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I’m thinking about our new year, our new US government, and some luminary Quakers. Despite several snow/ice storms, accidents and fear, I hold onto a vision of new justice for all in 2009. Obama, our bi-racial, bi-cultural, and our world citizen will sit in the White House, which has here-to-for, always been very White. He will have an American Black woman and two 21st century daughters (Quaker students) to guide him, if he chooses to listen! Happy MLK Day !  (I prefer being early to being late.)

I am as always working at home and mining the spiritual lessons taught by 2 strong willed teens. Elias is 16, who eats whey by the drams in smoothies, and owns 12 pairs of sneakers (each one a diff color). He is reading Shakespeare and Paolini this month. He maintains strong grades in high school and throws his body into basketball and volleyball. Asa is 20, completed his 1st semester at Oberlin College with strong grades especially in his lit class of Satire and Humor. He’s witty, and reliable. Working during vacations at Lord & Taylor, he looks transformed wearing a suit, carrying his metal coffee cup, and brushing up with the very rich. He loves skiing and seems quite good.

After years of struggle, to find compatibility is a blessing. I prepare quick meals for him– I offer lots more salmon and whitefish these days. Living together after a year in Spain, I’m much more aware of how central heat pleases my sweetie. The US is decaying, but we have reliable clean water and electricity every day. Thank you, Gaia. With the long deep nights, he snuggles up beside the curve of my ribs and in the morning we leap out of bed. We prance onto crystallized earth, he prowls the street as the sun springs onto a pale sky. Then- he terrorizes other cats while I go running. If you thought his name was Jonathan, I’m happy to inform you it’s Ocelot, our elderly cat. Pets are luxurious, but Ocelot helps all the family by showing us that temperature, food and cleanliness matter more than wars or even wordsmithing.

Minga

Minga

My Quaker journey has taken me to off-beat places. I’m charged with encouraging Friends to talk about difficult topics without turning into cannibals. I’ve talked with different Friends meetings about sexuality, same-sex marriage, and heterosexual privilege. After counting, I’ve traveled to 12 Meetings to visit and give workshops. What a delight. Also rewarding is my part-time job at the Cambridge public hospital, CHA. I work with women at OB/GYN who live with an abusive partner. It’s totally hard work, and I enjoy all 40 women I’ve met this year. My job differs this year because a core component is working with pregnant women and reversing the violence before the child is born.

Jonathan is, indubitably, wonderful and 2009 is our 25th anniversary. JVB has tolerated my quirks, my rants and our kitchen coated with flour after cookie baking. He and I have a strong partnership on co-parenting, paying the bills, and giving to the community. Other times I bray and he cackles. JVB enjoys laughing, website designing and playing his newest instrument, the bass guitar.

I’ve felt something tugging inside, like early contractions, when a baby wants to emerge. The inner nudge, call it a Guide, is pushing me to polish some ideas on survival in 2009. I’ve had a bushelful of Quaker books, many about Quaker abolitionists, and Quaker preachers against ‘worldly possessions’ (silver, slaves, business), and adoration of the ‘beloved community.’ Mary Peisley wrote to a Quaker male minister who was distracted from witnessing truth to this “lukewarm, backsliding, degenerate age.” She continues, “Consider what thou art doing with these excellent talents. …thou should not cease to use them. . .Do not become a salve to the world.” The lure of such outward business could outwieigh the call of witness. What message can Quakers give in a landscape of fear? How do we untangle our dependence on armaments? How do we live into a culture of peace recognizing that race and class influence our decisions? Peace seems shallow, almost a jingoism. I’m looking for 5 kinds of peace, or assalam. Like shalom, it’s a becoming word.

All society is held together by nonviolence, even as the earth is held
in her position by gravitation
.

M. Gandhi.