Winter 2024: We are Stories Being Told

Uncover the timeless power of storytelling with the Winter edition of our Seasons Quarterly, “We Are Stories Being Told.” This issue invites readers to explore identity, memory, and shared journeys through moving narratives. From the role of the Bard in preserving wisdom to the Palestine peace-building legacy of Rizek Abusharr to the joy of discovering beauty in nature, each piece offers a window into the soul. We explore with a man, who in his 50s as he learns he has autism, experiences a revelation that transforms his view of the past and reshapes his future. We read about the traumatic brain injury of a physics professor and how he embraced the changes and created a new life. We share music, poetry, and a long-forgotten but reviving winter story. Join us in weaving the tapestry of human experience, where every story reveals a truth that connects us all.

In the end, we'll all become stories.

― Margaret Atwood

We Are Stories Being Told

The role of the Bard has always been that of a storyteller, a keeper of tradition, history, and wisdom through the spoken word. In ancient times, Bards were revered not only for their ability to entertain but for their deeper purpose: to preserve the cultural memory of their people. Through song, poetry, and narrative, the Bard weaves stories that connect past, present, and future, ensuring that the values, beliefs, and lessons of a community are passed down through generations. In many traditions, the Bard's storytelling is also a spiritual act, a means of unfolding truth and revealing deeper layers of meaning. By blending creativity with memory, the Bard plays a vital role in shaping identity and fostering a sense of belonging, while also guiding their audience through self-reflection and collective understanding. In essence, the Bard’s art of storytelling is a sacred craft, one that engages both the intellect and the soul.

But here’s the thing—there is a Bard in all of us, and we are stories waiting to be told. Each one of us is both the storyteller and the story itself, continually weaving narratives from our experiences. And the story doesn’t end with us. Every moment of connection, every glance, every conversation, creates threads that intertwine with the stories of others. You, the reader, are part of my story, just as I am part of yours. The lines we carry on our faces, the scars, the memories, all bear witness to a life lived—but what would these stories mean if they weren't shared? As the song says, "these stories don’t mean anything when you’ve got no one to tell them to." Our stories gain meaning when they are heard, when they touch others, and when they are reflected back to us.

There’s a deep interconnectedness in storytelling—it's not just about individual experiences but about the collective narrative we’re all part of. Just as the Bard’s role was to bridge the past and future, our stories today are woven into the stories of those we encounter. Our stories connect us, shaping how we see ourselves and the world around us. As the song says, "I was made for you," reflecting the idea that our experiences only gain full meaning when shared with others.

As we embark on our hero's journeys, facing challenges and new experiences, Carl Jung’s concept of self-discovery emerges. For Jung, the path of personal growth involves confronting the shadow—those hidden parts of ourselves that we may not fully understand or acknowledge. Like the stories we tell, our inner journey is shaped by what we know and what we have yet to uncover. This idea parallels the Johari Window, a tool used to explore self-awareness. In this window, there are aspects of ourselves we know, aspects others see, and areas in shadow, yet to be discovered. Each new experience opens another pane, shedding light on what was once hidden.

Johari Window

Or perhaps we are engaged in self-discovery, peeling back the layers of who we thought we were to reveal deeper truths. This process mirrors Jung’s exploration of archetypes, where the stories we live are often shaped by deep, universal patterns within the human psyche. In Whitehead’s view, this is the process of concrescence—the coming together of diverse experiences into a coherent whole. Each new revelation about ourselves is not just an addition but a reconfiguration, where old ideas meet new insights, creating a fuller, more complex picture of who we are.

Some of us are fighting for peace, working toward justice in a world that seems ever fractured. Whitehead reminds us that harmony is not the absence of difference, but the delicate balance of contrasting elements. The quest for peace is a story in which we seek not to eliminate conflict but to create relationships where differences coexist in creative tension. Peace is not static—it is an active, ongoing process, much like the living flux of the universe itself.

No matter where we find ourselves—on a hero's journey, in self-discovery, fighting for peace, learning to live with disabilities, or deep in study—we are stories. We have stories to tell. And in telling them, we become part of the larger story of the world, a world that Whitehead describes as a process of creative advance. Our stories are not finished products, but ongoing works of art, shaped by each new moment, each new encounter. Jung’s concept of the collective unconscious reminds us that while our stories are deeply personal, they are also part of a larger human narrative, interwoven with universal themes and archetypes.

As we move into the season of winter, where change is visible in the bare trees and cooling air, let us remember that we, too, are in constant transformation. Our stories are never fixed, but always unfolding, always growing. In the flux of life, we find not chaos but the beauty of becoming—each of us a part of the grand cosmic story. And, like the song, our stories gain meaning when shared with others: "These stories don’t mean anything when you've got no one to tell them to. It's true. I was made for you." I feel that so deeply. Your story matters to me.

We are stories being told.

Kathleen Reeves is the community relations specialist at the Cobb Institute, and leads the Institute’s cohort program. She also serves on the communications team and assists with the Institute's social media messaging.

Brandi Carlile - The Story

All of these lines across my face
Tell you the story of who I am
So many stories of where I've been
And how I got to where I am
But these stories don't mean anything
When you've got no one to tell them to
It's true, I was made for you

s-o-c-i-a-l-c-u-t-FluPNkHfCTs-unsplash (1)

Photo courtesy Social Cut

“All that we are is story. From the moment we are born to the time we continue on our spirit journey, we are involved in the creation of the story of our time here. It is what we arrive with. It is all we leave behind. We are not the things we accumulate. We are not the things we deem important. We are story. All of us. What comes to matter then is the creation of the best possible story we can while we’re here; you, me, us, together. When we can do that and we take the time to share those stories with each other, we get bigger inside, we see each other, we recognize our kinship – we change the world, one story at a time…”

― Richard Wagamese

One Song to Leave Behind

RENT

Scene from Rent, the movie (2005 )

One song, Glory
One song, Before I go
Glory, One song to leave behind
Find
One song, One last refrain
Glory

–Johnathan Larson

His Story is a Song

The song “One Song, Glory” appears early in the Broadway show RENT but it brings teas to my eyes every time I hear it, not because of what is happening on the stage but because I connect it to the songwriter’s own heartbreaking story. But there are others as well- "Seasons of Love", "No Day But Today"- they all tell the story of living as fully as possible because we never know when the story ends.

Jonathan Larson was a composer and playwright with a dream: to create a revolutionary work of theater that would speak to the struggles, hopes, and resilience of his generation. Born on February 4, 1960, in White Plains, New York, Larson grew up with a passion for music and storytelling. He was inspired by the world around him, particularly the growing crisis of AIDS, the struggles of artists, and the challenges faced by marginalized communities in New York City. His goal was to create a musical that combined rock music with traditional musical theater, something that would capture the spirit of his time.

For years, Larson struggled to gain recognition. He worked as a waiter at the Moondance Diner in SoHo while writing musical after musical, trying to find his voice and a platform for his work. He faced numerous rejections, often finding that his vision was seen as too unconventional or too risky for commercial theater. Despite these setbacks, he continued to persevere, driven by his passion and belief that his work had something important to say.

That work would ultimately become Rent, a modern-day reimagining of Puccini's opera La Bohème, set in the gritty streets of New York's East Village. Rent tells the story of a group of struggling artists and musicians dealing with issues like poverty, addiction, love, and the devastating impact of the AIDS epidemic. It was a story drawn from Larson's own experiences and those of his friends, and it reflected the realities of a generation facing uncertainty, but also finding hope in community and creativity.

After years of workshopping and rewriting, Rent was finally set to premiere Off-Broadway at the New York Theatre Workshop in January 1996. It was poised to be Larson's breakthrough moment—a show that combined raw emotion with a rock-and-roll sensibility, and a musical that spoke directly to the struggles of young people in the late 20th century.

But Larson would never see the full realization of his dream. On the morning of January 25, 1996—just hours before the first preview performance of Rent—Jonathan Larson died unexpectedly of an aortic aneurysm, likely caused by undiagnosed Marfan syndrome. He was just 35 years old. His sudden death, right on the brink of his success, sent shockwaves through the theater community.

Opening night of Rent, was unlike any other in Broadway history. The cast, crew, and creative team were struck by the sudden, shocking loss of Jonathan Larson—the composer and playwright who had poured his heart and soul into the musical was died just hours before the first public performance.  What should have been the most thrilling night of his career became a night filled with both grief and reverence for the work he left behind. There was a strange and tragic irony in the songs about facing life, death and meaning.

The cast and crew were devastated. Many of them had known Jonathan personally, worked alongside him for years, and were fully aware of how hard he had struggled to get Rent to the stage. Larson’s death felt like an unimaginable loss, and the atmosphere backstage was heavy with sorrow. Yet, they knew the show had to go on—not just for the audience, but as a tribute to the man who had given so much of himself to this project.

Rather than perform the full show as originally planned, the cast made the decision to honor Larson in a unique way: they would do a staged reading of the musical, sitting in chairs, singing through the score. However, as the show progressed, the emotional power of the music and story began to take over. By the time they reached the final number, "Seasons of Love," the performers had gradually risen from their seats, delivering the songs with the full force of their voices and their emotions. They couldn't hold back—they were living the message of the show: life is fleeting, and what matters is how you live and love in the time you have.

Seasons of Love

Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes
Five hundred twenty-five thousand moments so dear
Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?
In daylights, in sunsets
In midnights, in cups of coffee
In inches, in miles
In laughter, in strife
In five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes
How do you measure a year in the life?
How about love?
How about love?
How about love?
Measure in love
Seasons of love
Seasons of love
Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes
Five hundred twenty-five thousand journeys to plan
Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes
How do you measure the life of a woman or a man?
It's time now to sing out
Though the story never ends
Let's celebrate
Remember a year in the life of friends
Remember the love
Remember the love, remember the love (oh, love)
Love (oh, give me love now)
Measure in love
(Measure in love
Measure in love
Seasons of love)
Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes (seasons of love)
Five hundred twenty-five thousand moments so dear (moments so dear)
Five hundred twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes (seasons of love)
How do you measure, measure a year?
Measure in love (love), sweet love (love)
Seasons of love, oh yeah
Love (love), sweet love (love)
Seasons of love
Love (love), sweet love (love)
Seasons of love
Measure your life in
Seasons of love
Yeah, oh

rent

Rent Poster

Picture10
Larson1

Johnathan Larson 1960-1996

The audience, which included Larson's family and friends, as well as prominent figures in the theater community, was deeply moved. The raw emotion in the room was palpable, and many in attendance were in tears. At the end of the performance, the cast stood in silence, hand in hand, and someone in the audience broke the stillness by shouting, "Thank you, Jonathan Larson!" The applause that followed was not just for the performers, but for the memory of Larson and the incredible work he had left behind.

The night became a memorial and a celebration, where grief and joy were interwoven in a way that mirrored the very themes of Rent—love, loss, and the urgency to live fully. It was a deeply emotional experience for everyone involved, and the catharsis felt in that room was something none of the cast or audience would ever forget. From that night forward, Rent would become more than just a musical; it became a legacy, forever tied to the memory of its creator, who had lived and died as passionately as the characters he wrote about.

Larson's passing was a tragic twist in what would soon become one of Broadway's biggest successes. Rent opened to rave reviews and quickly transferred to Broadway, where it would run for over 12 years and win multiple awards, including the Tony Award for Best Musical and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Its themes of love, loss, and survival resonated deeply with audiences, and Larson’s vision of theater that combined modern music with traditional storytelling had finally come to fruition.

Although Larson never lived to see the massive impact of his work, his legacy endures through Rent, a musical that continues to inspire new generations with its message of living fully and authentically, despite the challenges life may bring. His story is one of persistence, creativity, and ultimately, a deep belief in the power of art to change lives—even if the artist himself is no longer there to witness it.

Go Deeper

Watch the full live production of Rent

Rent isn’t just a musical—it’s a story that invites you to step into the lives of a group of friends facing love, loss, and hope against the backdrop of New York’s East Village. It’s a celebration of the human spirit, filled with raw emotion, passion, and a reminder that every day we live is a chance to write our own story. Whether it’s navigating friendship or battling personal struggles, RENT speaks to the universal desire for connection and meaning. Come watch and let the music and storytelling move you—it’s a tale that reminds us to embrace life fully, no matter what challenges come our way.

Watch the tick… tick… BOOM trailer

An early musical by the composer of Rent, Jonathan Larson, tick… tick… BOOM! opened on May 23, 2001 at the off-Broadway Jane Street Theatre where it played 215 performances. Originally written as a one-man show, which was performed by its author at the off-off-Broadway Second Stage Theatre in September 1990 and at the Village Gate in November 1991, about a would-be composer in New York City questioning his choices in life.

There's only us, there's only this
Forget regret, or life is your's to miss
No other path, no other way
No day but today
There's only us, only tonight
We must let go to know what's right
No other road, No other way
No day but today
I can't control my destiny
I trust my soul, my only goal
Is just to be
There's only now, there's only here
Give in to love or live in fear
No other path, No other way
No day but today

–Johnathan Larson

The Life Story of Rizek S. Abusharr:
Building Peace Through the Jerusalem YMCA

“We never had the money to go to the YMCA as kids, but one day my friends and I snuck in to see the famous elevator we'd heard about. It was an old accordion-style door, and we were thrilled—scared but curious. We pressed the button and went up, felt like we were flying to the heavens. I got caught when my friends ran off, though.”
–Rizek Abusharr, The YMCA Hall of Fame (video posted at the end of this story)

When I sat down to interview Rizek Abusharr, I knew I would be getting a good story, but I didn't know the half of it. This man has planted so many seeds for peace and some have sprouted up. but could one of them be the one to grow into the peacemaker we need right now? Anything is possible.

Abusharr was born in Palestine to a Christian family. His perspective and his life’s work are fascinating. He knew Netanyahu and didn't think much of him. He referred to him as a furniture salesman. In fact, Mr. Netanyahu often ate lunch at the Jerusalem YMCA where Abusharr was director. But Netanyahu didn’t pay his bills, and he had a tab that was quite high that he tried to ignore. This was actually quite normal for Netanyahu to renege on his bills. But Mr. Abusharr said, "I don't want to talk about him".

I'm glad we moved on because the story about Rizek Abusharr is more interesting and more honorable.

Abusharr was born into a prominent Palestinian family with roots stretching back over 500 years in Jerusalem. He speaks English, Arabic, and Hebrew. He is a Christian who was born and raised in a place where Islam, Christianity and Judaism come together like no other place on Earth. Raised amidst the rich cultural and religious tapestry of the Holy Land, Abusharr understood early on the deep divisions that characterized the region. As a child, he was fascinated with the YMCA. For a little boy, the Jerusalem YMCA was a place filled with wonder and discovery. The towering building with its 152-foot tower, the bells ringing out, and the beautiful architecture would have been awe-inspiring.

YMCA3
YMCA
YMCA2

Jerusalem YMCA 1933

The Jerusalem YMCA building was completed and dedicated in 1933. It was envisioned by Dr. Archibald Clinton Harte of the YMCA of the United States and funded by philanthropist James Newbegin Jarvie. The architectural design is notable for its symbolism of peace and coexistence, featuring contributions from Jewish, Christian, and Muslim builders, reflecting the mission of unity in a divided region. The YMCA became a landmark in Jerusalem, fostering a space for dialogue and reconciliation among different faiths and communities. At its dedication on April 18, 1933, in the presence of huge crowds of Palestinians who heard Field Marshal Lord Allenby deliver the dedication speech wherein this sentence, “Here is a place whose atmosphere is peace, where political and religious jealousies are forgotten and international unity fostered and developed,” became the motto of the Jerusalem YMCA. It would turn out to be Abusharr who years later would hang the sign with those words.

“Here is a place whose atmosphere is peace, where political and religious jealousies are forgotten and international unity fostered and developed.”

The YMCA offered activities like sports, music, and educational programs, creating a sense of community and belonging, a place where differences were set aside in favor of shared experiences. Abusharr was one of the children put together with boys of other faiths. This is how Abusharr learned how to create peace; start with the children. His belief in the vision of the Jerusalem YMCA inspired Abusharr to work all his life to further that goal.

That dream of peace and tranquility was almost lost when in 1946, the bombing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem left over 100 dead and many more injured, devastating the area. The nearby Jerusalem YMCA suffered extensive damage, with windows shattered and debris scattered. The aftermath was grim, as human remains were found on the building’s façade, and bodies were strewn across Julian’s Way. In the years that followed, the YMCA became a refuge, offering shelter to refugees and the wounded, and was later nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993 for its humanitarian efforts.

Abusharr was educated both in Palestine and the United States, eventually returning to Jerusalem, where he married Alice Krikorian in 1961. Together they raised two sons, Raja and Nabil, and became grandparents to four. Abusharr’s lifelong work with the Jerusalem YMCA would become his legacy. For over 50 years, he served the YMCA with a singular focus: fostering peace and coexistence among the city’s Jewish, Christian, and Muslim communities. He believed that true peace would come not through politics or conflict, but through understanding, education, and shared experiences.

One of his most powerful initiatives was the Peace Preschool at the YMCA, which brought together children of all three faiths to learn about each other’s traditions in an atmosphere of mutual respect. “If you want to know what peace in the Middle East would look like,” Abusharr once said, “climb the well-worn stone steps leading to the Jerusalem International YMCA and go inside. Coexistence doesn’t seem like such an elusive dream here”

Abusharr witnessed firsthand the power of human connection. He saw children who spoke different languages and came from different religious traditions form deep, lasting friendships. The knew this from his own experience as a young boy in Jerusalem and he witnessed it in his work again and again. This was not just the work of a community center; to Abusharr, it was a symbol of what could be possible in the broader conflict-ridden region. "The YMCA is a place where religious and political differences are left outside the door. It is a sanctuary for peace," he often said, reflecting his deep conviction that spaces like the YMCA could transcend centuries of strife. When he retired as general manager of the Jerusalem International YMCA, he came to the United States as a messenger of peace.

I asked him what people in Israel/Palistine thought of Jimmy Carter, and he got a big smile on his face. "I got to meet him" he said. He told me a beautiful story about Carter visiting Jerusalem in 1979 and wanting to go to worship at a Christian church. He happened to go to Abusharr’s church, and he was the one to open the doors for Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter. They signed in the guest book and chose a seat. Carter, always a humble man refused to sit up front.

In 2004, Abusharr’s decades of dedication were recognized when he was inducted into the YMCA Hall of Fame, a testament to his enduring impact on the organization and the city of Jerusalem. His influence extended beyond the walls of the YMCA, as he often traveled to the U.S. to advocate for funding for peace-building initiatives. As he put it, “For the price of one tank, the Jerusalem YMCA can continue its programs for the next 10 years. Peace and brotherhood come to people through mutual respect and understanding rather than the barrel of a gun”

After retiring in 2006, Abusharr and his wife Alice moved to Pilgrim Place Retirement Community in Claremont, California, but Jerusalem is never far from their hearts. Until recently, they returned annually, leading pilgrimages and sharing the lessons they had learned in their life’s work. Even in retirement, Abusharr remains committed to fostering peace in the region, leading his final pilgrimage in 2018. His belief in the possibility of coexistence, even in one of the world’s most divided cities, has left a legacy that continues to inspire those who worked with him and learned from his example.

Sitting with Abusharr though one can’t help but sense a note of sadness. When we talk about the Middle east, he sighs and shakes his head. I ask him what is heavy on his heart. He expresses his frustration and feeling that all his work came to nothing, “look at it now, this fighting” he says. He thinks he didn’t do enough.

I asked him about the children he taught. “You planted seeds of peace and Understanding”, I say. “Can you think of any of the children you taught who might be an agent for change?’

His face lights up as he tells me about one man who gives lectures and writes books about peace. They are still in touch. We have to end our interview but I am left with hope. Afterall, someone like Abusharr sparked something in him. He sparked something in others. Often the peacemakers are gentle quiet people who plants many seeds.

Throughout his life, Rizek Abusharr exemplified the power of one person to make a difference, not by grand gestures, but by steadfast dedication to peace, understanding, and the belief that history does not have to define our future. His legacy lives on in the children who learned to see beyond religion and politics and in the communities that continue to strive for peace, both in Jerusalem and beyond.

Listen to Rizek Abusharr in his own words.

Go Deeper

Historic YMCA Jerusalem

"Home" (Phillip Phillips) - Sam Tsui & The YMCA Jerusalem Youth Chorus

Jerusalem Uncovered: A look on the history of YMCA building in Jerusalem

YMCA Jerusalem Youth Chorus

We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other’s children

- Jimmy Carter

The Best Christmas Ever

When I was eight years old, I worried that Christmas wouldn’t come.  Every year of my life, we celebrated Christmas at our Salinas Valley home on Christmas morning.  Santa Claus knew the way, and every Christmas morning, we found presents under the tree.

But this year would be different.  We were going to celebrate Christmas Day with my aunt and uncle in Southern California. How could Santa Claus find us if we weren’t home on Christmas morning?  I wrote a letter to Santa informing him of our new location and  I prayed that God would make sure everything would work out for Christmas. For an eight year old these were existential questions about which I ruminated for the two weeks leading up to Christmas.

As last, Christmas Eve arrived.  My mother, brother, and I went to a friend’s house for Christmas treats, while my father recorded a sermon on the local radio station.  When my father arrived, we piled into the car and headed south toward Los Angeles.  Even as I breathed a prayer, I carried my unspoken anxieties with me like the large suitcase stored in our Rambler Classic’s trunk. After a few miles, my father spoke up, “Darn! I forgot something.  We have to turn around and go home.”  And so, we turned around and headed back to the house.

When we turned the corner of our street, I was surprised.  Our house was lit up and when we went inside, the tree was luminous and beneath it, colorful presents were piled.  Santa knew where we lived, and Santa came early just for us.

To this day, the Christmas of 1960 is the one Christmas I remember from childhood and, apart from our son and grandchildren’s first Christmases, the best Christmas of all.  Even though I suspect my father was responsible for Santa’s visit, I still remember that Christmas with gratitude and wonder.  Christmas is love in action, and between Jesus, Santa, and my parents’ love made a young boy’s dreams come true.

Looking back over sixty years, I still feel the magic of that moment.  Although I don’t anticipate divine interventions every time I pray, that Christmas reveals something important: God’s incarnation, the gift of Jesus, is ever-present and not contained or controlled by our expectations or doctrines.   Incarnation can surprise us and can happen anywhere: at the stable in Bethlehem, in the delight of a young boy, in the hopes of a Central American family dreaming of a new home in the United States, in the prayers of a child that one day the skies will be filled with stars and not bombs, in my best friend hoping that she will live long enough with her incurable cancer for her children to be launched as young adults.  Incarnational moments are everywhere and, even if we are not aware of it, touch everyone of us.

The Christmas story reveals the Embodiment of God.  God’s vision comes to us concretely in our time and place.  Eternity and temporality, Infinity and finitude, Spirit and flesh, Unity and diversity, gives birth to our experience of God’s aim at wholeness and beauty.

Whitehead notes that the teleology of the universe is aimed at the production of beauty, and I am sure that the divine aim was moving through Bethlehem on the day of Jesus’ birth, and that this same divine aim moves through all of our lives even when we are unaware of its presence.  The baby Jesus, like many Gaza and Palestinian children, never lived one day of his life as a politically free person.  Like the immigrant families of today, Jesus’ family fled to Egypt for asylum.  Their lives depended on the kindness of strangers, and persons like us.  The great Celtic saint Pelagius, excommunicated by worshippers of the authoritarian and coercive God, proclaimed that the face of every newborn child bears the face of God. The proto-process-relational theologian Pelagius guides our vision today: the Christmas experience is about sensing God everywhere and midwifing Jesus’ birth wherever we find ourselves.  As Whitehead says, the world lives by the incarnation of God, and that moment-by-moment incarnation, makes every moment a potential Christmas celebration and every encounter a doorway into welcoming angels.

Whether or not you celebrate Christmas, you can celebrate the incarnation of love, be a love finder and love creator, and claim your vocation as God’s companion in healing the world.

nathan-lemon-W7nbakRx1Ks-unsplash

Photo by Nathan Lemon

dan-kiefer-uPl8fJ5Ce2M-unsplash

Photo by Dan Kiefer

Bruce Epperly is a pastor, professor, spiritual guide, and author of over eighty books, including Process Theology: A Guide for the Perplexed; Process Theology and Politics; Prophetic Healing: Howard Thurman’s Vision of Contemplative Activism; and Walking with Francis of Assisi: From Privilege to Activism.

Some of his latest books are God of Tomorrow: Whitehead and Teilhard on Metaphysics, Mysticism, and Mission and Head, Heart, and Hands: An Introduction to Saint Bonaventure

Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmastime.

― – Laura Ingalls Wilder

A Discovery of Autism at 50

“Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle.”

 –― Lewis Carroll 

Amidst the hum of stray thoughts and simultaneous conversations, a voice I haven’t heard before grabs my attention.

“Hey, remember that time you were at the Ferguson’s house, and felt so ashamed when you left? That you were rude, even though you didn’t know why? That's not how it happened.”

Yes, it is, I remember what happened. But I'd rather not think about it right now… thanks, now I’m thinking about it. I was young, maybe fourteen, in the living room of some people from our church. My mom is friends with the mom of this family, and she has Lupus. She was feeling weak from a medical procedure, so I came over to help her with a few things. I really like the whole family. The dad is so much cooler than mine, and even though their kids are younger than me, they act older. Hanging out with the mom and the kids, I don't really want to go home; it's been a good day. I’m sitting at their piano and start playing, secretly hoping the dad will hear me, and I notice him standing by the doorway. As I glanced up, he said, "I really appreciate you coming over to help out today, but it's getting late. You should get going. You really need to go home, now." I feel a little dizzy, like I slipped while walking and lost my bearings, even though I'm just sitting on the piano bench. His words are not harsh, but his voice is tight, his arms are crossed, he's looking at the floor. I’m not sure how to make sense of these signals, but I must have done something wrong. I realized I should have left earlier, but I didn't know. How did I not know? It seems like it should have been obvious, like he thought it was obvious, even though I still don’t know. I get up and grab my stuff and get out quickly. I avoid him at church from then on. I don't think I ever spoke with him again.

Picture3

Photo courtesy Allef Vinicius

“I said how, not what. You remember what happened, but you aren't looking at it the right way.”

What? How could you know? Who are you? What are you doing here?

“I'm the part of your brain that learned I'm autistic. We're autistic.””

That can't be right. I'm the way I've always been.

“Yes, that's exactly right. We've always been autistic.”

That can’t be right. What does that even mean?

It means you have a condition characterized by difficulties with social interaction and restricted and/or repetitive…”

Stop. I know what the word means. What I mean is, I would have known, wouldn’t I? Are you saying that I don’t even know myself?

“You know yourself. You just didn’t know we think differently than most people, and the stories in your head don’t take that into account. Remember when…”

I'm a second grader sitting in a third grade Language Arts class. I'm really not sure why, last year I was in the first-grade class, with the mean teaching assistant who always yells at me for taking too long in the bathroom. The teacher gave us little plastic boxes full of tiles and we're supposed to be marking parts of sentences, but I'm not sure what the difference between an adverb and adjective is, or a preposition and a pronoun. I probably shouldn't ask, because it seems like I should know this, and I don't know what I did wrong that I don't know.

I'd really rather be reading a book. My mom bought me a book on mythology that I to read, and every day when I finally get home, I listen to my Van Cliburn record. All the boys in school are obsessed with KISS, but I like Chopin better. But before I can go home, I have to go to gym class, I hope they don't make us climb the rope again, because I can't do it, even though most of the other boys can, some can even touch the ceiling. And they’re always yelling.

Why did you think you did something wrong?”

Because everyone else knew what to do. I don’t know how they knew, or what I missed to know. I guess I felt dumb.

“Did you always feel that way in school?”

I’m in 10th grade, the year my grade point average took a nosedive as my priorities shifted away from doing the homework I was told to do, to finding friends through showing off. Everyone is talking about the standardized test we took a few weeks ago. I hadn’t given it much thought at the time; I’d been out drinking with friends the night before and arrived at school about twenty minutes late. Slightly hungover, I went straight to my homeroom class, but the door was locked. Weird. But then I remembered, we’re supposed to meet in the gym for some test. Great, I should have said I was sick and stayed home. In the gym, the entire 10th grade is busy, huddling over tables, filling in circles with #2 pencils. I return the usual scowls from the usual teachers with my usual smirk, get my booklet scantron, and start the questions. Why are there so many puzzles?

I heard from other students that what we had taken was an IQ test, and today the front office is calling students in for individual meetings with Dr. Sears to go over how they did. And by third period everyone has figured out they’re not calling students in alphabetical order; they are calling them in from lowest to highest score. Every interaction between students starts with, “Have you been called in yet?” I think this is hilarious. At lunch people ask me, “Have you been called in yet?” I say no. “Oh fuck off, you were probably called in first. What was your score?”

In the last period of the school day, a student assistant comes into my class and hands the teacher a note. He calls my name and says to go to the office. Utter shock on the faces of some students, a few cheers from my friends. This is so weird and embarrassing. I go to the office and sit down, and it’s just me and Jason, who is carrying his backpack full of textbooks, as usual. Apparently, this is the end of the list. Jason gives me a side-eye glance. Dr. Sears opens the door and calls in Jason. That glance turns to a glare, and Jason has his meeting. Then it’s my turn.

“Do you ever feel bored in class?” Dr. Sears inquires. Always. “Is that why you get in trouble?” I have no idea. My score doesn’t sound that high to me, but he explains it’s in the third standard deviation above the mean, which apparently means it’s pretty high, and that might indicate why I’m not finding any of my classes engaging. Problem solved, I guess. Thanks Dr. Sears. He never calls me in for another meeting that year. I didn’t talk to him again until my senior year, when I was expelled.

What did you think about that? Did you feel anything?”

I’m not sure what I feel right now, I need to think about it... Damnit, that’s a typical autistic trait, isn’t it, having to think through feelings? What are people going to think of me, if this is true? My wife? My kids?

“They probably won’t think any different of you. It probably won’t change anyone’s mind about you, except maybe your own.”

 What am I supposed to do about this?

“That’s a good question. Why did those events come to mind? Has anything changed?”

They’re all the same stories, but it’s as if I’m watching while standing in a different place. So, it changes nothing. And everything.

allef-vinicius-8lI4lsWQ4ts-unsplash

Photo courtesy Allef Vinicius 

Go Deeper

Autism Diagnosis in Adulthood

Autism Diagnosis in Adulthood

Understanding Autism: A Spectrum of Diversity and Changing Perspectives

Autism, often referred to as Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), encompasses a wide range of characteristics that impact social interaction, sensory processing, communication, and patterns of behavior. The term "spectrum" reflects this diversity, highlighting that no two autistic individuals are the same. Some people experience sensory sensitivity or struggle with social situations, while others may have a deep focus on specialized interests. These variations create a rich diversity within the autistic community, challenging older, one-size-fits-all views of autism.

Autism has traditionally been identified in childhood, sometimes with signs that change over time. Some children on the spectrum may experience shifts in traits as they grow, such as improving social skills or adapting sensory sensitivities. However, autism is lifelong, and these changes don't mean that autism "goes away"—instead, they show how development can be dynamic and how autistic individuals find ways to adapt.

In recent years, the language around autism has evolved. We no longer use the term "Asperger’s Syndrome," as it’s now recognized under the autism spectrum to reflect the interconnectedness and variation within autism. Today, we understand autism not as a disability to "overcome" but as a unique way of experiencing the world. This shift has also brought attention to adult autism, acknowledging the experiences of those who were diagnosed later in life or never diagnosed in childhood. Many autistic adults are increasingly open about their experiences, helping to build awareness and dispel myths about autism as solely a "childhood condition."

Prominent figures have helped bring autism into the public eye. People like animal behaviorist Temple Grandin, author Naoki Higashida, and activist Greta Thunberg have all shared their autistic experiences, offering insight into their unique perspectives. Their voices, alongside those of countless others, remind us of the strength and creativity that come from diverse ways of thinking and experiencing the world.

Autism is an interconnected diagnosis influenced by genetics, environment, and personal development. As we continue to learn more about it, we gain a deeper appreciation for neurodiversity and the many ways autistic individuals contribute to our communities.

About the Author

The author, who has chosen to remain anonymous, holds a Ph.D. and works as a therapist with over 25 years of experience in the field. In his 50s, he discovered in 2024 that he is on the autism spectrum, a realization that has brought a new perspective to both his personal and professional life. As he continues to adjust and explore this part of his identity, he approaches his journey with curiosity and self-compassion, gaining fresh insights into his own experiences and the diverse ways people perceive the world.

And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.

 –― T.S. Eliot

Saving the Snowy Plover

I remember the first time I saw the Snowy Plover, their tiny legs carrying them along the surf, in unison like a dance company. It was a moment of pure enchantment—a brief, unexpected connection with a creature I had never noticed before. I was on a beach in Santa Barbara, the morning sun soften by the clouds, and the waves steady. These small, delicate birds gathered in groups, darting in and out of the surf, as if playing a silent game with the sea.

Curiosity took hold of me, and I had to know their names. After a bit of research, I discovered that they were Snowy Plovers—a species that, once common, had seen its numbers dwindle to near disappearance along the California coast. Once plentiful, these birds faced habitat loss and increasing human activity on beaches. It was heartbreaking to learn that their populations had declined so dramatically. But what truly struck me was that they had returned—thanks to the quiet imposed by the COVID-19 lockdown. Without the usual throngs of beachgoers, the Snowy Plovers found space again, as if nature, given a moment to breathe, had decided to reclaim this corner of the coast.

The irony of the situation wasn’t lost on me. It took a global pandemic, a time of uncertainty and isolation, for these birds to return. But there they were, flourishing in the emptiness, their fragile presence a reminder of nature’s resilience and adaptability. Once considered nearly lost in California, they had come back—timid yet determined.

Plovercute

Snowy Plover Calls

Snow white bird
Dances on windswept shore,
Footprints in wet sand
Washed away

-Kathleen Reeves

Beach plover

The Snowy Plover is a small, pale shorebird found along the Pacific and Gulf coasts, while the Piping Plover, slightly larger with distinct black markings during breeding season, inhabits the Atlantic Coast, Great Lakes, and sandy shorelines. Photo by Don Dvorak

Watching them, I felt a deep connection and fascination grow. It wasn’t just their beauty, their soft, sandy-colored feathers blending perfectly with the shore, or their tiny, darting movements, like whispers across the sand. It was what they represented—survival, resilience, and the delicate balance of ecosystems that we, as humans, often disrupt. These birds had found refuge in a momentary pause in human activity, and in doing so, they had brought a kind of magic back to the beach.

Now, I find myself returning to that same beach with different eyes. Each time I see the Snowy Plovers, I’m reminded of how fragile our connection with nature is, and how easily we can miss it in the noise of everyday life. These birds, thought to be disappearing, had returned not just to the beach but to my consciousness, reminding me of the importance of creating space—for them, for us, for the world we share. I love them now, not just for their beauty, but for the way they’ve quietly woven themselves into the fabric of my own awareness, showing me that even in loss, there is hope for renewal.

Picture4

Snowy Plovers in Santa Barbara.

plover art

Inspired by the unique wildlife of Channel Islands National Park, BiJian Fan's 3D kinetic, PVC sculptures combine science and art to educate and engage visitors to protect the park.

Picture5
Birdfeet
Picture3

Western Snowy Plover - Saving Species Together

PIPING PLOVERS being CUTE for 5 minutes

It seems to me that the natural world is the great source of excitement: the greatest source of visual beauty; the greatest source of intellectual interest. It is the greatest source of so much in life that makes life worth living

–David Attenborough

Walls That Sing:
Folk Art and the Stories of the House of Blues

Folkart

House of Blues, Chicago

Painted Souls, Swirls, Skulls, and Songs

When I walked into the House of Blues for the first time, I realized that I had walked into a story. After all, stories take you to places you’ve never been, and that’s exactly what the folk art surrounding me did. It wasn’t just paint on walls or sculptures resting in corners; it was a portal. I was transported to the American South, a place I had never been—an expanse of dirt roads, front porches, and the unrelenting hum of cicadas that sang the backdrop of long, warm nights.

Each brushstroke whispered of lives lived in the margins, of hands that worked the land and fingers that strummed guitars late into the night. The art here wasn’t refined or polished, nor was it ever meant to be. It was raw, unapologetic, and grounded in the earth. Dots of paint spiraled into swirls that seemed to breathe, as if they too were alive and still telling their stories. Every skull, flower, and sunburst drawn across the walls spoke of ancestors, of spirits lingering just behind the veil, reminding you of life’s fleeting beauty and its haunting inevitability.

I felt the heavy presence of blues music in the air, an unspoken agreement between the art and the melodies. Both were born of pain, loss, and joy, revealing the soul of communities shaped by hardship and resilience. Folk art, like the blues, doesn’t ask for permission to exist—it emerges from necessity, from the need to carve beauty out of brokenness, to stitch together histories that were never neatly written.

Chicagoblues

Chicago House of Blues

The House of Blues wasn’t just a venue; it was a shrine to all that was unspoken, unsung in the annals of mainstream history. It celebrated the vibrancy and grit of cultures that had been shaped by struggle. As I stood among the swirling colors and intricate designs, I felt the pulse of life in each piece—art that wasn't confined to canvas or galleries, but birthed from the hands of people who had stories to tell and nowhere else to tell them but on discarded planks, in music, in food.

And there, in this collision of color, rhythm, and narrative, I found something sacred. I realized that folk art, like the blues, was not just a relic of the past, but a living, breathing testament to the human spirit. It wasn’t something you admired from a distance. It enveloped you, asked you to feel it, to remember where you came from—or perhaps, to discover where you had always been meant to go.

Each House of Blues I’ve visited since—whether in Anaheim, Las Vegas, Chicago or elsewhere—has its own version of this story. The walls may change, the swirls of paint may dance differently in the light, but the heartbeat remains the same. These places are not merely buildings; they are repositories of memory, of experience, of survival. Every visit is a reminder that folk art is more than decoration—it’s a map of where we’ve been, and a glimpse into where we’re headed.

ByronArt

(Above) Archie Byron

Archie Byron was a man whose life was woven from the many threads of service, creativity, and resilience. Born on February 2, 1928, in Atlanta’s Buttermilk Bottom neighborhood, Byron embodied the spirit of a true Renaissance man. A U.S. Navy veteran, small business owner, and the founder of the country’s first African-American-owned private investigation firm, Byron’s influence extended far beyond the walls of his businesses. His early friendship with Dr. Martin Luther King undoubtedly ignited a passion for community, leading him to run for the Atlanta City Council in 1981, where he served for eight years, committed to making a difference in the place he called home.Byron’s legacy didn’t stop at civic service—his art became an outlet for expressing his deep connection to the world around him. His journey into folk art was sparked serendipitously when, working as a nighttime security guard, he found a piece of wood that reminded him of a gun. He took it home, shaped it, sanded it, and hung it on the wall—a simple act that opened the floodgates of his creativity. This love for the natural world led him to scour lakeshores and riverbeds, seeking out unusual wood formations to transform into functional art.

In his shop, amidst piles of sawdust, Byron saw potential. He began using sawdust to craft paintings and life-sized statues, giving new life to discarded material. His art often reflected his pride in his heritage and his contemplation of social and racial issues. His pieces—like Anatomy, Lakeside, Puzzles, and Tall Boy—are more than just visual experiences; they are deeply personal narratives that speak to his roots, his community, and his vision for a world shaped by both beauty and justice.

Archie Byron’s art, like his life, was grounded in the power of transformation. From wood to sawdust, from small business owner to city councilman, Byron’s legacy is one of reimagining what is possible when you look at the world—and its discarded pieces—with fresh eyes.

1Folkart

Jimmy Lee Sudduth’s art was born from the earth itself. Raised in rural Alabama, Sudduth’s earliest artistic inspiration came from his mother, who crafted natural medicines from herbs and roots. This connection to the land deeply influenced his approach to art, which began humbly, drawing in the dirt and on tree trunks around his home. His curiosity led him to experiment with the materials around him, blending mud with honey to create a mixture that defied the elements and left his early creations intact, a revelation that would shape his art for decades to come.

Sudduth’s works are as much a reflection of his environment as they are a testament to his resourcefulness. He infused his paintings with the textures and colors of the natural world, using mud, clay, and even lawn-mower exhaust to tint his creations. Grass, berries, and other materials became his palette, grounding his art in the Alabama soil where he grew up. His subjects—self-portraits, city skylines, and, most notably, scenes from everyday life in the South—are windows into a world where the ordinary becomes extraordinary.

His pieces, such as Log Cabin with Blue Roof, Soul Train, and Man on Bicycle, capture the rhythm and pulse of life in rural Alabama, transforming the familiar into something timeless. Sudduth’s art, like his life, was shaped by his environment, a deeply personal blend of memory, place, and imagination. Each work is not just a painting but a story, told through the eyes of a man who understood the power of the earth beneath his feet and the stories it could tell through his hands.

Bill Traylor was a storyteller of shadows and light, a man whose art rose from the soil of the South, unfiltered and alive with memory. Born into slavery in Alabama, Traylor's art emerged late in life, but his vision had been brewing for decades, steeped in the rhythms of the rural world he knew. His figures—bold, flat, and stark—are as much mythic as they are human, distillations of life on the edges, where survival, spirit, and imagination intermingle. Traylor didn’t need formal training; his art was born from a deep well of lived experience, from the raw and unspoken history carried in his bones. His drawings, often on scraps of discarded cardboard, seem simple at first glance, but they hum with energy, capturing the tension between freedom and constraint, joy and sorrow. Traylor’s work doesn’t just tell the story of a single man; it tells the story of a people, of a place, of a time when everything was in transition. His art is a bridge between worlds—past and present, seen and unseen—where everyday moments become sacred acts, etched forever in the lines of charcoal and color.

Bill Traylor
Folkart11

John Sperry’s art is a joyful collision of memory and imagination, where childhood echoes vibrate through every brushstroke. Born in the 1950s, Sperry is a Southern folk artist whose vibrant, quirky works burst with life, painted not on canvas, but on the humble surfaces of found tin and wood. His choice of materials reflects his rootedness in the earth—each piece of discarded metal or wood a reminder that beauty can rise from the overlooked, from the forgotten. His paintings, filled with bright acrylics and lively forms, capture the stories of his past: the small-town Southern life, the textures of family, and the wildness of a child’s imagination. Sperry’s art is playful yet profound, a visual diary of a life well-lived, told in bold color and whimsical shapes. There’s a certain innocence in his work, but also a knowing—an understanding that the past is never truly gone; it lives in the textures and colors of everything he creates.

folkart

House of Blues, Unknown artist Chicago

Leroy Almon’s Devil Fishing (1992) is a striking piece from the renowned House of Blues Collection, embodying the spirit of Southern vernacular art. Almon, a self-taught artist deeply rooted in the traditions of American folk art, used his work to explore complex themes of morality, faith, and human struggle. In Devil Fishing, the imagery is vivid and raw—capturing the eternal tension between good and evil in a style that is both symbolic and narrative.

The piece was part of a larger exhibition, When You’re Lost, Everything’s a Sign: Self-Taught Art from The House of Blues, which opened at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans in 2013. This exhibition celebrated the unique vision of self-taught artists like Almon, showcasing over 100 works from the House of Blues collection, a vast and evolving repository of Southern vernacular art. The exhibition's title itself, "When You’re Lost, Everything’s a Sign," evokes the way folk art—much like the blues—serves as a guide, reflecting both the individual and collective human experience.

1Folkart

Leroy Almon, Devil Fishing, 1992. From the House of Blues Collection.

House of Blues has long been committed to preserving and promoting American blues music and folk art. Almon’s Devil Fishing, with its intense storytelling and bold symbolism is a great example from the collection.

horse

Bill Traylor, Untitled (Mule), December 1939, opaque watercolor and pencil on paperboard, sheet and image: 15 × 14 in. (38.1 × 35.6 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, The Margaret Z. Robson Collection, Gift of John E. and Douglas O. Robson, 2016.38.90, © 1994, Bill Traylor Family Trust

2folkart

Sister Gertrude Morgan, Fan, ca. 1970, paint and ink on card, 9 3⁄4 × 8 1⁄2 in.; irregular, double-sided, Smithsonian American Art Museum, The Margaret Z. Robson Collection, Gift of John E. and Douglas O. Robson, 2016.38.43r-v

Howard Finster was no ordinary artist; he was a visionary, a mystic who blurred the line between the earthly and the divine. His work was a pilgrimage, each piece a sermon stitched together with vibrant colors, religious iconography, and fragments of scripture. Finster didn’t just paint; he channeled, pulling images and words from a world beyond the seen. His sprawling Paradise Garden, a sacred space in Georgia, was more than just a collection of art—it was a living testament to the fusion of folk culture and spiritual ecstasy. Finster believed he was called by God to paint, and that calling vibrates through every brushstroke, every meticulously placed shard of glass or mirror. His art was his altar, a place where the mundane and the cosmic collided, inviting anyone who wandered into his orbit to see the holy in the humble. Like the blues music he adored, Finster’s work came from deep within, echoing the heartbeat of a man who saw the divine not in cathedrals but in everyday things—a bicycle wheel, a Coke bottle, a blade of grass.

Finster Angel
Finster2
Finster3
Finster1

Every work of art tells a story

 

― A.D. Posey

Go Deeper

Artbook

As we reflect on the incredible vision and creativity of self-taught artists, I invite you to explore a video that dives into some of the most fascinating examples of American folk art environments. From the mystical geometry of Coral Castle to the spiritual landscapes of Miracle Cross Garden and Land of Pasaquan, these spaces are living testaments to the power of personal vision. We’ll also explore Paradise Gardens, The House of Crosses, and The Garden of Eden, each a unique sanctuary of imagination and faith. And, of course, we’ll journey into the world of Howard Finster, whose work continues to inspire and move us.

This video offers a window into these extraordinary places where art, belief, and creativity come together, offering us not just beauty, but deep reflections on life, spirit, and community. Join me in this visual journey, and let’s discover how these artists transformed their surroundings into sacred spaces, forever imprinted with their stories.

House of Blues: A Backstage Pass to the Artists, Music, and Legends 
by Daniel Siwek (Author), Ron Bension (Introduction), Dan Aykroyd (Foreword)

Celebrating its 20th anniversary, the House of Blues is an institution in music history. Since opening its doors in 1992 in a converted historical house in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it has been home to live music, original folk art, and delta-inspired cuisine. Today, House of Blues boasts thirteen unique venues across the country, with its headquarters in Los Angeles, California. Countless famous musicians have performed on those stages, from the Blues Brothers, Bootsy Collins, Al Green, and Eric Clapton, to Lenny Kravitz, 50 Cent, and Snoop Dogg. Concertgoers, music fans, and pop culture junkies alike will dig this illustrated account of the story behind the music.

Chapters explore the venues, musicians, performances, and food, providing readers with a backstage pass to everything House of Blues. Personal interviews with company founders and famous musicians tell the story, revealing behind-the-scenes details and outrageous party anecdotes. Vivid photography showcases iconic performers on stage as well as in private moments in dressing rooms. Tucked among the pages are concert memorabilia, including special reproductions of tickets, posters

OUTSIDERS showcases talented folk artists from Georgia and the Appalachian mountains.

Make Your Own Folk Art

Folk art is the art of the people, a reflection of culture, tradition, and daily life expressed through decoration, music, or practical craft. It is rooted in the specific experiences of a community, telling stories that carry the essence of place and time. What should you paint? Paint what moves you, paint what you know. Let your reality be your canvas. Folk art isn't about technical skill or perfection—it’s about storytelling. It’s about expressing the world as you see it, much like children do, with their uninhibited sense of creativity and freedom. We often lose that freedom as we grow older, but folk art invites us to reclaim it. Approach your art with the curiosity of a child. Use whatever materials inspire you—paint, fabric, clay, wood, tin. There are no limits. Paint on anything you can find. Let your imagination lead, and let your work be a reflection of your true self.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hp1P72NQWsA

"Between Worlds: The Art of Bill Traylor" Symposium

Journeys Into the Outside with Jarvis Cocker

Stories are a communal currency of humanity.

 

― Tahir Shah

Learning in Depth

michael-2myR-7dfgWk-unsplash

Photo courtesy Michael

Anyone who wishes to achieve mastery must also master the art of learning in depth. Although many people acquire this skill naturally, like Earl Scruggs learning to play the banjo, others take more time and may have to experience successive attempts before achieving success at learning a knowledge or skill deeply. I know people who have shown early musical talent in their youth but who discontinued their studies as their lives became filled with other responsibilities. Now in their later years, these people are often able to find joy in returning to the promise of that early talent in playing the violin, cello, or piano. The previous chapter profiled the inspiring case of Alma who had her first solo exhibit of paintings at age 80. In that chapter, I also shared the story of my struggle as an undergraduate competing against students who were far more knowledgeable. Some individuals who encounter similar setbacks revise their goals and choose alternate paths to success in different areas. I was fortunate that my own career path led me back to the deep learning I craved coming out of high school. Here is how it happened.

Pursuing a Passion for Educational Reform

Unlike many Americans, I was fortunate to enjoy a childhood of comparative privilege, peace, and prosperity. I grew up on an island located two miles above Niagara Falls. During my childhood there were 5,000 people living in the town. Its population was solidly middle class, a mixture of old German farming families and newer technocrats and laborers who commuted to businesses in nearby Niagara Falls and Buffalo. Most of all, it was a town where everyone knew everyone, where store owners and town managers were greeted by first names, where the milkman delivered milk by sled if the roads became impassable after major snowstorms, where the librarian also drove the town school bus, and where the bread delivery person also owned one of the largest farms on the island.

The children of our town enjoyed a sense of community safety which is increasingly rare in present day America. We biked freely to friends’ homes, or to the local woods, or to the nearby sandy beach, knowing that we would all be called (or whistled) home for supper by twilight. In winter we flooded the nearby buckwheat field to play hockey on the ice. In early spring we raced to be the first to swim in the river, while the ice floes from Lake Erie were still making their slow, majestic way toward their plummet over Niagara Falls. We explored the dusty road to the big willow tree that hung out over the water. We paddled in inner tubes upstream for a mile or so before floating back, drifting lazily, downstream. We experienced each other as equals, equally deserving of respect. This deep understanding of respect for others has informed my life.

At the same time, my sense of individualism was beginning to burgeon slowly, sometimes awkwardly. I read books and listened to music, like Handel’s Water Music, that most of my friends had never heard of. I trailed along with my father when he went to art galleries to sketch. In those days of distancing and questioning, I often found refuge in the town library, a big room in the basement of the town hall. Here I could roam at will, figuring out what how the Dewy decimal numbers could lead to different areas of knowledge and to new adventures in learning. The librarian/school bus driver often assisted my searches.

Every artist was first an amateur

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

Once we completed ninth grade, there was no high school for us on our island. But unlike Alma Thomas, we were bussed “overtown” across the town’s bridges to city high schools in Tonawanda, Kenmore, or Buffalo. At Riverside High School, in a mixed race, blue collar neighborhood, I received the conventional mid-century high school education: textbook driven, facts oriented, teacher directed, and carefully avoidant of questions of values or issues of social unrest–just what Dewey and Whitehead had railed against. When I arrived at college at age eighteen, I sighed with relief. Yes, this is it! Here people think like me. They ask questions like me; they have hopes like me. What I soon discovered, however, to my chagrin, is that these folks knew a whole lot more than I did. Are you going to major in philology? What is that? Classic vs. romantic? How can I tell difference? Develop a thesis and defend it. Great. Now what’s a thesis? Used to receiving straight A’s, I now counted myself lucky if I managed to scrape out a B.

Like many of my generation, I married soon after graduating, and committed myself to assisting my partner through graduate school. I enrolled in a work study program that provided employment as I earned an MS in Library Science. It was a pragmatic choice, but supervising the circulation desk of a college library did not stir my sense of wonder. Then I was introduced to an inspiring teacher of educational media who believed ardently in the power of open, empowering education to change the course of the world: to free students from following rote learning, to let them follow their own interests and questions. She vividly demonstrated how these goals could be accomplished if the library media center, instead of the classroom, became the heart of the school. I had finally found my passion.

In the years that followed, I worked to improve curriculum and inclusion in public education. I helped to pioneer one of the first on-line individualized instruction programs in the country and worked with other teachers to campaign for the integration of Boston suburban schools.  Later, I worked for the Department of Education in Massachusetts, helping to supervise the administration of funds for the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA).[i] At that time, the Department of Education was headed by Neal Sullivan, the visionary leader who had integrated the Berkeley Public schools. Sullivan brought his reforming zeal to the Department, creating an Office of Equal Educational Opportunity and initiating training in racial equality, including white privilege, for all his employees. These were heady times in education, when funds were plentiful and new ideas were welcome. Because people willing to work for change were welcomed across the Department, I found myself working in many different programs. Under Sullivan’s leadership, I assisted in evaluating ESEA programs, and helped to create a special grant program for innovative uses of educational materials, a grant program that was open to teachers and even students, in addition to administrators. My work at the Department of Education was deeply satisfying, not only because I was able to serve as an agent for educational reform, but also because it provided a positive impetus at a time when my peaceful life was disrupted by a painful divorce. But the heart recovers in mysterious ways. Eventually, I committed to a new relationship and moved to Ithaca, New York.  I returned to work directly with students as a media specialist in a public elementary school. The library was literally the center of this open plan school, flowing directly into its classrooms.  I was able to work collaboratively with each teacher in the school, designing independent learning programs, and creating interdisciplinary inquiry projects, drawing on primary as well as secondary resources, and taking students out into nearby woods and fields and creeks for their inquiries. When I learned that my small grants program had spread to New York, I worked with other teachers to create a program to address values and ethics issues as they emerged in the curriculum. We brought experts on moral development[ii] and values education[iii] to collaborate with our teachers on how to integrate ethical problem solving into the ongoing curriculum. This work on ethics led me to a summer program to study moral development,[iv] which further deepened my commitment to integrated learning.

But as I grew more polished in spreading my message about educational reform, I also began to have more questions. Does learning lead, as Piaget suggested, to the logical elegance of Swiss scientists? Or is learning much messier than that? How do scientists learn and solve problems, anyway? How do we distinguish between what is learned and how it is assessed? Are ethical questions simply value choices, or something deeper, more spiritually compelling? How do different learning styles affect what is learned, and even what is chosen to learn? How does one’s social and ethnic background influence the learning choices one makes? I was hungry to learn, hungry to tackle issues I had only scratched as an undergraduate, and more intellectually prepared to ask them than I had been as a young school media specialist. I applied to a PhD program at Cornell University and was accepted into an interdisciplinary program in philosophy of education, psychology, and human development. “This is what I came to college to learn,” I reveled.

Learning never exhausts the mind

― Leonardo da Vinci

I began my doctoral studies focusing on the related issues of the philosophy of change and cognitive development. Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions and Schön’s Beyond the Stable State soon led to the more challenging work of Lakatos and Habermas on criticism and the growth of knowledge. Reading Piaget is research project in itself. It is a long way from his stage theory of intelligence to Biology and Knowledge. One must address tough issues of epistemology that lead to Aristotle, Plato, Descartes, and Kant, and then to Quine, Russell, Putnam, and of, course, Whitehead! My elementary school values project had already taken me to Simon’s values clarification, Lickona’s character education, and Kohlberg’s moral stage theory. That led to feminist critique: to the work of Gilligan and then later to Noddings. I had to dig further to grasp Rawls, Nozick, and Stephen Toulmin. As one learns about children’s thinking, one observes how they solve problems, how they deal with new evidence, how they remember and how they make mistakes. But how do they know?? And how do we know?? More questions, more books to read, more conversations to share. I was privileged to be able to watch fine scholars wrestle these same problems and observe their thinking evolve. What is the difference between Gibson’s concept of affordances and Whitehead’s theory of prehension? What is involved in attention, anyhow? Is it a response to a process of cognitive modulation? Or is it a much more basic embodied response? These were just a few of the questions I tackled in the first years of my interdisciplinary doctoral program. As one professor put it, “Well you clearly know how to use a university.” And at last, I did.

janko-ferlic-sfL_QOnmy00-unsplash

Photo by Janko Ferlič

Learning in Depth

As we deepen our understanding, we come to appreciate a rich web of knowledge that allows us to analyze distinctions, appreciate subtle metaphors, and perceive new connections. As we deepen our study, we begin to see that all issues must be understood in context. History, art, science, philosophy, all lie embedded in the rich grounding of their culture. The more I studied ethics, for example, the more I could see how ethical questions infused history, psychology, and philosophy. The more Lou Harrison studied percussion, the more he appreciated the percussive instruments of other cultures, including Indonesia. As Julia Packard worked to create an aquarium, she encountered problems in physics, engineering, and soil stability, as well as sociology and biology. A visit to the aquarium invites us to see the relationships between life on the sandy shore, the kelp forest, the bay, and the open ocean. To pull up one strand of that story requires unearthing them all and seeing how they are connected. Like a fishermen’s intricately tied net, adults’ webs of understanding could be pulled up at any point, allowing them to examine the connections from different perspectives. The more deeply we learn, the more interconnections we implicitly understand, and the richer the metaphorical and interdisciplinary ties we can explore.

Ancient Buddhist texts refer to this phenomenon as the Jeweled Net of Indra. As Jeremy Lent recounts the tale, in the heavenly abode of Indra on the top of Mount Meru there exists a wonderful net that stretches out infinitely in all directions. In every node of that net where the threads cross there hangs a glittering jewel. Since the net is infinite, there are an infinite number of jewels. Moreover, the jewels are polished so perfectly that if one inspects any one jewel, one discovers that all the other jewels, infinite in number, are reflected in it. Furthermore, each of the reflections is also reflecting all the other jewels, so the reflecting process itself contains infinite dimensions. This interconnected quality of existence is central to process philosophy. These ideas will be covered in greater detail in the next section on Integration.
The more deeply we probe and the more we come to know, the more sophisticated our questioning can become. We can evaluate new evidence, inquire about suspicious data, dissect an argument, address false claims, and pose alternative hypotheses to explain problematic evidence. In fact, becoming adept in the skills of critical thinking requires that we have already attained a certain depth of knowledge to support our investigation. Deep knowledge provides the support to solve tough problems, allowing one to create alternative explanations when faced with disconfirming or troubling evidence. Research shows that individuals who are allowed to pursue investigations to levels of depth become stronger at critical thinking skills such as analysis and hypothesis testing. It is no accident that the first task of seasoned debaters is to research the debate topic until they gain an intricate knowledge of the issues involved—a knowledge that allows them to move freely and adroitly through and around their opponents' arguments.

As the student’s skills of analysis grow stronger, parallel abilities of synthesis develop. Synthesis allows one to draw new connections and develop metaphors, which in themselves can further the learning process. A familiar story of the power of metaphor is concerns the famous chemist, August Kekulé (1829–1896). After a discouraging day in the lab trying to discover the chemical structure of benzene, Kekulé returned home exhausted to find, as he relaxed in his study blowing smoke rings from his pipe, that he could suddenly perceive the hexagonal structure of the benzene ring. The ability to perceive and appreciate metaphors lies at the heart of the creative process and many cognitive scientists, now believe that metaphor is central to the process of thinking itself.

Finally, learning deeply allows the student to experience the feeling of being an expert. This feeling of intrinsic success is deeply motivating. Once experienced, the confidence that comes from expert knowledge is never really forgotten. It is renewed and strengthened every time one is successful again. Once one has tasted genuine success, one gains a sense of how to accomplish it again. The delight of Maria in passing fer GED exam demonstrates that the experience of success gave her the motivation to continue her studies. The experience of genuine success that comes from deep learning is the ultimate motivator. It sustains the spirit, encourages new learning adventures, and reaches out to share these joys with others.

To more fully appreciate just how important learning deeply is to our intellectual ability, it may help to consider for a moment a topic or skill known so well that it has become almost second nature now. Perhaps it was swimming out to that standing rock at high tide. It might be a poem loved and learned until it has become part of oneself such as Frost’s “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening,” or a book, fondly read and reread, like Aldo Leopold’s Sand County Almanac. It might be a mechanical skill, like making a truffle omelet, or hand finishing a wooden surface. It might be a Beethoven sonata learned as a piano student, or a favorite rock piece from Chuck Berry that can still be called to mind in every detail. Now, take a little time to summon up the memories associated with this intimate personal knowledge. Remember the experience of learning to appreciate its art, and then practicing it, refining it, and finding out more. Remember coming to recognize the differences between good quality and poor quality in performances and the process of becoming aware of these differences. Experience once again the sounds, smells, textures, tastes, and emotions associated with the learning. Then consider how this knowledge has led to new metaphors and memories, and how it has strengthened ties to family and acquaintances. Just for the fun of it, consider making a concept chart showing how all these understandings are connected. Voila! An Indra’s net in miniature! These beautiful gems are the gifts that learning in depth can give to learners of all ages, particularly older adults who have such rich treasure troves of experience. For elder adults who are experiencing difficulties with memory, such times to reengage with intense beloved experiences of music, art, dance, literature, and nature can reawaken neuronal pathways and provide precious remembered pleasures.

Dr. Lynn De Jonghe’s 40 years of experience with progressive education and a long-time fascination with the philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead and process thought have come together in her book, Starting With Whitehead: Raising Children to Thrive in Turbulent Times. Lynn Received her BA degree in History from Harvard University and MS in Library Science from Simmons College before completing her PhD in Education at Cornell University.

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time”

 –― T.S. Eliot

Rambling Down Life’s Road…With a Brain Injury

Reflecting on how my adult life has proceeded, as many of us do on occasion or sometimes frequently, I am struck by how quickly one’s life can change.  Change can be good, or bad, with purpose and intention, or haphazard and lacking any meaning.  Such an event took place for me on the morning of Tuesday, October 27th, 1998, in Northfield, MN.  How my life was changed in an instant but what was the meaning of this change?

For a little more than a year prior to this date I was exceedingly pleased with the progression of my life:  I had attended Carleton College as an undergraduate and graduated with honors from the Physics Department in 1989.  I spent the following year living in Japan and teaching English in a program of the Japanese federal government.  Joining me on this year-long program was the woman who I had dated since we were juniors in high school named Karen, the woman who would become my fiancé, wife, and mother of our son.  After a year of both teaching English at four different local high schools in southern Tochigi-ken in Japan, we returned to the United State and I began to work towards a Ph.D. in solid-state physics at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana.  

My studies and research at this university went very well:  as part of my studies of  the electrical and magnetic properties of artificial, nanoscale magnetic multilayered structures (with layer thicknesses on the order of a few to several atomic thicknesses), I worked with researchers at the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, CA.  This research went quite well -- I was awarded a doctoral degree after writing one of the first Ph.D. thesis in the entire world concerning  the physics of the Giant Magnetoresistance Effect, an important effect that has allowed for the further miniaturization of hard drive read heads, thereby increasing hard drive density.  (In fact, today, ALL magnetic hard drives made anywhere in the world use read heads that employ the GMR effect and IBM has patents on this method of reading stored data -- patents for which the team I worked on is responsible.  So, a very small little bit of my work is inside all modern computers!)  After completing one year of my postdoctoral appointment with IBM, I was fortunate enough to be hired as a physics professor at Carleton College, my undergraduate alma mater!  Life was going quite well for me.  However, this was about to change….

I rose  early on the morning of Tuesday, October 27th, 1998, in a house my wife Karen and I recently purchased in Northfield, MN, a city about 45 minutes drive south of the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area.  It was the second year of my teaching at Carleton College as an Assistant Professor.  Today was a big day for me because I had recently been awarded a Cottrell College Science Award by the Research Corporation and was going to be presented with a celebratory cake at my departmental meeting.  This was a very prestigious award and it marked my potential promise as a young physics professor.  I grabbed an apple I’d picked in an orchard two days before with our young son, Andrew.  With Karen driving, me seated in the car’s passenger seat, and Andrew in a car seat in the center of the row behind the two seats we left in our Subaru wagon to take our son to daycare and me to work.  Karen would be working that day on drafting her Ph.D. thesis for her doctorate in American literature. This was the usual order of business, at least …

My next distinct memory was about one and a half months later, shortly before Christmas, and I was lying in a hospital bed, not in Minnesota but in Colorado.  I have no memory of confusion but only joy because four of the Denver Broncos cheerleaders had come into my room to cheer me up during Advent.  Each of these four beautiful women kissed me on the cheek as they left!  Had I died and was now in heaven?  

Slowly over the next several months I was told what had happened during the month and a half of which I have no memory.  On the fateful day of October 27th, 1998, Karen was driving to drop Andrew off at daycare and me at my work at Carleton College.  We were waiting to turn left off of Highway 119 and onto Jefferson Parkway in Northfield, MN.  Apparently it was a bit cloudy that day and Karen waited at the intersection for all the traffic to clear so we could safely cross the traffic to turn left.  The car immediately behind ours had pulled forward into the intersection and, waiting to turn left after we did, honked at us indicating that they felt we should go so they could turn as well.  Police reports indicate that the light had turned either yellow or red.

But then, as we proceeded to turn left, a king cab truck ran the yellow or red light and T-boned our Subaru wagon precisely where I was seated, slamming our car into a traffic light pole.  Accident studies done by the insurance company of the driver of the truck determined that when she hit our vehicle she was traveling in the truck at more than 65 mph!  The police report that our son Andrew was physically unhurt and tried to bite the officer as he was trying to remove Andrew from his carseat.  Karen had a broken hip and suffered a mild traumatic brain injury, losing consciousness for less than 5 minutes.  The truck, having hit precisely where I was seated, immediately knocked me into a state of unconsciousness and I acquired a severe traumatic brain injury (or TBI).   My body was trapped in the crushed car and emergency crews required 2 hours and 45 minutes to extract my body safely from the car.  In addition to my TBI, the accident broke four of my ribs on each side which punctured both of my lungs as well as lacterating my liver, pancreas, and small intestine.  My kidneys were also bruised.   

Accident_2

I was rushed to the Hennepin County Hospital in Minneapolis where I remained in a coma for eleven days.  On the eleventh day of my coma the attending doctor, one of this country’s experts at treating victims in a comatose state, called a family conference where he suggested to my family to agree to withdraw the life support sustaining me in a coma.  When asked why, he explained that 94% of victims in a comatose state for eleven days, never regain consciousness and die.  Those that don’t die while experiencing coma live in a persistent vegetative state from which they die, and the best prognosis he could make for me was that, at best, I would live disabled in a hospital for the rest of my life.  One sister and my mother were indignant because they thought that at times in the past eleven days I had squeezed my mother’s hand as I lay on the bed.  The doctor doubted my mother’s veracity because I had been tested for response to pins being inserted into my fingers to check my reflexes and, in eleven days of this testing, I had never responded to these needle pricks in any way.  The severity of my coma was rated at 3 on the Glasgow Coma Scale, the lowest score you can have while still alive.

My mother and one sister rushed out of the family conference room and back into the ICU where I remained comatose in a bed.  My sister pleaded with me asking me to show them I was alive or, she said, the doctors would kill me.  On hearing this, I apparently raised my left arm!  They were overjoyed and attending nurses in the ICU, seeing the commotion, came to my bed to ask my sister and mother what had happened.  They told the nurses and again asked me to show them I was alive.  I raised my hand again and the nurses were overjoyed as well.  Next, I had to raise my arm again for the doctor and the rest of my family to let them all know that I was responsive.  Because of my responsiveness, of which I have no memory today, life support was continued for me and I was allowed to remain an inpatient at the Hennepin County Hospital for about one month while I existed in a semi-comatose state.

I was transferred to Craig Rehabilitation Hospital in Denver, CO, where I remained inpatient for about four months.  During this time, I slowly regained consciousness and had to relearn almost everything (including using the toilet and eating with a fork and knife).  I was unable to walk because my balance was so poor and I couldn’t speak other than one word responses for about four months after my accident.  My first complete sentence I spoke following my injuries was about three or four months after the accident when I said to my wife “I love you!”  However, curiously enough, soon after I was able to stay conscious for an extended length of time, I was urged by my father-in-law, a chemical engineering professor, to try and see if I still could understand my physics and we discovered that, even though my short term memory restricted my speech to one or two word sentences, my long term memory was solid enough that I was able to solve quantum mechanic problems even before I could speak in complete sentences!

If your life changes, we can change the world, too.

 

—Yoko Ono

Further recovery from this initial post comatose state was arduous and required a few years of outpatient therapy which included physical, speech, and occupational therapy as well as years of counseling.  I tried to teach physics again, first for two years at the University of Colorado as a kind of TA, and then at my home institution of Carleton College for two years.  There, at first I taught as part of a team teaching pair and then the next year I taught classes alone.  In the summers during this time, I would travel home to Colorado where I volunteered at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in their magnetics division doing research on nanoscale magnetic materials.  I had to reapply for the award from the Research Corporation because, though I had already been awarded it the day of my accident, they were unsure if I could complete the research I’d proposed because of my injuries.  So, I applied again for this award and changed my proposal a little bit because in the intervening three years, two laboratories in Germany had constructed similar systems to what I had originally proposed when I was teaching at Carleton before my injuries.  Again, I was awarded a grant and this time it was for a considerably more expensive sputter growth system than I had originally proposed!

However, after teaching at Carleton for two years on a reduced scale, my teaching skills were evaluated and it was decided that I did not teach up to the standards of teaching at Carleton College.  This upset me greatly because I knew that I was a better teacher than one professor of physics that I had as an undergraduate at this institution.  I felt the college just didn’t want to be known as a college that employed a professor who was outspoken about his own disabilities, even though at that time the greatest physicist was Stephen Hawking -- one of the greatest physicists of all time -- who was himself quite disabled!

Having not been offered any  job accommodation as required by law, I was asked to discontinue working for Carleton College.  In this way, I was “fired” and I contend these actions of the college were in violation of the employment statutes of the ADA.  However, I was uninterested in filing a lawsuit against the college, even though the Minnesota Department of Human Rights investigated my case and told me that they thought I had a 95% chance of winning a lawsuit against the college for violation of federal law.  I just wanted to return to my home to be near my family.  So, I packed up and moved to my hometown of Boulder, Colorado.  I went back and volunteered at NIST again and began tutoring physics at the University of Colorado in Boulder in the same physics help room where I had a tutoring program when I taught there the two years after my accident.

However, after having tutored a bit in the physics help room at CU and done research at NIST for a year and a half, I found myself unsatisfied with my position working alone most of the time as a rather isolated physics researcher.  I believe that my injuries made me more interested in interacting with people; also, I wanted to work in a field where my experiences with disabilities would act in a way to promote my efforts, not hinder them (or me).  So, I decided to attend the Iliff School of Theology and to obtain a Masters of Arts in Specialized Ministry so that I could work as a Christian minister.  During this time of study, I decided to found an interfaith not-for-profit which would help encourage religious communities of any nature to become more welcoming to people with disabilities.  I felt called to do this mostly because of the negative responses that had received from church staff and congregation members after my injuries.  In addition, my studies at Iliff had taught me that the problem of accepting people with disabilities into religious communities was a challenge for congregations of all denominations and religions.  For this reason, most religious communities don’t include a representative number of congregants who live with disabling conditions.  For this reason, I started the organization called Faith4All and now work as the CEO of this small (one employee) company.  Faith4All works with religious institutions of any nature and helps guide their efforts to invite, embrace, include, and empower people living with disabilities into active lives of faith in their chosen community.

Rambling down lifesroad

Kevin Pettit is the author of Rambling Down Lifes Road with a Brain Injury.

This book is meant to give you a view from the inside out of what it can be like to experience the considerable effects of a TBI, encourage you to find ways to avoid having or causing a TBI, and make you laugh a little. It also contains thoughtful essays on what makes life worth living and how one can successfully adjust to significant life changes which can be imposed on you.

Songs of the Bard: Poetic Stories

sigmund-3FPtmyflfKQ-unsplash

Photo by Sigmund

Trash Cans

with thanks to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

At the end of the day
we stand side by side
at peace together
behind the sheltering sedge
empty of mankind’s refuse
ready to be refilled.

Each morning sees us open
to take the dregs of their success
each evening sees us close
I to trash, you reborn
to future life
something added, something done
we’ve earned our night's repose.

And now we wait in quiet
accepting our burdens
till our deliverance
when city trash trucks
come next Monday
to free us once again.

By Lynn Sargent De Jonghe, October 2024

Carousel Horse

You gallantly run past west facing windows
overlooking the side patio to the Pacific.
Head turned to watch those behind,

confident leader, with flying mane
eyes wide, nostrils open, sculpted smooth
basswood torso, saddled with leather reins,

aluminum legs, you are a jumper, nearly
a century old—yet fearless with all four
hoofs in mid-air.

Joy to visiting children who grasp the vertical
pole, giggle with affection, sing warm wishes,
hug, whisper secrets with a sense of wonder.

For years, a member of the family,
part of every-day life, yearly celebrations,
festive holidays, decorated at Christmas

wearing a holly wreath. When a stranger
enters, begins to feel your head, tail and rubs
your shoulders, speaks of strange numbers,

family members are unusually quiet. They respond
with more numbers and soon hands are shaken.
The world darkens and your semi-hollow interior

becomes vacant, wood turning to chips,
thoughts of being special die a slow death.
Your views of patio, ocean, palm tree are over.

You are sold.

© Veronica Michalowski, May 29, 2022

My antique carousel horse, Clyde S. Dale, was made by the Alan Herschell Company, North Tonawanda, New York, between 1925-1937.

Synesthesia -- for Janet

Only my eyes can say
words that abandoned us.
Only my ears can touch
silence surrounding us.
Only my heart can hear
the pain you suffer.
Only my nose can beat
good sense into aura.
Only my mouth can see
a new beginning, o.
Only my hands can breathe
forgiven tenderness.
Only my tears can kiss
all ways I do love you.

By Leo Jacoby


10/23/22 The Back Story

Out of sorts my senses all messed up,
this is a reconciliation poem for my wife
who gave me permission to share it.

I wrote it after we traveled two hours
without saying a word, until I sneezed.
"God bless," said Janet.
"Thank you," said Leo.

During the two hours the first line
kept repeating in my head as I drove
with my eyes on the road not on her.

The next day the remainder lines arrived
after I configured how the senses
could comfortably crisscross.

Eyrie

Before leaves know
they will hide the roost,
before seed pods know

their place on a twig
with masterful eyes hawks
soar, choose the perfect

branch to build a nest in the
crown of a barren sycamore.
Hens and tercels hunt for materials

to erect this intricate structure: weave
twigs, bark, moss, man-made
threads, yarn from landfills together,

eighty feet above ground;
create an ovoid shelter, far
from raccoons, snakes below,

to incubate, hatch their eggs,
feed nestlings, oversee growth
certain their young will have

an advantage against adversaries.
And then the skies darken, winds
begin to howl, rains fall vertically,

diagonally, gales blow them
side-ways across the landscape.
Roost branches move with the wind

north, then south, east, west
again and again. Nearby limbs
crack, break, dance their air ballet;

adjacent Monterey pines uproot,
self-destruct into the sycamore trunk
before hitting saturated soil. Hawks

voice a high-pitched scream, open
wings, shroud their brood for hours
until this hurricane passes.

The eyrie endures.

© Veronica Michalowski, February 4, 2022

Erie

Photograph of Dyed fabric Created by Artist and Poet Veronica Michalowski

tim-schmidbauer-eUdnaPZe-eo-unsplash
delia-giandeini-C2mXardQfcQ-unsplash

Photo courtesy Delia Giandeini

Snapshots

young love
they laugh
just because

mother to be
feels texture
of tiny dress

baby with furry toy
clutches, stares
smiles

backyard Maple
shines in afternoon
sun, sways

with breezes
and endless up down
of the swing

afternoons pass
leaves swirl
swing dangles free

rooms, hallways
once teeming
echo farewells

old man
alone now
eyes the bottle

walks toward it
then past it
into the yard

settles on the swing
peers into the night sky
and remembers

to say thank you

By Dick Bunce

kaleb-kendall-BsEDC20AioI-unsplash

Photo by Kaleb Kendall

San Francisco Dance Fever

Zombie night
in the tenderloin
is every night
tranq case club
gaping wounds
flesh-rotting cocktail
gangrene and
amputated body parts
addicts sway
or look frozen in place
they may slowly dance
stand bent over
at the waist
or walk slowly
like zombies with
their heads down

what’s the nod?
deadly tranq hooks
users with
euphoric head bow
trademark of heroin users
drift in and out
of consciousness
falling asleep in
the middle of
a sentence,
even nodding
off while standing

the nod is what
they are going for
complete numbness
tingling feeling
on the back of the neck
the nod that
heroin users crave

in such demand
Yeah, I like a good
Tranq-fent bag
some people don’t
like it, but plenty
of people do
Fentanyl is such
a short-lived
high… It’s a good high
cheap high
gives them
the euphoria
of the high that
they’re craving
then it gives
the sedative
effect that eases
the misery they’re in

that’s why
they prefer it
on the streets
even if it is deadly
It beats
the alternative

living in
this horrible
pain and misery
they know
a fatal dose
of fentanyl
could fit on
the tip of
a pencil

they don’t
care

By Kathleen Reeves

Backstory

Fentanyl causes severe muscle relaxation and loss of motor control, leading to users often bending or hunching over. This phenomenon, called the "fentanyl fold," occurs due to the drug's powerful effects on the central nervous system. In 2023 San Francisco saw over 800 overdose deaths linked to fentanyl

Witnessing the heartbreaking reality of San Francisco's streets left me in a state of shock and sorrow. On a recent trip, I found myself face-to-face with the numbing effects of the opioid epidemic, where addicts, trapped in the haze of drugs like fentanyl and xylazine, appeared more like the walking dead than living souls. It was impossible to ignore the bent -over figures frozen in place. Like most people, I had heard about this drug crisis in San Francisco and other cities, but I had never seen it with my own eyes. The sight haunted me long after I left, compelling me to dive deeper into understanding this crisis.

I’ve spent time reading, learning, and absorbing the stories of those trapped in addiction’s grip—many of whom turn to these deadly substances, knowing the risks, because they feel there is no other escape from their pain. This journey of learning has opened my eyes not just to the facts of addiction, but to the humanity that remains behind the label of "addict." Each person, each nodding figure, carries a story, a longing for relief, and in many cases, a desire for a numbness that, tragically, only leads further into danger. My poetic exploration into the opioid crisis has been my way of trying to make sense of this overwhelming grief and heartbreak.

Inside each of us is a natural-born storyteller, waiting to be released

― Robin Moore

Lives, Chapters, and Journeys

juan-cruz-mountford-AMFWArSckYM-unsplash - crop

By Kathleen Reeves | October 31, 2024

In this piece, members of Process & Coffee, the Cobb Institute’s longest-running learning circle, delve into the nature of joy—how it slips from our grasp, only to return in subtle, unexpected ways. The group explores the complexity of joy as something dynamic, shifting with the tides of life, particularly in trying times. Through their contemplations, they discuss how joy is not a constant state, but a relational force found in the smallest moments—through connection, shared experiences, and the simple beauty of existence. The conversation weaves together ideas on how joy continues to thread through our lives, waiting patiently to be noticed, even amidst chaos and hardship.

ryan-loughlin-ciA0atiZCaQ-unsplash-crop

I Am the Freak Priest: Reflections on Eclectic Spirituality, the Metacrisis, and the Power of Popular Culture

By Scout Reina Wiley | January 1, 2023

Scout Reina Wiley was always destined to be the Freak Priest. As above, so below. she does not ask whether or not all things are related—she only asks how. And if all things are related, of which she is arrogantly convinced, it matters not that God is dead. It matters not that lives appear to unfold in linear fashion towards a seemingly endless void. It matters not that death is, because there are no endings in this world—only changes.

david-mullins-3Jnws1iRSwk-unsplash-crop-1300x500

Remembering David Ray Griffin

By John Cobb | February 1, 2023

One way to reflect about a person’s contribution is to imagine what the world would be like now if she or he had not been part of it. In this post, John Cobb uses that method with David Griffin. He frames his reflections around two speculations: one, there would now be no substantial movement seeking truth about what happened on September 11, 2001; two, there would be only fragmentary and scattered interest in Whitehead and the implications of his thought outside the church.

Sung Stories: The Narrative Power of Music

Music has long been one of the most powerful ways to tell stories. The songs we choose, the lyrics we internalize, and the melodies that move us are often more than entertainment—they become the soundtracks of our lives, shaping how we see ourselves and the world. Each of the songs in this section tells a unique story, capturing universal emotions, struggles, and triumphs that many of us can relate to.

Don McLean’s "American Pie" is an iconic narrative of change and loss. The song captures the shifting cultural landscape of the 1960s and 1970s, with its nostalgic reflection on the end of an era. Many listeners are moved by McLean’s lyrical storytelling, which evokes a longing for a time gone by and reminds us how society’s transformations can be both beautiful and tragic.

Janis Ian’s "At Seventeen" speaks directly to the personal struggles of adolescence, particularly the feelings of isolation, insecurity, and the painful discovery that life doesn’t always align with youthful dreams. It’s a song that resonates with anyone who has ever felt like an outsider, a poignant reminder of how our teenage years shape who we become.

Sam Cooke’s "A Change Is Gonna Come" is a timeless anthem of hope and resilience in the face of injustice. Written during the civil rights movement, Cooke’s soulful voice tells the story of struggle and determination, inspiring countless listeners to believe in the possibility of a better future. Its powerful message still moves people today, reminding us that change is always possible, even in the darkest times.

Johnny Cash’s "A Boy Named Sue" tells a humorous, yet deeply emotional, story of identity and reconciliation. Cash’s sharp wit and narrative style draw us into the life of a boy struggling with a name that sets him apart, ultimately leading to a heartfelt confrontation with his father. It’s a song many of us relate to in terms of family, forgiveness, and personal strength.

Scorpions’ "Winds of Change" captures the spirit of hope and transformation at the end of the Cold War. The song’s message of global unity and change resonates deeply with anyone who has lived through or observed significant political or societal shifts. The haunting whistle and hopeful lyrics remind us that winds of change are always blowing, pushing us toward new horizons.

Dan Fogelberg’s "Leader of the Band" is a deeply personal tribute to Fogelberg’s father, celebrating the influence of a parent and the legacy of music passed from generation to generation. For many, this song touches on themes of family, heritage, and honoring those who came before us, reminding us of the stories our own lives tell as we carry forward the wisdom and love of those we’ve lost.

Tupac Shakur’s "Dear Mama" is an emotional reflection on the struggles of a single mother and the gratitude of a son who recognizes her sacrifices. Tupac’s raw vulnerability connects with listeners who have experienced hardships and family challenges, making it a song of both pain and love, a tribute to maternal strength and perseverance.

Brad Paisley’s "Whiskey Lullaby" tells a tragic story of love, heartbreak, and loss, blending country’s storytelling tradition with haunting visuals of grief and regret. It’s a reminder of the fragility of relationships and the lasting impact that emotional pain can have, touching listeners who have known deep sorrow.

Metallica’s  "One" paints a devastating picture of a soldier’s experience of war, with lyrics that speak to the physical and emotional toll of combat. The song is based on Dalton Trumbo’s anti war novel Johnny Got His Gun, which tells the story of a soldier severely injured in World War I, left unable to speak, see, hear, or move. The intensity of the music reflects the internal struggle of a man trapped in a body that can no longer communicate in a traditional way, making it a powerful anti-war statement that resonates with anyone impacted by the horrors of conflict.

"The Devil Went Down to Georgia" by the Charlie Daniels Band is a fast-paced, fiddle-driven tale of a showdown between a boy and the devil. Its story is both fun and dramatic, with a clever twist of fate at the end. The song appeals to our sense of justice, humor, and the thrill of competition, making it a timeless narrative that many enjoy for its sheer storytelling brilliance.

Billy Joel’s "Piano Man" is a classic narrative of the everyday lives of people gathered around a bar, each with their own dreams, failures, and stories to tell. Joel’s imagery brings the characters to life, offering a slice of humanity that resonates with listeners who see themselves reflected in the song’s tales of longing and nostalgia.

"The Boxer" by Simon & Garfunkel tells the story of a fighter’s perseverance in the face of adversity. Its haunting melody and powerful lyrics capture the sense of isolation, struggle, and survival that many feel in their own lives. The song speaks to anyone who has ever felt beaten down by life, yet continues to fight for something better.

Bob Dylan’s "Isis" and Leonard Cohen’s "Everybody Knows" continue the tradition of storytelling in music, with Dylan’s cryptic and poetic narrative taking us on a surreal journey, and Cohen’s sharp commentary on societal disillusionment. Both songs challenge listeners to think beyond the surface and engage with the deeper, often darker, truths of human experience.

Together, these songs represent the broad spectrum of human experience—love, loss, triumph, struggle, and transformation. Each song tells a story, whether it’s deeply personal or universally relatable, reminding us that music is not just something we listen to but something that speaks to the heart of who we are. These songs are, in many ways, the soundtracks to our lives, shaping our memories, emotions, and the stories we carry with us.

Music Cohort - featured - 1080x1080

The Cobb Institute's Music in Process Cohort explores music together. We invite you to join us.

Adventures in Reading

Winter is a wonderful time to settle by the fire reading a great story. It is even better if one can share stories with others in the warmth of fellowship. Here are two great reads about stories: one fiction and one non-fiction, both telling fascinating tales about the interrelationship of nature.

The Overstory by Richard Powers (Norton, 2018, 612 pages) won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for fiction and was shortlisted for 2018 Man Booker Prize. It tells the stories of nine Americans whose unique life experiences with trees bring them together to address the destruction of forests. Powers has explained that he was inspired to write the work while teaching at Stanford after he encountered giant redwood trees for the first time. His book is divided into
four sections: Roots, Trunk, Crown and Seeds, which mirror the structure of a tree.

In Roots, we learn the story of each character as a separate individual. Nicholas is an artist descended from a long line of farmers. generations. Adam studies psychology to understand how humans can only understand things that are put into narratives. Ray and Dorothy have decided to plant a tree in their yard every year. Douglas is an orphan who enlisted in the Stanford prison experiment before joining the air force. When his life was saved by a banyan tree, he becomes obsessed by saving the world from deforestation. Patricia is a dendrologist whose studies on how trees communicate is mocked by conventional experts in the field. Neelay is a programming genius who creates a series of video games called Mastery, inspired by the life stories of trees.

As the novel proceeds, the characters become increasingly interwoven with each other until they tell a combined story, just as the trees in an old growth forest share an interconnected relationship. Many of the characters bear similarities to real life figures. In particular, Patricia is inspired by the work of Suzanne Simard, whose book Finding the Mother Tree (2021), demonstrates the interdependence of forest ecologies with fungal mycelium. Powers’ book is a moving testimony, not only to the critical importance of forests to the wellbeing of the earth, but also to the equally important efforts of those who labor to support healthy forest life. And, if you like this book, be sure also to read his latest book dealing with saving life in the oceans, Playground, published in September, 2024.

This book is beyond special.… It’s a kind of breakthrough in the ways we think about and understand the world around us, at a moment when that is desperately needed.”
― Bill McKibben

 

Picture1
Picture6
Picture2
Picture4

Finding the Mother Tree: Uncovering the Wisdom and Intelligence of the Forest, by Suzanne Simard (Knopf, 2021, 349 pages) won the 2021 Sigurd Olson Nature Writing Award. Suzanne has woven rich stories of her family life growing up in the logging country of British Columbia

together with her emerging career as a scientist studying how to support the growth and protection of forests. Alongside raucous tales of how her uncle’s dog was saved after he fell into the outhouse, and how she spent her 22nd birthday swaying all day at the top of a young Douglas fir tree while a mother grizzly patrolled the area, she tells of her heartache at having to spray Roundup over a young forest to allow Douglas fir seedlings to “grow free.” Her continuing experiments allowed her to learn how trees communicate deep beneath the forest floor via vast networks of mycorrhizal fungi, using those symbiotic life-forms to help them share nutrients and even communicate information about threats such as disease and drought. Her deeply personal memoir laced with some memorable French Canadian cursing becomes a fascinating account of how her questions about promoting regeneration after clear cutting led to her discovery of Mother Trees and a radically new understanding of forests as social, communicative, and cooperative communities of interdependent beings. In April, Time Magazine selected Suzanne Simard as one of the 100 most influential people of 2024.

 

The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon.”

― Brandon Sanderson

The Winter Mare: The Ancient Story of the Mari Lwyd

It is I who stand in the cold, not your holy child. I am not a ghost of a forgotten age. I am not a relic to be cast aside in favor of newer stories. Once, the mare was revered, full with foal,
But now, dragged from the warmth of my stable, I knock at your door to remind you of the ancient rhythms, of the earth that still remembers me. I ask not to be feared, but to be remembered—not with sorrow, but with song. For I am the Mare, not bound to the past, but ever walking forward, carrying the stories of those who came before you, the ones whose breath still whispers through the cold winter air. The pregnant Virgin came, and from the birthing straw, I was heaved, aching with life not yet born. Now I wait, shivering under the weight of centuries, swapping warmth for bitter weather. Don't forget me!

I stand at the threshold, knocking.

I first met the Mari Lwyd at a gathering of pagans from across the world, drawn together by shared reverence for the old ways. I attended a lecture and ritual led by Kristoffer Hughes, Chief of the Anglesey Druid Order. As the Mari’s story unfolded, and the ritual took shape, something ancient stirred in me. The beauty of it all—the way she moved through the room, like a shadow of winter itself—brought me to tears.

The Mari can be mischievous, even bawdy, like an echo of Punch and Judy when she visits taverns. But in ritual, she is different. She reaches into the closed-off places within us, touching what we didn’t know we were holding.

After the ritual, I approached Kristoffer and asked if I might perform the Mari Lwyd ritual myself one day. He smiled and said yes, on one condition: "You must tell her story. You must honor where she comes from, and always carry her with respect."

When she comes to your door, it’s not just a skeletal horse knocking. She is death’s reminder, but also life’s invitation. She asks to be let in, not as a harbinger of fear, but as the embodiment of the cycles we are all a part of. In ancient times, the Mari Lwyd’s visit was a blessing, a promise that winter’s hold would not last forever, that spring was always waiting on the other side. She demanded verses, exchanges of wit, a verbal sparring that spoke to the truth that we endure not because we ignore the darkness, but because we face it head-on—with words, with laughter, with the power of story.

Meeting the Mari

The sky, vast and cold, stretches like the skin of an ancient drum, taut and waiting for the rhythm of winter to begin. The sky thickens, a blanket of silence draped over the land, and somewhere in the cold, there is a knock at the door. Out of the deep silence, she arrives, her form a fleeting echo of something older than words. In the depths of winter, the veil between worlds thins. Draped in ribbons, shadows clinging to her like long-lost kin, her skeletal grin glints pale as starlight. The horse skull she wears is not death, but a reminder—there is always more life beneath the surface.

The Mari Lwyd—the Grey Mare—waits at the threshold. Her presence is not a ghost of the past, not a relic, but as a force that pulls the present into remembrance…. a reminder of the earth’s deep rhythms, those forgotten cycles of life, death, and renewal that continue to pulse beneath the frost.

Her steps, slow and deliberate, hum with the pulse of a world we’ve forgotten, a world where the veil between the living and the dead was thin as breath. She is not just a relic, but the embodiment of winter itself—a force that strips everything back to its bones. Yet, in her cold grip, she carries the seed of something more—something waiting to be reborn.

Before there were churches, before roads carved the land into pieces, there were horses. Sacred. Sovereign. Wild. The Mari Lwyd comes from that ancient lineage, when horses were more than beasts—they were conduits between worlds, the living link between the human and the divine. Her origins are buried deep in the Celtic soil, intertwined with stories of gods and goddesses, of Rhiannon, the horse goddess who carried the weight of sovereignty and the mysteries of the underworld.

The Mari Lwyd, too, carries these stories in her bones, stories of a time when horses were honored as more than tools—they were the keepers of wisdom, the ones who could walk the line between life and death. In her hollow eyes, we see not emptiness, but the reflection of everything we’ve forgotten—the pulse of the earth beneath the frost, the way the land itself holds memory.Her skeletal grin is a reflection of what we try to forget: that life and death are not separate. They dance together, intertwined, one always leading the other. She is winter’s breath, cold and sharp, but carrying the seeds of what is yet to come.

The Mari Lwyd doesn’t just knock at doors; she knocks at the walls we’ve built around ourselves, the stories we’ve forgotten to tell. She demands more than fear or reverence. She asks for our wit, our poetry, our humor—our willingness to play with the darkness instead of shrinking from it. In her presence, we remember that to survive the long night, we must gather, not in dread, but in shared stories and laughter. Winter’s bite is sharp, but it’s in the resilience of the heart that we find warmth.

She challenges us, not with the cold, but with the truth that we are all part of this endless turning of the seasons. Life never truly stops, even in the stillness of the longest night.

She is a gatekeeper, a trickster, a reminder that the cycle of death and life is one we cannot escape, only embrace. The earth beneath her hooves may seem frozen, but it is not still—it’s dreaming of spring, of what will come after-- dormancy and bloom.

In her wake, we remember how to stand in the cold and see the beauty in its starkness. Her challenge is not just to endure the winter, but to meet it with open hands and open hearts, knowing that what feels like an ending is only a pause, a turning of the wheel. She is not death’s herald; she is the whisper that life is always waiting underneath.

But as the world changed, so did she. The old gods folded themselves into the new stories. The Mari Lwyd walked into the world of Christian myth, merging her ancient meaning with new symbols of light and renewal. No longer the wild mare of the Otherworld, she became the creature of midwinter ritual, arriving between Christmas and New Year, a liminal presence asking to be welcomed. In her approach, there is a challenge: Can we meet the darkness of the season, the cold grip of death, with wit, with song? Can we remember the resilience that lives within us?

The Mari Lwyd carries the weight of the land’s memory, its gods and goddesses etched into the bones she wears. She belongs to the deep time of the earth, to the eternal dance of soil and seed, death and birth. Yet she walks among us still, not as a myth, but as a reminder of how resilient we are—how we can meet the long night not with fear, but with song. Her rituals survive, though they have changed form. In some places, she still comes, still knocks, still waits for someone brave enough to open the door. The Mari Lwyd is carried through villages, her horse skull adorned with ribbons, her hollow eyes echoing with the weight of old stories.

When the world began to modernize, when cities grew and the land was divided, the Mari Lwyd was almost forgotten. Her knock faded into memory; her bones left behind in the stable of folklore. But even now, there are places where she is revived, where the old stories are sung again, where the cold knock of winter is met with warmth and laughter. The Mari Lwyd, with her grinning skull, her ribbons trailing like threads of forgotten memory, walks among us still.

As she knocks, she asks us to remember. Not just her, but ourselves. She asks us to gather, to sing, to exchange stories and words, to use our voices to resist the stillness of the grave. She knocks, and we are called to answer—not with fear, but with the knowledge that winter is just one part of the cycle. Spring will come. Life will return. But first, we must meet the cold, the darkness, the skeletal mare, and remember the beauty that lies within. We are part of the winter’s transformation, part of the story that continues to be told, in the frost on the window, in the breath of the cold air.

She is not gone. She cannot be. Her steps are too old, too woven into the soil itself. The Grey Mare reminds us that we are part of a larger story—one that doesn’t begin and end with us, but stretches back through the ages and forward into the unknown. Her knock is winter’s call, but also the whisper of spring waiting in the wings. She carries the tension of life and death, reminding us that one always makes room for the other. The Mare stands at the threshold, inviting us to step into the deeper mystery: that even in the stillness, life is always unfolding. She is our reminder that we are always living in the balance between what was and what is becoming.

Mari and Kat4

Kat Reeves and her Mari

kat's Mari

As the hooves draw near,
and when the dreaded knock cracks
on wooden doors a song must be prepared –
Gy-feillion di-niwad (Innocent friends)
I ofyn am gennad
(To ask leave)
I ofyn am gennad
(To ask leave)
Mae Mari Lwyd yma,
(Mari Lwyd is here)
A sêr a ribanau,
(In stars and ribbons)
Yn werth I rhoi goleu,
(Worthy of giving light)
Yn werth I rhoi goleu,
(Worthy of giving light)
Yn werth I rhoi goley nos heno.
(Worthy of giving light tonight)
Mari Lwyd, Lwyd Mari:
A sacred thing through
the night they carry.

Mariby Kat5

Journal Drawing by Kat Reeves

Centra Part of a Mari Ritual

East
Midnight. Midnight. Midnight. Midnight.
Hark at the hands of the clock.
Now dead men rise in the frost of the stars
And fists on the coffins knock.
No no, you frightening horse! no you may not come
We don’t know you, now go away to the dark where you come from

Mari
The mare-headedd queen
The Mari-Lwyd
I was mother of all the herds
Ten thousand years my shining foals
Bridled with starlight
Saddled with gold
Leapt the divide
Between living and dead
Quickened the year
With each toss of the head
Galloped the deep of beauty
And never grew old
Let me in!

South
Midnight. Midnight. Midnight. Midnight.
Hark at the hands of the clock.
Now dead men rise in the frost of the stars
And fists on the coffins knock.
No no, you frightening horse! no you may not come
We don’t know you, now go away to the dark where you come from

Mari
But Mother of God, The Mary Mild.
The pregnant Virgin came
Bursting with Jehovah seed
She entered my stable
And cried out her need
With ropes I was dragged
From the birthing straw
Aching with foal
I was heaved to the door
Swapping warmth for bitter weather
And birth of a rival creed
Let me in!

West
Midnight. Midnight. Midnight. Midnight.
Hark at the hands of the clock.
Now dead men rise in the frost of the stars
And fists on the coffins knock.
No no, you frightening horse! no you may not come
We don’t know you now go away to the dark where you come from

Mari
And now I am nightmare
I am rattling womb
The Uffington wraith I’ve become
Forced into darkness
You’ve made me a fiend
Bridled with shadow
Saddled with scream
From window to window
Traversing the night
My face in your glass
In a shudder of light
Seeking that deep of welcome
Befitting a Queen
Let me in once again
Let me in!
North
Midnight. Midnight. Midnight. Midnight.
Hark at the hands of the clock.
Now dead men rise in the frost of the stars
And fists on the coffins knock.
No no, you frightening horse! no you may not come
We don’t know you, now go away to the dark where you come from

Mari
A knock of the sands on the glass of the grave,
A knock on the sands of the shore,
A knock of the horse’s head of the wave,
A beggar’s knock on the door.
A knock of a moth on the pane of light,
In the beat of the blood a knock.
Midnight. Midnight. Midnight. Midnight.
Hark at the hands of the clock.
The sands in the glass, the shrinking sands,
And the picklock, picklock, picklock hands
Who will remember the old white mare
Who will let me in?
Who will let me in?
Who will let me in?

Mari3

History Of The Mari

The Mari Lwyd stands as a powerful link between Wales' ancient past and its present, blending the eerie beauty of folk traditions with a celebration of community, storytelling, and the changing seasons.

The Mari Lwyd (sometimes spelled Mari Llwyd) is an ancient Welsh folk tradition, dating back centuries, with roots in pre-Christian customs. The name "Mari Lwyd" roughly translates to "Grey Mare" in Welsh, and the tradition centers around a figure dressed as a horse, represented by a decorated horse skull mounted on a pole, draped in a white sheet, and often adorned with ribbons, bells, and baubles. The Mari Lwyd is carried by a person hidden beneath the sheet, with the skull's jaws manipulated by strings to give the appearance of a talking or snapping horse.

Origins and Meaning

The exact origins of the Mari Lwyd are shrouded in mystery, but scholars believe it may have pagan roots tied to Celtic and pre-Christian fertility rituals, where horses were revered as sacred animals connected to life, death, and the land. Horses in Celtic mythology were often associated with sovereignty, battle, and the Otherworld. The Mari Lwyd may have originally symbolized the transition from one year to the next, embodying the cycle of life, death, and rebirth during the dark days of winter.

Some interpretations link the Mari Lwyd to the Welsh horse goddess Rhiannon, a figure from Celtic mythology associated with sovereignty and the underworld, further connecting the horse to ancient beliefs about the afterlife and the spiritual power of animals.

Christian Influence

With the spread of Christianity, many pagan customs were absorbed into Christian traditions, and the Mari Lwyd became linked with the Christmas season. Over time, the tradition evolved, blending with Christian themes of light overcoming darkness, life conquering death, and renewal in the midst of winter. The Mari Lwyd became a midwinter ritual that took place between Christmas and New Year’s Eve, often associated with Wassailing and mumming traditions, where groups of people would go from house to house, singing and performing in exchange for food, drink, and gifts.

The Ritual

The Mari Lwyd ritual is typically a form of pwnco (a contest of verbal wit and rhyme). The Mari Lwyd and her party, which often includes singers and musicians, would arrive at houses and sing or chant verses asking to be let inside. The householders would reply with their own verses, denying entry. This back-and-forth exchange continues until the householders "give in" and invite the Mari Lwyd and her party inside, where they are offered food and drink. In return, the Mari Lwyd bestows blessings for the coming year.

The Mari Lwyd itself, with its eerie horse skull and snapping jaws, represents a mischievous or even frightening presence, but its visit is ultimately considered a blessing. It symbolizes not only the chaos and hardship of winter but also the endurance and hope for the return of light and spring.

Symbolism

The Mari Lwyd’s horse skull and skeletal appearance reflect its connection to death and the darker aspects of winter, yet its lively, playful interaction with people and its role in communal gatherings suggest the cyclical nature of life and death. The Mari Lwyd serves as a reminder of the vitality that persists even in the depths of winter, bridging the gap between the living and the dead, the old year and the new.

The Mari Lwyd’s knock on the door symbolizes the threshold between worlds—the physical and spiritual, life and death, winter and spring. She brings with her the dual reminder of the darkness that must be faced and the light that will inevitably return. The ritual of song and verse becomes a means of not only appeasing the Mari Lwyd but also of acknowledging the deeper cycles at work in nature and in human life.

Decline and Revival

The Mari Lwyd tradition began to decline in the 19th and early 20th centuries, especially as modernity and urbanization spread across Wales. However, in recent decades, there has been a revival of interest in Welsh folklore and traditional customs, leading to the resurgence of the Mari Lwyd in many communities. Today, the Mari Lwyd is celebrated at festivals and cultural events, particularly in areas of South Wales, where the tradition is strongest.

Modern Celebrations

In its modern form, the Mari Lwyd is often seen as a cultural symbol of Welsh identity and heritage, representing the survival of ancient customs in a contemporary world. Although the Christian aspects of the tradition have faded, the Mari Lwyd continues to be a beloved symbol of resilience and renewal, embodying the spirit of winter’s endurance and the hope for brighter days ahead.

Mari2
Mari8

Image courtesy WikiMedia

Mari Music

Midnight. Midnight. Midnight. Midnight.

Hark at the hands of the clock.

Now dead men rise in the frost of the stars

And fists on the coffins knock.

―The Ballad of the Mari Lwyd by Vernon Watkins

 

Go Deeper

Meet the Mari Lwyd

Here my teacher Dr Gwilym Morus-Baird, in Welsh story, history and culture presents about the Mari Lwyd

A Diversity of Relgious Celebrations

DECEMBER 2024

  • December 1 - Advent Season (Christian)
    A period of preparation and anticipation for the coming of Christ, marked by four weeks of reflection before Christmas.
  • December 3 - Feast of St. Francis Xavier (Christian/Catholic)
    Celebrates the missionary work of St. Francis Xavier, one of the founders of the Jesuit order.
  • December 8 - Feast of the Immaculate Conception (Christian/Catholic)
    Honors the belief in the conception of the Virgin Mary without original sin.
  • December 12 - Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe (Christian/Catholic)
    Celebrates the apparition of the Virgin Mary to St. Juan Diego in Mexico in 1531.
  • December 21 - Winter Solstice/Yule (Pagan)
    Celebrates the shortest day and longest night of the year, honoring the rebirth of the sun and the return of longer days.
  • December 25 - Christmas (Christian)
    Commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, celebrated with joy and religious services worldwide.
  • December 25 - Hanukkah Begins (Jewish)
    Marks the beginning of the eight-day Jewish Festival of Lights, celebrating the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem.
  • December 26 to January 1 - Kwanzaa (Ethnic)
    A week-long celebration of African heritage, unity, and culture, observed primarily in the U.S.

JANUARY 2025

  • January 1 - Feast of Mary Mother of God (Christian/Catholic)
    Celebrates the divine motherhood of Mary as the Mother of God.
  • January 6 - Epiphany (Christian/Catholic)
    Observes the revelation of Christ to the Gentiles, represented by the visit of the Magi.
  • January 7 - Christmas (Eastern Orthodox/Christian)
    Celebrated by Eastern Orthodox Christians who follow the Julian calendar.
  • January 7 - Bodhi Day (Buddhist)
    Marks the day Siddhartha Gautama attained enlightenment under the Bodhi tree and became the Buddha.
  • January 14 - Birthday of Guru Gobind Singh Sahib (Sikh)
    Celebrates the birth of the 10th Sikh Guru, who was a spiritual leader and warrior.

FEBRUARY 2025

  • February 1 - Imbolc (Pagan)
    A Gaelic festival marking the halfway point between winter and spring, traditionally honoring Brigid, the goddess of fertility and light.
  • February 26 - Maha Shivaratri (Hindu)
    A Hindu festival dedicated to Lord Shiva, celebrating his cosmic dance and meditative power.
  • February 28 - Ramadan Begins (Islam)
    Marks the start of the Islamic holy month of fasting, prayer, and reflection.