There's gold at the end of the rainbow (this from our deck), but the process of finding it can be chilling
My nephew was in a terrorist auto accident Saturday night, and he's been in a coma since then. (I call it a terrorist accident because he was driving at night on a small country road in Wisconsin when a pickup truck suddenly rounded the curve in his lane and ran into him. Terror. The driver of the pickup died.) I’m on my way to Minneapolis right now to be with him and my family.
On Wednesday, one of our “godsons” came by, to help cut some limbs off trees to better sculpt our garden and let more light in ... I went out with Josiah to the edge of our cliff, where a tree holding a cliff together is about to topple to the beach ... I asked him to cut the dead main tree so that the child could survive and continue to hold the cliff.
At the edge of the cliff was a ledge, and on the ledge was an alder tree, intertwined with the oldest-growth Indian Plum either of us had ever seen. And bound around with blackberry vines. And blackberry canes. And jungley growth.
He walked out on the gnarly tree. He cut the berry vines and honored the Indian Plum. He was suspended 55 feet above the beach. He was balancing on the Indian plum vines. His body had no hesitation. He was up to the task.
He took the chainsaw from me, and carried it out as he balanced on the horizontal "plank" of the tree so he could cut off the dead larger trunk and lighten the load for the roots.
He navigated the light, bouncy, woody stems of the Indian Plum as they wove making love around the plank of the alder tree. It seemed he -- and the tree -- were constantly one degree away from being 55 feet below, on the rocky beach. I was in awe of Josiah. He was Angel Boy / Earth Boy / Logger Boy. He was sawing up from under the nearly horizontal tree, first. His saw bound. "God-dammit!" he said from the edge of the precipice. There was smoke. He tried to vibrate it out. The whole diving board seemed to shake. He edged it out. I prayed.
As he started to cut from the top, "CRACK" -- "SHOT" -- the roots seemed to shake and a shot rang out that sounded like a gun. The tree plunged to the beach.
When he got back to solid ground, we hugged. My nephew had just been in a horrible accident, and I couldn't imagine another.
Now our cliff will likely stay intact for years longer, as a result of Josiah's arborial prowess.
**
As often, I'm out on the edge of the cliff.
Bill Weaver plans the Media That Matters gathering from the edge of his property on Desolation Sound on the east shore of Cortes Island
Media That Matters was created by a brilliant documentary maker, Bill Weaver (a Southern boy who did a stint in TV news in Portland, OR before becoming Canadian). Bill wanted to get media makers away from the “flickering screens” that become our lives and into the woods on one of the most beautiful places on the planet – to learn, work, dream, and play together.
Media That Matters is an invitational retreat which attracts journalists, filmmakers, web designers, novelists, academics, community organizers, and new media mavens. It’s always different, depending on who shows up. And depending on how open we all are to the astounding beauty of this place. The silences are even moreso (than Vashon Island or other places I’ve been). The birdsong (killdeer, wren, robin, oystercatcher, etc.) echoes across the water. Waves lap gently. Oyster beds abound. And the invitation to go inside and pay attention to inner voices resounds.
So this morning, my friend John Holliday drove me to the north end of Lake Washington, where I got on a floatplane and watched the water-dominated landscape of Seattle disappear as we made our way up past Whidbey Island and Port Townsend (paper mill pumping), past the San Juan Islands, across the Strait of Juan de Fuca and over Victoria, past the Gulf Islands to Nanaimo .
After a quick customs check (“do you have a work permit?” “no”), we flew over the Strait of Georgia, over many islands, BC ferry boats, forests, clearings, and limestone mines, to Cortes, where the Hollyhock Retreat Center is our Media That Matters home.
It’s always hard to get away from my routine, but when I do, I realize how important this is. I always have new insights here. I so look forward to this week. Deep breath.
I haven’t blogged about it much, but for me, this is the Season of the Journalism Conference.
I just returned from my first of three: Journalism That Matters: NewsTools 2008. It was a great gathering of nearly 200 journalists, technologists, educators, activists and bloggers – held at the Yahoo! Corporate headquarters in California’s Silicon Valley. (What a time to be at Yahoo!)
We kicked it off in URL’s Café (get it? Eat at URL’s!) – with a skit about old journalism (an intrepid newspaperman) encountering new, technology laden journalism (a Twittering young idealist). In order to create a common language between the “old” newsroom, and the 21st century “news ecology,” we prepared a map that drew out the roles and the values values (both tangible and intangible) involved in the process of getting a story out to an audience in the 20th Century.
Then we began to map the roles that might exist in the future. The experiment worked. While not everybody agreed about the new map -- in fact we began to identify lots of new roles that are developing – we had a great three-day “mashup” in which lots of new ideas were hatched, and lots of important connections were made between fascinating and diverse folks.
Next week, I’m off to Media That Matters at Hollyhock Retreat Center on Cortes Island in British Columbia, Canada – one of the true beauty spots on the planet. We’ll be exploring “Art, Story and Social Change.”
Then, on June 4-6, we’ll be at the University of Minnesota for another Journalism That Matters gathering called “A Passion for Place: New Pamphleteers/New Reporters: Convening Entrepreneurs Who Combine Journalism, Democracy, Place and Blogs.”
Hopefully, we're creating a new news ecology where truth, fairness, verification, and watchdog journalism can survive and thrive, even as new voices emerge as important storytellers in this turbulent time.
The emerging ecology takes the old roles of editor, reporter, and audience and converts them to sense-maker, beat blogger, and community.
The deck to the Forge, looking out at a beautiful banner made by my friend Ti/Cat
To counter the blues
I turn on the news --
Some folks have it much worse than I
Why turn to vermouth
When you can get truth
All covered with soundbits and lies?
The Forge's tiny desk works for journals, paper, laptop... and it wheels to the deck outside, the window view, or a blank white wall
Doggerel? Well, maybe, but that reminds me 'caterel'-- of our cat, Gertie Girl, who passed on last September. I miss her. I keep thinking I see her out of the corner of my eye. She provided a grounding for most of the time I’ve lived in this house – 18 years now.
Gertie Girl, who with her brother, Bert (aka Betty) Boy, watched over Soundcliff for nearly 18 years -- even during a remodel that demolished most of the house
The house looks pretty darn good on a spring morning like this, especially after we’ve had multiple instances of SNOW the past four days! (None of it stuck, but it’s been damn cold.) The clear blue sky only lasted a few hours, then clouds rolled in, and by afternoon it was raining that misty northwest rain that sometimes goes on for days.
April is the cruelest month? This year, it’s been pretty cruel, weather-wise. But there’s always another morning -- a sun salutation on the deck, coffee and meditation in the Forge, a chance, on some level, to start over.
It doesn't get much better than Soundcliff on a spring morning-- Happy Earth Day!
Practicing presence: The Dalai Lama listens intently, asks good questions, radiates love. P-I photo by Dan DeLong
This weekend Seattle hosted not only the Lost Angeles Angels baseball team (a mixed bag for those Mariners) but the Green Festival and – most auspicious – the Dalai Lama, a model for new leadership in our time.
On Friday I joined thousands of others at one of many events in which the Dalai Lama has enthusiastically participated -- part of a project called Seeds of Compassion.
My first response to the event I attended: profound disappointment in our lack of ability (or will) to engage with each other. Here were tens of thousands of intelligent, caring people in a sports arena. There to learn about compassion from a man who practices it beautifully. (Indeed, just being in the same space with him is a treat and a privilege.)
But despite one question from a speaker asking us to “think about what you can do” to foster compassion, there were NO opportunities for dialogue with each other. No “turn to the person next to you and tell about how compassion has played a role in your life,” or anything like that. It felt like a waste of potential learning and energy.
Plus, with the panel of mostly white experts on children, families and compassion, we and the Dalai Lama spent a good 20 minutes of the two-hour session looking together at videos of the panelists, made to bring alive what they do. It didn’t seem like the best use of our time. (Though I’m sure it makes good television – and the sessions are available to the world for viewing.)
The other sad part was that some of Seattle’s best facilitators and spiritual practitioners were waiting on Sunday afternoon to work with small groups to go deeper into the subject of compassion – but very few people showed up. The main reason: These sessions were not mentioned at the large events!
You can see some good, dynamic coverage of the Dalai Lama’s visit at the Seattle Times website. And you can read in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer about his amazing press conference. Talk about transparency! This guy lights up the room.
How many spiritual teachers do you know who basically say, “Don’t believe anything you hear until you test it for yourself. Analyze!”
When asked a question, he'd often give an eloquent answer and then say, "I don't know. What do you think?"
At a recent Breakfast Club session in Seattle, topics ranged from polyamory to the end of the world (as we know it)
Despite my being a futurist, traditions are important to me. As long as they’re useful.
One useful tradition is a periodic Breakfast Club -- which has been meeting in various Seattle locations since the early 1990’s. A group of us, who probably wouldn’t otherwise see each other, get together to gab about things that are important to us -- personally, professionally, globally, spiritually.
These check-ins have come to mean a lot. Sometimes we have a theme, such as ‘what are your wishes for the new year’ or ‘what’s the flame that’s burning inside you’? Other times, we just see what happens.
The point is to connect with each other about 10 times a year with the intention of connecting our inner lives with the outer. We’ve shared triumphs and tribulations, celebrated anniversaries and milestones, mourned passings. We’ve linked each other with needed resources – most recently a network of cancer care professionals. Another member has found potential interviewees for a documentary film on polyamory.
And our group’s not ingrown. We often host guests, and invite new members. The format’s simple: each person gets an opportunity to ‘check in’ with whatever’s up for them, both inside and in the world.
At a Breakfast Club session in 2003, we had two out-of-town guests--my mother Helen, and Sophia Bracy Harris, an early childhood advocate from Alabama and mentor to Andrea Rabinowitz (r)
Each month we weave a tapestry of insight, humor, reality, love. It’s a good tradition.
My brother Mark, mother Helen and I spent a glorious Easter weekend together in Florida
Spring is in the air!
And my brother Mark and I visited our mother, Helen Silha, in Florida while it snowed and sleeted where we live (he in Minnesota, I near Seattle).
Even though my partner Gordon Barnett chose to stay home to work on creating new bells, Helen asked me to bring a bunch of his bells so she could show them to her friends and neighbors. It's become a tradition to have a spring "bell showing" at her condo on Longboat Key, near Sarasota on the west coast of Florida.
This year I brought quite a few of Gordon's 200+ designs, cast in silver ... 
Mark enjoys the people as much as the bells -- as he checks out the sterling silver bells on the dining table
... gold ...
Helen oogles the 14K gold bells on the sideboard above her TV, an original piece of furniture from the 1980's when the condo was built
... and bronze.
Despite a very rainy day, the light was best on the lanai, where I checked out the bronze bells
We enjoyed a great Easter dinner of ham, sweet potatoes, asparagus, and key lime pie with Helen's church friends Dottie and Gladys, and then Mark and I headed to the beach.
Dottie, Helen and Gladys hung out at the condo while Mark and I swam in the Gulf of Mexico
Mark loves to swim in the ocean, and so do I. We didn't get in as much as we would have liked -- but we did take a glorious Easter dip, and as Mark says, "next year!"
Mark contemplates a sand-sculpture sphinx before jumping in the surf (or is that really Elvis?)
We also had a great time at the Selby Gardens in Sarasota, amazed at the orchids, bromeliads, and Buddhas.
Koi ponds, tropical gardens, and great views of Sarasota Bay made it a great place for Mark and me to climb trees and clown around
And since I was born on Easter weekend in 1950, it was great to spend Easter with Helen. Actually, any time with Helen is golden.
One of the 6,000 orchids at Marie Selby Botanical Garden in Sarasota -- don't ask me the name!
There's gold at the end of the rainbow (this from our deck), but the process of finding it can be chilling
