Creating Change!

I just got back from the annual Creating Change conference sponsored by the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (aka The Task Force or NGLTF). 

The Task Force is a vibrant, totally progressive organization that works on a real grassroots level in communities to (you guessed it) create change, especially around LGBTQ issues. This conference brings together LGBTQ folks and allies from around the country (and some from other countries) to focus on these issues.

“Change,” as we have come to call it, is always such a treat. The place pulses with folks’ excitement about this work. There are always lots of youth, and their enthusiasm and energy pervade everything that happens. They also make me very excited about the future of this movement. 

And “the movement” as used here means far more than LGBTQ rights. NGLTF has a broad-based, truly progressive agenda. So "the movement" includes the rights of women, of people of color, of poor people, of immigrants, of those with disabilities, of those outside the religious mainstream, and of all the other groups that are so easily left out of political discussions. 

Just being there is uplifting.

Besides, there are always these moments of surprise or insight that add to the fun. Here are a few from this weekend:

·        Our first evening there, in one of the social gathering areas (which buzz in a way I’ve never experienced at any other conference), I saw three young men in military uniforms. I stopped in my tracks and tried not to stare as I realized that this is the first time ever that members of the military could attend this conference openly. It’s the first time ever that the rest of us could see our brothers and sisters in uniform casually interacting with their civilian peers.

Never doubt that elections matter. And don’t doubt that Obama’s presence in the White House has changed the world in important ways.

·        "Change" always has gender-neutral restrooms, where people of all genders share the space. Conference newbies are sometimes surprised by this, but folks settle into a comfortable routine about it pretty quickly. So, one day, I was in a gender-neutral restroom that usually serves as a men’s room. The stalls were full, so I was waiting my turn. A man walked in just as a stall opened up, and he went directly past me and into the stall. My first thought was that he was being rude. But then I realized that he’s probably not used to encountering waiting lines in restrooms. So he didn’t recognize me as a “line,” but maybe thought I was just waiting for someone else.

Or, maybe he was rude. But in this context, I was quick to give him the benefit of the doubt. Instead of being cranky, I stopped to wonder what his experience might have been and what I could learn from this. Now that’s good energy!

·        I went to several sessions on upcoming elections about LGBTQ rights. In a fascinating twist, at least one of these elections (in Maine) will be an election about marriage equality initiated by the pro-LGBTQ side. Instead of fighting off initiatives designed to limit equality, this one will be an election on behalf of marriage equality. Word among folks who know these things is that it just might pass. Other states have their sights set on doing a similar thing soon. This is an empowering shift whether or not we “win” these elections. The fact that we have reached a point where we can take the initiative instead of just responding to attacks is huge!

Having survived Amendment 2 in Colorado and then thrived in its wake, I can see what an amazing change this is. Then, we were barely hanging onto our sense that we were worthwhile human beings. Now, we have the wherewithal to expect—not wait for, not beg for, not hope for, but expect—that we will eventually have equal rights. That’s a change that’s fun to see in its creation!

This shift comes to us courtesy of years of work by pro-LGBTQ activists, like the work on display at “Change.” With now dozens of elections under our collective belt, we have gained important ground. For one thing, public opinion has shifted increasingly toward support for equal rights. For another, grassroots activists have managed to gather a ton of information that they can use to craft campaign messages and campaign strategies. It won’t be perfect. But it will be a lot kinder to LGBTQ folks and their allies than the whole circus was a couple of decades ago, before we knew so much, before so much change.

I came back, as always, energized and enthused about what’s happening and what’s ahead. Also sleep deprived. Totally worth it.

Jawsercize

I always knew, intellectually, that I would get old. But somehow, I think I expected to get old in the same body. Imagine my surprise at all the things that are definitely not the same. Just for starters, I am not nearly as strong, as agile, as smooth skinned, as free of chronic “conditions,” as slow to fatigue, as quick to recover, or as sound of hearing and vision as I used to be. Heck, I’m not even as tall as I used to be. 

As I’ve slowly accepted this as a fact, I've begun to take it seriously enough to do something constructive about it. My frequent walks have turned into daily, nearly compulsory, and duly “brisk” daily outings. And I’ve resumed an old habit of hefting weights at the local rec center ... which also houses the local senior center, where I attend a “sit and fit” class as part of one of my volunteer gigs. Not exactly an aerobic workout, but good range of motion exercises can’t hurt.

Still, like others in my cohort, I face a steady trickle of health-related “events” that interrupt my life. At minimum, they add another doctor or dentist or PT appointment. At worst, they cause major disruptions in work or play schedules. As I heard someone say at the rec center yesterday (it was mid-day, when a fair number of “Silver Sneakers” folks were in the weight room with me), “You’re doing fine, and then something happens …”

I assume that on some deeper level, I’ll continue to be surprised by the reality of my aging body. But for the most part, I have come to accept it.

However, I was not prepared for the jaw thing. My jaw injury/condition is the residue of a car accident over 50 years ago, compounded by aging (reduced bone mass, reduced ligament elasticity). Even retirement may have contributed: I don’t talk as much as when I was teaching. Apparently, I suffer from the lack of what the fitness teacher calls “jawsercize.” So my jaw slips out of place for no clear reason, I can’t hold the phone to my left ear because it hurts my jaw, I can’t chew a sandwich except on one side and very carefully, and I have to arrange my jaw in a very precise position to be able to sleep. Bummer.

I must say, despite many warnings about the realities of aging, no one ever warned me to take care of my jaw. 

So, off to the PT I went. (PTs are magical in my book. They actually know things that are helpful). And I came away with a series of exercises for my jaw. “I can’t change your anatomy,” the PT said, “but we can bring in some muscle groups to help.” I trust her on this. I have to. So this week, I’ve been suctioning my tongue to the roof of my mouth and then opening and closing my mouth five times. Many times a day. Basically, every time I think about it. (I just now did it again.) I have a few other exercises that I won’t bother to describe. They involve distorted positions of tongue and jaw, and are also designed to do this “bring in some muscles groups to help” thing. “Make these your new nervous habits,” she said. Like I needed new ones.

I am less confident after 5 days of this than I was when I left her, but I'm persevering nonetheless. The other option, I guess, would be to talk more.

I suppose it’s a metaphor for aging in general. Whatever it takes to maintain this fading fantasy that really, life isn’t so different now. Just like when I was young, anything that’s wrong can be fixed, good as new.

It’s just that “new” is so long ago now.

Volunteer travel log: San Francisco

My last entry in my volunteer travel log, which seems like a long time ago, had us leaving Michigan, headed for San Francisco. Now there’s a change—in scenery, in culture, in pace, in essence! 

San Francisco is a vibrant city with lots of culture, great small movie theaters, the ocean on one side and the bay on the other, streetcars, and Fisherman’s Wharf. But it’s a city. It’s crowded, congested, noisy, and hurried, and there are far too few parking places. Long-time residents say that when you go out for dinner in San Francisco, you find a parking place and then look around for a restaurant. SF is geographically small—7.5 miles square—which makes it an easy city to walk (if you don’t mind the hills). I walked more miles in the year we spent here than I have since my mega-hiking days some years ago.

Coming from the political work I’d been doing elsewhere, it's not too surprising that my first foray into San Francisco volunteering was in LGBT politics. No particular anti-LGBT politics were afoot at the time (this was before the courts declared same-sex marriage legal and then Prop 8 then rescinded that right). But the local LGBT-rights group was very active anyway. I loved this idea: there were other issues of oppression happening in the state, and if we were committed to equality, we should be working for other groups’ equality, as well. So Equality California (EQCA, for short) was working hard on other issues. I joined up for the usual tasks of street corner voter ID, phone banks, and door-to-door campaigning. As a fundamentally shy person, I hate these activities. But organizers who are far wiser and more experienced that I am say these things work. So I devoted an afternoon a week to the street stuff and supervised a phone bank one evening a week. EQCA's work contributed to some great successes at the ballot box and forged alliances with other groups who stood by us when our turn came to be the targets. A good start to being involved in SF.

My next project, and the one I was most invested in here, was a totally new undertaking for me: teaching literacy to English-speaking adults. I heard about a training offered by Project Read, a literacy program at the SF library, and spent several weeks learning how to do this work. I had completed their training and was between learners when I decided to pursue an additional volunteer position that unexpectedly gave me a chance to put the training to good use.

There’s this program in SF called Delancey Street. It is sort of a half-way house for people coming out of prison or off the streets. They can choose to come here instead of other places of incarceration. This program is entirely run by the residents/inmates. In fact, residents designed, built, and are responsible for all maintenance of the block-sized residence hall where they all live. 

They run a restaurant in one corner of that building and a coffee shop in another. They perform all the duties required to operate these facilities—planning, ordering, cooking, serving, cleaning up, book-keeping … everything. They also have a moving business and do all the jobs required to run that business, from truck maintenance to booking jobs and record keeping to pick-up and delivery. At the holidays, they run Christmas tree lots, and residents do everything needed for those, too. Their income from these businesses helps to fund the program. The residents can’t leave except by earning the privilege and with supervision, but their days are filled with the things that fill working folks’ days on the “outside.”

The Delancey Street building with the Bay Bridge in the background

When I learned about this program (by visiting the restaurant with my partner, who knew the story), I was so impressed by the idea, that I decided I wanted to volunteer there. I met with the woman in charge and discovered that volunteering there wouldn't be so easy to arrange. They have no volunteers because the residents do everything. The one thing they were interested in was someone to teach a literacy class. Bingo! A perfect fit! So, for the rest of our time there, I did a weekly literacy class with a group of guys earning their way back into free society.

Both the teaching and the interpersonal parts of the task were challenging. These were guys who had grown up with minimal reading and writing ability. Their spoken language was fine, but they couldn’t read instructions for their work, couldn’t write a letter to the child they hadn’t see for years, couldn’t answer a letter from an old friend who had tracked them down, were concerned about getting out because there would be no one to translate the signs, the menus, the newspaper, and the instructions, on one to help them write letters (or emails), complete forms—all the things that make life in a print-laden world possible. On top of that, they had had minimal contact with people other than their fellow residents (and before that, fellow prisoners), and they were not very attuned to everyday social graces. Also, they had had virtually no contact with women. Boundaries were a huge issue here.

Challenges and all, this was a great experience. It felt really worthwhile and kept me thinking hard about how to be helpful. The classes were wrapped in a lot of laughter, like about the confusing maze of rules in English. And they brought many very gratifying moments, like helping that guy write a letter to his daughter. I don't know how much it helped because I had no contact with any of them outside class. Well, except for one letter, probably a result of my failure to be totally clear about that boundary thing. But that was quickly handled, and the rest was pure satisfaction.

I also did a couple of rather short-term volunteer gigs during that year. I worked for a while in the LGBTQ history archives, sorting and filing boxes and boxes of old documents, newspapers, flyers, and assorted memorabilia from decades of LGBTQ life in the city. This was a fascinating job just for the exposure to these old records. On the fun side, I learned (but was not at all surprised?) that there was a very active women’s touch football league in the 60s and 70s. On a more somber note, I also sorted through records from the 1980s, early in the AIDS epidemic. San Francisco (along with NYC) was ground zero for that disease in this country, and the impact on this city was immeasurable and tragic.

For a short period toward the end of our SF time, I volunteered with the health department, working at street fairs (of which there are many in SF) to disseminate safer sex information and provide free HIV and hepatitis testing. This felt like an excellent service to provide. It was also a pretty fascinating introduction to communities I usually wouldn’t encounter. Expanded my horizons, for sure!

And then, after a year of “sharking for parking,” in a friend’s words, we were off again. The next move brought us home to Colorado. For me, it was truly coming home—to the place of my childhood and virtually all of my adult life. To the mountains, the open, complicated skies, and the smell of rain (I never knew that rain doesn’t smell like this everywhere).

And then, the process of finding my place started all over again.

History in a lifetime

I've been working on some website material for the safe schools group I volunteer with, BoulderValley Safe Schools Coalition (which I talked about before). Mid-task, I paused and thought, "Wow ... This is amazing!" It just hit me how remarkable it is that I have these things to post—and that this site even exists. 

I was working on "Save the Date" announcements for two major LGBTQ-related happenings scheduled for a single weekend in March. Both are sponsored by major institutions in the state, and one is co-hosted by the governor. This is astonishing when you think about where we came from and how recently our journey began.

In my lifetime (in fact, in my adult lifetime), LGBTQ people in this country were universally shunned and vilified. In my lifetime, a “homosexual” identity was considered a sin by religious groups, illegal in the eyes of the law, and a sickness according to psychology. Of course, it is still considered a sin by many denominations (and many politicians). It was only declared by mental health professionals to be a normal form of human experience, not a mental illness, in 1973. And laws against homosexuality were endorsed right up to the US Supreme Court until 2003 – that's less than a decade ago!

But now, increasing numbers of faith communities are actively supportive of LGBTQ folks and their rights. All the major mental health professions have taken clear stands on behalf of the people they once declared sick. And progress toward equal rights before the law, while slower than we might prefer, is nonetheless dramatic.

Sometimes, LGBTQ people complain about how slow the movement toward full equality has been. But the time span of this movement is incredibly short. The Stonewall riots, widely considered the start of the LGBTQ rights movement, happened just over 40 years ago. Consider that time frame against the several centuries that passed before African American people made any major steps toward equality. And that movement is still in process.

Of course progress is spotty. Many LGBTQ youth thrive in supportive families and communities, but persistent homophobia leaves some at risk for harassment and even assault and many struggling with self-doubt and depression. The repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" allowed gay and lesbian service members to serve openly, but it ignored bisexual people and left transgender folks with no clear path toward similar rights. Same-sex marriage is legal in some states, but those marriages are not recognized in others. Gay-straight alliances are mandated in Massachusetts schools but banned in some other localities. Some elders have escaped the closets where they took refuge for so long and are now hearty contributors to this movement. Others remain more or less hidden, too frightened and demoralized by years of mistreatment to move far beyond a close circle of friends. Yet overall, if we consider the big picture, we are on a steep trajectory from invisibility and disdain to recognition and dignity.

For individuals yearning for full legal and social equality, the process seems slow. But in the context of historical time, the LGBTQ equal rights movement has been fast! Lightning fast. Eye blink fast. New York minute fast. 

And look where it has brought us! In the lifetime of people who once were refused the slightest right, the least honor, the smallest acknowledgement of their humanity—in their lifetime, we have come so far that I am posting announcements of two events on one weekend that are devoted to honoring, affirming, celebrating LGBTQ life. And I am posting them on behalf of a group that collaborates with the school district administration to make life right for LGBTQ kids.

This is amazing!

And then consider the nature of these events:

• The 6th annual TRANSformingGender Symposium, a chance for everyday folks to learn about transgender, gender queer, and other issues around gender identity and gender expression. Transgender identities weren't even named a couple of decades ago. Heck, the concept is still not understood by many folks (including many LGB folks). But here’s a 3-day program devoted to this edgy topic.
• The Statewide Convening on LGBT Youth will provide information and tools for folks all around the state who work with young people to help them understand the unique needs of LGBTQ youth. This amounts to a consciousness-raising and educational event for youth workers across Colorado to learn specifically about LGBTQ youth in a positive and affirming framework. This is the one co-hosted by Governor Hickenlooper. 

This is really amazing!

Think about how different this is from the sin, sick, illegal model that was completely unquestioned so recently. Not only do these events take LGBTQ lives seriously—seriously enough to devote days to them. Not only are they offered right out in the open, hosted by state institutions and the Guv. Not only do we now know enough about LGBTQ lives to hold multi-day events on topics within the topic of LGBTQ experience. But most astonishing of all, we have come to this moment from our starting point of shame in the short span of (less than) one lifetime.

How can we not pause to cheer?

Beach donuts and my gull, Mildred

What a wonderful weekend! They've been having a very dry winter in Oregon, but we were promised rain and snow from arrival to departure. This was the rare weekend designated for  snow on the beach. 

Somehow, though we managed to be in the donut hole between storms virtually the whole time. To our great pleasure, this meant lots of beach time with spectacular sunsets along with lovely, precipitation-free visits around the Oregon coast. These included spotting whale spouts from the observation tower and eating actual fresh seafood. And all the while, storms were visible in every direction but overhead.

This lucky whim of the weather goddess created  many opportunities for me to try out my new phone/camera. A photo travel log: 

En route to visit my sister outside Portland, we spotted this old (very old!), falling-down house. Amazingly, it seemed to be kept from tipping over by a single, scrawny tree.

So this was interesting itself, but around it were other trees that got me pondering: 

Trees would make a great projective test, sort of like a Rorschach inkblot test. Consider this: if you were to describe your relationship to your family in terms of trees, which of these would you pick and what would it mean: 

the scrawny one holding up the house, the wide-branching one standing nearby but apart from the house, or the double-trunk one across the driveway? Talk about this amongst yourself. No need to offer a public reply. Unless you want to, of course.

On to the coast to spend time walking the beach and discussing important matters with friends. Like which beach to walk on, how much home-made apple pie can we eat tonight and still have some for tomorrow, whether it’s legal to use pop abbreviations in the game of “Boggle” (e.g., lib as in ‘women’s lib,’ or rad as in ‘that’s rad!’). That, and matters of life and meaning and assorted endeavors that each of us is pursuing, conversations as satisfying as the food and surf.

That donut hole phenomenon made for some brilliant sunsets. Each evening, there were storms to the north and south of us, but we had a clear, brilliant view of the setting sun. I got caught in that serial photography thing. I took the “perfect” picture only to look up and see another view even more gorgeous. So I took that picture, only to look up … I imagine everyone has been there. 

            

Throughout the weekend, I was followed by this lone gull. I am certain it was the same one and that she was following me specifically. She spoke to me. I named her Mildred. Here are a few shots of her …honestly, she was around wherever I went!

So, now that I have mastered (hah!) the camera on my supersmart phone, my next goal is to figure out why I keep losing contact with my email. Maybe it has something to do with the time the camera froze because it (and my hands) had gotten so cold in the wind and sea spray (and the 26° weather) that neither hands nor phone worked. Or maybe it was the time I dropped it in the damp sand. But I don’t think so. I think I just screwed up some setting. I’m just overconfident enough to get in trouble with this thing.

More camera tales to come, I’m sure.

Meanwhile, what do you think about that tree question?

Time warp

Parkinson’s law: Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. My new law: Leisure time contracts no matter what you do. In fact, it vanishes.

Recently, I decided I needed to cut back on my workload in order to maintain my sanity (not to mention my car and my piles of filing and my medical appointments). So, I reduced my editing work to about half what I was doing before. This, I was sure, would free up time to do all the things I just haven’t been able to find time for. Like be retired.

This was my first week at this new lower work level. So far, the week has been a blur of running around all day and then coming home late in the afternoon to do my (reduced) load of work. I’m staying up late to finish it—even though I’m sure I was doing all of these other things even while I was working more.

Where did all that free time I imagined go?

This is so familiar. It’s what I said when I finished grad school and imagined all the free time to read non-required stuff. Then, I spent 30 years in a career where I pretty much read required stuff. So I took summers off, and imagined all that free time to read non-required stuff. Somehow, my summers flew by with no such free time. So, then I thought retirement would bring all this excess time to do bonbons and soap operas. Instead, I got so busy, the soap operas fell by the wayside before I even got started. As for the bonbons, who needs leisure time for that? Despite being “retired,” I discovered this great part-time work that involves reading required stuff. (A theme emerges here.) So, now I cut back on my workload so I could have more leisure time. I’ve let my magazines pile up and figured I could spend leisurely days filing papers, lunching with friends, and reading non-required stuff. Instead, I find leisure time has left the building.

So, where did this week disappear to? Let’s see … I caught up on emails with friends. I made several appointments and already kept a couple of them. I started a new “get fit” regime that will include visits to the gym (“Visits.” What a gentle  word for what happens at the gym). I did fail to finish one bit of required reading for a research meeting this evening.

Oh, yeah. And I got a new phone. The camera on my other one went totally haywire, and I’m really into taking pictures for this blog. So clearly, I needed a new phone. Anyone who has a smart phone knows that getting a new one is considerably more complicated than just activating the number. 

The dealer kindly transferred my contacts, but a lot were duplicated,  so that required some cleaning up. To do that, I was required to read stuff about how this gadget works. I had to do that online. There were virtually no printed instructions. I guess if you’re high-techie enough to get a smartphone, you have no further need of print media of any sort. Also, that transfer process didn’t include my calendar, which I consider the brain of my phone. How many hours does it take to fill in a calendar? All I can say is that this accounts for a lot of my missing time. And then there’s the whole process of “personalizing” the phone—which includes personalizing sounds, screens, icons, apps, widgets, and some other stuff that has clearly gone the way of those missing hours.

So, anyhow, the phone is finally up and running. Although I still find myself wondering whether this is the phone I want. It’s actually fine. In fact, it’s totally excellent, technologically speaking (as if I knew enough to judge). But it’s biggish and clunky. Too bad, Janis. Two-year contract, and I sure I can’t afford the cost of changing it. Nor am I sure I’d want to if I could. I ask myself, would I rather have a larger, clunky phone that does more (faster Internet, more memory for faster operations, better camera, etc.) or a smaller, simpler, lightweight, easy-to-handle phone that does the things I need, but slower, and that has an inferior camera. This was the dilemma I faced in the store, and it lingers. You can see where another chunk of my time has gone: ruminating on my choice of a phone, for Pete’s sake!

But never fear. All of this frantic activity will come to a most pleasant end tomorrow, when we travel to Oregon to visit friends. We’ll have dinner with a friend in Portland, then see my sister who lives near Portland for breakfast, and then travel to the coast to meet up with other friends to share good conversations and some quiet time at the ocean. Perhaps this will rejuvenate me enough to tackle another week of reduced workload.

I’ll take some pictures with my fancy new, clunky, high-tech superphone. That should make for a better story next time. 

Stream of consciousness ... dogs and democracy

This is a wandering stream of ideas that took me—improbably—from a trotting dog to the meaning (and distortion) of democracy. Jump on in! 

Recently, walking along a local bike path, I saw a woman who was walking her dog. Well, actually, she was jogging her dog. This was a really well-behaved dog, trotting neatly beside her human. As I watched them, I thought, “That dog hasn’t been formally trained.” I knew this because the dog was trotting on her human’s right side. Formally trained dogs are on the person’s left. So then, I asked myself, “Why should dogs be on the left anyway?”  “Convention,” I answered. But why? Why this convention and not another? Presumably, I figured, to keep the right hand free for other things.

Pondering on this, I was reminded of other “conventions” designed around handedness. For example, the handshake evolved in the Western world as a right-handed gesture to prove that neither party has a weapon. So a right-handed shake is a sign of friendship, of peace. And why would a right-handed shake be any better than a left-handed shake? Because most people (about 90%) are right handed. So that’s where the weapon would be. Or, in this case, would demonstrably not be.

This got me thinking about examples of preferences for the right hand in everyday life. (And any left-handed person can tell you there are many.) Consider scissors. We cut accurately with scissors by sighting along the sharp lower edge. (You may not realize you do this – try it out.) But for lefties, regular scissors are difficult to use because the upper blade obscures their ability to see the cutting edge. Or can openers—the old-fashioned hand-cranked ones. If you’re right handed, try to use one left handed. You’ll see that it’s possible, but you’ll also see that’s  it’s designed for righties. Remember pay phones, the kind you no longer see—in phone booths on the street corner or lobbies of hotels? They're so 20th century, they're hardly worth considering. But trust me: they were designed for righties. Think also of golf clubs, baseball gloves, power tools (what do these choices say about me…?), place settings at the table … and on and on.

So I was walking along pondering these things, and I thought about my father. I imagined having a conversation with him about the right-hand bias in the world. I feel sure that he would have said something like, “It’s not a bias. It’s just realistic. Most people are right handed, so you make things right handed. You can’t make separate can openers for everyone, for Pete’s sake! You do what works for the majority of people.” He, of course, was right handed.

I thought about that line: “You do what works for the majority of people.” And I was struck by the similarity between that phrase and a common (if simplistic) rendition of democracy: “The majority rules.” It seems that this is the understanding of democracy that is supported by the Tea Party and other social conservatives—“the majority rules.”  And, in the case of handedness, as my imagined father pointed out, “most people are right handed. You do what works for most people.” The parallels are easy to see.

It suddenly struck me how easily this very common definition of democracy—seen in dog training, scissors, and handshakes—can be used to justify our assorted biases against “minority” folks. We do what works for most people. To heck with lefties. That’s democracy. 

This isn't a new thought, of course. From the beginning of this nation (and before), people have warned about “the tyranny of the majority.” Recently none other than Rachel Maddow tweeted a caution about the “will of the majority” in matters of human rights.

It just hit me on a new and very concrete level. The majority rules. It actually appears to make prejudice and unequal treatment the "democratic" thing to do, the "patriotic" thing to do. Democracy, the great leveler, the philosophy that sees everyone as equal, reshaped into a tool of bias.

And that's the story of my journey that day. All from seeing a well-behave dog trotting along the bike path.

On her human’s right side!

Anarchy!

Dawn

I love skies, especially complicated ones with lots of different sorts of clouds. I love the surprises, the uncertainty of what it says about the air currents. They're especially wonderful when dawn or dusk provides the lighting.

The other morning, we got a special, new year’s welcome to the day. (OK, it was January 2, but who cares?) It was so spectacular, I had to take some pictures. 

These are all taken from behind our house about 7:00 a.m. on 1-2-12                                                                                      

                           

                                      

  

.......... Miraculous! ........

Volunteer Travel Log – Ypsilanti, Michigan

A while ago, I started a sort of travel log, wending my way through 6 years of wandering by telling tales of my volunteer gigs at each stop. So far, I recounted adventures in New Hampshire and devoted two posts to Massachusetts—one dedicated to my time with Rachel Maddow early in her career and the other to things more of this earth. 

So, our next stop was Ypsilanti, Michigan, a small town between Detroit and Ann Arbor in the southeast corner of the state, easily missed in the shadow of its two well-known neighbors. We moved to Ypsilanti at the beginning of the academic year. This meant that we learned about “up north” too late to take advantage of it that year. “Up north” is local jargon for the picturesque northern, wooded part of Michigan, including the  Upper Peninsula or “U.P.” (UP residents are called "yoopers"). 

Instead, virtually our only experience of the state outside of where we lived was the Interstate that led from the Canada crossing above the Lake Erie, down along the eastern edge of the state and into Detroit. The northern stretch of that highway in Michigan caught our attention (lots of serious hunting culture) but not our interest. So most of what we saw of Michigan was the southeast corner—i.e., Detroit, Ann Arbor to the west of Detroit, and our town, Ypsilanti ("Ypsi" to the locals), squeezed between the two.

We never really settled into Michigan the way we had in Massachusetts. As things turned out, we were there for less than a year. I found the grocery store and a car mechanic, but not a dentist or a doctor. And I never really found my “groove” here in terms of volunteer work.

After my great experience with AFSC in Northampton, I sought out that group early. However, the Ann Arbor office of AFSC was working solely on LGBTQ issues. Obviously, I'm not opposed to that sort of work, and I did some projects with them throughout our time there. But it never became a major focus for me.

As luck (or not) would have it, this was 2004, the year of the presidential campaign. “W” was up for a second term, and I was committed to doing everything I could to stop him. I was never excited about Kerry. For me, this was first and foremost a battle against Bush and his policies. To this end, I devoted myself virtually full-time to volunteer work at the Kerry campaign headquarters in Ann Arbor.

I did this from early September until November, when it was all over but the weeping. Here, I got a chance to practice the skills I learned working on the Oregon anti-LGB campaign while I was living in New Hampshire. I initially participated in and then supervised phone banks. I hate making cold calls. I especially hate making cold calls that are likely to be unwelcome, so this was not easy work for me. But I felt deeply obliged to do it.

I especially recall one day in October. It was close enough to the election that the campaign office was buzzing all day, and the hired staff were working virtually around the clock. But this was Ann Arbor, home to the University of Michigan Wolverines.

When the Wolverines play a home football game, the whole city empties out and fills the stadium. I volunteered to cover the phones during a game and ended up being the only person in the office. Here I was, new to Michigan, totally ignorant of local politics, a novice in campaign operations, but holding the fort by myself. I held my breath, hoping nothing noteworthy would happen. Fortunately, this tactic seemed to work.

After the election, I had a lot of free time and started casting about for other volunteer work. I was missing the broad social justice focus of AFSC in Northampton, so I went hunting for another group like that. Soon, I located a peace and social justice group called “Peace Works” (the name was so wonderful!) through a local newspaper article. (Hunting for a link to the group, I found that they closed shop the end of last year.) I worked with them for a short time, but somehow, this was never a perfect fit. You can see a pattern here—two volunteer gigs that didn't capture my passion. This is what I meant about not finding my "groove" here. One blessing of retirement, of course, is that if something doesn't work, you don’t have to keep doing it. So I moved on to something else.

And I found that something else in the LGBTQ community. On the same day that Bush was re-elected, the LGBTQ community of Michigan faced another major loss. The state’s voters passed a constitutional amendment that banned same-sex marriage and civil unions in the state. Michigan has an impressive array of LGBTQ community groups, as well as a really fine LGBTQ-specific newspaper, Between the Lines (now online under the auspices of “PrideSource”). After this painful loss at the polls, folks decided these groups needed to be working more closely and more effectively together. So, at a daylong retreat, representatives from these groups and from the community committed to creating a super-committee that would guide the way forward. I got to chair the group that selected that committee. Before I left in May, the selection process had been determined and the details clarified. The actual selection was well underway. I didn't get to see the final outcome of this process personally, but the super-committee went about its work, and soon, an umbrella group, "The Peninsula Group," was formed.

By that time, we were on our way to our next stop. This time, we went all the way west. We were headed for the City by the Bay, city of legend and song, city with a fascinating history, a vibrant queer culture, and way too few parking spots. San Francisco, open your golden gate!

1968

     1968: Like a knife blade, the year severed past from future … Time, 1988

     1968: The year that made us who we are … Newsweek, 2007

Here it is, the start of a new year—a perfect time to talk about a different year: 1968! It isn’t just an arbitrary choice of a year. It came up because my partner and I finally made it to the Boulder History Museum to see the exhibit, "1968," which ended yesterday. Sorry if you missed it. The pictures below (except the cover of Time magazine) were taken there.

Boulder History Museum

We’re both amateur historians anyhow, and we’re especially intrigued by this era and this amazing year. Anyone who experienced it can’t help but remember, and  it all happened during our "coming of age" years. So seeing it displayed in the museum was sort of nostalgic and sort of painful. Just like the year 1968: complicated, expansive, and difficult.

As I was writing this, I found myself reflecting on the meaning of 1968. That took me on a rather long cultural / historical jaunt that you may or may not want to join me for. If you do, you’ll find that part a few paragraphs down (“1968 … Reminiscing”). If you don’t, the next few paragraphs are about the Boulder History Museum exhibit—which is its own good story.

Visiting the museum exhibit about this remarkable year was … well, remarkable. The walls were full of memorabilia from that time—informational signs were posted alongside album covers and posters, newspaper articles and classic photographs. (Interestingly some of the iconic photos weren’t there: Martin Luther King’s aides leaning over him and pointing in the direction of his assassin; Bobby Kennedy lying on the floor of a Los Angeles hotel kitchen; the “police riot” outside the Democratic Party convention in Chicago). The mix was what you'd expect. But I had forgotten some things, or forgotten that they happened in that year (how many thing can happen in one year?). It was strangely poignant viewing it all in one space and time, from the perspective of over 40 years.

In addition to the materials I anticipated, there was quite a lot of information about Boulder in 1968 (and the years right around that). This city was home to a lot of activism, as were most university towns around the nation. Boulder had its share of sit-ins and occupations, its share of roadblocks and protests, and its share of the “counter culture” buzz. This isn’t surprising, of course. Boulder already had a liberal reputation in the 1960s. Still, it was fun to see how this pivotal year played out right here.

          

            Allen Ginsburg calms an anti-war crowd
         in downtown Boulder

Boulder anti-war protesters block US 36

So, here at the start of 2012, I find myself wondering: if people did a museum exhibit about "2011," what would they include? Roadblocks again, but this time in the halls of Congress. Space trips, but this time saying goodbye to the fleet of shuttles that were born of the space program (which was launched by President John F. Kennedy  in the early 1960s, with the explicit goal of reaching the moon in that decade). Human rights movements, this time on behalf of the 99% of us against the richest 1%. Campus protests, complete with tear gas, but this time over financial inequality at the hands of the hyper-wealthy.

I wonder ... might history mark 2011 like this, Morrow's comment on 1968?

Nineteen sixty-eight was a perverse genius of a year: a masterpiece of shatterings. The year had heroic historical size, and everything … seemed momentous.

1968 … Reminiscing

I was in graduate school in 1968. I remember the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and of Bobby Kennedy. I remember the anti-war movement, the marches, the sit-ins, the teach-ins (which I participated in a bit), and the occupations of university buildings (which I didn’t). I remember astronauts orbiting the moon and the first pictures of the blue marble earth seen from space. I remember when Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1968. Especially, I remember the sense of promise and of danger. Youth were on the move, and that was good. The society was in upheaval, and that was scary. I was in graduate school, and I missed much of it.

But I was very aware of the mood of the times. Things were different; I was sure of that. We were different. We had a different vision, a better one. If the old guard would just get out of the way, we could change the world. It was the classic, idealistic, and self-affirming conviction of adolescents. But this time, we had an advantage:  we were the baby-boom generation. Our sheer numbers gave us huge visibility. It was easy to believe that what we wanted would finally prevail.

It is true that this generation was extremely visible and vocal. Boomers were also extremely active. They swelled the ranks of the Civil Rights movement, the anti-war movement, the modern environmental movement, and the movements for women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, disability rights, Chicano/Hispanic/Latino rights, and elders rights. Most who didn’t participate in these things in 1968 knew about them. Of course, lots of folks didn't pay attention. Others knew, but were preoccupied with their own lives. Many of these people, too, were sure that their generation was special, was uniquely idealistic and daring.

But 1968 was not only about political activism. It was also a cultural whirlpool, drenched in ambivalence. Dreams of a better future stood side by side with longing for a safer, stable, known past. 

        

               The rock musical "Hair" promised
              "the dawning of the Age of Aquarius"

"The Graduate," where we heard
"Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio..."

The rock musical “Hair,” whose soundtrack was released that year, promised “the dawning of the Age of Aquarius”—the voice of youth imagining a new and far better age, if only because we would inhabit it. 

That same year, on the soundtrack for the movie "The Graduate," Paul Simon lyrics pleaded, “Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio? A nation turns its lonely eyes to you”—the voice of those yearning for the certainty, the stability of some vaguely defined past moment, past hero.

In 1988, the cover of Time magazine recalled the iconic year. A sense of simultaneous terror and promise weaves through the cover article by Lance Morrow:

1968: Like a knife blade, the year severed past from future

Nineteen sixty-eight had the vibrations of earthquake about it. America shuddered. History cracked open… 

Nineteen sixty-eight was more than a densely compacted parade of events … [It was] to some extent a war between the past and the future, and even, for an entire society, a violent struggle to grow up.”

For years, I assigned that Time article in my Psychology of Adolescence course. Not because it talked about adolescence (although it did), but because it talked about a national reckoning, that “violent struggle to grow up.” 1968 seemed to mirror the invigorating, scary, idealistic, painful process of adolescence. The nation was seeking its identity, trying to define who it would be, what it would believe.

1968 was the coming of age of the nation. And I was there, just coming of age myself. I imagine that 40 years from now, history will have something to say about 2011. But it’s hard to imagine that it will match Morrow’s description of 1968:

One is sometimes incredulous now at 1968, not only at the astonishing sequence of events but at the intensity, the energy in the air... Revolutionary bombast [and an] elegy for something in America that had got lost, some sense of national innocence and virtue.

And the music. What message will people glean from the music of 2011?