After a Week-end of Protests: "Dona Nobis Pacem"

I am tired this morning.  I had a mostly good week-end:  more time in the pool than usual, some reading time, getting grading done, getting errands run quickly and efficiently.  When I look back on this week-end, I hope I remember it as the start of the time when I began to focus on my mandolin.

I played on both Saturday and Sunday--ah, the return of evenings on the front porch.  On Saturday, my spouse showed me how to pick out the notes of "May the Circle Be Unbroken" and reminded me of how to play each note of the scale that starts with middle C.  We ended by playing "Taps."  On Sunday, we continued to work on those songs, along with "Dona Nobis Pacem."  I have loved that Canon for many years, although for the longest time, I associated it with Christmas music.

I was feeling peaceful when I turned on the TV.  I was all set to watch The Simpsons, even though it was a repeat of a show that was on just a few weeks ago.  Instead, I saw footage of gatherings in Miami and Ft. Lauderdale.  I saw various groups and lines of police in riot gear in Ft. Lauderdale.  In Miami, people seemed to be walking by the Adrienne Arsch center; my spouse said, "Why are they going to the American Airlines Arena?"  I speculated that they had probably parked there.

In Ft. Lauderdale, I saw that there were protesters trying to pick a fight with police, so I wasn't too surprised when a curfew was declared.  I was not prepared for the phone calls, one from the county and one from the city.  The county one came at 9:30, just as I was drifting off  to sleep.  And then, the city of Hollywood called at 10:15.

I feel conflicted about these protests taking place across the nation.  On the one hand, I am glad that horrific images of police brutality can still inflame us and make us take to the streets.  On the other hand, I'm not sure that they do much good anymore--and they don't seem to be very specific, some of these assemblies.  Are we protesting that one incident?  Are we seeing problems in our own local communities?  Are we protesting larger policies of policing and incarceration?  Are we looking at even larger societal structures?

And why rush the police, the way that some did in Ft. Lauderdale?  The 3 hour protest was over.  Some people stayed behind to look for a fight, and some stayed behind hoping to de-escalate and to keep the violence at bay.

It could have been worse.  From what I can tell, there was some tear gas and people dispersed.  There were some arrests, but I'm not seeing reports of deaths or buildings on fire or all the ways the situation could have been escalated.

I am glad that I spent an hour with "Dona Nobis Pacem."  I will continue to sing it; it will be a constant prayer today, and throughout the rest of the year.

I have resolved to spend the month of June picking up my mandolin each and every day.  I am now adding to that resolution--I will learn "Dona Nobis Pacem."  I will pray for peace each day as I learn the song and memorize it.

A Year in Creativity

Ah, the first day of a new year--which feels much the same as yesterday did.  In some ways, these arbitrary distinctions aren't useful.  It's far better to check in on our trajectory quarterly than just once a year.

But I can make one of those quarterly check-in points correspond with the new year--may as well tap into this energy!

I have occasionally chosen a word or phrase for the year.  Once I could make it rhyme (worry free in 2003!), but it's not as much fun when every year ends in teen.

I wonder what would happen if I chose a photo for the year.  If I did that, I'd choose this picture from yesterday's motorcycle practice:

That's me, tackling new challenges, working through fear, riding towards a wonderful 2016!

But first, let's assess 2015.

In terms of creativity, let's see how I did.  I'll paste my goals that I wrote down a year ago in this blog post, and underneath, in a different color, I'll talk about how I did (as always, I have done more than I thought I was doing, while at the same time, missing some goals):

Here are my creative goals and intentions for 2015:

--Write a poem on both Tuesday and Thursday with a week-end day as my back-up day.  Today is Thursday.  I will need to get started on that.

Some weeks were better than others.  I wrote approximately 82 poems this year--and as always, I'm counting attempts.  This year, I'm not counting the stray line or two that went nowhere.

So, if I had followed this plan, I'd end the year with at least 104 poem drafts.   I fell a bit short, but to be honest, I'm surprised I had this many poems.


 --Write one short story each month.

I wrote 5 short stories.  For whatever reason, it takes me much longer to complete a short story these days. 

I will be exploring different approaches in this new year.  What would happen if I spent the first 15 minutes at my writing desk each morning writing a short story or a poem?  I'll let you know in a year.

 --Finish the memoir/essay manuscript.  A more specific definition:  have a draft that if published instantly, I'd be proud of it.

I completed this goal, and I started querying agents.

 --Send the poetry manuscript to 10 possible publishers.

I sent the manuscript to only 4 possible publishers--but that's because one of my chapbooks was accepted, and I needed to pay attention to tasks that the publication of the chapbook required.

 --I want to make 100 submissions of individual poems and short stories--get those packets out into the world!
I sent 88 packets of poems and short stories out into the world.  I'm calling this a success, especially since I'd have met the goal, if we count the pitches I made to the Living Lutheran site--where, I might add, my acceptance rate was much higher.

 --Other creativity:  I want to get back to fabric art that's less practical while continuing to make baby quilts and prayer shawls.  I want to sketch more.  That one should be easy--if I sketch once, I've sketched more than I did in 2014.

This year I crocheted 2 prayer shawls and finished 2 baby quilts.  I worked on quilts for Lutheran World Relief, and I created this piece of fabric art for the first week of Advent:

Does this picture capture it better?

I did sketch for a month, but my flimsy attempts irritated me.  I have an artist friend who tells me that doodles can count as sketching.  If that's the case, I've been wildly successful.  Every meeting agenda gets filled not only with notes but with curving lines and swirling shapes.

Here are my goals for 2016:

--Become more aggressive/intentional about sending queries to agents.  I will send three queries a month.

--I will spend the first 15 minutes at my writing desk each morning writing a short story or a poem.

--I will continue sending packets of poems and stories out into the world.  My goal will continue to be 100 submissions.

--I will send the larger poetry manuscript to 5 possible publishers.

--And along the way, I'll need to do some support of my forthcoming chapbook.

It's going to be a great year--that's my fervent hope/prayer/yearning.

The Last Day of 2015: Assessment and Goals

In an hour, I will walk to the beach.  As the sun rises over the ocean, I'll spend some time letting go of 2015.  I'll think about the aspects of the year that I'd like to wash away from me.  And throughout today and tomorrow, I'll spend time thinking about what I'd like to see more of in 2016.

Let me just capture some thoughts here.  I've already written a post about my spiritual aspirations (preview: encouraging light over dark and building community) at my theology blog this morning.  Tomorrow on this blog, I'll spend time thinking about my creative accomplishments and goals.

So, onward:

My biggest achievement, perhaps:

This was the year of motorcycles, which presented me many opportunities for facing fear and moving through it.  I was terrified to ride on the bike behind my spouse and terrified to learn to operate a bike.  I was terrified when we rode by ourselves and terrified to ride in a group.

This process made me realize how rarely I move outside of my comfort zone.  When I try something new--whether it be food, exercise, a creative activity, a spiritual experience--it's usually not very far away from what's familiar.

I saw one of those pithy Facebook posts that encourages us to do something that terrifies us once a day. 

Really?  Am I the only one who has to work 45-55 hours a week?  That doesn't leave a lot of time to be terrified.

But I should make time to move outside of my comfort zone more often.  And once in awhile, I should move way far outside of my comfort zone.

Health:

I have done a decent job of keeping up with basic eating and exercise goals.  Most weeks, I do a vigorous work out (think spin class) 4-6 days a week.  I almost always have 3 vigorous work outs a week.  In between, I also walk and swim.  I usually eat a diet full of fruits, vegetables, and lean proteins, and most of what I eat is made at home.  I floss every day.

Where I could improve:  My dental hygienist was blunt--I need to brush my teeth more often.  So my goal will be to brush my teeth when I come home from work or when I take my contact lenses out.  If I wait for the traditional time of before bed, I might miss that tooth brushing, since I tend to nod off while watching TV at night. 

I used to think I nodded off because TV is so boring, and that's partly true.  I also need to be more intentional about my wine consumption.  The first glass is fine--but I need to drink the second glass, if there is one, closer to the time I intend to fall asleep, so that I'm not fighting the urge to sleep much too early.

I'd like to do more in the evenings than watch TV.  This goal ties in to my goal of being present.

I would also like to eat more fruits and veggies, and to drink V8 that has extra antioxidants.  That's my ongoing goal.

I should do more strength training.  When I arrive early at spin class, I'd like to go ahead and pick up the weights that are in the spin room now.  If I could do that 2-3 days a week, that would be enough for this year.  Likewise with stretching--I'd like to do some simple stretching throughout the day.  I don't have time to go to yoga classes or to add time-consuming strength routines to my week.  But I can do a smidge more each day.

I plan to spend more time in the pool.  I will swim a bit, stretch a bit, work against the resistance of the water.  I want to do this every day, but if I do this 4-5 days a week, I'll be happy.

Reading:

I continue to wish that I had time to read more--but I spend a lot of time online, and some of that is reading time, but a lot of that time could be better spent reading books.

This year, I'm going to make a list of every book I read.  If I read 2 books a month, that's 24 books by the end of the year.  I used to read 24 books a month.  But let me not get lost in what used to be.  I will read 2 books a month, plus one volume of poetry each month.  That's at least 3 books a month.  That's my goal.

Being Present:

I've gotten better at looking away from the computer screen when someone sits down in front of me in the office.  Now I need to work on being present to others outside of my office.

I've done a good job of adding breaks into my work day to actually talk to people, usually over meals or tea.  Now I need to do that outside of work.

I want to continue meeting with my quilting group of friends I've had for a long time--we've done a fairly good job through 2015 meeting every 4-6 weeks.  I want to continue.

I want to do more with friends from church.  I'm not sure what I want that to look like at this point, but I've enjoyed having groups over periodically.  Perhaps I don't want to do more, so much as I want to keep making that effort.  It would be good to see church friends socially (by which I mean outside of Sunday morning) at least once a month.

And I have similar goals for my other friends.  I am slowly making peace with the fact that my friendships won't be the intense, daily friendships of my college and grad school years.  But I'd like to see people who make me happy at least once a month.

I've spent parts of this past year feeling disconnected:  from people, from activities that once brought me joy, from essential parts of myself.  Part of my disconnection was job-related:  we've had new bosses and new expectations, and it's been a difficult year when it comes to work.  Part of my disconnection is in my head:  I start to believe that no one would notice if I didn't exist, and thus, I start to feel a bit more like I don't exist.

I want 2016 to be the year of reconnecting.  I began to feel a bit more reconnected as this year came to an end, and I want to build on that.

My overall goal:

To remember all the ways my life is important--I am living a life in sync with my values--at least most days I am, and to take another Christmas lesson forward, from It's a Wonderful Life, other people's lives are diminished when one of us is gone.  I may wish I could do more to make this world a place of peace and justice--but in my small ways, in my immediate periphery, I am doing just this.

I want to be more committed to peace than justice.  Justice-minded Kristin can be a bit harsh and legalistic.  We have quite enough of that quality in the world. 

I want to be one of the light-bringers, the light protectors.  I want to be part of the tribe of encouragement.

I want to keep the Christmas message in my head all year.  I want to remember that although we live in a land of deep darkness, the darkness will not overcome the light.

Migrations, Inner and Outer

Oh, how I wish I had vast swaths of time in which to read. There are several books out that sound fascinating, but they're non-fiction and huge, and my history hasn't been good with huge works of non-fiction read in the hour here and the hour there that I have to read.

I want to buy the book The Warmth of Other Suns, just for the title alone. What a GREAT title. And the subject matter sounds great too: the Great Migration, that movement of African-Americans from the U.S. South to the North and the West, during the period between the Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement. I've read that it was one of the biggest relocations of people for a non-war reason.

Of course, you might say that there was a war of sorts. When I've heard about the lives of African-Americans in the pre-Civil Rights era South, it horrifies me. Even beyond the separate bathrooms, drinking fountains, and Bibles in the courtrooms--I've heard more than one older black person recounting road trips where everyone took a potty break before crossing the Mason-Dixon line, because they wouldn't be stopping again until they left the South.

Imagine driving across multiple states without stopping to stretch your legs, to get a Coke, to go to the bathroom. Imagine vast chunks of the nation where there was literally no place where you could get a hotel room for the night.

Isabel Wilkerson has imagined it, and her book, which has gotten rave reviews, helps us imagine it too. I especially love this story which talks about her writing process, her immersion in that oral culture that taught her about the time, her immersion in artifacts from that time. She also talks about the migrations of her family and her own migration back to the South (some demographers are calling this time period the Third Great Migration, as African Americans move back to the South).

I also wish I had some time to read Helen Vendler's new book, which is really Emily Dickinson's old book. At least this one sounds like one I could dip in and out of; as Michael Dirda quotes in his review, "As Vendler writes in her introduction to 'Dickinson,' hers isn't so much a book to read through as 'a book to be browsed in, as the reader becomes interested in one or another of the poems commented on here.'"

I've always wanted to understand Dickinson better than I do, and it sounds like this book will be just the guidebook I've wanted; Dirda writes, "Emily Dickinson is certainly never going to be an easy poet to understand, but her dense, poignant lyrics are now a lot more accessible to ordinary readers thanks to Vendler's unravelings. If you're going to read Dickinson, this 'selected poems and commentary' is the place to start."

I'll start by listening to this NPR program where Helen Vendler is the guest. And then I'll get the book and commit to reading at least one poem and commentary each week. I will also choose a modern poem and write a commentary on it here--yes, that's what I'll do. I'll start next week. It will likely be a poem that has yet to make it into anthologies. And when I start teaching Composition again, in October, I'm going to experiment with poetry and essay writing, again with more results here.

Technologies, Old and New

I spend a fair amount of time thinking about technology on any given day, but during the past 24 hours, I've thought about it more than usual. I spent time photocopying, a technology that still seems miraculous to me--and now, many of us can afford a small, home copying machine (in the form of our printers, which can print scanned documents, or our printer-copier-scanner-fax machines that many of us have).

Then I went to my book club, which celebrates an older technology. We're all still reading the books we choose on paper. We discussed Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad, a book which wrestles with the eclipsing of various technologies, especially in the music business, and it presents the first successful short story told in PowerPoint format. We meet in a classroom, and towards the end of our meeting, students started to arrive for one of our member's classes. It was great to watch them watching us talking about books. By then, we had started talking about Justin Cronin's The Passage. Vampires, the end of the world, disease! Several students started taking notes.

I came home and prepared some poetry packets for my fall mailing. How many years have I greeted fall by sending out my poems in envelopes with stamps? Many, many years. But this year, I'm just as likely to send them electronically. It's a shift; we seem to have reached a turning point where more journals accept electronic submissions than don't.

We realized later in the evening that we needed some cash for the yard guy. I hate going to ATMs at night, so we went to the grocery store, where we could pick up some groceries and write a check and get change. How many years has it been since I wrote a check for actual goods that I bought, goods right there in front of me in front of a cash register? Sure, I'll purchase my electricity that way. But a check for groceries? Years, if not decades.

While in the grocery store, my spouse had a hankering for Kool-Aid, which led us to the powdered drink aisle--or the powdered drink section of the prepared drink (but not soda pop) aisle. We had exactly 4 choices, all rather mundane: cherry, grape, lemonaid, and tropical punch. What happened to the Sparkleberry Punch flavor? We bought 5 packets for a dollar, which may be overpriced for citric acid, I'm not sure. It still seems cheap to me. We're probably the only people in the tri-county area still mixing up our own Kool-aid and making our own iced tea, the way our moms did, and their moms before them.

This morning, I noticed that I'm not the only one thinking about technology. At The New York Times, there's a great essay written by a man who went to a Buddhist retreat where he spent 5 hours meditating and 5 hours walking each day. He returned home to observe his brain wrestling with technology: "So there you go: covetousness, schadenfreude, anxiety, dread, and on and on. It’s the frequent fruitlessness of such feelings that the Buddha is said to have pondered after he unplugged from the social grid of his day — that is, the people he lived around — and wandered off to reckon with the human predicament. Maybe his time off the grid gave him enough critical distance from these emotions to discover his formula for liberation from them. In any event, it’s because the underlying emotions haven’t changed, and because the grid conveys and elicits them with such power, that his formula holds appeal for many people even, and perhaps especially, today."

And at the same website, the ever-wonderful William Gibson weighs in on visions of the world envisioned by older sci-fi and the reality of Google: "Cyberspace, not so long ago, was a specific elsewhere, one we visited periodically, peering into it from the familiar physical world. Now cyberspace has everted. Turned itself inside out. Colonized the physical. Making Google a central and evolving structural unit not only of the architecture of cyberspace, but of the world. This is the sort of thing that empires and nation-states did, before. But empires and nation-states weren’t organs of global human perception. They had their many eyes, certainly, but they didn’t constitute a single multiplex eye for the entire human species."

We live in interesting times, as we watch technologies seem to eclipse each other and then sometimes, technology comes swooping back to reclaim a piece of territory. We wrestle with new technology's impact on our attention span, just as humanity has always wrestled with issues of attention, intention, and efficiency.

What will today bring? Before I get too enswamped in modern technology, maybe I'll read a poem or two. Maybe several times. Sandy has a great post on reading a manuscript and thinking about how she should change her approach to reading volumes of poetry. Maybe I'll adopt her strategy for a single poem. Maybe I'll choose one poem each week and spend each day reading that same poem several times. An interesting Fall resolution . . .