Recovery: 6th Month

Six months after hip replacement surgery I am able to hike up and down mountains, sleep, and simply move through the day without pain. An incredible difference!

En Este Momento

Our way is not to sit to acquire something; it is to express our true nature...There is no preparation for something else. That is our practice. (Shunryu Suzuki)

In Costa Rica

I'm in Costa Rica--we're in Costa Rica. The first month was about setting up, and we successfully covered the basics: enrolled kids in school, found house, bought car, opened bank account, accessed internet. Then it was settling in, meaning we established routine: up by 5:00, wake kids by 6:30, prepare breakfast, brush teeth, put on sun lotion, drive to bus stop, exercise, write, etc. All this seems to work well, and is perhaps necessary, but I wonder to what extent routine romoves me/us from Costa Rica? At the same time, I remind myself, when preparing breakfast, prepare breakfast--there's nothing else needed in that moment, even in Costa Rica.

Moving to Costa Rica

On August 17 we will land in San Jose, Costa Rica to begin a school-year adventure. We're going into this with lots of unanswered questions like where will we live? How will we get around? Will we have enough money? Once settled in, my work is pretty well defined: I will write and do research. As a family, we mainly want to have fun. And for the kids, they will learn Spanish... Bringing myself back to the present, so much to do to prepare the house for renters moving in on August 1, pack what we think we'll need for 9 1/2 months, and otherwise attend to all the details associated with moving. It will come together; and if not, well, we're moving to Costa Rica anyway.

Cafe Felix

Music blasts dark cadences of desire across an open field. Tattooed breasts in the eastern sky reveal our place in the world. “Down!” she shouts, missing why an old man slumps in a plastic car seat on the empty parking lot. “What does this mean?” ask young lovers as they flip through channels of despair on a television that no longer works.  Chemo is today's special eluding the bloody reality oozing from pores where we feel but won’t look.

$merica Today

Boot Camp

My son began boot camp this week, his initiation into the military culture in preparation for the Coast Guard Academy this fall. I'm impressed that he was selected by the Academy for a full ride, four-year college education--this is quite an accomplishment. However, as his dad, I do wonder what will happen to his human spirit during the next seven weeks of hazing and indoctrination. Will this serve as the first step in becoming another cog in the military machine, or will he engage his intellectual, creative capacities to learn about himself, others, and the world?......Most likely I'm missing it all together and he'll simply come away from these weeks with his story. Will I listen?

Asa King

Asa and friend landed a king at Willow River yesterday. He was thrilled!

Compassion is action

I attended a presentation this morning and was reminded that compassion is action: listening to a friend's story, holding a frightened child, picking up a piece of trash. When asked if we would share personal examples, I immediately thought about the night a few weeks ago, when I was still hurting from surgery, I slowly made my way into a chair at the dinner table. Just as I was settling in, out of the blue my four-year old daughter, Eva, gently placed a pillow against my back. Without deliberation, she saw a need and simply took action. That's compassion.

Post-op Day 20: All is Well

After almost three weeks since surgery, I'm driving, walking without assistance, riding a stationary bike, and generally feeling much better. The doctor released me for work beginning tomorrow. Although I still need an occasional short nap to restore my energy, all is well.

Post-Op Day 10: Better, but slow

I went into this surgery with expectations of bouncing back in a flash. Funny how expectations set me up for frustration, disappointment. Fact is, I am improving each day, but it's a slow process. Right now my typical morning is consumed by very few activities: eating breakfast, doing exercises, taking a short walk, resting--and by then it's lunch time! Challenging my sense of productivity.

Post-Op Day 5: Surgery is Violent

The pain, swelling, bruises, and raw incision so much a part of these first few days of post-op remind me that surgery is inherently violent: A surgeon’s job is to cut, saw, rip, and otherwise dismember the human body. I know the "end justifies the means" rationale—that is what allowed me to give consent last Monday. But even though the procedure serves a greater good, the actions themselves are forceful, intense, violent. So I'm curious about who becomes a surgeon? Or, asked in a slightly different way, who is this person when being a surgeon? What is it like to perform actions that are unacceptable in any other arena? And how does the dehumanization that must be necessary to effectively do this work affect the way the surgeon experiences him(her)self and other human beings outside the OR?...

Post-op Day 3: Rehab

I made my first visit to the physical therapist this afternoon. When I returned  home took a crutch-supported walk down the sidewalk in sunshine and fresh air. Neighborhood kids on bikes crossing sidewalk, making me a bit nervous--dislocation must be avioded!

New Hip

Early Monday morning, I walked from my home to Alaska Regional Hospital where I underwent total hip replacement surgery. After the operation, the surgeon said, "You didn't rush into this one." He was right, I didn't.

Snowflake

Snowflake silently floating, landing softly on white blanket.

Addiction Gone Mad: Requiem for a Dream

I finished the Requiem for a Dream last night. It is a story of a mother, a son, a girlfriend, and a buddy "chasing the dragon," falling tighter and tighter into the clutches of addiction. Although disturbing, the film offers a graphic portrayal of human suffering and our thirst for connection, certainty, and relief. Worth seeing.

Morning in Homer

I awoke to spectacular view of snow-covered mountains across a calm Kachemak Bay. Beautiful even before coffee.

Testing Season

I recently heard a new term in the jargon of public schools: “Testing Season.” It’s a time to anxiously “teach to the test;” to eliminate any activity that doesn’t directly prepare children for “the test;” to forget what is known about good teaching and learning and simply get kids ready to take "the test."

What a waste of precious time jumping through hoops created by policymakers who reduce children to products necessary for so-called economic competition. A lost opportunity for children to learn and teachers to teach...When will educators, parents, and students rise up and say "No more! To hell with your testing season!"

Day after Super-Moon

Brilliant sunlight streaming through blue sky lightly touches melting snow.

Morning: Feb. 16

Good morning. Kids in school. Zena sleeping soundly. Annette reading ADN Letters to Editor. Silence broken by buzzing engine of small plane taking off from Merrill Field.. List of tasks await my attention as steam rises from black coffee...

The Scream: School Today

I dropped off Asa and Eva at Aurora Waldorf School this morning, and hung around long enough to join Eva's class' morning song and verse: "....Welcome, welcome brand new day. Our hearts open wide, light shines deep inside...Good morning dear friends." This followed by a goodbye hug and kiss from Eva, I was on my way.

Like most mornings, I left the school feeling warm and peaceful, effects I attribute to an environment where children are honored, beauty is celebrated, and imagination is encouraged. However, as I made my drive home, any hint of tranquility was abruptly disrupted by a woman aggressively waving her arms and angrily yelling at me to "slow down!" I quickly glanced at my speedometer and saw I was not speeding. Standing on the sidewalk in front of the neighborhood public elementary school--which is just down the street from Aurora--she was apparently supervising children as they crossed the street.

It struck me as the antithesis of what I’d just experienced in my children's school. And I wonder what it was like for these children to witness a yelling adult just as they arrived at school for a new day. What was the spectacle teaching them about dealing with stress or a perceived violation? Was her behavior somehow justifiable or even normal in a school culture driven by rules and reward-punishment mentality? And in what ways might her anger be indicative of effects from a dehumanizing system that reduces children to "human capital" and ties their worth to scores on standardized tests?

Did anyone else hear the scream at school today?

Feb. 2011: Day 1

First day of new month stirs aspiration beyond thoughts.

Weekend: January 29-30

The weekend events with family and friends are still fresh in my mind this Monday morning. Here is a brief recounting.

Saturday was our usual "chore day," a time for all of us to pitch in with the cleaning and organizing. That afternoon, while I was on the grocery shopping run, the kids, Annette, and a friend from Homer went ice skating at Westchester Lagoon. In the evening, we extended my birthday celebration--which was last Wednesday, January 26th--by sharing a meal and cake with a couple friends. I prepared the vegetable stew; Costco baked the bread; and Annette made the Lady Baltimore cake, a family favorite passed down from her great-grandmother.

On Sunday, after sitting zazen at the Anchorage Zen Community in the morning, I hung out with kids--Asa, Eva, Zena, and one of their friends--for a couple hours while Annette attended a board meeting.The kids made paper airplanes and hats, played with cars and trucks, and created music with drums, bells, a recorder, and their voices. In the afternoon, we all went for a ski at Russian Jack Park, joined by another family. Asa has become quite the skier, thanks to training with Jr. Nordic and regular outings at his Waldorf school. Yesterday was Eva's first time on skis, but you wouldn't have known it given the ease at which glided along the trails. We ended the day with a wonderful dinner at another family's house in our neighborhood.

Pointing to the Sky

Driving to school yesterday morning Eva intently searched the sky for the “stairs to heaven,” convinced they were simply waiting for her to discover. Thanks to a neighbor friend "sharing her faith," Eva had the details of this fairytale down pat: the stairway, angels, spirits, god--they were all there, "just up there," she insisted while pointing to the sky. When I told her she is already an angel, she quickly corrected me, “No I’m not because I don’t have wings…but when I get to heaven I will have magic and can fly without wings.” Later in the day, she expressed her dismay that god had not given her wings...

...Outside my window, I see a plump raven perched on a light pole next to the church’s white steeple. It flies away leaving a steeple pointing to the sky.

Healthcare Repeal

Last week House Republicans repealed Obama’s healthcare reform. All their ranting about keeping promises, fighting Big Government, and preventing “socialism” silenced the deeper moral and political questions about health care in this country. Questions such as: Who should have access and who decides? Is health care a fundamental human right or is it a commodity reserved for the privileged? Is it okay that providers get rich by exploiting human suffering?

The last question is especially intriguing to me because I never hear it mentioned by mainstream politicians, yet it is such an obvious example of injustice playing out daily in every community throughout the US. I realize not all providers are greedy, self-serving bastards, but in a capitalist healthcare system, by default they are vultures positioned to prey on humans in a most vulnerable place: our experience with sickness, pain, and potential death. For the docs these feasts-on-suffering supply their bank accounts with thousands of dollars each year. Are we okay with a healthcare system that creates and perpetuates such blatant exploitation?

And what if the patient can't pay? The system allows docs the option of refusing care, which happens all the time, for example providers refusal to serve patients on Medicaid. But there is also the magic of credit, and I don’t mean the provider offering a personal payment plan as a service to the patient. No, it's a credit system that ensures the doc gets paid. For instance, a provider recently explained to me that in his office he offers a credit card option to those “can’t pay” patients. The credit card company pays him and gives the patient a few months to pay-off the balance. If the patient fails to pay-off the balance in those few months, he is hit with an astronomical high interest fee that is retroactive! All the while the doc has either spent or invested the money without having to give second thought about the economic repercussions to the patient.

What would take to reframe the health care debate, shifting from political rhetoric to an engaged dialogue about the purpose of the healthcare system and who it should benefit? What actions can we take to create a healthcare system that serves human needs rather than greed?

Snowing

It’s snowing this morning. Although I've lived in Alaska 20 years and seen hundreds of inches of snow, it still evokes delight. Don’t know exactly why—perhaps it’s the way it silently falls and quiets a noisy city; or how it magically transforms dirty streets into lanes of soft-serve icecream; or the way it reminds me of my grandfather and his stories about tracking rabbits in the snow when he was a child. Whatever the reason, I’m grateful for snow this morning.

Last Day in Hawaii

Today is our last full day on the Big Island. After some condo cleaning, we'll soak up a few more hours of warmth and sun. It has  been fun but looking forward to returning to our little red house on Wintergreen Street.