Weaving Venus

Summertime Top Ten

10.  Watching Fireworks, July 4   After seeing Michael Moore's latest film about our "health care" system with Michelle and Tim ("yikes - oh, my lord - this is shameful!"), we watched fireworks from Pike Place Market in downtown Seattle ("ooooh - aaaaaaah - I like the ones that twinkle at the end!").

9.  Canning Peaches, August 18   On a thunderstormy Saturday, Stacey and I made cinnamon peach preserves in her farmhouse kitchen.  There's nothing like the slipperyness of a ripe peach in your palm after you've submerged it in boiling water and then carefully slipped away the skin.

8.  Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix, July 11   I've only been to a few midnight movie releases - and the fifth HP film was surely worth the preparatory espresso infusion.  Especially the glass-shattering battle between Dumbledore and Voldemort in the Ministry of Magic.

7.  Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows, July 21  I've never stood in line to buy a book - a line that stretched until 2:30am  - but I didn't want to miss out on the social phenomenon that is the HP book release party.  I went with Maggie and her family to their cabin, where we read aloud to each other by the light of the firepit.  Accio marshmallows!

6.  Josh Groban Concert, August 10   Classically trained baritone dreamboat.  I would listen to this man sing anything under the sun and moon - from Italian operas to used car jingles - and think it was the most gorgeous thing since the dawn of time.

5.  Irish Fair, August 12   Ingredients for a perfect summer evening:  traditional Irish music on an outdoor stage; city lights jigging on the river; breeze in the Cottonwood trees; blanket spread on the grass; tall glass of Guinness.

4.  A Day with Will & Sebastian, August 4   Ingredients for a perfect summer day with your nephews: freezie pops; play-doh; coloring pictures for cousin Felicity; peanut butter toast; Chutes & Ladders; Pokemon; walking in the rain; water fight with the hose since you're already wet from the rain; more freezie pops; snuggle.

3.  One Voice Choir Concerts, June 13 & 14   We performed two terrific concerts titled "Generations Rock," focusing on pieces that look at the connections between young and old folk, including spoken word performances by local teen poets.

2.  Stillwater High School Reunion, June 30   Not to toot my own horn, since I was on the planning committee, but wow, the reunion was the best time ever.  All the kids said so.  Plus I got to take a walk down to the railroad tracks under the full moon moon with my high school sweetheart.

1.  James & Kristi's Wedding, 07-07-07  Cascade Mountains.  Canyon backdrop.  Fiddle.  Wildflowers.  Wine.  Raspberry.  Slow dance.  Aurora Borealis.  Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful friends.

A Robin in the Snow

It's April 11, and fully the season of spring.  On a balmy walk last weekend I saw my first robin and my first flower - a purple crocus, two tender inches tall, next to a yellow stucco house.  (Cue the Hallelujah chorus.)

However.  The theatre of my picture window offers a wintry wonderland scene of jolly, fat flakes falling down, up, and sideways - depending on the whim of the wind.  Unlike my "the glass is half full" approach to life, I do view this snowfall as "the shovel is half empty."  The co-workers and baristas I chat with this morning say, "Oh, NO! This is awful!" and "It's not supposed to DO this!" and "Yuck."

But I think it's so pretty.  Besides, it'll melt by tomorrow, probably.  And the outlook for the weekend is 60 degrees.  So the robins and crocuses haven't gone far.

May the well-worn wisdom in the phrase "This, too, shall pass" remind me that, just like spring snow, the cold pain of divorce will melt.

The Best Valentine Ever

My blogging has been sparse.  Perhaps because I haven't written about The Big Thing Going On In My Life.  I've been separated from my husband, G, for a whole year now.  One morning he said I want you to move out, and I did.  I migrated from guest bedroom to guest bedroom for 6 months before making a nest in the Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis.

I'd hoped our months of marriage counseling would usher in healing - sometimes kicking and crying, sometimes compassionately danced, but redemptive healing all the same.  In years to come, lying in bed or walking along the Mississippi, we'd be able to say, "Remember that terrible time...Remember how we wouldn't let go...Remember how we made it through?"  A rough patch in our life path together would have been successfully navigated while so many other relationships have gone astray.  And then we'd be able to kiss and squeeze, and feel so blessed and capable of love.

For G, though, our counseling and my efforts to 'be what he needed' were heart-breakingly 'too little, too late.'  Perhaps it is true that our individual paths are too different, leading us too far apart to walk a marriage together.  And so the Serenity Prayer floats through my days, gently and insistently reminding me of the Buddha-Me I try to be.  Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

The occurrence of Valentine's Day so close to the one-year anniversary of leaving my home could have thrown me into the 'pit of despair' a la The Princess Bride.  But my dear friend, Mette (aka Mette m'dear) kept me in the light of day with her brilliant tradition of sending her single girlfriends a Valentine care-package.  I hadn't received this goody-box for about 9 years - since before I met G.

I settled into my new, second-hand couch and sliced through the tape and cardboard to find several little gifts, each wrapped in a unique bit of tissue, hand-made paper, string, and ribbon.  This is what you give for the Best Valentine Ever: chocolate-frosted marshmallow cookies, tiny sunflower magnets, a heart-shaped candle, finger cymbals for bellydancing, bite-sized chocolates, and a card reminding someone she is still someone's yummy Valentine.

Birthday Bliss

My birthday this year was one of the best ever.  I like to be the Princess on my birthday, which I suppose is high maintenance and creates high expectations for the folks who plan something for my I-Am-The-Princess Day.  So, I decided to plan my own celebration this year - wanting to nurture myself in the ways I most need and enjoy.

Birthday Eve, 5pm - I gather with cousins, aunties, and immediate family at my parents' for pizza and root beer and gifts of crayon artwork from my nephews.

7:15pm - Girls-Only trip to the neighborhood theatre, The Grandview, to see "Dreamgirls."  I get chills all through the ballads by Jennifer Hudson.  Especially during "I Am Changing," because I am.

10pm - The six gals come to see my new apartment and eat pineapple upsidedown cake and drink Earl Grey tea with honey.  My mom calls this cake "Better Than Sex Cake."

12:01am - It's officially my birthday and the gals sing to me while my cousin Jenny snores on my couch.

9am - I grab a latte with almond flavor at my favorite coffeehouse and drive out to Stillwater to the Aveda spa.  My girlfriends Donna and Meri meet me for manicures and pedicures.  I feel very pampered and fancy-pants.

2pm - My girlfriend Maggie picks me up and we fly off to the annual henna party at my bellydance school.  About 80 women and a few fellas sit on pillows and blankets to watch a bellydance performance.  Next came Middle Eastern treats and drinks and painting our hands and feet with henna, creating swirling designs of diamonds and dots and leaves.

7pm - I join Meri and her husband Fergus for dinner at his parents' home - a cozy haven of original art and sculpture, jungly plants, highback easy chairs, and a snapping fire.  Fergus' father shares my birthday, so we toasted over a delicous meal and a creme brulee dessert.

Midnight - I say hello to a new chapter of my life.

Some Borrowed Words on Solstice

from "In the Bleak Midwinter," hymn text by Christina Georgina Rossetti (1830-1894)

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,

earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;

snow had fallen, snow on snow,

snow on snow, in the bleak midwinter, long ago.

from Garrison Keillor's Writer's Almanac

In the northern hemisphere, the Winter Solstice is the shortest day of the year and the longest night.  It's officially the first day of winter and one of the oldest known holidays in human history. Anthropologists believe that solstice celebrations go back at least 30,000 years, before humans even began farming on a large scale.  Many of the most ancient stone structures made by human beings were designed to pinpoint the precise date of the solstice.  The stone circles of Stonehenge were arranged to receive the first rays of midwinter sun.

Ancient peoples believed that because daylight was waning, it might go away forever, so they lit huge bonfires to tempt the sun to come back.  The tradition of decorating our houses and our trees with lights at this time of year is passed down from those ancient bonfires.

from New Moon Occult Shop

"Yule" is when the dark half of the year relinquishes to the light half.  On the morning after Solstice Night - the longest night of the year - the sun climbs just a little higher and stays a little longer in the sky.  Hundreds and thousands of years ago, much celebration was to be had as the ancestors awaited the rebirth of the Oak King, the Sun King, the Giver of Life who warmed the frozen Earth and made her to bear life from seeds protected in her womb through the fall and winter.  Bonfires were lit in the fields, and crops and trees were "wassailed" with toasts of spiced cider.

Children were escorted from house to house with gifts of clove-spiked apples and oranges, which were laid in baskets of evergreen boughs and wheat stalks dusted with flour.  The apples and oranges represented the sun; the boughs were symbolic of immortality; the wheat stalks portrayed the harvest; and the flour was accomplishment of triumph, light, and life.  Holly, mistletoe, and ivy not only decorated the outside, but also the inside of homes.  These extended an invitation to Nature Sprites to come and join the celebration.  A sprig of holly was kept near the door all year long as a constant invitation for good fortune to pay visit to the residents.

The ceremonial Yule log was the highlight of the festival. In accordance to tradition, the log must either have been harvested from the householder's land, or given as a gift… it must never have been bought.  Once dragged into the house and placed in the fireplace, it was decorated in seasonal greenery, doused with cider or ale, and dusted with flour before being set ablaze along with a piece of last year's log (held on to for this ritual).  And thus, the old year gave way to the new in a rebirth of blazing light.

from "Solstice Fire," by Will Winter

Suddenly, it is December and it is dark.

In July I had so much; remember how I squandered it -

going to a movie that sunny afternoon?

What was I thinking?

This year, if I am lucky, and if this fire works,

the Night Thief will begin restitution!

Tomorrow a minute is back - maybe two.

Before long, I'm thinking that my gold

will be returned to its rightful owner.

And, as for me, I will be more careful next time.

Love Your Mother

I live across the street from a busy, thriving Unitarian-Universalist church.  The building was built as a Jewish temple, so the facade has an impressive line of pillars and arched windows.  It's lit-up with activity until late, and it's comforting and companionable to look out my picture window and see people always moving around like people-bees in their church-hive.

A couple of weeks ago, I went over and joined a group of about 20 dedicated, environmentalist people-bees to watch a screening of Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth."  Have you seen it?  I know - I was putting off seeing it, too.  I didn't want to feel angry, powerless, hopeless about the future - the present! - of our planet, our world, our country, our society, my own life.

But I'm glad I crossed the street to see this film.  In addition to the emotions I feared, I also felt impressed by and grateful to Al Gore for his decades-long mission to raise awareness and effect action and change.  I also came away feeling at least a little empowered and hopeful in the flutter of redemption this film offered.  I'm a big fan of redemptive endings.

You and I know what needs to be done - on global, national, and personal levels.  Here are a few environmental organizations to which I contribute that you might consider for a year-end donation or holiday gift:

Trust for Public Land

Save the Redwoods League

Sierra Club

Nature Conservancy

World Wildlife Federation

Heifer International

Singing at the AIDS Quilt

In August I joined the "One Voice Mixed Chorus", one of North America's oldest (almost 20 years) community choirs for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender singers - and a few of us "straight allies."  When my friend Kevin encouraged me to audition, I wasn't sure I would be welcomed.  Would this close-knit group of GLBT folks feel I was treading on their turf?  Diluting or compromising their collective identity?  Aren't there other choirs for heterosexual sopranos?  This is OUR rare and precious place!

My apprehension came from a genuine desire to respect the importance - the life-giving and sustaining necessity - of this group to GLBT musicians who might not feel, or be, welcomed elsewhere.  But I needn't have worried.  The Monday night rehearsals have offered me not only enthusiastic welcome, but also donuts, Fritos, organic grapes, and budding friendships.

Oh - and the singing!  Ah, the singing.  I have proudly worn the mantle of "choir geek" since 5th grade, when I tried to convince my music teacher to mount a production of "Xanadu" so I could play the lead role - Olivia Newton John's unforgettable role as a singing, rollerskating Muse.  (We did a musical about Thomas Edison instead.)  My choral career climaxed amazingly in a tour of China and Japan with my college choir.

But since college, a chunk of my soul has been starving to sing with a choir again.  That hunger is being fed now, and it is dee-lish-ous.  Do-Re-Mi.  Earlier this month, One Voice Mixed Chorus went on tour of northern Minnesota and up into Canada for a fantastic concert in Winnipeg, where we collaborated with their Rainbow Harmony Choir.

Yes, northern Minnesota has GLBT organizations thriving - or just beginning to blossom - all over the place.  Many of them are starving for groups like ours to visit their communities with a message of strength, solidarity, courage, compassion, and justice for GLBT folks and for everybody.  And all of them have their own powerful messages to share with us in return...

Like the couple who lost their gay son to AIDS twenty years ago, and have continued to live in their small town, holding their heads and hearts high in the face of shuttered judgment and outright condemnation.  This couple drove four hours to attend our concert.  For empathy and comfort.  To remember and honor.

Like the teacher at one of the high schools where we performed, who took aside our director and quietly confided, "I'm gay, but no one here knows.  Thank you for being here.  Thank you."

Like the 60-something woman from a rural, conservative community who is not just "coming out" to her friends and family - but leaping out!  She said our music was an empowering springboard.

I shiver to imagine all the hundreds of messages - shared or silent - that were exchanged along this tour.

After our final concert of the trip at Bemidji State University, some of us from the choir walked across the cold, windy campus to the candle-lit auditorium where part of the AIDS Quilt was displayed.  Alone I moved from one memorial piece to another - each measuring 3 feet by 6 feet and decorated with every imaginable artistic expression and medium.  Glitter, photos, poems, and feathers.  Songs, scripture, t-shirts, and flags.  Embroidery, belt buckles, flowers, and foil.  Signatures, symbols, baby blankets, and teddy bears.  Names.  Names.  Names.  Lives.  Lives.  Lives.

I moved from life to life - humming the music I had just performed, singing the songs of strength, solidarity, courage, compassion, and justice.  For the lost lives, for my new friends in One Voice, for the people I love.  For me.

Bellydancers Galore

The crowd ululated.  The Syrian musician drummed.  The stage lights dimmed to a deep red.  Six women in sky-blue silk flowed onto the stage - all swiveling hips and sparkling lips.  Some of them were lithe and tanned.  Some were pale with beautiful bellies pooching.  All of them were barefooted and bare armed, with loose hair hanging down their bare backs.

They spun, trailing gold and emerald scarves.  They shook their hips as fast as vibration, jiggling thighs and bellies and backsides, while their upper bodies remained perfectly still.  They framed their faces with hands fluttering gracefully like birds.

The drummer paused, and began a new faster, frenzied rhythm, ushering three more women onstage.  These dancers took my breath away - dark eyes lined heavily with kohl, hair braided and dreaded and wound with chrysanthemums, arms decorated with weighty silver bangles.

The shortest dancer, with a jeweled headpiece, reminded me of the snake goddess from Crete.  Another dancer scared me a little - she had the intensity of Kali, the ferocious Hindu goddess.  And, oh, the third dancing goddess was my favorite - her stomach was tattooed with two peacocks facing each other on either side of her pierced bellybutton.

But bellydancing is not just about appearances.  I imagine my bellydance instructor sniffing suspiciously at a performance that seems all "smoke and mirrors."  While these fantastic costumes add to the sensual mystique, the true art of bellydancing is in the execution of the very physically and aesthetically demanding moves.  Stomach muscles, women!  Stomach muscles!

Thankfully, the performance in Minneapolis by the Bellydance Superstars that enthralled me last night showcased several masters of the art of bellydancing.  They had mystique and technique.  I'm going to sign up for another class today!  Why don't you?

The Wheels on the Bus

The '92 Honda Civic gave up the ghost.  A blue ghost with rust, windshield cracks, and duct tape accessories - but long since without A/C, electric locks and windows, horn, wiper fluid sprayer, radio...and, most recently, the passenger side rearview mirror.

But.  She always started.  And stopped.  And the seatbelts worked.  She carried me north - almost to Canada as Lake Superior's north shore leaves turned scarlet and gold.  She carried me east - to Thanksgiving meals and family Christmases across Wisconsin.  And she carried me south - up and down and around the gorgeous Iowa landscape of bluffs and cornfields.  (Sorry, Dakotas, we didn't go west.)

Now, within two days, I know how to navigate the Twin Cities' bus routes between my home and my first job; second job and first job; second job and choir practice; choir practice and home...  The possible combination of locations to which I must get to and fro in my daily life is endless.  Okay, maybe not endless, but I can't and never could do word problems - or algebra or physics.

Last night while waiting for the 144, I heard all about how the octagenarian man on the bench next to me used to work for a road crew.  He thinks it's a pity how so many people wear headphones or talk on their cell phones now while waiting for and riding the bus.  We don't talk anymore, he said, shaking his whiskered face.

This morning while waiting for the 5E and studying my music lyrics, a lovely man with dreadlocks and brown corduroy pants asked me what instrument I play.  I'm a singer, I said, I have to memorize these songs by Monday night.  We talked for maybe 47 seconds, then my bus pulled up.  When he said goodbye, he touched me lightly on the right shoulder.

So in addition to all the good reasons for using public transportation instead of a car - primarily economic and environmental for me - there's also the human to human interaction.  A light touch on the shoulder - just a brief affection - which I would not have had otherwise.