Tamora Pierce and Everyday Magic

Just when I had nothing to read...the fourth grade gave me an $80 gift certificate to Santoro's Books! Have I mentioned that I love my school. So I promptly bought Bloodhound, by Tamora Pierce...the highly anticipated sequel to Terrier...which if you haven't read it and you are interested in being transported to ancient Tortall for some good mystery and crime solving, you should totally get it. I am a big Pierce fan, having read The Lioness Quartet and it's companion books Trickster's Choice, Trickster's Queen, the Wild Mage Series and the Keladry books.

Pierce is most known for her female protagonists. She writes about girls and women who are unconventional, ambitious, and adventurous. Her heroines are knights, spies, and mages (people with magical gifts) and they are always up to something interesting. The friend of mine who first introduced me to Pierce loved the series on knights, but wasn't into magic and kind of down played the Wild Mage and the Circle of Magic series, saying they weren't as interesting as the rest. But since I had the gift certificate and knew I'd want to read more Pierce after Bloodhound, I took a chance and bought all 9 books of the Circle of Magic series...there are actually two series (4 books each)...The Circle of Magic and The Circle Opens and a fat culminating book titled The Will of Empress. Well Jez, you were wrong, those books were really good.

The story begins with four ambient mages discovering their powers. There are regular or academic mages whose gift is stored within them, and ambient mages whose gift is rooted in something in the surrounding world like Tris, whose magic is in the weather. She doesn't create rain or lightning, but she can draw it and use it. Then there is Briar who has plant magic, Sandry, who has thread magic, and Daja who has metal magic. Ambient mages are so rare and their powers work so differently, none of them know they're mages right away. Mage testers looked for power within them and didn't see it, but through a series of events, Tris, Daja, Briar, and Sandry, four orphans with intense stories of their own, come into contact with the great mages at Winding Circle who take them in and teach them how to handle their magic. The four of them become like family and learn to master their magic. There are adventures, travels, fights, and mysteries. I found the whole series totally entertaining.

But what captured me the most was the idea of everyday magic. Sandry, the thread mage or stitch witch, is a high born nobel and as such isn't allowed to learn to weave (it's seen as to common). When she is finally taken in for mage training and begins to learn her craft, she is able to do amazing things with only thread and needle. I began (I am such a nerd!) to really identify with her. No, I can't sew very well, in fact, every button I've ever sewn has fallen off, but I can do art and I can edit. I can communicate with people even when I don't know the right words or if we don't share a language. There's magic to that right?

While reading these books, I began to see all the every day gifts of my friends and family as a real life form of ambient magic. For example, Mz. Blu, my roomate and friend, is the person in my life most likely to know how to fix something. She can do anything from dry wall to hanging curtains. She taught me how to string wire on the back of canvases and to reverse the direction on my ceiling fan. She could have her own TV show...but more than being able to do something, it's that she does it so effortlessly. I could spend 6 hours trying to fix my bike, but if she messes with it for 5 minutes, it's fixed and ready to go. And Coco has girlie magic. She can take a $5 sun dress from Target and rock it like she's on the catwalk in Milan. She is truly and artist between the make-up and the jewelry and those gorgeous intense high heel shoes. So what kind of mage are you?

Thanks Ms. Pierce. I love your books. They always give me so much to think about.

Bishop Spong and expanding the tribe

When I first began attending the Center for Spiritual Living, my Dad was really happy. I know he wished it were the Episcopal church, but he seemed to take it as a divine victory that I was at least going to some form of church again after an almost four year hiatus. As my spiritual journey has continued, I've kept my family in the loop, sharing with them the new things I've been learning. There's been a lot to share and after a while my dad jokingly nicknamed CSL "the cult" because it seemed to be totally changing my thought process.

Well after about a year of avoiding "the cult" my dad finally gave in and decided to see what it was all about. Of course that would be the one weekend that we would have a special guest speaker, the retired Episcopal Bishop and my favorite heretic John Shelby Spong.

I have always been a cynical Christian, a questioner. "Did Jesus have brothers and sister," I would ask during Sunday school? "Did Jesus ever get married and have children? If Mary was a virgin, what exactly did the angel of God do to make her pregnant?" I didn't like the mystery and I didn't want to hear stories that left out important details or didn't make sense. I wanted to believe in God and Christ and the stories of the bible, but some parts of faith came easier than others.

I first came across Bishop Spong when I was really struggling with my faith. I love the Episcopal church. It is the spiritual home for both my parents and has been a source of love, comfort, and support throughout my life, but at a certain point I became unsatisfied with the answers I received to my questions. I stopped feeling like I was growing. That's when I came across a book called Why Christianity Must Change or Die written by Bishop Spong. Here was someone from my church, a bishop, a leader in my community asking the questions, voicing the same thoughts that had been running through my head for years. People called him a heretic, a blasphemer and worse for ordaining the first openly gay priest, writing books about Jesus possibly having a wife and brothers and sisters. He was radical, an agent of change, pushing the church towards spiritual evolution. And what he taught me was that there was more than one way to live in faith. If anything I kept my ties to the Episcopal church longer because I knew that if someone like him could have a place in our church, then so could I.

And so it was fitting to finally get to see him in person at the place where my faith has been allowed to change, grow, and live. He spoke of tribes and all the ways in which we, as human beings, continually redefine ourselves in oppositional terms...the quintessential problem of US and THEM.

It got me thinking a lot about what Kathianne term "rugged individualism". She often refers to herself as a reformed individualist...and every time she does I kind of laugh to myself knowing that I am as yet still unreformed, but in the process. As Bishop Spong spoke about dissolving the borders that stand between us and our higher humanity, I silently examined my own...my reluctance to connect or commit, that awkwardness I've felt when strangers and acquaintances have poured out their deepest secrets before me. I've wanted to say...don't tell me, I don't want to know because then I'll know too much about you and I might just have to love you. But love isn't something you can really control. I'm learning that this year. Love isn't bound by logic or boundaries, it isn't like an animal you can teach to sit and stay, it roams as it pleases and the more reformed I become, the more I feel it flowing from me towards the most unlike souls...people definitely not of my tribe.

In my spiritual practice class, in addition to the readings, the various meditations, and the prayer, we also have small groups where we come together and pray with and for one another and check in on our lives. I have taken several classes at CSL and been in several small groups. The groups consist of stranger, many of whom I probably wouldn't have talked to otherwise....not because they're bad people or anything, just simply because they didn't particularly draw me. But this group has been unlike any other. Perhaps it's because this class is longer than the other ones I've taken and we've spent more time together, or maybe because it had a pre-requesite and attracts people who are more serious, but I have found myself filled with a deep, inexplicable love for these stranger. And there is reciprocity. We've become so invested in being together that we are forming a sanga...a monthly prayer group, so that even when the class ends we will still have a time and space to be together.

Bishop Spong's words once again captured my imagination. What if there were no tribes or if we actually learned how to be together as one big human tribe. Perhaps that's too idealistic, but in learning to appreciate total strangers that I have very little in common with, I guess I feel like it might be more possible than I'd thought...that the differences between us aren't quite so great....

The Giant Magnet

Yesterday I had a fabulous time co-chaperoning the fourth grade on our all school field trip to the Giant Magnet. The Giant Magnet, formerly known as the Seattle International Children's Festival is happening at the Seattle Center from May 12-16. The 17-18, they are taking the show down to Tacoma. If you have kids and you're looking for something fun to do, I highly recommend it.

This is actually my second time at the Festival. Last year the theme was music from around the world, and we got to see some really spectacular groups from South America and West Africa. This year we arrived around 10:00am for "The World of Laughter Sampler" and were ushered into McCall Hall along with children and their teachers from schools all around Seattle. Some wore uniforms or color coated bandannas. It was quite a scene and a bit overwhelming if you aren't accustomed to traveling with hordes of squirmy, giggle, happy-to-be-out-of-school children. Once everyone was settled down, we met our MCs, a couple of break dancers clad in green vintage Adidas tracksuits commonly known as The Massive Monkeys...accompanied by DJ Blessed1. I would have never thought of having hype men for a kids event, but it was fun and effective. They were great at channeling all the squirmy energy into clapping and cheering.

First up was Lelavision, a woman and a man dressed kind of like cave people, who performed a kind of skit with these two large shells. At first it seemed kind of strange,but it was oddly fascinating to watch them use the shells like transformation chambers by actually crawling inside them and becoming different entities. Next up was a comedic duo from Germany called Hacki, accompanied by a blue suited guitar player. It was fun and spastic filled with lots of surprises including a bubble blowing genius and a box that blew smoke rings. The sampler ended with a skit from Les Argonauts, which was also very different...a little slap sticky, but ultimately totally entertaining. I was seated next to one of my colleagues who is notorious for his tendency to fall asleep at these kind of things and even he stayed engaged the whole time.

It was a gorgeous day to be downtown. We had a quick lunch on the still damp grass outside the theater then made our way back to see The Gentleman of the Carolina Chocolate Drops and Friends. This was a four man band of black men who have dedicated their time and considerable talent to keeping alive the tradition of folk music from the south. They had a wide array of instruments from banjos and jaw harps to harmonicas, kazoos, and snare drums and they explained everything in kid friendly terms with a few jokes and some great songs in between. The crowd favorite was a man nicknamed Slap Jazz, who played the jaw harp and also donned a pair of white gloves to play percussion on his own body. In addition to some cool music and good humor, the Chocolate Drops were also totally dropping knowledge about the history and flavor of black culture in the south. It was awesome and once the shows were done, we headed toward the fountain and let the kids run loose on the lawn where magically loads of hula hoops and bouncy balls had appeared. It was a great experience and well worth attending.

The Runway

Since my first debut as a painter last June, I have wrestled with this whole idea of being a public artist. It's one thing to paint for fun or to create something beautiful that then lives on the walls of my room, or maybe at the home of a friend or relative and a totally different thing to take that creation public and put a price tag on it. One, how do you assign a financial value to something you created. Do you base it on how much it cost to make it? How many hours you worked on it? How much you love it when its done? And then how can you sell this thing you created to a stranger. It's one thing to sell or gift art to friends, knowing anytime you want to see it again, it'll be at their house and totally different to send it home with a stranger who you won't ever see again and know that some part of you is hanging up on their wall. Do they look at it and love it? Do they end up being bored by it? Does it get put out at a garage sale when they move?

At first I was not really into it, but now for a multitude of practical reasons I am ready to figure it out. For one thing, I have so many paintings I've run out of wall space. Even as I rotate things through, I still have at any given time about 30-40 painting stacked up in my art closet. I need to get rid of it to make room for the new art...which seems kind of weird. It reminds me of something Eddie Watkins said once about what happened when he became a song writer. He said that after he had written his first really good song he was afraid that he would be a one hit wonder, that he wouldn't be able to come up with anything as good. But then he realized that his ideas were like planes lined up on a runway. Once one had taken off, another was right behind it just waiting for the space to be born.

Lately that's how I feel. I have all these paintings and art projects in my head, it's just a question of clearing space and allowing the inspiration to flow through me. In the meantime I am in the process of putting together a proper website and making moves. Two weekends ago I sold 10 paintings in one night. It was the first time I had sold so many in one sitting and moreover it was the first time I had sold to complete and total strangers and it was actually really neat to know that people I'd never met would want a piece of my creative energy living in their space. I think I might be ready now...

Staff Appreciation Week

Last week was staff appreciation week at my school. It began on Monday during our weekly all school assembly. Each of us received a small vase of gerber daisies followed by a resounding thank you and a standing ovation from our students and their parents. What a way to start the week! This was followed by the gift of fresh fruit and muffins found in our make shift staff lounge on Tuesday. Then the Parent Association provided us with a lovely lunch during which parent volunteers took care of our recess duty, so that no staff member had to miss out. Then Thursday we all found ribbon tied bags of tropical jelly bellies in our mail boxes. Also throughout the week the children have been writing thank you notes to their teachers and posting them on the large cloth cherry blossom tree hanging in the hallway.

Then on Friday I was invited to the fourth grade to be properly appreciated. The children came and found me and brought me to their room where they greeted me with applause and handed me a large shopping bag. Inside it was a lamp which they had customized with drawings to remind me of them AND and $80 gift certificate to one of my favorite bookstores! I love private school. If that wasn't enough, the went around the room and each told me one or two things that they appreciated about me. I have never felt so loved at a job before. So here is my top ten list of what I appreciate about my school:

I am grateful for...
1)the kids!
2)my awesome coworkers
3)money for professional development
4)medical and dental insurance
5)good job security
6)freedom to design my own curriculum
7)lots of mentors to help me figure out my career
8)a flexible schedule
9) a good work / home life balance
10)feeling valued in my job.

Thanks Universe!

Cinco de Mayo en La Casa del Mojitos

I don't remember the exact day I first stumbled upon Son Latinos. I know it was in 1999, because I had recently moved to Cadiz, Spain to study Spanish(among other things). Son Latinos was a bar located in the Plaza de Mina, everyone's favorite spot to botellon (take a bottle of your own favorite liquor in sit in the park with friends). It must have been the music that called to me. Even now, every time I hear salsa, I can't help but smile and start to move. It was in Son Latinos where I met some wonderful Cubans who introduced me to my favorite (and now signature) drink...the mojito.

Rum, ice, fresh muddled mint leaves, sugar cane, fresh lime juice, and a splash of soda...ahh....just perfectly sweet, minty and refreshing.

Fast forward 10 years to my life in Seattle. Salsa dancing and enjoying a good mojito are still up there on my list of favorite things to, but here it's complicated. For salsa, there is Century Ballroom, Tango, or China Harbor, sometimes there are live bands at Selena's Guadalajara or Babalu (though the mojito I had a Babalu's was THE WORST MOJITO I've ever had in my life...I repeat do not order a mojito a Babalus). But while it's great to have the space of the ballroom or the great bands that show up at Babalu, often the dancing doesn't have that satisfying feeling. I've taken salsa lessons before and I don't have anything against people who take lessons, but where I really learned how to dance is from the cuban sailors at Son Latinos. There was no counting, no talk of rock steps, or debate about whether or not to start on the one or the two. We just danced...no counting, minimal thinking, just me and the music and workin' it out. And it felt good and fun. All too often now, I find myself partnered with people whose lips move as the count every moment or people who don't know the difference between choreography and just dancing. It's annoying and it detracts from the fun. More over, there are very few places you can get a decent mojito in this town. Elliot's Bay makes good drinks...but no dancing. Babalu has good bands, but bad drinks and not a lot of space.

Son Latinos itself wasn't that large of a bar, but what I came to love about it, in addition to the fact that it had that perfect combination of great music, great dancers, and suberb mojitos, is that I felt like family there. Every time I walked in the door I was greeted by name. It wasn't meat-markety or filled with people dancing for sport. Everyone danced with one another and it was just fun.

Last night and for the past few Fridays, I have been hitting up La Casa del Mojitos in the U-district. I first ventured there for ropa vieja...my favorite cuban dish of shredded beef with peppers and onions served with black beans and rice. One of my coworkers took me to lunch there to negotiate a special goodbye breakfast for our graduating students. I immediately felt comfortable. The food was lovely, the mojitos were well made, and when I heard they had live salsa on Friday nights I knew I had to check it out. So I did and I was not disappointed. It's what I've been missing, a place to dance for fun, where the people are friendly, the men are nice without being over solicitous, the music is fabulous, and there's no cover charge. I highly recommend it.