tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16044676676698842322024-03-13T07:40:54.097-05:00Caryn Mirriam-GoldbergYour Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.comBlogger49125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-21369324808668800182009-06-09T22:59:00.001-05:002009-06-09T23:01:06.362-05:00We've Moved!I just moved this blog to CarynMirriamGoldberg.wordpress.com, which gives me the capability to have multiple blog pages. This is an important feature since I'll soon be posting podcasts and links to High Plains Public Radio on "Write From Your Life," with the new feature of inviting readers and listeners to respond to the writing exercises on this site.<br /><br />So come on over to www.CarynMirriamGoldberg.wordpress.com!Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-38001827245002654272009-06-08T10:25:00.003-05:002009-06-08T10:30:26.992-05:00Press Release for Book Launch and Poet Laureati Party<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Si0uKFMjMgI/AAAAAAAAArI/LFYlSEgRdA4/s1600-h/DeniseLow.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 125px; height: 177px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Si0uKFMjMgI/AAAAAAAAArI/LFYlSEgRdA4/s320/DeniseLow.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5344979083487031810" border="0" /></a><span style="font-style: italic;">Come to the Lawrence Arts Center at 7:30 p.m., July 1 for the following event. Denise moves out of the poet's mansion that night, and I move in (I hear it has a hot tub, but then again, I hear it's an outhouse). Drop on by for a wonderful time.</span><br /><br /> The Committee on Imagination & Place announces the first publication of the Imagination & Place Press, Imagination & Place: An Anthology. This eclectic collection features poems, essays, and fiction by writers from coast to coast, broadening the conversation about place and its relation to the natural world and human culture.<br /><br /><br /> Also, July 1, 2009, is the first day of the two-year term of the recently named third Kansas Poet Laureate Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg and represents the conclusion of the term of the second Kansas Poet Laureate Denise Low. Both Mirriam-Goldberg and Low are members of the Committee on Imagination & Place and from Lawrence.<br /><br /><br /> Consequently, the public is warmly invited to attend a combined celebration taking place on July 1, launching the anthology and paying tribute to Mirriam-Goldberg and Low. The event will occur at 7:30 p.m. at the Lawrence Arts Center, 940 New Hampshire, Lawrence, Kansas.<br /><br /><br /> Admission to the event is the purchase of a copy of Imagination & Place: An Anthology per household. The books will be available at the door for $12.95 each plus tax.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Si0ub9FKN3I/AAAAAAAAArQ/X9p-JYF_8RA/s1600-h/anthology-2009-400.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 230px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Si0ub9FKN3I/AAAAAAAAArQ/X9p-JYF_8RA/s320/anthology-2009-400.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5344979390546196338" border="0" /></a><br /><br /> A booksigning and readings by area contributors to the anthology, as well as readings by Mirriam-Goldberg and Low will make up the July 1 program. A poem by Mirriam-Goldberg is included in the anthology; Low serves on the Imagination & Place Press editorial team. Books by Mirriam-Goldberg and Low will be offered for sale as well. A reception will follow.<br /><br /><br /> About her position as 2007-2009 Kansas Poet Laureate, Low said, "As a new poet laureate, I planned to make appearances and to create a series of electronic poetry broadsides to disseminate to poets, arts organizations, libraries, and publications. I did not expect to take on such a broad role as an ambassador for poetry to colleges, arts centers, libraries, social service organizations, and churches. I spoke on radio and television shows. I judged contests and ran my own series of contests for Poetry Month. In this time I discovered the profound hunger Kansans have for high-level communication. Poetry is not an easy art form, as it requires concentration, skill, logic, and heart. It is the most intense form of literacy. I appreciate the chance to be part of the Kansas Arts Commission-sponsored effort to bring arts into daily lives of my fellow citizens."<br /><br /><br />On becoming the 2009-2011 Kansas Poet Laureate, Mirriam-Goldberg said, "Over many years teaching and leading writing workshops in communities throughout Kansas and the U.S. and Mexico, I've continually witnessed how powerful our stories and writing can be when we speak in our own words and tell our own truths. My Poet Laureate project -- "Poetry Across Kansas: Reading and Writing Our Way Home" -- offers communities opportunities for not just readings and writing workshops, but support for ongoing writing circles facilitated by local writers, teachers, artists and community members. Building on the good work of our first two Poets Laureate, Denise Low and Jonathan Holden, I'm also bringing communities writing prompts based on the poetry of Kansas writers featured on the website Holden started and Low's Ad Astra project, which also, in turn, helps the people of our state get to know the poetry of our state, and how such poetry can help us see where we live and how to live with new eyes."Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-60815121140395519212009-05-13T19:27:00.007-05:002009-05-13T19:53:59.489-05:00Who Knew? I Enjoy Being a Girl!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqCVD9guI/AAAAAAAAAoA/tEd68nRElxU/s1600-h/agirl_fs.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 133px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqCVD9guI/AAAAAAAAAoA/tEd68nRElxU/s200/agirl_fs.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5335474771796525794" border="0" /></a>If you saw me at this moment, you might have a hard time reconciling my black satin with silver rhinestone high heels, silver sparkly jacket, silky black dress, make-up, hair piled on top of my head and jewelry with the uniform I wore for most of my adulthood: black jeans, oversized t-shirt, sturdy sneakers, short hair I never glanced at let alone comb.<br /><br />Something happened in the last few years, something I made happen as a way to bring <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqJXlZ8iI/AAAAAAAAAoI/Oy4gTedxHq4/s1600-h/carmelquinn432034.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 192px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqJXlZ8iI/AAAAAAAAAoI/Oy4gTedxHq4/s200/carmelquinn432034.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5335474892732756514" border="0" /></a>back to the surface who I always was: a femme in hiding. "But you would make a great diesel dyke," a friend of mine used to say me. Fair enough, but not who I am.<br /><br />When I was a kid, I used to draw for hours each day, and what did I draw? Women in dresses, skirts, evening gowns. I had secret ambitions to be a fashion designer. Put a catalogue in front of me in 1969 or a clothing website today, and what I look at first are the dresses, especially the frillier ones that feature black lace, gold silk or hot pink ruffles. As I got older, I tended toward dresses and skirts whenever possible, even going so far as to camp regularly in denim dresses or corduroy skirts.<br /><br />But then something happened: I gained weight, and decided I didn't look thin enough in anything that flared from the waist. I hunted down princess cuts with that v-shape waist that gives the center of the torso the illusion of narrow girth. Yet it became increasingly difficult to find things that fit well, flattered and were comfortable, and so I succumbed to jeans. Black jeans, with a hidden elastic waistband or stretch fabric, and over them, t-shirts large enough <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqvFMdGdI/AAAAAAAAAog/853sHD40yeg/s1600-h/yoga.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqvFMdGdI/AAAAAAAAAog/853sHD40yeg/s200/yoga.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5335475540631296466" border="0" /></a>to give coverage. Three pregnan<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqO2V9SkI/AAAAAAAAAoQ/k1FCGBSR-2U/s1600-h/dansko%2Bheels.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqO2V9SkI/AAAAAAAAAoQ/k1FCGBSR-2U/s200/dansko%2Bheels.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5335474986888809026" border="0" /></a>cies, two graduate degrees, many teaching jobs and thousands of dishes later, I didn't pay my appearance any mind, to the extent that a former rabbi once told me it was great that I didn't ever think about how I looked. Or was it really?<br /><br />Eventually, and fairly recently, after living through cancer and then with low-grade chronic illness for three years, I realized that there was a direct line between health and beauty, and following it led me back to who I am. I've gone through various passions since then, all of them sticking: first exercise and especially yoga, then clothes cut to fit and full of colors and textures I loved, jewelry -- which I started making myself, <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqUmShaAI/AAAAAAAAAoY/LDoG5TryKos/s1600-h/glassbeads2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 196px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SgtqUmShaAI/AAAAAAAAAoY/LDoG5TryKos/s200/glassbeads2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5335475085658646530" border="0" /></a>make-up even (right before a show with Kelley Hunt, when I saw her applying bare minerals on her face and asked me to put some on me too), shoes, and lately, even comfortable heels, and of course, dresses.<br /><br />While I wouldn't doll myself up this way too often, tonight, right before I give a joint poetry and song performance with Kelley, I put on the dog, and this dog likes being walked, groomed and aiming itself toward what flows, shines and delights.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-47567621170824605472009-05-04T15:46:00.016-05:002009-05-04T22:35:54.332-05:00Bar Mitzvahed!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9Z67lm6vI/AAAAAAAAAlw/9qHt8F3cZOY/s1600-h/IMG_0715.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 194px; height: 197px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9Z67lm6vI/AAAAAAAAAlw/9qHt8F3cZOY/s320/IMG_0715.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332079352792673010" border="0" /></a>The weekend was a wheel of people and joy turning through our time. We began with a pie-making party Thursday night -- the Weedle Caviness Memorial Pie-Making Party -- to try to replace what can't be replaced: Weedle's amazing pies she made for Daniel's and Natalie's Bar Mitzvahs. The joy, however, and humor were there in full-force as about a dozen friends and family came over to mix and roll dough, cut fruit, and gingerly lift the pie crusts into the pans.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9bwLWwkfI/AAAAAAAAAl4/a7qhaOu4F6A/s1600-h/IMG_0720.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 216px; height: 212px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9bwLWwkfI/AAAAAAAAAl4/a7qhaOu4F6A/s320/IMG_0720.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332081367070052850" border="0" /></a><br /><br />On Friday night, we had regular Friday night services at the Lawrence Jewish Community Center with a twist. Instead of just doing the normal candle-lighting prayer, Ken called up six other men important in Forest's life -- his uncles, Mark and Brian; family friends, Jerry, Jack, Herb; and his brother Daniel -- to join Ken in honoring Forest's crossing over into adulthood. Each man lit a dark green candle in a blue glass candle holder and said his wish for Forest as a man. It was moving, gentle, strong and beautiful.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9ktmi2CXI/AAAAAAAAAmg/16c_l7So6_c/s1600-h/IMG_0775.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9ktmi2CXI/AAAAAAAAAmg/16c_l7So6_c/s200/IMG_0775.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332091218433542514" border="0" /></a><br />Saturday was Bar Mitzvah central -- the actual event began at 10 a.m. at the LJCC, filled with over 130 of our friends and family. So much was moving about the ceremony, but what stands out for me and what others told me they loved include the blessings of both his Grandmothers, Alice and Barbara; our family carrying around the torah while all of us singing; Forest's wonderful speech about the importance of kindness and listening when it comes to living a holy life; Ken and my talks (mine is below); the gorgeous duet sung by Susan Elkins and Natalie, our daughter; the throwing of the candy and how, just beforehand, Daniel <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9c5H7F02I/AAAAAAAAAmA/6JrbuqV7j8E/s1600-h/IMG_0749.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 91px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9c5H7F02I/AAAAAAAAAmA/6JrbuqV7j8E/s200/IMG_0749.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332082620279149410" border="0" /></a>and the torah scooted off to one side of the Bema and the rabbi to the other side to miss the onslaught of Tootsie Rolls.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9dfLxldDI/AAAAAAAAAmI/TKg_8GVh2Nk/s1600-h/IMG_0760.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 239px; height: 150px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9dfLxldDI/AAAAAAAAAmI/TKg_8GVh2Nk/s200/IMG_0760.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332083274148049970" border="0" /></a><br />In the evening, about 80 friends and family came out here for a pie party -- 15 pizza pies and 16 fruit pies, plus all the other dishes people brought. People spille<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9gXOmag7I/AAAAAAAAAmQ/sSj48w34sSU/s1600-h/IMG_0762.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 182px; height: 179px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9gXOmag7I/AAAAAAAAAmQ/sSj48w34sSU/s200/IMG_0762.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332086436002431922" border="0" /></a>d out onto the newly-finished front porch, and the back deck, in the drive and throughout the house, visiting, laughing, eating, telling stories. About 9ish I got suddenly tired and actually took a 10 minute nap, then found myself rejuvenated until 11 when the last people, dear friends we had a blast visiting with, left.<br /><br />Now it's quiet and peaceful as I type this on the front porch, all the cats and the dog out here with me, focused on the singing of a bird nearby.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-zQGNl4nI/AAAAAAAAAm4/TY33G28-T6U/s1600-h/IMG_5502.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 185px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-zQGNl4nI/AAAAAAAAAm4/TY33G28-T6U/s200/IMG_5502.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332177572956856946" border="0" /></a>*******************************<br />Dear Forest,<br /><br />Here it is the night before your Bar Mitzvah, and I can't help thinking of the night before your birth. It was a windy, rainy May night as I sat in your grandfather's heated car at 2 a.m. while your dad ran back and forth from house to car to load up everything, including the other kids. Throughout contractions and the all-too-short-space between, I was held in the most beautiful choral music playing on the radio, women's voices entwined in multiple harmonies that po<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-yoahrOAI/AAAAAAAAAmw/qYvv67ygPWU/s1600-h/IMG_5479.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 136px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-yoahrOAI/AAAAAAAAAmw/qYvv67ygPWU/s200/IMG_5479.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332176891215034370" border="0" /></a>ured through me like the wind poured through the trees I watched in the dark.<br /><br />The next afternoon, you were born, and the first look on your face – just like the first look of total intensity on Daniel's face and total joy on Natalie's – conveyed your temperament. You simply looked around casually and seemed to shrug. If you could have talked, I think you would have said, “So this is life? Oh, well.” You were present, accepting and interested in all your encountered.<br /><br />Since that time, you've brought the most amazing enthusiasm and whimsical curiosity to whatever you find – whether it's basketball follies, the economic crisis' latest flurry of bankruptcies, or the cat sleeping in a basket. When I pick you up from school or downtow<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-zYSPL7FI/AAAAAAAAAnA/3SzecjdB0yo/s1600-h/IMG_5518.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 196px; height: 200px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-zYSPL7FI/AAAAAAAAAnA/3SzecjdB0yo/s200/IMG_5518.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332177713623723090" border="0" /></a>n, you always both ask me about the news – “Mom, what happened with the Dow today?” and your trademark question, “What's the plan?” You follow music, film, news, sports, and all manner of quirky information widely and deeply, telling me something you found on The Washington Post site or Rotten Tomatoes. You listen to radio, television, read papers and magazines, updating your acute sense of where we are as a country. This world is interesting to you, and you bring to it a wonderful ability to take it all in, apply critical thinking to evaluate and integrate what you really believe, and then tell us about it.<br /><br />You've also brought your big heart, always present and always accepting, to all you encounter, which over<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-zychIrwI/AAAAAAAAAnQ/yV3qQjPrwas/s1600-h/IMG_5568.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 120px; height: 200px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-zychIrwI/AAAAAAAAAnQ/yV3qQjPrwas/s200/IMG_5568.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332178163059961602" border="0" /></a> your life, has been full of fierce challenges – the car accident you survived, in part due to the love and support of this community; my cancer; and some difficult-to-shake illnesses you're enduring – and heartbreaking losses, mostly in the last year, of both your grandfathers, your namesake, and a good friend. In all of this, you've shown up – in all senses of that term – to learn, mourn, find, and carry on as well as to share your wide pool of kindness with whoever else is hurting. You know well what it is to just be with someone going through a hard time, how to listen, and how to listen for what would really help. It's no suprise that the words you <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-zfNB5DhI/AAAAAAAAAnI/GoFUMhjGb6A/s1600-h/IMG_5529.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 153px; height: 200px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf-zfNB5DhI/AAAAAAAAAnI/GoFUMhjGb6A/s200/IMG_5529.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332177832484867602" border="0" /></a>wrote in your speech about how to live a holy life came so easy to you – they are words you live everyday.<br /><br />What's the plan? The plan – I hope and believe – is for you to simply keep being who you are. For all of us who know you, you're a shining light of all these qualities: kindness, presence, curiousity, enthusiam, patience, earnestness, and many times, joy. For a long time, I've believed we become more of who we always were as we grow older, but you were born that way, and already, you live guided by your desire – besides to play the wii and watch countless episodes of “The Simpsons” – to help others and celebrate the amazing gift of life.<br /><br />That night, nearly 14 years ago, before your birth, I was about to receive one of the greatest gifts of my life. Of course I'm proud of you for all you've done at this Bar Mitzvah, but I'm eve<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9hSgZs8dI/AAAAAAAAAmY/KpBqMM3CVkk/s1600-h/IMG_0766.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 84px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sf9hSgZs8dI/AAAAAAAAAmY/KpBqMM3CVkk/s200/IMG_0766.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5332087454393233874" border="0" /></a>n more proud of you everyday for how you live. I love you with all my heart forever.<br />Love, MomYour Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-60727119231632051832009-04-27T12:18:00.007-05:002009-04-27T12:44:39.914-05:00Spring and the Bar Mitzvah Express<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXr2kTFS9I/AAAAAAAAAlg/o_S7eOLChsw/s1600-h/IMG_5714.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 217px; height: 163px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXr2kTFS9I/AAAAAAAAAlg/o_S7eOLChsw/s320/IMG_5714.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5329425056752028626" border="0" /></a>Spring has sprung wildly in the last few days thanks to several days of fast, hot wind and the several more days of intense rain. Meanwhile, we're working in the yard continuously, riding the Bar Mitzvah express which <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXrtEIb8JI/AAAAAAAAAlY/6X_ZUDzqaHI/s1600-h/IMG_5712.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 216px; height: 147px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXrtEIb8JI/AAAAAAAAAlY/6X_ZUDzqaHI/s320/IMG_5712.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5329424893498618002" border="0" /></a>is high-speed, expensive and has frequent breakdowns.<br /><br />What this translates into is a lot of yard work, including putting in some shade gardens, spray-painting rusting folding chairs, making pots of mixed flowers for table center pieces for the actual event, and outrageous amounts of weeding and mulching.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXrkEhsOCI/AAAAAAAAAlQ/1-KxLJzor90/s1600-h/IMG_5710.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 172px; height: 129px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXrkEhsOCI/AAAAAAAAAlQ/1-KxLJzor90/s320/IMG_5710.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5329424738985719842" border="0" /></a><br />The great part of this is how much time we have outside. The not-so-great part is how <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXqtw-v7-I/AAAAAAAAAlI/qTdkxS0hlMY/s1600-h/IMG_5705.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 162px; height: 121px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXqtw-v7-I/AAAAAAAAAlI/qTdkxS0hlMY/s320/IMG_5705.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5329423806025953250" border="0" /></a>the chiggers have sent out a few scouts, way before they should be out in force. There's also some poison ivy, seed ticks, and large startled snake (plus many nests of baby ringnecks).<br /><br />Meanwhile one of the most lush times of the year unfolds quickly and vividly -- irises ready to break open, leaves unfurling at the speed of<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXsAE91BkI/AAAAAAAAAlo/JUtApVOm84g/s1600-h/IMG_5717.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 211px; height: 159px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SfXsAE91BkI/AAAAAAAAAlo/JUtApVOm84g/s320/IMG_5717.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5329425220140074562" border="0" /></a> sound on the Cottonwood, and lilac in full bundles of blossom. I keep reminding myself to step off the train and take this in.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-24835653410976211672009-04-14T10:50:00.018-05:002009-04-14T11:18:59.067-05:00Prairie Fire!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeSzlIoP--I/AAAAAAAAAkI/6KGJBv2Ktbw/s1600-h/downsized_0411091825a.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 275px; height: 206px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeSzlIoP--I/AAAAAAAAAkI/6KGJBv2Ktbw/s320/downsized_0411091825a.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324578110011603938" border="0" /></a>Saturday around 4 p.m. when we were at the hardware store, Ken said, "You know, I think the only window to burn is about right now." He was right: it had rained for days beforehand, the morning was barely dry enough, but the winds were too high, and more rain was coming. Considering it was April 11, and we were supposed to have the fields burned the first week in April, it was time for action.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeS0btUAzzI/AAAAAAAAAkY/pF8LYl1facA/s1600-h/0411091857.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 180px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeS0btUAzzI/AAAAAAAAAkY/pF8LYl1facA/s320/0411091857.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324579047571771186" border="0" /></a><br />Luckily for us and maybe not so fortunate for him, I ran into Mike Caron in the check-out line at the hardware store. "Want to burn some prairie in an hour?" I asked him, and after juggling his schedule a bit, he said yes, and he even brought a friend. We called the guys who lived on the other side of our hill -- Monte and Brent, and they also showed up along with Brent's girlfriend Amy. Ken's pal Dave came out, and within an hour, we were lighting matches, dragging pitchforks of fire (it works bes<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeS0oLsk45I/AAAAAAAAAkg/M1DgKB6Sjyw/s1600-h/0411091907.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 180px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeS0oLsk45I/AAAAAAAAAkg/M1DgKB6Sjyw/s320/0411091907.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324579261886292882" border="0" /></a>t to wrap up the loose grass like spaghetti on a fork and then drag it), and hauling water in case things got out of hand.<br /><br />They didn't, and the wet ground made for a good safety valve although we did see a few cedars go up like, well, Christmas trees (but that always happens). The burn was also very fast -- we burned over 15 acres, broken up into about five fields, in less than two hours.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeSxRcovP_I/AAAAAAAAAjY/ATyE9PwbCRU/s1600-h/0411091846.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 244px; height: 183px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeSxRcovP_I/AAAAAAAAAjY/ATyE9PwbCRU/s320/0411091846.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324575572761722866" border="0" /></a><br />Why do we burn? Prairies need to be burned to bring more nutrients to the soil, clear out the invader trees, and make way for new growth. The history of the prairies shows us that lightning was a great fire-starter, especially during a time when prairies weren't 99% replaced by farms and concrete. There's also evidence that many plains tribes regularly burned the prairies. We also burn bec<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeSxDvEaZFI/AAAAAAAAAjQ/QLnhxetVRjQ/s1600-h/0411091827.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 237px; height: 228px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeSxDvEaZFI/AAAAAAAAAjQ/QLnhxetVRjQ/s320/0411091827.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324575337191466066" border="0" /></a>ause we're required to by the law -- it's a condition of the USDA program the farm is enrolled in to restore and maintain these native grasses.<br /><br />But there are other reasons to burn: it's outrageous fun, a great way to get to know fellow-burners, and for me, always a ritual of spring -- clearing away the falling over remnants o<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeSxxvWwUJI/AAAAAAAAAj4/WDrmCrSGfUQ/s1600-h/0412091434.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 190px; height: 137px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SeSxxvWwUJI/AAAAAAAAAj4/WDrmCrSGfUQ/s320/0412091434.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5324576127542382738" border="0" /></a>f an old season, preparing the ground of this land and my own heart for what's next to come.<br /><br />Pictures: All from the burn, plus Ken afterwards, catching up on some sleep.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-54196223355376752752009-03-24T10:50:00.008-05:002009-03-24T11:13:45.487-05:00I Live In Big Wind Country<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SckEa8MMgjI/AAAAAAAAAgo/SKN_piaNaaQ/s1600-h/truck"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 213px; height: 160px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SckEa8MMgjI/AAAAAAAAAgo/SKN_piaNaaQ/s320/truck" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5316785695967969842" border="0" /></a>Kansas is windy, often, and not just a little. When spring comes, the big wind comes with it, and yesterday was a vivid illustration with gusts up to 90 mph in some parts of the state and ordinary old 45 mph gusts regularly around it. It's hard not to tilt a little when you walk, and when we did balance poses in yoga -- in a room in the country, second story, windows all around -- it was hard not to fall over (but then it's often hard not for me to fall over).<br /><br />Yesterday, semi-trucks overturned on the turnpike, mailboxes left home, our bird feeder flew the coop, and the top of a hard-plastic child playhouse unfurled itself. It was the kind of wind that made me and everyone around me feel a little crazy, off-balance, agitated, confused and overwhelmed.<br /><br />It reminds me of a good wind story too -- and in Kansas, many of the good weather<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SckE-hki0iI/AAAAAAAAAg4/IlozW1QQU2I/s1600-h/rooster.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 216px; height: 161px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SckE-hki0iI/AAAAAAAAAg4/IlozW1QQU2I/s320/rooster.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5316786307297628706" border="0" /></a> stories (and most of the good stories do involve weather) are obviously wind-related. When Ken, my husband, was but a lad, his family had a mean attack rooster named Chip-Chip, who attacked (using his nasty spurs) everyone but Ken's grandpa, who had basically trained him to be a the rooster equivalent of Cruella DeVille. One day a tornado, with accompanying big winds, came to the area, and Chip-Chip mysteriously disappeared. Days later, his wasted body was found a few miles away. When humans didn't, out of decency, exact revenge from Chip-Chip, the wind <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SckElk1cUMI/AAAAAAAAAgw/7PnCzHJRhCo/s1600-h/182.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 231px; height: 173px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SckElk1cUMI/AAAAAAAAAgw/7PnCzHJRhCo/s320/182.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5316785878677082306" border="0" /></a>did.<br /><br />So now the wind has settled down, and it's good to be back in the saddle, crossed over to spring with the grasses seeminly scribbled bright green and the trees budding. Yesterday's big wind is today's sky all bright baby blue and pristine white clouds, all the debris blasted free from our minds.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-11341350682765822282009-03-12T19:41:00.005-05:002009-03-12T20:21:33.160-05:00Hanging Out In The Giant Parking Lot of Grief<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sbm0Pk0LM9I/AAAAAAAAAfk/Er1w_8rhjS8/s1600-h/6559145-lg22.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 221px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sbm0Pk0LM9I/AAAAAAAAAfk/Er1w_8rhjS8/s320/6559145-lg22.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5312475415133762514" border="0" /></a>In the month since my father-in-law died, I've revisited the giant parking lot of grief, the one where you can never remember where you parked or even what car you were driving at the time. What I mean by this is that grief seems to be the most unmappable of all emotions. If fear, depression, joy, boredom and other day-to-day feelings we move through are seasonal weather, grief is more like those wild card days when it can change over a long afternoon from a dainty day among to tulips to a blizzard to a thunderstorm with a small tornado on its back end.<br /><br />My family, like me, tends to not act as I would imagine. Sure, there's stretches of quiet sadness and that big gaping hole in the center of our lives, what a large meteor would leave once a large yellow crane lifted out the rock. But how grief manifests in us is variable and unchartable. My youngest son goes from characteristically chirpy to sullen and slurring his words when I ask him questions. My husband hurt h<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sbm0ikvPeBI/AAAAAAAAAfs/0QybCV2FbtQ/s1600-h/Black%2520Willow%2520Photograph_f.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 214px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/Sbm0ikvPeBI/AAAAAAAAAfs/0QybCV2FbtQ/s320/Black%2520Willow%2520Photograph_f.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5312475741530585106" border="0" /></a>is back about two weeks ago, and can't easily shake, work, rest or walk through the pain, which recedes far slower than usual. My teenager daughter goes from one overwhelming sadness to being a cool customer. My oldest son had a long flare up of digestive issues. And I'm struggling with the draw to cozy up with some bad old habits (mostly workaholism, thank heavens there's not chocolate in the house) that just die hard.<br /><br />Meanwhile, nothing seems to have changed. Meanwhile, everything has changed. Through it all, I know two opposite things to be simultaneously true: this is a huge loss, and as Theodore Roethke wrote, "What falls away is always, and is near."Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-69716780476015077622009-02-21T18:29:00.003-06:002009-02-21T19:05:08.667-06:00"I'm Sorry" and "Congratulations": Death and PoetryAll week, I've experienced a juxtaposition of "I'm so sorry for your loss" and "Congratulations!" side by side, sometimes even simultaneously, like at my father-in-law's funeral when one person gave me a copy of the small article on me being named poet laureate in the<span style="font-style: italic;"> Kansas City Star </span>while someone else offered his condolences. The cards and notes that come in the mail and the emails I download offer me the same mixed message, which seems to add up something my brain hears as, "Mazel Tov! And remember, life sucks" or "This too shall pass, so don't get too excited about any of it."<br /><br />Perhaps what's most odd about it all is that I can't tell by the face of whoever is approaching which message will pop out. I'm sitting at my computer at a coffee shop, a man behind me turns around, taps me on the shoulder, and says, "Sorry to hear about your father-in-law, and please give Ken my best" or a woman I don't know on the street passes by and yells over her shoulder, "Great to see you in the paper."<br /><br />For years we've dreaded the loss of Gene, and for years, I yearned for some recognition and a lot of readers, compounded by the piles of rejection slips, and years spent shepherding books to publication. No surprise that now, during a very good year indeed as a writer, the void left by Gene is like the Grand Canyon compared to the little ant hill of successes. This is not to say that I don't appreciate being congratulated, the forthcoming publication of books, and the quiet calm of being seen alongside the hard-won peace of feeling good in my writer's skin.<br /><br />Meanwhile, there's the Grand Canyon behind my shoulder, a place I peer into and, just like the actual Grand Canyon, can't see to the bottom of it all. My father-in-law, although he used to tease me that "how could this be poetry when it doesn't rhyme?" -- even while he stapled together copies of my chapbook for six hours one day -- never issued even the vaguest rejection slip or "this doesn't quite suit our needs at this moment" messages. In the almost 26 years I knew him, he accepted me always, helped when I asked, tried not to impose when he needed help, and probably served me hundreds of tacos, dozens of roast beef dinners, and a whole lot of bowls of hamburger soup. Despite the reality that since his heart surgery four years ago, and his seizures two years ago, he had lost a lot of short-term memory, mobility, strength and lung capacity -- and he was leaving this life a little bit at a time -- his death is still unfathomable to me.<br /><br />Yesterday, lying in corpse pose at the end of yoga class, I saw him in his oversized red woolen cap and 30-year-old gray coveralls, just coming in from chopping wood and happy to stand close to the fire place. He was always cold, and it broke his heart a little when he could no longer run that blower connected to his fireplace when he went on oxygen. In a strange way, it's as odd that he grew so old and fragile as it is that he died. Diagnosed with rheumatic fever during WWII, he tinkered on the brink of serious illness and regular life for over 60 years, and now that he's gone, I am sorry for his loss, but I could almost congratulate him for leaving behind years of illness, pain, and discomfort.<br /><br />But since he's gone, and I can't tell him anything directly, I just share this poetry -- which doesn't rhyme, but I think he would be okay with it anyway:<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">In the End, There Is Only Kindness</span><br /><br />for Gene<br />February 19, 1925 – February 10, 2009<br /><br /><br /> When the floor slips and the time comes,<br /> when interventions falter, there is only kindness,<br /> a lantern to hold at journey's end, then hand over<br /> so someone else can lift the light enough<br /> to illuminate where to step next, and how.<br /><br /> In this kindness, there are always stories:<br /> Telling the checker who rang up his milk twice,<br /> don't worry, everyone makes mistakes.<br /> His long wait among aging magazines at the VA<br /> so a homeless vet could get his medication.<br /> Gravel on our walkway because he didn't want<br /> us slipping when we brought home the new baby.<br /> The vase of roses he left on my kitchen table<br /> and for Alice because roses were on sale.<br /> Jokes about being old and decrepit while he<br /> cooked everyone dinner. How he power-rocked<br /> the babies to sleep, his heart beating through theirs.<br /> Christmas stockings and grandchildren to wake up early,<br /> coins to collect for each one. Oxygen in one hand,<br /> a cane in the other so he could see a grandchild<br /> in orchestra or band, graduation or swim meet<br /> even when his back and memory hurt.<br /> The dishes or long drives, reaching for the check,<br /> and taking the time to greet the stranger eating alone.<br /> Only kindness matters in the circle of love<br /> he made out of this world.<br /><br /> In the end, there is always the beginning,<br /> a seamless turn from here to there<br /> even if everything is different from<br /> the irreplaceable loss shining and aching at once,<br /> a kind of river running alongside our lives,<br /> or weather reminding us that<br /> we love, were loved by a man here only<br /> for kindness, which is not just a kind of love<br /> but the only love there is.<br /><br /><br /> – CarynYour Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-79640989630526900772009-02-10T15:21:00.010-06:002009-02-11T18:44:19.113-06:00Remembering Gene<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SZH2oGwiebI/AAAAAAAAAdA/gZvCw2BkWPE/s1600-h/IMG_2132.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 161px; height: 320px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SZH2oGwiebI/AAAAAAAAAdA/gZvCw2BkWPE/s320/IMG_2132.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5301289405261183410" border="0" /></a>Today my father-in-law, Bill "Gene" Lassman, died at age 83 after many years of severe health issues and breaking his hip two days ago. While there's a lot to be said about how hard he struggled, how long he outlived all predictions, how strong his spirit was despite the frailty of his body, and the details of his dying, I want to focus here on what Gene meant to me.<br /><br />I met Gene when Ken and I started dating in 1982, and the first thing he told me, when he was giving me a lift back to town from the country, was how sorry he was for accidentally running over Ken's dog when Ken was a boy. This may seem an odd way to get to know each other, but it showed me right away that being a good father was at the core of who he was. That core glowed around his children and grandchildren, all of whom were surely the light of his life.<br /><br />Having grown up with an difficult father who was only about emotionally mature as a sullen 12-year-old, it took me a long time to really understand just how loving Gene was. Over the years, it began to sink in: when he rocked my babies to sleep and held them for hours, when he babysat and drove around my kids; when he dressed up and got his portable oxygen to see any performance the kids were in; when we were broke and he lent us money; when we were exhausted and he invited us over for dinner; when he went out to buy me jumbo maxi pads after I gave birth; when he left roses for me in a vase on my kitchen table because they were on sale, joking that his no-good son didn't buy me flowers so he needed to. Gene turned upside down what I knew about men of his generation just as Ken turned upside down what I knew about men in general.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SZH2Ubx-JdI/AAAAAAAAAcw/iJwKLJ0jr5c/s1600-h/IMG_3107.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 302px; height: 252px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SZH2Ubx-JdI/AAAAAAAAAcw/iJwKLJ0jr5c/s320/IMG_3107.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5301289067306952146" border="0" /></a><br /><br />His generosity extended itself well beyond the family. After 38 years of teaching printing at the high school -- which, in the early days included many kids who didn't fit in elsewhere -- he retired, but found friends everywhere he went, who called out, "Mr. Lassman!" He spent a lot of his retirement going from one supermarket to another, to get the bananas on sale here, the milk on sale there, but mostly just to be social. I didn't really understand why he shopped so much, but he once told me that if he could help a checker at a grocery store or janitor in a department store feel a little better by showing them friendliness and kindness, that made his day. It obviously made the day of a lot of other people, the ones we often don't see as we rush from one thing to another.<br /><br />I'm in the odd position of writing this from Vermont, 1,400 miles from home, Ken, and our kids, but I'm flying home Saturday in time for the funeral, burial, and sitting shiva. Although Gene wasn't Jewish (Lutheran turned Methodist), I look toward my own tradition's way of opening up space to feel the loss, and from far away, I say Kaddish for him. This poem, which a good friend sent me, speaks to my soul right now.<br /><br />KADDISH<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SZH5qBlHaAI/AAAAAAAAAdY/BxZOz5Z0r_Y/s1600-h/IMG_0621.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SZH5qBlHaAI/AAAAAAAAAdY/BxZOz5Z0r_Y/s320/IMG_0621.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5301292736765716482" border="0" /></a><br />Look around us, search above us, below, behind.<br />We stand in a great web of being joined together.<br />Let us praise, let us love the life we are lent<br />passing through us in the body of Israel<br />and our own bodies, let’s say amen.<br /><br />Time flows through us like water.<br />The past and the dead speak through us.<br />We breathe out our children’s children, blessing.<br /><br />Blessed is the earth from which we grow,<br />blessed the life we are lent,<br />blessed the ones who teach us,<br />blessed the ones we teach,<br />blessed is the word that cannot say the glory<br />that shines through us and remains to shine<br />flowing past distant suns on the way to forever,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SZH4kN3fijI/AAAAAAAAAdQ/EIwGVKXE9Z4/s1600-h/IMG_0615.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SZH4kN3fijI/AAAAAAAAAdQ/EIwGVKXE9Z4/s320/IMG_0615.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5301291537473178162" border="0" /></a><br />Let’s say amen.<br /><br />Blessed is light, blessed is darkness,<br />but blessed above all else is peace<br />which bears the fruits of knowledge<br />on strong branches, let’s say amen.<br /><br />Peace that bears joy into the world,<br />peace that enables love, peace over Israel<br />everywhere, blessed and holy is peace, let’s say amen.<br /><br />~ Marge PiercyYour Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-36995717048201293712009-01-16T15:10:00.007-06:002009-01-16T16:10:42.348-06:00In the Batcave Doing Yoga<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SXD5OmqEtPI/AAAAAAAAAbI/-bfpdAJjXaE/s1600-h/40068237.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 211px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SXD5OmqEtPI/AAAAAAAAAbI/-bfpdAJjXaE/s320/40068237.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5292003591450834162" border="0" /></a>Today I hung upside down -- a bat in a line of other bats. It was my first time doing this pose (see picture on right although I didn't look quite as poised as this woman, and also, not quite as happy as the bat on the left). Still, I wa<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SXD4dNfnYLI/AAAAAAAAAbA/k_kFEXfPTSQ/s1600-h/Finished_Studio_Carol_Ann_on_Ropes_Wall_4.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 155px; height: 320px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SXD4dNfnYLI/AAAAAAAAAbA/k_kFEXfPTSQ/s320/Finished_Studio_Carol_Ann_on_Ropes_Wall_4.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5292002742882492594" border="0" /></a>s thrilled. I was also terrified. As I hung there, after my very gracious yoga teacher for this class -- Anne Underwood -- helped me jump, pull myself up and climb into this inversion -- I felt waves of panic. What if I fell and broke my neck? What if the ropes didn't hold? What if I just freaked out in front of everybody?<br /><br />As usual, I countered the fear by telling myself, "breathe, breathe, breathe." Each asana, each breath, is a continual way to come home to my body, and to re-program how I inhabit my own body.<br /><br />This month, I'm doing YoMo through the <a href="http://www.yogacenteroflawrence.org/">Yoga Center of Lawrence </a>, a commitment to do yoga everyday through January. A few days ago, when I had a virus, I wondered if a prolonged time in corpse pose would count ("Hell, yes," said Kelley), and some days I feel myself stretching, reaching, almost soaring through Sun Salutation. Often it's just the old struggle: how to try my hardest without putting so much effort into trying that I make the pose hard. Today, at least, I found a way to hang. And in the hanging, there was no such thing as trying too hard or not hard enough. There was just the support of the wall, ropes, and Anne, the strength of my body, and the beauty of gravity. The hard part was surrendering to it all. Now that I'm upright, I want to do it all over again.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-1235332592551839502009-01-12T11:51:00.004-06:002009-01-12T11:53:27.500-06:00Stories and Healing: Barbara Esrig<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWuDSHS33hI/AAAAAAAAAa4/OQGmr8KXpGk/s1600-h/esrig.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 150px; height: 175px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWuDSHS33hI/AAAAAAAAAa4/OQGmr8KXpGk/s320/esrig.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5290466534495870482" border="0" /></a>Okay, so I'm stealing this item from another blog I edit -- <a href="http://www.tlazine.blogspot.com/">http://TLAzine.blogspot.com,</a> but the story is just too compelling to not share.<a href="http://www.storycorps.net/listen/stories/barbara-esrig"> Barbara Esrig</a> tells the story of surviving a car accident that nearly took her life and finding meaning through the power of words -- and her story is now featured on the <a href="http://www.storycorps.net/">StoryCorps</a> site. Barbara is writer-in-residence in the <a href="http://shands.org/AIM/default.htm">Shands</a><a href="http://shands.org/AIM/default.htm"> Arts-in-Medicine</a> program in Gainesville, FL. where she does oral histories for patients to remind them that they are more than just a diagnosis. She's presently collaborating on a book on these oral histories as well as writing about her own work. Listen to her story and check out her amazing work. Barbara has been a frequent attendee at the <a href="http://www.tlanetwork.org/conference">Power of Words</a> conference, and she has been active in the field of Transformative Language Arts for many years.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-6474518683098757072009-01-03T18:29:00.008-06:002009-01-04T00:57:26.399-06:00What Happens When Kelley Hunt Performs<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWALzpyj2bI/AAAAAAAAAaQ/fT_DjLMduV8/s1600-h/318832139.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 194px; height: 320px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWALzpyj2bI/AAAAAAAAAaQ/fT_DjLMduV8/s320/318832139.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5287238944552114610" border="0" /></a>New Year's eve, and again, Kelley Hunt sang us up and over, far and wide toward the changing of years. This time, it was in the Lawrence Arts Center, where Kelley performed "I Dreamed of Rain," a benefit concert, with an astonishing drummer, Diego Voglino from Brooklyn, and also the soulful Gary Mackender on accordion and percussion. Throughout the concert, I found myself feeling a deepening connection with the packed audience as the boogie-woogie unfurled and long notes rose. While this was a performance, a form of entertainment, it was much more a long conversation, a ceremony, a meeting in the calm hum of our dreams, and then an awakening when we can't help but dance in our seats.<br /><br />I remember several years ago another Kelley Hunt concert -- this time in Liberty Hall, and on the New Year's eve eve. On the dance floor, in the middle of "It Ain't Over When It's Over," Kelley had us all belting out with her, "I'm gonna lay down my sword and shield, dow<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWAJykWdG4I/AAAAAAAAAaI/gWfAqH7xRRM/s1600-h/IMG_4933.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 256px; height: 193px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWAJykWdG4I/AAAAAAAAAaI/gWfAqH7xRRM/s320/IMG_4933.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5287236726888930178" border="0" /></a>n by the riverside." I remember how glorious the meeting of worlds was: two elderly women sang with all their heart, lifting their arms to the stage that they stood before. A woman with short hair and maroon pants and top shimmied up and down along with her midrift-baring teenage daughter, holding hands and singing to each other. A older man, unshaven and gray, jumped up and down with his arms waving above his head. Two young women in love wrapped their arms around each other and leaned close with their eyes closed. An older lesbian couple swayed as they spooned and sang quietly. An young African-American woman jitterbugged with a middle aged white guy. It was quiet and ecstatic, sacred and wild. The music made us all family at that moment.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWAI_87Si9I/AAAAAAAAAZ4/cKJW4QOavTo/s1600-h/g04853.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 261px; height: 248px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWAI_87Si9I/AAAAAAAAAZ4/cKJW4QOavTo/s400/g04853.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5287235857312549842" border="0" /></a><br />I felt the same thing at this concert. Kelley's beautiful arrangement of Jan Garrett's song, "I Dreamed of Rain" threaded into "We Shall Overcome," which she also sang -- the traditional song of freedom and equality. Yet Kelley's song also acknowledged that we will not only overcome some day, but this day; that we won't be afraid some day, but this very day. The song paid homage to Barack Obama's election and to all the ongoing struggles for civil rights and social change.<br /><br />The final songs of the concert echoed this message -- that the struggle goes on, but the light comes through. Kelley sang a newer song, "There is No Place That God Isn't,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWAJUSWWU7I/AAAAAAAAAaA/148Yys2IIcE/s1600-h/Caryn+%26+Kelheadshot.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 278px; height: 225px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SWAJUSWWU7I/AAAAAAAAAaA/148Yys2IIcE/s400/Caryn+%26+Kelheadshot.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5287236206660572082" border="0" /></a>" a tribute to healing and comfort, and also the power of words, and then exploded into a boogie woogie jubilee in "Say the Word."<br /><br />The songs circled through us, circles through us still, calling forward the soul of community, the heart of love that so seamlessly blends the political, spiritual and artistic; the power of a single voice and the beauty of harmony and rhythm; and always endings and beginnings, showing us how we can lift above the cusp of what blinds us and see the rain, the freedom, the change we dream of.<br /><br />Pictures: Kelley and a friend at Camp Wood, where we'll do our next Brave Voice; Kelley and me in Vermont after she performed at The Power of Words conference; Kelley's latest CD, "Mercy." See more about Kelley at her <a href="http://www.kelleyhunt.com/">website</a>, <a href="http://www.myspace.com/kelleyhuntmusic">mypage site</a>, and the website we share for our business,<a href="http://www.bravevoice.com/"> Brave Voice.<br /></a>Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-39873217721955734542008-12-12T14:04:00.006-06:002008-12-12T14:24:50.265-06:00Breaking the Mold<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SULH__UhwwI/AAAAAAAAATU/FOtvjyd9bs8/s1600-h/Inland-Ocean-0.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 225px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SULH__UhwwI/AAAAAAAAATU/FOtvjyd9bs8/s320/Inland-Ocean-0.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5279001615374861058" border="0" /></a><br />It started with underground rivers of salty water left over from the days when Kansas was part of a large inland ocean. At our house, we draw our water from 200 feet down, right from the core of one of these underground rivers. When we mix such salt water with metal piping, over time, of course there's erosion. That erosion led to a small leak under the kitchen sink where, unfortunately, we had a pile of newspapers to be recycled. Over months, it turned into layers of mold (mostly green mold, as I'm now learning, but still potent enough that we've had frequent colds lately).<br /><br />Now, within a few days, the kitchen will be taken apart by some mold restoration folks, the air cleaned and exchanged seven times, boards and walls sanded down or replaced, counters removed and doors taken off. The air and mold guy tested the air, found enough evidence of mold under the boards and walls under the kitchen <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SULHr6ZnumI/AAAAAAAAATM/8Ez4aOLFS3w/s1600-h/kitchen-sinks-01.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 207px; height: 207px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SULHr6ZnumI/AAAAAAAAATM/8Ez4aOLFS3w/s320/kitchen-sinks-01.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5279001270456662626" border="0" /></a>sink, and left us with a somewhat startling report and a big square of dark chocolate (in a mold of his company's name). Now we're facing our kitchen plastic-ized off with some kind of plastic-ized door and a lot of dining out for a few weeks (covered, remarkably, by insurance).<br /><br />Within a week, we should be completely and thoroughly <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SULHkI_iMdI/AAAAAAAAATE/3ooqviN86sI/s1600-h/mold2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 129px; height: 131px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SULHkI_iMdI/AAAAAAAAATE/3ooqviN86sI/s320/mold2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5279001136934826450" border="0" /></a>mold-free. By the end of the year, the restoration should be done, but it's still tricky in looking at an in-tact part of this home and knowing it will be turned inside-out. Breaking the mold. Knocking it down and building it back up again. Re-making home. I exhale, tell myself the only way out is through, and turn the new air purifier on high. May the end of this year bring new breath into all of our lives.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-32956128246891746722008-12-04T09:03:00.006-06:002008-12-04T09:23:04.448-06:007 x 7<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/STf1osilChI/AAAAAAAAAS8/H9DKZHZdCU8/s1600-h/IMG_5048.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/STf1osilChI/AAAAAAAAAS8/H9DKZHZdCU8/s320/IMG_5048.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5275955567987591698" border="0" /></a>Seven has always been my lucky number although I can't say it ever won me a lottery or a horserace. I've just always been partial to odd numbers, especially this one that encompassed the days of the week. This probably goes back to my imaginary friends of childhood and beyond -- the days of the week. Each day I hung out with an invisible pal. Monday was more mature and little anal. Wednesday was my best friend, and quite naughty at times. Saturday was sensible and laid-back. Sunday was a slightly uptight, prissy man. Tuesday and Thursday were twins, each with a distinct personality although both preferred wearing green.<br /><br />Today, although it's the 4th (not the 7th), I celebrate being 7 x 7 year's old, a perfect square and also the Jubilee birthday. In ancient Hebrew traditions, Jubilee meant two things -- one was that every seven years, you let the fields go fallow so that they could regenerate themselves. The other was that at your Jubilee birthday (your 49th, your 7 x 7), you gave everything away and started over again. It was a way of giving you a clean slate, a new start, a lighter way of being while also helping out those less fortunate.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/STf1XrPcwQI/AAAAAAAAAS0/Mes4VtVrZZ0/s1600-h/IMG_5050.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/STf1XrPcwQI/AAAAAAAAAS0/Mes4VtVrZZ0/s320/IMG_5050.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5275955275581145346" border="0" /></a><br />Although I don't plan to give everything away (although I have been making my usual deposits to the local goodwill), I've been thinking for months about what I'm ready to release, and the list is long and, at times, trecherous: inactivity, compacency, all vestiges of self-hatred, the kinds of judgments of others rooted in the need to protect myself, little meannesses, big impatience, rushing around for no good cause, and yelling for no good reason. It may well take me another 49 years to give away what I'm accumulated.<br /><br />So as usual, it's breath by breath, stretch by stretch, story by story, word by word, and deed by deed. When I blow out the candles, I'll be wishing for enough awareness to see where to turn and how to step next.<br /><br />Pix: Elvis, Juan-Tomas, Ken and me in Nashville, and me one morning after the coffee.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-58204914920276849292008-11-05T15:00:00.006-06:002008-11-05T21:05:05.054-06:00How I Learned To Stop Worrying & Love America<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SRIdvFfXsTI/AAAAAAAAARM/JNIwOwo4pZQ/s1600-h/header_l_meetc.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 75px;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SRIdvFfXsTI/AAAAAAAAARM/JNIwOwo4pZQ/s320/header_l_meetc.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5265303609114341682" border="0" /></a> A Black man is president-elect. A man who calls on each of us to bring our highest calling to our work and thoughts has been elected in one of the widest margins of popular vote in decades. Someone who speaks of sacrifice and hope in one breath is our president-to-be, and one I can call "my president" without sarcasm or shame. For the first time in my life (to paraphrase the oft-misrepresented words of Michelle Obama), I am proud of my country, but in my case, I don't mean "prouder"; I mean, "for the first time."<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SRIfa92rYHI/AAAAAAAAARc/13F0I87fjhI/s1600-h/43203613.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 218px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SRIfa92rYHI/AAAAAAAAARc/13F0I87fjhI/s320/43203613.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5265305462490488946" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Last night, sitting on the couch with friends and family, glued to the television screen in between leaping up to check one of eight websites or listen to the radio, I felt the kind of elation I only knew decades ago, when I made my living as a political organizer (mostly working with labor unions), and occasionally, I would stand with labor bosses in some dingy basement hall, singing out "Solidarity Forever." I was young, told often I was naive, and totally in love with doing something to change the world, even if it mostly entailed taking many notes and sorting bulk mailings. At the same time, I knew the labor movement was an ambling, often-falling-down old soul, someone most people outside the movement (which is to say, most people) looked at as some nonsense-filled kook.<br /><br />Over the years, like many of you, I've been involved in armfuls of campaigns and mailings, event-organizin<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SRIeRDYwnSI/AAAAAAAAARU/K0xHpzVdYpk/s1600-h/ss-081104-obama-campaign-tease.grid-2x2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 142px; height: 107px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SRIeRDYwnSI/AAAAAAAAARU/K0xHpzVdYpk/s320/ss-081104-obama-campaign-tease.grid-2x2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5265304192665296162" border="0" /></a>g and putting together testimonies or attending city commission meetings. I've stirred soup for a dozen, and joined a few to do bulk mailings for thousands. Whether the cause was environmental, labor, gender or educational, I've often found the most profound fellowship and meaning in this kind of work. Yet like many of you, I've also felt isolation at times, doubt, and a kind of trembling hope that just a few people (as it was and is often just a few) can make some kind of difference even though the difference is mostly a hundredth of an inch forward.<br /><br />With this election, it's the same but different. The fellowship is vast and infinite. I think of the elders in Barack's father's village in Kenya, the kids now attending his old elementary s<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SRIJlGHEjGI/AAAAAAAAARE/2gd9BXRRDRk/s1600-h/kenya.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 229px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SRIJlGHEjGI/AAAAAAAAARE/2gd9BXRRDRk/s320/kenya.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5265281447249611874" border="0" /></a>chool in Indonesia, the sea of humanity in Chicago or LA or New York. I think of my friends and neighbors in downtown Lawrence, cheering and crying, or driving down Mass. St. honking horns. I think of my family in Florida, my dear friends in Tennessee, my marvelous colleagues in Vermont, and the many of you I visit virtually each day on Facebook, all of us united by this event, this evolution, this breakthrough.<br /><br />While I've always loved what America could be, now, finally, I love America.<br /><br />Pictures include you-know-who, plus Obama's 87-year-old Kenyan grandmother. Some interesting weblinks:<br /><a href="http://www.cnn.com/interactive/allpolitics/0811/slideshow.obama.speech">Lovely slide show of part of Obama's speech with great images</a><br /><a href="http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/politics/2008/11/05/colin.powell.reaction.cnn">Colin Powell's reaction</a><br /><a href="http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/politics/2008/11/05/colin.powell.reaction.cnn">Jesse Jackson talks about civil rights and crying with joy</a><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDa6CwzSA74">Signs of Hope and Change</a><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytItUIoq2Wc&feature=related">Springsteen sings Seeger while Obama talks of hope</a><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijnZTPP38YM&feature=related">Obama Rising (Springsteen)</a>Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-8432274920170554252008-10-27T09:56:00.007-05:002008-10-28T20:24:44.417-05:00Changing Light Reading at the RavenI'm thrilled to be able to share a reading with two very fine poets -- Peter Wright and Kathleen Johnson -- at 7:30 p.m., Sat., Nov. 15th at the Raven bookstore. I met Peter over 17 years ago when he showed up in a poetry writing class I was teaching at the University of Kansas, and he dazzled me with his raw and alive poetry, which has continued to unfold over the years. I met Kathleen 20 years ago when we had babies to balance around our poetry, and even then, I was taken by how she used language is such vivid and delicate ways. I share a poem from each of them below. Please join us for the reading, in which we each will read poetry that has to do with changing light, sky and land.<br /><br />Peter Wright -- from <span style="font-style: italic;">Cloud Poems</span><br />nothing is distinct<br />but echoing kettle drums<br />in this summer sky<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SQXcZlz0F_I/AAAAAAAAAQE/6pW0Sy9px2o/s1600-h/August2505+055.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SQXcZlz0F_I/AAAAAAAAAQE/6pW0Sy9px2o/s320/August2505+055.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5261854071856568306" border="0" /></a><br /><br />from green rolling hills<br />a huge rose in black and white<br />blooming and blooming<br /><br />slate green above<br />your inhabitants have morphed<br />into waves of rain<br /><br />come hither earthbound<br />imagine we are your own<br />animals to ride<br /><br />far away voices<br />hang in storm clouds and pouring<br />issue from my mouth<br /><br />Kathleen Johnson -- from her debut collection, <span style="font-style: italic;">Burn<br /><br /></span><span>Muse</span><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SQXco-0oekI/AAAAAAAAAQM/7wTLl8HrUGk/s1600-h/KathleenJohnson.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 223px; height: 320px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SQXco-0oekI/AAAAAAAAAQM/7wTLl8HrUGk/s320/KathleenJohnson.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5261854336268925506" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"> Poetry will always be<br />a wild animal<br /> </span><span>William Stafford</span><span style="font-style: italic;">, You Must Revise Your Life<br /></span><span><br /></span><span>I've seen a wolf<br />in the woods of a dream.<br /></span><br /><span>her canine contours run<br />ravenous with color:<br />sage, pine, sun-yellow,<br />adn canyon-brown, the rich<br />carnelian of a Mexican sunset.<br /><br />Lean, leggy,<br />pink tongue wet and lolling<br />she stares me straight in the eye.</span><br /><span><br />Silver moonlight on her back,<br />wildfire burning in her eyes,<br />she circles close in the night<br />daring me.<span style="font-style: italic;"><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span><br /><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span>Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-53092384371165873552008-10-07T18:51:00.006-05:002008-10-07T19:12:11.604-05:00Walkabouts on the Prairie<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SOv57wSroiI/AAAAAAAAAPA/LRNWH50HVZM/s1600-h/IMG_4822.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SOv57wSroiI/AAAAAAAAAPA/LRNWH50HVZM/s320/IMG_4822.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5254568195228672546" border="0" /></a>It started with a simple yearning to hang out together, be outside more, and not add another meeting to our overburdened schedules. The "we" here was <a href="http://www.kawcouncil.org/">KAW Council,</a> the local bioregional group I've been part of since it started in '82, that meets annually for a weekend gathering each spring, plus does other workshops, events, and mostly, a lot of potlucks. At our annual meeting last May at the usual place -- Camp Hammond (located between Lawrence and Topeka), we again perused the ways we could be with each other more and walk our bioregional talk until we stumbled on the idea of simply getting together one Sunday morning each month for a walk with each other, a walkabout.<br /><br />I've come to love walkabouts, being outside with old and new friends, moving my body and feeling the earth beneath my feet. So far, we've walked along the Kaw river from points on each side, through the Haskell Wetlands, and circled Mary's Lake. This month -- <a href="http://www.kawcouncil.org/calendar.html">Oc</a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SOv4-NTodsI/AAAAAAAAAO4/OGu2c3sBq5w/s1600-h/IMG_4903.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SOv4-NTodsI/AAAAAAAAAO4/OGu2c3sBq5w/s320/IMG_4903.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5254567137865397954" border="0" /></a><a href="http://www.kawcouncil.org/calendar.html">t. 19</a> -- we meet at Clinton Lake. We meet at 9-ish most times, but I imagine we might move the time a little later to correspond with the colder months.<br /><br />In any case, there's simple joy and connection in walkabouts, an Australian Aborigine tradition of singing/telling the particular song/story of wherever a person steps. While we don't sing out loud (at least, not yet), I feel the sense of each particular place -- met communally by our moving feet -- coming through each walk.<br /><br />Through KAW, we've done long walks for years -- at Camp Hammond through woodlands to prairie, but also all around the watershed, including Castle Rock near Quinter, KS.; the Flint Hills on various occasions; along the Platte River in NE; at night and in the daytimes; in winter as well as summer. Walking together is a way to deepen our connections, sometimes just by stepping in concert with each other and the pale or fierce wind, early morning heat or cool damp air, in silence or while our voices tell new stories and re-tell the old ones we've come to love for how they make us laugh. <br /><br />Come join us any time we're walking, and feel free to bring your coffee, kiddies or walking stick. See more at the <a href="http://www.kawcouncil.org/">KAW Website</a> or <a href="http://www.kawcouncil.blogspot.com/">blog</a>.<br /><br />Pictures: A bunch of us in a big hole near the KAW river, August; and some of us on a bench in the Haskell Wetlands, September.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-76064671761568020962008-09-15T19:11:00.013-05:002008-09-15T20:19:10.063-05:00The Sweetness of Between-ness<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SM8FdM3ay-I/AAAAAAAAAOg/4LiRJ1o2wZA/s1600-h/moon2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SM8FdM3ay-I/AAAAAAAAAOg/4LiRJ1o2wZA/s320/moon2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5246418090137930722" border="0" /></a>I write this from the Cleveland airport, where I wait in the in-between. The full moon has risen just over the terminal out this window, and it shines in that milky-yellow of harvest moons, holding its own and the sky above it that it will soon travel.<br /><br />I travel home to Kansas soon, after leaving my other home, Vermont, where I spend an average of one month a year, although not any consecutive season. There's the green explosion of dark, late summer, an exhilarating leap from Kansas in late August where summer builds character (as we tell ourselves). In winter, I leave a Kansas landscape of muted black, brown and white for the white and green winter wonderland of Vermont, where no one lifts an eyebrow over a foot of snow. Then there's the autumn <a href="http://www.goddard.edu/powerofwords">Power of Words conference,</a> an event to grow <a href="http://www.goddard.edu/masters_transformative">Transformative Language Arts (TLA)</a> that I started over six years ago and cajoled, organized, begged and pleaded into existence and continuation, despite bureaucratic obstacles, sudden presenter cancellations, and all manner of confusion about what I was doing.<br /><br />But such confusion is to be expected when starting anything new. I was reminded of this the other day in Vermont when I went for a walk, somehow lost the trail, and finding 30 minutes' worth of thick bramble. The trek was an odd combination of pushing through attack blackberry bushes that left dozens of scratches on my legs, but occasionally presented me with a fresh blackberry, which led to an inner dialogue of a lot of cursing punctuated by ecstasy. Did I mention it was raining too? I experienced many thorny branches, some heavy rain, and great many wild blackberry moments over the six years of the conference and the 10 years of helping to found TLA.<br /><br />What's sustained me most are those who also resonate with how our words, aloud and on the page, can change our lives, and how I've seen -- through TLA -- how a few people, and then a few more, and eventually a community can make something worth sustaining. I had always envisioned that a TLA professional organization would one day take over the conference, and that a group of dedicated people committed to transformative uses of language would step in and grow TLA. I also sensed, without yet knowing the form, that something else was calling to me, which I've since realized was simply a less-intense and more embodied way of being.<br /><br />Now the dream I once dreamed solo is being sung in chorus. The <a href="http://www.tlanetwork.org/">TLA Network</a> -- composed of past and current TLA students and others in this emerging field, profession and calling -- slow-danced through a mindful process to decide to take over the conference, hired a coordinator, and then stepped with great heart and deep thinking into making all of this happen. Heather Mandell, our marvelously gentle, wise and compassionate coordinator, began last spring , and she has been shadowing me since. The TLA Network Council members are already planning next year's conference with verve and creativity, wisdom and vision.<br /><br />Last night our whole conference community sat in a circle in the moonlight after an astonishing "Coffeehouse of Wonder" (two hours of song, poetry, story, drama by some 24 participants) to sit in silence under the moon. The closing circle, held and led by Callid and Kristina Keefe-Perry in the Quaker tradition, brought us together in silence, complimented by the language by the wind and by any of us who felt so moved to speak.<br /><br />As I sat there, looking around at the 50-60 people on chairs and the ground, between the Haybarn Theatre and the grassy hill that led to the dorms, everything framed by the swaying Firs and Pines, and the full moon, I k<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SM8FvSsU40I/AAAAAAAAAOw/2weG9kTmdJQ/s1600-h/planeMoon.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SM8FvSsU40I/AAAAAAAAAOw/2weG9kTmdJQ/s320/planeMoon.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5246418400939664194" border="0" /></a>new the sweetest peace. The peace of community speaking its mind, the peace of letting go when the time is right, the peace of the gorgeous wind that held us all, the peace of people speaking about the beauty of reclaiming themselves, the peace of one time coming to its close to another can begin.<br /><br />According to the airline representative who just spoke, that time is delayed about 37 minutes for me, but no matter. I'm savoring the moon, now higher and brighter, a full disk that carries me between that time and this one and the next, between those I love in one place and in another, between two lands that seem -- despite being 1,400 miles apart -- to be just over the bend from each other in my life. I am grateful for the stories -- and the power of words -- that link these lands like the same moon I can see from here, there and in-between.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-56747452853740054342008-09-08T20:32:00.008-05:002008-09-08T23:19:06.247-05:00The Sky Begins at Your Feet and Is Going to Be PublishedIf you've known me for a while, you know that I write like crooked politicians vote: often and always. For me the wall has never been about writing, and I confess, dear reader, that I don't experience writer's block, maybe because I keep rotating among projects, aiming for where the energy is, and loving the act of writing. What don't I love? Not being able to get writing published, even after years of trying, reading books on writing the perfect query letter, writing agents who are friends of friends, and feeling generally hopeless for long stretches of time (I also don't love the Bush administration, the scary look in Sarah Palin's eyes, and cottage cheese). All of this is to say that I have good news: my memoir about breast cancer, bioregionalism and community -- <span style="font-style: italic;">The Sky Begins at Your Feet</span> -- is going to be published.<br /><a href="http://www.icecubepress.com/"><br />Ice Cube Press</a>, a small Iowa-based press that specializes in books about the earth is publishing my memoir. The little email I got today from the publisher with the contract attached showed me what I've been wanting to hear for a very long time: yes.<br /><br />My woe-is-me-and-the-publishing-world-sucks story is long and boring, and suffice to say, I went through all the stages of grief. After years of yearning to be "choosen" by, say, HarperCollins or another big press, despite all I heard about the screwed up state of publishing and how authors are treated, I persisted in holding onto the old dream. For decades.<br /><br />I went through bargaining (please publish my book and I'll polish your poodle for you); anger, mostly when I walked through bookstores (why them and not me?); denial (maybe the 20 agents I wrote to simply misplaced my query letter); and depression (and how!). Eventually found myself to looking more honestly at the situation, which some might call acceptance, and thanks be to good and patient friends, who helped me cultivate more curiosity and tenderness about it all. The old dream about being chosen didn't hold so much weight anymore, but the writing itself did, and if I wanted to get my work out, I could, which led me to where I'm landing now.<br /><br />On the ground, where the sky begins.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-89285666727195569832008-09-03T15:28:00.005-05:002008-09-03T15:49:01.773-05:00When Downward Dog Goes to the Dogs<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SL74EmEQsII/AAAAAAAAAOY/qxiYyG1W0HY/s1600-h/IMG_4852.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SL74EmEQsII/AAAAAAAAAOY/qxiYyG1W0HY/s320/IMG_4852.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241899774127419522" border="0" /></a>After a solid week of ecstasy over my realization that I was truly in love with yoga, the small punctures of self-doubt deflated my starting-to-soar mind. Luckily, my body is still a happy horse, although one that seems to be trotting or even walking slowly at times instead of galloping. I'm still going to yoga daily, and I'm still reading, watching yoga videos, and often -- when standing in line or talking on the phone -- doing some simple balance poses. But I'm also encountering my original response to yoga: it's just hard for me.<br /><br />It's hard for me to get into some poses. It's hard for me to hold some poses. It's hard to remember to breathe. It's hard to get down. And it's hard to stand back up. At each class, I find myself going through a tragicomedy of emotions, starting with the thrill to being ready to go again, tthe surprise at how unflexible I became overnight, the trembling and hard breathing and onslaught of doubt (occasionally interrupted by looking at people around me step wider, bend lowerand reach higher), the reprimand not to compare myself to others, the second wave of doubt about becoming a teacher, and then -- usually in the middle of Corpse Pose -- a slow chime of joy that's so exquisite at times that it's all I can do not to cry on my mat.<br /><br />I realize too how choking and hot this doubt can be -- the same kind of doubt that has plagued many students I've worked with over the years about their desire to write and call themselves writers. While tabletop (a pose) and forward bends might come easy to some (bu<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SL727WPsEcI/AAAAAAAAAOQ/BoVDLR-UJUw/s1600-h/Downwarddog.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SL727WPsEcI/AAAAAAAAAOQ/BoVDLR-UJUw/s320/Downwarddog.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5241898515749933506" border="0" /></a>t not me), writing always came easy to me. Yet whoever we are, and whatever we do, to practice an art is to bring yourself to your edge, breathe, relax and dwell there however long it's healthy and productive, and then exhale slowly and stand back up.<br /><br />I tell myself this while holding downward dog (a supposed rest pose that's always been more like running a marathon for me). I also tell myself that like any good practice, I'm just showing up, trying to cultivate curiosity and drop judgment, and find greater compassion for living in a body, this body, forward-bended or stretched out, upside down or back on its feet.<br /><br />Pictures: Me doing Downward Dog-With-Photography-Variation; other -- someone on the internet I found doing Downward Dog.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-44009644813271708192008-08-23T09:13:00.011-05:002008-08-23T20:22:13.103-05:00Galloping Toward Becoming a Yoga Teacher<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SLAiOFihIZI/AAAAAAAAAN4/3zwI-ZXBk1Q/s1600-h/643845694_theme_yoga.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SLAiOFihIZI/AAAAAAAAAN4/3zwI-ZXBk1Q/s320/643845694_theme_yoga.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5237723992032354706" border="0" /></a>On Tuesday I said out loud something floating through my mind for months, a thought so strangely persistent and impossible I kept trying to dismiss it just like the farmer in the movie <span style="font-style: italic;">Babe</span> tried to ignore his idea to enter Babe in the sheepdog trials (Babe is a pig). Sitting in my therapist's office, I said, "I want to become a yoga teacher."<br /><br />"Of course you do," she said, completely convinced it was the perfect next step. Reeling, I left, went out to lunch (or was I metaphorically already there?) with my friend, Kris, who gave me further encouragement. I jumped on the internet, and despite other things to do, started cruising for yoga teacher training programs, of which there 5.2 million, most <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SLAhRs0tPfI/AAAAAAAAANo/3xc59jCXoC4/s1600-h/big+yoga.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 101px; height: 107px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SLAhRs0tPfI/AAAAAAAAANo/3xc59jCXoC4/s320/big+yoga.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5237722954605608434" border="0" /></a>sporting pictures of 20-somethings in spandex doing headstands or balances more delicate than peace in the Middle East. Without ever having been there, I instinctively knew my program was Kripalu, one of the premier and oldest yoga centers in the country, located in Western Mass and offering long-distance training (two 12-day intensives as the main teaching format).<br /><br />At first, I thought I would work up to the training in, say, two years or so, and by that time, I should be able to do a shoulder stand without my legs falling over. On some level, maybe I was thinking I would also "look" just a tad more like someone who teaches yoga. But after a wonderful phone call with a former lead yoga teacher at Kripula and student at Goddard, the lovely and inspiring Susan Moul, a writer and yoga teacher I admire tremendously, the gate opened and the horse of my body shot out.<br /><br />I know it's a dualistic way to talk about the body as if it's running with the mind saddled on, yelling, "Whoa!" and "Oh my god!!!" as it tears across the field, but it's obvious that my body is way ahead of my thoughts. My galloping body surged into research and found some important books to read<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SLAhsZzVNPI/AAAAAAAAANw/IMYfh5NvMjU/s1600-h/carynhorse2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SLAhsZzVNPI/AAAAAAAAANw/IMYfh5NvMjU/s320/carynhorse2.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5237723413356033266" border="0" /></a>. My galloping body took me to yoga practice already five hours in four days, and now it wants to do it again today and tomorrow. My galloping body took me shopping for more yoga work-out clothes, and told me, "Who the fuck cares?" when the yoga pants I tried on showed me how the straight lines of my legs led to the large bowl of my stomach. My galloping body took the prerequisite information for Kripula of an hour of yoga a day for six months, and instead of thinking it needed a few years to even begin to begin, immediately started fulfilling that requirement.<br /><br />Coming from a history of some mild eating disorders, an avoidance of exercise, and a wide swatch of overweight family, just the notion of practicing something like yoga regularly is a radical departure from my genes and upbringing. My people, when there's a family gathering, tend to bring a dessert (as in a whole pie or cake) for each person attending. When we get together, the news is the latest gastric bypass experience among us (out of a dozen of us, four have had the surgery). Most of us have been through deep pain and years of struggle over our bodies, peppered with shudders of shame and infused with hopelessness.<br /><br />Yet what makes becoming a yoga teacher unlikely for me is also why I need to do it. It's the best initiation into the rest of my life that I can imagine, and the process alone<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SLAie62BcmI/AAAAAAAAAOI/Po0NCLspslw/s1600-h/595705907_summer_cat_web.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SLAie62BcmI/AAAAAAAAAOI/Po0NCLspslw/s320/595705907_summer_cat_web.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5237724281219150434" border="0" /></a> of going through the training and deepening my practice through training and teaching is the best way for me to continually strengthen my health and enhance the rest of my life.<br /><br />This summer, I taught a class on finding your calling with no notion where putting that out was going to land me. While I watch this new calling unfold, I'm thrilled, scared, and I know this is absolutely the galloping motion I'm in love with and need to ride out.<br /><br />Photo of yoga practitioner is Meer Patricia Kerr, <span class="style7">founder of "Big Yoga"<br />Other photos are a horse and me when I was about 8, and photos from Kripalu.org.<br />Check out Susan's <a href="http://susanmyoga.googlepages.com/">website/blog</a> too!<br /></span>Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-30157225626286811772008-08-18T15:41:00.010-05:002008-08-18T16:37:54.764-05:00The Brigadoon of Goddard<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SKnhJf40xpI/AAAAAAAAANY/142KamJfO5A/s1600-h/facult22.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SKnhJf40xpI/AAAAAAAAANY/142KamJfO5A/s320/facult22.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5235963595089823378" border="0" /></a>As many of you know, my day job is teaching in <a href="http://www.goddard.edu/masters_individualized">Goddard College's low-residency Individualized MA</a> Program. Because the college in Vermont, the students are all over the world, the faculty is in the U.S. and Canada, and I'm in Kansas, I often find myself having to convey the geographically-challenged workings of such a job. By the time I get through how students and faculty come together for a week-long residency twice a year, followed by a four-month semester we then do through students emailing packets and faculty emailing back letters, then detailing how students design their own studies, I've usually thoroughly confused my listener too much to bring up the time travel dimension of our residency, which is a little like the story of Brigadoon.<br /><br />For those of you who haven't seen the play/movie, Brigadoon is secret Scottish village that wakes up to once every hundred years, then <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SKnjOb02MTI/AAAAAAAAANg/_fXUivIeRqk/s1600-h/brigadoon.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SKnjOb02MTI/AAAAAAAAANg/_fXUivIeRqk/s320/brigadoon.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5235965878921998642" border="0" /></a>disappears into the highland mist. Witness one lovely June 1 in Brigadoon in 2008, and then come back for June 2 in 2018. In the case of our residencies, we go from summer to winter seemingly overnight (never mind the three of snow replaced by nine varieties of green) when we leave in August and return in January.<br /><br />What happens in that mist that swallows us back into our home communities is as mysterious at times as Brigadoon itself. People change. Through packet work, and the spaces in between, we start to articulate more of our life's work, and what it means to craft lives that are more engaged with the local and the global, not to the mention the body and the mind.<br /><br />To get a tad more specific, I've had the joy of witnessing student projects that include:<br />* Developing a new expressive writing model to help children use poetry to counter the trauma and stress in their lives. See <a href="http://www.tlazine.blogspot.com/">Heather Mandall. </a><br /><br />* Creating a community trance dance ritual that fosters joy and connectedness (Gary Meitrott's Soul Bath Trance Dance).<br /><br />* Traveling the world to take part in pilgrimages in Spain, France, Tibet and Peru, and from this walking, come to understand the psychological and spiritual stages of pilgrimage. See <a href="http://www.mysticalroad.blogspot.com/">Angela Mullins.<br /></a><br />* Building "a room of one's own" for women in Trinidad/Tobago in which these women can read and write their way toward a greater sense of self (Sue-Ann Commissiong)<br /><br />* Exploring and challenging beauty conventions, and unfolding a new way of claiming beauty through the arts and the natural world (Patricia Fontaine).<br /><br />* Making a film about how to transform moments of competition into cooperation and community-building. See <a href="http://lab.wgbh.org/open-call/competing-thoughts">Ben Stumpf.<br /></a><br />* Explore and reclaim what it means to be a body, particularly a body living with chronic illness, through writing, embodiment and photography practices.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SKnf26nZOOI/AAAAAAAAANQ/xLBSATU8eAI/s1600-h/janetcaryn.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SKnf26nZOOI/AAAAAAAAANQ/xLBSATU8eAI/s320/janetcaryn.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5235962176335329506" border="0" /></a> See <a href="http://www.goddard.edu/rhondapatzia">Rhonda Patzia</a>.<br /><br />The mist that envelops the residencies sometimes makes it hard for us to see what we're doing, but within that space of letting go of what we thought we knew to uncover new knowledge and new ways of knowing (and living), magic prevails. It's the kind of magic that continually addresses that core question of how to live. Yet there's also immense joy in the process of being together, going to too many workshops or staying up too late, hanging out with others following the work and studies that thrill them. To quote Gene Kelly in the movie version of Brigadoon, it's almost like being in love.<br /><br />Thanks to Cynthia Curley -- who's created a young adult novel that blends fantasy with overcoming racism for her Goddard work -- for the great Goddard photos of some of us faculty (top photo: Francis Charet, Ruth Farmer -- program director, Ralph Lutts, Ellie Epp, Katt Lissard, and me; bottom photo Janet Tallman and me).Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-8686362937562795872008-07-30T10:31:00.005-05:002008-12-11T17:42:29.502-06:00Dog Days of Summer Turned Cat Days<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SJCOm3akW8I/AAAAAAAAANA/lybhuB9pzqE/s1600-h/IMG_4804closeup.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SJCOm3akW8I/AAAAAAAAANA/lybhuB9pzqE/s320/IMG_4804closeup.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5228835965738703810" border="0" /></a>Today and yesterday and probably tomorrow is rain, but not the ordinary kind of hard and fast-moving summer rain. This storm is a dying hurricane, swept inland about 1,000 miles to linger slowly and gently over us, fading to almost nothing, and then nothing. Last night, we saw a white volcano-looking cloud standing in the middle of the storm, the center of Hurricane Dolly, Ken told me.<br /><br />Usually, we have the kind of hellish heat and sun that we jokingly tell non-Kansans "builds character," and by that, we mean, "we still live here and often love our home despite the absolute horror of summer of late July and early August." This period of time usually is marked by highs in the over-100s, and lows in the low 90s. I remember someone telling me he moved to Lawrence in early August, arriving in the middle of the night to see a bank time/temperature sign that said, "1:30 a.m. Temperature: 99," and he seriously considered turning right around.<br /><br />Inside our house, where our air-conditioners are lounging about instead of pushing iron, it's also anything but dog days. The kittens are about 16 weeks, and the older cat, Judy, hasn't seriously injured them yet although she growls, spits and hisses like the kitty version of "The Exorcist" when she sees them. The kittens just come right up to her, and cock their heads <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SJCO1ZLEbJI/AAAAAAAAANI/7DVXxEXMNxw/s1600-h/IMG_4801.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SJCO1ZLEbJI/AAAAAAAAANI/7DVXxEXMNxw/s320/IMG_4801.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5228836215318670482" border="0" /></a>as in, "Oh, aren't you fascinating."<br /><br />So it's cat days here, somewhat naughty, almost getting into the kind of weather and paper bags you wouldn't expect this time of year, and still ample with napping. The sky yawns. The kittens stretch out and sleep on the laptop. The big cat stands in the mild rain, still distraught over these new invaders. And the dog sleeps in the closet, terrified of the thunder and lightning that come at night. Nothing to complain about, but not what we expected.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1604467667669884232.post-88108590029997545292008-07-16T21:05:00.005-05:002008-12-11T17:42:29.842-06:00One Cool Breeze in the Seasons of My Life<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SH6rKd6WVNI/AAAAAAAAAMw/BkbtcYrsuw4/s1600-h/IMG_1359.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SH6rKd6WVNI/AAAAAAAAAMw/BkbtcYrsuw4/s320/IMG_1359.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5223800814112756946" border="0" /></a>It's mid-July, and in Kansas, that means heat, more heat, and then even more heat. This year, we seem to be lucking out in that it's mostly hovering in the low 90s this week, but that stretch of weeks between mid-July and mid-August is usually when the temperature starts hanging out in the 100s, and the nights sport lows in what most people would prefer to see as highs.<br /><br />I keep thinking of that small poem I wrote about some months back.<br /><br />Then thousand flowers in spring, the moon is autumn,<br />a cool breeze in summer, snow in winter.<br />If your mind isn't clouded by unnecessary things,<br />this is the best season of your life.<br /> -- Wu Men (Hui-k'ai), 1183-1260<br /><br />This small poem has become a talisman for me as well as guide for how to live. And this is just what I thought about while sitting on the back deck tonight, watching the wind swoop up Old Cottonwood Mel (the giant cottonw<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SH6rldF2rII/AAAAAAAAAM4/-_v-VtD7cOM/s1600-h/black+eyed+Susan.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_LWSsGzuEk0U/SH6rldF2rII/AAAAAAAAAM4/-_v-VtD7cOM/s320/black+eyed+Susan.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5223801277749046402" border="0" /></a>ood tree I named for my dead father) while the leaves shimmered that bright, pale green at their edges against the stunningly crystal blue sky.<br /><br />For me, the problem isn't necessarily finding beauty in all moments, but figuring out how to stay with that beauty instead of getting mind-clouded (to paraphrase the poem). But at that moment as I sat with the tree, I realized dropping all the tiny hooks that seem to grab me from across my computer screen and within my mind could be easy. It could be like just watching a tree, enjoying the cool breeze, the light, the color and simplicity of a singular moment in life.Your Program or Projecthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10442611016047142329noreply@blogger.com1