Silence

I listened over these last weeks, hearing patients, friends, and family members talk about what they are seeking over the winter holidays.

To summarize what I have heard in one word:

Silence.

I hear a need to quiet the chatter and clamor, internal and external.

In a world addicted to noise, where every moment is furiously filled with sound, our bodies yearn for that space where we can again hear our breath breathing life.

Where will you find silence in these next weeks?

How will you actively create space for silence?

What do your traditions teach you about silence?

What sound does silence have for you?

 

I can remember one of my first conversations with silence. 

I was on the Navajo Nation for the first time, seeing a landscape that was completely new to me. I knew cities and highways and constant noise, but I lacked an appreciation for the vastness of the desert. I was on a run (surprise!) and had gotten far from town and suddenly silence was upon me.

Silence became stillness.

I stopped moving to commune with what I was hearing.

And I was indeed hearing something.

Silence was loud, in a sense.

It was a life force pressing upon malleus, incus and stapes (bones of the ear).

Silence, I discovered, was not the absence of sound, but the presence of something. Myself. The Divine. Life speaking to me, frustrated that I had drowned it out with so much noise.

I bowed, asking for forgiveness, and continued to listen.

Stillness.

Silence.

Heartbeat pounding.

Eyes taking in the mesas before me.

 

 

My relatives, look for ways to invite silence in over these next weeks.

Know that she wants to be invited into your sphere.

She has been waiting patiently for you to seek her out.

 

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A few thoughts for your journey with silence…

Get outside and find silence in a place you have wanted to explore.

Curl up with a pen and paper and write. Or doodle.

After busy days with family, make time and space for silence before resting head to pillow.

Go screen-free for a period of time. (Try this with everyone in your house)

I will share a personal practice that I do each winter break that has been quite helpful in this quest. I shut off my phone for 9-10 days, understanding that these devices create much of the noise in our lives. After a first day where there is a legitimate withdrawal symptoms (as with any addictive substance taken away), I notice how things slow. My thinking slows. My ability to be present improves.

John Cage produced a piece 4'33'' in which the musicians are instructed to sit in silence with their instruments for the duration of the piece. As Mr. Cage says, "Everything we do is music". This is a  performance of 4'33''.

The Sacred Pause

Debbie struggled with a deluge of negative thoughts.

She asked me for ideas. I didn’t have much to offer.

Searching for herself, she figured out the simplest of answers.

At her next visit, I asked her how she was doing with the thoughts.

“Much better.”

“Really? Tell me more.”

“The thoughts are still there, but when something negative pops into my mind, I pause.”

“That’s a good idea.”

“But that’s not it. After the pause, I ask myself ‘I wonder what my next thought is going to be?’ It gives me a chance to see the thought as an observer so that I am not consumed by it. I might even smile as I come up with a few possibilities to answer the question, ‘What will come next in my stream of thoughts?’”

“I knew you would come up with the answer, Debbie.”

She smiled.

 

The sacred pause.

An invitation to sit with discomfort as opposed to reacting to it.

Observing as opposed to consuming.

Jumping to the shore instead of going with the current of negativity.

A chance to center again as opposed to being toppled.

 

“Today is going to be a horrible day.”

Pause.

Deep breath.

“I wonder what my next thought is going to be.”

“Maybe that I am going to be fired today even though I know my boss supports me?” Smile.

“Or is my next thought going to be about that report I am having trouble completing? I could see my brain coming up with that one.”

“Was I going to have a thought about that stressful conversation from last week that I can’t seem to let go of?”

“Wait, what was the negative thought I had a few moments ago??”

 

Try out the sacred pause today.

Share it with others.

Debbie, thank you for answering your own question in a such a beautiful way.

Thank you for allowing me to share it with these amazing people!

 

Gifting

The 1^st day of the last month of this year.

31 days to close out 2023.

From a heart perspective, 3 million heartbeats to get us to 2024.

For some, the best part of the year. For others, the hardest time of the year.

 

What is it that you need at this moment?

If you were to gift yourself with something for your own wellness, what would it be?

Quiet time each morning?

Reading for pleasure each evening?

Rekindling a friendship?

Reinvigorated spiritual practice?

Reintegration with community?

Journaling?

Movement?

 

Commercials will do their best to get us to listen to them as they tell us what we need and what we should buy for everyone in our lives. 

They feed into the pressures of the holiday season to buy things to show how much we care about the people in our lives. 

The implication is that with this new thing they want us to buy for $199.99, we will find contentment and joy. Ditto for the people we gift.

 

Brothers and sisters,

Turn off that noise.

Close your eyes.

Listen to stillness.

Listen to silence.

Listen to life.

Listen 

            to the soft rhythm of your own breath.

Listen 

            to the beautiful beat of the heart in your chest.

Keep listening.

You will see that what you need in these last 31 days of 2023 cannot be bought.

Start there and give freely and unconditionally to yourself.

Let that self-care ground your gifting to others.

Joy

“Each day, I look for joy.”

My patient shared her perspective on life and health in these six simple words.

Not some days, but each day.

The act of looking, a reminder that we are active participants, not passive recipients, of our journey, of our healing.

Joy.

Not happiness. Joy.

Not elation. Joy.

Not drama or discord. Joy.

 

A moment to consider what we choose to seek today and everyday.

How does seeking joy differ from seeking happiness?

“Even though we may seek it, desire it, pursue it, etc., feeling happiness is not a choice we make. Joy, on the other hand, is a choice purposefully made.” (courtesy of Compassion International)

Another perspective: “Happiness comes from things happening. It is circumstantial. Joy is about where your confidence lies. Where is your confidence when things are not going your way?” (Purpose City Church)

 

Cultivate joy, brothers and sisters.

If you have lost touch with joy, give her a ring today. (She always picks up when we call)

Find a person next to you and share your joy with them. And then be open to them sharing similarly. Joy, like most of life, is best experienced with others, in community.

 

Each day, I look for joy.

May it be so.

A pic that is joy to me. It is rain clouds and water and transition and brilliant colors. All offering us different medicine. I took this a few weeks ago on the shore of the Rio Grande.

The 26.2 Healing Journey: Race Day

We huddled as night turned to day, each of us ready for our own unique journey.

I knew in the early miles that the marathon would give me more life lessons. My healing journey had gotten me to here, but the run itself was going to continue the teaching.

So, I listened. And here is what I learned.

Replace Win vs. Lose with Winning Your Own Race

The wonderful thing about running races is that everyone wins. Of the hundreds of us lining up for the marathon, each person toes the line with a chance to beat their own expectations, limitations and self-doubt. We all run with a chance to overcome - addiction, depression, and anything else we may be struggling with. Each person is engaged in a competition to see what incredible new things they will accomplish today. In this sense, the race clock and one’s place in the race fade into the background, formalities to record the event. This week, when life tempts you into a “win vs. lose” mentality, you can choose instead to focus on winning your own race.

Patience and Rest = Work

The first half of a marathon is a very unique place. Most of my mental energy over the first miles was focused not on speeding up, but on slowing down. You run this part of the race in a way that seems uncomfortably slow so that your body is able to run the entire distance. The first 13 miles remind that in a world that asks us to “go hard, all the time” that there are times where the best thing we can do is to hold back and become patient. There will be moments, as there were in my own head during the race’s opening miles, where you dismiss yourself and your effort, as we have been trained to see rest and patience as un-important and even as a failure. In actuality, finding time for rest may be the most important work we do this week.

 The beauty of leaving our comfort zone

Despite my months of hard and despite my meticulous attention to nutrition and hydration on race day, my body and mind started to fatigue with eight miles to go in the marathon. From a competitive running perspective, this is where the race unraveled. My mile splits slowed considerably. My dreams of finishing fast vanished. From a life perspective, however, this is where the most important lessons were being taught. Life took me from my comfort zone and reminded me that I was not in control. Embrace those moments of struggle this week. They are a gift, a place where you can see what cannot be seen when we are in our comfort zone.

The most important part of healing is not crossing the finish line, but rather, crossing the starting line

At 3^rd and Tijeras, we all gazed at the road ahead of us.

The horn sounded and the race began. Over the next sixty seconds, hundreds of feet crossed from one side of the starting line where you could still turn back, to the other side of the starting line where we committed to the journey.

By crossing the starting line, each of us was finishing a journey that took us through doubt, injury and other hurdles unique to each person.

The journey

to my healing

to your healing

to our healing

both starts and finishes

when we cross the starting line

 

Celebrating with friends and family at the finish!

The 26.2 Healing Journey

From hurt to healing to healed.

From a muscle tear to tearing up the miles once again.

My 6-month journey from a calf tear to today has been a “beautiful struggle”.

I am going to line up this Sunday to run 26.2 miles at the Duke City Marathon, feeling fit and healthy. Ironically, even though this marathon has been centered on coming back from injury, I am the healthiest I have ever been going into race day at this distance. (Marathoners and distance runners have very accurately been called “the healthiest group of injured people in the world”)

Had a patient of mine said, “Doc, what do you think about me coming off the injured list to run a marathon?” I surely would have done all I could to knock some sense into them. Maybe a psychiatry referral as well.

But, luckily, I have not been to the doctor in these last months.

As I ran in the liminal space between day and night this morning, I reflected on the larger life lessons these last months have given me. I will share a few of those here with you. I trust that they can support your healing journey.

Lesson #1 – Activating your healing journey is the hardest step

After months of limping around, I began to try short runs at very slow pace. It was hard on many levels. The calf still gave me pain that made me question if I was really ready to run again. The runs on a body that was out of shape were a mix of humbling and humiliating. When we are hurt, we have become stagnant because of that injury. Moving toward wellness begins with those first slow and timid steps.

Lesson #1A – The most important part of healing is not crossing the finish line, but rather, crossing the starting line

When I look at the last 18 weeks of running, it was crossing the starting line (e.g. starting to run again) that was the critical moment. In doing so, I was proclaiming to life and myself that I believed in my healing. Before that moment, I was holding onto my injured status. And beyond that, well, everything flows once we believe in our healing.

Lesson #2 – Learn to ignore the things that do not matter

As a runner, you can fill your mind with lots of numbers and metrics for your training. Pace per mile. Miles per week. Coming back from injury made me slightly better at seeing the bigger picture (“Wow, I am running again. Grateful to be out here!”) and better at ignoring meaningful stuff that does not matter (“Darn, that last interval was 3 seconds too slow”)

Lesson #3 – Put yourself around healing energy

It was a silly thought. I was very early in my training, but showed up in the foothills where some elite runners were doing a hill workout. I knew that I was not going to run with them, but a voice inside me said “Just go”. I think it the voice of wisdom, telling me that I needed to get around people who would remind me of where I was headed, helping me to forget where I had been. I continued to seek people who could help me heal in these last months – from physical therapy to Running Medicine friends to Solomon, Keenan, Chris and others. Injury isolates us. Healing requires us to connect back with those around us.

Lesson #4 – Shout your vision to the world (even if it comes out as a whisper)

It was a family vacation in July when I first uttered the words, “I might even run a marathon this fall.” I remember saying it in a whisper, not believing yet that this was more than a laughable hallucination. There is power in our words, and even more power when we share with others what our vision for healing looks like. What are you ready to shout out to the world?

 

 

My friends and relatives, brothers and sisters,

I embrace this healing journey with joy and gratitude. Thank you for listening and may it allow you, in some way, to move from hurt to healing to healed.

I will run for all of you.

I will run for all who cannot run.

I will run for healing.

Solomon and me, on a last tempo run along the race course. He pretended to breathe hard on the run, which was quite slow for his pace.

Balloon Week

 

Balloon week has brought near-perfect weather to Burque.

It is a week that invites us all to be a child again.

It is a chance to appreciate this place we call home.

Stressed? Angry?

Try this – go outside to get a glimpse of one or hundreds of hot air balloons. Let go and let the balloons take you to a better place.

Or even better, try chasing one to see if you can follow it to its place of landing.

 ~~~

Balloon week is special in our house as my parents often come from Baltimore to enjoy time with us. They take a balloon that says “Southwest Airlines” on its side, one that actually has steering on board. 

The week with them is always a full one.

 A meal or two at Frontier. Time in the Bosque, biking and hiking. 

And lots of balloon mornings and an occasional balloon glow evening.

The balloons become the backdrop for lots of quality family time and a chance to slow down.

Mom and dad, thank you for being our best part of balloon week!

A morning with mom and dad this week on a perfect balloon morning

Mrs. B is going strong

I last wrote about Miss B two years ago, and thought it was time to give everyone an update.

If you have read this blog from the beginning in the first weeks of the pandemic you may remember Miss B as a very important part of our house during the “virtual school” period. Our smallest one Sihasin saw her older siblings doing school on the computer and was feeling left out. So, our oldest daughter decided to become “Miss B”, broadcasting some on-the-spot interactive lessons for Sihasin. (Original story on Miss B)

The last we heard of Miss B, she had used the pandemic to find her true calling. Turns out education wasn’t a long-term fit for her, and she went into the pawn shop business. Seems that she also found a life partner, as her shop on Gibson is called “Mrs. B’s Pawn Shop.”

Yes, this news shook the Writing to Heal blog community when I shared it two years ago.

By "shook", I mean to say that all credibility I had as a writer was lost. And that 98.2% of readers decided not to read the blog anymore.

Well, we went to check in on her recently, wanting to see how she was doing.

In her words:

“The Pawn Shop business has treated me well. I am still an educator, but now it’s more about how this 20-year old lawn mower really will change the person’s life if they would just buy it from me for $150 in cash. 

I talk to them about how it doesn’t matter that they live on a 4^th floor apartment. It is about dreaming to have grass and then the grass will come. And that starts with having one of my lawn mower's that may or may not actually work. I guess you would say I am an educator for life.”

Whether you are completely confused or laughing out loud, Mrs. B says to have a great day...

…and to come buy this darn lawn mower so she can make room for some more junk that she can peddle to people who don’t need it.

Sihasin visited her "teacher" recently. Looks like Mrs. B was taking some well-deserved rest, as the shop was closed. Or maybe she was out looking for the next great lawn mower to sell...

Transition (Fall is Here)

I was in the Bosque this morning and saw the first yellow leaves on the Cottonwoods.

A reminder that we are in a moment of transition.

Summer bowing humbly as it gives way for Fall to arrive.

Both do so with some doubts. Summer, on one hand, having settled in over the last months, worries about what it means to step aside. Fall, on the other hand, is a bit timid as it steps up, wondering if it can live up to expectations.

Transition.

It carries such beauty and power.

It can also be scary.

Tearing us from a place of comfort.

Teasing us with visions of what we might become.

Taking us to a land of the unknown.

 

As the Summer to Fall drama unfolds around us, one leaf at a time, each morning slightly darker and crisper than the one that preceded it, reflect on the transition occurring in your life at the moment. 

Where are your leaves changing?

How are the seasons changing in your life?

What is receding? What is being birthed?

How are you doing with the transition?

How and who do you want to be as you let Summer go and embrace Fall in your life?

 

Writing to Heal community, take some time to write today on the transition. Let nature be your co-author and guide if you wish, writing under a favorite tree or while you walk your favorite path.

Enjoy the journey that is your transition!

Enrique's Movement Journey

As a family doctor, I have a front-row seat to inspiration. My patients share their stories and lives. They share their journeys with me. Overcoming addiction, disease, pain, unhealthy work and family situations, etc.

My gratitude to all of those who I get to work with as their doctor. If you are reading this blog as one of my patients, this is your doc saying thank you. (Will give you a hug when I see you next).

I will share one of those stories today with you. Enrique is a great guy, a great father. But he recently had a health crisis, one that reminded him that he needed to turn more of his attention to his own health.

I will let Enrique tell you the rest…

Movement

It started as a need. I was dying. I had just been discharged from the ICU. I had suffered from a bout of diabetic ketoacidosis, and my blood sugar reading when I was admitted to the hospital was 415, and I was diagnosed with type-2 diabetes. I needed to change my diet and my activity level, but I was afraid I wouldn't have time between a very demanding work schedule and my aching body it seemed impossible to effect any meaningful change. Some major life events were going to quickly free up my time and motivate me in ways I hadn't considered.

The first event was getting laid off from work a week and a half after being in the hospital. I suddenly had more time than I knew what to do with. I could now begin to walk in the Bosque every day. I started just doing three quarters of a mile a day and eventually worked my way up to 3 miles a day within about a month and a half. I was starting to move in ways I hadn't been able to since my 20s. I was feeling good, and I was managing my diet well. My doctor was very pleased with my progress.

The second event happened about three months into my movement journey. My wife of 21 years decided that she wanted a divorce. It was an unexpected and soul crushing development. I was overwhelmed with despair and pain.  At the time, I was walking about 4 miles per day.

As I was working through the grief of separation, I noticed that when I was moving, the internal pain and angst I was experiencing was lessened. Movement provided me with a safe space every day, if only for a brief moment. I started to walk more and was soon averaging 5 to 6 miles per day.

Today, it has been over 9 months since my type-2 diabetes diagnosis and 6 months since separating from my ex-wife. I am averaging 7.25 to 9 miles per day with about 50 to 55 total miles per week. I have lost 50 pounds and am as strong as I've ever felt in my adult life. My blood glucose is now completely managed through diet and exercise.

Unexpectedly, movement has become the chief activator of healing in my life. Physically, mentally, and spiritually, I have come to rely on movement to place me in a position to learn, grow, and connect with myself and the world around me.

Movement is as important to me today as breathing. My life and my spirit are abundant with happiness and joy. I can’t imagine where I would be if I hadn’t had the good fortune to be able to experience the life events that drove me to movement. I am truly blessed and grateful for the life I have been allowed to live today.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My brother Enrique, thank you for sharing with me and giving me permission to share with others. Thank you for allowing me to be a small part of your journey. 

I trust that your words will inspire others who need to take those courageous, intimidating first steps toward their own healing. #writingtoheal

Enrique now sees his doc on a monthly basis. The "visits" are done while walking a few miles at beautiful places and open spaces. The medicine is in the movement. This pic came from our last "visit", Los Poblanos Open Space. Shout out to the sunflowers that allowed us to pose with them.

Embrace the Wobble

Crying profusely.

“Dad, don’t make me do it.”

Our 5-year old had promised to try riding her bike, and I was trying to stand strong. But her tearful protest was making it hard not to back down. For a few months we had failed at getting her to be able to ride a bike without training wheels. “Why force her toward another failed attempt?” I asked myself.

After a few minutes of emotional tug-of-war, we got little Sihasin onto the bike.

She settled onto the bike seat.

Struggled to push off, but finally did.

Bike wobbled.

Wobbled some more.

She reacted and steadied herself.

Wobbling continued.

She again reacted and kept the bike from falling to the side.

She had figured it all out! She was riding a bike.

Tears of “don’t make me do this” replaced with “wow, I can do this!”

Daddy no longer feeling guilty, but now feeling a proud papa elation.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~

This week, we may feel like Sihasin when faced with a daunting challenge. We may not cry in protest, but we may wish we could.

Maybe that is the exact moment where we are going to have the breakthrough, if we just push through the fear of failure. In fact, it might be helpful to stop and name what we are afraid of as a way of getting ourselves onto the bike to at least make an attempt.

And when the bike inevitably wobbles, trust that you can figure out how to react. 

Just like Sihasin. 

In fact, our failures have taught us how to be successful, even if we cannot quite see it yet in that moment.

Embrace the wobble.

Embrace the “don’t make me do this” voice in your head.

But similarly, embrace the voice telling you “I can do this.”

Summer Rain

driving hard

pushing us indoors

summer rain reminds

of

cycles

blessings

showering

love

courage

strength

resilience

hardship

nourishment

until

silence

nothingness

where

only

summer rain remains

Presidential Visit

Yesterday was a big day for our little street in the North Valley.

As I took the kids to school, NPR talked about President Biden’s trip to the southwest, which was to include two fundraisers.

“One of those two will take place on our street,” we realized together.

 The first visit from Secret Service over the weekend gave us a sense of how big this was. The street would be shut down at times during the day, and we were told what we could and couldn’t do. The big offer was that we could take pics with the presidential limousine when the event was happening. A 50-car motorcade would come in with the President, and the attendees of the fundraiser would be bused in. Governor Lujan-Grisham and multiple Pueblo Governors were going to be in attendance as well.

Monday night, the Flegs were busy making signs to place in our front yard to help welcome the President.

"Welcome to our neighborhood Mr. President"

How it all actually went down? Well, you could get a better account of that from my family. (If you really need to know right away, go to Longfellow Elementary School today and ask for Sihasin or Shandiin. I am sure the Principal will be happy to pull them from their learning to talk to you.)

While I wasn’t there to see it all, but I do know that it took me an hour to get from “just around the corner from home” to getting to my house. As I approached our road, police were re-directing everyone. I found a place to park along a ditch and decided to try to walk home. On the way, a police vehicle stood blocking the trail. Even my proof of living on the street was not enough to get me past. The officer assured me, “Don’t worry. It is almost over,” as he listened to a play-by-play on his radio of what was happening at the event. 

“The President has just set down his glass. Oh, wait…he looks to be taking another sip after all. Now wiping his mouth with a napkin.” 

Exciting stuff!

After standing there for about 10 minutes, the motorcade began to exit our street. Neighbors stood in their driveways waving at the President as he waved back. I can at least say that I saw the President’s vehicle 100 yards in front of me, and can tell you that it was black and had tinted windows. Hey, that’s good enough for a tabloid story, right?

This morning, our street is quiet again. As if nothing happened.

And I am smiling, knowing that I will able to get to my house this evening.

Pic with the presidential limousine.

Biden waving from the back seat of the limo as he passes our house.

Beginnings

Beginnings

require a letting go

releasing grief’s tears

who nourish the soil

coaxing seed from its casing

as life sprouts anew.

 

Beginnings

mark endings

the two dancing in step

affirming and erasing the other all at once

blending and fusing until they are indistinguishable

leaving growth in their wake

making growth all that matters

 

Beginnings

allow what was to recede

what is becoming clear

as what could be emerges

Rain drops from nowhere

The first drops hit my skin.

I thought it was just sweat. I was running after all.

Then a few more.

I looked up. A sunny NM morning, no clouds and definitely no rain clouds above me.

I knew it was going to be a special day.

Rain without clouds was a sign. The fact that I am starting to run again, 4 months from the calf injury was another.

I got home, took off my blue Running Medicine shirt and put on a yellow Running Medicine shirt.

I spent the next hour with a group called Addict 2 Athlete (A2A), helping to lead a workout at a local park. Great energy, with all of us healing and recovering together through an intense workout.

Sped home, and took out my 3^rd Running Medicine shirt of the day, this one a maroon color. Off to coach my son and our Running Medicine basketball team in the county rec league.

Then off to cheer on our RM team at the regional track meet. No shirt change this time.

I guess the theme for today’s piece could be “A morning in the life of a mover” or “Anthony is a bit different”, but let’s go back to the raindrops and those small gifts that each day gives.

Some of the gifts in your day today, like the raindrops from nowhere, will be unexpected and unexplainable.

Look for those today.

Embrace them when they come.

Spend a moment to enjoy the gift, stepping back from computer and anything else that might distract you from gratitude.

Find someone to share the gift, the amazement with. In my case, the rain drops led to a conversation with another trail-goer as we shared a moment of awe and wonder.

May rain fall from nowhere for/on us today.

May we be present enough to notice it when it does.

Striking down affirmative action - a loss for all of us

Until we have eliminated inequities along the lines of racial status, affirmative action is just and necessary.

I write this as a white male for whom doors have been opened from my birth. Access to great schools, support if I ever faltered, and all of my basic needs being met. I got into college because of race – my white race – that gave me an unfair advantage in the game of standardized testing, AP classes etc.

It is a sad day for equity, a huge loss for justice when our supreme court says that leveling the playing field is now against the rules. It is a loss for under-represented, minoritized communities. But it is a loss for all of us. We lose out when students who have faced closed doors since birth are asked to play on an “equal” playing field with people like me, for whom the doors were always open. When one of those students who is destined to be a brilliant engineer, a stellar lawyer, or a climate change leader is denied admission to college because of the “equal” playing field (e.g. one without affirmative action), we all lose.

Let us not lose hope brothers and sisters. These assaults on women’s bodies and affirmative action by a court with a perverted sense of justice should give us added momentum to work together to make sure that their gavel is drowned out by the symphony of our voices singing freedom songs as we work toward equity and justice. Let that gavel be muted by our loud, boisterous and loving efforts to build The Beloved Community.

I call to mind Cornel West’s wisdom: “Justice is love expressed in public.”

That’s the gavel I choose to honor, listen to, and ground my actions today.

ICWA - A victory for all of us!

A few days ago, I heard a story about one of our Native elders. He saw his nephew being prepared for adoption, with a plan to have the boy go to live with a non-Native family across the country. This elder knew of the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA), a law passed in 1978 to reverse the removal of American Indian children from their communities and went into action to adopt his nephew, citing ICWA. He was successful, and the child was kept in his home Tribal community.

That made me think of my wife’s father, who was plucked from his mother on the Navajo Nation to be raised by a Mormon family in southern California. A group of government officials deemed his mother too told and not healthy enough to raise her son. To this day, some of his siblings refuse to acknowledge him as part of the family.

These stories took on another meaning yesterday, as the Supreme Court ruled 7-2 to uphold ICWA,something that was far from a certainty given the current composition of the Court.

This is a big win for all of us, whether we are American Indian or not. 

This is a win for justice.

This is a win for Indigenous peoples and their sovereignty. 

It is a win for Indigenous cultures and languages. 

It is a win for all of us.

A bit more about ICWA

Removing children from their Tribal communities and placing them with non-Native families far away from home was a continuation of the centuries of U.S. policy toward the original inhabitants of the land. The goals included elimination of Indigenous people from this land (genocide) and the elimination of Indigenous culture/language (colonization).

“Before ICWA, as many as 35 percent of all Native children were being removed, usually forcibly, mostly from intact Native American families with extended family networks, and placed in predominantly non-Native homes, which had no relation to Native American cultures. In some cases, the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) paid the states to remove Native children and to place them with non-Native families and religious groups.

ICWA gives tribal governments a strong voice concerning child custody proceedings that involve Native children, by allocating tribes exclusive jurisdiction over the case when the child resides on, or is domiciled on, the reservation, or when the child is a ward of the tribe; and concurrent, but presumptive, jurisdiction over non-reservation Native Americans' foster care placement proceedings.” (Wikipedia)

So, on this week that sits between PRIDE and Juneteenth, a week that reminds us that our country can stand for inclusion and an honest account of our history, we add ICWA to the party.

On a week where we celebrate fathers, we get a well-timed present in the form of a Supreme Court ruling that allows Indigenous kids to have dads and moms and uncles and aunties and grandparents who can teach them the stories and ceremonies of their cultures. 

For a U.S. government that has made efforts to destabilize the family structure in Indigenous and other communities of color since the inception of this country, ICWA being upheld is a small victory.

Colors That Speak Words

I started to sweat.

I was a guest presenter in a class for medical students on writing and healing.

That wasn’t the part that made me nervous.

The students were to find a piece of art and write a response to that work.

I had not done the homework. And I didn’t want to show up not having done the exercise.

Sweat glands continued to activate.

I glanced next to my work computer and saw a piece of art from Mallery Quetawki, one of my favorite artists. (She did the cover art for the book Writing to Heal.)

So, I wrote a piece in the few minutes I had before it was my turn to share.

The writing process itself coaxed the sweat glands back to rest mode.

I decided to share the piece with Mallery, curious if she would be able to figure out which of her pieces of art I was writing to. She immediately knew, and said this was the first time anyone had written poetry in response to her art.

An idea was born.

(Procrastination as the mother of creativity!?)

Six months later, Mallery, myself, and two other creatives – Blythe Mariano and Chilan Mustain – get to present a show on this concept to the world. Colors that Speak Words is about translating, transforming, and transcending art into a written form. And vice versa – taking a piece of poetry and creating art in response. The opening is this Friday, 5-7pm and it all happens at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center. The exhibit will be up until mid October. A big shout out to IPCC Museum Curator Paula Mirabel and her team that has helped make this a reality.

I shared one piece from the show a few months back, and will share the original art and poem that started it all here. 

An invitation to take out pen and paper and write your own piece to Mallery's art. No sweating required.

abundance

cultural beauty

warmth + love

                                growing

                                flowing

corn pollen blessings

beading beauty

up

in double helix harmony

                                                over

                                                                kiva

                                                                plaza

                                                                dancers

                                                around

                                                                circle

                                                                ceremony

                                                grounded

                                                                by pottery’s

                                                                abundance

                                                                cultural beauty

                                                                warmth + love

Our Precious Little Ones

Today's piece is dedicated to the Longfellow Elementary Pre-K Students who have a promotion in a few hours toward becoming Kindergarteners in the fall. I am a proud dad of one of those students, Sihasin. Excited to hear what the children have prepared for us at the promotion ceremony.

The class showing off their garden last week.

Our precious little ones,

Today you make it to the big time (Kindergarten!)

May you continue to play nicely with others in the sandbox.

May you continue to play, teaching us older ones who have forgotten how to do so.

May you continue to play.

Our precious little ones,

May you continue to learn how to live for and with others.

May you continue to paint outside of the lines to your heart’s content, never letting others constrain your creativity and vision.

 

Our precious little ones,

Continue to sprout toward the sky while digging roots deep and resilient

Continue to

    Grow goodness

            Seed joy

                    Nourish us all.

 

Continue on.

        Continue up.

                Continue bringing smiles and happiness to the world.

 

And one last thing, just for us parents.

Please, please, please: Promise to never grow up, okay?