REFLECTIONS ON LIFE – December 2016

REFLECTIONS ON HOME IN COLUMBIA

This December 2016 entry completes the first full year of my Reflections on Life - virtually the sole entries on my roughly year-old blog, “Perspectives on My Universe” Reading back over them serves as a mini series on this year of my life. I have had some offers of guidance from some who are more tech savvy than I (that includes legions), and it is my intention and plan to make that blog more active in 2017.

On December 21, Winter Solstice, I celebrated the completion of my 73^rd year on planet earth with the theme Lloyd coined after our marriage 23 years ago – “Liz brings the light back.” After all of these years I still cannot adequately express how much I love those words, and yet, with them comes a certain role or responsibility to spread light in the world. I take that role very much to heart, and I both value and love playing it. It is a humbling role, and sometimes I lapse, only to find that I can always “light up” again. This year, more than any I can recall, there is a strong and clear meaning to “bringing the light back” – to me, such a dark time in our nation and throughout our world. Yes, we must seek out and address the many injustices surrounding us humans and other beings. Equally important, we must celebrate - with joy and love - the gift of life.

Each year, Lloyd gives me a handmade (by him) birthday card. This year, as every year it seems, the message could not be more beautiful and more fitting:

“Three things cannot be

Long hidden: the Sun,

The Moon and the Truth”

 ~Buddha

On the Sunday before Christmas I partook of a perfect opportunity to celebrate - with joy and love – the gift of life. It was the occasion of “Gloria! The Music of J.S. Bach” directed by Tom Benjamin and sung by the 50+-member choir of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Columbia which includes more than a few close friends. The centering thought printed in the program was the “somewhat revised” phrase of Swiss Reformed theologian, Karl Barth: “When the angels sing to each other, they sing Mozart; when they sing to God, they sing Bach.” Zach, a big Mozart fan, showed up when I read those words. I was completely absorbed in exquisite beauty of Bach’s music against the backdrop of such deep social, economic, and environmental injustice in our nation and world. As the music played out, that backdrop remained. It did not disappear. Rather it became fainter even as the magnificent music expanded and filled the room and all within it. I resolved to approach our current national condition as best I can in just that expanded manner.

“We do survive every moment, after all, except the last one.” John Updike

"Hope is not blind optimism." Barrack Obama

About ten years ago, a dear friend and long time Columbian, gave me the following ritualistic words about the winter solstice. Lloyd and I share it with some friends on the solstice evening.

December 21^st, we enter the belly of the night.

Winter Solstice: We come to the portal that separates darkness from light. Standing in this arch of time where Earth takes a breath before facing us back towards the sun, we too, take a breath, turn inward, pause in this pregnant moment and let darkness reveal its gifts.

Winter Solstice: A time to look back at the year gone by, gather its lessons and put them in the stew of your life. Time to let the heat of your presence cook the stew. Render the lessons into the sweet nectar of wisdom. Then drink of it, one small sip at a time.

Winter Solstice: Time to savor the sweetness of the dark. Nothing to fear. It’s only you. And millions of years of Earth’s turning: away and then back, away and then towards the light. It’s all you. The dark, the light, the fire, the night: It’s all you. You’re all it. Sweetness oneness, savored in the dark.

Winter Solstice: A time to let the longest night of the year seduce you into stillness. Time to silence inner voices, listen to the beating of your own heart. Time to breathe slowly, become the breath. Linger here. The night is long.

Winter Solstice: A sacred link, where Earth’s veil thins, the unseen seen. Images of ancestors and ancient roots threading back beyond time. Back to first humans, their fires still burning to call back the light. We are the ones who hold them sacred. We honor their struggles, their triumphs. We’re here due to them. They gave us our blood.

Winter Solstice: A time to reflect on your life in this moment. Like never before or ever again. Reflect on the sweet fragile moment.

Winter Solstice: A time to let go of what burdens. Empty out stones sitting heavy in the heart. Let bygones be bygones. Acknowledge. Forgive. Begin again.

Winter Solstice: A fertile time, a time to ready the womb, a time for pregnant possibility. A time to sow seeds of imagination, to germinate in the darkness. A time to tend the inner hearth, be warmed by the coals of creativity.

Winter Solstice: The union of opposites. Fullness – emptying. Emptiness – filling.

The shortest day meets the longest night. Celebrate the dark. Greet the light. We’ve journeyed long. We’ve journeyed far. In summer, we rejoice in the sun, now absent. In winter, we settle into the night, now present. We draw inward, tuck in our wings to keep warm. All flights are canceled.

Winter Solstice: A time to check inner weather and road conditions. Are you cold? Are you hot? Are you merely lukewarm? Is it stormy? Is it balmy? Are there blue skies inside? Does the road rise to meet you? Are you on shaky ground? Is it smooth? Is it rocky? Can you see where your are?

Winter Solstice: Can you be with it all, just as it is? No fighting, no trying, no pushing the river. It flows by itself, so you watch it. You notice. You see twigs and branches submerged in the stream of your life. Without effort, the water flows over, under, and around it all. Nothing can stop it. It goes on forever. Like you do. Like I do. Like we do.

This month the Baltimore Sun published an article about the recognition of the solstice in an old California mission town:

“… As the sun rises in the dip between two hills, the amazing (engineering) accomplishment of some 18^th century priests becomes crystal clear. Through an open window at Mission San Juan Bautista, a brilliant beam of light enters, bathing the alter in gold before traveling up the center aisle, gilding the 200-year-old rust colored tiles.”

I am considering being there next year on my birthday morning, flying back home in time for an evening solstice ritual watching the sun set behind the trees rimming the large pond in our beloved back yard.

I love birthdays. I love that mine occurs on Winter Solstice.

One day in the last week of this month, it was so warm and sunny that Lloyd and I ate our lunch on the table on our back deck with the birds and squirrels overlooking our big pond.

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Night skies continue to fascinate me – particularly the moon and planets, but also airplane flights. The third in a series of super moons was the most majestic of all, visible from our two bedroom windows. On some nights I willed myself to wake up at about 3am when the moon was perfectly visible through the window by my bedside. I would watch for a while and then get up and sit on the couch in Lloyd’s office adjacent to our bedroom and read for an hour or two. When I returned to bed, straining my neck somewhat above my pillow, I could see the moon begin to settle behind the leafless trees, their black branches silhouetted against the deepening golden orb. Night time plane flights over our home continue to mesmerize – their sounds and lights gradually increasing and then fading - sometimes visible going in and out of light clouds, first through the window over our headboard and then the one on “my” side of the bed just as the noise begins to fade. I love both the sight and sound of these night flights, as I love flying them, amazed at the exquisite beauty of the stars and sometimes the moon from my usual window seat. Lloyd almost always suggests that I sit there. It couldn’t be that I’m “spoiled,” could it? Then again I enjoy just about all flights. Sometimes I feel as if in this enjoyment I am abandoning other community residents who are disturbed by the noise of the planes. I suppose it does not come as a surprise that I never pull down the shade by my window seat. Nor do I wear an eye mask.

Next month, January of 2017, will conclude two complete calendar years since I left public office after serving more than thirty years. I continue to absolutely love the freedom to live my life with less structure imposed from outside of me. In previous Reflections, I have written that I made a strong and fast decision not to serve on any board or commission, with the exception of a congregational Maryland legislative committee on which I already served. I held out for almost two years, and then a couple months ago I agreed to serve on the board of the Little Patuxent Review, a literary publication begun by Columbia pioneers, Ralph and Margot Trietel in the very early days of our new town. Lloyd and I have many of the editions in our living room bookcase. I was surprised in the 70’s as a young newly elected member of the Howard County Council to find myself the subject of an article by Ralph Trietel in one of the very early editions. The upcoming edition – there are two each year - will be “launched” on Sunday, January 22 at 2pm in the Oliver Carriage House in Town Center, The subject of this volume, prison justice, is one of the most serious social and economic issues facing our nation and state today. I know several residents of our community who have dedicated themselves to lessening this injustice – music and literature teachers, a librarian, a prison labor supervisor. I believe you would find this gathering to be quite an eye opener, both deeply troubling and, simultaneously, inspiring. As we adjust to our changing political climate, this is one of the issues we must understand and address. Washington Post article 12/28/16

We are so fortunate here in Maryland to have one of the staunchest and bravest advocates for prison justice in the U.S., Attorney General, Brian Frosh.

I hope to see some of you at the Carriage House.

REFLECTIONS ON ZACH

During this month of December, Zach has shown up in my life and the lives of many others in two unique ways: chance encounters with other human beings heretofore unknown to me and also through various cultural experiences

First, the chance encounters:

Now that neither of us is “gainfully employed,” Lloyd and I regularly sit at a corner table in a local coffee shop while reading and discussing the Washington Post over our morning coffee. That table is situated in the shop in such a way that people in line to place an order at the counter frequently stop and stand by us until the line moves forward. On most mornings we see and speak with several people we know and on many some we don’t know. About three weeks ago a very large guy, appearing to be about 40 years old and wearing a football shirt, stopped and began a conversation about the weather. Neither Lloyd nor I had met him before. We discovered several things in common. Greg works with an acupressure company in Virginia Beach, where Lloyd’s daughter, Carolyn, works in the Planning Department. He also works in the Penn North neighborhood of Baltimore where Freddy Grey was arrested before his death in prison. Our dear friend and teacher in life, Bob Duggan, who founded the Traditional Acupuncture Institute in Columbia, also founded the only on demand drug treatment center in Baltimore at Penn North. Lloyd and I recently attended Bob’s memorial service there and were deeply inspired by all of the residents of the area who attended in gratitude for all of his loving work deep in their community where many are afraid to even tread. In our first conversation with Greg, we learned that he is good friends with a former University of Maryland football star and friend of my daughter Chris, and through her of Zach’s as well, Ziz, who also worked with Zach when he served as assistant manager of the U of MD basketball team. Finally we learned that Greg is also a former U.S. Olympic bobsledder who recently drove with his bobsledding buddies to Lake Placid NY and participated in a contest. Lloyd and I were telling our kids and grandkids about Greg on Christmas day. Chris texted Ziz about our conversation, and he replied that Greg’s just about as good a friend as you can get. Since our first meeting about a month ago, we have seen Greg in the coffee shop on about six more occasions, each with another great conversation. Now he’s our friend as well, through the “Zach connection.”

Several weeks ago, Lloyd and I spent a weekend in a condo owned by friends of ours in Chesapeake Beach, Calvert County. My mother’s father’s family, the Monnett’s, settled in Calvert County in the late 1600’s. They were tobacco farmers. (Zach’s full name is Zachary Monnett Lederer.) I have written in earlier “Reflections” of my mom’s dad, Laurence Lucian Monnett, meeting his future bride, Martha Elizabeth Schaub, on the dock at Prince Frederick where he was awaiting the delivery of an additional horse to help work the farm. The horse was arriving from Baltimore on what was then an overnight voyage down the Chesapeake Bay. Our friends’ condo is in a town named Chesapeake Beach very near Prince Frederick. While walking around town, we decided to check in at the courthouse and see what if anything we could find about the Monnett family. The historian was out, but we were told that there is substantial material on the family.

Although my mom wrote about the history of the Monnett family and succeeded in having her work accepted by the Maryland Historical Society, I don’t know whether she had any contact with the Chesapeake Beach area. We were invited to return to the town’s historical society and plan to do so sometime this spring.

This life of “retirement” life is taking up a whole lot of our time.

Five years ago next May, after getting out of bed in the morning, I stumbled and fell against the frame of the window from which I love to watch the night skies. I then took the few steps to the foot of our bed and turned right only to stumble again and fall against a chest of drawers. Aware then of dizziness, I proceeded with my day moving very cautiously. By the time I went to the afternoon appointment I made with my primary care doc, all of the dizziness had ceased and she found no other symptoms. Nevertheless she prescribed a CAT scan. After undergoing that procedure the next day, I headed to Virginia for my annual weeklong silent meditation retreat.

On the second night of the retreat at 11pm when I had just fallen into sleep, Lloyd phoned to tell me that the scan showed a tumor in my brain. I can recall so clearly how I received his words with deep calm. Lloyd and I decided that he would drive to the small town near Richmond and, against retreat house rules, spend the night with me. (I had a private room.) I phoned my kids, Chris and Cliff the next morning. Zach was in his second year of treatment at the time by one of Hopkins leading neurosurgeons, and Chris volunteered to try to get me in to see him soon. She succeeded. The doc told Lloyd and me that this was a very common tumor, a meningioma, which ordinarily caused no problems, and that it was not rare for such a tumor to be discovered during autopsies of individuals who had no idea they had a brain tumor. He took me on as a patient for continued observation, thanks to Zach and his mom.

When I told Zach, who was at the time being treated by the same doc, he was so pleased. Then I said “Zach, you know how much I like to emulate you, don’t you?” He replied “yes” and I continued “but don’t you think this is carrying it just a little bit too far?” He replied as loudly as I had ever heard, with his deep infectious laugh.

My MRI’s and doc appointments have gone from every three months, to every six, and now annually. Each one has shown no change.

This month I went in for my pre-doc appointment for the accompanying MRI, my 10^th one. I first thought I would not fare well in that big tube confining me from my head to my knees. I made it a point of reminding myself of Zach’s words to me “Grandma, I don’t understand why, but for some reason I love those things (MRI’s). I like to listen to a good CD like the Temptations while I’m in there.” So for my first MRI I took Zach with me figuratively and the music of the Temptations literally. Subsequently, much as I love the Temptations, I have chosen to have no music playing during the imaging. I prefer to be with Zach’s spirit and words amongst the clanging and banging of the scanner. Amazingly, I have been in deep peace for each of those hours.

I have told a few close friends about this tumor, and for reasons not quite clear, chose to keep it otherwise to my family and myself. Again, for reasons not quite clear, I decided after talking with Lloyd, to write the foregone paragraph in this month’s Reflections. It feels “right.”

REFLECTIONS ON BALTIMORE, MY HOMETOWN

My relatively new I-phone is gradually becoming more and more friendly toward me. Truth be told, I am amazed about how much I have learned. That doesn’t mean that Lloyd, who got a new one at the same time, and I don’t make weekly visits to the Mac store in the mall for assistance.

On one of those visits during the past month, we were assigned to a Mac employee who was meticulously groomed and wearing several of what appeared to be icons. We explained our electronic communication folly of the moment, and he went about it precisely and professionally asking us questions to help him zero in on the problem. I told him that his icons around his neck and wrists were very beautiful and had caught my attention. That led to a conversation about where he grew up in Edmondson Village in west Baltimore where I lived the first 14 years of my life.

As a child he lived on Rokeby Road just north of Route 40 and very near the Village itself and two blocks from my childhood home. I told him how I loved roller skating downhill on Rokeby Road skipping over the sometimes-deep cracks in the concrete pavement in my clamp-on metal skates with my scraped up knees and my skate key on a string around my neck.

The Sun

Writers Guild to give John Waters its lifetime achievement award

David Simon to present the honor

Two of Baltimore’s most gifted appear together. It can’t get much better than this

The Sun

Three Baltimore gems and landmarks undergo transition: Center Stage, Lexington Market, and Jimmy’s restaurant in Fells Point

From childhood through adulthood, I have frequented all three of these Baltimore landmarks. It is so encouraging to see them surviving, though I must confess to questions about the wisdom of “jazzing up” Lexington Market.

REFLECTIONS ON PUBLIC POLICY IN OUR COUNTY, STATE AND

NATION

Casino Gambling spreads its tentacles throughout our state and nation

The Atlantic December 2016 edition

“Did Scott Stevens die because he was unable to rein in his own addictive need to gamble? Or was he the victim of a system carefully calibrated to prey on his weakness?”

Washington Post December 8, 2016

Editorial

Ka-ching! Gambling addicts’ problems just got worse

With the opening of a gigantic casino near the District, the vulnerable are in MGM’s crosshairs

Prison Injustice and Reform

Washington Post December 28, 2016Maryland to consider changes to bail system

Prison justice will be a major issue in the upcoming legislative session in our state of Maryland. This article relates to my words earlier in these “Reflections” in the section “Home in Columbia” and the Little Patuxent’s Review’s program to be held in Oliver’s Carriage House on January 22 at 2pm

Although I am now a “private” citizen, many people – some of whom I do not know – frequently approach me and ask me for one of my “cards.” The Maryland Legislature prints “business” cards for the members to give to constituents who have questions about state government. So after almost two cardless years, during which I handed out little scraps of paper with my contact info, scribbled on them, Lloyd prepared a private citizen card for me. It has a dark gold background with my name in dark blue. Lloyd used the logo that he designed more than 20 years ago to be used in campaigning. He added my e-mail address and phone number. As soon as I saw it, I loved it, though something was missing. Then my eye was drawn to the wall of my office next to my new standing desk (highly recommended) where hangs a framed print by beloved Columbia artist Wes Yamaka who died about two years ago. Hundreds of early Columbians have one or more of his works in their homes. Now in the bottom right corner of my newly printed name cards are the same words as are on this print: “There may be more beautiful times, but this one is ours.” Jean Paul Sartre

What better reminder of our current calling to work in world?

January commences the work of the U.S. Congress and the Maryland Legislature.

There will be literally volumes to cover then on public policy.

REFLECTIONS ON OUR PLANET BEYOND THE UNITED STATES

If we do not see the following article and editorial from the Washington Post as wake-up calls, will we ever wake up?

The Great Barrier die-off

In 2016, the reef saw the worst devastation of coral ever recorded

Scientists share theory on Arctic’s winter warmth

Atmospheric patterns may trade places, causing extreme cold elsewhere

What can be said or written about Aleppo? Tragedy, anguish and terror so far beyond my comprehension. Sitting in meditative silence, I cannot even get close to comprehension.

REFLECTIONS ON OUR UNIVERSE

 “Rocket Man”

Elton John launches music video contest…giving filmmakers a chance to create music videos for his 1970’s hits.

OK, David, Alan, and JD. You know who you are. How about an entry that will rocket us into outer space?

James Taylor, one of my favorite singers, upon receiving the Kennedy Center award this month:

“Music suggests an order to the universe”

Washington Post Op Ed

Yes, humanity is cosmically special

By Howard A. Smith, Harvard astronomy lecturer and astrophysicist

“Some of my colleagues strongly … echo Hawking: ‘I can’t believe the whole universe exists for our benefit.’ Yes, we all have beliefs – but beliefs are not proof. Hawking’s belief presumes that we are nothing but ordinary, a “chemical scum.” All the observations so far, however, are consistent with the idea that humanity is not mediocre at all and that we won’t know otherwise for a long time. It seems we might even serve some cosmic role. So this season let us be grateful for the amazing gifts of life and awareness, and acknowledge the compelling evidence to date that humanity and our home planet, Earth, are rare and cosmically precious. And may we act accordingly.

…and so may it be in the year 2017 on planet earth.

Have a happy and peaceful New Year.

~Liz

Pools of sorrow, waves of joy

Are drifting through my open mind

Possessing and caressing me

Across the Universe

~Lennon and McCartney

Be well and love life.

~ Liz

REFLECTIONS ON HOME IN COLUMBIA

Daylight savings time ended a few weeks ago.  Standard time stepped in.  Sunset comes earlier now, and evenings give way to dark about 6PM.  As in years past, I welcome this progression of the seasons.  When I am at home, alone or with Lloyd, I am aware that the earlier dark brings with it a deeply reverent stillness.

“The darker the night, the brighter the stars.” Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Sometimes when I wake in the middle of the night, I imagine I hear the roar of the Pacific and anticipate seeing Oregon’s dramatically beautiful coast when I rise in the morning. Then, upon becoming more aware, I realize that I am back home in Maryland and what I am hearing is the sound of the wind through the trees.  I doubt that I will ever cease to be fascinated by the choice of the name “Pacific” for such turbulent waters.

Birds still gather at dawn by the birdfeeders and suet hanging in the tall pine outside the window alongside our bed.  The robins, blue jays, and other larger species have now given way to sparrows, wrens, and small woodpeckers.  I love lying there with my head on my pillow watching about eight of them at a time flitting from pine branch to feeder for seed, to block of suet and back again.  They appear weightless in the air.

Mums, pumpkins, and pine cones have replaced potted geraniums and impatiens as decorations on our decks. We have moved our two large clay-potted houseplants inside from the back deck until spring.  The plant Lloyd’s daughter, Carolyn, gave me as a house warming gift when in 1987 I moved with my kids, Chris and Cliff, to my present home has undergone many re-pottings.  It continues to stand as a sentinel just inside the long glass pane alongside our front door, greeting all who enter. One foot tall when I first gave this plant a home, it now stands well over six feet with shiny deep green fronds.  The other, a potted fig, which I bought shortly after moving in, stands where I first placed it, in the corner of the dining room now dubbed the “Monnett memorabilia corner” after my mom’s maiden name.   The headboard of the bed where my sister Martha lived the last weeks of her life was against one of the walls forming this corner.  Martha loved to draw, and her framed etching of St. Francis of Assisi accompanied by his words “serve with great humility” hangs next to another etching, of Martha as a beautiful little girl, artist unknown.  She personified those words of Francis. Two more framed pieces share that corner.  One is Zach’s pastel of his great-grandmother, my mom, and his great-aunt, my sister Martha, shortly after they died within three months of each other.  His parents, my daughter Chris and her husband John, found it in his take-home folder from elementary school and gave it to me. The other is a receipt for a workhorse purchased to plow the family tobacco farm that my grandfather Monnett (Pop to me) picked up at the dock in Prince Frederick, Calvert County.  I wrote in Reflections not many months ago that while he was waiting for the delivery of the horse my grandmother stepped off the overnight ferry from Baltimore for a visit with relatives in Calvert County.  My grandfather later told his family that as soon as he saw her he said to himself  “I’m going to marry that girl,” and he did. When he died in his 80’s, having survived his wife, Martha, by more that 20 years, all of his earthly possessions fit in one metal container the size of a shoebox.  When my mom opened that box, one of the dozen or so items inside was the receipt for that horse.  The date, August 8, 1899 – the cost, $70.50.  When my son, Cliff, saw it he said “you have to frame that receipt.”  I did, and when my mom died years later at the age of 94, it moved to my home. Although she never finished high school, my mom, “Ma” as she liked us to call her, was one of the best read people I have ever known – history, classic literature, philosophy.  Having worked as a legal secretary for a prestigious Baltimore law firm whose main client was the B&O Railroad, she was able to personally research the Monnett family history in the land records, before computers, back to 1600 and the St. Bartholomew’s  (sp?)massacre. Over a hundred years of family history in that corner.

Last week’s strong winds have left the maples virtually bare of their leaves, the ground beneath covered with a reddish golden carpet that crackles underfoot.

Now Lloyd and I can see the sky quite clearly overhead through the dense trees  from our bed in the morning and when we go for our daily walk in the Middle Patuxent Valley. 

We had a moment of nostalgia while we were walking last week. I had stopped to prop up my foot in order to tie my sneaker lace which had come undone.  From a couple of feet behind I heard Lloyd ask me “do you remember going to the five and dime store on a regular basis as a kid to replace worn-out shoe laces?”  Instantly I appeared in my own mind as a seven year old little girl, grubby from running and playing in the dirt with the other kids in our neighborhood in West Baltimore.  It was as if I had read Lloyd’s question in Proust’s “Remembrance of Things Past,” replete with the smell of a sweaty little kid playing in the dirt making mud pies

We had Thanksgiving dinner at our home with our kids as we have every year since we were married almost 20 years ago, with the exception of one year when it was too difficult for Zach to travel.  Chris and John had all of us at their home for dinner that year.  Each year on the night following Thanksgiving, the grandkids come back to our home for a sleepover and their parents go out for dinner together.  We sit around our dining room table and eat leftovers from the previous day.  This year there was little turkey left, so the kids ate pizza.  We all watch a movie together that the kids select.   This year the film was Princess Bride which some of the kids had already seen.  Watching it for the first time, Lloyd and I laughed so hard we could not catch our breath. After the movie when Lloyd and I had gone to sleep, the grandkids selected a name from among their cousins to exchange gifts when we get together on Christmas. Occasionally one or two of the grandkids go elsewhere on the night after Thanksgiving now that they are in college.  Lloyd and I have said that we will continue this tradition as long as any of them want to come, and if and when that time passes, we will miss the tradition and will be so grateful for all the beautiful times we had.

 REFLECTIONS ON ZACH

Last week at the Turf Valley golf course, the Zaching Against Cancer Foundation, which Zach himself founded, held it’s annual 10K race.  Last year there were about 400 participants.  This year more than 850 participated, most running.  Lloyd and I walked the course.  It was a beautiful sunny day.  After the race there was a great celebration of Zach with music and good food. In the midst of it all, Zach’s spirit shines through, appearing brighter each year.  It seems that everyone there had a personal story of how Zach’s life has inspired them, influencing their life deeply.

It becomes increasingly clear that the number will keep growing.  I can imagine Leonard Cohen’s having Zach’s indomitable spirit in mind while composing his magnificent “Hallelujah”. R.I.P. Leonard.

Two weeks ago a college student, Benjamin, approached me at a gathering and said he had done a college on-line project on Zach   He forwarded it to me, and I was amazed at the creativity, though not surprised.  Thank you Benjamin.

REFLECTIONS ON BALTIMORE, MY HOMETOWN

This month, Lloyd and I attended the memorial for our dear friend, Bob Duggan, who founded the Traditional Acupuncture Institute in downtown Columbia more than 30 years ago.  He also founded the Penn North Addictions Treatment Center in downtown West Baltimore.  The service was held in that center which is located very near where Freddy Gray suffered his fatal injuries in the course of being arrested.  There was no space left in the center, including for standing.  Many attending arrived in cars from the suburbs or out of town, and many more on foot from the surrounding neighborhood which the press often describes as “one of the most dangerous” in the city.

The rooms were filled with reverence as about ten individuals spoke of the profound and deep impact Bob had on their lives.  Some of those who gave tribute were individuals from Columbia and other parts of the country who had a professional relationship with Bob – each with an inspiring story.  Of the others, were those who worked with Bob or were treated by him at Penn North.  One young man, Shadow, the most eloquent of all, told of being sentenced to jail in Baltimore.  He was terrified that he would die in prison.  Shadow recounted how Bob talked with him each and every day – sometimes in person and sometimes by phone - as he served out his sentence.  To use Shadow’s precise words,  “I am alive today because of Bob Duggan.”

The service lasted three hours.  No one was fidgeting or appearing eager to leave.

Lloyd, who rarely engages in demonstrative gatherings such as Bob’s memorial service, told me “I would have happily stayed for three more hours.”

Virtually every month, I received a message from Bob about these “Reflections”.

Now you are the source of inspiration for us, Bob.  R.I.P.

(2 GUYS – DUNKIN AND MAC STORE IN MALL)

Baltimore Sun

Spotlighters to redevelop landmark Read’s building

What a great use of this landmark of Black history, a bastion of discrimination in my hometown.  I recall occasionally eating a sandwich with my Mom at the counter of this store in the center of downtown Baltimore’s shopping district with a department store on each of the four corners at Howard and Saratoga Streets – Hutzler’s, Hochschild Kohns, Stewart’s, and The May Company.  As an elementary school aged girl, I was completely oblivious to the discrimination taking place, though it could not have been more obvious considering all the black people on the sstreets outside, and yet none at the lunch counter. We would catch the streetcar, and then later the bus, on Edmondson Avenue to ride into town from home on the west side.  We would end our shopping day at Lexington Market at Fadely’s Seafood stand, run by a man from Ellicott City up Church Lane from Main Street. Later when I was attending the University of Maryland law school as a young mom, Fadely’s, just two blocks away, was a great place to grab a quick lunch of raw oysters at their seafood bar. Now to have the prospect of the great performances of the Spotlighters taking place there brings together social and economic justice in this city where I grew up.

REFLECTIONS ON PUBLIC POLICY IN OUR COUNTY, STATE AND NATION

I chose to include our recent presidential election in this section.

More than a few of you have told me that you are eager to hear what I have to say on this topic of such great and deep magnitude, not only to us citizens of the United States, rather for the entire planet and beyond. Some of you may be disappointed in what I have to say at this point. Be assured, I will not abandon my practice of speaking out loudly and clearly even when it is not popular to do so.

I will not now write in terms of issues – justice, economics, education, human rights – not yet. Nor will I write in terms of fear. I have chosen to focus on love, compassion, truth, and justice.  And I am not choosing that as a “soft” approach.  Hatred and anger can only lead to more hatred and anger.

I am calling forth the lessons I carried with me from my silent retreats over the past ten + years, particularly from Jack Kornfield who said (slightly paraphrased):

“It’s like two arrows. The first is the event itself, the painful experience.  It has happened.  We cannot avoid it.  The second arrow is the one we shoot into ourselves.  This arrow is optional. It adds to the initial pain with a rigid frightened state of mind. The great exemplars of non-violence such as Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. were strategic and skilled in this way.  They rallied people, used the courts, blocked the way, negotiated, moved forward and back, found allies, … all to stand up for what is right, AND they did it all with a loving heart.”

This does mean we become weak and flimsy.  Nor does it mean that I don’t realize the dire seriousness of our nation’s and the world’s current situation re public policy.  It is clear that my Democratic party was not well prepared and informed for this election.  I believe it is now clear that we should have known better, and I bear some of that responsibility.  I believe that we all share in the responsibility for this outcome, though not necessarily in equal shares.

For me, it is clear that right now I need to continue focusing on a peaceful heart and mind, while learning all I can about what we did wrong and how to avoid repeating our poor judgment in the future as we deal with a very different ideology in our new national government

I will not change my ways in participating in our democracy on issues of social, economic, and environmental justice.  I will take more time to absorb the results of the election, and then participate fully, hopefully with a loving heart.

NOV. 18 BALTIMORE SUN EDITORIAL BY NEWS EDITOR ANDY GREEN

Your own facts

Does the 2016 election mark the end of the objective truth?

I knew Andy when he covered the Maryland Legislature for the Sun.  I believe he hits it right on the mark in this editorial

REFLECTIONS ON OUR PLANET BEYOND THE UNITED STATES

A new political order in West

CENTER-LEFT LOSES ITS GRIP ON EUROPE

Post presidential election, we have more in common with European nations than

we ever imagined.

Report warns of planet’s plunging wildlife populations

We’d best do whatever it takes to move this item up on our global priority list.

These common birds have broken the world record for nonstop flight

Swifts tracked by study (in Sweden) were able to stay aloft for 10 months at a time

During their journey from Northern Europe to Central Africa.

Simply incredulous!

REFLECTIONS ON OUR UNIVERSE

Scientists hope to seize an opportunity to knock a nearby asteroid off course.

 “Andy Cheng of the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University (Lloyd’s employer for 30 years here in Howard County, though in the area of nuclear medicine engineering) is the lead U.S. investigator for this project.  He compared the mission to a linebacker slamming into a running back to knock him off course – only in this scenario, the running back is as big as the U.S. Capitol building, and the linebacker is moving at a pace six times as fast as a bullet shot from an AK-47.”

Pools of sorrow, waves of joy

Are drifting through my open mind

Possessing and caressing me

Across the Universe

~Lennon and McCartney

Be well and love life.

~ Liz

                       

October 2016 REFLECTIONS ON LIFE

(Monday is Halloween, then one more glorious month moves on into history.)

REFLECTIONS ON HOME IN COLUMBIA

October 10th marked Lloyd’s and my 23^rd wedding anniversary.  YIKES!

     After obtaining our marriage license at the courthouse in downtown Ellicott City lo those many years ago, we walked down the hill to Tersiguel’s restaurant on Main Street.  We have known the owner, Fernand, since this excellent French restaurant was located in another building about two blocks down the hill.  I had gone there frequently for lunch and dinner during my years in county government, and missed it terribly after the fire in the 80’s burned it to the ground.  For a few years Fernand operated a restaurant near the shot tower in east downtown Baltimore.  Then a few years later on Main Street he opened yet a third restaurant at its current location.  On that fall afternoon in 1993, Fernand was very happy to hear that we were about to be wed and sat us at a small table for two in a corner by the “Reynard” (fox) stained glass window.  For 21 years we returned to that same table for our anniversary lunch for 21 years.  The French entrees – lamb, fish, duck – and the fresh as fresh can be vegetables grown on the land where Fernand and his family lived were always scrumptious. Each year we accompanied our meal with a bottle of French Vouvray.

     Sad as we were to have our tradition of 22 years broken by the recent flood in Ellicott City, it took us literally no time to decide on our celebration restaurant for this 23rd anniversary - King’s Contrivance, another favorite for many years.  In addition to the excellent food and service, the scenery of the rolling green lawn with its stately trees, beautiful shrubs and flowers is readily visible through the solarium windows. We particularly love the awareness that we are dining in the childhood home of former Judge James Magill of the Circuit Court in Howard County.  He had strong feelings about preserving farmland in Howard County, and occasionally got me aside to share his wise thoughts about preservation legislation that I proposed as County Executive and which was then passed into law by the County Council.  To me the most memorable phrase of his judicial decisions was “When you let a whale through the net, you cannot block the minnows.” 

     After retiring from the bench, he studied to such a degree that he could, and did, read – in Greek - all of the Greek classics.  He also took up sculpting in marble and fine woods.  Lloyd and I have two of his modern sculptures in our living room, each about two feet tall - one in walnut which Lloyd gave me as a gift features a large egg shape enveloped in a likeness of a womb, and the other in pink marble entitled “Torso” which I purchased for Lloyd at one of the artist’s shows and had a label  “Happy Birthday, Lloyd” placed on it before we walked through the sales gallery together.

     Many called this brilliant and gentle man “Jamie,” though I could never bring myself to do so.  He was and always will be Judge Magill to me.

     Next year we will return to Tersiguel’s in their restored site on Main Street when, hopefully, there will be a greater respect for the power of water and the potential danger of run-off from allowing building on steep slopes and clear-cutting of trees near flood areas.

………

     I recall my writing months ago about my decision not to accept a position on any boards and commissions now that I no longer hold public office, choosing instead to carry out my commitment to various public policy issues as an individual.  I would join various organizations and speak out on social, economic, and environmental justice issues but not take a leadership position.   So in early 2015 when Mike Clark, who chaired the board of the Little Patuxent Review (LPR), a longstanding local literary publication, invited me to join its board, I responded that I was not going to accept any organizational board position.  I knew the founders of the publication, Ralph and Margot Treitel, who were original residents of Wilde Lake, Columbia’s first village.  Ralph personally delivered to me a copy of the first edition in which he had written an essay about me as a 30-some- year old new member of the Howard County Council.  Since then I have attended most of the unveilings of each of the bi-annual editions.  For many years now they have taken place in Oliver’s Carriage House in Town Center.  Each time I experience deep gratitude for the talent and often courage of the various authors of poems, short stories, and essays.  I can truly say that I walk away inspired each and every time.  Now that I am doing some writing of my own, mainly in these monthly e-newsletters, I treasure the role of LPR in our community even more. All of this to say that, with Lloyd’s concurrence, I have broken my vow to myself and accepted a position on the board of The Little Patuxent Review.  The decision feels very much in sync with my soul.

…

     Since my September issue, two men who exemplified the spirit of Jim Rouse’s Columbia have taken their last breaths on this planet - Bob Duggan and Gordon Livingston.  I first met Gordon as a peace activist, author, and psychiatrist.  He appeared to me as a conscience of our community.

       I came to know Bob Duggan shortly after I was first elected to the Maryland House of Delegates representing Columbia.  I had heard of the Traditional Acupuncture Institute, TAI, though I had never entered their institute then located in the American City Building in Downtown Columbia.  After lunch at the lakefront with Bob and two others from the institute, we walked back together, and I was given a tour of their offices and practice space.  Dianne Connelly joined us in a discussion of their mission of integrative health care.  The next day I phoned and made an appointment with Dianne for an initial acupuncture treatment, thus beginning more than 20 years of life learning.  “To come to life more fully” was one of the first transformative benefits I realized.  I could quote Bob for paragraph after paragraph, and I choose this one that he related he had heard from a monsignor who had once been his teacher in seminary.  They had been visiting together in Rome after not having seen each other for some time.  Bob expressed regrets at their time together coming to an end.  The monsignor replied, “However much time we have is enough”.  Those words have held me in such good stead countless times during these 20 some years, including my time with Zach, who had met Bob on a few occasions when they had a great talk.

     Your spirit surrounds us, Bob and Gordon.

REFLECTIONS ON ZACH

     Lloyd and I now have three grandkids in college.  Zach would have graduated from the University of Maryland last spring.  He had wanted to have a career in journalism. I believe he would have been quite gifted at that, AND, no matter how much so, he could not possibly have had a greater impact on so many lives than he did in showing all of us, so many of us, how to live and die.

     During this past month, as in every month, I am aware so often of all I learned and continue to learn from Zach.  That awareness was particularly strong when Lloyd and I visited Calvert County and returned to the roots of my Mom’s family, the Monnett’s.  My daughter Chris loved my mom very much.  She and Zach’s dad, John, gave Zach her surname as his middle name.  Zachary Monnett Lederer.  My first grandchild, my greatest teacher.

REFLECTIONS ON BALTIMORE, MY HOMETOWN

Lloyd and I spent two beautiful sunny days in Baltimore this month.  One was to visit the Patterson Park pagoda where my mom used to play as a young girl.  There are plaques on the pagoda marking the years when certain nationalities dominated the immigration waves - Germans in early 1900’s when my grandmother, Martha Elizabeth Schaub, came to this city with her parents.  She later married my grandfather, Laurence Lucien Monnett, from southern Maryland and gave birth to my mom, Helen Marie Monnett, in their home on Barry Street very near the Baltimore harbor.  We also visited Calvert County on the Chesapeake this month where my grandfather worked on a tobacco farm owned by his family who came here from France in the late 1600’s.

Our other day visit to Baltimore was to see the U.S.S. Zumwalt, a new large stealth ultra modern destroyer visiting the harbor for four days.  It was accompanied by the Navy Blue Angel team. Lloyd served in the navy in the mid 50’s including a four-month tour of the Mediterranean. Most of you know how anti-war I am, AND it would be less than honest for me to say I didn’t see beauty in those planes soaring and swooping over the harbor as Lloyd and I enjoyed a delicious lunch at a harbor side restaurant.  Conflicts in my mind.

A recent article in the Baltimore Sun reports on the return of the ship, Pride II, to its home harbor after travelling the east coast and Great Lakes to promote maritime education.  Upon return from the 3,000 mile voyage, the ship’s cook, Philip Keenan, said:  “It’s a tremendous opportunity to stay present and to be in the moment, because that’s all there really is.”  The Dali Lama could not have said it better.

Baltimore is Among the Most Lethal of the Nation’s Cities When It Comes to Shooting Deaths

Shoot to Kill

“He was about 13 years old.  Growing up in Baltimore, he knew it was wrong to shoot a man. Still he didn’t feel remorse. What he did feel was that his crew had new-found respect for him.”

More than any article I have read, this one gives me a clearer picture of just how huge is the task ahead of us to heal Baltimore.  It can be done.

The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA)

It was such a joy to read on the front page of The Baltimore Sun on October 28 that the BMA has been given the international distinction of assembling the U.S. entry into the 2017 Venice Biennale, arguably “the oldest and most prestigious international art exhibit in the world and often referred to as “the Olympics of the art world.”  We still have so much to do in the city in the areas of social and economic justice.  It is encouraging to see that we are still recognized for our great museum.  As I have written before, I have a particular soft spot for the BMA, having more that occasionally “slipped out” of class in the nearby high school I attended to visit this museum and expand my appreciation and knowledge of the arts.  Looking back, I think it has held me in good stead.

REFLECTIONS ON PUBLIC POLICY IN OUR COUNTY, STATE AND NATION

Howard County

I am very supportive of Question A on the ballot because it provides a good first step in reducing the impact of money on politics.  I must say that it simply defies logic for any of our County Councilmembers to even consider voting for the $100,000,000 TIF, a pure “gift” to Howard Hughes to build garages, and other projects necessitated by their development in Downtown Columbia which have previously been paid for by the development company itself

STATE

Prison Justice:

I have written in past months of my deep respect and admiration for Maryland’s Attorney General, Brian Frosh. The Baltimore Sun editorial below supports his plans to make injustice in our prison system a priority during the 2017 legislative session in Annapolis.

Health Care:

Vinny De Marco, who has been a tireless and very effective advocate for greater economic justice in our health care delivery system spoke at the Wilde Lake Interfaith Center this month on his plans for the upcoming legislative session.  Thank you, Vinny, for countless hours of hard work on behalf of others who cannot always help themselves.

Letter to the Editor of the Baltimore Sun

Dr. Andy Lazris, Ellicott

Health Care Held Captive

I have had the good fortune to hear Dr. Lazris speak a few times in our Columbia Community.  This man, whose daughter graduated from Wilde Lake High School last year with our grand daughter, Katerina, shows such wisdom and courage in advocating forcefully and by example for greater economic justice in the delivery of health in our state and nation. 

A deep “thank you” to you, Dr. Lazris

When My Times Comes, I Want the Option of Assisted Death

How inspiring it is to have Bishop Desmond Tutu join the ever-growing number of us calling for Death with Dignity, which will be a health priority again this year in the Maryland Legislature.

Another Baltimore Sun editorial

Evergreen’s Mission…We need all the competition we can get on Maryland’s health exchange but also the innovation the state’s lone health co-op has provided.

Dr. Peter Beilenson has done so much to provide economic justice in our health care system.  May he find a way to continue to do so.

Education:

Washington Post

Why future officers should study Shakespeare

Liberal arts should matter to the service academies as much as STEM

…and I would add to all fields of education.

Baltimore Sun

Top schools on PARCC exams very geographically

Sun analysis of math and English scores ranks Baltimore area schools

Can we really consider it new news that “test scores are often closely correlated with a family’s income and educational background”?

We particularly need to keep this in the forefront here in Howard County.

Transportation:

Rescuing Metro

This Washington Post

The troubled transit system needs a long-term dedicated funding source, not naysaying politicians.

U.S. National

Immigrants to be held in jails deemed unfit by Justice Department

ICE expands is use of for-profit, private prisons cited for deaths, poor care

We must stop this gross social and economic injustice

REFLEXIONS ON OUR PLANET BEYOND THE U.S.

Sweden

Washington Post

Lyrical laureate:  Nobel deems Dylan prize-worthy

     The Swedish Academy, in my opinion- though I realize some literary minds disagree - demonstrated deep wisdom in seeing poetry in the lyrics of Bob Dylan’s songs and accordingly awarding him the Nobel Prize in Literature.  At this time, our time on planet earth, there is so much beauty and so much horror. Perhaps, just perhaps, this recognition will ripple out and out through our planet like a rolling stone as the times they are a changin’ and the answer is blowin’ in the wind.

Mexico (via Calvert County, MD)

     Lloyd and I had the good fortune through the generosity of friends in Columbia to spend an October weekend at North Beach on Maryland’s western shore of the Chesapeake Bay, not far from where my grandparents met at the boat dock as I described on the prior section on Baltimore in this e-newsletter. Walking through town one afternoon, we came upon a small cottage with two elderly men sitting out on the front porch.  We stopped to say hello and noticed right inside the front yard fence a large butterfly bush laden with monarchs, just as I described them in an earlier newsletter on the milkweed plants around our pond.  The men told us that hundreds of them settled on that bush every fall.  They were shocked and pleased when we told them those monarchs were en route to the central Mexico mountains in their annual migration.

     It has not been that many years, circa 1975, since the Monarch Butterflies overwintering sanctuaries were discovered in the Mexican state of Michoacan, 50 miles northwest of Mexico City. The story of the discovery was published in the August 1976 edition of National Geographic Magazine.  Every autumn hundreds of millions of these orange, black, and white beauties migrate thousands of miles from eastern Canada and the United States to the mountains of Central Mexico, where they spend the winter.  In February they commence their return flight north. 

(Google to learn more about their incredible multi-generational journey.)

     In 1999, Lloyd and I travelled to central Mexico and visited several towns: Patzcuaro, known for its elaborate and extensive celebration of the Day of the Dead, and Morelia where Lloyd located a driver who was willing to take us to visit the monarchs’ wintering site.  Fortunately, the site had not been commercialized.  Walking from the car to the steep hillside leading to the large evergreens, we passed several handmade rickety wooden stalls where local women were selling bottles of juice and roughly carved walking sticks used to assist in the climb.  I bought a stick about four feet in length and one inch thick which had been hand carved to a semi smooth state.  It served me well on the climb up and back down, and now rests in the entry hall of our home against a table upon which lives the Barbara Kingsolver novel, “Flight Behavior,” about the effect of climate change on monarch butterflies.  After about a twenty-minute climb, we reached the area of maximum monarch density.  The branches of the tall evergreen were drooping to an almost vertical position due to the weight of tens of thousands of butterflies.  As we walked, several monarchs alit on our jackets and slacks.  Within minutes of our stopping at an optimum viewing location, Lloyd was literally covered with hundreds of these magnificently beautiful creatures.  In my mind’s eye, I can still see him clearly, a perfect model for a Diego Rivera or Frieda Kahlo painting.

Everything is connected.

REFLECTIONS ON OUR UNIVERSE

Super moon

     The October full moon on the 15^tth and 16th was the first of three “super moons” that will close out the year 2016, continuing in November and December.  Super moon is the unofficial term when a full moon coincides with its closest approach to earth (perigee) in its oval-shaped orbit, making it appear four percent larger in the night sky and often taking on an orange hue.  Super moons appear larger because they are a bit closer to the earth.  When we look toward the horizon we are looking through a greater thickness of earth’s atmosphere than when we look overhead. The greater thickness of atmosphere in the direction of the horizon scatters blue light most effectively, but it lets red light pass through to your eyes, creating an orange hue.

Earthsky.org, Columbia PATCH

Washington Post 

There may be 10 times as many galaxies in the universe as scientists thought.

      Now there’s a moderate and manageable goal to which I can expand my awareness of the universe during daily meditation – 200 billion galaxies!

Pools of sorrow, waves of joy

Are drifting through my open mind

Possessing and caressing me

Across the Universe

~Lennon and McCartney

Be well and love life.

~ Liz