No Trees, Only Wind: On Cowboys and Lobster Fishermen

Have you noticed that the geography of states really changes at state lines? Wyoming: monolithic rock outcroppings tower over the biggest, flattest, most treeless plains I have ever seen. We will reach the edge, where this treeless expanse meets the sky, and fly off, soaring into the thin blue-almost-white atmosphere. The Wind is gusting at 70 mph, moving our 10-cylinder van like any tumbleweed across the road, from west to east. Giant Black Angus steer look like tiny plastic toys dotting the plains; the highway is lined with barbed wire fencing; the range criss-crossed with x-shaped, metal snow fencing in an attempt to stop the wind from overwhelming the road. The wind pushes and shoves the barbs across one’s vision until my eyeballs feel scraped: branded with the image of Matthew Shepard’s scarecrow-like form, a gay youth beaten and tied to wire such as this. This landscape is tough: not actively hostile, but indifferent to us and our many identities and destinations.

The Wind rules here, it is the shape and motion in a landscape devoid of trees or other objects. A cowboy on a horse or in a Chevy Silverado has only the wind as companion to his work, just like the lobster fisherman in his small boat upon the sea. There is a line between earth and horizon, there is you, there is the wind. In this way, tussling alone against the wind, cowboys and lobster fishermen must form their ideas, their souls, their characters. When they ride back into harbor, they expect to find more wind but instead find community. Speaking in the rhythms and languages of the wind as it scrubs the uneven surface of the water or the range, they become multilingual or often do not speak at all. Going back to our time in Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico, I am wondering if this is what Judith means, at least in part, when she talks about the “spirit of the west;” if it is what we mean, at least in part, when we talk about the unique culture of Down East Maine. We are a wind-licked people, the wind pushes us and we push back. We bluster, we push, we struggle. The wind is ceaseless and relentless, fierce and cold and sharp. In these locales it is never gentle. And so we bundle up, our faces and hands are chapped, we have to holler to be heard against the wind’s loud insistent voice. We yell at it, we live in it, finding it difficult to make a difference between our wind-voice and our people-voice. Maybe the spirits of the west and the spirit of Down East are of each of us alone, talking with and often over the loud wind. Shouting at god. Feeling as if we cannot be heard; and that, as between each of us, it is difficult to determine what is or is not a response, to translate god's words, to understand their relationship to our own.

Malheur, Oregon: Inspiring Theater Tales in the Desert Grim

You gotta think twice, or maybe three times, when you drive for hours and hours—a full day, in fact—through a cold, high, empty desert with a county and town and river all named Malheur. Eastern Oregon is quite empty and wild. As with so many points along our trip, we pondered what it must have been like to be a pioneer woman going through here, just a little south of the highway that was the Oregon Trail, pre-Dairy Queens and such.

We didn’t have enough time to hike or explore, but we did have the joy of observing several small, Main Street movie theaters—such as the Desert at left, and the Rex below—that are still alive and kicking in these tiny rural locations. Note that they, like our own beloved Opera House, were playing Bee Movie and Dan in Real Life the two weekends after Thanksgiving. The little, handlettered sandwich board outside the pretty, pink-trimmed Desert says “Matinee Today!” (it was Sunday) and proudly promoted the fact that they were showing two different movies for the holiday. It made us feel right at home. Viva la cinema! Viva la Maison d’Opera!

Jack and the Inukshuk

We hit Thanksgiving in Eugene, OR, with so much for which to give thanks. We had just left a wonderful visit with Jeanine and Don; friends in San Francisco; Dale and his fine family of three blonde boys (ASIDE: when I first went to Bowdoin, everyone assumed I was from California. Now I know why. It’s the Blonde State.) and had arrived in Eugene at Jennie and her family’s beautiful home.

There was just one small problem: our 6-month old puppy, Jack, was throwing up. All day. Beginning on our arrival in OR two days before Thanksgiving, he had no energy. We took him to the vet, who was puzzled, on Wednesday. We thought, as with all of his puppy diarrhea, that he had gotten into something and would get over it.
He didn’t. He was a limp noodle in our arms Friday morning, when we rushed him to the vet and he was diagnosed with parvo. We were stunned. He’d had all his shots; and dogs die from parvo within three days of showing symptoms. The vet rushed him into isolation and put him on an IV, giving him a 50-50 chance and telling us what rotten places rest areas and dog parks are for young dogs whose immune systems are not fully developed. What?! Why hadn’t someone said that to us previously??
And still, we had and have so much for which to be grateful. We had extra time, extra meals, extra hot tubs with grandchildren Carmen and Bodin. I got to go swimming with them, and be there when 4-days-short-of-5-year-old Bodin discovered swimming noodles and traversed the kiddie pool on his own. Now, to add to all of that, Jack has recovered from parvo.

We are on the road again, our travels safeguarded by Inukshuk (see photo of Jack with stone sculpture, above). Inukshuk is a statue created from flat stones by my sister Donna, with whom we stayed outside of Bruneau, ID, on November 25. According to some information she provided along with the statue, Inukshuk, which means “in the image of man,” are “magnificent lifelike figures of stone which were erected by the Inuit people and are unique to the Canadian Arctic.” The traditional meaning of an Inukshuk, which is reminiscent, to those who hike, of trail cairns, was to act as a compass or guide for a safe journey. For example, an Inukshuk on land with two arms and two legs, like this guy, means there is a valley, at the end of which the traveler has a choice in the direction we choose to take in our lives . . . happily, Donna’s Inukshuk now oversees our travels from the dashboard of the Opera House’s Ford van. There are a lot more interesting things the Inukshuk represents; stay tuned for more Inukshuk wisdom as we go along.

According to the wisdom of the Buddha, we can actually use our lives to prepare for death. We do not have to wait for the painful death of someone close to us or the shock of terminal illness to force us into looking at our lives. Nor are we condemned to go out empty-handed at death to meet the unknown. We can begin, here and now, to find meaning in our lives. We can make of every moment an opportunity to change and to prepare -- wholeheartedly, precisely, and with peace of mind -- for death and eternity. In the Buddhist approach, life and death are seen as one whole, where death is the beginning of another chapter of life. Death is a mirror in which the entire meaning of life is reflected. - Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying

The Amazing Human Experience of Choice

As an adopted child, I've been extremely lucky on many, many fronts (that's my birth mother, Jeanine, with me in the photo at right). The one of which I am most conscious, however, is the awareness that adoption brings of the wondrous power that comes from choosing one's family.

Imagine the power of growing up in the early 1960s with your parents telling you they CHOSE you. Imagine the self esteem that creates; especially for a girl, who one day will have that choice herself. I believe that much of my sense that I can create anything in this world--including family--comes from being made aware, as a young child, that we are all, in some sense, chosen.

I think more children are raised this way today, in their birth as well as their adoptive families: because giving birth and having a family are at last, since 1972, more clearly about choice. I say "more" because I still know, both on my rural Maine island and the city in which I once lived, many teen age girls who don't feel as if they have a choice: who have babies at 15-16-17-18-19 because that's the only choice they feel they have, economically and culturally and ethically.

I've always felt so awed that someone -- my adoptive family -- chose me. Knowing that choice has allowed me to go into the world and create my own family. This big extended family--my lesbian partner and her children and grandchildren; my friends and former partners and their children; my adopted family, godparents, cousins, and their children; and most recently my birth mother, half siblings and their children--may not be traditional but it is a rich and diverse stew that feeds me to the extent I feed it. This is my family, and I am proud of it and honored and grateful to be a part of it. Thanks to all of you who allow me to consider you a part of this family.


I've only more recently become aware of the more difficult choices faced by my birth mother, thanks in part to an excellent book on the subject of these girls who, just after World War II during the "baby boom" years--which included a huge boom in babies "given up" for adoption--were confronted with increased sexual freedom and few ways to deal with the biological consequences of this freedom. This book, The Girls Who Went Away: the Hidden History of Women who Surrendered Children for Adoption in the Years Before Roe v. Wade, prompted me, at 44 years of age, to seek out my birth mother. Getting to know Jeanine and her family has been another part of the wondrous ride of being a part of chosen family.


A lot of adoption stories aren't so happy, of course. (The photo to the left shows me in northern California last Sunday at my half brother Dale's house, with his family; my birth mother, Jeanine; and her husband of 35+ years, Don.) A lot of the women who had no choice about the fate of their bodies--women who were forced to have and to surrender their babies--did not fare as well as Jeanine; and the reunions between these children and their birth mothers, when they occur, don't bring the kind of love and joy mine has. Choice is one of the most fragile and amazing aspects of being human, and all too often we don't honor it, or attend to it. Choosing is an amazing and complicated act: each choice we make cuts in many directions.

In the context of having babies, the other side of "chosen" is "unwanted:" and children in that situation know their beginnings just as surely as I know mine. I'm not precious about the fact that I was born rather than aborted. When I talk about the critical role choice has played in my life, its power and importance, I'm not talking about being lucky because my mother chose to give birth to me (she actually didn't have other choices at that time): I'm talking about her choice to surrender me for adoption. I'm talking about the important power of each of us to choose life carefully and death equally: to not be afraid of death, but to choose it. To choose abortion where necessary; to choose to give birth; to choose our families from those we love, no matter their gender or color or genetic connection to us. The amazing human experience of choice.

"If you look deeply into the palm of your hand, you will see your parents and all generations of your ancestors. All of them are alive in this moment. Each is present in your body. You are the continuation of each of these people. To be born means that something which did not exist comes into existence. But the day we are born is not our beginning. It is a day of continuation. Since we are never born, how can we cease to be?" -- Thich Nhat Hanh, Present Moment, Wonderful Moment

Deep Blue

Beneath the sea, beneath the sea beneath the deep blue sea . . . we were at 170 feet below sea level in Death Valley. It feels a little as I imagine Jacques Cousteau might have, in his watery underworld, only without the gear. Here is the sea floor, here are the sand dunes. Here are the rugged, impassable and impassive mountains, holding it all in. Our 10-cylinder Ford purrs across the dips and rises that stymied horse drawn wagons. It takes us hours to go from below sea level to almost 9,000 feet in the Sierra's Tioga Pass; the gold rushing forty-niners spent days and weeks and months trying to traverse this salt encrusted landscape, many dying in the passage.

What's most interesting about Death Valley is that the reason for its existence is the constant, ongoing movement of the Panamint Mountain plate. It remains active, which is to say it is constantly pushing up; thereby pushing the floor of the valley ever lower. I close my eyes and can almost feel, in my pelvis, the gyroscopic quality of this see-sawing movement. We've made it to California, and the earth does still move here.

There's so much those of us who grow up and live 3,000 miles away just don't know about this landscape, and therefore about the people who live here. Maybe at one point in geography class I learned that Mount Whitney, pictured to the left with me and the two dogs, is the highest point in the 48 states: but growing up with Katahdin and Mount Washington, who thinks of these things?! Yet here it is, shadowing the Owens River Valley: a fabulously beautiful and mineral rich area, which Los Angeles's William Mulholland (think Mulholland Drive, those of you rich in LA or movie lore), a working class Irish immigrant who rose through the ranks to become superintendent of LA's water system, tapped as the giant aqueduct which travels down and across the state and makes LA the fabulous LA it is. The aqueduct pipe is 10' in diameter and buried for miles and miles; like the Blade Runner-ish Hoover Dam we crossed to get here, it is an engineering marvel and one that makes it difficult not to respect man's uncanny ingenuity--even when it is harnassed to sap the landscape and create plagues such as nuclear waste (buried just to the east of here, in Nevada) and global warming.