to her scent i will go...

Today I had this semi-sacred experience regarding the new soul who inhabits my waking and sleeping hours.

I was at work and work has been hard. The grief and stress and violence of other people's lives constantly surrounds me. In our work we are witnesses to suffering and salvaging and sometimes small victories. On top of that, I also have to deal with piles of administrative bullshit, truly wonderful volunteers (something like 12 this semester), planning for meetings, and working in coalitions...

That, there shit above, is the backdrop. I sat at my desk almost paralyzed by the amount of stuff I had to do, when this scent came barreling into my nose. The smell of my darling daughter's skin fell over my face. She, of course, was at her home day care, not there with me in my garage of an office.

The gentle scent of her little head--the place where infant sweat, the scatterings of sweet food and breast milk leftovers, soft, downy hair oils, and her baby bath soap mingle--came over me as if she were sitting on my lap. I paused what I was doing. My eyes glassed over with tears; tears bordering on the edge of the divine and sentimentality, and I inhaled with devout attention for a breath.

Then it all became a divine moment.

It was some kind of miracle. A reminder of this sacred bond I have with another human being. A reminder that legal rights (while I will fight for them until the day I die or until I get them) mean nothing in the face of the daily miracles and sufferings kk and I go through as we engage and love this small child.

If only I could bottle this scent and experience and sell it to the conservative right. The people who think I have no business raising a kid. The people who do everything in their power to disconnect me via intrusive laws (or non-existent ones) from willa's existence...oh ya, folks, if I have not mentioned it here before, I cannot adopt willa in MI--there is no second parent adoption. So, I feed her, bathe her, dance with her, love her with all of me, but, in the end, someone who does not love her as I do or who does not love kk as i do could essentially do legal battle to get her from me and essentially kk's next-of-kin have more rights to her than me. Blah de blah blah fucking blah dee da.

But that ghost-like tendril of traveling smell, it reminded me of the oppressive nature of "man"-made laws. It reminded me of the lasting longing of the deepest sacred parts of humanity. It carried me to a new and better place. The connection embodied in this real, yet profoundly strange, moment surpasses that which the political sphere, the sphere of marginalization and bigotry, and the sphere of civil and human rights can never tap into. I have both animal and spiritual connection to my child beyond the imaginings of the human mind.

So, to her scent I will go. To the smell of her hands that now feed her own self--peaches and dirt, summer and minerals. To the smell of her cheeks when we enter the house from a walk in the sun. To the smell of her shit that invades the whole house with intestines discovering the nuances of various human foods for the first time. To the smell of her tears, like water on dry stones. To the smell of her breath, like an indescribable sweetness doused in the gentle sour of buttermilk. To this small being who I love with the deepest parts of me. To her scent I will go.

hankering for willa;)

My little, constipated darling is nestled against my chest sleeping hard. She is experiencing her first bout of real constipation and I hurt for her little abdomen. I thought you might be hankering for some willa shots so find a quick photo narrative of the last many weeks. Oh, by the way, the willster is sitting on her own now. Yes, at 5.5 months her little abs are strong and she can hold herself up. She is a bit wobbly, but nonetheless, I am impressed.

For my b-day weekend at the end of April we went on a little trip. This is my sweet one and me all pooped out on a hotel bed. The wrench was a gift from an interwebs' awesome person.


Willa at the Growing Hope Plant Sale! Me all squinty in the back...


The chickens really, really want to make a snack out of will's toes. We have to chase them off when willa is in the yard.


Our first mother's day. I have so many reflections to share on what this all means or does not mean to me, but I won't. Though, I will, soon and very soon, reflect on how heterosexism has become so much more visible and real to me since becoming a parent to this amazing little chunk of star.


Willa's first Bike Ypsi Spring Ride and Festival. She is being held up by our really tall friend in a florescent wbreaker.


Besides working too much, gardening as much as I can, riding my bike as much as I can, and spending quality time with will and k, kk decided that we should dig up the back yard and replace the sewer fittings that come out of the house and about 8 feet out to the old clay pipe. So, I've been supervising and working on that project too. My co-worker and neighbor dug this daddy out in a few hours and then our friend t helped glue all the parts together and fit it up nicely. All of this was guided along by this really great water engineer ypsi guy (for free). We are lucky. So, this has also been taking up my time. I have worked on backfilling the hole. This means throwing heavy dirt/clay back down in a gaping 6 by 8 by 6ish feet deep hole in intervals and stomping the hell out of it.

Pic of us staring down...

tired, sad, and tired

I should be working. But, I am too sad to work. I've been missing in action over here at injection reflections because I have been working too much and trying to be a good parent and good partner. But today it is gray and beautiful and my heart is breaking for so many reasons.

I am tired of the meanness. I am tired of the ruling, white elite.
I am tired of the rich. I am tired of the haves and have nots. I'm tired of violence. I'm tired of humans killing the planet. I'm tired of the disconnection.

I am tired from witnessing the problem of prison:
the abuse within prisons;
the social factors that lead to the use of prison;
the inequities in sentencing;
the cycles of violence that lead to death and harm and insanity in poor communities;
The homophobia and transphobia that lead to the incarceration and then further abuse of queer people once they are incarcerated;
the general public's ignorance of what really happens in prison and the ability of their ignorance to shape policy (tough on crime measures and then restrictive, punitive, retributive practices once people are in prison)
the racism that fuels the expansion of the use of prison...

I am simply tired of fighting.
But, I will keep on keeping on. Only because of the individuals who we are able to help.

I started writing up the case of someone I've been working with for so many years...it hurts to think how long she has been suffering, but then I decided I'd just lay it out this way. Imagine being a nearly fully transitioned M to F and being forced to live in an all male prison. Imagine having serious difficulty getting appropriate health care to deal with a complication with your top surgery--silicone leakage (I'm talking five years of pain and suffering). Imagine the daily harassment from other prisoners and staff alike. Imagine being called mister, sir and he just to turn the knife in those soft parts connected to your gender identity when all your life you simply wanted to be recognized as the girl you are. Imagine living amidst the constant threat of sexual abuse and sexual harassment. Imagine getting a major misconduct ticket for impersonating a female when you are a woman. Imagine the refusal of the prison system to acknowledge the trans/homophobia of the system. *note: I was able to help get her moved to a unit with a less-abusive climate.

But I want more.

I want this woman and other woman and men like her to be able to shape policy directives to include their perspectives on how they will be able to live more safely and wholly while having to live in prison. For years the woman above has been asking to be moved to a different prison and to be able to choose another gender variant identified bunkie at a more easy going, well-run prison than the one she lives at now. When I first met her she was in a level V prison cause she needed a single bunk. Eventually, we were able to get her moved to a lower level single bunk. Then, recently, she was moved to a prison notorious for being called the glad.iator school (a prison for younger--often more violent--prisoners). Why? Why?

Imagine being a prisoner rights activist and some days just feeling utterly hopeless and tired with the almost impenetrable system.

I'm done now.
But just for now.

when they were young

i have so many reflections buzzing through my mind and so little time to capture them with letters.

work, play with the new love of our lives and taking care of the new love of our lives, and sleep seem all to be the center of the universe to us.

Some days, I look at pictures of my parents when they are young, and I am amazed at their tenacity in the face of the newness of being parents. After all, my mama was 19 and my dad was 22. K is 36 and I am 34 and we are so green, but easing into this with clarity and open hearts.

me and daddio


me and willa


our elders next to our bed


my sweetheart, again...

quick letter to you

Dear Readers,
I've been really swamped. I've been to Kalamazoo, Lansing, Chicago, and Detroit (numerous times--Detroit) that is in the last 3 weeks.

The US Social Forum is in full swing and we've (as in AFSC-MI) have been participating. Did a workshop on prisoner advocacy on Wed, participated, but only half of it, in the prison justice PMA yesterday. And, today--well today is our big Retur.ning Cit.izens Family Reunion picnic down at the USSF on the Detroit river. We've been organizing it with a bunch of other organizations. It should be beautiful.

With all of this happening, my kk is still with child. She is getting to near half-way through. I cannot believe that soon and very soon we will be parenting a new little life. After the 20 week mark, I will have more detailed updates on what we are planning and doing regarding the preparation for birth.

And I have been gardening like mad.

Yesterday I got home from work around 6:45 and then worked compost and my gardens until 9:00. I cannot even begin to explain the joy that I feel in the physical exhaustion that accompanies laboring in the earth. And for those of you have not figured it out yet, I am really, really into all of this mass compost creation. So much so that I hand picked 3 large bags of clover and other greens from my yard to layer a new active compost pile the other day. Can you imagine having the opposite dilemma of the most common city compost problem which is not enough access to brown material? I have more than enough access to the browns--I need me some greens:)

Well, readers, I am soon to leave for Detroit to hopefully help kick off a super delightful picnic with the people.

Pics later and I do have another little comic to upload, just need to have the 10 minutes to scan it and post.

Be well,
the injector

refueled smiles

Wow. What a week. I am on a train on my way home from Chicago--arrival time estimated at 11:30 EST. P and I headed there on Tuesday to mingle with our colleagues and talk about our work and learn and live a little. It was good.

Our Chicago office had a fundraiser last night that went really well and was inspirational because it was all about honoring young people working for social justice within AFSC--young high schoolers, young college kids, and young in-betweeners--between college or previous work and the rest of their lives.

Anyhow, our regional director is incredibly inspirational and he is so focused on the organizing work that we all do on the ground and the educational pieces of our work built into the fabric of our organizing; this focus really plays well off of our local work with people in prison in MI.

We work with so many young interns and volunteers. We rely on these full-of-energy, yet-to-be-jaded people to help us get through the thousands of letters and other correspondences that we receive each year from people in prison and their loved ones. I am so proud of these kids. Yes, I call them "kids" cause in some ways they are like our real kids. We've developed strong relationships with them and we learn so much about living from them, and they also learn so much about advocacy, and activism, and organizing.

For all of the stress that my work holds within the very nature of its reality; for all of the heartache that crosses our paths; for all of the abuse and harm that we are witness to on a daily basis; knowing that these young people are getting turned on to justice issues and knowing that they will carry what pieces of hope might still be cracking in dust balls from the sky into fertile somethings that will grow a different future--a future dedicated to compassion for all living things and for generations to come, well, all that knowing makes me smile and refuels me for the days ahead.

And, we happened to be in downtown chicago when the blackhawks won last night. kind of neat and surreal.

And, P, got to see the big city for the first time. Also, really neat.

So, to hope, I raise my invisible glass and to the next many weeks of work, I turn to the vapors of energy rising from the minds of those young ones in my life who will and are making a difference in the lives of countless others.

swollen

Well, I guess I've been served up a super fancy dose of sitting time. I had planned to work in the gardens all weekend, but yesterday's work will have to suffice. For the first time in 1.7 years, my knee has ballooned up into its swollen irritated self.

Instead of garden work, I will consume copious amounts of ibuprofen and heat, ice, heat, ice, heat, ice. It seems like my knee always has a beef with me after a strenuous work event.

I guess my body responds in ways that I listen. It is saying sit the fuck down. And now, I am forced to.

It gives me time to think and write and perhaps read things I feel like catching up on.

Now, on to nursing my gelatinous appendage.

party for penelope and pregnacy still hopping

okay. Sorry to flit away. But my life is out of control busy. I feel totally overwhelmed to the point of acting slap happy most days. Tomorrow we throw a big ass party for penelope. penelope was the director of where i work for over 23 years. she retired back in march and tomorrow is this big fundraiser/retirement party to honor her 23 years of prisoner rights work.

i ended up being responsible for most of the organizing even though i am so far from an event planner i smell extra strange when aiming to plan an event.

i think what starts happening is my mind drafts a story of how the evening should go--please understand the stories in my mind are not all that normal. so how the evening should go gets all goofy, and, in the end, i hope that goofiness turns to interesting.

simply put there is a party mix containing multiple covers of john denver's rocky mountain high; shitloads of desserts (provided in large part by my always pulling for me friends);a presentation that i've been working on for days; and dancing (international folk dancing and regular dancing).

in baby world, k had an ultra sound on monday and she saw the critter jumping around "like a monkey." those are her words. i was not there, cause i was working; busy life made flesh.

the doc could not see the hemorrhage and the bleeding has mostly stopped.

In another news, it is fucking hot for may. we are talking nearing 90 and the gardens are thriving and i have so many more plants to get into the ground, but they will have to wait until the weekend.

i also have another amazing bee hive experience to share, but that too must wait.

till then. happy hopping baby and parties celebrating a person who gave (and gives) a damn about those who are often considered the most unlovable.

it will be okay and maybe even better

I have things to do. Work—lots of it. This work includes my paid work and my house work, but then it also includes the work of my own head and heart.

I need to work through some themes that keep surfacing. Since k had all the bleeding spells, she has not been riding to work with me (though she did ride both ways yesterday for the first time in three weeks). It leaves a void, but also this time to contemplate the things of the world.

Spring is such an active time. Everything is bustling with energy and newness. It makes total sense that my mind is doing the same thing. It is shrill with desire. The desire to know; the desire to understand; the desire to love; the desire to make love; the desire for something bigger than human to help.

Help with what?

To make sense out of human motivations, love, desires, actions, hatred. I do not need definitions or total explanations. I need a bigger peace.

I need to know that when I witness the heinous actions of humans against humans that amidst the knowledge of those actions I can survive and so can those that I know and love and do not know and love. And the survival I am writing of is not just getting by, getting through it; rather, it is knowing that the little efforts toward something better do indeed matter and that these little efforts translate and carry over to generations to come.

And when I speak of generations to come, I do not simply mean human generations, but I mean the vitality and security and well-being of all living things and the rocks, soil, water, and air with which they all exist.

All of this gets me waxing spiritual. Whitman comes to mind a gruff booming in my ear. The rhythm of his voice a fixture in my head though I have never really heard him (except on the gravely, “36-second wax cylinder recording of what is thought to be Whitman's voice reading four lines from the poem ‘America.’”) But rather the rhythm bounces over my memories because I have been reading him religiously since 11th grade American literature when I fell in love with his words and the rapture they induced in my belly.

And, so when I ride my bike down by the river and I think about this woman I met last weekend—the daughter of a man who probably sexually abused hundreds of young woman—I move to Whitman and the words that he wrote; the words that invoke the turn toward something akin to perceptiveness and peace.

I think of our fallibility and our ability to harm. I think of our holiness and our ability to heal. I think of how this woman who expressed that she had done all that she could to keep her father from acting out again and again should never have had to endure that endeavor alone. I think about the messed up world we live in that isolates and abandons people leaving them to their own devices rather than welcoming, developing community, and holding one another accountable over and over again for all of our actions and in-actions.

I think how I want it to be different. I pray that it will. I hum praises to the birds that bring me peace and spin smiles and gestures to the water lapping over rocks and ridges of river.

I listen to this old man, long dead; the cadence of his writing like a comfrey balm. It seeps liquidy over the bristled edges of my heart into those cut places where pus and angst rise up and where I yearn for something more to cradle my face and whisper in any form that comes--it will be okay and maybe even better.

From Walt Whitman's Song of Myself
The smoke of my own breath,
Echoes, ripples, buzz'd whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and
vine,
My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the pass-
ing of blood and air through my lungs,
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and
dark-color'd sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,
The sound of the belch'd words of my voice loos'd to the eddies
of the wind,
A few light kisses, a few embraces, a reaching around of arms,
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs
wag,
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields
and hill-sides,
The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising from
bed and meeting the sun.

Have you reckon'd a thousand acres much? have you reckon'd
the earth much?
Have you practis'd so long to learn to read?
Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?

Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin
of all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions
of suns left,)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look
through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in
books,
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.

34

i turned 34 this weekend.

i worked all day on saturday--the day of my birthday.

we went for beer at founders after working all day; it was yummy and we visited with good friends. we were in grand rapids.

k is still bleeding on and off. she is feeling sicker and sicker; i guess this is a good sign.

i have been reading like mad. i have been working so much that i turn off quickly when i come home by ducking my eyes and therefore my brain into a good book. I've read three kate delafield mysteries and one jane lawless mystery in the last week and a half and yesterday i read hood. yes, i am still on my "lesbian" fiction kick. I went through all the young adult lesbian novels at the whitaker branch library and now i have to get the other 4 i intend to read from the other branch. but in the meantime, i've been reading any other lesbianesque novel i can get my hands on. I go through these phases once in a while. these times when i cannot handle anymore straightness since it circulates around us like dandelions and grass and wind, essentially it is everywhere.

anyhow, it s just nice to read about two women finding peace and pleasure in one another. i like that. it helps take me away from the chaos of my working life and the stress of this living that is trying to happen in kk.

now, i am older--one year more notched out of the wooden trim lining the front door. now, i am hoping for longevity and limberness as this embryo unfolds into a child inside kk. i need strength. i need some bigger peace. i'll write about that more some other day.

My meditation

Taking care of our chickens is my daily (or every other day) meditation time.

The meditation goes like this:
While still inside in the semi-warmth of our kitchen, fill three or two containers with warmish water.
Set outside on back porch.
Dress in large winter jacket and warm hat (usually forget to wear gloves, because I like my hands to be nimble not clumsy)
Make sure my feet have socks on them.
If I am missing socks, go put a pair of socks on cold feet. (kk constantly gets on me about going barefoot in the middle of winter. I’ve lost count of how many times she has placed a pair of slippers in front of me and given me the finger wag and look).

Slip into boots (usually k’s green mucks are perfectly placed on the back porch).

Walk down treacherous steps and through backyard to coop/run.
Greet our ladies with a, “hi lovely girls. How are you this morning?”

Pull snow tarp back and open door.
If we will be home, keep door ajar
If we will be gone, shut myself into the run with the hens

Monitor feed bucket
If feed refill is needed, unclip feed bucket
If no feed is needed, leave feed bucket in place
unclip rubber, water bucket from chain

exit run
with bucket/s in hand

Beat on rubber bucket until ice water releases
Depending on the temperature, sometimes must run hot water over bucket then kick it/ throw it until ice releases

Take bucket/s on back porch.
Fill emptied water bucket with warmish water
Fill feed bucket with feed and oyster shell mix

Walk back down treacherous steps and through backyard to coop
Re-enter run
Hang up the water and feed

exit run

If we have special scraps, retrieve them from porch or kitchen

Back to run.
Feed the ladies the scraps.

Check hen house for extra amounts of chicken shit.
Remove with small rake and throw into compost heap.
On some days, refill pine and straw in hen house.

Check for eggs in nesting box.
Lately, only 1 or 2 are there.

Collect eggs.

Walk back to house.
Slip out of boots.
Go inside the house.
Put away eggs.
Wash hands with warm water and soap.

Meditation ends.
20-30 minutes of good chicken work and quiet, cold emptying of mind and preparing for another day

good bye sabbatical

I've been back to work for one week.
It was hard diving in. I cried. Well, I wept hard.

I was scared that all my compassion had dried up and that stumbling back into the madness of direct connection to a justice system so full of injustice and ache and madness (not insightful madness, but the angry, heart wrenching madness of a system rusty at the root and too heavy with the bones of too many souls to turn in any degree of right direction) would be too difficult to stomach.

When the days were long and the flowers were blooming and life was pulsating in the perfect patterns of aliveness all around me this summer and early fall, I felt contentment. I also felt that deep satisfying exhaustion due to all of the hard physical labor I did around the yard (our little urban farm on the edge of some woods; the kind of wooded area in cities where dead, human bodies turn up--eerie woods I would not walk alone in at night).

Anyhow, I was so fortunate to have these many months off and explore the pieces of myself that have often been pushed asunder because so much of my time is spent working away from my homestead. When I list what I accomplished over the last 3.5 months it is quite amazing:
Scraped and painted front porch and railings
Got chickens
got bees
learned about beekeeping from my beekeeper mentor and some books
harvested over 2 gallons of honey two weeks ago by myself--well kk was my helper--but I did it without my mentor
rendered beeswax
made lip balm
built from scratch with no plans mobile chicken run for chickens
put together pre made coop and permanent chicken run
took a permaculture course and got a certificate
dug a four by four by four root cellar in the back yard
filled it with a shit load of michigan squash, onions, and soon some sweet potatoes
planted and tended gardens at home/gardens at community garden
made a lot of pies
went raspberry picking
went blueberry picking
made blueberry freezer jam
dehydrated a hell of a lot of roma tomatoes
taught myself to cook lamb shank
cooked a lot of good food from local farms and my own backyard
read some books
tended to kk's dying grandma
ushered in her death in our living room
eulogized grandma s at memorial service
spent a vacation up north with my sister,eo, her husband, the 3 wee ones, my ma and dad, k's dad, and grandma c and got along swimmingly
threw a great dinner party for my baby sister's,ea, pre-wedding celebration
stood up in aforementioned sister's wedding with kk and other sister
road my bicycle a lot
planted three american black currants, two precocious hazelnuts, one american hybrid chestnut, two beach plums, four regent serviceberries.
pulled out bushes in front yard including stumps, by hand, in order to plant the serviceberries
ran a chicken wire fence behind where the tall bushes once lived
went to reskilling festival and milked a goat
wrote
drew a little
loved a lot
enjoyed my friends
enjoyed sleeping
drank good beer
rested
got my hands dirty
hit 5,000 miles on my portland
loved some more
realized how much i love animal husbandry and how one day i want to keep goats too and homestead as full time as possible

so, I am back to work and I still have an ever-flowing chest of available compassion which I am thankful for. And I have the understanding hearts of people around me, at work, who are insisting that I not jump full force into the nitty gritty and that I be good to myself.

Good bye dear sabbatical; you were so good to me and my heart is better for having known you.

for something different

have you ever woken at dawn and felt as though it is dusk--that dusk feeling--you know the one like the sadness of the day is falling into night but still hovering over your chest, following you to bed? but today it was morning and the dusk still settled softly over my bones and my dreams still teased me with vivid images; images not so lovely and not so terrible.

my perception of time is all mixed up, yet my affinity for the cycles of life taking place all around me is thriving.

the hens in the backyard know it is dawn. they do not get confused. they are walking and bouncing on specific patterns of time.

I am trying to sync with the goings on in my backyard and garden. I am trying to line my life up with these miraculous cycles. I am trying to eradicate this blurriness between dusk and dawn.

I think that is what I am here to do--to close the gap that has been created between humans and the living things all around us. that gap is responsible for the violence and harm we wage on one another as human beings, and more succinctly and profoundly the violence we wage on this beautiful earth.

If i could have my dream--if i could live more for that which is just, i would be working here at my home to raise my food and share it with my family and community. i would be involved in detaching more and more from the bullshit of desire for useless things. all in all, it is this desire for stuff that helps to create systems of perceived needs (which are really wants).

Of all of the people I have crossed paths with who are locked behind bars, none of them have been locked up there for stealing the basic necessities needed to live--stealing food, or clothes (well maybe retail fraud, but that is above and beyond stealing the clothes needed for warmth and protection from the elements), or squatting to keep a roof overhead.

But the ravages of isolation, addiction, desire for a constructed idea of comfort and belonging based on the accumulation of more objects, distrust, heartache, and violence (connected to our ultimate separation from one another and the other living creatures on this planet)--these are the culprits that lead to destruction and then in turn to our complicated system of punishment.

I really do not think any of it can be "fixed" within our current reality. Do you know how futile it makes me feel about my paid work--this work I have been doing for nearly 7 years for justice/for change/for something different? Not that anyone out there reading this really gives a flying fuck about these constant conflicts in my head and heart, but I had to vent and I had to introduce you to our new chickens--some days I wish I was a chicken or a bee then my dawn and dusk would be marked with no edges of confusion.

coop, insects, photos

soon chickens will be living in here

Right now my body is hurting with some deep muscle pain from hours of scraping and prepping our front porch for a new coat of paint, priming the clothesline poles and the porch rail, and helping to carry an enormous chicken coop over our fence and then screwing it together (at one point k and I almost literally appeared to be screwing the chicken ramp cause it landed between our legs while drilling up under the house).



Besides house improvements and mini-urban farming, I've also been riding plenty of mileage on my bicycle. I am up to 4,400 miles.

Lately, I have this obsession with insects and eugene o'neill. Below are some pictures I took on one of my bike rides down by the river i love.


ladybug


many at work


grapes


alone at work


sumac

work, the body, the soul (June 25)

I am sitting here loving a respite from the humid heat that’s been hanging like a milk soaked sponge over our heads for the last day and a half. A late afternoon thunderstorm emerged out of the humidity and pressure; dousing the 93 degree 97% humidity day with nickel size raindrops and ripping cracks of thunder that boomed lead heavy into my ribcage as I pedaled with all my might up the hill that emerges from the Huron river valley.

The rain was hot on my shoulders, but the wind chilled the wetness and sent the gladness of cool over my sweaty skin. The temperature reminded me of how present I am in the always recognizing the physicality of my own body.

Lately, I’ve really been contemplating work. The action of moving our bodies as human beings and gaining something in return—that which must be done to stay alive—work is in essence all about our survival. I am not talking about paid work. I am not talking about our jobs as the tool for survival. I think paid work (and this is stating it simply—but the idea that we make money in order to buy the things we need to survive is what the root really is) is one of the roots to all of our current woes—violence, addiction, “economic hardship”, starvation, lack of community, homelessness, individualism, the existence of the nuclear family sand the extended family, to name a few.

I’m a big Wendell Berry fan. I like his frankness and willingness to call things as he sees them even if sometimes some of his ideas might be twinged with a dose of didactic, white heterosexual man syndrome that makes me cough. I think overall he is a reasonable and very important thinker.

So, I was reading The Body and the Earth from the Unsettling of America a while back and I wept over a couple of paragraphs. I mean really cried. Of course, I had just had my wisdom teeth out. But I was numbed in the mouth, and so my tears came because of the substance behind the text. There is this whole section of the chapter where Berry is arguing that working with the earth has been conceptually turned into drudgery through the disconnection of body and soul imposed upon us by modern urban-industrial society (of course this is my simplistic weaving together of many of his much more complicated points).

The paragraphs talk about the evolution of the “hatred of bodily labor.” Berry states, “ Perhaps the trouble began when we started using animals disrespectfully: as ‘beasts’—that is, as if they had no more feeling than a machine. Perhaps the destructiveness of our use of machines was prepared in our willingness to abuse animals. That it was never necessary to abuse animals in order to use them is suggested by a passage in The Horse and the Furrow, by George Ewart Evans. He is speaking of how the medieval ox teams were worked by the plow: ‘…the ploughman at the handles, the team of oxen—yoked in pairs or four abreast—and the driver who walked alongside with his goad.” And then he says, ‘It is also worth noting that in the Welsh organization…the counterpart of the driver was termed y geilwad or the caller. He walked backwards in front of the oxen singing to them as they worked. Songs were especially composed to suit the rhythm of the oxen’s work…’”

And then I cried. Because this kind of respect and connection and interdependence in the ways we live on this planet, in the U.S. in particular, is so missing. Some of my finest days are the days full of what some might call drudgery. When K and I work in our yard and grow things together and create and build a life and cook and eat and smile into one another’s eyes and sweat deep puddles of salt, these are the days that sink into my heart and fix themselves like nails of golden memory to my brains.

While I am fortunate enough to have meaningful paid work, it still is not the work of creating a household or a community that I will come home to and build my days with. I think in this striving for constructed leisure that now rules the waking hours of so many people’s existences, we have blemished the goodness that can come from hard, physical labor that is interwoven with our very survival and our seeking of that which is beautiful, creative, and beyond our own understanding.

There is a great documentary out there called Ancient Futures: Learning from the Ladakh that is based on a book “by Helena Norberg-Hodge, has become an international grassroots best seller. Part anthropology, part uncompromising critique, it raises fundamental questions about the whole notion of progress, and serves as a source of inspiration for our own future.”

The documentary gives insight into the traditional Ladakhi people and the ways in which body and soul are still connected in their everyday lives--in their work which is their living and survival. It also demonstrates how the body/ soul dichotomy ideology of the west and the ever growing push, that comes with western ideology, toward automation, individualism, monetary wealth and “leisure” has begun to infiltrate and destroy their culture. Anyhow, I suggest checking it out.

So, what I want is to work with my hands and legs and arms and continue to help build this household and community that I am a part of and to do this well and to have the love and beauty that is grown from the people and the other creatures of this region carried on to the next generation and the next.

As Berry succinctly wraps it up, “It is possible then to believe that there is a kind of work that does not require abuse or misuse, that does not use anything for a substitute for anything else. We are working well when we use ourselves as the fellow creatures of the plants, animals and materials, and other people we are working with. Such work is unifying, healing. It brings us home from pride and despair, and places us responsibly within the human estate. It defines us as we are: not too good to work with our bodies, but too good to work poorly or joylessly or selfishly or alone.”

I AM THUNDER. I AM SIRENS.

If only I could bellow like the thunder roaring and the the sirens shrieking outside my old cat scratched screens.

If only I could shout to the heavens and ask them for relief from the dark cloud hanging on the rusty hinges of my heart.

If only...

So, really things have not been all that bad. Zoloft has given me a lift and I have become chatty cathy queen. Oh, yes, dear readers, I have been popping a pharmaceutical. I take it daily and I think it makes my tits hurt and it makes me pee a lot and I was hazy for the first three weeks and I wanted to scream that I had caved to what I had called the lies of western medicine.

But after losing the pregnancy--oh yes I was fucking pregnant which sometimes sounds so weird as it rolls off my tongue or saunters over the soft gray matter of my thoughts--all the chemistry in my brain went back to the high-anxiety state of precoming out of the closet. All late winter and spring I had panic attacks and sleeplessness and even night sweats.

Finally, more than six weeks ago, my therapist was like, "you need something to break the chemical cycle that you cannot control." And so I started the drug. Well, I got the script and then it took me two weeks to start it but I did it. And now I am kind of "normal" again. Kind of.

But work is slowly giving me the kind of anxiety that feels like 3000 bricks piled high on my chest, and I just want to say-SHUT UP WORK. I AM THUNDER. I AM SIRENS. I AM SCREAMING AT ALL THE BULLSHIT.

I love my work--the actual work--the working with people in prison and their loved ones and trying with all of our might, together, to make us all look at crime and suffering and victimization and mental illness and hurt differently. And exposing through the direct stories and testimonies of the people living behind the caged walls what prison really is like--guess what folks it hurts people and communities more than any of us will ever realize.

But, without going into too much detail--my organization is having financial trouble right now and I am tired, tired, tired of the fall out of years of dysfunction--the dysfunction before the financial dysfunction that is exacerbated by the financial woes--cascading mountains of ash all around me.

So, lovely, nearly mid June Michigan thunderstorm, I am bellowing with your voice; I am calling out to the winds to bring more rain to cover the ash of the dysfunction and the wounds within our own hearts and histories.

Stopping the melodramatic writing: I really am just screaming and hollering like crazy, loud in my head and waiting with more and more anticipation for my sabbatical which will arrive soon and very soon (more on all that later).

My Dirty, Hardworking Daddy

Lately, I’ve been thinking about my growing up days. I’ve been reflecting on my hard working parents and all of the time and energy they gave to raising the three of us and trying their hardest to do it as well as they could with what they had in their arsenal of parental tools and tricks.

On this note of yesteryear, here’s a brief introduction to my dad as I remember him in my early years.

My father is a roofer. He has been a roofer almost his whole adult life—since he was about 21. He has only ever known hard, physical work. Before he was a roofer, he tried being a line worker at Chrysler—like his father before him—but he could not stomach working for the man. So he went to work for another kind of man, the roofing man. And then he eventually started his own roofing company; he still owns and runs this company in these thin and trying economic times.

As a kid, I remember my dad as a dirty man in the evenings. He was covered in soot and tar and asphalty stuff when he came home from work. And then he would take a shower and be refreshed, but there was always this sort of everlasting grit ground into his skin. His pick up truck stank of acrid tar-paper and hot tar and sweat and burnt things and dust. I remember longing to run my hands over the well-worn steering wheel and drive for hours with my dad to some far off destination just the two of us alone hanging out and talking. I wanted to go to Tigers’ games with him, sans sisters, in his truck and somehow catch the hard-working smell of his skin and hold it for always.


Dirty dad in his pick up

He provided for us. He used his hands until they were cracked and rough to cover other people’s houses and businesses and keep them from rain and wind and snow. He burned his nose over and over again in the blazing sun till it bubbled with infection and is probably now a fertile ground for cancer.

He worked 6 or 7 days a week—and he still does. And he always said to us use your minds not your hands to make a living. I find it funny sometimes that I was the only one who really listened. Both of my sisters went to beauty school; I’m the only one who went to university. They both use their hands to make a living. While they do not have to weather the elements and haul bundles of shingles or torch down or weld specialized products to roofs, they do use their hands day after day to earn money. And they work hard and long hours.


the injector with her dad as a kid

We all do. My father gave each of us the gift of knowing how to work hard. None of us have ever been slackers. I had my first job at age 15. I worked at the hockey rink concession stand. And then I worked at Keck’s Hardware—I was the first girl to ever work there. And then I worked for my dad for a few summers. And I acquired the smell of sun and sweat and tar skin.

And while I use my mind mostly to do my work, I pedal hard to get to work. I use my body to transport myself there and it is often my most favorite time of the day—riding in the sun and my beating heart pumping fast and hard. And then my next favorite time of the day is coming home from my paid work and working in the soil with my hands, digging deep and hard and being dirty even after a shower and cooking food for my darling and tearing shit apart when she asks me to do so and cleaning and scrubbing our house to make it feel good and comfy. Daddy did you know you taught us well? We all three know how to make it pretty damn okay in the world. We all know how to work hard and long and still grow our families well.

i'm still tired, but some reflections on a good day

this week has been pressing on my heart like an overloaded semi-truck. I am glad tomorrow is friday.

We really had an amazing start to the week (sans the fact that kk started bleeding again). Sunday was our bike ypsispring ride and festival. we had blue skies, sunshiny weather; great attendance and great moments of cohesion and goodness among people in community. That to me is what this bike ypsi is all about--folks coming together and creating sustainable, meaningful community! We succeeded and we will continue to succeed in making ypsilanti a super bicycle friendly community; we will be a presence on the streets and in the parks and in the common, shared spaces that we are fortunate enough to be able to walk through and ride through and exist in.



It was so excellent to have between 100 and 130 people out in the park enjoying simple food (all donated except for the hot dogs and veggie dogs), tooling around on bicycles, roaming by booths that focused on healthy living and bicycles (yet again bicycles), and lazing about in the fifth month's clear and crisp air.

But the day and the days up till the bike ypsi day drained my energy. By the end of sunday i could barely move and monday i had a hard time rolling out of bed and making my way via bicycle (yet again bicycles) to work.

And then work...oh work...oh the work...oh justice work...oh fighting for something that resembles some version of someone's or some people's justice. i will not go into detail about the horrendous abuses and violence and fucking shit that i soak up at work on certain days, but i will say that i searched out a new therapist this week. I looked for therapists who work with activists and found none.

So, while i love bike ypsi and i love helping to organize all of us people to do good and healing things in my own community, when my energy gets zapped and then i have to jump right back into my paid work with no quiet, no breaks, no nothing but the incessant reminders that we treat people like shit and they in turn treat others like shit and the cycle goes on and on and on, then i feel the crashing reverberations of a burgeoning semi riding the bones of my rib cage as if it were a highway to hell.

All in all, i am tired and I need to heed the words of Chickasaw poet, Linda Hogan, "You have to have time, and you have to have quiet. We don't take that often enough. I like to take a day off every week not to do anything. Not take off work to do other work, or chores, but take a day off. It's an incredible experience. Magic happens."

Finished!

Finally, the report (on the state of health care and mental health care services in Michigan’s prisons from the perspective of advocates, activists, and the people inside the prisons) is finished. Done—dropped it off at the printer yesterday at 4:15. Right after I left it there, I went and treated myself to soy chai and a blueberry muffin at zingerman’s. Then I walked over to kk’s office and climbed the stairs to her attic.

Luckily, I saw her director out of the corner of my eye; before kk’s eyes hit mine. Cause, if I had seen k first, I would have started weeping, and I would not have been able to stop.

The completion of this report is a big deal for many reasons.
1.We have been working on it for over three years.
2.The intensive writing piece of it has been going on for the last nine months. The thing has been edited and re-edited by multiple people and then I’ve waited on some people’s edits and contributions and whole sections and they never sent them. Writing in coalition is like pulling one’s teeth out with a wrench. I have spent countless, sleepless nights pondering this thing and tossing and turning with anxiety over it.
3. My good friend, A, was contracted on this thing to write (she became my good friend through the prison activism work we were both doing, but then she moved on to something else) and now this monster will no longer haunt her days.
4. Hopefully, the contents of the report will lend itself to real changes in policies so that people in prison in MI will benefit and be able to grow healthier in mind and body before coming back to the free-world.

A, R, KK, and I went out to celebrate the completion of this 125 page, 11 point font, single spaced beast last night. Three of us drank yummy martinis (ginger, lime ones—so spicy for winter); we ate delicious food and basked in the glory of being done with it!