Reflection: the Year(s) in Review

February 2017: this is the midway point in my five-year term as Parent Representative on the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education. Governor Deval Patrick appointed me in August 2014, and as a sitting, twice-elected School Committee member at the time, Massachusetts General Laws required that I step down from that role in order to accept my new role on the State Board.

Coming in, I knew there'd be differences, although, arranged around the table as we are with the Commissioner, the State Board looks very much like a School Committee sitting with their Superintendent and, insofar as both bodies create policy and hire and evaluate their department leader, that's understandable thinking. However, the work is not the same (and I have a whole, new appreciation for elected School Committees and their work). It's not that decisions are "easier" or "harder"; a locally elected policymaker and advocate sees and hears steadily from residents about how their decisions impact locally. That local impact from community members is what's missing from my appointed role and that, apparently, is by design. To the degree that parliamentary procedure is acknowledged and recognized, we have some discretion.

Still, no other State Board of Education reserves a seat for a parent's perspective and it's a privilege to be that parent with a voice in the decisions being made here.

A decision I made when coming on Board was to communicate via this blog to parents, educators, and others about what it's like to sit at that table and to share some of my thoughts about it. Many of my twitter and Facebook followers have made a point of telling me how much they appreciate hearing from that perspective, since they know of no one else doing it. I've been reflecting on that decision, and on my public life; here's what's worth sharing, halfway through my term:

• Public Service and Volunteerism are alive and well in local, state, & national roles. In addition to serving on the State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education, I continue serving as an elected rep from my neighborhood to Town Meeting. My State Board colleagues nominated me, then, at the annual conference in October 2015, representatives from 10 NASBE states elected me as Northeast Area Director to the NASBE Board of Directors. That was a bonus bit of involvement I could not have anticipated at the time of my appointment. It's rewarding to see so many interested in my NASBE posts, especially when they juxtapose with issues locally and statewide. Since we are in the period of transition to a new White House administration (DeVos) and to a new education law (ESSA), it is, as they say, "interesting times". Decisions made at national and state levels have the most impact when they resonate locally.

• Online & Offline Life: balance lies in dropping on and off. Facebook friends are the longest suffering, so I encourage people to follow my Facebook page instead. Twitter followers will give me a poke (if I've been away so long that they've actually noticed) and have reached out to be sure I wasn't too ill to tweet. Instagram is a nice place to spend some time, too.

• Upshot: I'm not nearly as courageous as I'd like to be. Reflecting back on that statement reveals that I've sought clarity about what matters and have been willing to step out of my comfort zone. Also, that I'm resilient to keep going in spite of it all. When I'm feeling pressure "to be more courageous", I've discovered that if I focus less on the action itself ("What's the bold action I can take here?") and more on the relationship ("Who matters most to me here?"), then bold action is much more clear. From there, it's much easier to understand the thing that I seek to do.

True Sympathies

In the birth-order of his large family, Glen's place was somewhere toward the eldest end of siblings. He was a few years older than me and I was close to him by association, which is to say, I wasn't close at all.

After college, a dozen of us singers from UMass, joined singers from New York, North Carolina, Florida, and California to work as performing wait staff at the Mount Washington Hotel, in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. I'd worked hard at the several jobs I'd had before this, but the work at the hotel was most intense.

We worked breakfast and dinner and rehearsed every day for a few hours following the breakfast shift, until about 1:00 or so. We had the rest of the afternoon to ourselves (such as it was) until returning to the dining room at 5:30 to prepare to serve dinner and, most nights, to perform one or two songs in the main dining room at about 8:00. After dinner we made a quick change (out of alpine-inspired waiting garb) into evening costumery and performed an impressive floor-show for hotel guests in the ballroom.

The living was intense, too. The vast majority of us lived in small, private rooms in the on-site housing (dormitory) above the hotel's laundry and dry cleaning because housing, beyond the rambling resort property, was scarce (if you've ever visited the Bretton Woods area, you know how remote it is); it also made it easier to be on time for those 6:30 AM breakfast calls.

Only a couple of weeks into the season, and there was an outbreak of salmonella. Kitchen, housekeeping, and dining staffs were reduced by more than a third. We were asked to call on friends and family to see if any were available and interested to join the ranks of hotel workers while those ill went off to recuperate; some hunkered down in their rooms; others left altogether. That's when I met Glen. He was one of the replacements who showed up that June to work as a member of the performing wait staff. Glen teamed up with Mary in the dining room and lived, not in the dorms but behind them, in a dwelling that was a bit further down the property. Instead of stressing out about the work and rehearsal schedules, Glen seemed amused by it all.

The music, sweat, and laughs we all shared, as well as the dorm-style living and long days of work with little time off, made fast friends of us all, and some of those friends married each other; Mary and Glen did so not long after that summer. I didn't keep up with them afterward, even after the birth of their daughter; they stayed up north and built their lives in NH. After a few years, though, they divorced. I'd seen Mary only a few times since then and lost touch with Glen altogether.

An out of the blue email, sent to me and my bestie, Carol, informed us of Glen's untimely passing. She had remained in touch with Glen and, in her follow up email to me, wrote that she wanted to go to the service, and offered to pick me up early and drive us there.

Spring in New Hampshire is the exact opposite of its lush green summer or crisp colorful autumn; it's called "mud season" for good reason. The landscape is bleak and uninspiring, but grey Cranmore, Moat, and white-capped White Mountains rise above it all.

We arrived ahead of schedule, parked on the street across from the church, and walked up the block for coffee. Our reminiscing, begun in the car on the drive up, continued in the cafe. We talked easily and laughed hard about those busy, chaotic hotel days. Memories, of the time we mapped our dreams and held them close, quickened. Unconsciously, I panned to my twenty-something self, then to my contemporary me, as if scanning a view in different seasons from high atop some precipice.

Our coffees consumed, we walked to the church. Mary greeted us at the entrance, all twinkling eyes, bright smile, and open arms. Inside it was pristine and light and full of family and years of friends. Sunlight streamed through clear glass, full-length and clerestory windows. Glen’s casket was at the foot of the altar steps. People acknowledged each other with big hugs or smiles or by simply nodding. During the service they shared delightful, heartfelt stories; beautiful music and songs and poetry and tears were offered. Before the final blessing, a piper played “Amazing Grace” on his bagpipes, outside, from the knoll behind the church.

The church emptied slowly as we followed the casket and pooled onto the walkway. Only immediate family would go to the interment. The rest of us were slow to move to cars, but eventually we did and drove a few miles to the inn where we would meet up with Glen's family for a reception.

The too-bright sky, brilliant blue and cloudless above dense pines, reflected on mirrored and polarized shades of the mourners, outside, on the inn's broad patio. We lingered there, over coffee or ale or single malt, sharing stories and laughing and catching up. I was struck to feel, after all the years between the hotel and now, this connected to Glen. No Time stood between us.

After visiting a good while, Carol and I said our goodbyes to everyone and settled into the car for the drive home. We did so in silence, initially, reflecting on observations from the church or during the service or at the reception. That "No Time" feeling, I now understood, was Love: Love between friends and shared experiences, for family, and for places and times. A poem had taken shape in my mind and, once home, I wrote it down:

drove
to the big White Mountains
stopped
in a church to pray
heard
the thoughtful people
what they sang and had to say

in the church
Love testified
to wise and poignant turns of phrase
a tapestry of vibrant hue
the record of his days

Love never dies

reflected big blue dome above
drove past pines
and heard the ‘pipes
amazing grace
how sweet the sound
put Love into the ground

Love never dies

The Hours*

I've blogged before about my years living at Shim Gwang Sa, Mind Light Temple, located on the outskirts of Boston. It was wonderful community living and a privilege to train zen martial arts under the tutelage of a modern Zen Master. After several seasons I became attuned to temple life and the concomitant seasonal changes in nature, due in part to the tempo of care and maintenance of the temple building itself, its gardens, and grounds.

With the setting back of clocks this weekend, I'm reminded that we revere monastics (and poets) for their moment-to-moment awareness: awareness of subtle shifts in nature, awareness of time.(1) Thinking further about time found me reflecting on the monastic understanding of the word "hour", which goes back to the Greek word, hora.

The Greek notion means "time" or "season", and is more expansive than our notion of a day evenly divided into twenty-four-hour segments. Modern folk come closer to an appreciation of the original understanding when considering the seasons of the year: in which a season is a mood and an experience, not an exact period that starts, say, on December twenty-first and ends on March twenty-first. We sense a difference in the quality of light, the length of daylight, the feel of the air on our skin and are aware that something is changing in nature.

This time of year feels natural to slow down and begin a daily practice of contemplation and meditation. All of this thinking about monastic life has drawn forth memories of extended family who had taken Holy Orders -- and of my first encounters with the canonical hours. A canonical hour is more a presence than a measurement. Benedictine Brother David refers to this sense of time as "a soul measure". He says, even in our busy modern schedules we notice that pre-dawn, early morning, and high noon each have qualities all their own. Mid-afternoon, "the time shadows lengthen", has a different character from the time when it gets dark and we turn on the lights. Each monastic hour issues a distinctive challenge and calls for a unique response; just reading about them invites a sense of calm and purpose:

• Vigils - The Night Watch: before the day's noises begin; when it is still perfectly quiet

• Lauds - The Coming of the Light: around breakfast time; nourish your soul for the coming day

• Prime - Deliberate Beginning: when you get to your workplace and just before you begin

• Terce - Blessing: a mid-morning prayer break

• Sext - Fervor and Commitment: a meditation during lunch hour

• None - Shadows Grow Longer: the needed boost for the last hours of the work day

• Vespers - Lighting the Lamps: an evening celebration

• Compline - Completing the Circle: at night just before going to bed

Of course, there are many ways to pray (and not all chose to). It was said of Abba Arsenius, a desert monk from 4th or 5th century Egypt, that on Saturday evenings, preparing for the "the glory of Sunday", he would turn his back on the sun and stretch out his hands in prayer towards the heavens, till once again the sun shone on his face. Then he would sit down.
- - -
* Bonus hour this weekend with the end of Daylight Saving Time; clocks back Saturday night.

(1). 

OneWord

In the last days of 2014, my PLN challenged me to reflect on OneWord of purpose for the coming year. (More about the OneWord spark from PLN colleague Ted Huff here). And my initial reflection brought many good words of purpose to mind:

courage - strength - vision - soul - authentic - thrive - desire - passion - dream - inspire - essential - hope - imagine - persevere - reflect 

I carefully considered each one, ultimately deciding that these very good words were better suited as foundation words from which to build and support my OneWord choice. I wondered: Could my OneWord sum up all that I hoped for in my vision of purpose and interaction with people, things, time? It is to lead, persist, and inspire with soul, yes, and to lead from the truth of who I am.

The word I claimed for myself is, BOLD. In the past few months of living with the word, I have come to understand that to focus on it is to arrive at what is most essential; a word of purpose and commitment that is applicable personally, professionally, and in my public life.

"Change is easy - you go first."

We know that change is hard. One thing I like about the OneWord concept is that it enhances who I already am. This isn't to say that adopting my word has been easy, but it has been illuminating. PLN colleague, P.A. Cormeny noted that when one begins to focus on one's word, one sees it exhibited in others (see her OneWord blogpost). I also like the way her post included quotes in support of her word and so I offer the following:

One must be bold, at the risk of having been deceived and making mistakes.
~ Camille Pissarro

Freedom lies in being bold.
~ Robert Frost

Even as far back as between 29 and 19 BCE, Virgil provides: Fortune favours the bold.

Themes of Justice and Mercy, Virtue and Sin predominate in Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, where we find: Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful.

Reflecting on a good use of the word for public service, Thomas Jefferson said: I was bold in the pursuit of knowledge, never fearing to follow truth and reason to whatever results they led, and bearding every authority which stood in their way.

Be bold. Be dynamic. Be unafraid. And continue to make this the #BestYearEver.

Monks and Ripples

Back in my twenties, after attaining a First Degree Black Belt in Shim Gum Do Korean Zen Martial Arts, I moved into the monastery located on the outskirts of Boston. I lived with other residents and the Founding Master, Zen Master Chang Sik Kim, a Korean Zen Buddhist monk who taught us and other students at Shim Gwang Sa, the Mind Light Temple.

Shim Gwang Sa is a renovated 100+ year-old building, a former church. Students in the Residency Program have professional jobs or attend college classes during the day and maintain a daily morning and evening meditation and martial arts practice and weekly temple work schedule. During the nearly four years I lived there, the number of residents varied between nine and sixteen, and ages ranged from adults in their twenties and thirties, primarily, with a few folks in their forties.

None of us at Shim Gwang Sa aspired to monkshood. We took no vows of celibacy or poverty; we were training for good health and successful living. In ideal terms though, there was a lot we could learn from the monk: a monk always knows what he's supposed to do at any given time of the day and temple-life strove for this ideal.

In college, I had been introduced to the poems and writings of American Trappist monk Thomas Merton and German-language poet Rainer Maria Rilke. Merton's work, The Seven Storey Mountain, written during his first years in the monastery at Gethsemani, redefined contemplative life for many. Rilke had no desire to become a monk, but he was so moved by the monastic life he found when he traveled in Russia - and was particularly inspired by the archetype of the monk - that he wrote a series of poems called The Book of Hours, the title coming from the book from which monks chant the canonical hours.

I live my life in widening circles that reach out across the world. I may not complete this last one but I give myself to it. 

I circle around God, around the primordial tower. I've been circling for thousands of years and I still don't know: am I a falcon, a storm, or a great song? 

~ Rainer Maria Rilke, Book of Hours (translation by Joanna Macy and Anita Barrows)

To the monk, a canonical hour is more a presence in the day rather than our common understanding of a sixty-minute segment of it. We come closer to appreciating the monastic idea when reflecting on the seasons of the year: each season is defined less by exact start and end dates and more on qualitative aspects of time expressed in nature.

Before the calendar marked the beginning of Autumn last week, we already knew something was underway. One sensed a subtle shift in mood: the angle and quality of light and diminishing daylight betrayed the warm summer temperatures. I noted that some of the trees had given way to this shift with changing leaves, in evidence since August. It's the time of year when personal reflection comes more easily and naturally for me, too; I reflect on personal goals, hopes, dreams. It feels easier now that children are back in school than during our active summer.

Even in our busy schedules, we notice that different times of the day have unique qualities, as well. In monastic life, each hour issues a distinct challenge and calls for a response.

Living healthy lives means building in moments of daily vision, then letting our action flow from it. A Japanese proverb warns: 

Vision without action is a daydream.
Action without vision is a nightmare.

The over-arching clarity of our vision and action ultimately builds our days, our weeks, our lives. To the monk, life is about bringing together clarity of vision and action in each moment by moment. Vision alone, meditation alone, is incomplete contemplation. Completing the circle requires a melding of vision and action; all of us (not just monks!) are called to contemplation in this sense.