This was such awesome fun this weekend. This enormous blue tarp was one of a few that Atom had purchased back in February/March to keep the birth tub from leaking. (Oh, yeah, I still have to share that whole story sometime....) Why is it sooo huge? Because we were in a pinch (or so we thought - baby still didn't come for weeks after this purchase), and this is what he could find....
our future masterpiece as it was
So, this enormous big blue tarp, which was folded over many times and placed as one of many layers into a leaky birth tub, looking like a big blue plastic nest, has been being used to cover the super cool old phone booth Atom acquired, that is being refinished for an art installation. Gonna be so pretty.
With all the rain lately, the tarp had gotten pretty soaked, so to dry it out, we had spread it out on the ground, and then Atom decided to clip one end to the clothesline. Since it was a windy weekend, and the wind happened to be eastward, which was just the right direction, the results were fabulous! (It was an incidental bonus, right Atom, or was this intentional?) This kept the kids entertained, hoopin' and hollerin', for hours and hours on both Saturday and Sunday.
adobe & phoenix in the tarp ocean
And what a great lesson on aerodynamics in action, without us needing to say a word about it, to intellectualize it, or explain - just for them to see, and feel, and experience the joy of it.
surfin' waves in the tarp ocean
It dawns on me in retrospect that perhaps this is how Christo & Jeanne-Claude got started, with a happy accident.... If you don't know who they are, check them out. They adorn large stretches of land and other things with fabric. Well, really, if you're familiar with their work, that's a huge understatement. Their next undertaking is 'Over the River' - the Arkansas River:
"Over The River is a temporary work of art by the artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude. Christo plans to suspend 5.9 miles of silvery, luminous fabric panels high above the Arkansas River along a 42-mile stretch of the river between Salida and Cañon City in south-central Colorado.
Christo is currently working to obtain the necessary permits so that his team can begin the installation process. He is hoping to exhibit Over The River for two consecutive weeks in August, 2014."
This ocean we've discovered in our backyard is so awesome, I don't know if I ever want to take it down.
a grave marker in the beautiful Sierra Vista Cemetary in Taos, NM
"Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
there is a field. I'll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
doesn't make any sense."
Rumi
It's been an emotional few weeks. Quite a bit of weeping.
Mitakuye Oyasin. We are all related. I do believe that beyond these bodies, we are all one, and the sentiment of this poem by Rumi resonates deeply with me - yet still, the reality of mortality can be hard to deal with.
Two weeks ago today, our dear sweet neighbor and landlord Mr. Bowyer passed away. I truly miss him and wish that we had spent more time with him. His presence was comforting, and pretty much every warm day that we had, he would be out in his wheelchair, either in his beautiful big backyard, or occasionally in the front driveway. Adobe liked to take friends over to meet him, outside or in the house. He had an open-door policy. He was a real sweetheart, and I feel that he loved knowing there was a nice family here enjoying this house, which we do, so much. I wish that we had had him over for dinner sometime, which just seemed like it would be tricky because of his big automatic wheelchair, with both entrances to the house being a few steps up, but I really wish now that we had made it happen, somehow.
My heart aches when I'm in the kitchen, where I'd always look out the window and see him across the yard getting fresh air and sunshine. My heart aches any time I look over at the house, and think about the fact that he (his living body) is no longer there, and his grandson, who's just a couple years older than me, is now there alone, after all these years of living with him, and helping to care for him, and being his buddy. But I know that he is still here, I feel his spirit around us, over the trees and the grass, and the houses, and I talk to him.
I am so thankful that I had the opportunity to pay last respects while there was still breath in his body. I wept so much on the way to the hospital, going into the room, and when I was saying goodbye to him. I wish that I had had a couple minutes alone with him, but the room was full of family members and his caretakers. I wanted so much just to give him a little Reiki, and a kiss on the cheek. I did whisper in his ear that we loved him and would miss him so much. And even though he was unconscious, I know he heard me.
Yes, he was not a member of my blood family, but I love him, and this is my first experience really of 'losing' someone that I am used to seeing on a regular basis. The only other family member who has passed on was my grandfather, and I loved him so much, but I hadn't seen him for ten years. In both cases, there is regret, and things I wish I'd done when they were alive.
My granddad's funeral is the only one I've been to. Mr. Bowyer's is delayed until January, because it will be at Arlington Cemetary, and they are booked up. My granddad's viewing and funeral gave me great comfort & closure - I wept over him, and kissed him, and stroked his hair, and his Buddha earlobes, and talked to him, and told him how much I loved him. He looked so small lying there, a shell of the big robust man I knew, so full of life, the man who threw great parties on the holidays for his family, who would sing, and tell stories, and enlist me and my cousins to perform for him, much in the way he did with my mother and her sister apparently.
This morning, I am attending another funeral. Two days ago, my dance teacher (from age 7 to 18), Ms. Sparks, passed on. More regrets. I have been talking for years about going to visit her, right here in Arlington, and never did. I'm so thankful though for the many great memories that I have of her from my childhood, and for the focus she brought to my childhood, the influence she had on my life, and the training she gave me, which along with others, helped me to support myself by teaching dance for many of my adult years. I did get a chance to thank her, many years ago, but I wish that I had gone and told her these things again, and told her how much I loved her. Today, I will be doing alot more weeping, I'm sure.
I weep for the pain of our knowledge of our own mortality.
I weep for the pain that causes my father, and for the wish that he will find resolve with this before his time comes.
I weep for the pain and sorrow of loved ones who miss that special person they will see no more.
I weep for the pain of humanity.
I weep for the pain of mothers and fathers who have lost a child.
I weep for the pain of children who have lost their parents.
I weep for all of the suffering in the world.
I weep because change is so hard sometimes.
I weep with gratitude and joy for the gifts in my life, first and foremost being my family.
I weep with gratitude and awe for this amazing baby and my other children who have chosen me as their mother.
I weep with gratitude and joy for life.
Yes, I'm back! I have really missed writing here. Why have I been gone so long?
Well, two reasons: I had a long, drawn-out pregnancy that I really wanted to enjoy, but it was so difficult (a more detailed story of that and the birth, which went fine in the end, later...) that I couldn't really focus on much other than myself, my body, my family, and the little life that was growing in me, more, and more, and more, and more!
laboring away with my enormous melon of a belly and my sweet supportive husband Atom
Tammi checking fetal heart tones
our boy the moment after he was born, when he still had no name...
Takoda Din was born early March 7, at home in a birth tub, almost a full month after his supposed 'due date', after a very long and arduous labor, weighing in at exactly 9.5 pounds. It was awesome, exhausting, and so incredibly empowering! My lovely, amazing, and very very patient midwife, Tammi McKinley, was at my house for over 36 hours and never once made me feel pressured in the least. Atom kept telling me all the right things just when I needed to hear them, when I was totally exhausted and felt like I couldn't go on.
Reason 2: So, after I got that over and done with and rebirthed myself yet again, I came to Blogger, and things were all messed up! They had changed things, and there were some weird bugs going on, and I was so frustrated! I thought 'What is goin' on here?! Am I going to have to switch everything over to Word Press? Or to iWeb where I have much more control of everything visually?' But, I guess Blogger was having some growing pains too. But now, today I came here, and everything's more new and pretty fabulous so far! So I posted something I'd had in draft for months (the Race to Nowhere post). Thank goodness they got it together, because I really need to write. And you can tell I'm really excited, because I usually abhor gratuitous use of explanation points! :)
That's it for now, just wanted to fill you in, in case you've been wondering what happened to me, or happen to notice the huge gap in time here....
'Til next time.... I promise it won't be another 8 months.
And here he is just two weeks ago! My beautiful angel, baby #3.
sitting up independently for the first time really, at our friend's house <3
As children start a new school year, here's some food for thought. If you are a school-going friend, please don't take this as an affront, but a call to action. Here in the Northern Virginia area, many families are blessed to have their children attending pretty decent schools, even good, and in some cases, even great. But just stop to think about what it is that makes a school great. Ask questions. And see this film.
On a Saturday last winter, I had the pleasure of attending a screening of the film, “Race to Nowhere” by parent and first-time film maker Vicki Abeles, as part of the Alexandria Film Festival. I wrote a review for AlexandriaNews.org, the majority of which comprises this blog post that for some reason is just now being published. (Um, I birthed a baby on March 7. ;) Race to Nowhere was one of the winners of the festival, receiving the Audience Award. This is one of the most moving, timely and crucial films I have seen. Abeles said in the Letter From the Director, on the film's site: “Race to Nowhere was inspired by a series of wake-up calls that made me look closely at the relentless pressure to perform that children face today. I saw the strain in my children as they navigated days filled with school, homework, tutoring and extracurricular activities. But it wasn’t until the crisis of my 12-year-old daughter being diagnosed with a stress induced illness that I was determined to do something.” And do something she did.
This film is a great addition to the dialogue in an issue that is a hot topic right now – education reform. Race to Nowhere provides a healthy antidote to many of the current voices on the subject which seem to be missing the point by blaming teachers and still focusing on how to raise test scores. In an era that is still reeling from the effects of No Child Left Behind, what the system really needs is a complete overhaul in not only how we measure success, but the mere definition of the word, as it relates to education and to life. The film echoes my sentiment that what we really need to ask is this – what makes for a successful learning experience? What cultivates a successful – and fulfilled, and happy – human being? Shouldn’t that be the point of educating our loved ones?
One of the experts in the film states, “I’m afraid our children are going to sue us for stealing their childhoods.” Many children are growing up in a world where every minute of every day is scheduled, and there is little to no down time, time to be bored, time to just be a kid and play. Abeles own daughter Jamey says at one point in the film, “I can’t remember the last time I had a chance to go in the back yard and just run around.”
Countless youth are aware that something is just not right with this formula of get the best grade – participate in as many extracurriculars as possible – so you can get into a good college – so you can get a good job – and make a lot of money. It doesn’t sound so bad, really, as a premise, but at what cost? One of the girls in the film points out that not only do you have to get good grades, but you have to be involved in the arts and play sports, join clubs, and find something unique about yourself so that you stand out when applying for colleges; and that among all of that, you have to figure out who you are, because if you don’t, you’ll lose yourself. At the end of the day, what matters more – how much money you have, or whether you’re truly happy and fulfilled? Abeles herself admits in the film, “Sometimes, parents just need to step back and say, ‘You know what, you’re doing a really good job.’”
Abeles received inspiration for the title of the film when interviewing one of the high school students who commented that students “get caught up in a race to nowhere”. Many students either get caught up in the drive to succeed, and sacrifice everything they can, including their mental, emotional, and physical health, or they tune out, and just decide they don’t care. It’s a Either road often leads to trouble. It’s a widely-known fact, also highlighted in the film, that among the students who do appear to be succeeding, cheating runs rampant. I remember this from my own high school days, 20 years ago.
The film shows that pressure comes from both ends of the spectrum – from highly successful parents who worry that their children won’t be as successful as they are, perhaps higher income parents who want to be able to brag to others about all of the things their child is accomplishing, and from lower-income parents who perhaps never even graduated high school, or never attended college, who not only want better for their children, but demand that the only possible route to college for their kids is to get the best grades so they can get scholarships to attend school. “The pressure comes from the colleges, from the parents, from the government, but it has to stop.”
In the film, the young people who were interviewed were experiencing such pressure to perform and “succeed” that they experienced stress-induced health problems and depression, engaged in food and sleep deprivation so they could stay up well into the night, sometimes all night, to complete their work, used pharmaceuticals to enhance their performance, and in some cases, found themselves institutionalized or hospitalized for eating disorders or mental breakdowns. Parents expressed that the little family time they had to share in the evenings were often filled with conflict and strife, both with their children and their spouses, over homework and grades. And then there is the very serious increasing epidemic of teen suicide. The film was dedicated to a beautiful 13-year-old girl from Abeles’ community (not involved in the movie) who had always been a straight-A student and very successful at all of her endeavors – and several months into the making of the film, committed suicide one weekend, because she was devastated after receiving an F on a math test.
The system at large does not allow for innovation. There is so much pressure on everyone to “succeed”, including the teachers, that they are forced to “teach to the test” because that is the main method by which everyone’s success is being measured. Creativity and individuality, in teachers and students, are sacrificed to protocol. One of the important points of the film is that these rote methods of learning are not promoting problem-solving, not producing critical thinkers. “Our students are pressured to perform; they’re not necessarily pressured to learn conceptually and deeply.” “And what is that going to mean, when we have a whole population of dentists and doctors who have been trained from the script?” One of the teachers in the film, who winds up making the very difficult decision to resign from her job out of frustration with the system, says tearfully, “Things that actually get our students to think are pushed aside.” Matt Goldman, Founder and CEO of the Blue Man Group, and Co-Founder of the Blue School in Manhattan, says, “These kids come to the table with this creativity and this love of learning…. Let’s just not take it out of them!”
The problem is not going to be solved by more rigorous testing, by more drilling of facts that lead to high test scores, by firing teachers in schools that fail to “perform”, by cutting funding in “under-performing” schools, by making teachers feel the pressure of losing their jobs if their students don’t test well, by giving bonuses to those who out-perform others. One of the main messages of the film comes through loud and clear: what we need is a re-definition of success.
As a side note: unfortunately, Obama’s Race to the Top (not directly mentioned in the film), while well-intentioned, is only another piece of the puzzle that is serving to perpetuate the problem. The state of Virginia chose not to participate.
If this is an issue that concerns you, please try to attend, or even host, a screening of this film. Register on the Race to Nowhere website to receive their action points and find out what else you can do, in your life and in your community, to be a part of this movement. There you can also see when & where the next screenings of this film are playing.
Chime in! I'd love to hear your thoughts. Please keep the conversation respectful.
documentation of life learning with my children and classes i'm teaching, snippets of inspiration and gems of information, my thoughts on life, spirituality, metaphysics, esoterica, politics, childrearing, 'homeschooling', education, teaching, the history of institutionalized schooling, the (brief) history of institutionalized childbirth, the miracle for which women's bodies were made, love, travel, daydreams, holistic health practices, food as medicine, glimpses into my family life, trips down memory lane, adventures with my photography & art, and thoughts on humanity's paradigm shift... the possibilities are boundless. please share your thoughts on whatever you read & see - leave comments! your feedback means the world to me. thanks so much.
one of my many callings in life, one that has gotten the least attention from me, is my role as a writer. it is an incredibly strong & natural impulse in me - i write in my mind all the time, literally, and have been for years. i had promised my self that eventually i would find an outlet for this, because i am one of those people who just has an extremely busy mind already - constantly planning & developing various aspects of my business, being hit with strokes of inspiration, ruminating on the changes humanity will see over the next few years & what the best plans are for my family to see it through safely, and so on... plus, i am very interested in dialoguing with other people on a variety of subjects, so in some cases, this may serve as a starting point. if nothing else, it helps alleviate a bit of the burden my big beautiful mind carries. (thank you, mind!) and now that we are back to our 'free to be...' schooling, this blog will also serve as a way to paint a clearer picture of daily life outside of an educational institution.
i am passionate, and sometimes perceived as opinionated, but i never pass judgment on anyone who feels differently about things than i do, and i would never try to ram my viewpoints down anyone's throat. i have lots of friends with differing beliefs on various topics, and where there is respect and love, there are no obstacles. i simply wish to share a piece of myself, my discoveries, my way of looking at things. i am always open to someone else's perspective. we all have something to learn from one another. maybe you will read something here that you hadn't thought about. maybe you will make a point that i had not thought about. my hope is to inspire you, and be inspired. and most importantly, to spread light and love.
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