Happy Christmas

Christmas is the holiday we celebrate the birth of Jesus.  It's the time our family gathers here on Christmas Eve.  What we do has become traditions that the children look forward to and going to the 5 pm family service at church is one of the most loved traditions.  After, we hurry back home and have a Scandanavian smorgesbord dinner, honoring Bob's heritage and our time in Denmark.  Christmas morning starts early, with the opening of stockings Santa brought the children.  Then we eat breakfast, the girls say is the longest breakfast that ever happens.  Finally we begin opening of the gifts.  It starts in a very orderly way, one gift at a time and then soon becomes chaotic.  The children get hyper, the adults tired, but the celebration is most special.  Many of the gifts are homemade.  I love that.  One granddaughter got the point of it all, as she showed me an empty gift bag, she said, "there's nothing in there, see."  And then she said, "it's full of the best gift of all, love.  I love you, grandma."  She went from person to person doing that.  Christmas is all about love.  Love coming to earth in the person of Jesus, who we follow.  Love, here on earth, in all its unexpected, messy, chaotic ways.

Last Minute Shopping

This morning there was a break between rainstorms and so I headed out early to do my last minute food shopping before family starts arriving tomorrow.  I've figured out if one goes early, there aren't crowds, mostly.  I headed to the Berkeley Bowl, the best place in town to get fresh produce and got there 15 minutes before they opened at 9 am.  There were only two people ahead of me at the door.  Fresh organic chicken, perfectly ripe golden pineapple, sweet smelling melons, baby beets with greens, long English cucumbers, honeycrisp apples, Meyer lemons, bosc pears---the produce delights.  Then, I took the freeway to Costco which opens at 10.  I got a front row parking place and waited in my car for 20 minutes.  By the time I got to the door, I was shocked to see there was a crowd like at a football game.  Once the door opened, merging all the giant shopping carts took skill, but everyone, getting a leg up on shopping, was cheerful.  I knew what I wanted:  the Christmas roast.  I found it humorous that at the prime rib counter, there was a crush of white-haired grandmothers, each one getting the best and cheapest roast to be found.  The lady next to me bemoaned "the roasts are all so big."  They were and all cost well over $100.  "I found one for $85," she exclaimed!  Then I found one too and we gave each other a high-five over the roasts.  I realized I am not unique at all.  This time of year though, as I imagine all the houses with families gathering like here at our house, I want to take a moment to remember those who are sad or depressed or alone, those who don't have anywhere to go, those who can't afford a Christmas roast and especially those who are homeless.   Let the greatest blessing of love and peace go forth into the world this Christmas season to all people.  Let me bring blessings in big and little ways, by being generous and by sharing a smile and a wish for Christmas to those I encounter.

Preparations

It's hard to remember that the preparations are a part of the whole experience of Christmas.  Sometimes it seems mundane, sometimes it seems crazy.  Shopping for presents, writing cards, shopping for food (why is it I have to go to 8 different places?), cooking, decorating the house, going to church, cleaning, going to the library to get the granddaughters books to read........it's all part of the holiday and I want to remember this, so I can pay attention, keep calm and enjoy every bit of Christmas preparation!  We are so blessed to live in a peaceful country, to have enough resources to do what we want, to have the whole family coming to be with us and to have enough good health and energy to make it all fun.

Darkness

This time of year, the days grow shorter and shorter as the darkness comes early and enfolds us.  It is hard to find comfort in the darkness when there are so many dark things happening here and around the world.  I hesitate to mention Donald Trump's abhorent speech but what really bothers me is the base to which he is pandering.  Polls show his numbers haven't fallen.  Can there be so many biogoted, angry, fearful people here in the United States?  I guess so.  The darkness creeps and leaps in seeking to cover us all.  The Bible says that light is always stronger than the darkness and I believe that is literally and metaphorically true.  Let us find the light in ourselves and speak out, shining the light of tolerance, compassion and kindness to all people.

Huggelig

Huggelig (pronounced hew-gah-leigh) is Danish word describing a state of extreme coziness.  Last night sitting in front of a roaring fire with Bob and friends, watching the yellow, orange and blue flames, while a Christmas tree was being put up and decorated, it was hygellig.  I loved hearing the stories of each Christmas ornament as it found its place on the tree.  Winter cold, the dark and unseen scary things were pushed out and the warmth and comfort of friendship allowed easy conversation punctuated with times of quiet.  I was enfolded, held and greatly cheered by the hygellig evening last night.

Holiday rituals

With Thanksgiving over, I've turned my face toward Christmas.  I seem to have much more time to reflect than anyone else in the family and I'm anticipating Christmas and the rituals we use to celebrate the holiday.  Consumerism has co-opted Christmas and so this year I polled the family on gift giving to the adults in the family (of course, we all want to give presents to the children).  One son said definitely, no gifts; another wanted little gifts; a third said let everyone do what they want to do which is what we decided.  Tomorrow, December 1st, starts the Advent calendars.  For as many years now, I've collected little treats - candies, toys, Christmas tree ornaments - which I wrap and send to the grandchildren.  They tie the enticing little presents on to the large felt calendars I made for them.  Each day the girls open one present which perhaps spoils the girls, I know, but builds crazy anticipation.  I wonder how do we teach the children the joy of giving?  The annual giving to our favorite charities is done in private.   Decorating the house is a ritual that brings me much pleasure.  I love putting out the 50 year old Christms decorations from our time in Denmark which brings continuity of all our Christmases.  I love the many candles which bring light to the long dark nights.  This year I've folded multitudes of golden origami cranes to use to decorate our Christmas tree bringing my strong wish for peace.  I plan when I tie each one on the tree, to say a prayer for peace for people or group of people.  And finally the ritual of writing our annual Christmas letter.  This year its my turn and I like it to be brief.  It gives me great pleasure to remember our friends and to write a special note to each.  I love receiving the holiday greetings and news from friends and family far and near.  One ritual which has gone by the wayside is holiday baking which is just as well now we know how bad sugar and butter are for us.  But I will miss the good smells coming from the warm kitchen.   We are especially blessed that all our children and their families will be with us for Christmas.  December is almost here and I'm excited.

Thanksgiving

Sitting in our dark living room, lit only by candles, mellow with a belly full of turkey (high in tryptophan that natural mellowing agent), I am feeling particularly grateful.  Grateful for the wonderful guests who came to our Thanksgiving dinner - one veteran, three foreigner nationals and two children who wiggled, squealed and generally livened up the place.  Grateful the  dinner came together smoothly and was enjoyed by all.  Grateful for the peace I am feeling just now.  I love this holiday when I especially remember and am grateful for things I all too often take for granted.

Train Adventure

We were invited to go along on a weekend train adventure.  It was a marvelously planned weekend by our daughter-in-law.  We took the Amtrack Capitol Express train from Jack London Square to Sacramento.  The grandkids, age 5 1/2 and 3, were excited from the first sight of the great big train to the last moment.  They stood at the windows, exclaiming about everything they saw.  When we got to Sacramento, we walked to the nearby California Train Museum in Old Town, down by the Sacramento River.  The grandkids ran from train to train, so excited!  It is a great museum filled with actual train cars and engines from all different time periods. I marvelled at human creativity and craftsmanship.  A highlight for me was to walk through the Pullman Dining Car with displays of the table settings complete with silverware and designer dishes.  Quite a change from the current dining car with paper plates, pre-made food and plastic knives, forks and spoons.  Then we checked in to our nearby hotel where the kids immediately all went swimming.  When it got dark, we walked back for dinner into a magical Old Town by night.  The highlight was a candy store with multitudes of buckets overflowing with every imaginable kind of candy.  The next morning we walked to State Capitol and enjoyed seeing the seat of California government. Walking through the extensive gardens, the kids picked oranges which disappointingly were very sour.  But they found fun things to do wherever they went.  The kids loved racing along the long blocks and playing in the fallen leaves.  Little Liam, though, kept saying he wanted to go back to the train museum and so there we went.  This time they discovered to their great delight the toy trains on the second floor.  We caught the train back just before sunset, all of us tired out from a great weekend adventure.

Fear

Terrorists seek to evoke panic and fear among their enemies---all of us in the Western world.  Random attacks of innocent civilians is a powerful weapon.  130 killed in the Paris attacks and millions become afraid.  It has warmed my heart to see Parisians going back to normal life so as not to give in to fear.  Now another terrorist attack in Mali.  Fear is a powerful emotion, contagious and often paralyzing.  I've spent way too much of my life living in fear and I've never been near anything like a terrorist atack.  But fear has too often paralyzed me:  fear of not being able to do things or not being good enough;  fear of unknown future; fear of being mugged or attacked.  I am appalled by many Republican governors saying no Syrian refugees settling in their state.  Politicians know appearing to fight a source of fear gets votes.  Advertisers know fear sells.  The news media uses fear to keep us watching (ABC's Extreme Weather reports as a case in point).  FDR said, paraphrasing Sir Francis Bacon, "We have nothing to fear except fear itself."  So clearly this fear permeating our world is not a new thing.  Fear is a natural emotion in response to real or perceived threats to our wellbeing. When we are actually under attack, it's a great response helping our survival.  When we're just imagining a threat, our body doesn't know the difference and then we find ourselves afraid and stressed.  It is our job to not let the terrorists, the advertisers, the media, the politicians manipulate us using fear.  Let us examine our fear carefully so we can respond to real, not imagined, crises reasonably and with compassion.

Paris

I am heart-sick about the horrible terrorist attacks in Paris  yesterday.  As President Obama said, "This is an attack on universal humanity and the values we all share."  We stand in solidarity with France and the people of Paris, sharing their shock and grief.  I cannot imagine the fervent hate that must have been inside the terrorists to do that.  Even in the light of this evil slaughter of so many innocent people, I still believe kindness and compassion are stronger than hate.  What can we do?  We can be kind to each other and ourselves in our shock and heartbreak.  Another question is what can the civilized world do to stop such attacks designed to create fear and draw us all further into conflict and war?  Retributive justice doesn't work.  For us to strike back even more strongly is what they want---but an eye for an eye only creates more blindness.  Yet fight against this evil we must.  What can we do that respects our precious freedom and our values yet prevents future attacks?  Must we sacrifice some more of our freedom in the name of protection?

Merchants of Doubt

Last night we saw the documentary "Merchants of Doubt" based on a book of the same name by Naomi Oreskes.  She is a history of science professor at UCSanDiego and set out to explain the disconnect between the consensus among scientists on important areas of research and the public debate around that issue.  She found that a handful of scientists and some lobbyists have obscured the truth about scientific research on a variety of topics from tobacco, fire retardants, pesticides to global warming.  They blocked government protection of consumers using the same devious method over and over.  It was shocking to see how the same people have been involved in obfuscation of the public for the last fifty years.  Scientists aren't generally good communicators of their findings and these obstructionists take advantage of that by using the following tactics.  I'm sure you've seen these arguments in Op Ed pieces and even on the PSB NewsHour where one scientist (representing 99% consensus) argues with someone with an opposing view (representing much less than 1%).  First, these obstructionists deny that the finding is even happening saying over and over, for example, there is no such thing as global warming.  Then when finding become so clear it can no longer be denied outright, they will say something like, scientists don't all agree, the science is unclear.  They plant seeds of doubt.  When that argument no longer holds up, these guys will take on one point and try to deflect the argument, saying, for example, global warming is happening, but it's not caused by human action.  And when that argument no longer holds, they will say something like, global warming is happening and it is caused by humans, but the economic consequences of controlling our emissions will devastate our economy and destroy our way of life.  They lie.  They aim to distract policy makers and the public from the most central important issues.  They even go so far as to directly and personally attack the scientists.  It was very disheartening to see Republicans in the Senate and House, first stating that we must act on global warming (there was even a shot of Nancy Pelosi and Newt Gingrinch sitting together on a couch agreeing about our need to act on global warming).  The politicians  took a strong stand then not too much later reversed themselves saying there is no such thing as global warming.  Someone got to them.  It seems now denying global warming is a conservative Republican litmus test.  I hope those who have doubts about global warming will see this film and begin to recognize the tactics exposed in the film.  The science is clear.  I just hope our collective action isn't too little too late.

Rain

This morning it rained.  I sat in the gray light and just listened to the sound of rain falling on our roof and porch.  It is a comforting, nurturing sound; a sound that in these drought years brings special joy to my heart.  Here in California, we get our rain in the winter, but there's no guarantee enough will come to ease the drought.  Weather and climate are events we humans cannot control, but only influence.  Yesterday I heard a passionate sermon about Climate Change.  It started off with an ecstatic musing of being in the beautiful wilderness, reminding me of John Muir, then quickly shifted to a clear strong statement about our moral duty to care for the earth (God's garden she called it).  Indeed!  I hope this is an idea whose time has come.  I hope it isn't already too late.   She invoked the Jewish idea of Tikkun Olam (the concept that the original wholeness of creation was broken apart eons ago and it is our job to bring the broken pieces together - to work to heal the brokenness).  Yet so much of what I do is mere tokenism and doesn't make much difference.  Studies show that recycling, while it make us feel good, doesn't actually help that much.  I think we all must change our way of life!  We must consume less, travel less and there needs to be fewer of us here on earth.  I hope the U.S. at the coming Paris conference on Climate Change can be a leader and commit to making significant changes.  I hope we can work for the greater good and not just serve our own national self-interest.  I hope it isn't already too late.

Gratitude

Neuroscientists say there is no such thing as multi-tasking and I always thought I was so good at it.  Turns out, I just could switch my thought focus very quickly and I thought I was multi-tasking.  So we can only think of one thing at a time.  That's good news for the practice of gratitude which I've been thinking about today.  When we think about what we are grateful for, then, at that time, we can't think about anything else.  If we look, there is always much at every time, in every situation to be grateful for.  Even, maybe especially, when things aren't going well, it's useful to remember the practice of looking for something to be grateful for. When I broke my hip some years ago and was laid up for 8 weeks, I was pretty unhappy and frustrated.  After I healed, I asked my orthopedist, what I could do to prevent such a thing happening again and he told me to join a gym.  Not just any gym, he said, but one that I liked because his wife had told him, people only keep going to gyms they like (maybe that only applys to non-fitness buffs like me).  It was hard to put down the money for the gym I liked, but I did and it has been one the best things I've done for myself and my health.  I even gave Bob a membership for Christmas last year and now as a gift from the broken hip experience, we are keeping fit.  I'm grateful for the gym each time I go.  Gratitude is an antidote for negative thinking and depression.  It is so easy and so human to take blessings for granted after a while.   I'm going to start once again writing down what I'm grateful for each day.  I have a strong feeling it will do great things for me.

Garden Help

For the last fifteen or so  years, since Arne left home, I haven't had much help with our garden.  Today my gardening angel is coming to help me.  I am so excited.  Ananda is a tiny little woman with a great big can-do attitude.  She'll climb up the apple tree to prune the top branches.  She'll stand in midst of the blackberry patch or under the huge sprawling California grape to create order and direction of the exuberant vines.  As I work along side her, we usually talk, philosophizing about what's going on.  I realize, once again, how my garden is a metaphor for my life.  It's survived, even thrived, without a lot of attention.  There are strong natural rhythms that sustain life.  Truth is, though, I do like my garden better when it is tended.   My garden has been a natural selection experiment for years because only seriously drought tolerant plants survive the long dry summers.   I don't water much in the summer.   When I get quiet and listen, I hear my garden's hushed yearning for water.  My garden is more than a little wild and deeply alive, providing great habitat for birds as well as other less desirable creatures (raccoons, skunks, mice and other rodents).  I don't want my garden so tidy that the habitats are lost.  We share the garden.  Moles visit from nearby Tilden Park, leaving their mazes of tunnels which further dries out the soil.  I have tried everything to get rid of them, but they persist and come when they please.  Is the lesson just learning to live with them or having patience and persistence in the uphill battle of getting rid of them?  I am excited for Ananda to clean up and prepare my garden for the coming winter rains.  I am inspired once again to buy Spring bulbs and sweet pea seeds and plant them in anticipation of next Spring's blossoms.  It is good to plant bulbs and  be hopeful.  In the quiet of my garden, I find deep peace and I feel gratitude for my gently tended garden.

Making Cookies

I'm making chocolate chip cookies, dark chocolate chip cookies.  It feels good to be creating a yummy treat to take to the SNO celebration party tomorrow afternoon.  I don't make cookies much any more.  We don't want the many Calories they contain.  How long will it take me to burn off the Calories from one or two cookies at the gym?  All that butter is bad for us raising our cholesterol.   The sugar stimulates the release of too much insulin all at once.  The flour contains gluten and so many people nowadays are gluten-intolerant.  The salt, baking soda, vanilla, eggs and chocolate seem innocuous enough but maybe I just haven't heard about what they can do to harm us.  It feels good to be making cookies.  It takes me back to a more innocent simpler time when we didn't know so much and a full cookie jar was a sign of a well run kitchen.

Tell Me Something I Can't Forget

Pat Schneider, a favorite writing teacher of mine, used to say before we'd do a writing exercise, "Tell me something I can't forget."  I've never forgotten that.  Let me tell you about something a South African driver told me as we were driving through native lands on the way to Kruger National Park in summer 2014.  I was impressed how much nicer the houses were here in the countryside than in the black townships around Capetown.  The houses were small but very tidy, with well kept yards.  I asked if they had utilities.  Yes, he said, they have electricity, but there was no running water or sewers.  The driver was proud of the houses, their modernity but, he said,  people are careful to use the electricity sparingly and only when necessary.  He told me how when he makes a cup of tea, he is always careful never to heat more water than he will use for his cup of tea.  Now, every single time, I make a cup of tea, I think about that and about the extra water I heat that goes to waste.  I think about how careless I am in my use of electricity. We are so blessed with so much we take most of it for granted.  We don't usually pay attention to things until we no longer have them.  Now, most of us in California was very conscious of how much water we use.  My driver was my teacher and I am glad once a day when I make myself a cup of tea that I remember what he said.  I can't forget it.

Enjoying the Morning Light

Each morning when I get up, it is my pleasure to watch the edge of morning light creep down the tree covered East facing slope behind the house.  If I keep my gaze on the advancing line of light coloring the trees yellow green, it is hard to see it move.  But when I look away for a moment, and then return to look at the hill, I see the light has advanced.  I'm actually watching the earth slowly turning.  Soon the whole hill is basking in the warmth of morning light.  The sun is illuminating our Earth providing essential energy for all life.  I see birds flitting from tree to tree, a goldfinch here, a house finch there.  When I move across the room to look the other direction, I see the grand old oak trees backlit with bright streams of God-light pouring over and around the branches.  The sun is directly behind the trees.  I hear quail calling off in the distance.  Beautiful angled morning light has come, blessing another day.  I don't know why it pleases me so much to watch this prelude to my day.  It is almost the same every morning.  Perhaps it is my rapt attention to this new beginning that brings me the enjoyment and gives my morning meaning

Flowing Days

The days flow by, seamlessly merging one to another.  Living in the present moment, I find it hard to recognize that things are changing if ever so imperceptibly.  Each morning: the coffee, the news, breakfast and time to reflect, one day after another.  But the light is changing.  I recognize that.  Now the days are shorter and the afternoons fade sooner into cool evenings than they did in summer.   I too am less strong than I was, even with prodigious effort to maintain my strength.  I am grateful for the warm autumn days, grateful for another day to live, grateful for the peace.

Good News

Watching the news on TV is depressing.  The stories, even on PBS, are about mass shootings and our inability to stop them, our dysfunctional government, dangerous extreme weather, Syrian refugees.  The worse the news is, the more the reporters seem to relish it.  Good news doesn't sell and so we rarely if ever see positive stories.  Well, here is some really good news:  globally "there is a stunning decline in poverty, illiteracy and disease." (Nicholas Kristof, New York Times op-ed 10-1-15).  Amazing!  I never heard that the number of world's population living in extreme poverty (earning less than $1/day) has fallen from 35% in 1993 to 14% in 2011.   We've heard about the horrors of Ebola, but not that other diseases are disappearing in Africa.   With this increase in wealth, more children are being educated.  80% of girls in developing countries now complete an elementary education.  With this rise in prosperity has also come a drop in birthrates.  If one is more certain children will survive, fewer are born.  Turns out we all want the same thing, a better safer life for our children.   Atul Gawande reported "by 2030, 1/2 to 2/3 of the global population will be middle class." (p. 192 in Being Mortal)  All this has been going on and I didn't know about it.  To be sure, we've all heard of the amazing Chinese prosperity since the 1980's.  When Bob and I visited Bejing in 1985, there were few cars, one was considered rich if one had a bicycle.  Scientists our age were happy just to be working in science having survived the Cultural Revolution's extremes.  Now Chinese tourists literally flood US and European destinations.  Young Chinese tourists keep the Cambridge tourist industry working hard.  What an exciting time to be alive!!  Good news is out there and I for one want to know more about it.

Home Again

Late Tuesday night we got home.  The suitcase is emptied, the clothes washed and put away.  The mail is sorted.  Been to the market and stocked up the frig.  Things are back in order, but the jet lag persists.  My body can't quite adjust to the radical change of a 10 1/2 hour flight with an 8 hour jet lag between London and Berkeley.  It's good to be home, quality comfort soothes the body and spirit.  I think the best part of a trip is coming home and seeing familiar things with fresh eyes.  Berkeley seems so quiet, uncrowded and downright spacious compared to Cambridge.  I can't get over how big our house seems.  As I reflect on the trip, it seems like we were in constant motion for the month, in a whirlwind moving us ever onward. There were hard parts, like being so sick most of the time, but life  is like that, a mosaic of light and dark.   As the trip turns into memory,  I willl remember how great it was to see old friends, renewing our friendships, to see so many beautiful sights and to share so much time with Erik while exploring the treasures of Cambridge and adventure that was Ireland.  It's good to be home.

London

We went into London, a 2 1/2 hour journey one-way,  yesterday to visit my nephew and his family.  They're starting their 8th year in London and seem totally adapted to busy urban life.  Their apartment is vertical, rising up three stories with a very small base.  Their girls (almost 7 and 5 1/2) attend a nearby private school. don't speak with a British accent even though they've lived in London their entire lives and are well adapted to city life.  No playing in the dirt (there is no dirt or even grass anywhere nearby), no riding bicycles or chasing balls for these petite cherubs.  There are 250,000 Americans living in London, many working in the banking/financial sector.  London struck me as much more crowded and busy than I remember it in the 80's and early 90's when I was traveling to London.  There were crowds of people everywhere: in the Cambridge train station waiting for the train to London, in the Underground pushing to get through the ticket gate and waiting for the train then rushing to get a seat (I didn't get one but a young Arab gave me his seat with a smile, nice).   It was great to see family and catch up on all their activities, but other than that,  London was far too crowded for this old country girl.

Annascaul

The Dingle Peninsula is dominated by the big wild mountains.  It wasn't what I expected.  I had a mental image of pastoral green meadows spotted with Celtic Crosses and sheep.  No,  the landscape is more reminiscent of Scotland or parts of Wales.  The mountains are glaciated, rounded on top with no trees at all and colored streaked brown, dark green and gray .  The rain soaked soil meant the trails were little muddy rivers in places. We have walked the flats, admiring the mountains from afar.  Last night in O'Connor's Pub in Cloghane on the West coast,  we sat and listened as other Americans came in and told and retold their tales of walking over the Mount Brandon that day.  "It's was horrible, especially the wet slippery way down" one fit New York lawyer exuded.  We sat, sipped our Crean's Ale, ate our pub dinners.  After dinner, I asked the bartender about the airplane engine in front of the pub.  He called for silence in the pub and moved in front of the peat fire and with a special flair the Irish have, told us all the story of the four planes that crashed on Mount Brandon during WWII.

Today we transferred by taxi to the village of Annascaul back across the peninsula and walked to Lake Annascaul through lovely back roads with hedges of red fuschias and once following a herd of cows.  It was a lovely blackwater glacial lake sitting in a large glacial valley.  Annascaul  is full of history.  They have especially honored Tom Crean, the Irish Antarctic explorer who travelled there twice with Scott and twice with Shackleton.  One pub, The South Pole Inn, seems to have cornered the history; the walls were covered with photographs of Tom Crean in Antarctica.  Crean was born and buried in Annascaul.  For Bob, this was a special pleasure to recall his South Pole adventures, here far off the beaten track in rural Ireland.  We've had lovely adventures on the Dingle Peninsula and leave tomorrow to go back to Cambridge.

Finally Ireland

We landed in Kerry Sunday afternoon after a one hour flight from London's other airport, Stanstead.  The first words I had to describe the land I saw were green and soggy.   It had rained all day.  It was not the weather that impressed me, but by the friendly warmth and genuine hospitality I felt from everyone, from the Irish Customs Agent who smiled and welcomed us to Ireland to the taxi driver Maurice (pronounced Morris) with a shock of white hair like my dad's to Mary at our B and B in Tralee who welcomed us warmly and gave us tea and scones and then sat down and watched the rest of the football match together with us.  All Ireland was watching the big game of the Irish football championship between Kerry and Dublin.  Sadly, Kerry lost.  Dinner at the Grand Hotel, the only quiet place to be found in Tralee that night.  Tralee isn't much to look at, except for the beautiful rose garden.  The city has been built and destroyed so many times during its long history, the current buildings seem practical and haven't got very much charm.  But the people have got charm, firm strong handshakes and of course that musical Irish way of speaking.  We got a ride to Dingle to start our tour with our tour company, a fortunate coincidence.  Dingle is like an old painted lady with dyed red hair and a very wrinkley face wearing too much make-up.  The brightly painted houses look garish to me, trying too hard to attract the tourist Euros.  We discovered sometimes the ticky-tacky exterior belies a higher quality - like the "Out of the Blue" restaurant where we had a fabulous fresh fish dinner that delighted our taste and sensibilities.  Bob and Erik walked the first walk today and came back nicely tired with beautiful photos. Tonight in the Dingle Pub, out of the 30 people in the restaurant, only one was Irish-the waitress, the rest were all Americans.  I know it is impossible to really know a place when visiting.  I am filled with many first impressions and try to keep my eyes alert and my mind open to new understandings.

Cambridge

Cambridge is crowded!  Coming here on the train the other day, the rush of people to get to the train was crushing. And the narrow sidewalks here are overfull of people, not to mention the many many bicycles.  Walking along, one hears a little single ding and then I seem to always look over the wrong shoulder so I'm surprised when the bicycle whizzes by.  They even have double decker bicycle racks.  Not only the people are crowded, so are the buildings.  Every inch of space is spilling over with history.  Yesterday at the Sedgwick Geology Museum, we saw an actual notebook of Charles Darwin and then walking through a nearby courtyard we came to the Cavendish Lab where Watson and Crick did their work leading to their model of the DNA molecule.  It was a Friday night and the many pubs were SRO, bodies crowded too close for comfort for me.  Erik and I spent the morning shopping for waterproof boots for me.  The weather in Ireland is predicted to be in the low 50's all week with a 50-90% chance of rain each day.  Wet feet were guaranteed  with the boots I brought along.  Later this afternoon we're going to a Festival of Church Music at Kings College Chapel.  I'm looking forward to hearing the voices in the resonant chapel.  Today I've been thinking about what a gift life is, in all its many forms.  There are no guarantees of what will happen, try as we might to control life.  Every day, every moment, as often as one can, one needs to just be aware and be very grateful.

Leaving Germany

We arrived in Cambridge last evening after five nice days in Southern Germany.  Some observations: Germany is a place where a cup of coffee costs more than a 1/2 L draft beer;  everything seems bigger and newer in Germany - bigger tractors, bigger cars, bigger portions of food than in France;  everything seems perfectly in order, no trash, no weeds, nothing out of place;  a bigger prosperity is evident.  There were birds to be seen, in the beautiful forests, in the fields and hedgerows and along the paths by the Donau River where we walked.  And the Germans love their solar power - there were solar arrays on almost every farm house and barn we passed.   Germany is a very clean, well organized and efficient country and that's hard not to like, even though I remember feeling oppressed by the social pressure to conform when we lived in Germany in the 1980's.  I have been impressed by the concern expressed for the fleeing refugees and Angela Merkel's willingness to step up and receive thousands upon thousands of them.  For anyone over 70, these refugees' helplessness brings back memories of the terrible times during and after WWII.  I wonder where the voices of the Church and NGO's are?  Perhaps I missed them with my poor translations of TV news and newspapers.  Now we have a couple of days to spend exploring Cambridge before heading off to SW Ireland for our walking tour.  I'm hoping I'm up for it.  I've been sick since we arrived in Europe and my lungs haven't yet cleared up.

Deutsches Museum

Monday it rained and we took the Streetcar #16 to the Deustches Museum.  It is a world class technical museum.  We wandered through the boats, marveling at human ingenuity in using myraid local materials creating varieties of shapes and sizes hard to even imagine from the Eskimo kayaks to Italian gondolas and round Andean boats made of reeds.  We enjoyed the airplane section, impressed by helicopters and cross sections of an Airbus.  Then we visited power machines - those used to make power - from windmills to giant generators.  Finally the big metal machines the kind Bob likes.  The models impressed me and particularly one statement telling that what drove the development of these machines was the need for better weaponry.  I considered once again that aspect of human character and our sad history of wars.  I contrast this with the humanitarian response here in Germany for the Syrian refugees.  The news is full of it.  13,000 came into Munich on Saturday, the day we arrived.  Everyone feels overwhelmed, yet today the news spoke of the Germans looking forward to the influx of workers to help their aging workforce.  I am impressed with the Germans for being willing to open their country to increasingly rising numbers of refugees.  This is a humanitarian crisis that technology or money alone won't solve.  It takes courage and resolve to take the risk of helping, to do the right thing.

German Forests

We arrived in Munich on Saturday evening after an 11 1/2 hour train ride from the South of France.  Contrary to what we had heard, all the trains were punctual and our transfers worked perfectly.  We found our AirBNB room which is most conveniently located and quite comfortable.  Sunday morning we headed out for a walk in the nearby Englische Garten.  It's a large wooded park reminding me of Golden Gate Park in San Francisco and is filled with many trails and benches.  Joggers of all ages passed us by.  My favorite was a woman about my age jogging very slowly while her dog just ahead was walking very slowly as if to pace her.  The German forests are very beautiful and one of my very favorite things of Germany.  There are large mature smooth gray barked beech trees among other large forest trees.  There are wide green meadows and clear green rivers.  It is a place for walking and bike riding.  Bob led the way to the Chinese Tower - a brown three story pagoda surrounded by green tables and chairs.  It was a Hof Brau beer garden.  There was a brass band playing traditional oom-pa music and people were sitting in the sunshine drinking beers that seemed to come in every possible size and eating large 12 inch sof pretzels and traditional German food.  Children played off on the nearby playground.  We walked on after enjoying a coffee since it was only 11 am.  I love walking in the German forests and was very happy to be able to enjoy of my very favorite activities on a warm sunny day.

Fig Tart

It's all about the fig tart.  Today friends were coming to visit and my friend Martine decided to make a fig tart to serve to them.  After breakfast we were given the task of going out in the edge of a far vineyard where the fig tree grew to pick the ripe figs.  I was told, "Pick the soft ones."  The walk out of the village took a while as we had to stop and chat with all the neighbors who happened to be outside.  We walked about 20 minutes, past the field where the grape pickers were working and found the special tree.  In no time at all we filled the bottom of the big bag we brought and turned to go.  Walking up the hill to the village, we met the lady we had spoken to earlier.  She took us along to her private garden which was sadly untended.  She lamented how there used to be beautiful productive gardens all along the road, but now the young people would rather watch television.  We picked more figs and returned back home.  My friend made a beautiful fig tart.  She told me how, here, nothing is wasted.  What she doesn't use, that which is overripe, is fed to the chickens.  What the chickens don't eat, is composted.  Here in the countryside, life is more simple and basic.  Here food comes from the land and the returns to the land.  Here you take time to speak to your neighbors.  Here in the countryside, life moves at a slower pace and seems very peaceful.  Here today it's all about the fig tart.

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The Backroads around Babio

We've been in Babio for 2 1/2 days.  Babio is a tiny village where our friend's daughter has a winery.  She studied oenology in the University and put her learning into practice when she bought 13 hectares (about 30 acres) of wine grapes and an old winery l2 years ago.  Life is relaxed here but not as relaxed as the previous time I visited 11 years ago since now there are the grandchildren (Barbara age 6 and Jason age 8).  There is still time each day to have a look around to visit the local wonders.  We visited the ancient Cathar village of Minerve on Monday.  In the XII century Cathars were considered an evil sect by the Catholics and were hunted and killed.  Minerve sits as a fortress on the side of a mountain with narrow ways paved with local rocks.  Down in the nearby riverbed there is a giant cave going under a nearby hill.  It was magical and I could imagine the Cathars of long ago being there.   Yesterday we visited a salt marsh area south of Narbonne to look for flamingoes and we were not disappointed.  It was a lovely rich marsh complete with birds, big fish and many many insects.  Today Bob and I visited L'Abbaye de Fontfroide,  a XII century Cistercistian monastery founded by St. Bernard of Clauivoux.  It was a peaceful quiet place, nicely restored and now privately owned.  Getting to all these places we drive on the backroads.  I'm impressed by round-abouts at every intersection, the big speeding trucks on the narrow roads, the many tractors pulling carts of grapes, the way the roads wind through the villages twisting and turning this way and that.  The villages are beautiful, very old, the buildings made of beige local rock and most windows have blue shutters.  I recognize that we see through our own lenses.  We see what we bring with us.  If I'm peaceful, the places I visit seem peaceful.  Sometimes the place can influence though rarely  change what is there in the observer.   I am appreciating old things, history, and especially the warmth of friendship of so many years.  

(photo of flamingoes taken by Martine Weissenbach)

Joie de Vivre

We landed in Paris Friday morning after 9 1/2 hours in the air.  Then after 2 hours of walking, going through customs and getting our baggage, we were whisked off by our French friends to the Loire Valley where we spent the night in chateau.  On the menu there, we learned a chateau is a house big enough to house two horses inside it.    But first we visited a XII century church and then the arguably most famous chateau in the Loire - Chenonceau.  We were late getting there, the sky was gray and cloudy, it was magical.   I loved old tall trees planted in long rows that give one the sense one is walking in a cathedral and the sense of history one feels visiting these old places especially without other tourists.  The gardens were filled with lovely magenta, white and pink flowers, generously overflowing their beds.  Saturday, we worked our way south and west traveling one backroads, we  stopped at 5 different out-of-the-way XII century churches, each one different from the other.   The straight simple lines of the buildings gives one a clean rational sense of the long ago simpler times.   A highlight was a "picnique" we had with provisions from a local super-market, fresh bagettes, delicious fresh local goat cheese, pate, tomatoes and yellow mirabelle plums.  We sat on a high bank of a field by the road and swung of feet and looked at the distant village with a beautiful castle.  The French people know how to enjoy simple pleasures of life and better than just knowing, they take the time to stop and enjoy.

Over the weekend we traveled to Royan - a beach town on the Atlantic Coast where our friend's sister was having a family celebration of her marriage last winter.  We felt honored to be included.  What impressed me was the relaxed pace of the evening dinner.  We didn't start eating until 9:30 or 10 and then the fruits du mer kept coming on large platters heaped high with shellfish, local oysters, local mussels, shrimp both large and small, crab claws and grilled cod.  We didn't leave until 1:30 am.  The pleasure they found in each other's company was punctuated by loud laughing.  The evident pleasure they found in eating and drinking made me realize how these people know how to enjoy life.  They told me "French people only work to live" and live well they do.

New Consciousness

The videos on TV and the Internet of streams of refugees pouring through fields, across the border into Hungary breaks my heart.  There are so many people.  I've never seen so many people moving, like giant stream of migrating snow geese or multitudes of salmon swimming up a river.  When I look closely at the people, I see families, mothers with young children, teens, old people, crippled people in wheelchairs, I see a flood that will not be stopped.  The Europeans are calling them migrants, meaning they migrate for work but there is no moral imperative to help them.  But these people are refugees fleeing political instability of the failing states in the Middle East, war and outrageous extreme violence of ISIS not poverty.   These are people that have left everything they had behind seeking a safe place to live.  It is said this is the largest movement of people since World War II.  This is a time for the Euro-Zone and the world to look to their consciences and seek a solution.  So many lives in chaos demands a moral response.  As the Lakotan Native Americans told us last June, we, humans, are all one.  What happens to you, happens to me and vice versa.  And if this crisis isn't enough, we have the growing Climate Change crisis.  We are truly all in this together with our one Earth as our home.  Humanity needs to rise to a new level of thinking and leave behind the selfishness that has characterized our human history.   Things are changing and a new level of consciousness is needed to solve the problems we are facing.  It is too easy to fall back on past responses - taking care of ourselves.  Now we know we are all connected.  We humans must find a way to live together in a sustainable and peaceful way.  

Getting in Shape for Dingle

I'm more than a little anxious about a part of our upcoming trip to Europe: our walking tour in Ireland.  We thought we ought to do something exciting while visiting Erik in his new home in Cambridge UK and came up with the idea of a walking tour.  We're going to the Dingle Peninsula in SW Ireland.  The anxiety producing part for me is that we booked a private tour on which we're scheduled to walk 10-12 miles per day.  The Irish company arranges for the B and B, plans the tour, picks you up at the B and B hands you maps and drops you at the trail.  They also pick you up at the end of the day and take you and your luggage (which they have taken care of during the day) to the next B and B.  The good part is that we can walk at our own pace.  But the length of the walk and pace of my companions, two very tall, fast walking guys, has me stressed.  So to get in shape I've been walking the treadmill at the gym.  I feel a bit like a hamster, walking and walking, getting sweaty while going nowhere.  It's got me thinking about my attitude and expectations of myself.  I've remembered the truism that life is not about the destination, but the journey.  I've decided on this journey I want to have an attitude of openness, relaxation and spaciousness.  And I don't want to miss anything along the way.  In practicing on the treadmill it is amazing how quickly the minutes fly by; 106 steps per minute,  6,360 steps an hour.  It might not rain the whole time.  It might be incredibly beautiful.  I might have the energy to do this.  The key is I have control over my attitude and that might just be the most important part of this journey.

Slowing Down

I've been volunteering for about a month at the University of California Botanical Garden, not far from us in Strawberry Canyon.  There, time slows down and I enter another realm, one focused on plants.  I've loved plants as long as I can remember.  I'm especially fond of trees and flowers.  One of my earliest memories is of picking a huge bouquet of red tulips for my mother from our neighbor's yard.  I still remember being surprised when I was spanked and forced to go and apologize to the neighbor.  At the Garden, everyone loves plants.  Everyone pays close attention to plants, noticing when they are too wet or dry, in too much sun or shade, pot bound or otherwise unhappy.  We all know plants respond to their environment, only more slowly than animals do.  The tasks I am learning are not too hard: taking cuttings, repotting plants, watering, labelling, arranging and rearranging pots on the sales bench at the Garden shop.  I am learning to slow way down, so I notice everything around me.  I am volunteering so it doesn't matter if I am super-busy or just quietly taking my time to do what needs to be done.  I love the peace that soaks into me when I slow down.  Maybe this firecracker person that I am will finally do what mother always told me to do----slow down.

Is Freedom a Burden?

Last week Jeb Bush blamed President Obama and Hillary Clinton for ISIS's rise to power and its current successes.  Cheeky of him and wrong.  Doesn't he know it was his big brother who is responsible?  That's the superficial take on the problem of ISIS from the progressive perspective. We all know ISIS is a backward, brutally violent, repressive movement causing great harm to the people of Iraq and Syria.  But  this past week Mississippi State a young pre-med student at Mississippi State University and her fiance were arrested as they attempted to board a plane and begin a journey taking them to Syria to volunteer with ISIS.  What could lead a young American woman, presumably on the path to success, to make such a decision?  Friends and family were confounded saying the couple were unlikely candidates to be radicalized.  Was it for love that Jaelyn Young so changed?  Was it her yearning to be a part of something bigger than herself that lead her to commit to ISIS?  Did she have a religious conversion experience?  In an excellent op-ed piece in the New York Times(Saturday August 15, 2015) Roger Cohen tries to explain what it could be that attracts increasing numbers of American and European young people to ISIS.  He says ISIS recruiting "is tapping into something deep.  Perhaps that something is a yearning to be released from the burden of freedom."

I have been pondering for years what it is that attracts people to any kind of fundamentalism.  Or maybe the question is what is it that is missing in modern Western culture that is appears to be present in ISIS?  Jaelyn was raised Christian but was described as a wishy-washy Christian, not deeply involved.  I've wondered for a long time if our progressive Christianity is too bland, too sanitized of meaning to give our young people and the rest of us anything to hang on to.  Here, freedom is for all people, but where is the meaning for our lives to be found?  Is there anything left in the American Dream that isn't materialistic?  Have we failed to invite our people to a deep spirituality that feeds souls.  Is there too much choice and hypocrisy and a moral vaccuum here?   Maybe we are not as free as we would like to think but trapped in a shallow materialistic culture devoid of heart and soul.  Maybe the circus going on in Washington and in the Republican primary shows the political bankruptcy in our country.  Maybe these young people are holding up a mirror to us.

Copy-Cat

Today we babysat our grandchildren, age 5 and 2 1/2 because their daycare in Palo Alto is closed.  Before they came, I wondered whatever were we going to do all the day long.  I was also concerned whether I had enough energy to keep up with the two of them, even with Bob's help.  At the hand-off in downtown Oakland, the kids were clinging to daddy and not very happy to see their grandparents.  But on the way to our house, the ice began to melt and they both began to chat with us, noticing lots of things.  They were downright cheerful by the time we got to our house.  Upon entering they perused the environment and settled down- Liam by the big red bucket filled with toys his father played with as a boy and Elsa at the art table with scissors, tape, markers and white paper.  Before too long Elsa decided she wanted to make cookies, which we did.  The preparation interested Liam, especially my big well-worn Kitchen-Aid mixer.  Elsa enjoyed measuring the sugar and flour and especially tasting the final products.   The highlight of the morning for Liam was a visit to Bob's workshop where he learned to use the electric power drill.  Imagine, it is the same tool I used for the first time in June at the Rez and he is only 2 years old and learning to use it.  And we wonder about gender bias.  For lunch we went with Bob to a lab picnic at Codornices Park.  Liam managed to slip and slide down a dusty hill twice and fall in the ashes behind the barbecue before we got our food.  The sausages were rejected as too spicy (oh well) the fruit rejected being in too big chunks (too bad) but thank goodness they liked the bread.  Then they ran off to the children's area, attracted to the long cement slide which is at least as high as a second story.  We watched the older kids sliding by on pieces of cardboard, squealing with pleasure racing past us.  Both kids headed up the stairs, "Wait Liam!"  I cried out and just caught him.  He went to the lower slide and I was interested he took with him a piece of cardboard and copied exactly all those on the bigger higher cement slide.  He probably could have done the big one.  Elsa found it scary but insisted on going down twice.   They both played hard and I thought "this isn't so hard, especially at a park!"  Immediately, getting in his carseat, Liam flew asleep.  It's quiet time for Elsa now and I see that our day together today is mostly over.  It's been a pleasure to watch them play, and observe how they learn and see how much they have grown.

Great love

Shakespeare spoke of love and asked how one shows the ways?  The ways of love are as many as there are couples who love one another.  This past weekend we went to the most extravagant show of love one guy could imagine in celebration of 50 years of marriage.  The whole event was kept secret from his wife, somehow, even though the planning took 8 months.  Nine couples from all around the world arrived Saturday afternoon at the rented mansion overlooking Emerald Bay on the shores Lake Tahoe.  The wife had been distracted by her daughter with a massage and facial.  The large house was decorated with more than a hundred helium filled gold balloons with photos from their many years together tied on.  We, the women, thought the wife would know something was up, but she didn't and she was breathless and joyfully surprised.  Her graciousness in receiving the surprise and all of us showed her style and generosity of heart.  Many toasts to the couple followed and the wife was presented with a necklace of fifty Tahitian pearls with a center piece of seventy five diamonds in thanks for the years together and hope of many more years to come.  We ate a gourmet catered meal on tables with blue and white floral arrangements with live background music and then danced under the stars to 50's songs.  The next morning we all blessed them as they reaffirmed their wedding vows in the cool shade of tall redwood trees and then brunched on the patio.  The weekend festivities were topped off by a sailboat cruise on the Lake. It was the gold standard party weekend, perfect in every tiny detail.  But what made it really so special was the evident great love of the couple magnified by the happiness and love of their family and friends.  What a way to spend a weekend!  Bravo for their celebration of love!!

Golden Threads

I don't know what happens to us after we die.  I honestly don't know, even though I am a minister.  I often say that I can't believe the spark that animates living things, that spark that leaves when we die, just dissipates into entropy, disappearing into the cold grayness.  I like to think that like the molecules that make up our bodies, like that spark, go back somehow into a pool of matter and energy that is God.  Yesterday I went to a Memorial Service for a former favorite student of mine.  His death at 45 was a tragedy.  The service ended with a friend of his singing a song he composed on the day after my student died called "To Be a Tree".  The song-writer and my student had talked about death and mutually decide the best outcome after death was to become a tree.  I've oftened thought the same thing and even chosen the kind of tree I want my ashes buried under so that my molecules can be recycled and become a part of my favored tree, a copper beech.  I don't share that with church folk.  Instead I often tell them that when we truly love someone, there is a Golden Thread that is formed - heart to heart and  to God's heart.  I like to imagine that this Golden thread of love does not break with separation or even death.  Today I experienced these enduring Golden Threads from a congregation I served for 5 1/2 years in the Almaden Valley.  I had not been back in the pulpit there since I left 11 plus years ago and the love between us today was so strong that the Golden Threads were tangible, almost visible.  It was for me a strong affirmation of my call into ordained ministry.  When we truly love, that love doesn't end when we are no longer present for whatever reason.  The Golden Threads of love are woven together into a beautiful garment and today I wore that garment in church.  It was a great blessing.

The Elephant in the Room

Listening to yet another doom and gloom global warming story on the radio, reading another story of what's to come in the newspaper and today driving midday in horrible traffic, I wondered, once again, with extreme frustration, why nobody ever says there are just too darn many people and that is the cause of many of our present and future troubles.  Whatever happened to ZPG (Zero Population Growth) of the 60's  and population biologist Paul Ehrlich?  It was such a thoughtful argument:  no one should have more children than two - replacements for yourself.  It was shut down by the argument that liberal white people (the one's putting forth the idea) were asking for voluntary genocide of the minorities and ZPG disappeared.  Over-population is the elephant in the room.   Animals and plants, all living things, reproduce extravagantly.  But in nature, there are always checks and balances.  For example, wolves reproduce in good years with lots of food increasing their population until they reduce the population of their prey - say deer.  Then with so many wolves, there are not enough deer to go around for the wolves.  Then the wolf population dies back, starving and reproducing less.  But humans have wiped out any predators, so our population just keeps on increasing.  Modern medicine has improved health until people are living longer and longer.  Machismo, Catholicism, fundamentalistic religions,  poverty, lack of education ---all these and more birth rates high.  As a biologist, I know eventually nature will limit our human population in dire ways.  What has happened to the sense of responsibility for the earth?  There are too many people and that is a main underlying cause of many of our problems.

Trudy the Corpse Flower

A true phenomenon occurred at the U.C. Botanical Garden over the weekend.  We drove by on Sunday morning on the way to church and were surprised to see a long line at the gate, overflowing cars in the parking lot and many people walking the half mile down the hill from overflow parking.  We had no idea what was going on.  In the 35 years we've lived here, there's been nothing like this.  At 6 pm we drove by the Garden again (it's on our main route home) and saw it was still crowded.  Botanical Gardens don't attract a lot of people.  Then it hit me,  it was a flower-Trudy the Corpse flower - people were going to see.  I'd seen a story on TV about it.  Nicknamed Trudy, the flower is a Titan Arum and blooms only every few years.  It is the world's largest flower and one of the stinkiest.  It emits a horrible order like rotten meat only for a few hours, to attract pollinators and blooms quickly, in just a day or two.  By the the time we saw it on Monday morning, the 3-4 foot flower was fading and had no odor.  While Trudy is wonderful, so is every flower of the great variety that have evolved over millions of years. What thrilled me about this event was that so many people cared about seeing a flower.  How wonderful!  And if that wasn't enough I finally got a call yesterday that I am needed to volunteer at the Garden. I am thrilled to begin working in the propagation department.  I love being in peaceful and beautiful Botanical Garden.

Recognizing Racism

There's a lot of talk about racism being alive and well these days.  It's like white folks have had a painful extended course in self-awareness and sensitivity training. And so of course, I wonder about my own racism.  I have never had an African-American friend, nevertheless I don't want to think I'm a racist.  I've lived and worked in integrated neighborhoods and I've taught many black students in my teaching days.  In my life, I have tried my best to treat all people equally with respect and dignity.  A recent experience gave me pause.  Some of us from the Edgewood Church met for lunch in Davenport, Iowa our way to South Dakota.  Bob and the two women ordered bowls of chili.  The two other men ordered sandwiches.  The chili arrived first, then the white man got a side of fruit he'd ordered.  The African-American man had nothing served to him.  He began to get agitated, saying he was hungry too.  Where was his food?  After another five minutes the two sandwiches appeared but the African-American man didn't eat much of his and soon left the table.  I didn't think much about it.  But when I was told why, I felt really badly.  Jerry thought his food was held back because he was African-American.  That thought never occured to me.  I realized how hard it was for Jerry and all African-Americans to always have to be on alert.  How easy it would have been for the waitress to just give him a word and say his food would be right up.  I have never experienced being treated badly because of my race and so I see how my consciousness and sensitivity needed to be raised.  I could have said something to support him but I was clueless.  I felt hit hard by my own recognition of my ignorance and lack of empathy.  But now I know and have another example of my own white privilege.

Walking on water

Sitting with my feet in a cool pond on this hot hot day, I watched some water skeeters.  It amazes me how they whiz about the surface on the water.  Photos of them in my biology text show, what I cannot see with my naked eyes, that their wide feet with delicate tiny pads make tiny dimples on the water not breaking the surface.   It's understandable, they don't break the hydrogen bonds.  Their feet distribute miniscule weight not breaking the surface tension of the water.  I've been thinking about miracles today.  The Bible tells us Jesus performed miracles.  It's hard  for this ex-science teacher to know what to do with miracles that go against the way we understand this world works.  People sink if they try to walk on water.  We can't walk on water.  The hydrogen bonds can't hold together with so much weight.  I do not read the Bible literally.   I never have.  I never will.  Bishop John Shelby Spong says in his book on the Gospel of John that if Christians don't stop reading the Bible literally, Christianity is going to die out sooner rather than later.  Hooray for his bold statement!

 We have to look historically, culturally and mythologically to figure out what walking on water in the Bible could mean.  It could be like a Zen koan, something to puzzle over, with no answer.  I think about all the amazing things humans have done around water.  We've created boats of all shapes and sizes.  We water-ski on water.  We scuba dive in water.   We've taken water and moved it over and through mountains.  But we don't walk on water.  Puzzling over the Bible I usually find something new and wonderful to ponder, some new insight, some new puzzle.  Maybe that is the point:  to wonder and practice not taking anything for granted.  Water skeeters are amazing and fun to watch on a hot summer day.  They can walk on water!  I can't.  Life is wonderful!

Clutter and Spaciousness

Perhaps the best thing from our time at the cottage on Lake Michigan is a book Bob bought at the Book Nook in Montague.  It is a book about de-cluttering one's life.  It outlined a method for throwing away things, category by category, creating open space in your house, on your desk, in your closet, wherever there is too much stuff.  It spoke to Bob as he read it carefully and thoughtfully.  I am thrilled and looking forward to watching and even participating in the purges of my own.  Clutter creates busy-ness and contributes to one feeling anxious, oppressed and tired.  Who needs that?  Getting rid of clutter frees one's mind and spirit.  Our house in Michigan is relatively clutter free and everyone feels it is a very peaceful place.  Now we are staying for a couple of weeks in a house that in addition to being clutter free and also very large and spacious.  I am so attracted to the spaciousness of this place. This beautiful place has lots of open space both inside the house and outside.  I feel better here.  I feel as though I can breathe more deeply and I am peaceful.  The open space encourages my spirit to soar.  As I sit here in the quiet morning light, I wonder about my inner landscape.  How is it affected by what I see around me?   What things can I do to expand my inner space and release my spirit?  I know negative thoughts clutter and contract my inner space.  I want to choose thoughts that encourage my spirit to expand.  I want to remove the clutter in my mind.  Here I am reminded of the good effect of spaciousness on my spirit.   Here I am free to be peaceful.  Here I am peaceful.  Here I am free.

Women's World Cup

Bob and I walked to the local Buffalo Wild Wings last night for dinner and to watch the final game of the Women's World Cup: the US against Japan on their multitude of giant TVs.  Watching these soccer games, I've been astounded at the power, strength, beauty and grace of the women.  As a team, they play together so well.  How about those first three goals in 15 minutes by Carli Lloyd.  Wow!   For me, to see such strong athletic women makes me teary.  I am so proud of them.  When I was young, girls could only aspire to be cheerleaders or maybe on the Drill Team.  There were no competitive sports for girls and of course not for women.  I bought the message that girls weren't able to do those things.  In my 20's it made me very happy to hike and backpack with Bob because there I became strong physically and capable.  When Title IX came along, everything changed.  And now the whole world is watching women's sports and girls are encouraged to be strong and go as far as they can and want in sports.  Hooray!

Change

My old dad used to like to say "Nothing's permanent but change."  That things change is a given in life, but not one that I always like or even am aware of.  Who knew the water level in Lake Michigan has changed, risen 28 inches over the last two years, essentially wiping out the beach in front of the cottage we've rented for many years?   My favorite activity was to take long walks on the beach and hunt for treasures: rocks, fossils, feathers, worn driftwood.  Now the beach is a narrow couple of feet band of sand, at best, with the water splashing up against a 5 foot cliff of sand and dune grass.  Things change.  We celebrated both of our birthdays up there.  Yesterday was my birthday and we went to the local 4th of July parade in Montague.  It had veterans;  all the emergency vehicles for several counties flashing their lights, honking their horns and roaring their sirens;  cars full of politicians; cars and trucks from the service organizations;  churches on flatbeds;  merchants in trucks; and children, lots of children in wagons, a boy on a bike with the tires decorated with red, white and blue crepe paper and just walking along.  It seemed anyone who wanted to be could be in the parade.  It was an extravaganza the likes of which is found only in small towns in America.  Everyone watching was waving little American flags and smiling as the loud rock music filled all the air space and we celebrated our country and our freedom.  At night I watched the Capitol Fourth on TV.  Looking at the enormous crowds on the Washington DC Mall, listening to the patriotic music and seeing the larger than life monuments lit up by fireworks, I could not get visions of the Rez out of my head.  Now I am no longer innocent.  Now I know the dark side of us, the Europeans, conquering this land.  I saw the incredible poverty, heard the stories of broken treaties and learned about despairing teenagers crushed by abuse, bullying and poverty who hanged themselves.  I learned about Lakota history and spirituality.  I am changed and I didn't even know it had happened.

Sweet time

Last Saturday, the day after we returned from Pine Ridge, we took the granddaughters off to the cottage on Lake Michigan we have rented every year since Erika was born.  It was pouring rain when we left early, but the rain stopped by Grand Rapids and we had bright sunshine at the Lake.  The first thing the girls did was choose their rooms (they each slept in a separate bedroom of their own) and then run down to the beach.  The lake level has risen and this year washed away most of the beach, leaving a steep cliff from the dunes to the beach.  They discover two ways down, the slide (sitting down) and leaping off the 5 foot cliff into the sand below.  We packed a lot into the 24 hours we had with them there.  They delighted in riding the waves on a big inner tube, squealing with joy each time they were pushed toward the shore.  At one point, Sonja told me "It's hard work, but it's what I do."  They built endless sand castles and we walked the beach looking for treasures to be used building fairy castles.  The highlight was cooking our dinner (hot dogs and s'mores) over a fire Bob built on the dunes.  Sunset came late there (nearly 9:45 pm) and we spent our time waiting for it to get dark playing endless games of Old Maid.  It was a very sweet time, the girls loved every minute and so of course did we.

Re-Member

We're back from a week spent on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in southwest South Dakota volunteering with a mission group from Edgewood United Church at Re-Member.  It was an intense, but good and thought provoking time.  It's a long way from Michigan to Pine Ridge, our group of 20 drove 1100 miles over two days to get there.  Re-Member is a group started in Grand Rapids that develops relationships with the Indians and provides services to Indians who ask for them.  It is staffed mostly by white folks (only three Lakotans work for them now).

There was an especially large group of 57 volunteers this week, including 24 teen-agers, which stretched the facilities to the limit.  The accomodations for volunteers are simple - a men's and a women's bunkhouse.  Besides organizing the work, Re-Member has an extensive workshop where volunteers build bunk beds and outhouses.  Besides providing volunteers with three simple meals a day, they organize a program education about Lakota spirituality and history.  Each night, a Lakotan elder came to talk with us about what was on their minds.  We heard the Lakotan creation story, about Lakotan attention to children and youth, about the Wounded Knee massacre, about the betrayals by the US government (a long list in the dining room went from ceiling to floor listing all the broken treaties).  Each of them spent time talking to us about the recent rash of teen suicides which breaks all of our hearts.

We were all assigned small working groups which we assigned different projects.  The first day, my group delivered outhouses which involves getting the wooden outhouse into the truck, driving out to the site (which was far away) and then digging a six foot deep hole and putting the outhouse over it.  I found this basic practical work made me happy.  It is hard enough to imagine people living with no running water or plumbing (most of the people on the Rez) but impossible to imagine people living with no outhouse.  Yet there are many and people were so quietly grateful.  Bob worked in the workshop on site and then building an arbor for a pow wow.  Like with prayer, it is hard to know if our effort made a difference, but what I realized is that we never know the impact of what we do.  Our intention was to help and to show them some people care what happens to them.   It deeply affected us and that is something.

Against Hate

I am so so sad about the murders of 9 black people attending a church prayer service a few days ago in Charleston, South Carolina by a young white man.  It is beyond my understanding how someone could hate people he didn't even know enough to kill them.  Slaughter of unarmed people in the sacred space of a church is especially egregious.  I stand against hate, violence and especially the easy accessibility to guns that make this kind of violence possible.  We have so far to go in this country dealing with race relations.  As we leave today to go to the Indian Reservation in South Dakota, I am thinking about the violence perpetrated against the Indians, the killing, the violence and the forcing them into dependence on lands no white people wanted.  There are no easy answers.  Humans are a violent species, one of the few that kills their own kind.  We, white Americans, haven't got a clean record.  Humbly, can't we agree to recognize the humanity of all people and their right to live, to be safe, to worship, to work and thrive here in this place where we live, the United States.  I know not everyone is violent or wants the destruction of people different than themselves.  We must stand up and speak out against hate, against violence and against guns.

Lost

In a few days, Bob and I are heading west to Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota with a group from the nearby UCC Church in E. Lansing.  From everything I've learned about the Rez, it is  really dire there.  The people are lost.  It has the second worst life expectancy in the W. Hemisphere, only Haiti is worst and has the highest rate of poverty anywhere in the U.S.  The N.Y. Times has recently had articles about the sad sad high rate of sexual abuse and high teen suicide rate.  It has 80% unemployment.  The vast majority are alcoholics.  The horrible history of mistreatment of Native peoples by the U. S. government in the last 200 years only compounds the sad situation.  I've been thinking that I'll have to take up the attitude I had when I taught the mentally ill inmates in the county jail.  I never wanted to know what they had done to get there and I knew that I couldn't control what they would do when they got out, all I had was the one hour in which we were together in class.  I let go of judgment and expectation.   It worked well for me and allowed me to look deeply and see the beautiful child of God in each of the inmates.  

On Sunday at church, the group going on the Mission trip got commissioned and blessed.  I loved the liturgy.  We, the delegates, said:  "We go to recognize God's unlimited and unconditional love in those we meet.  We go to be a part of that love.  We go to walk with our sisters and brothers whom God calls friends and in the journey to find ourselves befriended.  We accept your (the congregation's) love, support and prayers.  We accept the responsibility to be open to new ideas, inspirations and insights during this journey.  We accept, with the help of God, the possibility of transformation in ourselves and others."

Those who have done this trip before speak of the powerful Lakota spirituality to which they were exposed.  It seems to me that in such dire circumstances, it is only the Great Spirit can intervene and change hearts working through people.  Keeping  the spiritual vision alive and before us while allowing ourselves to be open to this Spirit seems essential.  I look forward to this week long challenge.  Who knows, maybe what is lost will be found in this most unlikely place.

the Circus

Tonight we went to a one-ring circus, a family circus really, in a little town near E. Lansing.  It was at the Ingram County fairgrounds in Mason and a small sort of deal.  But they had lions and white tigers and elephants, which made me sad for the poor beasts, their spirits broken, their eyes so sad.  There was a clown, a lot of different acrobats, horses, a juggling act where they kept dropping the pins and a motorcycle sphere of death act.  Something for everyone.  The girls loved it.  They were excited for the elephant ride (once around the ring on the back of an elephant).  I felt so sad for the poor animals and wondered if they too were sad.  Life is full of such sadness and yet such joy.  It is very challenging to see it all and hold it all in my heart.

Crone Years

I heard my daughter-in-law Paula once explain to her oldest daughter Erika just before her 4th or 5th birthday, "in this life, if you're lucky, you get to be all the different ages."  Well, I can say after lots of careful thought, my current age isn't my favorite age.  Sunday, someone said to me, "we're in the Crone Years and we might as well enjoy them."  If I am a wise crone,  it doesn't seem much of what I've learned over my life is shared.  I liked working better than retirement.  Now my days are too focused on myself.  I go to doctor's appointments, I go to the gym, all in pursuit of keeping my body together.  It seems as though I am on an escalator moving slowly downhill and I must work hard just to stay in the same place.  I know, I know,  I have many blessings - good health, enough money, a husband and busy healthy family, but my days go by too slowly.  My volunteering has dried up.  I have never been very good at self-direction, with filling my days with whatever is my pleasure and suits my interest.  I don't like this time in my life very much.

Rumi poem

A Rumi poem  I found copied in a small notebook from 1996.

The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want.
Don't go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the doors!!
where the worlds touch.
The door is round and open.
Don't go back to sleep.

Storytelling

Sunday afternoon I went to the Ordination of my friend Judy Davis to a storytelling ministry.  She and I were classmates in seminary back in the mid 90's and its taken her all these many years to finally get approved by the Sacramento Presbytery.  I'm impressed with the Presbyterian Church for its adaptation to new forms of ministry, beyond the church.  Maybe it's what the future holds for all denominations.  Judy was ordained to a ministry called "The Gathering" which is (I quote from her write-up in the program) "a growing community of people who come together to hear personal stories from ordinary people.  Its guiding vision is a belief that our personal stories are all a part of God's bigger story that we live within.  In the sharing of our stories we not only recognize and understand better our own stories but we build community and relationship and provide a setting for fellowship, spiritual connection and healing."  I believe at our core we humans are storytellers.  It's how we know who we are and where we have come from.  For years, as I sat at the kitchen table with Bob's mom, I heard stories, many of them over and over and I learned her story.  As I try to write my own story, I know how difficult it can be to understand it in isolation.  We need community as a safe place where we can be held and where we tell our stories.  I am impressed with quiet Judy's persistence and exuberant joy in her ministry.  How wonderful to be ordained, approved by the church, at such a time in one's life.  The Presbyterian Church is most fortunate.

Empty Mind

In the practice of meditation, one is told to empty the mind of the racing thoughts, to calm the monkey mind.  As one sits for meditation one is supposed to slow down and let go of all the thoughts that come.  The image often given is of the mind being like a river and the thoughts are like logs and debris floating in the river.  Just notice the thought as it comes and then let it go on down the river, we're told.  It's always been a struggle for me to slow or stop the thoughts, until recently.  Now I seem to have an empty mind much of the time.  I don't know what's happened or maybe it's just there's not enough happening in my life.  But I am very quiet.  I wonder something is wrong.   I have little to say, so most of the time I just listen to what others say.  I sit outside when the fog lifts and enjoy the peace and quiet of the garden.  Maybe I've reached the goal, though I must confess I do find it boring.  I wonder what mischief I can create to stir things up a bit?

Just returned from our granddaughter's Preschool Graduation and potluck in Palo Alto.  Ten little ones marched down the center aisle in royal blue caps and gowns to Pomp and Circumstance.  They were very dignified and orderly and sat on the platform very quietly.  The age appropriate program consisted of the director saying over and over how much they loved the children and that's why they do this ceremony, the children singing songs (ABC, Twinkle Twinkle, Itsy Bitsy Spider) and then getting their diplomas.  Then we ate.  I didn't cause a ruckus but I saw how to do it.  You run around and around screaming at the top of your lungs and amazingly, if you're 2 or 3 or 4, folks think it's cute.

Memorial Day

Today is the day we honor our war dead and those who have served in the Armed Forces.  It's really seems like a day honoring war and warriors.  While I give my thanks to those who have served and suffered in wars, I am deeply sad today to think that after all the years of human history we haven't come very far.  We're still fighting each other.  There seems no end of tyrants and bigots and those who would kill anyone who disagrees with their philosophy/religion.  And now with there being so very many of us, it is hard to imagine a future without violent conflicts for scarce resources.  What kind of species are we anyway?  Have we not evolved culturally at all?   Is there violence at the very core of human nature?  I hope for better from us humans.  On this Memorial Day, I try to imagine a future with peaceful solutions to conflicts and struggles, but it is hard to conjure up.  I work for peace and justice in my own life and in the communities of which I am a part and hope it makes a difference.  

the girls

After almost a week taking care of the girls, here are some of things I noticed.  Sonja just turned six and has her first loose tooth.  Her clear blue eyes open wide with surprise when she's wiggling it.  She's a curious, free-spirited child who believes in fairies even though they have stopped writing her notes.  She's figured out if she goes to bed in the clothes she's chosen to wear to school the next day, she doesn't have to get dressed in the morning.  She likes to cook and has an efficient competence when making scrambled eggs.  Sitting on the floor, she cracks the eggs into a bowl, measures the milk and salt and mixes them with a fork.  Then she gets out the stool and stands at the stove, stirring the eggy mix with a spatula until they're done.  She makes cheesy toast in her very own toaster oven.   Sonja can be very kind, like the time she helped and encouraged Erika's friend trying to learn how to skate on roller blades.  It was a lovely sight to see Sonja, a whole head shorter, providing the steadying hand.  She can be stubborn when she gets her mind set on something.  She can be sensitive, like the time she burst into tears thinking she'd broken Grandpa's computer by standing on it.  But best of all is to watch Sonja whizzing to school on her Razor scooter with hot pink wheels and hand grips, her blond pony tail swinging behind her.  She's a scooter princess with perfect balance who's pleasure is evident as she glides along.  She likes to go fast and go first and ride in the street.  It's taken me a while to let go of nervousness and just smile watching the child disappear three blocks ahead on the way to school.

 Erika is almost nine, just finishing up 3rd Grade.  She always seems to have her nose in a book.  Going to the library is a favorite activity and it isn't unusual to check out thirty books.  There are open books all over the house, on the table, on the arms of chairs, on the edge of the bathtub and of course in her bed.  She's got the sophistication of the older child who has figured things out and taken on responsibility.  She's careful, when she was practicing roller blading around the block she wanted Gramma to walk nearby, just in case anything happened.  She takes voice lessons, piano lessons and tennis lessons and all would benefit (she knows) if she practiced.  She sings along in church, reading the music and singing in tune.  She's sweet and will give a hug and ask for a snuggle.  She's scared of thunderstorms, running to climb in bed with me as the lightning flashes and thunder crashes.  And she loves vegetables.  I think she's the only girl in town who will request cucumbers when asked what she wants for a snack.  Getting to be with the girls is its own pleasure and reward.  We are so blessed.