The Premise

I'm deconstructing my 2003 book -- literally -- and turning it into small artworks. (You can see them at my It's Only a Book blog. If you'd like one, just let me know.) A paragraph I ripped out today got me to wondering if a new religious awakening (not fundamentalism but a true springing forth of loving our neighbors and feeding sheep)is going to accompany the economic disarray in which we've found ourselves.

Here's the paragraph:

Even God makes more sense from the premise that life's a nightmare. Who needs God when nothing bad can ever happen to you because you have a late-model car, health benefits,and a retirement account? In that circumstance, God's a sidekick, a buddy, a fuzzy blanket you sleep with at night bcause it's comfortable. Then when disaster arises you whine because God was supposed to be your personal defense system, keeping you safe. On the other hand, if you know life to be a nightmare, then the presence of God is a sanctuary, like the shell of a turtle, traveling with your wherever you go, rain or shine, sickness or health, for better or worse.

This week, think and write a little bit each day about sanctuary: what it is; where you find it; whether your understanding of the concept has ever changed; what precipitated the change.

Audre Lorde on being the change you wish to see

The thing about being a feminist is that there's always something new to set your, by which I mean my, teeth on edge.

I was looking at the Audre Lord Project in New York City and noticed in a block on the left these words:

We must be the change we wish to see in the world. Audre Lord

Hmm. Don't know about you, but I've seen that quotation attributed to Mahatma Gandhi more times than I can count. I did some searching and turned up the news that Gandhi never said it. Oh, go ahead, doubt me all you want, but then go read what the gandhitopia site says and start spreading the news. The mahatma said a lot of important things. However, when it comes to being the change we wish to see, it's all Audre Lorde all the time.

Tell everybody you know. It may seem a small thing, but our lives are woven, stitched, embroidered, engraved, delineated, written one small thing at a time, and to give credit where credit is due is no small thing at all.

Why I Love Sam Pickering

Yesterday I was just getting started on a damn fine rant rant about how newspapers keep laying off the important people -- journalists who cover finance, science, and the environment -- while hanging on to the sports and celebrity reporters.

At the same time I was reading Sam Pickering's Letters to a Teacher, a 2004 collection of his essays about teaching, and came upon this statement:

"In truth sports are popular because they are trivial."

It's hard to rant well after that. The triviality of sports and also of celebrity coverage is their real power. They don't matter. Everybody knows they don't matter. Even the people who can recite statistics about every baseball team or recall the outcome of every Super Bowl game or remember when Eddie left Debbie for Liz or the day Britney and K-Fed split -- those people are lodging their attention and emotion in things that don't matter because putting attention and emotion into the things that do are too taxing. They might stir up things better left unacknowledged or unaddressed. They might bring about change, and who knows what will happen then? But sports? We know the score there. Literally, we know the score; and some days that's enough to know.

Do you follow sports or celebrities? If so, how do you perceive their role in your life? If not, what allows you relief from the stresses and vagaries of real life? Where is your safe hiding place?

The Dalai Lama, Jean S. Bolen, Desmond Tutu & Deb

I've learned that my co-author, Debra Landwehr Engle, has an essay included in The Art of Living: A Practical Guide to Being Alive, a book released in October 2008 in both English and Spanish by publisher Editorial Kairos in Barcelona, Spain.

Deb joins voices worldwide who share "their thoughts on those questions of being alive which concern us all." Other contributors include the Dalai Lama, Jean S. Bolen, Desmond Tutu, Mikhail Gorbachev, Sir Richard Branson, Deepak Chopra, and a 104-year-old Holocaust survivor. The editor is Claire Elizabeth Terry.

Proceeds from the book will benefit Green Cross International. Founded by Mikhail Gorbachev, the organization's motto is "Give humanity a chance. Give the earth a future." Copies are available from Editorial Kairos in Barcelona. To order or for more information, e-mail them at info at editorialkairos dot com.

"The Dalai Lama, Mikhail Gorbachev, Mario Vargas Llosa, Muhammad Yunus, Deepak Chopra, Federico Mayor Zaragoza, Jean S. Bolen, Desmond Tutu, Sogyal Rinpoche, Michael Douglas, Sir Richard Branson, John Berger, and others.
"The Art of Living consists of a cross-section of voices from diverse cultures worldwide, each of whom share with us their thoughts on those questions of being alive which concern us all – irrespective of our religious or cultural backgrounds: in effect, ‘pooling our resources’, in order that we may all help each other learn the beautiful and complex ‘art’ of being alive.
"From the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Michael Douglas, Mario Vargas Llosa, Muhammad Yunus, Deepak Chopra and Mikhail Gorbachev, to a Native American storyteller, an Armenian Shaman and a 104-year-old Holocaust survivor, The Art of Living doesn’t pretend to be an exhaustive study of every single aspect of being alive, but it is compiled with the hope that it may help to shift our perspectives – just a little.
Claire Elizabeth Terry studied stage-management at the Central School of Speech and Drama, London. After working for several years in British theatre, she became a travel writer. Short-listed for the Shiva Naipaul Memorial Prize, she has written for the acclaimed Rough Guides travel series, as well as for several international publications. Claire has lived in Paris, Berlin, Crete and Florence. She now lives in Barcelona with her son, Roberto."