Holiday Letter 2011

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!

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.

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.

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.

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.
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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.

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.

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."