I just wanted to say

that the weather is beautiful outside and have been a consistent, favorite thing in my life. I actually just ate a with a . How about that? How I can think these positive things when I have been in THE WORST mood for the last week is beyond me. Then again, I am thinking of knives... I could sure use them on a housemate or two... wink.

These States, August 2007, and team communication

We had a training on race and ethnicity for 2 days this weekend. To spare you from the emotional exhaustion, here is an idea I have about the future of this country and racism: how about... everybody goes back to their countries of origin (includes all us Euro mutts), Native Americans take back their land (all of it), and we all go back to our original cultures and become good countrypeople. Us white "Americans" are so detached from our original European cultures, and I think a lot of that is because we didn't have and still don't have any damn idea as to how we can live in harmony with other cultures and ethnic groups, even within our own "race." I am at least Irish, German, Scottish, and Welsh- probably more. It would be so hard to find out who I am and how I can honor and take pride in each of these groups both separately and jointly. So what do I do? Do I say, "God Bless America", and just accept that I live in this ridiculous, unbalanced, unfair, unpeaceful country/melting pot and continue to encourage others to do the same in order to have some visceral peace? I don't want to. How could we screw things up so much? Hmm... maybe if we all did, indeed, start over in separate countries, the same things would happen again. Some ethnic group would end up wanting to acquire land via violence and humiliation, and there would just be another bunch of jerks in this country (if not white people again) and we would be back where we started from. Dang. What a crappy situation. I think we should re-draft the Constitution and have equal numbers of all ethnic groups, men, women, who live in the States. Guh.

My identity as a child of the Living God should suffice, and the bottom line is that it does. But... I'm in this world, and despite all the pain and idiocy, there is a lot of beauty. And there is plenty of work to do. I'm trying to figure out what it means to be in this world but not of it (wherever Paul said that in the New Testament). I can't just ignore all the racism and crap in the world like it doesn't exist (i.e. a typical white response) and be totally idealistic. I have to fight against it head on, but at the same love my neighbors: red, yellow, black, and white. Such a simple command, but not simple as in "easy." Oh Jesus, have mercy on us sinners.
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And then onto what I will do after this program is over in August.

1. I'll stay in Philly and maybe finish up my undergrad (international something or other? social work? + ESL certification)

2. I'll go to China and teach English. I miss it a lot.

3. I'll go to Europe and figure out who my ancestors were.

Oh, the options!
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Hmm, strangely enough, I don't even want to talk about team stuff. I'm too tired of dealing w/ all this other stuff. Let's just say, spring break couldn't come any sooner! And that if a relationship is redefined, it take time to reel from what that means for interaction between two people afterwards, and how the dynamics have changed and such. No, this is nothing about romance. Sorry.

So, the said ferocious storm turned out to be...

a decent sized storm after all. It snowed all the day I posted the last blog, it had been snowing since early that morning, and it continued into the next day. When all was said and done, we got about 6"! It was, of course, messy and required a whole lot of shoveling, which I sure didn't mind. I miss physical labor sometimes; I don't do it nearly enough or as strenuously as I'd like. However, between all that shoveling and drumming, my arms have changed quite a bit.

Exhibit A- my arms before snow, djembes, and dun-uns:

Exhibit B- my arms AFTER snow and djembes:

The difference is pretty vast. Plus, as you can see, I've started smoking a corncob pipe. And these are my arms even before TENNIS SEASON is starting! There was a point where my forearms were so swollen that I had to take my watch off before it cut off my circulation- crazy! And this is ME, being in the skinny-wrist club w/ some old friends.my muscles will even fit on this page after I've been out on the court for a while!

But anyway, the snow was, of course, AMAZING. I spent probably about 3 hours or so outside on St. Patrick's day playing w/ a couple of neighbor kids.

And speaking of St. Pat's, this was a weekend of cooking endeavors for yours truly. I made colcannon for the first time and soda bread- both successful! It was an excellent meal- an Irish blessing, good Irish food, Flogging Molly, 3 housemates... but there was, indeed, something missing. In Nate's words, "it starts with a 'G' and ends with an 'uinness.'" Oh, and two other housemates were gone for the evening. That's what I meant. Then after dinner, a couple of us went over to Camden to listen to some good ole Irish folk music. It was nice, albeit operatic at times, which doesn't throw me too much :-| Then it was off to tea at the home of friends. It was a nice day overall.

drip. drip. drip.

I've never been a big fan of deep bodies of water. This has been the case since I was a kid, between seeing scary trees in a lake and then being around a cold ocean about every other weekend.

Despite this, I have had a lot of run-ins with aquatic things, such as:

1. It's snowing/sleeting/raining/winter-mixing today a lot and people are FA-LIPPING OUT. Here's a picture of the FEROSITY OF THIS STORM: Come on, now.
2. I colored a picture the other night, and I would not even think to use any colors that weren't blues or greens. I had never felt such an aversion to "warm" colors.
3. I drew a walrus on the mirror- LOOK:
4. We were reading a poem about the environment at afterschool and are painting a mural of things we want to protect that are mentioned therein. I chose "rivers and the fish." (It's not painted yet, but it will be incredible, believe you me!)
5. My drumming class is SIMPLY AMAZING. It is so, so much fun, and I get new bruises on different parts of my hands every week. Last night, I was thinking about how there are all these watery things going on, and then I remembered: the song that we are being taught is called the Kuku. The kuku is a song that is played in Guinea after women return from their fishing harvest. How about that? The folks teaching my class are called the psalters. They are incredible, and here they are performing this beloved Kuku: www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPeH89IVcjE (can't figure out how to post it as a video)This isn't the whole song or performance; it's from the 3rd break to the end. The entire song is even more incredible.
I'm so lucky to have these folks teaching me. Life is rad.

Here are my thoughts: community living has been tough, there are some hard things going on in the house, I feel a lot of spiritual distance from God, and the weather this winter has in part been dreary, stagnant, and seemingly unending. My whole self is yearning for freshness, new birth, new growth...

I'm ready for winter to be done and for spring to come.

I feel so connected to this canvas; it feeds my soul everyday I see it.("All creation groans for rebirth!")

Spring and Angela

One: I have new spring legs. I shaved them for the first time since Christmas, and even then I didn't really want to. Oh, and this endeavor took nearly one half hour. But the weather is amazing; it's hard to be in a bad mood when it's so great outside, for real. Hopefully it sticks around... supposedly it's supposed to snow tomorrow; drat!

Two: I still haven't posted pictures. (update: psyche! I've scattered a few throughout posts!)

Three: Here's a cute exchange I had w/ a student I hadn't seen for a few weeks-

Me: Hi Angela!
Angela: Oh!... em... goo morning!
Me: Donde has estado?
Angela: Em... I... eh... como le dicen "yo extrano"?
Me: "I miss"
Angela: "I meess"
Me: Uh huh.
Angela: Bueno. Em... yo extrano... a you teacher!

Angela is a great lady. She is 70 years old, a recent immigrant from Colombia, and in my morning class. We looked at the word "pharmacist", I asked her how she thought it might be pronounced, and she said, "...en?" So we have some work to do.

Yo extrano Lake Twenty-Two and the Glacier region in general:




But I do have this out our back window, which I think is pretty great also:



Thank you God for beauty.

"Little Richard" auf Deutsch and a small gust of "Four Winds"

I had a pretty great weekend, and I have some pretty great pictures to share from the last few months.
...
Neither of those are in this post. BUT! Here's a little culture, old and new:

First, a poem by Rainer Maria Rilke that went well with me the other day:

Alle, welche dich suchen, versuchen dich.
Und die, so dich finden, binden dich
an Bild und Gebarde.

Ich aber will dich begreifen
wie dich die Erde begreift;
mit meinem Reifen
reift
dein Reich.

Ich will von dir keine Eitelkeit,
die dich beweist.
Ich weiss, dass die Zeit
anders heisst
als du.

Tu mir kein Wunder zulieb.
Gieb deinen Gesetzen recht,
die von Geschlecht zu Geschlecht
sichtbarer sind.

_____

All who seek you
test you.
And those who find you
bind you to image and gesture.

I would rather sense you
as the earth sense you.
In my ripening
ripens
what you are.
I need from you no tricks
to prove you exist.
Time, I know,
is other than you.
No miracles, please.
Just let your laws
become clearer
from generation
to generation.
II, 15

I like. Also, I heard this lyric off the new(er) Bright Eyes album:

"People are made up of water and fear/
if there weren't women present, we wouldn't be here/
so let's make like we're friends."

Somehow, these blokes make me pensive. Then I find out that there's a reference to something that everybody already knows from pop-culture or something like that. Either way, the new album is pretty good. More upbeat than past ones.

Sharing the wealth, sort of

If you haven't heard of pandora.com, you should go to the site and listen your little heart out. I was just made aware of this site a few weeks ago- you go and tell it what song or artist or whatev you like and it customizes radio stations just for YOU. It's wicked cool. That's all- see you in a few months!

Approximately 10 Thursdays later...

So all of a sudden, I have a good handful of friends who are writing blogs pretty faithfully that I read and I remembered that I started one up about 3 months ago, which I have all but neglected. These blog things aren't really my bag, I guess, but since I've given up myspace for Lent in hopes of getting better at other correspondence... I have a craving for just some internet activity. I'm a machine! Blech.

So, this is my first update in a while and I really have very little to say. Except that I got my haircut. And I'm going to a West African drumming class tonight and then to pubquiz. And that Louis fell asleep at afterschool yesterday, was snoring like nobody's business, and us teachers (well, mostly me. And Nate) were cracking up. Here he was:

Here he is with Mallory- two very dear people in one picture. Almost can't handle such goodness:


Stuff is still busy here- I'm tutoring folks everyday and teaching ESL pretty much all but one of those days, afterschool, community/social/church stuff... not to metion trying (feebly) to uphold relationships in WA. You know. Okay, goodbye internet