Canada’s BC: An Acronym in Search of Worthy Words

Posted on October 1, 2023 by gretchenwing

The Mate and I have always had a huge crush on British Columbia. We’ve meandered up the Sunshine Coast, used Harrison Hot Springs as a base camp for checking out multiple provincial parks, thrilled ourselves with the Discovery Islands, and last September, spent two weeks exploring the lower half of Vancouver Island. And that’s not even counting the many times we’ve driven through on our way to the Rockies, murmuring, “Why aren’t we stopping here?“

Pictured: “Here,” a.k.a. some throwaway lil’ waterfall along Rt. 23

This trip was all about stopping here. Not traveling too far in any direction. Going in circles, even. Exploring parks we’ve never heard of. All in the name of soaking up the wonders of a place that REALLY needs a better name.

Beautiful Coastline? Best Countryside?

We started in Manning Prov. Park, especially of interest to me because it’s the terminus of the Pacific Crest Trail, of which I’ve hiked many sections.

Since we were camped at Lightning Lakes, it seemed only fair to hike around them.

Bear Country? Bewitching Conifers?

The weather window started closing behind us at Manning, with snow predicted the next night, so we kept moving, down toward the flat(ter) Okanagan. We’d heard of the famous Kettle Valley rail trail, and in Princeton we did ride a section of it, but we also checked out trails in the community reserve of China Ridge, just above the town.

Thanks to the lovely woman at the Info Centre who sent us here! We’d never have found it.

The trails were more mountain-bikey than we usually ride, but we enjoyed our short stint up there.

Biking Country? Best Camping?

Next night we camped by the Kettle River, right where the rail trail crosses. Having had two rides that day, we just strolled some of it; the river was the best part. Notice the burned area in the back left? That’s from a 2015 fire. We were hyper-aware, this whole trip, of the fires still burning near Kelowna, and made sure to avoid the area.

Burning Cruelly? (unfortunately that “BC” could apply many place)

Following lovely Rt. 3 (the Crowsnest Highway) to Castlegar, we once again met up with the Kettle Valley River Trail, and rode another section…along the Columbia River. Yes, THE Columbia River–what we Washingtonians, and probably some Oregonians too, tend to think of as OUR Columbia River.

Horribly lowered by drought, dammed to within an inch of its life, clogged with industry…”Roll On, Columbia,” and good luck!

Behold Columbia? (That one at least makes some sense!)

After that ride, we swung north on little Rt. 6 to the tiny town of Slocan. We’d chosen Slocan because of its proximity to Valhalla Prov. Park, whose photos looked more national-park level than provincial.

Zooming in on Gibli Peak–gorgeous, but pretty inaccessible

But we soon discovered how hard it is to get INTO Valhalla.

It’s really a backpackers’ park, and we hadn’t come to backpack.

We ended up just hiking the bottom left portion of the lakeside trail, and that was PLENTY.

Big Cop-out? Maybe. But luckily for us, Slocan boasts its own rail-trail, which follows the Slocan River as it flows out of Slocan Lake.

Slocan itself is a sweet, quirky little town with rainbow crosswalks and helpful volunteers in the library. We’d go back there in a minute, and maybe ride all the way down to some other simpatico towns on Rt. 6 with hippy-sounding cafes and bakeries.

Bakery Central? (I guess that applies to lots of places too) Biking Capital?

Even rockslides don’t stop these folks. You can hike right through this one.

Leaving Slocan, we decided to loop around a bit. The plan HAD been to camp 2 nights at Glacier National Park…but that weather window slammed shut, and we didn’t want to camp in snow. With an extra day before our hotel reservation in Revelstoke, we followed Rt. 6 back west in a squiggly semi-circle that took us back to–ta dah! The Columbia.

Or more accurately, ACROSS the Columbia, by FERRY.

They don’t even call it a river there, they call it Arrow Lake! Seeing that mighty river so abused brought us no joy. OK, a little joy. It was still fun ferrying across.

Burdened Columbia?

But that afternoon cheered us right up. First we got to ride yet another rail trail (Okanagon) along Laka Kalamalka, an honest-to-gods, true-blue, undammed stretch of watery glory…

Looking across at another Prov. Park I wish we’d stayed in

…and then, that evening, near the lake, the Mate and I got our first Glamping experience, on a hydroponic farm!

Don’t worry, I didn’t know what a hydroponic farm was either.

Doug, the friendly owner of Utopia Feels glamping, gave us the full tour, including veggies:

Inside that white tube-tower, it’s raining!

…critters:

Silly & Billy, the goats, and Bad Bunny, enjoying veggie trimmings

…and of course, the glamping tents!

If anyone’s looking for an AMAZING wedding venue, I highly recommend this place!

I can’t say we’ll ever do this again, but it was a hoot and a half to do once!

And this is a SMALL tent. Some sleep up to six!!

Bountiful Campgrounds? Bodacious Comfort?

Leaving the Okanagan behind, we turned north and east again, as if heading for the grand Rockies. But this time we stopped short, in the town of Revelstoke, home of…

…you guessed it: the Columbia River. Still dammed (just upstream from town), but looking closer to a real mountain river than I ever dreamed it could.

Beautiful Clarity!

Revelstoke nestles into a whole batch of mountains, including Mt. Revelstoke, which has its own national park. Clear skies were in short supply when we drove the single road in and up to hike toward the summit:

Over the next couple of days, as the rains moved in, we took advantage of little breaks to revel in local awe (Revel? in Revelstoke? See what I did there?).

glaciers of Mt. Begbie, part of where that silt comes from

Just up the road (literally, up) from Revelstoke is Canada’s Glacier National Park, and it KILLED me to be so close and not go. But we were disinclined to drive in possible snow & ice. So…next time, B.C.

Best Choice?

But Revelstoke was quirky enough for us. Examples: Woodenhead, apparently carved decades ago by some dude for the fun of it, and adopted by the town:

…and this Indian-German fusion restaurant we found.

After Revelstoke, stymied by weather to the east, we turned west. I’ll save that for Part II, because that part was

BEYOND COMPARE.

He’s Worked For Peace in Gaza. He Can Probably Help Your Family.

Posted on September 22, 2023 by gretchenwing

It takes a lot these days to pull me back into the blogosphere, but my friend David Hall is a lot. A child psychiatrist and peace activist for multiple decades, David has just published the second edition of his 2001 book, Stop Arguing and Start Understanding: Eight Steps to Solving Family Conflicts.

This is a person and a book I thought many of y’all would appreciate knowing about.

As David’s blurb puts it,

“At the heart of Hall’s approach is the empowerment of readers, encouraging them to embody greater tenacity and compassion in their interactions. By addressing family conflicts with a fresh perspective, readers can transform their dynamics and pave the way for a more fulfilling family life. Hall’s emphasis on recognizing the unique viewpoint of each family member is a pivotal cornerstone of his methodology. Through this lens, the book offers practical and actionable steps that lead to genuine understanding and resolution.”

Full disclosure: My own family has never sought counseling, nor have I ever purchased such a book. But as I found myself thinking, “David’s is a book I would buy,” I also felt like digging deeper: why is that? Which led me to this brief interview.

Me: How did you get into this business, anyway?

DH: I was a Goldwater Republican when I entered Harvard as a freshman in 1964. I’d been my high school’s student leader of an all-school mock political convention for which Bill Miller, Goldwater’s Vice presidential nominee, helicoptered into our school for the keynote.

As I came out of a lecture hall, a SDS [Students for a Democrative Society] leaflet asked if I knew who was the personal hero of Nguyen Kao Ky, South Vietnam’s then Vice President. The answer? Adolf Hitler. That leaflet set me on a new course of understanding the war in Vietnam. As I approached graduation, I studied the selective service laws and eventually applied and was granted a Conscientious Objector deferment based on the Gospel of Matthew.

That led to my being drafted halfway through the Master of Arts in Teaching program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. I ended up working for the next 3 years in the Treatment Program for Habitual Sexual Offenders at Western State Hospital south of Tacoma. Deciding on a future after that led me to medicine and child psychiatry, wanting to get to kids BEFORE they offended.

Me: Can you describe a typical day of work with children in the past decade or so?

DH: My last decade of full-time work was at Island Hospital in Anacortes three days a week. I had a full schedule from 9am to 5pm working an hour at a time with kids and families ranging in age from 2-1/2 to 80. We’d sit facing each other while I listened carefully to their concerns and hopes for change. The process built on collaborative creative problem-solving exercises looking at new strategies that might replace interactive patterns of communication that continually led to conflict. The challenge was often finding ways to address longstanding histories of family conflict and sometimes significant trauma for parents and their parents, so we focused on breaking the grip of this cascade of intergenerational distress. A key was maintaining a no-fault, no blame approach to any of the emotional or physical trauma, establishing a trustworthy and nurturing environment in which the work could take place, and helping participants to be honest, articulate, and hopeful about healing their soul wounds.

Me: Your book focuses on family conflict. Have you played the role of family therapist in your career, or have you simply found that, with your individual clients, family communication (or its lack) lay at the root of, or exacerbated other problems?

DH: Several years into private practice of child psychiatry, I spent a year with Dr. Tom Roesler’s Montlake Family Therapy Institute learning strategies for dealing with family systems, which became the foundation over the next three decades for engaging conflicted families in healing conversations. I knew from my work with habitual sexual offenders that almost always family trauma lay behind their fractured personalities, often with parents whose fractured personalities continued what I came to call the cascade of intergenerational violence.

Me: I know you and your wife Anne have made international travel a staple of your political and moral lives, including many trips to Gaza. Do you feel a connection between your work with kids and families and your work between nations, or did those two strands of your life arise separately?

DH: My travels grew directly out of my awareness that how children are treated makes a huge difference in how they behave as adults and as participants in governing politics. My first international trip was to Tashkent, Seattle’s sister city in the 1980s. I went as the trip physician with a group of 15 teenagers who spent three weeks with 15 Russian teenagers putting together a “Peace Child” musical, which we performed in the local park at the end of the trip. Subsequently Anne and I took our church youth group on separate trips to Haiti and Tanzania.

In 1993 we traveled with Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility to Chelyabinsk, Russia, the Soviet Union’s plutonium production region, and to conferences of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War in Stockholm, Worcester, and Beijing. Following that meeting, we went up to Lhasa, Tibet, then already under Chinese occupation.

Also in 1993 we began a series of medical visits to Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza, where we eventually focused on bringing outside medical training and accompaniment to physicians isolated by the Israeli occupation in the open air prison that is Gaza. I have come to see the way Israeli politics plays out with their immediate enemies in the Palestinian territories directly parallels the way the United States deals with its enemies halfway around the world.

Me: How many times have you and Anne been to Gaza?

DH: I think 8 trips to Gaza beginning in Oct 1993. Our latest was just as COVID was breaking. We arrived in Gaza in late February 2021 then on March 5th we learned that COVID was likely to close the Ben Gurion Airport, so we got together and decided to leave the next day.

Me: I’ve heard that on September 22, you are receiving a Lifetime Achievement Award from Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility. Can you say a little bit about what this award means to you?

DH: This award is in recognition of my core leadership on the WPSR board for 38 of the last 40 years. I served 2-year terms as chapter president in 1991-2 and 2003-4.

When I retired briefly during our move to Lopez in 2011, the WPSR chapter president died, and the chapter collapsed. I was one of three who put it back together in 2013.

I also served on the national PSR board in the 1990s and was president of that board in 1997. I describe PSR/WPSR as my home community, the third leg of my personal grounding along with family and child psychiatry.

Me: How did you come up with the Nine Steps described in your book?

DH: My early child psychiatry family therapy experiences nudged me to summarize what I learned from the families I was working with.

The core lesson was learning to listen deeply and patiently, understanding that I didn’t really know these people until I could guide them toward more honest and open disclosure of their true feelings and experiences.

From my several years leading a peer-confrontation therapy group of convicted sexual offenders in the Washington State Treatment Program for Habitual Sex Offenders at Western State Hospital, I’d learned to listen empathically to their childhood stories of maltreatment, ostracism, and humiliation.

Me: What would you say to someone (maybe a parent like I was, or my parents) who says, “Oh, my family’s fine–we just fight it out, we don’t need a book like this!”

DH: The choice to recognize conflict and deal with it is personal and belongs to every parent and family member. It’s when someone in the family says things need to change that I have a window of opportunity to be helpful.

Me: Thank you so much, David! I feel grateful for the opportunity to shine a little more light on some of the healing work you’ve spent your life on.

And just in case you haven’t yet, click here to buy your own copy of Stop Arguing and Start Understanding. This man knows what he’s talking about.

Mamma Mia, Here She Goes Again: My 88 Year-Old Mom’s Track Meet

Posted on August 2, 2023 by gretchenwing

“That’s amazing!” said most folks, hearing of my sisters and I road-tripping to cheer on our mother as she raced the 800 meters and the 1500 at the international Masters meet.

I disagree with that assessment. Admirable? Definitely. Humbling? Yes. Pride-inducing? Hugely. But amazing…no. If you know my mom, Martha Klopfer, you would not be at all AMAZED at her racing. You would EXPECT it.

Martha’s been running since the late 1960s. So have I, for that matter; our whole family formed early part of that first big Fitness Wave. But MY knees called for retirement about four years ago, in my late 50s. Hers still work just fine. My mom has literally outrun me.

Since COVID interfered with my 60th Birthday Sisters Weekend a couple of years ago, I lit on the idea of turning Mom’s race into a way to spend quality time with my sisters. So my Texas sister & I both flew to my Michigan sister, and from there we three “girls” drove down to North Carolina…

Did someone say ROAD TRIP?? Quick stop in the lovely Hocking Hills of southern Ohio

…via Ohio, West Virginia and Virginia…

Another quick stop: New River Gorge in WV (& highest suspension bridge in the western hemisphere, we learned)

…for 48 hours of family…

…and track. While Martha did her stretches in the shade…

her fans braved a sweaty July afternoon to cheer her…

Carolina Friends School Principal Karen Cumberbatch (in CFS tee) brought family members,
showing their support for one of CFS’s founders!

through the 800 meters (2 laps)…

They combined all the age groups from 70 up. The woman second from left
set a world record for 75 y/o’s in the 5k the day before, 22:41!!!

When she finished (in 5:49), I was so proud I did something I almost never do: took a selfie.

But Mom? She and Dad watched the video I took of her race, then watched it again, like coach and player, and both agreed: Not enough up on my toes. Better try a different pair of shoes.

Believe me, this man would be out there too if his legs would let him.

The result, for a race less than 18 hours later and nearly twice as long: a 1500 meters in 11:06, which translates to a proportionately faster pace than the 800.

I didn’t need to take a selfie for pride this time. I had Mom with Medals.

If this were a different blog post, I might write more about my first-ever Sisters Road Trip. I might even mention the buffets we hit in West Virginia, both south- and northbound.

Or the bath I gave my hot feet in the Huron River in Ann Arbor

But this blog is about how our Amazing Mom isn’t really that amazing, in the sense that she’s trained us not to be amazed at the things she’s still able to do.

Proud, though. So very, very proud.

MFA in LA, Part III: Intertwined Inspiration

Posted on June 22, 2023 by gretchenwing

One year ago, I was soaking up the sights and sounds of Culver City on my daily walks to the campus of Antioch University for the first residency of my MFA program in Creative Writing. Mostly I was dazzled by the Southern CA flowers.

Oh, this old thing along the bike path? I just threw it on…

What I should have used as a photo was a full-blast firehose, because that’s what Residency #1 was like. Back home, I likened my new venture to a switch from hiking to rock-climbing. Not long after, I chose to step away from blogging altogether, devoting all my precious writing time to my most precious writing. Residency #2, last December, received no analysis.

But this summer, riding along that same bike path, I was stopped by a new metaphor: this rainbow tangle of flora:

You gardeners will spot pink and red oleaner, scarlet bouganvillea, orange trumpet vine and blue morning glory, all rampaging joyously over a substrate of purple jacaranda. What I see? A message to stay focused on more stories than mine.

YES, I am writing a novel. YES, it requires my time. But not so much to keep me from this blog’s renewed mission to AMPLIFY voices for justice and understanding. Which is why it felt so perfect, on the same day I took that picture, that I turned on a car radio and discovered House/Full of Blackwomen.

Nighttime Procession, March 2017, Photo by Robbie Sweeney

CreativeCapital.org describes the group this way:

House/Full of Blackwomen is conjure art, the insistence movement, activated in store fronts, streets, houses, warehouses, museums, galleries and theaters of Oakland, California. House/Full began as a two-year project and morphed into an eight-year process of 15 public “episodes” which unexpectedly appeared as street processions, all night song circles, secret rituals of Black women resting and dreaming, sacred ceremonies on the track, and multi-media offerings. Black women gathered around a dining room table to recall, rage, rally and restore themselves, while creating ritual performance strategies towards shifting systemic evictions, displacements, erasure and the sex trafficking of Black women and girls: all driven by the core question, “How can we, as Black women and girls, find space to breathe, and be well in a stable home?”

Dreaming Blessing, March 2017, Photo by Robbie Sweeney

As I listened to Episode One of The Kitchen Sisters’ podcast on NPR, which describes the group’s mission, I was filled with excitement, hope, awe, empathy…and the immediate desire to share all those feelings.

So here you go! The above description, not to mention the podcast itself, says more than I could about the power of this group of 34 women. All I want to do is steer you toward them. Creative Capital says,

The final episode of HouseFull, Episode 15: this too shall pass will premiere March 4–12, 2023. Performance times, venues and details can be found here. All events are sold out, but you can sign up for the mailing list to learn about future performances and project iterations.

And me? I still have a few more days in LA. I still plan to drink from that hose–a little more carefully now, sipping the drips, letting them soak in. Or, to go back to florals, I plan to gather some individual roses as they offer themselves…

…be they writing advice or part of the more tangled, brilliant stories around me. Please join me in discovering House/Full of Blackwomen!

Of Moose and Meaning: When Politics Meets Mountains…Mountains Win

Posted on June 10, 2023 by gretchenwing

Hmmm. Turns out I’m feeling a little conflicted about this getting-back-to-blogging thing.

Seriously? After just two weeks? Why?

Because…I went on a road trip.

So?

So, I’ve always blogged about my road trips! I loved sharing pictures and stories. I think I’m secretly a travel blogger at heart.

What’s wrong with that? You love travel blogs.

Yeah, but I just made a commitment to blog regularly about some of the social causes I care about…making amplification my this-is-all-I-can-do-right-now “contribution.” I can’t just interrupt that for travel photos, can I?

Why can’t you do both?

Nah. It’d be weird.

How d’you know until you try?

*sigh*

Yeah, you’re probably right. Forget I suggested it. I don’t think you could handle the balance. I mean, it’s not like you’re studying writing right now or anything…

FINE. *deep breath* Listen up, people! The Mate and I just took a 2-week discovery jaunt through Wyoming and Idaho, two states that don’t tend to support the progressive political agenda I support. But they do have three things I DO support, wholeheartedly: mountains…

…wild critters…

…and flowers:

OK so far. Now let’s see you tie that promo in with your “progressive political agenda.”

Okay…See, along our camping, driving, and motel-ing way, I stayed in touch with the Common Power Institute. Wherever we had wifi, I was catching up on videos I’d missed during its May 17th 24-hour Teach-in on Truth in Education. This talk by Dr. Harry Edwards especially caught my attention, as he was the mastermind behind the 1968 Mexico City Olympics protest that got Tommie Smith and John Carlos stripped of their medals.

Seriously? You’re just gonna shove Dr. Edwards’ talk into your post like that, then go back to the nature pics? Who’s gonna watch it?

You’d be surprised. I think there are a ton of folks out there like me, folks who love mountains, critters & flowers just like I do, but who also want to keep educating themselves about how to be effective anti-racists, like I do. They may not get to this video right away; I didn’t. But when they have time, they might come back and learn more about “history with eyes wide open”, as Dr. Edwards says.

If you say so. Can we see some trip pics now?

Oh, twist my arm. Ahem. On our way out of Washington, The Mate and I stopped to ride our bikes in Spokane, and marvel at the majesty that is Palouse Falls.

I was SO sad that the bike path bridge was closed for construction!

Our main destination was Grand Tetons National Park. But it turns out, one of the best ways into GTNP is through this place…

Yep, the Grandmother of all NPs: Yellowstone herself

We’ve both been to Yellowstone several times over the decades, and I’m embarrassed to admit I don’t even bother taking photos of their bison and elk any more. (Here’s an old blog post to cover that.) But I COULDN’T stop taking pictures of those prismatic pools.

As planned, we only spent a day in Yellowstone, which was so crowded we remembered why we love traveling during the shoulder seasons (not Memorial Day weekend, for goodness’ sake! Who planned this trip?!) But when we drove across the park border into the Tetons, it was time for us to sit up and take special notice. THESE mountains were something NEW, at least to us.

Nary a foothill in sight. Just a sagebrush plain and then…BAM!

After a fews days of (rather WET) camping, we moved into a motel in Jackson, finally answering the question: what’s the difference between Jackson Hole and Jackson?

…whereas Jackson Hole refers to the entire region, the valley filled by the (not pictured) Snake River.

Now you know. But if you’re from Wyoming, you probably don’t give a shit what the rest of us think.

The Mate & I were very favorably impressed by two other aspects of Jackson (besides its proximity to GTNP): its community bike path system…

We saw a TON of bikes at all the public schools. Kids and parents really use these paths!

…and its bakery, Persephone. (Aren’t bakeries and bookstores the best tests of a town, really?)

Just doing research for my own employer, Holly B’s on Lopez Island! 🙂

One more way-cool thing in Jackson: this vertical, rotating greenhouse built into the side of a very tall parking garage. Never seen anything like it!

The company’s called Vertical Harvest. The lettuces looked happy!

Our most prized hike of the trip came on a day when we got up early in order to be the first on the Tetons trails, and were rewarded with a moose AND a bear, in the same video! (You’ll have to take my word for it; it’s not YouTube quality so I didn’t bother uploading.) But here’s the moose:

Not pictured…barely!…is the bear that’s actually lurking just behind and to the right of Ms. Moose

Leaving Wyoming’s western side, we passed into Idaho and took a quick tour of Craters of the Moon National Monument.

I found the dead trees as entrancing as the dead lava.

Thunderstorms were forecast, so we decided against camping and added a night to our motel in Hailey, which is the cheap(er) town 10 miles from swankier Ketchum and swankiest Sun Valley. The Mate & I were pleased to find all three towns connected by bike path…

Heading over the Wood River, which was running HIGH

...and Liza and I rode pretty much every inch of it, including up & around a ski hill.

Definitely helps that Liza’s an e-assist bike! My knees are grateful.

But it wasn’t bike paths that led Liza and I to bumble into the most amazing “superbloom” of wildflowers I’ve ever seen outside the Cascades–it was a plain ol’ dirt road.

Those flowers? They followed us into the Sawtooth Wilderness, our last spate of camping right smack in the middle of the state. I mean, yes, the mountains were just as striking as the Tetons…

…but the FLOWERS!!!

I didn’t know Larkspur came in so many shades of blue!

We had more adventures than pictured, of course: elk and antelope and lakes and crags. But I think you got the idea. And I want to leave you enough time to go back and dip into that lecture of Dr. Edwards’, if you feel so moved. But whether you do or not–thanks for bearing with me all this way (or moosing with me). Here–I got you flowers.

Be the Challenger II: Yes, Virginia, You Can Be a White Civil Rights Activist

Posted on May 31, 2023 by gretchenwing

“I was a typical young Southerner, born and raised in LA—Lower Alabama.” Meet Bob Zellner.

I got to do just that, last October, when Bob and his activist wife Pamela joined my Common Power Team NC canvassing group. Over big plates of BBQ, I got to ask Bob questions about events I’d read about in his book, The Wrong Side of Murder Creek. Like the time Bob was beaten badly on the steps of the town hall of McComb, Mississippi, in a march led by Black high school students. But in the New York Times article, they called Bob “the leader” of the march–because he was the only White guy there.

You could call Bob the White counterpart of Representative John Lewis; they grew up quite close to each other in Alabama, both poor, both country–but on either side of the color line. Which explains why Bob started life from a KKK-supporting family, before becoming the first White field secretary of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the 1960s.

In Bob’s interview by Dr. Hasan Kwame Jeffries (History Professor at The Ohio State University, and, incidentally, brother of Congressman Hakeem Jeffries), you can hear him explain how, “That was the way you got accepted in SNCC–you go to the dangerous places and do what the people were doing.”

Bob’s a folksy guy; like a lot of Southerners, he’s not into drama. Just tells it like it was–and is. His mission today, he says, and for the rest of his life, is to tell young people: “You can be White, and you can be a Civil Rights activist, and you can survive.”

Come to think–that’s a pretty good message right there. Reading Bob’s story, not to mention rubbing shoulders with him, reminded me how ordinary these extraordinary “ACTIVISTS” can be. Maybe a teensy bit braver than I am…

I hope you listen to Bob or check out his book. Pass it on!

Be the Challenger: How Muhammad Ali and NASA Reeled Me Back In

Posted on May 24, 2023 by gretchenwing

I’m not going to spend time talking about why I’ve stepped away from this blog for the past year. I’d rather talk about what brought me back.

Since Sandy Hook, since Trayvon, since Charlottesville, since [fill in your own moment of “whatthefuckishappeningtous”], I’ve been looking for people and ideas and groups which provide myself with hope and purpose. Along with my family; some dear friends; some small-but-mighty organizations within my community; music; nature, and writing, I found Common Power, and its educational branch, The Institute for Common Power, both of which I have written about.

For the last three years, I’ve gone deeper into action to protect and extend democracy, mostly through phone-banking and donations, but also writing letters to elected officials, and, last October, canvassing in my home state, North Carolina.

This is VA, not NC, but you get the idea–this kind of thing (photo by Charles Douglas, CP)

But canvassing requires travel, and phone-banking (besides being NO FUN) feels pretty limited. I was looking for other ways to plug in, when I tuned into Common Power’s 24-hour Teach-in for Truth in Education in Florida, and heard Dr. Yohuru Williams.

Dr. Williams is a History professor at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN, and founder of their Racial Justice Initiative. It was his part of that 24 hours of teaching that got me back to Wing’s World. He talked about two “challengers,” starting with NASA’s Challenger Space Shuttle, which exploded live on TV in 1986 (which many of us remember all too well).

Dr. Williams reminded us how Ronald Reagan went on TV to tell American children the tragedy:

“We don’t hide our space program. We don’t keep secrets and cover things up. We do it all up front and in public. That’s the way democracy is, and we wouldn’t change it for a minute.”

His message: Ron DeSantis, anti-“woke” Republicans–are you LISTENING? Democracy means FACING UP TO BAD STUFF. Like, you know…U.S. History.

Dr. Williams closed by talking about Muhammad Ali, of whom actor/director Ed Begley Jr. said, “Ali’s secret was that he was always the challenger.”

Ali in 1976, filming The Greatest (courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

And this historian/activist then looked at the camera and asked us listeners to find ways to continue to be the challenger. To do more than what we’ve been doing to help our country be its best self.

And I thought: okay. At the very least, something I can do is to expand Dr. Williams’ message.

So in the next few weeks, I’ll be highlighting some of the talks from that incredible 24 hours. I’ll be sharing, amplifying, extolling the messages I’m absorbing about how to help our country. And if just a few of you reading this decide to do the same, consider yourselves challengers too.

Florida vs. Truth (Which Means Florida vs. All of Us): How to Stand Up

Posted on April 10, 2023 by gretchenwing

When folks say, “Shit just got real,” they generally mean shit just got real for them. Clearly, shit has been real for several hundred years in this country for vast numbers of people.

(Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons: Dedicated to the Foot Soldiers of Birmingham Park)

But Florida, under the leadership of Ron DeSantis, just made it real for me. As a former history teacher, realizing that Florida’s new “Stop Woke Act” would penalize most of my old lesson plans was a watershed moment.

*Wait–they’d be coming for* me? I’m a member of the dominating caste! (FPHS graduation 2009–wish I could remember who took the photo!)

What would the Stop Woke bill do? According to the Florida ACLU:

ASSAULT ON DIVERSITY, EQUITY, AND INCLUSION TRAINING:

● This bill flips the script – deeming non-discrimination trainings as a source of discrimination.

● Under this bill, employees could sue their employers for discrimination if: ○ They claimed a feeling of “discomfort” during equity and inclusion training. ○ They claimed a feeling of “guilt” for being a man after attending sexual harrassment training. ○ They claimed a feeling of anguish after attending a session on implicit bias. ○ They claimed a feeling of “psychological distress” after being taught about discrimination perpetrated against LGBTQ people by others.

So. All it takes is one disgruntled student, and that teacher might have to choose between shutting up, getting their district sued, or getting fired (the most likely option)

Even more chilling, as the Florida ACLU describes, this bill would CENSOR HONEST CONVERSATIONS, exactly the kind of conversations our country is only beginning to recognize we need:

● This bill gives the government broad censorship over honest conversations about our nation’s history and the root causes of injustice and discrimination. Teachers and employers should be free to have these tough conversations. (Can you imagine teaching ANYthing without reference to the truth of the past??? Me neither.)

● It will have a chilling effect — schools will be hesitant to create open dialogue about our country’s history of slavery, Jim Crow, the civil rights movement, LGBTQ history, and other subjects to avoid legal liability.

So, my former students–all those role plays we did, inhabiting the lives of people on either side of historical divides?

Like here: Shawnese Heyer and Emani Lemasutele, facing off as a member of the Cherokee Nation and President Andrew Jackson.

Out the window. Toast. Get out your (highly redacted) texts, kids, while I hand out the accompanying worksheets.

So…who’s ready to take this lying down?

* * *

Thought so. If you’re as outraged as I am about Florida’s assault on the truth, here’s an outlet for you.

The Institute for Common Power (part of Common Power, the Seattle-based progressive organization which has helped keep me sane since November 2016) is staging a good, old-fashioned, 24-hour Teach-in For American Democracy, May 17, in Florida.

It’s a call to conscience and to common sense. It’s a spotlight on the shameful censorship Florida is trying to instill. It’s a courageous step–I know this because the organizers are already receiving death threats in Florida.

And it’s all on Zoom, and it’s free.

If you click on the above link during any hour of the Teach-in on May 17, you can tune in to hear lectures by activists and academics–some famous names, but all folks like you and me who are horrified at the idea that truth is now under legal attack under the leadership of a governor who is running for President.

We’re all busy. On May 17, I don’t plan to sit at my computer watching speaker after speaker inspire and energize me. But I DO plan to keep my audio playing in the background of my day, and I DO plan to let the idea of a Teach-in percolate into my own days, reminding me of the power of AMPLIFICATION when it comes to justice.

In fact, I’m starting right now, with this blog post.

You know what they say: See something, say something.

I say, I stand with THESE folks. Can you join me May 17? Can you pass this along?

(Courtesy Wikimedia Commons and National Park Service)

“The Most Appealing Young Heroine Since Scout”: The Kudzu Queen

Posted on February 1, 2023 by gretchenwing

I interrupt this blog-pause to bring you delightful literary news: Mimi Herman, one of my longest besties (’cause we’re not OLD), has just published a lively, authentic, and moving novel, set in our home state, North Carolina: The Kudzu Queen.

Oh, and that quote above? That’s from NYT best-selling novelist Lee Smith (once my 9th grade English teacher at Carolina Friends School, where Mimi & I met). You get your book blurbed by Lee Smith, you have arrived.

Some of you familiar with Southern landscapes might be thinking, “Whoa there! Kudzu? That awful introduced plant that tried to eat the South?”

Yes. That. And it’s still trying. (Photo courtesy Wikipedia)

But the dramatic irony of knowing what kudzu will become makes Mimi’s story all the more poignant, because her characters are present in kudzu’s Genesis moment, back in 1941. Why don’t I let the book’s flyleaf tell it?

Fifteen-year-old Mattie Lee Watson dreams of men, not boys. So when James T. Cullowee, the Kudzu King, arrives in Cooper County, North Carolina in 1941 to spread the gospel of kudzu—claiming that it will improve the soil, feed cattle at almost no cost, even cure headaches—Mattie is ready. Mr. Cullowee is determined to sell the entire county on the future of kudzu, and organizes a kudzu festival, complete with a beauty pageant. Mattie is determined to be crowned Kudzu Queen and capture the attentions of the Kudzu King. As she learns more about Cullowee, however, she discovers that he, like the kudzu he promotes, has a dark and predatory side. When Mattie finds she is not the only one threatened, she devises a plan to bring him down. Based on historical facts, The Kudzu Queen unravels a tangle of sexuality, power, race, and kudzu through the voice of an irresistibly delightful (and mostly honest) narrator.

The choice of 1941 is not accidental. Mere months before Pearl Harbor, Mattie Watson, her family, her community, and her country are all aligned on the cusp of transformation: Mattie into womanhood; her family (and, more dramatically, that of her best friend) into a new configuration; her community into the brave new world of cultural and economic change; and her country into its 20th-century world leadership. While kudzu is a very real part of this change–Mimi’s book is thoroughly researched–it is also a perfect metaphor for the way “growth” does not automatically entail “improvement”–or at least, not without cost.

But can I step away from theme for a moment to trumpet some sweet, sweet prose? For a taste:

“The afternoon’s brightness had traveled with me, infusing the white clapboard of our house with its own light. My mother’s azaleas were enjoying their brief moment of pink glory before they subsided into wilted blossoms the color of old newspapers.” (p.88)

“…brief moment of pink glory” (image courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

“Sometimes a rain will start so quietly that after a while you realize it’s been raining for some time and you dadn’t even noticed. By the time I grapsed the fact that I was crying, I’d progressed to wet hiccups.” (p. 216)

Much as I enjoy The Kudzu Queen’s active prose, I think I admire its dialogue most.

“‘How many fish are we going to catch, Aggs?’ Danny asked.

‘A million?’ she ventured.

‘At least,’ he told her. ‘I was thinking more like two million.’

She laughed, a sound I heard so rarely that I almost didn’t recognize it.

‘How many can you eat?’ he asked.

‘Six,’ she announced.

‘Excellent. That means six for you and one million, nine hundred ninety-nie thousand, nine hundred and nine-four for me me.’ Danny tugged her sleeve. ‘This your fishing outfit?'” (p. 190)

It’s hard to write too much without spoilers, so I’ll stop with this recommendation: if you want to delve deep into a time of relative innocense without a drop of mawkishness; if you want to give yourself over to that narrator Lee Smith calls “the most appealing young heroine since Scout;” if you’d read anything David Sedaris–yes, David Sedaris!–calls “funny, sad and tender,” then–ask your local bookstore to order The Kudzu Queen, or order it yourself, here.

Mimi autographing a copy for moi! (Image courtesy Cris Wiley)

Oh–I almost forgot this part! Mimi’s “day job,” while producing her own writing, is to be a Teaching Artist. She’s taught gazillion classes and workshops over the years, to writers in every decade of life. Currently, she and partner John Yewell offer tantalizing Writeaways–extended workshops in exotic European castles and other inspiring places. Take a look at the link!

Who could resist?! (Image courtesy writeaways.com)

Congratulations, buddy. And Happy Reading, everyone!

Doggone Vacation, Part II: Trailing & Pathing Through Vancouver Island

Posted on September 26, 2022 by gretchenwing

Like my new word? I was trying to find a way to describe the way The Mate and I tend to travel, and it occurred to me: pretty much all we do, wherever we are, is look for trails to walk or paths to bike (or vice-versa).

Leaving Tofino, we drove less than 20 miles down the road to Pacific Rim National Park, a thin strip of forest and beach that runs a good length down Vancouver Island’s Wild West Coast. The hiking trails are all short, but the longest of them is run by the Nuu-chah-nulth people, whose land it occupies.

It’s hard to get The Mate to turn around for a photo.

Along with offering some moments in the best parts of the forest, the trail tries to deepen one’s awareness of that culture, like this:

If only I knew how to pronounce those words…

This totem pole along the trail is maybe the most beautiful I’ve ever beheld.

Everywhere you go in that park, signs remind you whose land you are on–a convention our US parks would do well to emulate.

That sign, by the way, greets walkers and bikers for MILES as they traverse the longest path of all: the bike path that runs the entire 20+ miles of the park. The Mate & I LIVED on this path during our camping days there, using it to move from one beach or hiking trail to the next. And, given the number of poop-piles we counted, the local bears live on this path too!

Does the bear shit in the woods? Actually, no…not when there’s pavement available. (Not sure why someone placed a rock on this batch)

Of course we didn’t spend ALL our camping time on the move.

Not when there’s giant fungus to groove on! (foot included just for scale)

I’m not a “beach person” in the sense of lying on them for hours, but give me a beach with tidepools and I’m good–at least till the next mealtime! 🙂 PRNP has some AMAZING rocks and tide pools.

In one pool, I was amazed to discover an eating-sized fish who appeared trapped, as if in an aquarium. I vowed to come back next morning to try to save him if the tide hadn’t come in far enough…

…only to discover him, to my chagrin, still there…along with an even larger buddy…both of them attached through the gills by a nylon line, and the fisherman who’d caught them still trying to augment his catch. Apparently he was using this tide pool as his bucket to stash his fish, even overnight!

[Not pictured: pathetic caught fish in tide pool. I’m a terrible hypocrite; I just like to eat ’em.]

Seriously, though, I can’t say enough about this part of Canada. Come for the big trees…

…stay for the big trees at sunset!

Leaving the Wild West (regretfully), we moved slowly back through the center of the island, spending the night in Port Alberni. Not much pathing nor trailing there–but I did fall deeply in love with their bakery. If you want to know more about this very blue-collar town at the far end of the LOOOONG inlet which bisects the west coast, let me refer you to my friends’ blog–they do a good bit more than pathing and trailing when they travel.

[Not pictured: Port Alberni. Nothing really grabbed me there, visually; probably due to lack of trails & paths.]

On the way out, however, we walked in the Cathedral Grove (pictured at top), and later stopped at Little Qualicum Falls Provincial Park, where we vowed to come back sometime and camp. Here’s why.

Luckily, we’d already had our leaping-salmon experience the week before at Stamp River, because…

…these falls were not exactly leap-able. Ridiculously gorgeous, yes. We had some of our best “trailing” around this river, seeing its falls from all angles.

Our final stop was Lake Cowichan, where I’d attempted to take The Mate on last fall’s ill-fated Mystery Birthday Trip (see previous post). The Trans Canada Trail runs through there, so we had high hopes of pathing it on our bikes.

But it was closed for construction. So we had to make do with the lake.

Lake Cowichan looked even better from above, although the trail itself led mostly through the scruffy results of clearcutting.

The scenery finally got pretty just about when we were ready to turn around. Oh well.

We spent our final Vancouver Island night near Nanaimo, where we’d be boarding the ferry next morning. Yes, we did manage to find a couple more trails & paths nearby, but by this time we were starting to feel all that mileage in our legs. So we kept the walks short, and fell gratefully into the bed which took up our entire tiny room in this adorable pub/hotel.

Did I order the poutine for dinner? Yes I did.

We arrived home to find the Cascade skies still hazy with wildfire smoke. Happy as I am to be reunited with Maya the Malamute, I’ll end with this photo from the ferry back to the Canadian mainland, because…