notebook
* writing pen
* sitting blanket and/or pillow
For more information, RSVP or registration contact:
margishindler@yahoo.com
21685 SW Ornduff Rd
Hillsboro, OR 97123
503-440-7412
( Opportunity to carpool with me to the coast is possible with advance RSVP!)
Sponsored by The Tolovana Arts Colony
Valerie Manes Mcgee, Program Coordinator
Jeff Womack, President
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Traveling
"Masters are under no cosmic compulsion to live on mountains only". .... " The Himalayas in India and Tibet have no monopoly on the saints. What one does not trouble to find within will not be discovered by transporting the body hither and yon. As soon as the devotee is willing to go to the ends of the earth for spirititual enlightenment, his guru will appear nearby".
From : 'The Sleepless Saint', Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramahansa Yogananda
The middle sentence, 'What one does not bother to find within....' is a principle on which I base my summer yoga offering in Cannon Beach -Yoga and Writing combined. This integration of disciplines is a concept I employ in my morning practice when I have the time (which lately seems not often enough). Now I will share the opportunity with a group for 2 luxurious hours of nothing to do but yoga and the words which emanate from this practice. All this, and the ocean air on a Sunday morning in July.
Class size is limited .. :) Stay tuned.
From : 'The Sleepless Saint', Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramahansa Yogananda
The middle sentence, 'What one does not bother to find within....' is a principle on which I base my summer yoga offering in Cannon Beach -Yoga and Writing combined. This integration of disciplines is a concept I employ in my morning practice when I have the time (which lately seems not often enough). Now I will share the opportunity with a group for 2 luxurious hours of nothing to do but yoga and the words which emanate from this practice. All this, and the ocean air on a Sunday morning in July.
Class size is limited .. :) Stay tuned.
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Crazy Weather and Revolution
The news today includes yet another really destructive tornado, this one in Springfield, MA. The Midwest and east of the U.S. is being pummeled weekly. While here in the Pacific North-wet many of the facebook posts lately have been about how horrible our spring has been, with endless cold, rainy gray days. The crazy natural disasters/unusual weather seem to have begun with the tsunami in Japan, back in March. The tsunami was technically not meteorological, but geologic, even so, it seems the gods have it in for us right now. How very vulnerable we are.
There are a few articles which dare to mention 'Climate Change', also known as 'Global Warming', but warming makes no sense to those of us stuck in winter temps during most of April and May this year, just as we fevently hope for a reprieve from our already too long winters. Climate change is the result of the upsetting of natural ocean air currents which give us what we can't help but recognize as 'weather'. There are scientists being paid good money to keep up a stream of obfuscation on the issue. In the end, if you are the recipient of climactic anomalies, you will either be digging your belongings out of the rubble of your home, or wondering if you will ever be able to plant your vegetables as the summer begins on the calendar, and you are still building a woodstove fire to keep warm.
Earthquakes are probably not avoidable on any level, but nuclear power plants, especially near fault lines, are.
On a happy note, there is an awesome non-violent revolution going on in Spain right now. I just watched a youtube video of a whole crowd of people camped out in the square in the city of Valladolid. The video was set to music, the vignettes were lively and inspiring. One image I loved is of a little girl, about 5 years old. Her t-shirt said, "Para mi futuro" - "For my future".
The future looks very strange indeed, as the Boehners etc. try to pillage Social Security, as though this fund belonged to the Wall street types. If the politicians were true fiduciaries, the fund never would have been raided to pay into the National debt. Now that it has been pillaged, somehow it is fair game to be taken from the millions of us who go actually go out and get dirty working everyday.
Your humble posting writer wonders, as she gets nearer elderhood, what will be left of our social fabric when the time comes that she might need to count on the money paid in all these years by the hapless workers. However, it is not too late. It must not be, it can't be. We can all get sleeping bags and camp out in front of our government offices. Even tornadoes can't keep the people from going forward into the future with courage and the truth.
My sincere condolences to all those who have lost people and homes in this past spring's disasters. I hope you find the light within shining anyway, and the joy of working as a community again, where we find we always do need one another. Our best selves can manifest during times of intense cooperation.
As always too, during times of uncertainty, we have our practice, which reminds us of the truth, and the goodness we can carry into the world.
There are a few articles which dare to mention 'Climate Change', also known as 'Global Warming', but warming makes no sense to those of us stuck in winter temps during most of April and May this year, just as we fevently hope for a reprieve from our already too long winters. Climate change is the result of the upsetting of natural ocean air currents which give us what we can't help but recognize as 'weather'. There are scientists being paid good money to keep up a stream of obfuscation on the issue. In the end, if you are the recipient of climactic anomalies, you will either be digging your belongings out of the rubble of your home, or wondering if you will ever be able to plant your vegetables as the summer begins on the calendar, and you are still building a woodstove fire to keep warm.
Earthquakes are probably not avoidable on any level, but nuclear power plants, especially near fault lines, are.
On a happy note, there is an awesome non-violent revolution going on in Spain right now. I just watched a youtube video of a whole crowd of people camped out in the square in the city of Valladolid. The video was set to music, the vignettes were lively and inspiring. One image I loved is of a little girl, about 5 years old. Her t-shirt said, "Para mi futuro" - "For my future".
The future looks very strange indeed, as the Boehners etc. try to pillage Social Security, as though this fund belonged to the Wall street types. If the politicians were true fiduciaries, the fund never would have been raided to pay into the National debt. Now that it has been pillaged, somehow it is fair game to be taken from the millions of us who go actually go out and get dirty working everyday.
Your humble posting writer wonders, as she gets nearer elderhood, what will be left of our social fabric when the time comes that she might need to count on the money paid in all these years by the hapless workers. However, it is not too late. It must not be, it can't be. We can all get sleeping bags and camp out in front of our government offices. Even tornadoes can't keep the people from going forward into the future with courage and the truth.
My sincere condolences to all those who have lost people and homes in this past spring's disasters. I hope you find the light within shining anyway, and the joy of working as a community again, where we find we always do need one another. Our best selves can manifest during times of intense cooperation.
As always too, during times of uncertainty, we have our practice, which reminds us of the truth, and the goodness we can carry into the world.
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Forget-me-nots
Tonight the light, as it fades, makes the forget-me-nots glow iridescent. Even in this gray evening in May, when it seems like the night should be warm, and the sky full of stars, the air is cool enough to make us build a fire. The mist is thick over the hills.
It seems inconceivable that a few short days ago I was in the hot sun in Tuscon, hiking along the rocky hills, appreciating the cactus in bloom, air drying in the warm breeze after a shower.
Tuscon was the site of graduation from The University of Arizona Law School for my daughter-in-law Kirsten, and her roommate Jessica, who is also my son Arlyn's girlfriend. What a weekend it was, to celebrate this achievement, and Kirsten and her Mom's shared birthday.
As I watched the girls approach the stage, I held the flowers we would hand them on their way up the auditorium aisle, and tried to fathom the work, the studying, the papers, the tests they have forged through for three years. I felt so honored to have them in my life.
I sat next to Amery, realizing that he had supported his wife diligently to help her attain her goal. He has already proved himself a good husband.
I felt so awed that Kirsten and Amery planned and carried out a wedding during the time in law school, and that someday they will be the parents - the smart, fun, competent parents of my grandchildren..... it was almost too much to comprehend as I sat in the dark building, listening to the inspiring speeches. I knew in the most visceral way that I was watching the future.
A week in the sunshine, and the milestones of family was almost too much to comprehend all at once. I managed to rent a car, fly alone, find my way around an unfamiliar town, and read 3 good books too. I would recommend it .... desert hiking, family parties and bookstore browsing.
Let this be a toast in words to you, my sons and their partners. You have all worked so hard, to graduate from college, go on to masters programs and career work in your chosen fields. You are all I could hope for and more in a family. May the world go well for you..
It seems inconceivable that a few short days ago I was in the hot sun in Tuscon, hiking along the rocky hills, appreciating the cactus in bloom, air drying in the warm breeze after a shower.
Tuscon was the site of graduation from The University of Arizona Law School for my daughter-in-law Kirsten, and her roommate Jessica, who is also my son Arlyn's girlfriend. What a weekend it was, to celebrate this achievement, and Kirsten and her Mom's shared birthday.
As I watched the girls approach the stage, I held the flowers we would hand them on their way up the auditorium aisle, and tried to fathom the work, the studying, the papers, the tests they have forged through for three years. I felt so honored to have them in my life.
I sat next to Amery, realizing that he had supported his wife diligently to help her attain her goal. He has already proved himself a good husband.
I felt so awed that Kirsten and Amery planned and carried out a wedding during the time in law school, and that someday they will be the parents - the smart, fun, competent parents of my grandchildren..... it was almost too much to comprehend as I sat in the dark building, listening to the inspiring speeches. I knew in the most visceral way that I was watching the future.
A week in the sunshine, and the milestones of family was almost too much to comprehend all at once. I managed to rent a car, fly alone, find my way around an unfamiliar town, and read 3 good books too. I would recommend it .... desert hiking, family parties and bookstore browsing.
Let this be a toast in words to you, my sons and their partners. You have all worked so hard, to graduate from college, go on to masters programs and career work in your chosen fields. You are all I could hope for and more in a family. May the world go well for you..
Saturday, April 30, 2011
Chatting With Dennis Kucinich in Tacoma
I had heard for years that Dennis Kucinich is an especially charismatic person, so to see him in person was the chance that came along this week, and thanks to Trina Ballard and facebook, we hooked up to make the trip from Bellevue to attend a small fundraiser at the IBEW Union Hall in Tacoma. After tonight I can picture Dennis in real life, and still feel his sincere handshake given with a warm smile. I can hear his voice, intelligent and clear, his morals not in compromise, no cognitive dissonance in his conversation.
Dennis has to raise money to run again, to preserve his Congressional seat in Ohio. Ah, the whole election process in this country is so daunting, as we supporters put our 40.00 or so into the envelope, I was thinking of the billionaire Koch bros who fund the people who will serve their interests. So now in America if you are a person of conscience, you will never have the kind of funding as a sell out. I guess this has always been true, and I am having to see it in all it's horror.
Last Friday evening, Dennis answered questions for 45 minutes, and then walked around the room. Trina and I were able to speak with him personally for a few minutes. The issue of Bradley Manning was raised earlier, and he told us the crazy story of how he has tried visit Manning. He contacted the Sec. of the Army, who told him to contact the State Dept, who told him to contact the Sec. of the Navy, who told him to contact Manning's lawyer, then he was told he needed Manning's permission, which he got. Well, then he was cleared by the prison in Quantico, Virginia to visit, and informed that if he visited it would be taped, and that he could be called as a witness in the trial. Sounds like blackmail to me.
Dennis is on the Congressional Oversight Committee, to further the injustice of this scenario.
For the past 8+ months Manning has not been allowed to exercise 23 hours a day, including in his cell, not allowed normal clothes, and is kept in isolation.
"They are trying to break him." Said Dennis.
Contrast this with the 5 soldiers being held in prison at Fort Lewis for murdering Iraqi civilians unprovoked, and dismembering the bodies. One of these soldiers was just allowed to return to his home with a minimum security monitor.
There you have it, the priorities in the U.S.: it is far worse to share state secrets of illegal war operations than it is to murder people.
The issues raised were so numerous, and daunting. For instance that are 15 million unemployed in the U.S. now. Millions have stopped even filing for unemployment, so the official figures are not close to the reality of our social situation.
Our tax dollars are going to fund and insure Nuclear Power plants because there is no private agency or insurance company who would dare invest in something as unsustainable and risky.
Kucinich's district in Ohio is being redrawn, because of the huge population loss occurring in Ohio in recent years. Now he may have to run in an entirely new district.
Even with all of this, he tells us there is reason to keep working. From a practicing Buddhist I will take this home with me as a mantra in troubled times.
He is a lone voice of truth in a sea of confusion. If you have a chance to ever see him, and put a few dollars in the envelope, it might assuage that distant fear that there are no high quality leaders in our midst. Dennis is the real thing.
Dennis has to raise money to run again, to preserve his Congressional seat in Ohio. Ah, the whole election process in this country is so daunting, as we supporters put our 40.00 or so into the envelope, I was thinking of the billionaire Koch bros who fund the people who will serve their interests. So now in America if you are a person of conscience, you will never have the kind of funding as a sell out. I guess this has always been true, and I am having to see it in all it's horror.
Last Friday evening, Dennis answered questions for 45 minutes, and then walked around the room. Trina and I were able to speak with him personally for a few minutes. The issue of Bradley Manning was raised earlier, and he told us the crazy story of how he has tried visit Manning. He contacted the Sec. of the Army, who told him to contact the State Dept, who told him to contact the Sec. of the Navy, who told him to contact Manning's lawyer, then he was told he needed Manning's permission, which he got. Well, then he was cleared by the prison in Quantico, Virginia to visit, and informed that if he visited it would be taped, and that he could be called as a witness in the trial. Sounds like blackmail to me.
Dennis is on the Congressional Oversight Committee, to further the injustice of this scenario.
For the past 8+ months Manning has not been allowed to exercise 23 hours a day, including in his cell, not allowed normal clothes, and is kept in isolation.
"They are trying to break him." Said Dennis.
Contrast this with the 5 soldiers being held in prison at Fort Lewis for murdering Iraqi civilians unprovoked, and dismembering the bodies. One of these soldiers was just allowed to return to his home with a minimum security monitor.
There you have it, the priorities in the U.S.: it is far worse to share state secrets of illegal war operations than it is to murder people.
The issues raised were so numerous, and daunting. For instance that are 15 million unemployed in the U.S. now. Millions have stopped even filing for unemployment, so the official figures are not close to the reality of our social situation.
Our tax dollars are going to fund and insure Nuclear Power plants because there is no private agency or insurance company who would dare invest in something as unsustainable and risky.
Kucinich's district in Ohio is being redrawn, because of the huge population loss occurring in Ohio in recent years. Now he may have to run in an entirely new district.
Even with all of this, he tells us there is reason to keep working. From a practicing Buddhist I will take this home with me as a mantra in troubled times.
He is a lone voice of truth in a sea of confusion. If you have a chance to ever see him, and put a few dollars in the envelope, it might assuage that distant fear that there are no high quality leaders in our midst. Dennis is the real thing.
Friday, April 22, 2011
Washing the Floor and Hoeing the Garlic
Today cosmic circumstance gave me the opportunity to spend the morning washing my kitchen floor. It is the kind of clean that you can feel with bare feet. I did not have to hurry while I washed, I just washed with no thought of time. My space feels happier now in a general way.
The weather turned finally toward spring, the bite of cold receded by the afternoon when I walked down to my neighbor's garlic field where I am helping in the work. My efforts are part of a trade for fresh vegetables. We hoe and chat or sometimes I am alone and I think. Hoeing and thinking is a natural combination. I feel connected to the many ancestors through the ages who worked their fields for survival.
The light has come to gloaming, the cats walk in front of the windows, maybe waiting for the moon to rise. The blossoms on the plum trees and the daffodils glow in this light. Another luxury, to stare out the window. The sky is several hues of dark blue.
It is quiet except for the evening birds chirping. It is quiet enough for a mind to drift, to float unhurried, agenda free. It is quiet enough to hear the sound waves left by the voices of those long dead, who seem to have a hand in why I am here, in this farmland, on this hill, with the sense of closeness to something I walk toward in my dreams.
The weather turned finally toward spring, the bite of cold receded by the afternoon when I walked down to my neighbor's garlic field where I am helping in the work. My efforts are part of a trade for fresh vegetables. We hoe and chat or sometimes I am alone and I think. Hoeing and thinking is a natural combination. I feel connected to the many ancestors through the ages who worked their fields for survival.
The light has come to gloaming, the cats walk in front of the windows, maybe waiting for the moon to rise. The blossoms on the plum trees and the daffodils glow in this light. Another luxury, to stare out the window. The sky is several hues of dark blue.
It is quiet except for the evening birds chirping. It is quiet enough for a mind to drift, to float unhurried, agenda free. It is quiet enough to hear the sound waves left by the voices of those long dead, who seem to have a hand in why I am here, in this farmland, on this hill, with the sense of closeness to something I walk toward in my dreams.
Saturday, April 16, 2011
High School P.E. Yoga
Last week my work took me out to the small high school in St. Paul. A rural school set in the midst of the fertile agricultural lands of the mid-Willamette Valley. The landscape is flat as a pancake, and a patchwork of orchards, hop fields, nurseries, afalfa, strawberries and the people who work and harvest these crops.
My assignment was 2 mornings as the middle school P.E. teacher. P.E. was never my favorite gig, as my field is English Ed., but after taking roll, when the class was supposed to spend 5 minutes on warm-ups, my mouth suddenly opened to say "I'm a yoga teacher, and anyone who wants to do yoga stretches instead of laps come over here to this corner."
Substitute teaching is very much improv, and here I was winging it... not sure what would occur, given the large class including a number of boisterous 12 and 13 year old boys.
At the mention of the word 'yoga' several of the girl's eyes lit up, they smiled and I could hear a small chorus of "All right! I LOVE yoga. Oh this is so cool!"
As I began I was thinking, "OK I hope this isn't crazy!"
Fully half the class came into my corner... even a few boys showed up, and almost all of the girls. Most were watching me intently as I quickly scanned my brain for anything we could do with shoes on, no mats, and me having to have one eye out on the rest of the class, none of whose names or behaviors I knew yet.
We did a few stretches and combinations of tree pose balances. The kids were fabulous and sweet. The usual adolescent "everything is stupid" attitude was not on display. What a small joy. No, not small, it was a revelation. One of the biggest obstacles in education is that ennui against enthusiasm. This very thing has kept me from wanting to be in large classrooms. Today, however, I saw a glimmer of what could be.
One girl, Rachel, the angel of my day, (there is usually one) came up after class, looked me straight in the eye and said, "Thank you for teaching us yoga today." My heart melted. That is what I took home with me, after 4 hours of listening to basketballs and shouts reverberate inside gym walls, and the constant supervision of packs of wild, unconscious boys. (I later learned that some of them had urinated into the soap dispensers in the boys locker room.)
It was a 2 morning gig, and on the following day the principal joined me for the last class. The activity of the day was weightlifting. There wasn't a good venue for yoga stretches, and it felt harder to fit them in, so I accepted the routine. One of the comments the principal made after class, a wonderful teacher by the way, was that kids this age are very 'body unaware'. So true, and true for many adults too.
I can't help thinking how wonderful it would be to offer yoga to school kids, to give them early opportunities to learn focus through body awareness. There are some schools who offer yoga, and I hope it will become a trend. It could be part of the evolutionary change we need to make to continue our survival as this complicated species with a the big brain which often isn't our best quality.
Working with middle school age kids is giving me hope, actually. I believe they will find new holistic ways to see the world and to live. They will have to, and maybe on some level most know this, even if popular culture tells us otherwise.
My assignment was 2 mornings as the middle school P.E. teacher. P.E. was never my favorite gig, as my field is English Ed., but after taking roll, when the class was supposed to spend 5 minutes on warm-ups, my mouth suddenly opened to say "I'm a yoga teacher, and anyone who wants to do yoga stretches instead of laps come over here to this corner."
Substitute teaching is very much improv, and here I was winging it... not sure what would occur, given the large class including a number of boisterous 12 and 13 year old boys.
At the mention of the word 'yoga' several of the girl's eyes lit up, they smiled and I could hear a small chorus of "All right! I LOVE yoga. Oh this is so cool!"
As I began I was thinking, "OK I hope this isn't crazy!"
Fully half the class came into my corner... even a few boys showed up, and almost all of the girls. Most were watching me intently as I quickly scanned my brain for anything we could do with shoes on, no mats, and me having to have one eye out on the rest of the class, none of whose names or behaviors I knew yet.
We did a few stretches and combinations of tree pose balances. The kids were fabulous and sweet. The usual adolescent "everything is stupid" attitude was not on display. What a small joy. No, not small, it was a revelation. One of the biggest obstacles in education is that ennui against enthusiasm. This very thing has kept me from wanting to be in large classrooms. Today, however, I saw a glimmer of what could be.
One girl, Rachel, the angel of my day, (there is usually one) came up after class, looked me straight in the eye and said, "Thank you for teaching us yoga today." My heart melted. That is what I took home with me, after 4 hours of listening to basketballs and shouts reverberate inside gym walls, and the constant supervision of packs of wild, unconscious boys. (I later learned that some of them had urinated into the soap dispensers in the boys locker room.)
It was a 2 morning gig, and on the following day the principal joined me for the last class. The activity of the day was weightlifting. There wasn't a good venue for yoga stretches, and it felt harder to fit them in, so I accepted the routine. One of the comments the principal made after class, a wonderful teacher by the way, was that kids this age are very 'body unaware'. So true, and true for many adults too.
I can't help thinking how wonderful it would be to offer yoga to school kids, to give them early opportunities to learn focus through body awareness. There are some schools who offer yoga, and I hope it will become a trend. It could be part of the evolutionary change we need to make to continue our survival as this complicated species with a the big brain which often isn't our best quality.
Working with middle school age kids is giving me hope, actually. I believe they will find new holistic ways to see the world and to live. They will have to, and maybe on some level most know this, even if popular culture tells us otherwise.
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Applesauce Carrot Cake
Here is a cake recipe, in honor of my Arlyn, for whom I waited 3 weeks past his due date, finally the pangs of labor beginning 33 years ago today. I can still see the green trees and the grass warm from spring sunshine in the clearing near our cabin where I passed the first hours of labor. You know, the ones where you think, oh, this isn't going to be so bad...
He finally joined us on the outisde at 3 am on April 10.
Today I made a birthday cake for our birthday lunch tomorrow. It turned out so well, I have to share it:
Applesauce Carrot Cake
2 c hot applesauce (homemade gravenstein canned last summer is lovely!)
1 1/2 c organic cane sugar
1/2 c brown sugar
2 farm fresh eggs
1 c shredded carrots
3/4 c veg oil
2 teas allspice
2 teas cinnamon
1 teas nutmeg
1/2 teas salt
1 1/2 teas baking soda
1/2 teas baking pwder
2 c. unbleached white flour (preferably Bob's Redmill)
1/2 c. whole wheat flour "
1 c. chopped walnuts
Heat the applesauce in microwave for 2 min. Blend eggs, sugars, and oil together. Mix in applesauce and carrots., blend again. Add dry ingredients, blend to consistency for cake batter, adding flour or applesauce as needed for consistency. Bake at 350 for 40 minutes in cake pans.
Muy rico, very rich.
Frost if desired... buttercream or cream cheese frosting. Decorate with your baby's name, or whoever the cake is for.
Birthdays remind me of how lucky I am to have so many people to love in my life. spending time making a real cake with first rate ingredients is my way of going to the place of gratitude.
He finally joined us on the outisde at 3 am on April 10.
Today I made a birthday cake for our birthday lunch tomorrow. It turned out so well, I have to share it:
Applesauce Carrot Cake
2 c hot applesauce (homemade gravenstein canned last summer is lovely!)
1 1/2 c organic cane sugar
1/2 c brown sugar
2 farm fresh eggs
1 c shredded carrots
3/4 c veg oil
2 teas allspice
2 teas cinnamon
1 teas nutmeg
1/2 teas salt
1 1/2 teas baking soda
1/2 teas baking pwder
2 c. unbleached white flour (preferably Bob's Redmill)
1/2 c. whole wheat flour "
1 c. chopped walnuts
Heat the applesauce in microwave for 2 min. Blend eggs, sugars, and oil together. Mix in applesauce and carrots., blend again. Add dry ingredients, blend to consistency for cake batter, adding flour or applesauce as needed for consistency. Bake at 350 for 40 minutes in cake pans.
Muy rico, very rich.
Frost if desired... buttercream or cream cheese frosting. Decorate with your baby's name, or whoever the cake is for.
Birthdays remind me of how lucky I am to have so many people to love in my life. spending time making a real cake with first rate ingredients is my way of going to the place of gratitude.
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
April is the Cruelest Month....
April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
T.S. Eliot, "The Wasteland"
Spring here, so heart breakingly green.
...the tiny pink flowers in the woods, and trillium.
I pick fresh nettles to have them for lunch
they give me strength for more garden work.
The squall comes in at 5, sending me back inside
by the fire.
10 years ago, we thought it should be warm,
My Mom and I,
leaving on the train for the east,
but no.
The plains were mud and sleet,
The Mississippi flooding our bridge
The snow
had barely melted in New York.
Eliot wrote of wars, the irony of new life upon the dull
land..
And I know, even in the heart hopes are too sharply bright
for the eyes, like wet spring green grass against the shifting sky
April is the cruelest month, only because of crocuses and cherry trees
Do they they know of their audaciousness?
I think not, as the white blossoms litter the muddy road
And we watch the rain for isotopes
We cannot see.
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
T.S. Eliot, "The Wasteland"
Spring here, so heart breakingly green.
...the tiny pink flowers in the woods, and trillium.
I pick fresh nettles to have them for lunch
they give me strength for more garden work.
The squall comes in at 5, sending me back inside
by the fire.
10 years ago, we thought it should be warm,
My Mom and I,
leaving on the train for the east,
but no.
The plains were mud and sleet,
The Mississippi flooding our bridge
The snow
had barely melted in New York.
Eliot wrote of wars, the irony of new life upon the dull
land..
And I know, even in the heart hopes are too sharply bright
for the eyes, like wet spring green grass against the shifting sky
April is the cruelest month, only because of crocuses and cherry trees
Do they they know of their audaciousness?
I think not, as the white blossoms litter the muddy road
And we watch the rain for isotopes
We cannot see.
Sunday, April 3, 2011
Bittercress as a Model for Survival
Bittercress is the springtime weed which defies all efforts against it. As I pull hundreds from my yard and garden every year, I feel a relationship with this tenacious plant. I feel it telling me what it knows. It knows how to survive cold, lack of water, heat, bad soil, other agressive plants, being ripped up, being smashed, it seems almost indestructable. The only way to make certain it is stopped is to compost it before it goes to seed, or burn it.
As a metaphor for life, here is what I can learn from bittercress:
It begins growing in the winter, so it can flower as soon as the sun warms..... :)
It knows to hide between other similar plants, wrapping it's roots in such a way as to create more security against being extracted.
It's roots are like elastic, they grip the soil for dear life.
If uprooted, it has reserves in it's stems and roots which allow it to attach into concrete if necessary, seeking out any iota of water or soil to sustain any small part of it's ability to produce seeds.
It produces seed which flies out from the plant stem like trajectories when the plant is barely touched.
It grows small and tough when conditions are harsh, and big and bushy when conditions are ideal.
It doesn't care if it is not liked.
As a metaphor for life, here is what I can learn from bittercress:
It begins growing in the winter, so it can flower as soon as the sun warms..... :)
It knows to hide between other similar plants, wrapping it's roots in such a way as to create more security against being extracted.
It's roots are like elastic, they grip the soil for dear life.
If uprooted, it has reserves in it's stems and roots which allow it to attach into concrete if necessary, seeking out any iota of water or soil to sustain any small part of it's ability to produce seeds.
It produces seed which flies out from the plant stem like trajectories when the plant is barely touched.
It grows small and tough when conditions are harsh, and big and bushy when conditions are ideal.
It doesn't care if it is not liked.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
I Want to Hear Colors
I want to hear these cold wet daffodils
as poetry in my storm tossed mind
I want to hear the world described
from out of the fog rolling through the trees down into the valley
In words that float or sing to which
I feel a dance coming on
I want to swim the gray air hovering over the garden
swim through it to the hidden
sun
Then afterwards I will know once more
what colors to paint the easter eggs
The dance of spring revealing itself again and again.
as poetry in my storm tossed mind
I want to hear the world described
from out of the fog rolling through the trees down into the valley
In words that float or sing to which
I feel a dance coming on
I want to swim the gray air hovering over the garden
swim through it to the hidden
sun
Then afterwards I will know once more
what colors to paint the easter eggs
The dance of spring revealing itself again and again.
Friday, March 18, 2011
What are you Sinking About?
It is Friday evening, Viernes, and the start to a much deserved spring break for the teachers who live in the greater Portland area. Teachers, go out and a have a few really good beers, laugh a lot, go off to a warm place... I am your fan. Let this be my fan letter!
Today I was given the opportunity to work a full day in a local Elementary School, so I feel an even greater kinship with the teachers in our midst. I must say it now, and with gravity, the teachers, classroom aides, staff in every field - they all should have an instant pass to heaven, they are all angels, they are the best humans, giving every day in ways those of us not at the 'front lines' of education could never imagine.
Picture this:
A ten year old boy, in diapers, with limited reasoning capacity, laying on a bathroom floor...throwing a tantrum for an hour ....
while the little girl, 8 years old, who cannot speak, has to be fed intraveniously, cannot walk or speak.. she hears the shrieks of the boy and begins to thrust her legs spastically and bang her head against her wheelchair supports... while the 5 year old who cannot walk on his own, decides to spit at his teachers while they work closely with him.. while the staff calmly assesses the situation and talks kindly to the child, bringing him slowly back to reality.
Miraculously the end of the day comes, when we walk the children out to the buses, and a 7 year old who has limited communications ability suddenly throws up in the center of the hallway as the whole school passes by departing at the end of the day..... her aid saying "I don't have any gloves... ' and me, the newbie running to the office to find the health room and some gloves.
Not till I walk out the door headed for my car do I wonder if I have contracted some kind of stomach flu from the little sick girl, with whom I worked in close proximity all day. I have family who cannot afford to get sick right now, so I must quaranteen myself, on this Friday night.
Again I wonder why those who work with children are put at the lower ends of the pay scale. Such hard work, requiring far more that just the physical motions of work deserves huge rewards in a society based on justice.
All this is going on while a nuclear reactor in our climate zone is melting down. This blog is not meant to be negative, only realistic. There is so much it seems we cannot talk about anymore, in this feel good, Pollyanna land. Where are we headed? I have just joined the 'Coffee Party'.... for real. Just when I think the cause is lost, I read about cool people with fabulous imaginations doing something proactive and positive. Viva la vida!
Someday when I am not fresh out of the epitome of a wierd day I will edit this essay, but if you see it now you get the full effect of where I am. ( The moon in the gloaming of this evening, one day away from full, but still shining white and magical in the night sky may or may not have something to do with this day... )
I hope we all have springs with flowers, some sun, new ideas, healing and love. If you would rather have passion than love, then her it is.... I hope we all have passion, I wish it for the world.
Today I was given the opportunity to work a full day in a local Elementary School, so I feel an even greater kinship with the teachers in our midst. I must say it now, and with gravity, the teachers, classroom aides, staff in every field - they all should have an instant pass to heaven, they are all angels, they are the best humans, giving every day in ways those of us not at the 'front lines' of education could never imagine.
Picture this:
A ten year old boy, in diapers, with limited reasoning capacity, laying on a bathroom floor...throwing a tantrum for an hour ....
while the little girl, 8 years old, who cannot speak, has to be fed intraveniously, cannot walk or speak.. she hears the shrieks of the boy and begins to thrust her legs spastically and bang her head against her wheelchair supports... while the 5 year old who cannot walk on his own, decides to spit at his teachers while they work closely with him.. while the staff calmly assesses the situation and talks kindly to the child, bringing him slowly back to reality.
Miraculously the end of the day comes, when we walk the children out to the buses, and a 7 year old who has limited communications ability suddenly throws up in the center of the hallway as the whole school passes by departing at the end of the day..... her aid saying "I don't have any gloves... ' and me, the newbie running to the office to find the health room and some gloves.
Not till I walk out the door headed for my car do I wonder if I have contracted some kind of stomach flu from the little sick girl, with whom I worked in close proximity all day. I have family who cannot afford to get sick right now, so I must quaranteen myself, on this Friday night.
Again I wonder why those who work with children are put at the lower ends of the pay scale. Such hard work, requiring far more that just the physical motions of work deserves huge rewards in a society based on justice.
All this is going on while a nuclear reactor in our climate zone is melting down. This blog is not meant to be negative, only realistic. There is so much it seems we cannot talk about anymore, in this feel good, Pollyanna land. Where are we headed? I have just joined the 'Coffee Party'.... for real. Just when I think the cause is lost, I read about cool people with fabulous imaginations doing something proactive and positive. Viva la vida!
Someday when I am not fresh out of the epitome of a wierd day I will edit this essay, but if you see it now you get the full effect of where I am. ( The moon in the gloaming of this evening, one day away from full, but still shining white and magical in the night sky may or may not have something to do with this day... )
I hope we all have springs with flowers, some sun, new ideas, healing and love. If you would rather have passion than love, then her it is.... I hope we all have passion, I wish it for the world.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Kindergarten
Last night, when the job listing showed up in gray, the jackpot color, not the usual red "no jobs at this time", I read the words "Kindergarten" and immediately thought of 1990, the year my youngest son was a kindergartner, and I was his teacher's regular sub. I knew all the kid's names, and the routine of the class. I knew about Eli, the little guy with FES, and I had usually talked with Pat, the gregarious lovely teacher, at length in advance. I knew the lesson, the interval for recess, how the routine on the rug went. (Children adore routine). I welcomed the chance to spend the day with my own son. It was a win/win, in our little rural school where everyone knew everyone, and the principal met the kids as they disembarked from the bus with a hearty welcome and a joke.
Teaching a pack of little ones who want anything but sitting still can be sort of like doing aerobics. I know this, and I know that unfamiliarity makes it much harder, but still, I was excited to be in kindergarten again!
So, 22 years later I walked into a Kindergarten room, unrehearsed and right out of my new 55 year old life. They whupped me into shape right away. Little kids are so wonderfully transparent. Just when I thought I was a goner, I would put my hand on the shoulder of the kid who could not sit still, and felt him calm. I whispered in ears often, and this they listened to. We sang some songs, lullabies our parents sang to us. It was precious to hear the high child singing recount the song they loved best. In a few years it will be impossible to get them to sing a song alone, in front of their peers. How lucky I felt today, letting them perform, gently reinforcing to the class how "we listen with respect".
At the end of my day with them, I wanted a small amount of closure, so I said, "I teach yoga, and we have a way of saying goodbye, namaste,.. ) and I bowed to them. Every child's eyes were on me, they were still and silent for the first time in 4 hours. It was cosmic. It was the perfect way to end my morning with them.
I didn't practice yoga in 1990. I wish I had, it might have calmed me in my racing, anxious, fragmented young widowhood. It might have.
To be grateful now for my practice is what I have. To see little kids, and to always see my own kids within them.. To see myself mirrored in their guilless responses, and the future of the world in their eyes.
Teaching a pack of little ones who want anything but sitting still can be sort of like doing aerobics. I know this, and I know that unfamiliarity makes it much harder, but still, I was excited to be in kindergarten again!
So, 22 years later I walked into a Kindergarten room, unrehearsed and right out of my new 55 year old life. They whupped me into shape right away. Little kids are so wonderfully transparent. Just when I thought I was a goner, I would put my hand on the shoulder of the kid who could not sit still, and felt him calm. I whispered in ears often, and this they listened to. We sang some songs, lullabies our parents sang to us. It was precious to hear the high child singing recount the song they loved best. In a few years it will be impossible to get them to sing a song alone, in front of their peers. How lucky I felt today, letting them perform, gently reinforcing to the class how "we listen with respect".
At the end of my day with them, I wanted a small amount of closure, so I said, "I teach yoga, and we have a way of saying goodbye, namaste,.. ) and I bowed to them. Every child's eyes were on me, they were still and silent for the first time in 4 hours. It was cosmic. It was the perfect way to end my morning with them.
I didn't practice yoga in 1990. I wish I had, it might have calmed me in my racing, anxious, fragmented young widowhood. It might have.
To be grateful now for my practice is what I have. To see little kids, and to always see my own kids within them.. To see myself mirrored in their guilless responses, and the future of the world in their eyes.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Riddles
I have a young reading student who I thought might respond to humor, so I looked up some riddles. There are plenty - I am happy to report- of clever people writing these ditties and posting them in easy to locate sites. Bravo humor thinkers!
Periodically I get the sense that we don't laugh enough, that we take life too seriously. (Except for the weird celebrities and pundits that are journalistically puffed up and watched for diversion, which does nothing to tickle my funnybone)
So here are some of my favorite recent finds :
What is the cannibals favorite game?
Answer: Swallow the leader.
I wonder if Barack Obama can relate to that.
I just read that they want to oust David Wu because he sent a photo of himself in a (gasp) tiger costume to some of his staff. Wow. What has become of this place? The ghosts of the Puritans are busy busy. Someone thinks that a tiger costume makes a person unfit to be a Congressman. I like David Wu, and I think he looked cheerful in the costume. What is wrong with being cheerful?
Now, if you want to loose weight, take the advice of Miss Piggy:
"Never eat more than you can lift."
If that is taken out to it's pure end, well, you do the math. It can be applied to anything.
I really like this one - What do you do when a bull charges you?
Answer: Pay him!
That is good advice for living within your means. But don't live being mean.
Maybe this is my reaction to the fact that Congress is trying to eliminate funding for all the best parts of our country - like Americorps and Planned Parenthood. Shock has caused me to wax nutty.
Those union members in Wisconsin are fantastic... I hope they live forever.
Periodically I get the sense that we don't laugh enough, that we take life too seriously. (Except for the weird celebrities and pundits that are journalistically puffed up and watched for diversion, which does nothing to tickle my funnybone)
So here are some of my favorite recent finds :
What is the cannibals favorite game?
Answer: Swallow the leader.
I wonder if Barack Obama can relate to that.
I just read that they want to oust David Wu because he sent a photo of himself in a (gasp) tiger costume to some of his staff. Wow. What has become of this place? The ghosts of the Puritans are busy busy. Someone thinks that a tiger costume makes a person unfit to be a Congressman. I like David Wu, and I think he looked cheerful in the costume. What is wrong with being cheerful?
Now, if you want to loose weight, take the advice of Miss Piggy:
"Never eat more than you can lift."
If that is taken out to it's pure end, well, you do the math. It can be applied to anything.
I really like this one - What do you do when a bull charges you?
Answer: Pay him!
That is good advice for living within your means. But don't live being mean.
Maybe this is my reaction to the fact that Congress is trying to eliminate funding for all the best parts of our country - like Americorps and Planned Parenthood. Shock has caused me to wax nutty.
Those union members in Wisconsin are fantastic... I hope they live forever.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Blue Sky
It is still muddy here, the jory soil, gummy and brick red, sticks to the shoes if you walk on the non-gravel roads. Three mountains are out, shining white. The violets are blooming even as there is frost on the grass before the sun hits it. Spring seems very close today, a tease, but I will take it as a birthday gift anyway.
I am celebrating my life today, having permission because it is the day I came into my first breath 55 years ago. I have to thank my parents for wanting me. They were 30 years old, I was their 4th kid. They were so worried that I would actually make it after Mom had 2 miscarriages. They gave me this gift, of being alive in a body to know the joy and the pain, to see the beauty and the trials.
Our breath is the one thing which connects us to the beginning and the end of life. Our practice offers us the reminder to notice that breath. Today I notice how lucky I am to have clean, fresh air to breath.
In our travels last month I experienced the fright of having unclean water cause angry red blisters to form and spread on my skin without my understanding of what was happening for a week.
A good doctor took one look and gave my 5 days worth of penicillin. Even as I assiduously took my required 6 pills a day, and no alcohol or spicy food, I could only imagine times before the penecillon option . One might have had to sit and watch the body rot. Of course there was less bacteria in the water. The increased propagation and domestication of animals for food and otherwise has given us crazy new viruses and compromised water. Human overpopulation is the other big factor.
In short, I am so grateful for antibiotics. I can't change the world, make the water cleaner, stop overpopulation, except to attempt to live simply in the ways that present themselves. The skin on my arm is healing slowly, I watch it everyday with fear and amazement. The thoughts of others who live with compromised air and water weigh heavily for me. If I am more specifically grateful for these simple things, this should cause me to be more active in the protection of the environment.
It should...
I am celebrating my life today, having permission because it is the day I came into my first breath 55 years ago. I have to thank my parents for wanting me. They were 30 years old, I was their 4th kid. They were so worried that I would actually make it after Mom had 2 miscarriages. They gave me this gift, of being alive in a body to know the joy and the pain, to see the beauty and the trials.
Our breath is the one thing which connects us to the beginning and the end of life. Our practice offers us the reminder to notice that breath. Today I notice how lucky I am to have clean, fresh air to breath.
In our travels last month I experienced the fright of having unclean water cause angry red blisters to form and spread on my skin without my understanding of what was happening for a week.
A good doctor took one look and gave my 5 days worth of penicillin. Even as I assiduously took my required 6 pills a day, and no alcohol or spicy food, I could only imagine times before the penecillon option . One might have had to sit and watch the body rot. Of course there was less bacteria in the water. The increased propagation and domestication of animals for food and otherwise has given us crazy new viruses and compromised water. Human overpopulation is the other big factor.
In short, I am so grateful for antibiotics. I can't change the world, make the water cleaner, stop overpopulation, except to attempt to live simply in the ways that present themselves. The skin on my arm is healing slowly, I watch it everyday with fear and amazement. The thoughts of others who live with compromised air and water weigh heavily for me. If I am more specifically grateful for these simple things, this should cause me to be more active in the protection of the environment.
It should...
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Obesity Linked to Right Wing Ideologies
OK, it is still winter, and I am very soon to turn 55, yikes... so it must be time for a spot of humor:
I can't eat 'Onion', so I'll call this my 'Garlic' (form of satire):
Clinical research is now finding a direct causal relationship between the amount of excess body fat a person holds, and the hours that person spends listening to fox new's glenn beck, or talk radio's rush limbaugh.
'Top scientists' have studied groups of adults, many of whom are 20 - 50 pounds overweight, and guess what? Yes, just as you might have suspected - anger, vitriol, misinformation and hatred all contribute to poor eating habits, lack of meaningful activity, and, consequently, fat.
How would that make us think, and act... to believe that holding mean thoughts makes the body hold onto calories? This could be a new take for the billion dollar weight-loss industry. Is a patent in order?
I think it is at least partly true. Kind thoughts and kind words, compassion is the diet of the happy future.
I can't eat 'Onion', so I'll call this my 'Garlic' (form of satire):
Clinical research is now finding a direct causal relationship between the amount of excess body fat a person holds, and the hours that person spends listening to fox new's glenn beck, or talk radio's rush limbaugh.
'Top scientists' have studied groups of adults, many of whom are 20 - 50 pounds overweight, and guess what? Yes, just as you might have suspected - anger, vitriol, misinformation and hatred all contribute to poor eating habits, lack of meaningful activity, and, consequently, fat.
How would that make us think, and act... to believe that holding mean thoughts makes the body hold onto calories? This could be a new take for the billion dollar weight-loss industry. Is a patent in order?
I think it is at least partly true. Kind thoughts and kind words, compassion is the diet of the happy future.
Monday, January 24, 2011
The Last Day
Life is really a series of endings and beginnings, it is only our perception which creates the title and the definition of where the boundaries are.
There is one more day for Curtis and I to traverse the streets of D.F. and feel the sun, as well as the dust.
Last night I thought of how my mind has reconfigured itself because of language barriers, and how I spend time learning words like a child, the mind as a sponge, to soak up the world. Let me stay in this.
The thought of returning to the tea party is frightening, I must admit, but one must face life with courage. The people I love have been dealing with the rain, and the politics. My heart goes out to you, and I hope soon to be sitting with you in yoga practice to soften the world.
I have been traveling with my purple soft mat, the very first yoga mat I ever owned, and tonight I shall go to Liliana's apartment and leave it with her. My heart, corazon, is in the places I have been, and the places I will return to. It is with the world of kindness which is so huge, so much larger than our fears will let it be, in the dark of the night wondering about survival.
I close this with a story about another traveler we met, named Buddy, a house painter/musician from Alaska. He was having dinner on the square in Patzcuaro, where beggers, singers, and women selling trinkets with babies on their backs make a continuous parade through your meal.
He had a big pile of change on the table, and a particularly haggard woman came along. He could not help himself, and gave her all the money at once. He and she were both crying he told us. I was not there, but I can see the scene in my mind, and I will carry it with me as comfort, like I carry those I love in the rucksack of my heart.
There is one more day for Curtis and I to traverse the streets of D.F. and feel the sun, as well as the dust.
Last night I thought of how my mind has reconfigured itself because of language barriers, and how I spend time learning words like a child, the mind as a sponge, to soak up the world. Let me stay in this.
The thought of returning to the tea party is frightening, I must admit, but one must face life with courage. The people I love have been dealing with the rain, and the politics. My heart goes out to you, and I hope soon to be sitting with you in yoga practice to soften the world.
I have been traveling with my purple soft mat, the very first yoga mat I ever owned, and tonight I shall go to Liliana's apartment and leave it with her. My heart, corazon, is in the places I have been, and the places I will return to. It is with the world of kindness which is so huge, so much larger than our fears will let it be, in the dark of the night wondering about survival.
I close this with a story about another traveler we met, named Buddy, a house painter/musician from Alaska. He was having dinner on the square in Patzcuaro, where beggers, singers, and women selling trinkets with babies on their backs make a continuous parade through your meal.
He had a big pile of change on the table, and a particularly haggard woman came along. He could not help himself, and gave her all the money at once. He and she were both crying he told us. I was not there, but I can see the scene in my mind, and I will carry it with me as comfort, like I carry those I love in the rucksack of my heart.
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Beach Towns we Have Loved and Lost
Ocean towns used to be
places with cottages and gramas who gave a basket
for blackberries to make a dinner pie.
Children knew the sand for hours, forgeting time
television was somewhere else, too many rocks and sticks and shells to find
Even in places where the waves were always cold, the children and their families played
And slept 3 or 4 to a room, on floors, and never wished for more.
Here, another over loved beach reveals itself each day..
Red lights ring a palm tree painted white at the base to
deter insectos or rats and everywhere bacteria unseen
my arm announcing something with red flares.
The beggar women come along, approaching each table
of beer drinkers and gringos to sell
earthquake detectors, made in China, in some other sadness
Their children on their backs or tagging along, carrying their own basket of trinkets
The children are so tough here, so wise, so uncomplaining
The night warms as a firelit room in the north
the air soft, lights on the hills denote the mansions of the rich
whose faces one will not see on these streets.
Whose money buys the hill, the water, whose sewage still flows into the bay.
They looked to be redeemed, The Shawshank men, here in this
quiet fishing village, and that was then.
The sun still shines, the waves still break,
as they do where the cannon washed up so far
North of here, and my girl self was the prisoner of school,
who loved the beach like a mother.
places with cottages and gramas who gave a basket
for blackberries to make a dinner pie.
Children knew the sand for hours, forgeting time
television was somewhere else, too many rocks and sticks and shells to find
Even in places where the waves were always cold, the children and their families played
And slept 3 or 4 to a room, on floors, and never wished for more.
Here, another over loved beach reveals itself each day..
Red lights ring a palm tree painted white at the base to
deter insectos or rats and everywhere bacteria unseen
my arm announcing something with red flares.
The beggar women come along, approaching each table
of beer drinkers and gringos to sell
earthquake detectors, made in China, in some other sadness
Their children on their backs or tagging along, carrying their own basket of trinkets
The children are so tough here, so wise, so uncomplaining
The night warms as a firelit room in the north
the air soft, lights on the hills denote the mansions of the rich
whose faces one will not see on these streets.
Whose money buys the hill, the water, whose sewage still flows into the bay.
They looked to be redeemed, The Shawshank men, here in this
quiet fishing village, and that was then.
The sun still shines, the waves still break,
as they do where the cannon washed up so far
North of here, and my girl self was the prisoner of school,
who loved the beach like a mother.
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