occupy myself

I was running along Tulpehocken street with my backpack, my purse, and my guitar. I didn't want to miss the train after work. A lady pulled up, and asked if I needed a ride to the station. After hesitation, I climbed in. She ended up taking me all the way to City Hall, since she was headed that way. I think her name was Margaret?

As we pulled into the roundabout around City Hall and she moved closer to the center, we saw lots of people with signs, and I jumped out before we held up too much traffic.

Apparently, we are the 99%.

We are the 99 percent. We are getting kicked out of our homes. We are forced to choose between groceries and rent. We are denied quality medical care. We are suffering from environmental pollution. We are working long hours for little pay and no rights, if we're working at all. We are getting nothing while the other 1 percent is getting everything. We are the 99 percent.

The Occupy Philly's 99% Declaration lists two demands: 1) a national general assembly by next July 4th; and 2) an addressing of its list of grievances. The general tone lays the responsibility to find solutions on the vaguley-defined 1% who is blamed on making this mess (two girls at the info table said, "well, you know, it's their fault"). If you go to their tumblr account featuring direct stories, where the recurring issue is a legitimate need for jobs with a living wage, or a means to get an education to get such a job, without exorbitant debt. Many make a point to say they know they are the lucky ones, which I appreciate. While not reflected in the tumblr, at the demonstration military activities were often pointed to as a poor use of government funds, in light of this need.

Jobs are good. People need jobs. But I don't like blaming the 1% cartoon villain for all the problems. Particularly when, at a global level, most of America's 99% -and certainly its most vocal - is actually the 1%.

We - including myself - need to spend more time occupying ourselves: finding ways to create solutions, changing our spending and giving habits, becoming local entrepeneurs, like people who started Grameen Bank micro-finance loans. That's what I've been troubled about lately, in the midst of dream jobs and real jobs and the PBS Series Women, War and Peace, where Muslim and Christian women "prayed the devil back to hell" through protest, song, and political pressure.

That and homesickness, OC Music Awards music, and wonderful BuildaBridge classes, where kids learn how to be Doug E. Fresh and dougie, and sing along "everybody loves me." Awesome, powerful talks about being fresh and loved from that. Plus incredible energy with the kids, and even the women passing by. Particularly in a context of homelessness, where "freshness" isn't so easily come by, this was...good.

And because I like glee's dougie vid...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uYi729Rf0U

Proactivity: Mission Less Lame

It’s not just an acme cream.

I’ve been trying to be less lame and more proactive. Got my laptop looked at, bought some work-out gear I’d been needing, scheduled and followed-through with some hanging out so that I’d be happy with a social life. Took initiative at work to be happier and more productive. I’ve spoken up more, and kept silent when I wanted, too.

Mission Less Lame Quasi Accomplished.

Getting priorities right is weird, though. Because I’m happy to do these things, but they’re pretty self-focused, while the world spins on. Palestine’s making its bid for nationhood, and everybody’s hyped about what should happen. And I don’t know what SHOULD be done, but I know it seems wrong for the U.S. to ask people to not show up for the vote. As I sit at a pizza place in Germantown, the manager switched from the military channel WWII war movements analysis to the news because “it’s not good to eat to.” There’s something about terrorists on the news, but before I can find out what, he switches to sports and shrugs.

And just as quick as turning the channel, I start thinking about me again. Because in a random perfume commercial I really identified with the script: “I’m not going to be the person I’m expected to be anymore.”

But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to be somebody who doesn’t care – or do anything – about “the bigger issues.”

There’s a group called Plan that I’ve never heard of before. There was a guy doing sidewalk marketing in center city, and I stopped and talked with him a bit. They began in 1937 helping Spanish children during the civil war, but now have significantly broader work around the world, both in war areas as well as with human trafficking victims, etc. It turns out they published Anna Freud’s work “War and Children,” which I started reading online until it wouldn’t let me read more.

Interesting because I wouldn’t fill out the form – had never heard of them before. But I asked a lot of questions to the point of what they do and their success, etc. I’m realizing it’s not enough to care. You gotta be good at what you do – knowledgeable, too.

It’s weird. Someone I know and respect made a rather prejudiced remark the other day about Jews, regarding the stereotype of them lacking generosity. Weirder, still, when it was pointed out by a third party that I’m part-Jewish, because rather than say it was a joke, they explained that it’s really true. I was pretty surprised. I shrugged and said something about there’s always some truth in stereotypes. LAME. Later when they checked to see if I had been offended, rather than explain my surprise that such a stereotype would still be so strongly believed, I shrugged it off by saying I wasn’t real connected with that part of my identity anyways. DOUBLE LAME.

So when I came across Anna Freud’s work “War and Children” on the Plan site, I wished I had known about it before, so I could’ve given her as a counter-example. And it reminded me of Einstein’s role in the creation of the International Rescue Committee, which works with refugees. And I wished I had given him as an informed counter-example.

I bring all this up because it was a learning experience for me. I sucked at something I care deeply about (reconciliation in general, not even specific to that issue). If I had been better-prepared/trained/informed, I could have made fruitful dialogue. Instead, I was worse than a push-over. Which sadly, is quite the stereotype of the warm-hearted person. It’s expected that they’ll also be soft-spoken, and that they won’t be strong-minded (or if they are, it’s to the extreme of abrasive bull-headedness).

SAD DAY. So I’m going to try and be more proactive about…not…being those expected stereotypes. And maybe then it’ll be:

Mission Less Lame Accomplished.

Partly to make myself feel less lame, please respond with learning moments when you were lame, what you learned, and how you are trying to be less lame in the future....

P.S. Before feeling any disapproval for the person in my story about prejudice, STOP. This person is, from my view, quite well-educated, globally aware, sensitive and caring. Not a bad guy in a story, but rather just as much as a reminder as my own role in the story that despite our best intentions, everyone has prejudcies we have to work at getting rid of so as to become less lame. Because that, after all, is the purpose of life. ;)

dream job

"If you built castles in the sky ; your work need not be lost ; that is where they should be. Now, put the foundations under them. " - Henry David Thoreau

I still don't quite know where my castles stand, or how they're laid out. I think I've become too busy trying to build foundations that I've forgotten to look up and dream and let go. I'm trying to, though. Someone asked me what I want a day ago, and it was strange because I hadn't thought in those terms for a very long time. I still don't particularly have an answer to that, or answers in general. But the question helped. My professor shared this quote freshman year, and, like many of his students, it's stuck with me:

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions” - Rainer Maria Rilke

There's so many life questions I use that for, but one most particularly:


God?

The answers I get confuse me. A lot. Today I was thinking about such things, when Micah 6:8 came to mind:

or, put another way,

Although I became familiar with this because of its social justice aspect, it's the last part that I resonate with most strongly. For me, that is my heart. At least, I want it to be. Even the cross is empty of its power if you do not approach it with humility. Today, that is an answer.

And since I'm just a little Sarah, I go back to that first question more just about me and what I'm doing. And I go back to the Rilke quotation about the point being to live everything - both questions and answers. I don't even know exactly what my dream is yet, what castles I want to build, how I want to use my hands to help. But that's good, because it keeps me humble with the interests I do have. I'm kind of all over the place. I might not yet have many answers about what my dream job is or should be. But I believe I can do something good with my hands. Thanks partially to my friend Amber's collaborative art piece With These Hands. Here's mine.

I also remember what godly professors taught me about worship being at the heart of mission, and what vocation we all share, and about goodness, truth, and beauty, and - yes - about walking humbly with your God. I think of all of that when I think about my dream job. And I know I have to be brave. Because I know what I want my answer to that first question to be:

A Day in the Life

Today had several interesting scenes, so I thought I'd just share snippets! My life isn't usually this interesting. Or maybe it is, and I don't notice.

Well, first, let me fast forward through my morning, which I spent at home, mostly in bed, but also on the computer and playing guitar.

I took the bus and walked to the new house I'll be moving into next month to sign the lease. The first thing I noticed walking in was that Charla - the 32-year-old who owns the house and paints on the patio, makes lamps in the basement, who had applied to BuildaBridge and who goes to the FitLife Gym with her and soon to be my roommates - was wearing those interesting Barefoot running shoes, that are like toe socks and just entirely very unique. Very fitting since later that day I'd be watching the music video that goes to Brett Dennen's Make You Crazy song:



While I was waiting for Charla to get the lease, I sat and looked out the window. There was a beautiful, large monarch butterfly perched on the aptly-named butterfly bush in the front yard. It made me be still for a moment with it. Every once in a while I see a butterfly or a speck of dandelion fluff, and whenever I do, it reminds me of things good and true and beautiful.

Then, as I walked to work along Washington Lane, I passed a house that had a small kiddie pool on its front lawn, complete with 7 adorable kids stuffed inside like sardines. As I walked away, one little girl kept yelling to her older brothers, "Somebody dunk me." They complied. :)

At work I started making the first few phone calls to connect with past alumni and donors. I got to talk with a friend from the Institute, Stevie Neale, and learned about her work doing choreography for a k-2 theatre group. Imagine that age group learning about the Circle of Life through Lion King, and then playing a dance game where one little girl yells out, "Let me see your omnivore!" to get all the kids to pretend to eat grass. Yeah, it was adorable when I imagined it, too.



After work, I was walking along Germantown Avenue, and decided to check out the BuildaBridge Artology summer camp art installation on the front lawn of Cliveden House. As I looked, a boy walked by and asked if I liked it. I said I did, and began talking with him. Josh attended his third year of Artology this summer. He's in 5th or 6th grade. His favorite part of the camp was the water fight. His second favorite part was going to a glass-blowing studio. We walked on together half a block before he was stopped by an older woman who greeted him by name.

I continued walking to the Wired Bean Cafe, for the open mic night. The sign-up list was empty for the first 15 minutes, and so the host, a middle-aged white guy, continued playing renditions of the likes of Adele and the Eagles - using the same chords! As I was waiting for my drink, a woman in line turns to me and says, "I'm Katie." I give a double-take, and I realize it's a lady from the Circle of Hope church, for whom I've babysat. Their cell group had decided to meet at the cafe that night. I smile, because I was a bad little Sarah and ditched my cell group that night for the open mic night, reasoning that a discussion about if we need an inner life might be one-upped by a night of music as inner life.

I was right. Great music. Eda James "At Last," Ingrid Michaelson's "Keep Breathing," and Sam Cooke's version of "Summertime," to name a few. There was also an old man with some fun rhyming jokes, as well as a man who had found bongo drums in the trash and taught himself how to play. The first hour was mostly older men and women. Later, a group of 3-4 girls, all black, came with this white guy who played guitar, and they just brought the house down. But EVERYBODY got cheered for, everyone felt appreciated. I sure did!

It was fun to look out the wall-length windows across the street, where a black man with a Muslim white robe and hat stood outside of a Hong Kong Chinese restaurant, next to a Mermaid Bar, with a younger black guy in a tank top stood. A couple ran by with the guy pushing the girl's back to get her to go faster. The mostly white Circle of Hope cell group met on the patio.

Today was nice.

Heart Beats

I wrote a story about Atlanta for the BuildaBridge website, below, but also here.





BuildaBridge and Refugee Family Services (RFS) were waiting for the last act of their BuildaBridge Arts Week Celebration, and all eyes were on a smaller boy at the front of Class 4. Kay Do So projected a sense of serenity and calm as he stood with his back to the audience, facing his class, arms high and ready to begin conducting. No one had coached him to stand with such poise; it just came naturally over the course of the week as he became more knowledgeable about what sounds he wanted produced and how to bring them about. With a flick of the wrist, he signaled his classmates to begin.

On the first day of arts camp, their music class had begun with introducing the heartbeat rhythm, but it quickly became a near free-for-all, as each student plucked, banged, and blew on instruments to their hearts’ content, with little regard for any guidance or instruction. While I knew how far the class had come since then, I was curious to see how well they listened to one another and controlled their voices and instruments. Some of the boys from Class 4 were so excited, that when Class 3 went up before them for their music performance, they began chanting along quietly, elbowing each other and smiling. I didn’t need to worry. By the end of the week, Ms. Josie had successfully harnessed that energy, and taught them how to control their music and enjoy themselves. In fact, the class had been planning and plotting their performance earlier that day.

Kay Do So kept his wand and his entire body low to the ground, signaling his friends to begin quietly, as they had discussed. Many of the kids imitated him, ducking their heads down near the drums as they lightly hit it, or bending conspiratorially towards one another as they began saying his name in rhythm to the beat, the same heartbeat introduced at the beginning of the week. Everyone’s eyes were riveted on the wand, and when it pointed to another classmate, they began chanting that child’s name as a single voice, much to her delight.

As Kay Do So raised the wand higher and higher, the whole class strummed, drummed, sang and smiled harder and harder. They had been waiting for this moment, and their eyes shone with excitement, as the whole room reverberated with their rhythm. They ended by singing their version of “We Will Rock You.” Each child had the chance to sing one of the lines of the verses they had written, and they all sang the chorus together, ending with a cheer, “Class 4!”One of the class 4 students, Amanuel, doing visual arts about the heart

The class had begun with the metaphor of the heartbeat, that each person and each group has a unique heartbeat, and that music is the heartbeat of the world. That first day, each child played only what they wanted to, how they wanted to, or if they wanted to. By the last day, they came together as a class, listened to one another, and responded musically to one another. They found their class heartbeat.

The next day, I found their community heartbeat. Rosa Dunkley, RFS’s Youth Development Coordinator and one of our lovely hosts, drove Julia and I around some of the apartments where the kids live. Turning into some complexes felt like entering another world, with refugees living together from Somalia, Thailand, Bosnia, Burma, Iraq, Sudan, and Burundi, to name a few. I saw people sharing life together: hanging laundry on a line, walking on errands, talking to neighbors, or watching kids play soccer and bicycle. Some of the complexes looked clean and safe, and even had a pool. Some still had the debris from when one of the buildings had burned down, taking the lives of several of the youth with it. Some, Rosa shared, had landlords that had stolen from the refugees. One no longer had many refugees because of tensions with the Americans also living there. Several times we spotted “our” kids, playing and talking and living. When they saw us, we smiled and waved like crazy people. Whether or not they saw us, I saw them, and I heard them. I had spent a week with them talking about heartbeats, but I had not yet discovered theirs, until that trip. It is strong, communal, resilient, and hopeful, vibrating with vitality.

You will...not...be missed

Yesterday I had my first official day as a paid employee of BuildaBridge. Fun :) Rather obviously, I am staying in Philly. The probationary period is three months, at which point we'll review my work, and I'll review my finances. If all is well enough, the position is a year-long one.

Still more than a little weird to think about.

In the meantime, I'm probably signing a 3-month lease this week at a cheaper house. Dr. Corbitt was kind enough to volunteer to drive me around the area at night, so that I can get a feel for how safe it will be, particularly for coming back after work at the restaurant or back on public transportation after an evening in center city. We will see, but the girls seem nice (three of them). The room is pretty much a very big closet, it's so small, but I think it'll work fine.

As for Atlanta: I came. I saw. I sang.

I'll write a separate blog, or a few separate ones, to tell about those stories. It was good. Great, really. I led opening music with all 56 of the kids aged 4-14 every morning for half an hour. That's a lot of kids. And a lot of singing. I liked it. I learned a lot, and made a few friends along the way. And a lot of memories.

you will be missed

Today was the last day of my internship. I feel relief mixed with sadness. My work with BuildBridge isn’t quite over, so there’s no good-byes. But it is another transition. I feel like a spectator to my own life, curious and wondering what’s next. I’m being proactive with job applications, but I can’t shake the feeling. My mom arrived today, and it’s nice but strange to see where and how I live through her eyes. Again, I feel like a distant observer, realizing how very odd of a time of life it is.

Tomorrow we head for the Pittsburgh area to see family; my aunt is having a retirement party. Looks like transitions don’t ever end. That takes me back to last year and graduation and transition talks with torrey peeps. My cousins will be quite a bit older, one of them fresh from his first year at college in Atlanta.

The Institute went really well. I wish the people could have stayed altogether though, instead of returning to their homes in Ohio, Canada, Kansas, New York, and more. It was revitalizing to be with young people my age, full of enthusiasm and ideas, tempered and given wisdom by faculty with experience, know-how, and a strong desire to provide mentorship. It was also encouraging to get to be a part of making it happen. It’s been a while since I’ve been that person, the one that makes things happen. I missed that. It was a huge blessing to also be able to attend classes and do some serious soul-searching about the work.

I believed arts could bring healing before, and I saw it with the kids I worked with. But now I feel the true power arts, to bring transformation, beating in my breast, pushing me onward. I still don’t know quite which road to take, but I don’t want to forget to march to that rhythm.

As I say that, I think of a little girl, D, from the class I helped with at WAA – Women Against Abuse. D has been increasingly close to my heart over the few weeks as I’ve grown as an assistant and learned more about how to help her with her sadness and anger and insecurity. I should have filled this blog the past month or two with stories about her, and about WAA, but I haven’t know how, it’s been too close. D is a little 4-year-old girl. The first day of class, she was the only student, and we were reading a book about Anansi the Spider, but D didn’t like Anansi. So she hit him (the picture on the book). She often threatened physical punishment against kids who she saw as “misbehavin.” She also, almost every class, would at one point hide underneath a table, lie down and begin whimpering, or run away. On one such occasion, I came after her and tried to reason with her that a boy didn’t do anything wrong by holding the book about Anansi (I’ve since learnt that reasoning with a 4-year-old is not always the best course of action). She began saying she wasn’t pretty, that nobody loved her. I was shocked. She also continued threatening to hurt the boy with whom she was angry. That day, Dr. Vivian Nix-Early (one of the BuildaBridge co-founders, the COO, and also a clinical psychologist) stepped in, because I didn’t know what to do or how to help. She took D aside and explained she shouldn’t be mad at the boy, because the only reason she was missing class was herself, and as soon as she calmed down, she could come back. She told D she couldn’t come back until she was done crying, and then she let D cry for a while. Eventually, she asked D if she could clean off her face in the bathroom. Dr. V later told me D began again saying she wasn’t beautiful, and so as she cleaned her face she just told her how beautiful she was, and specific things she found beautiful about D. Another week, I used the same method. The look in her eyes was so vulnerable. That killed me, too.

We had our final celebrations for the two classes I assisted with. At WAA, Women Against Abuse, the little girl that was “my baby,” “D,” wasn’t there. That day her mom had got in a fight. It kinda killed me that she missed her celebration. I miss her. I wish I knew now from working with her and from the Institute back when I first met her. Not that I now know so much, but I know a little more, and maybe I could have helped more.

It’s unsettling. This feeling, of wishing I could’ve helped more, it’s reminding me of something else. One of my friends from Uganda passed last month, two weeks after his birthday. He had suffered with depression due to the malaria meds. The details of his death were not shared, but I think it’s a word I don’t feel like saying. It’s amazing how you strong of an emotion guilt may be, whatever justifications are used to try to reason the emotion away. Which, by the way, is another thing I learned at the Institute, about brain development and emotion versus reason, particularly in kids, and how art can bridge that. Anyways. David was a blessing in my life. He helped me see things more clearly. It makes me angry, that I or somebody didn’t help him more, although I know he had friends and amazing family and therapists that were helping him. It makes me want to make myself someone who could help.

I feel like there’s a lot to miss in life right now: people, opportunities, purpose, peace. It makes me not want to waste any time, but sometimes time is what you need. I think that’s what I need to do for a while, sit and be still and let time do it’s thing and I do mine until the water is still.