Pandemic postcard #37: 'We are still here'

Eight miles west of Highway 101, I had a decision to make: Continue straight to La Push on Washington 110 or turn right to Mora. I had a reservation at the Mora Campground near Rialto Beach, but check-in was many hours off, so I thought I'd spend the morning at Second Beach near La Push. As I neared the intersection, I saw the choice had been made for me: The temporary road sign flashed "QUILEUTE RESERVATION CLOSED."

Good for them, I thought.

As the pandemic took hold last spring, tribal governments up and down Washington's coast closed their lands to visitors. When summer came and the spread of the virus slowed, many adjacent areas in Olympic National Park opened to stir-crazy Americans seeking outdoor relief from isolation. I saw license plates from all over at Rialto Beach and cars parked a half-mile down Mora Road. But just across the Quileute River, its eponymous tribal nation remained off-limits to outsiders, as did the Makah reservation at the northwestern tip of the contiguous United States and the Quinault Indian Nation in southwestern Washington.

I applaud tribal nations for doing whatever they can to keep the coronavirus at bay, especially given the long history of indigenous people dying from diseases brought by outsiders and the high COVID-19 toll some Indian nations are facing in 2020. The closures are a reminder that the 574 tribal nations in the United States are sovereign and have the right to self-determination as well as the right to receive benefits from the federal government.

At least most of them do. Here in Seattle, we live on the unceded land of the Duwamish people. Our city was named for Duwamish Chief Si'ahl, who famously said, "The earth does not belong to man; man belongs to the earth. This we know: all things are connected like the blood which unites one family. All things are connected." 

The Duwamish are a federally recognized tribe under the 1855 Treaty of Point Elliott, but they are not currently on the list of federally acknowledged tribes. According to the Duwamish website, in 1978, the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs basically amended the treaty by adding seven new rules with which the Duwamish must comply to receive land, benefits, and services. The case has been under review by the Interior Department's Board of Indian Appeals for more than five years. 

Meanwhile, despite being in the heart of one of the wealthiest areas in the United States, many Duwamish people cannot access health services, nor can the tribe profit from tourism and gaming, as so many others do. (Seattle is surrounded by high-end resorts run by the Snoqualmie, Puyallup, Suquamish, and other neighboring tribes.) Even if the Duwamish prevail, I'm not sure how likely I'd be to hit a future casino. But along with more than 10,500 other people--half of whom have signed up in 2020--I've decided it's time to pay a small, symbolic amount of rent to the Duwamish people in recognition of the centuries they've spent caring for the land where I live today.

In last Sunday's online service, my minister Rev. Beth Chronister advocated for Real Rent Duwamish, and she also acknowledged that our physical building is on Duwamish land. I am part of a faith tradition that is grappling like never before with our nation's history of settler colonialism and enslavement. But Rev. Beth cautioned us against absolving ourselves with what theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer called "cheap grace." We can pay token rent and say a land acknowledgment and call it good, or we can go deeper, into real relationship and covenant with each other. 

I can think of two ways beyond church that I will try to do this. Early in my freelance writing career, I authored two guidebooks that explored the Oregon Trail and the Lewis and Clark Trail. I know I tried my best--given my body of knowledge in the 1990s--to offer a nuanced view of how the United States expanded westward, yet I am sure I fell fall short. As I get future opportunities to write about history, I will do better.

Second, I recommit to living as lightly as I can. I retain a small footprint by American standards, dwelling in 400 square feet, yet like Henry David Thoreau, I need to leave my cabin now and then. I usually go on foot, but I have a car, and I occasionally use it to visit nature that's not within walking distance. A paradox, I know. So when I go into the woods and walk beside the waters, I want to be as mindful as I can of what I find there. "We rarely care for that we cannot name," says British writer Robert Macfarlane, who has worked with artist Jackie Morris and musicians to re-animate lost words from the natural world, just as many Americans seek to authentically connect with indigenous wisdom.  

This is not wisdom from the past. Its practitioners are here now, seeking the right to harvest salmon and protect their water from oil spills. As best I can as a 21st century urban creature of comfort, I want to know plants by their names and birds by their songs. I want to invoke spirits and spells and "sing the things I see," perhaps gaining a tiny fraction of the knowledge possessed by the people who have lived here for millennia and who still live here today. I honor their wisdom and would be grateful for a small measure of it, if I am worthy. Spirit of life, let me be worthy of these gifts, and let us share them widely.

_____

Thank you for reading Surely Joy. You can find the new version of the blog here.

Pandemic postcard #17: Expecto benignitas

Every summer but one since 2003, I have spent the second full week of July at a Unitarian Universalist family camp in Seabeck, WA, gathered with about 250 other people who long ago became dear to me. A norovirus swept through the camp the first year my family was there, sickening many of us. I got a mild case, but I had no question I'd be back the next year and the year after that and the year after that ...

Alas, the past two summers at camp have been a bit bumpy. In 2018, I arrived two weeks to the day after my sweetheart Tom died. It was a hard week, but camp was where I needed to be, especially since it was where Tom and I had fallen in love five years before--and where I had so many good people looking after me and my stepchildren and Tom's first wife, who were also there.

Last year was tough for other reasons. Our 2019 speaker had to leave part way through the week as a family member was near death. I remember with pain how, a day earlier, a young adult friend passionately and publicly called out the speaker (who had cluelessly appropriated a phrase and intonation used mostly by Black people) on his middle-age privileged white guy-ness. Later that day, I told my friend that when someone needs to be corrected, it might be kinder to do so in private rather than in the heat of the moment. One of my favorite quotes comes to mind: "Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle."

It was a wearying week in several other ways, and by the end of last year's camp, I had decided it was time to take a year off--a decision cemented by the idea that the July 2020 theme was going to be how our faith's failures to address systemic racism were failing us. My July 2019 mindset was "I've done this work. This isn't why I come to camp." Instead, I signed up for the more lighthearted August arts camp, eager for a sort of reset button.

Now we're all living through much more of a reset than we ever imagined. The 2020 arts camp was canceled altogether, the July camp is online, and I have belatedly signed up. Systemic racism is no longer the topic; as the pandemic took hold and it was still uncertain whether we could gather in person, camp leadership wisely decided to defer that topic to 2022 when we can give it the attention it merits. (Next year's speaker had already been booked.) But in light of this summer's Black Lives Matter uprising, and because this camp is filled with folks fervently seeking justice, it seems likely we'll be wrestling with racism and privilege, and that's as it should be. I just hope we can be kind, especially as we gather over Zoom in these fragile times.

I've been thinking a lot for a few years now about the problems with cancel culture. Publicly shaming people, usually online but sometimes in person, has become rampant--and the malicious person occupying the White House threw gasoline on the flames of cancel culture when he used the phrase in his speech at Mt. Rushmore last weekend, seeking to deepen the already gaping divisions among Americans.

People do and say stupid and spiteful things, often intentionally, sometimes out of ignorance, and we are losing our ability to contextualize and modulate our responses. This "hot take" culture prompted several dozen writers and public intellectuals to sign a letter to Harper's magazine this week--but the letter was dismissed by many because its signatories include J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter books, who has recently made several cruel statements about people who identify as women but weren't born with that gender assignment. Transgender activists and allies have tried to tell Rowling why her comments are harmful, yet she's dug in deeper.

Whether she is transphobic, mean, or simply blinkered, Rowling's motivations are increasingly suspect. At worst, she risks coming off like a version of her detestable character Dolores Umbridge--yet so do the inquisitorial people who wish to unilaterally cancel Rowling and negate her body of work. The Harry Potter books have helped millions of kids (and adults) feel more at home with themselves and with the notion of difference. As long as I've attended July camp, Harry Potter readings have been a fixture after lunch. It'll be interesting to see whether that continues this year. It may be time to retire the tradition, but if so, let's do it in love, not cancellation.

We need an activism that is sustainable and rooted in kindness. We need an activism that is able to sit with discomfort, engage in dialogue, and help people retain the possibility of changing their minds (and publicly admitting they have changed). I want that for J.K. Rowling when she realizes the unnecessary harm she is doing. I want it for myself when I admit I have only just begun to address my white privilege. I want it for everybody who is right now so passionate and sure in their beliefs on any number of topics, but who may come to know years from now that their thoughts, words, and deeds lacked nuance--or were even flat-out wrong. 

___

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Pandemic postcard #16: Happy Interdependence Day

" ... when it comes to creating a multiracial, multiethnic, multireligious, democratic society, we are still a developing nation." -- Vincent Harding to Krista Tippett, On Being, 2011 (rebroadcast this week)

I used to love the Fourth of July--then 2003 happened. That Independence Day was the first one after our country went to war in Iraq on false pretenses. I was in Casper, Wyoming, visiting family and attending a holiday celebration at the local events center. From the fireworks to the jingoistic music to the diesel-belching monster trucks, it all rubbed me the wrong way. Being in Dick Cheney's hometown didn't help.

Of course, many of us now view the Bush-Cheney era with a mild pang of nostalgia. Things were bad then, but we had no idea how much worse they could get. Tomorrow may be the most divided Independence Day in our 244-year history. Maybe the rancor was worse during the Civil War or Vietnam, but we didn't have 24/7 media saturation to amplify and magnify our differences--and of course, we didn't have a global pandemic.

Ironically, this is also a Fourth of July of more promise than we've had in a long time. A growing majority of us have finally decided to recognize and reckon with the reality that our country was literally built on the backs of once-enslaved people who are not yet totally free, by immigrants, and by indigenous people. The pandemic continues to be a huge challenge, but it is also making us creative and resilient, and the new surge of cases reminds us that science is in charge.

Eighty-five years ago, poet Langston Hughes was riding a train from New York to Ohio when he wrote "Let America Be America Again," his poem noting that for many, our nation's promise has yet to be realized. Eighty-five years later, every word continues to ring true--despite the civil rights victories of the 1960s, despite having had a Black family in the White House, despite the general civility with which most of us live our lives. We still have work to do, and the Fourth of July gives us a chance to commit anew to the cause.

Our break from Britain was a long time ago. Maybe it's time to rename this holiday Interdependence Day as a reminder that we need each other--that, in the words of the Rev. Theresa Soto, "All of us need all of us to make it."

Pandemic postcard #10: Holiday in Pandemia

My church had its annual Coming of Age service last Sunday. It's one of my favorites, the culmination of a year when our ninth-graders spend a year thinking about life's big questions. Of course, the service was online, and it was still wonderful. "Joyful but realistic," one woman described it in our virtual coffee-hour gathering afterward.

From Easter and Passover and Ramadan to Mother's Day and graduation season, we've checked off nearly all the spring boxes. I love the congratulations-and-stay-strong signs honoring graduates all over my city, and it's been fun to listen to online commencement speeches by everyone from President Obama to Awkwafina to ... Donald Trump? And now it's Memorial Day Weekend, the unofficial start of summer. On Monday, when we pause to recall those who have died fighting for our country, let's remember the most recent casualties: the doctors, the nurses, the cashiers, the meat packers, the beloved grandparents.

It doesn't feel like summer. The steam heat in my apartment came on again yesterday amid a Seattle cold snap. The ballparks are empty, from the biggest stadiums to the forlorn sandlots, now given over to dogs and their people playing fetch. Concerts and sleep-away camps have been canceled. And yet ...

Italy? Mexico? Seattle!

I am not sure where or even if I might travel this summer. Except for a few recent forays to state parks open for day use, I haven't gone beyond a two-mile radius of my home. Still, it's been dawning on me anew that I live in a place that people from all over the world visit on vacation. Now that we can venture out a bit, I want to spend some time in my bigger backyard, the Emerald City. I want to wander through a nearly deserted Pike Place Market, see the murals that have popped up at Pioneer Square, and maybe hear a busker play in Georgetown. I want to spend some of my unemployment pay at local restaurants and shops in Ballard and Columbia City. And if I'm feeling really brave, maybe I can meet a friend for a socially distanced picnic or a cup of coffee, or even go to a movie once the neighborhood cinemas reopen. I would totally do that.

In many ways, the new normal is feeling pretty old. Since the pandemic is going to be with us for a while, we might as well try to have fun, safely and responsibly and with thanks to the people who are willing to serve us. We ought to be realistic ... but joyful. This is our life right now, all of it.

Pandemic postcard #3: Reality sets in

Hello again. How are you this first Friday of April? Wasn't it interesting that April Fool's pranks seemed in short supply this year? We definitely need moments of levity, but foolishness seems out of order in these very weighty times.

For me, this was the week when the reality of the pandemic--and its accompanying economic crisis--really hit home. As I write this, the world COVID-19 case total has passed one million and people are dying at an alarming rate. I was especially sad to learn we have lost songwriter Adam Schlesinger, whose smart work with Fountains of Wayne and snappy title tune for That Thing You Do! have brought me lots of joy over the years. If I need a smile, as I did when I got this news, I need only watch this scene of a band hearing its song on the radio for the first time. Talk about joy. Thank you, Adam. (And please hang in there, John Prine.)

I mentioned last week that a longtime magazine client of mine had abruptly shut down. This week, I confirmed the not-unexpected news that my top editorial client--another travel company--has no work for me for the foreseeable future. I haven't yet joined the official jobless roll; my state's jobless benefits site says it hopes to have information on how self-employed people can apply by mid-April. Meanwhile, I plan to start volunteering at my local food bank next week. They really need help and I have too much time on my hands. They are having people work six feet apart, and you can only volunteer one week at a time to limit any possible exposure to COVID-19. It feels a little risky, but I am healthy and it is a way I can be useful.

Meanwhile, I have also opened an online bookstore through Bookshop.org, a new venture that just launched in January, primarily as a way for small independent bricks-and-mortar bookstores to have a website, but also for authors and other lit lovers to buy and sell books. I have named my shop The Optimist, and its featured selections are books that I have personally enjoyed over the years--"timeless books and books for these times,"as I put it. I'm also featuring some of my photography on its pages. So if you are looking for a good read, please have a look. Your purchase will help me weather these tough times and it will benefit indie bookstores across the U.S., too.

Here are a few other things that got me through this week:

Long walks, as always. I average four miles a day.

Plenty of sleep

Lots of time to read (and spending a little less of it on the news and social media)

Mariners classics baseball, often accompanied by a solo game of Bananagrams

A concert-from-home by Josh Ritter

Online church each Sunday

Watching the classic movie Groundhog Day (An aside: It's only been a month or so, but I miss movies in the theater.)

I mentioned above that reality hit home this week, but here's something else we all know: As bad as this pandemic is right now, we will get through it. Stay safe, be well, and be kind. See you next Friday.

Another kind of food pantry. Pinehurst, Seattle, March 2020

'Melancholy: A Way to Happiness'

That's the title of a chapter I read this morning in Ageless Soul: The Lifelong Journey Toward Meaning and Joy by Thomas Moore. I'm enjoying this book. In it, Moore notes how we age throughout our lives--and about how it's natural for melancholy to increase as we get older and see more illness and death in our lives.

Mom, me, Dad

Today marks the sixth anniversary of my dad's death, so it's naturally a melancholy time of year--especially since my mom also died in early spring. As difficult as it is to face the loss of loved ones, I've always felt grateful that my parents both passed from this Earth in its time of rebirth. Spring softened the blow in both cases, even though their deaths could not have been more different. I was just 25 when I suddenly lost my mom; I was 50 when my dad died after years of decline. Both deaths helped prepare me for future losses, but my father's much more gradual passage was much more profound to me because I was old enough to process it in all its complexity.

I remember how, when I was living through my dad's difficult final months, I sometimes referred to the experience as my "holy days of obligation." As his daughter, of course I felt bound to help him through his final days as he and my mom cared for me as a child. That was the obligatory part, the often-difficult work of tending to the ever-shifting needs of someone wrestling with cognitive decline and physical pain he frequently could not articulate.

But it was an unbelievably holy time, too. I remember one evening when I wearily left Dad's apartment, crossing the parking lot to catch my bus on a nearby corner. A full moon had risen and I spontaneously broke into song:

Spirit of life, come unto me, sing in my heart, all the stirrings of compassion ... *

It was a preview of even more profound times to come, culminating in the day Dad said goodbye, three days before Easter 2012. On that day, as my brother and I sat vigil knowing the end was near, the stirrings of compassion became more real. With the help of an angel from hospice, we learned what it means to have a good death.

Moore writes how sadness is part of growing older. We don't need to rage against it; in fact, if we can sit with our melancholy, it need not turn into existential dread or depression "but instead only one strand of mood among others." And that is how I feel this rainy April day: As the best-laid plans sometimes shift and some long-held dreams recede, we learn acceptance and perspective. Or, as Moore says, "If you can allow melancholy its place, you have a better chance to be deeply happy."

* Spirit of Life, a beloved Unitarian Universalist hymn. Words and music by Carolyn Dade.

Easter as a decision

Last in a series for #UULent2018.

Easter is a decision to live with hope -- fully, recklessly, courageously -- even in the face of death and despair itself. --The Rev. Scott Alexander 

Today's #UULent word is anticipation. I grew up Lutheran, so it seems to me this would be a better word for tomorrow, the day before Easter. As a kid hearing the story of Jesus dying on the cross on what came to be called Good Friday, I sometimes wondered what was so good about it. Then again, we knew that the story had a happy ending on the way.

We can't always know that in real life, and the fact that Easter 2018 falls on April 1 gives the whole idea of happy endings a sardonic edge. But for decades now, I've thought of Easter as more of a verb--an idea introduced to me about 20 years ago in a wonderful sermon by the Rev. Scott Alexander. To Easter means to live in hope, particularly in troubled times.

And here I'd like to say a few words about baseball. The 2018 Major League Baseball season began yesterday, ushering in a six-month, 162-game odyssey that tests the hopes of its players and fans like no other sport. Baseball's Opening Day always brings huge anticipation that this year might be different (or the same, if you're the Houston Astros). But as I've written before, although a World Series ring is always the goal, a more realistic hope is to win more games than you lose--and have a good time along the way.

I finally made it to Cooperstown and the National Baseball Hall of Fame last fall, a few weeks after the 2017 regular season wound down. It was a bucket-list trip for me, and I  spent two days wandering its galleries and took hundreds of photos. (See more here, if you'd like.) Here are two I'd like to post today: a picture of the gorgeous spiritual home of baseball, Doubleday Field, and the hand-written lyrics of baseball's most famous song.

No matter what you anticipate in this season of resurrection and possibility, may you always experience joy in the journey.

Many, many thanks

Sixth in a series for #UULent2018.

Today's UULent word is gratitude. As I've noted a few times, I'm taking part in UU Wellspring--Spiritual Practices at my church. As befits our spacious Unitarian Universalist faith, we are encouraged to try any number of practices to see which ones work best in our lives. Back in January, we were encouraged to begin a gratitude journal: basically, to take time every night before bed to write down five things for which we were grateful that day.

I've fitfully kept gratitude journals before, as far back as 2005. This time, though, I've done it faithfully nearly every day since starting January 3. Two weeks after I started, I wrote, "This was a good exercise. It helped me recognize how grateful I am for my life as it is right now and that little things mean the most."

I like the idea of going to sleep with a grateful heart, but I've found that it's easier for me to write my gratitudes as part of the quiet mornings I enjoy most days: often before I read a while, sometimes after. Either way, it helps set the stage for a grateful day.

Gratitude journals past and present

I want to be in the room where it happens

Fourth in a series for #UULent2018

We’re living in a time when it’s possible to experience anything from a concert to a face-to-face conversation with friends in real time online, no matter where we are.

It’s amazing, but it’s still not the same as being there in person, without a screen as intermediary. Of course, I am writing this on my phone while sitting on the bus. But I’ve been blessed to have a few indelible in-person experiences in the past few weeks.

I traveled to Twin Falls, Idaho, earlier this month for the 25th anniversary party of the Unitarian Universalist fellowship I helped start there in 1993. It was a joy to see people I hadn’t seen in years—both from the Magic Valley UU Fellowship and from the Boise UU Fellowship, which brought its choir and other congregants along to help celebrate.

Earlier that day, I was able to check in on a friend I hadn’t seen in a long time. She was diagnosed several years ago with cognitive decline, so I wondered whether she’d remember me. She did, and we had a lovely visit—one we couldn't have enjoyed on the phone. It’s true her short-term memory is gone; she asked me the same questions over and over, as I expected she would. But she has sweet memories from decades gone by, and she is able to appreciate a favorite painting as much as she ever could. And interestingly, she told me how much less stressed I seem these days than when I was younger and always in a hurry. Hmmmm ...

Later that same wonderful week, I finally saw Hamilton onstage at Seattle’s Paramount Theater. It was all I’d hoped it would be; I still have earworms 10 days later. For weeks before the show, I'd been enjoying the original cast recording, but hearing and seeing this landmark musical in person was one of the best entertainment experiences of my life—made all the sweeter because I was able to share it with people I love.

Technology is a fine way to reach out to people and to experience the world. But being physically present—at least some of the time—is priceless.

More will be revealed

Third in a series for #UULent2018.

Sometimes in life, we choose things without really knowing why, trusting that we'll figure it out as we go along. Such was the case for me when I signed up for another year of UU Wellspring--a program for spiritual deepening--late last summer.

The first time I applied to be in Wellspring, for the 2015-2016 session, I was extremely intentional about it. I'd heard great things about the program from past participants, and I went into it feeling it might be useful as a discernment tool. Wellspring was helpful as I addressed the question of whether to stay in a job I liked but did not love, and it wound up being valuable in many other ways.

Still, when I got an email last spring asking whether I wanted to sign up for a year of further inquiry into spiritual practices, I demurred. I didn't think I'd have time enough to focus on what Wellspring ideally requires (a friend likens it to "graduate school for the soul," albeit without tests and student loans), and I was thinking about taking part as a mentor in my congregation's Coming of Age program. But another call for Wellspring went out late last summer. They needed a few more people to sign up if it was to proceed. I decided to go for it, and I'm glad I did.

Two-thirds into this year's program, Wellspring continues to give me a widening and deepening palette of spiritual tools. My final project for the 2015-2016 year was a collage featuring a "palette of practice," on which I included the many components I use on my eclectic spiritual path. (You can see it at the bottom of this blog's home page.) They include gratitude, nature, partnership, music, community, walking, meditation, attention, hospitality, and discernment.

Those are all still in play for me, but it's interesting to watch how they wax and wane. For example, two months ago, our Wellspring assignment was to begin a gratitude journal--something I've done occasionally over the years, but never faithfully. For whatever reason, I'm able to do it more regularly now, and I'm getting a lot out of it.  If I had to redo my palette now, I think I'd add one practice that doesn't seem to fit in with those I drew two years ago, and I'd call it "possibility"--as in, being open to possibility. In fact, I'd probably rename my work a "palette of practice and possibility."

In addition to our twice-monthly sessions and in-between homework of various kinds, Wellspring participants are asked to meet at least monthly with a spiritual mentor. At each session, my mentor asks whether I want to choose a little angel heart stone from a basket she has nearby. Most have words on the back, but the one I chose last week had no words: just the angel, arms outstretched, with a spark for the heart. It's the stone of unlimited possibilities, my mentor said.

Possibility is something I've written about before and something I sense stirring for me again. As a writer and editor, I must constantly think about where to place my professional energy and whether or not I'll earn money in the exchange. (That's not something the average mechanic or doctor or plumber needs to consider when plying their skills.) At times, this makes me resentful when I choose to write for no pay (as I do here on this blog, for example), or for less than I ought to earn. I also know that as someone who has freelanced most of my adult life and as someone of modest means, I'll need to use these main skills of mine for many years to come, for love or for money, ideally for both.

It's here that the sense of possibility keeps me going--that, and the flexibility I have as a self-employed person. Hearkening ahead to another word coming up on the UU Lent calendar, I find myself more curious than I've been in a while about where my writing may take me, and I feel open to possibilities I have not considered.

Learn more about UU Wellspring here. And if you'd like to support my work, consider buying a copy of Surely Joy (the book!) or even hiring me as a writer or editor for your project. You can learn more and reach me via LinkedIn. 

In defense of surrender

Second in a series for #UULent2018. 

Today's #UULent word is surrender, a word that has such a negative connotation in our culture: of defeat, of compromise, of being wrong, of giving up and giving in.

I've come to defend surrender.

I've been thinking a lot this winter about the Buddhist concept of "not knowing." It arose in the wonderful book my UU Zen group has been reading over many months, If You're Lucky, Your Heart Will Break by James Ishmael Ford. It came up again in my book club's February selection, This Is How It Always Is by Laurie Frankel. Not knowing. The middle way. Comfort with ambiguity. Deep agnosticism, as Ford put it.

In this context, surrender needn't mean defeat. It can mean acknowledging that you don't have all the answers. Should I leave my job with benefits to start a business? Should I marry this person? Should I participate in this clinical drug trial?

Surrender can mean moving ahead without having all the information you'd need to make what many people would call a rational decision. No matter how many Google searches you do, no matter how many friends you consult (on Facebook and face to face), no matter how many studies and self-help books and op-eds you read, no matter how many TED talks and YouTube videos you watch, no matter how many pro-con lists you make, sometimes you need to--or you might simply want to--follow your gut or your heart or your soul and move forward, despite the not-knowing.

Surrender can also mean giving up the idea that you must have an opinion on everything. It's the realization that you need not judge every person, every situation, and every circumstance you encounter. That form of surrender can be incredibly freeing, especially in the political and cultural climate we have today.

If you're reading this blog, odds are good you've read or heard "The Guest House" by the 13th century Persian mystic Rumi, but I'll include it here to refresh your memory (and if it's somehow new to you, you're welcome!):

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival. 

A joy, a depression, a meanness, 
some momentary awareness comes
As an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all! 
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out 
for some new delight. 

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing, 
and invite them in. 

Be grateful for whoever comes, 
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond. 

In other words, if I'm understanding Rumi (as translated by Coleman Barks), you don't need to rail against every politician with whom you vehemently disagree or curse every jerk who makes your life miserable. Nor do you need to sacrifice your ideals and values. But judicious acts of surrender can free you to have new insights, new experiences, and new delights that you may not be open to if you are consumed by the unhappy dogmas, habits, and plagues that are continually being visited upon us as part of being human.

Being comfortable with ambiguity, uncertainty, and surrender takes practice. (I figure I'll be practicing it for the rest of my life.) Since this is Lent, I'll end with a few more verses from Rumi (these are from "A Necessary Autumn in Each"):

There's a necessary dying, and then Jesus is breathing again.
Very little grows on jagged

rock. Be ground. Be crumbled, so wildflowers will come up
where you are. You've been 

stony for too many years. Try something different. Surrender.

Humility, humanity, and the art of adulthood

"It's hard to be humble when you're as great as I am." -- Muhammad Ali

I really hate making mistakes, and I recently made a bad one: In a book review, I relayed another author's quote about the work, but I mistakenly wrote that the person I was quoting had died last summer. My goof was the result of seeing an obituary in a too-quick Google check of the person's name. It didn't help that the still-alive author had the same name and birth year as the person who'd died, never mind the fact they both lived in the same city. Oy.

Mistakes will be made. They're never easy. I'm human, and I admit I goofed here.

Speaking of obituaries, John Perry Barlow died a few weeks ago and I enjoyed reading about his life. The one-time lyricist for the Grateful Dead was also the co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Among the artifacts that circulated in remembrances of his life was a 25-point typewritten document titled "Principles of Adult Behavior."

A healthy ego is a good thing, especially leavened with a sense of humor. I can be full of myself at times, and also full of it, so it's a useful corrective to be proven wrong once in a while.

Here's Barlow's list ...

P.S. Thanks for reading. This is the first of what I hope will be weekly posts over the next few weeks in observance of #UULent 2018.

In the name of love

Today is the day we honor the life and work of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, born January 15, 1929. What would he make of what we've made of our country?

Winter's dark days give us ample time for reflection, and an excuse to make the most of the light. Here in Seattle, we've had a spectacular holiday weekend: dry, clear, warm all three days. Such a gift.

For a long time, Tom and I have wanted to make the short trip to Whidbey Island to hear our friend the Rev. Dennis Reynolds preach at the Unitarian Universalist congregation he serves there. Yesterday was the day we finally made it, and it felt like we were meant to be there. Dennis was likely not the only minister who'd planned a sermon about Dr. King and found himself rewriting it late last week in the wake of words spoken in the White House.

But the bones of Dennis' message remained intact, and they were the bones and sinew and soul of Dr. King and other prophets, ancient and modern, who tell the truth. "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that," King wrote. More than ever, King's words urge us on toward commitment, and Dennis spoke of modern prophets, including the Rev. William J. Barber, who continue to carry a message of nonviolence, justice, and advocacy for the poor. Dennis finished his sermon with the entirety of Langston Hughes' "Let America Be America Again." Starkly juxtaposed against the past week -- but in fact the past year, the past decade, our entire history as a nation -- the 1935 poem is as relevant as ever.

America will be, but we're not there yet.

And yet hopeful signs abound. Here are a few others I've found just in the past week:

I read the Rolling Stone interview with Bono, then sat down to listen to Songs of Experience. My favorite song on the new U2 record remains the first single, "Get Out of Your Own Way." It starts as a plea for a woman to leave her abuser; it ends (in the segue to "American Soul") as a call for a singular country to fulfill its destiny. It's #metoo meets man-splaining, perhaps, but it's also the world begging America to become America.

Rick Steves has a new blog post about how his own family immigrated to America from Norway--at the time, "a miserable place to live...a land without promise." They arrived in Duluth, Minnesota, with $20 and thought of it as the Promised Land. We are and always have been a nation of immigrants, Rick adds, noting that while we may have a leader who fears and loathes immigrants, "I believe America is more American than that -- and that we're waking up." (Disclosure: I am a contract editor for Rick's guidebook division, and I feel blessed to be aligned with his company and his world view. Travel is the best way to trump ignorance and fear.)

Finally, after seeing it on so many Best-of-2017 lists, Tom and I watched the movie Mudbound last week. Based on a novel by Hillary Jordan and directed by Dee Rees, this Netflix original film is the story of two families living in the Mississippi Delta in the middle of the 20th century. I loved it on many levels, but especially for its rich detail of the inherent worth and dignity of nearly all of its many characters--and for how it shows us the possibility of leaving our bondage, not just the shackles of slavery, but the chains of thought and habit that keep us spiritually enslaved.

On this MLK Day, I believe we can rise up. I believe we can keep bending the arc of the moral universe toward justice. I believe that together, we can help America be America again.

Fall housekeeping

Last spring, after Seattle's rainiest-ever winter, I was done with rain. I never wanted to see it ever again. But then we had one of our driest, hottest summers ever.

So yesterday, when it rained much of the day, it felt sacramental. And especially at a time when people in other regions are suffering the after-effects of forest fires, hurricanes, and earthquakes, I will not begrudge whatever weather comes our way.

As much as spring always feels like a fresh start, so does fall. With our smoky skies cleared and our streets washed clean, with a new school year underway and baseball season winding down (giving me a little more free time since I am a seating host), autumn is one of my favorite times of year.

Today, I say farewell to two young women who have been staying in our Airbnb these past few weeks as they (successfully) looked for an apartment of their own. It's a challenge and an adventure to move to Seattle these days, so we were happy to give them a launchpad. We'll welcome our next guests in a few days -- but first, I'll enjoy the quiet of the space myself for a while.

Tonight, I begin a new session of the UU Wellspring curriculum I enjoyed the church year before last. I look forward to Wellspring as another opportunity for personal spiritual deepening, as well as the opportunity to walk now through next spring with a small group of kindred spirits.

I find that I blog a little more often during Wellspring, and I now have a little email subscription widget at the top right corner of this blog, if you'd like to see everything I write on here. (Don't worry; it'll still only be a post or two each week at the most.)

One more housekeeping note: I've been compiling a book-length collection of things I've written here and elsewhere over the past 25 years. It'll probably be out before the holidays, so watch this space for more news on that.

Wishing us all a lovely fall ...

'We're all just walking each other home ...'

At the start of this post, my first in a long while, I want to pause and say thanks to a few people:

Thanks to the civil servants who are speaking out. Thanks to the journalists who are speaking truth to power. Thanks to the everyday people who are doing whatever they can to keep this great spinning world more or less upright amid a lot of wobbling.

My little brother in California is reeling today from news of the death of Chris Cornell, the musician who was only 52 when he apparently ended his life yesterday. My cousin is in an Illinois hospital awaiting further word on a serious medical condition. I wish I could hug my brother and hold my cousin's hand, but sending love via email has to do.

The quote at the top of this post is from Ram Dass. I love it, and I've been seeing it weekly on the emails I get from Terry Hershey (whose "Create Space for Grace" e-course I'm eager to start next week).

"We're all just walking each other home ..."

What a lovely thought when none of us knows the way. We may think we do, or wish we did, but we don't.

Delicious ambiguity, the Rev. Marisol Caballero called it in her post at Braver/Wiser yesterday. She wrote:

The longer I live, the more I am taught he same lesson, over and over, by wildly different circumstances: the more I expect the unexpected; the more I roll with the punches of life’s tragedies and revel in life’s joys and victories; the more I give in to the reality that I am not as in charge of and cannot plan as much of this life as I would like, the more I can fully experience and even come to enjoy the deliciousness of my journey’s ambiguity.

Embracing and even enjoying ambiguity. Creating space for grace. These are the things we are called to do in this moment -- that and reaching out to people we love, however we can, to assure them they are not alone.

"Sequence" by Richard Serra, SFMOMA. Photo by Julie Fanselow, 2017.

Autumn is sending you invitations

This was one of the first fallen autumn leaves I saw this year, on September 17, by itself on a sidewalk in my neighborhood. I took its picture and posted it on Instagram and Facebook with the caption, "This seems to happen earlier these days. #fleeting #cultivatecalm." About two dozen of my Facebook friends and acquaintances liked the post, and one added a comment:

Autumn is sending you invitations!

Sometimes I'm tempted to give up social media, but it's moments like this I know I probably never will. I've been meditating on Sara's five words ever since that day, thinking about why the falling leaves are astonishing and poignant and meaningful, and why they become more so every year we spend on this planet.

This has been a year full of reflection for me. On the nature of work, as always. On the importance of love, and the balance between solitude and companionship. These matters merit my attention, and they help direct my attention to the handful of people who need me most (and from whom I am learning the most, too).

This blog takes its name from something Henry David Thoreau wrote, something I first read on a bumper sticker at the Walden Pond gift shop, "Surely joy is the condition of life." I bought three or four stickers and gave them to friends over the years. At long last, during my Wellspring travels and our study of the writer's work earlier this year, I was compelled to finally read this phrase in its context.

In his 1842 essay Natural History of Massachusetts, Thoreau wrote of growing weary of politics and even "the din of religion, literature, and philosophy," then he describes how his spirit is continually refreshed and renewed by nature, by

the young fry that leap in ponds, the myriads of insects ushered into being on a summer evening, the incessant note of the hyla with which the woods ring in the spring, the nonchalance of the butterfly carrying accident and change painted in a thousand hues upon its wings, or the brook minnow stoutly stemming the current, the lustre of whose scales worn bright by the attrition is reflected upon the bank.

And so it is for me. The first big windstorm of the fall is due tonight. It's raining now, and rain is forecast for the next week and probably for the next month, since this is October and it is Seattle. Yet I feel fortified for any darkness and uncertainty ahead by many walks in beautiful places this fall. I've been recording my impressions less in words and more in memories and photos, because that's where I am in my life.

I don't write here much, and I don't post much on social media. I take comfort (and, yes, joy) in what Thoreau says about "the inexpressible privacy of a life -- how silent and unambitious it is."

Autumn's invitation to me, especially in this season of din and angst, is to dare to be unambitious, to dwell in the present moment, to recognize and gratefully acknowledge gifts as they're revealed to me, and to share when I am moved to do so.

Thanks, Sara, and HDT, too.

Successful failure

Today's #UULent word is failure. A joke about UUs is that we read ahead in the hymnal to make sure we agree with the words we're about to sing. Well, I've been reading ahead on the list of words we've been asked to ponder, and today's is one I'd rather skip. (Especially coming a mere five days after mistakes last Friday. But we learn from our mistakes. Failure seems less noble, somehow. And isn't this a blog about joy?)

Still, I know it's spiritually useful to face the things we'd rather ignore. So this morning, as I consider failure, I'm thinking about two things: baseball and politics. Spring training opened yesterday, and my team won 7-0. Exciting! Success! Being an 18th-century Brit, Alexander Pope surely didn't have baseball in mind when he penned the phrase "hope springs eternal," yet it's perfect for a pastime that makes its annual debut in sync with this sublime season of newness.

I know that my team will lose 80 games or so this year. Everyone wants to win the World Series, but honestly, finishing over .500 is a more attainable goal. Along the way, the best hitters will succeed only a third of the time, and the best pitchers will lose at least a handful of games. But it's OK. Even the worst team in baseball will delight its fans 60 times or so before the boys of summer head home this fall. In sports, even amid failure, there's plenty of success. (Take it from Michael Jordan.)

Ten years ago, I was working as one of the nation's first paid Congressional campaign bloggers. On Election Night 2006, my candidate lost, as Democrats almost always do in Idaho -- but we had fun along the way, as this button attests. (I also remember walking in many small-town parades that summer as part of the Grant for Congress Clean-Up Crew, with our mops and brooms.)

From the candidate on down, we were a team of talented amateurs who'd suddenly turned pro. We really didn't know how to play the game, so we made a lot of mistakes. Yet on Election Night, we came within 5 percent of winning (in a district where the Dem is routinely beaten by 20 percent or more), and we helped pave the way for another, better-funded candidate with more Machiavellian management to win the next cycle.

I worked in politics for another six years, and it usually wasn't so fun. I experienced moral failure even amid victory, and many failures of imagination. I got out of the political game for good three years ago, blessed with an opportunity to return to journalism, and I won't be going back because I know that (for me, anyway), it is not soulful work.

Today, as I think about failure, I'm also thinking about a podcast I heard a few months ago with Elizabeth Gilbert and Brene Brown in which they tackled the topic at length. Brown mentions how her question used to be "What would I do if I knew I couldn't fail?" but it had evolved to "What's worth doing even if I fail?" Gilbert agrees and says we ought to let go of the idea of "it worked or it didn't work; it was a success or it wasn't a success." Of the creative life -- which of course is all of life -- Gilbert also suggests that it's better to be a trickster than a martyr. (That's another post ... or five.)

I know this baseball season will be a success because we'll all have fun along the way. I feel the same way about my return to independent writing.

My life has been a lot more joyful when I've been a trickster -- and when I've understood and embraced the concept of successful failure -- than when I've taken things way too damn seriously. I wish the same for you.

Space of infinite possibility

Today's #UULent word was fear. As a professional writer for 30+ years, I have no fear of the blank page. But blank calendar pages? That's another story.

I'm leaving my current job a week from tomorrow. I gave notice back in November, and my last day is almost here. This photo is of my planner a month from now, the third week of March, a time of the month I've been in production as a magazine editor these past two years. But next month, I'll have no deadline to meet. My successor will be putting her first issue to bed, and I'll be three weeks into not having a paycheck.

My challenge will be this: Can I overcome my fear of having nothing to do ... of hitting up my savings account ... of sitting with the blessed but somewhat scary spaciousness of the independent life?


I had a dream last night. I dreamt I was doing one of those little plastic puzzles we used to get in birthday party goodie bags when I was a kid. You'd slide little tiles around to get the numbers in order, which meant there had to be an empty space so the tiles could slide. But in my dream, there was no empty space, so there was no room to maneuver.

I love my planners, and these past two years, I've used something called the Passion Planner. Its creator, Angelia, is an amazing, inspirational -- and very young -- success story. But I found myself writing "NO" next to her tip of the week last week: "This week, try to fill as many time slots as possible. Schedule out everything from sleep, to meals, to time for yourself." The idea, she continued, is to track where your time is going, "allowing you to assess your productivity and truly be present during each moment."

No.

I've been keeping lists and scheduling my time and and assessing my productivity for decades. I'm at a point in my life where I just want to live. These days, being truly present means putting aside my compulsions to make endless to-do lists and plan every last thing.

There's something else on each page of my 2016 planner, something that resonates much truer for me. It's the Space of Infinite Possibility. Angelia is speaking my language here.

I am confident that, a month from now, these pages won't be blank. But my wish today is that I not fear the open spaces ... that I embrace these spaces of infinite possibility and not be in a rush to fill every last spot on my agenda. Because I have a feeling that it's through sitting in the so-called empty spaces that I will find the work -- and the play and the leisure and the meaning -- that is most true for me.

Hearts full of soul

It's the first Sunday of #UULent. On my Instagram feed, I am posting a photo each day to represent the word of the day. On Sundays, we are called to reflect, embody and enact the word, too. And of course, today's word is love.

I woke up this morning with the famous 1st Corinthians:13 passage in my mind, "Love is patient, love is kind." There's more before and after that, as you've likely heard at many weddings, but really, the first two phrases of that fourth verse say it all.

Love is patient. 
Love is kind. 

The rest is commentary.

I've been in love a few times in my life. Today, my sweetheart, Tom, and I celebrate our third Valentine's Day together. For us, love is patient, kind, frequently passionate, rarely prickly.

Most of all, it's companionable.

This box arrived last year filled with chocolate-covered strawberries. When it was empty, I decided to fill it with memories. It's filled over the brim already, and we're just getting started.

Romantic love is wonderful, but today, I'm also feeling love for my daughter. When I arrived at church, the early service not quite done, I opened the door and saw a mother quietly nursing her baby, just the two of them alone.

"That's true love," I said to her. I mentioned having happy memories of that experience, then noted that my "baby" will be 22 this year.

"They sleep through the night by then, right?" We both laughed.

Maybe not, but it's not for me to know. My daughter is living her life. It's the life I gave her; it's now fully her own, but she'll always be part of me and vice versa.

And there is even more love somewhere. As people gathered for the service, I happened to see -- and talk with -- a half dozen or more people with whom I've shared a bond in our faith community, through a Covenant Group last church year and Wellspring in this one. Shining faces, smiles and waves of recognition. I've only been part of my current congregation for two years, but I feel the love growing there. As usual, the more you give, the more you get.

Love starts within, and it ripples outward. May it ever be so. Meanwhile, got a date ... have to run ... :^)

Own your story

I've been a fan of Austin Kleon since Steal Like an Artist, and I've been having a lot of fun with The Steal Like an Artist Journal, which he released last year. This month, Austin is posting a page a day of people using the journal on his Instagram, so this is my shot at glory, at least among fellow Austin Kleon acolytes.

This post says a lot about me:

I'm up crazy early today. Deadlines.
I'm procrastinating from the work I'm supposed to be doing.
I'm not afraid of much.
Life is good.
A leap is nigh.