sweet land

This morning my radio alarm blared the static-fused voices of the in-between. Not really on a station, but blaring, nonetheless. I reached over to turn down the volume and adjust to my station, but without my glasses couldn't see if I was going the right direction.

Finally landed on a station and a preacher was preaching and his words revealed his fear that in 30 years, this country would no longer be a Christian nation but a Muslim nation. Unless things changed. Good God! I changed the station (to my liberal public radio) then turned off the alarm.

It hurts my ears, and something much deeper inside me, to listen to the hatred coming over the airwaves. And it saddens me to think of all the listeners who follow, all the children who are taught this by their families and their churches. It saddens me to think that so many people want this to be a land that is not inclusive. Because there is always a group, it seems that people turn upon to hate. When it is a professed Christian preaching the hatred, it is pure frustration.

My ancestors, like most Americans, were immigrants. They were from Europe, though the rumor of the "Arabian" man who climbed into the family tree has always intrigued me. And reminded me that we don't always know who's back there even if we have tried to figure it out through Ancestry.com. Because not all of it is written down. So, besides the mysterious man, there's some German, some English, some Irish, Scottish. People who didn't always get along. People of different faiths (yes, both my grandmothers were Catholics married to Protestants, gasp!)

I wish people would stop hating each other, stop teaching hatred, and come together to solve our country's actual problems and lend a hand across the globe. We are a nation of people of diverse backgrounds. People have freedom to practice their faith, whatever that may be. We even have the freedom to not practice any faith. And that doesn't make any one of us less deserving, less American. Isn't that what makes us the US? United in our liberties?

 We all remember these words from The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus:
...Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

How about these?
...
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome;


I don't often get into this kind of subject, but it bothered me & I thought I'd better say something about it. I guess I just want my fellow Americans to behave like decent human beings.

tour of veggies

Yesterday was the annual Anchorage Garden Club Garden Tour. I went for the first time last year, biking with friends from one garden to the next, half the time in the rain. This year, I joined my friends for part of the tour, driving instead of cycling. I visited every garden in the tour and the one thing that stood out this year was produce. People are growing their own veggies.

I don't recall any vegetables in last year's tour, but this year at least three gardens were growing not just flowers, but food.

This garden is in Oceanview (I spent more time chatting with friends who own the garden and didn't take many pics):

Overlooking the inlet. Though this shows mostly flowers, they grew loads of veggies here!

Another view.

Here are a few from Turnagain:

In the front yard.

South side of house; notice the mirror behind the lattice.

My favorite colors! This is on the back deck.

Peas climbing next to the raspberries.

I think this is the only way to grow tomatoes in Alaska!

Backyard garden entrance on north side of house.

Back in Oceanview:

The homeowner designed this fence and had a landscaping company build it.

Besides the vegetable gardens, I love looking at fences and gates. We're due for new fences in our backyard and will need a new gate or two, also. I remember this one from biking past it last year during the tour. This time we got to check it out and wander the yard.

So, there you have it, the garden tour 2012. This time next year I hope to report on a bike ride of the tour and my own veggies. For the record, Jon and I planted a tiny patch of potatoes this spring and some friends gave us a tomato plant. It's our first foray into gardening in a long time. I'll let you know how it turns out.

yes, poetry

I confess that I hadn't read any Gary Snyder before yesterday. It was his reputation (a Pulitzer) that compelled me to attend his free reading at the UAA campus last night. I'm so glad I did. As he read from a few of his books and some new, unpublished works, I was moved by the way he wrote about life: from the day-to-day activities of keeping his off-the-grid power working to his first climb on Mount St. Helens in 1945 and comparisons he drew from the volcano's eruption in 1980 to the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (which he learned about the day after that first climb).

He reminded me of how events early in our lives help shape our ideals and our way of seeing the world. It was clear that he has tried to live a life in balance with our planet. As much as that's possible when considering the impacts of air travel and other human activities.

Today, I sat down with one of the books I bought, Danger on Peaks. Prose poems. Un-rhymed verse. Haiku-inspired works. I'm no poetry scholar, so I don't know all the terms for the styles of poetry he writes. But I am enjoying his view of the world, his bringing together of thoughts from different continents, different teachings. He appears to be a man who lives with eyes and mind open; aware of the world around him on all scales, from the spruce beetle to the polar ice fields.

I've had to go to the dictionary a few times - yes, he's giving the gift of new words for my vocabulary -  yet it doesn't make the poems less accessible. In fact, this is the kind of book I would want in my backpack on a camping trip. Pull it out, share a few pages aloud over a campfire, ponder the ideas into the night. Most of all, he reminds me of how I like to write my poetry: sometimes adhering to form; sometimes writing without restriction, following the material.

Something Gary said last night on the question of whether he writes every day (we writers like to study other writers' habits) was this: "It (a poem) has to really insist on it before you let it into the world." So, there it is, permission to take a day off to live, do, ponder and read. I will also remind myself that if I'm writing and the material tells me it should be poetry, to not deny the material its form. Because sometimes poetry is the best way to say something. I think I need to say "yes" to poetry more often.

ever curious

A good writer looks around, sees the world with a sense of wonder and curiosity. Sometimes ask questions nobody bothered to ask. It's why I like to go to other places, so I can see new things, ponder new questions.

My friend, Katey, was curious about swinging bridges in her adopted state of North Carolina. She wrote a book about it, Lost Crossings. And now she's getting some great publicity on NC public television. Congratulations, Katey!

It reminds me that whether I'm here in Alaska, visiting a new place, or my hometown in Wisconsin, to always remain curious. You never know what you'll learn or how it may inspire you.

fragmenta

I love 1% for Art. I love that people who plan public facilities in Alaska keep this program going. All around the city, sometimes in unlikely places, whether it's on a pathway or a school entrance, an otherwise dull intersection or a bridge, we get to encounter art. Some of the art isn't all that popular; some of it is rarely seen. Some we cycle or drive past without really thinking about it.

The other day Jon told me I needed to see the new artwork that was installed on the grounds of the new state crime lab. He hesitated to describe it; just said I should see it. I forgot all about it until my sister and I were returning from a fine hike at Glen Alps on Thursday. As I was driving she exclaimed wow, look at that! (or something like that). I did a U-turn and we turned onto Tudor Center Drive and into the empty parking lot.

(The groundskeeper was watering nearby so

 I didn't get very close, but got a few photos.)

In the brilliant sunshine on the day after summer solstice, Fragmenta reflected not just light but color: blues and oranges, yellows, greens. It seemed to move as we moved around it, changing color like a shape-shifter. It made me smile and I imagined picnics and the joy that the artwork will bring. I wondered how it would appear in fall, winter and spring. I tried to imagine it at night.

So, I want to thank the artist, Osman Akan, and Alaska for keeping this program of public art going, despite some dissent. Because we need art. It reminds me of a topic from the Kachemak Bay Writers' Conference two weeks ago. I recall a speaker who talked about art in our society and our roles as artists, be it writers, painters, musicians or sculptors. Why do we need art? The speaker quoted poet Naomi Shihab Nye, and I'll paraphrase: Why do we need art? Just watch the evening news. To me that means hope.

In my writing group and at the conference in Homer, we talked about why we write. Why does any of us do what we do? With my trail guide, I wanted to give people answers, so in a way it was for my friends and for the rest of the community. Now, I'm working on stories that I think are relevant. I have something to say that I think will have an impact. Call it a gift of stories and ideas. And we all need stories. I'm looking for the story of Fragmenta. Though it is just beginning.

Here's the time lapse video of the installation. See the photos from the artist's site. And here's more about Alaska's art program. Thanks for reading. Enjoy.

getting there

Seems the darkest moments arrive just before clarity, discovery, recovery. Last weekend, I was veering close to a one-woman pity party, watching my image in the bathroom mirror as I obediently performed my physical therapy. Spent a moment too long looking at my right arm's flaccid tricep as I reached the arm first in front of me, then to the side.

It was the version of pity that made me wonder if I would ever make a cross-country trip on my bicycle. If I would ever buckle the hip and sternum straps on my camping backpack to spend a night or two in the backcountry. Or if I would ever just reach for something and not have to worry whether my arm could handle the weight.

Feels the same with the writing sometimes. I get discouraged. I see what others are doing and think: I want to write that beautifully. I see a list of titles and wonder how people conjure these stories from the recesses of their brains. Will I ever get there with this book that has again shape-shifted in my mind to short stories... maybe?

Then I have a day like yesterday when I was able to write several pages of fresh revision. Or today when the shoulder felt pretty good as I began some new exercises that are designed to start rebuilding the strength in my arm and shoulder. The goal, I realize now, is not to get back the old me. No, it must be to get to the new version, the better version of me. Rose 3.0. Mind and body improved. It'll take some work, but I will get there. And it will be worth all the effort.

re-vision

re-purpose

I've been in Homer these past few days, filling my brain with ideas at the Kachemak Bay Writers' Conference. Right now, my brain feels like a blender filled with a barrage of ideas on a dozen topics, names of new friends, new resources, new first words. As I prepare to head to the airport, I wonder: how do I begin to sift through the bits inside the blender?

First, by taking the idea that I came here with a goal: to find out if someone was interested in publishing my fiction. A premature notion, it turns out. But I'd submitted the first page of the novel to a panel of two editors and an agent. The anonymous submissions of a half-dozen writers were discussed publicly with the level of honesty authors need to, but don't always want to, hear.

Even before they said it, I knew my first page wasn't destined for greatness. It didn't lead the reader directly into the story. Instead, it set up some mundane action and thought that only meant something to me. I listened to the critiques of all the pieces. Several of us had this problem of taking too long to pull the reader into the story.

Afterward, I scrolled through the document on my laptop, looking for the beginning: page six? Really? I talked with a few people I met at the conference, including one of the editors. I told one new acquaintance I'd take his idea under consideration. Later in the evening, as I sat at a public reading, glass of wine in front of me, I pulled out my notebook and began jotting down a few words for the new first page. After the reading and a bonfire, I headed to my friends' house. It was midnight. I opened the laptop and began to write.

What emerged was a new page one. A new beginning for the story. A new voice. A voice with urgency. I completed a page, then closed down the laptop.

This morning, I attended a session on what happens after the rejection. Re-vision. Different from "revision," "re-vision" is a new way to look a the story. Now, I am ready for the re-vision. Next step: write page two.