New Blog

Dear Readers,

Thanks for the attention you have given to this blog.  I am going to keep it open as a resource I can use in my work.  I decided to begin a new blog on the cusp of the Fall Equinox.  This blog will be more personal, philosophical and will focus on living well in the last third of life.  I am guessing at age 65 I am well into the last third and look forward to articulating the journey.  I invite you to take a look at my first post.  A subscription by e-mail to this blog will not work for the new blog.  You need to register by e-mail on the new site.

I am titling my blog A Delicate Balance.   I look forward to continuing the journey with you.

Stone structure at Western Washington University

Thanks for reading.

Drew

Taking a Breath: Reflections on Sabbaticals

Dear Readers, As I get ready to put this blog to rest and begin new adventures in blogging I thought I would share an edited version of a sermon I delivered this past week at my church, the Bellingham Unitarian Fellowship and sprinkle it with a few pictures I took this year.

Taking a Breath: Reflections on Sabbaticals

Drew Lenore Betz

August 30, 2015

I was the guest speaker at my church on Sunday this week .  I volunteered to do the service because I spent the first six months of this year on a professional leave from my regular work at WSU.  I was on sabbatical and it never failed to amaze me when someone would ask me in a very friendly and well meaning manner how my trip was or when they showed surprise to see me in town as if I should have been in a remote place in the world.  I winced when I read the following references in the book, Time Off, The Upside to Downtime by Enea and LaTourette (2005) -  “gone are the days when the word sabbatical was used to describe the wacky university professor who needs a year overseas to study the mating habits of the Australian Wombat.  The authors refer to the professors who take sabbaticals as madcap.  Really? 

Many people have a vision of what they think a sabbatical is or should be and it is fun to explore that with others. The real rubber hits the road when you have to define it for yourself and do the work of sabbatical.

 Part One: Historical Roots

All Souls Church in NYC

Sabbaticals have their roots in ancient Hebrew traditions.  Most of us know that the Sabbath is celebrated on the seventh day of the week.  Also known as Shabbat, it is a time to be and to love. 

Rabbi Arthur Waskow, in Take Back Your Time (John deGraaf ed, 2003) in his Chapter, “What Can America Learn from Shabbat?,” explains the scriptural roots. 

            “For all the religious traditions that take the Hebrew Scriptures seriously, there is a teaching we call Shabbat. (The word is usually translated into English as “Sabbatch,” and comes from the Hebrew word for pausing and ceasing.)

            In Exodus 20:8-11, the reason given for the Sabbath is to recall Creation; in Deuteronomy 5:12-15, it is to free all of us from slavery.  In the Jewish mystical tradition, it is taught that these seemingly two separate meanings are in fact one.  Meditate on them, and we can see then that way.

            And we are taught not only the seventh day Shabbat: there are also the seventh year and the seven times seven plus one year, the fiftieth year, the Jubilee.

            In the seventh year, the land must be allowed to catch its breath and rest, to make a Shabbat for God, the breath of Life.  Since everyone in ancient Israel was a shepherd or farmer, this meant almost the whole society rested.  Since no one was giving orders and no one was obeying them, hierarchies of bosses and workers vanished. 

            In the year-long Shabbat, even debt – the frozen form of stored up hierarchy- was annulled.  Those who, because of poverty, had been forced to borrow money were released from the need to repay; those who out of wealth, had been pressed into lending were released from the need to collect.

            And in the fiftieth year, the land could breathe freely once again and the and not be worked.  All land was redistributed in equally productive shares, clan by clan, as it had been originally held. …

            These year long Jubilee observances that the Bible calls “shabbat shabbaton,” “Sabbath to the Sabbatical Power,” or deeply restful rest” are times of enacting the social justice, and times of freeing the earth from human exploitation.  They are times of releases from attachments and habits, addictions and idolitries. “Pp. 125-126

The seven-year break for reflection and change remains with us and sabbaticals can be one of the benefits in academia and for ministers.  I will suggest ways in which the sabbatical can be of benefit to a wide range of people in part three of this talk.

The modern sabbatical is not a time to let fields lay fallow or to have all your debts forgiven or to free the slaves.  It is a time for one to set aside of period of time in which work as usual is suspended and perhaps when we free ourselves of slavery to the routines that keep us busy in the Doing of our lives.    The typical modern tradition in the academic world is to grant sabbatical or professional leave as it is called once every seven years to faculty and staff who are eligible.  In ministry there are similar rules.  Sabbaticals can vary in length from a few months to a year.  In many cases some or all salary is paid during the leave.  In my world, a six-month leave is fully paid and a full year leave is supported at 50% of salary.  Churches who budget and save for sabbatical leave for their ministers and for the expenses they incur in the ministers absence are honoring the renewal that our professional leaders need.

Sabbaticals provide renewal, time to really focus and learn new skills or knowledge that will enhance one personally and/or professionally.   I have been inspired by the sabbatical experiences that colleagues and ministers have taken.   I remember Doug Wadkins, our previous settled minister at Bellingham Unitarian Fellowship, taking a sabbatical trip to the Midwest on the train and gathering stories from passengers.  Doug loved couching his sermons in the context of the most amazing life stories and he came back with wonderful new stories that taught him and all of us about lives well lived.  I remember my colleague Sam Tower, who was the WSU 4-H Challenge Course manager, taking a year to live in India and work with Play for Peace and then sharing that with many colleagues in the Experiential Education community.  He is now retired and continues his Play for Peace work both at home and internationally.   My colleague Tom Power is an accomplished scholar and has spent a great deal of time growing the Human Development Department and Prevention Sciences PhD program at WSU.  He was granted a year’s sabbatical at the end of his 13-year term as department head (long overdue) and spent most of the time catching up with his research and writing.  I had lunch with him last week in Pullman and we were debriefing on our sabbaticals.  I asked him about his time and he said he mostly stayed in Pullman and wrote a bunch of articles.  I asked him what a bunch meant.  He grinned and told me 10 or so. I asked him about the status of those articles and he said most were in press or accepted.  I am guessing that most of you will not be able to fully grasp what is means to produce 10 articles for publication in academic journals but I assure you it is a bucketload!  His break was from all the administrative details and his sabbatical gave him the time he needed to process the results of years of backlogged research findings and to interpret the meaning for the wider community of his peers.  There are many more stories I could share and I am guessing you have some of your own. 

Part Two:  My Sabbatical Experience:

I knew when I came to work for WSU Extension in 1993 that I wanted to earn and take a sabbatical.  When I say earn, I mean that I had to first earn tenure and then I would be eligible to apply.  I earned tenure in 1999 and it took fourteen years for my sabbatical dream to be realized.  Position and life changes scuttled the idea of sabbatical more than once.  Moving to Bellingham in 2001, my daughter Kate’s death in 2002, the retirement of our county extension director and my own appointment to that administrative position in 2010 all were reasons to defer an application for leave.  I decided to focus my energies on what I could do and worked towards a promotion to full Professor (2006) and then spend five amazing years on a project that expanded our Whatcom County programming to Latino audiences. 

My work on the five year project, officially named the Creating Culturally Competent Programs for Families, provided the spark for my sabbatical proposal and consequent leave.  I have been fortunate to be exposed to Latino issues and family programs since the early 1980’s when I was working with a statewide team that also included a project with the Washington State Migrant Council.  I learned early about how the cultural values of respect and family characterize the decisions and choices people make about their lives.  In my early years with Extension I recruited cultural guides to work with the growing immigrant population in Lewis County (Centralia and Chehalis).   We worked to establish a small family support center for Latino families and I learned that the Catholic Church had not migrated north with these families, meaning there were no masses in Spanish being offered and the families who built their lives around faith were being supported by a few Rogue nuns (from the words of Sister Catherine, a Dominican sister who worked in the area at the time).  It explains the religious diversity that exists in the Latino population in the northwest.

 It was not until I began working with families here in Whatcom County that that I became aware of the devastating impact that our US immigration policy was having on families.  I will tell you the story of one mother and her children and how that experience propelled me into my sabbatical.  Rosa (not her real name) came to our Fortaleciendo Familias program with her oldest child.  She was an eager student and our facilitation team was so impressed they invited her to come to training to become a facilitator.  She attended the training and it was suggested that we hire her when we had the chance.  I followed through and received her application.    The night I went to complete the paperwork with her and get copies of her official documents (in my world it is called I-9 documentation – social security card, driver’s license, green card, passport, etc), all she could give me was a pay stub from a dry cleaners.  I said that I needed her actual documents and she looked upset and said they were at home.  I was speaking to her with the help of one of my bi-lingual staff.  Rosa’s English was limited.  I will never forget the vigilance of her two sons who were watching the process and looked really concerned for their mother.  It took me a moment to realize that Rosa did not have legal documents and the reason why.  I quickly assured her and her sons that I although I could not hire her I would not share the information about her status with anyone else.  I assured them that they were safe.  I knew then that I needed to learn more about the whole immigration system and process and how it impacted the family system for our growing Latino population.  That experience was the spark that I needed to plan my sabbatical.

 

Art at the Wall in Nogales, Mexico

A poster in one of the shelters we visited.

Our learning community - Borderlinks journey

I dove into sabbatical planning.  The time was right and I had vision for doing some work that I had talked about for a long time.  When I wrote my first proposal and sent it for review to our Extension administration, I was advised to focus less on producing and more on learning.  I panicked at first.  I was so used to doing and to being a producer.  I was convinced that if I could rewrite the curriculum we were using with Rosa and other families to include contemporary issues that included immigration, acculturation, talking about personal safety, etc. that would be a huge benefit.  I was surprised that I was being asked what I would learn and how my study would benefit the larger community and the university.  I realized that I needed what authors Bob Sessions and Lori Erickson in their chapter,” A Case for Sabbaticals” in Take Back your Time (2003) call the true benefits of a sabbatical, rest and a new perspective.  

What a gift it has been to take a break from my normally busy and productive work life to rest, recuperate, and dive deep into an area of study and potential work that I deeply care about.  I know that some of you have been reading my blog (more proof of my drive to produce – albeit in a new and fun way) and I am beginning to connect my sabbatical learning to my work at the university.  Taking this break to really explore has been life changing for me and the benefits go beyond the learning about immigration.  A few things that have come for me:

-       I really enjoyed traveling with Michael to the Southwest and to NYC and involving him in the process, not something I can do when my work is office based.  He and I both participated in the UUCSJ border justice experience. He went to visit family support centers, graduate seminars, worker justice organizers and spoke to field workers and professionals with me.  I think he has more appreciation about why I work.

Mike in blue coat waiting to go into the Kino Center.

-       I took the time to look at my priorities and where I was spending my time.  I am not so caught up in the fury of daily e-mails as I used to be and am less likely to jump into new projects that are not central to my personal and professional goals. 

-       I rediscovered the joy of writing and discovered how to journal (aka blog) on line.

-       I feel renewed and really ready to work for a few more years and to have a productive late career instead of passing time until I feel ready to retire.

-       I was also able to come back.   A true sabbatical involve re-integration into that which was left for a time.  Coming back can be as hard as leaving.  I am so grateful that I was welcomed back with open arms the day I returned to the office. More on that in Part 3.

Part Three:  Creating Sabbatical Space

I have shared a bit about the roots of the sabbatical tradition and the modern traditions in academics and religion.  I know that sabbaticals exist in some other workplaces but they are more rare than not outside of the traditional forms.

I believe that it is possible for many people to take a sabbatical.  Session and Erickson contend that sabbaticals are for everyone.  They are referring to Americans who are employed in full time jobs and who lead very busy lives.  They argue that we could all benefit from more time to nourish our spirits and develop other parts of our lives and that our workplaces would benefit from having employees who are invigorated, refreshed and ultimately more productive because of their time away.  They emphasize that planning is key.  I think there are several key elements to having a successful sabbatical experience and I believe these principles serve for those who are employed or not. 

1.     Before any planning can take place, it is important to dream a bit.  Imagining what, how, when, where and why you would use your time.

2.     People who are employed in any setting must identify the job from which they can take leave.  If there are essential functions that have to be covered, those need to be identified and someone or a group of someones need to take over.  In my case, I had colleagues who stepped into various management roles in my absence and it worked.  In a church community, committees, visiting and associate ministers fill the gaps in the pulpit and pastoral care. 

3.     One must be prepared to really let go and then to integrate upon return.  Neither is easy if done intentionally, especially in today’s world of instant communication.  One of the many stories I have heard about ministers who take sabbaticals is that they fear their congregations will like have them gone better than they like having them there.  I was in a church in which that happened but I suspect it is the exception rather than the rule. 

4.     If one is retired or employed less than full time there may be something that is occupying more time than desired or in which one has reached the point of burnout.  Taking a break, a leave or time away from a committee or a group is something that can be done but it is rarely done with a plan to come back.  I have left several groups and have often wished I could have taken a sabbatical from the groups.  I attempted it once with a quilting group so I could focus on creating art quilts and it had limited success.  I therefore think that sabbaticals work best where there is a community to support the process whether it is a family, a workplace, a church community or a club. 

5.     The process works when there is some intentionality and there are plans and accountability that speaks to the learning and changes one is making.  I think it is important to share the sabbatical experience with at least one other person or to somehow recognize what has changed.

6.     I think it is important to focus some aspect of the sabbatical on feeding the spirit.  Although a sabbatical is not a vacation, it does provide more time for rest and focus.  Engaging in beauty, travel, art, cultural and service learning experiences can be part of that spiritual experience.

I invite you dream a little about taking a sabbatical.

Imagine a friend, loved one or colleague coming to you and saying that you could take six months off from your normal work, whether paid or not, if you could make a plan and a commitment to learning something that could help yourself or others. 

How would you start?

What might you let go of?

What might you learn?

How would you share it with others?

I will close with wisdom from Sessions and Erickson.

            Taking a sabbatical isn’t often easy.  It typically requires creativity, hard work, and a significant financial commitment.  But those who have taken them say that these life changing experiences are more than worth the effort…..

            What we need, clearly is a better balance between work and rest.  As Wayne Muller says, “If certain plant species…do not lie dormant for winter, they will not bear fruit in the spring.  If this continues for more than a season, the plant begins to die.  If dormancy continues to be prevented, the entire species will die.  A period of rest – in which nutrition and fertility most readily coalesce – is not simply a human psychological convenience: it is a spiritual and biological necessity.”

            We remain convinced: everyone needs a sabbatical. (p. 171 in Take Back Your Time).

Reference: DeGraaf. John (Ed), Take Back Your Time: Fighting Overwork and Time Poverty in America.  San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. 2003.

As always,

Thanks for reading.

All Lives Matter

"How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard."  A.A. Milne.  (Thanks to Gratefulness.org for the word of the day for July 11th).

I have had a busy few weeks of being back at work and re-entering the busy world of Extension work.  My sabbatical time is over and I have cherished it.  The more distance I get the more I realize what a privilege and profound experience it was for me personally.

During my last week of sabbatical I was privileged to attend General Assembly of the Unitarian Universalist Association in Portland Oregon.  Mike and I represented our congregation as voting delegates.  I have never experienced democracy on such a large scale and I was really fascinated by the process and how messy real democracy can be.  Hearing all voices is not easy when there are so many different stories.  My GA experience focused on social justice, honoring differences and diversity, appreciating the value of shared worship and connecting with friends from far and wide.  A retired colleague from University of Nevada in Reno and I realized at a joint meeting some time ago that we shared our faith tradition.  Jackie was in Portland and sought me out.  We had lunch together and shared the joy of work and personal connections.  We stayed with our friends Debbie and Rick in their Raleigh Hills retreat and were glad to get away each day from the crowds.  As an educator I am connected to social justice and equal access to opportunities.  This part of my work connects so well with the Unitarian and Universalist traditions of social justice and changing the world so everyone can experience dignity and freedom.  Our denomination stands on the shoulders of great social reformers.  This year the 50th anniversary of the march to Selma was celebrated.  It was hard to miss the dignitaries who walked across the bridge to honor the people who suffered and lost their lives in the struggle for racial equality in the south.  Two of the four people who died in March, 1965, were Unitarians.  Reverend James J. Reeb and Viola Gregg Liuzzo were both there to witness and help the cause.  Some 500 Unitarians were present in Selma in 1965 and the same number returned in March.  Our churches in Baltimore, Missouri, South Carolina and in other places around the nation are working to right social injustice for oppressed people.  Black Lives Matter was one of the themes that was prominent at GA.  Our meeting came not a week after the shooting in Charleston and the consequent destruction of African American congregations in the south.  It was pure synchronicity that Rev. Dr. Cornel West, renowned scholar, activist and theologian, delivered the prestigious Ware lecture.

Dr. West is an amazing speaker.  I have admired his honest and prophetic voice for some time.  He speaks truth to power in a way that is hard to ignore.  Even those who do not agree with him, have to do so with a loud and sure voice. I include the link to the article and his entire lecture (worth listening to) for those who have time and interest.

Black Lives Matter is something that resonated with the entire audience in the wake of the inequities and violence that has been sparked by young black people being shot by police officers across our country and by the racial profiling that ended in the murders of the eight church leaders in Charleston.  I have no issue with Black Lives Matter but I wonder what happens when we shift to All Lives Matter?  Can we add brown and white and yellow and red and blue and green to our color palette?  I am feeling overwhelmed by the debates on climate change and hearing the stories of our beautiful silver and red pacific salmon dying in the heated rivers and in fish hatcheries.  The lovely and lowly pink salmon are thriving.  Is that a sign of some sort?  Is the life of our blue-green earth at risk with all the man-made climate issues?  Can we include Gaia in the All Lives Matter statement?  And all of our animal and plant friends and neighbors?

I am getting too philosophical and I am ready to post this and get on with my closing post.  I will include a survey for those who have been reading.

I hope you are all surviving our hot summer.

My zinnias love the heat!

Thanks for reading!

Drew

The Power of Mentoring

I have been very busy lately as I transition back to my "normal" responsibilities.   I admit to a bit of trepidation about returning to the office after being away for 6 months.  My little bit of anxiety was immediately replaced with gratitude and delight when I found the welcome that was waiting.

I wanted to share a phenomenal trip I had to Olympia and Portland the last full week in June.  Mike and I traveled to first Olympia to meet with Maria Chavez-Pringle, Associate Professor of Political Science at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, and then we traveled onto Portland to attend the General Assembly of the Unitarian Universalist Association.  It was an amazing journey and a fitting finish to my sabbatical.  Each piece of the journey yielded riches I am honored to share here.  Today I will complete my piece on Maria.

I first encountered Maria at a seminar I attended at the University of Washington Tacoma Campus in May.  She was one of the speakers on a panel that focused on Immigration and Latino youth.  I began corresponding with her to try to get a time to meet and interview her and was happy after several mishaps including being stuck in a ten mile back-up on Interstate 5 on our first scheduled date to get a meeting set up with her in her hometown of Olympia last week.

Maria has an amazing story.  I was first drawn to her because she spoke clearly about the inequities in the immigration system and the trends from a political science point of view.  So much of what is wrong is related to policy.  I was further drawn to her when she said that she received her PhD from WSU.

We met at our favorite Olympia coffee house.

Maria at Batdorf and Bronson Roasters

Maria is working on her 3rd book.  She is interviewing first generation Latino professionals who are the first to graduate from college in their families.  It mirrors her own history.  Maria grew up in Orland, California, daughter of farm workers.  Her first language was Spanish.  She experienced daily prejudice in her home community and was subjected to a childhood of what she calls de-Americanization.  Her experience was not untypical for young Latinos.  She was tracked out of the college preparation courses.  She got pregnant at age 16, was rejected and ejected from her family home.  She married the father of her now 30 year old daughter and lived with him for 8 years, learning the trade of dental assisting and then moved to being a pharmacist's assistant.  Her journey to higher education began at a community college and  and then she applied to one college, California State University at Chico because it was close and familiar where she received her BA and teaching credential in Social Science.  She applied to graduate school at Chico and chose Political Science because it did not require her to take the GRE.  After completing her Masters in Political Science at Chico she found her way to WSU where she spent 4 years completing her degree.   She credits the difference in her life to wonderful mentors and helpful community supports that enabled her to get childcare for her daughter, access housing assistance, etc.  I think some of the credit goes to her own determination and desire to make the best life for herself and her oldest daughter and later for her new family (husband and three younger children).  She is very proud of her now 30 year old daughter who is working in Seattle.

Maria shared with me a link to her April, 2015, TedxTacoma Talk on the De-Americanization of Latino Youth.  I highly recommend that you watch her talk.  She talks about living the de-Americanized life and how her experience is different partly because she is a citizen.  She recommended we watch McFarland, USA, the recent movie by Disney.  She said there is much truth in the experience that reminds her of her childhood.  One of my California colleagues also recommended the film.  I think Mike and I will watch it soon (in between stages of the Tour de France..).

The wisdom Maria shared with me was the importance of exposing young Latinos who do not have a history of educational achievement in their families to the opportunities, responsibilities and rewards of completing high school and college.  She spoke of her mentors and the need for youth who are first generation college students (and high school students?) to have mentors that can coach, inspire, encourage and listen. Research shows how powerful mentors can be for youth development.  I spent some time yesterday visiting with Lindsey Karas at Sterling Meadows/Mercy Housing who I profiled on June 3rd.    Lindsey explained the difference that graduate students who spent a year mentoring the first generation Latino high school students in the homework club at Sterling Meadows make in the lives of the students.  The graduate students take the time to visit with the students in the setting of their high school and outside of their community center.

I left Olympia inspired and very glad that I had taken the time to meet with Maria.

I will close this post for today and write separately about the amazing experience we had at General Assembly.

Thanks for reading.

Wrapping up the Oregon visit

One little amendment before I begin today's post.  I went out to see my parents today and my mother did remember my birthday and asked me to pick something from the china closet.  I chose a lovely Portmeirion canton vase with the dog rose pattern!  I collect vases and had had my eye on this one for awhile.  I am glad she was feeling well enough to remember me this year and I love having this beautiful vase for my collection.
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My last, but not least, thoughts after visiting Oregon last week come from conversations I had with Doris while we drove around Central Willamette Valley (or Mid-Valley area) in Oregon together and visited with people both formally and informally on the street, in restaurants, etc.  First a little about Doris and her husband.

Doris is very well known in her community of Corvallis where she has lived for the past 10 years.  She came to Corvallis and began working as a mental health counselor after moving from Miami to Portland with her husband Juan Pablo Valot.  Both Doris and J.P. as he is often called by English speakers, are accomplished professionals.  Doris Cancel-Tirado is a first generation college student and now has four degrees!  She received a BA and an MA in Psychology in her native Puerto Rico.  She was recruited by Oregon State University (OSU) for the PhD program in Human Development and Family Studies.  She graduated with her PhD in 2009 and also earned a Master's Degree in Public Health from OSU.  She was at OSU for seven years and is very connected to the campus and the town.  She took me on a short tour of campus as we visited the Hallie E. Ford Center and she shared with me some of her experiences and told me about the people who were a large part of her journey, her friend Sarah who is alive and well in Ellensburg, and her mentor Alexis Walker, who is now deceased.  Doris teaches at Western Oregon University (WOU) where her interests include sexual and reproductive health issues among Latinos, health disparities, fatherhood, poverty, and diversity in higher education.  I found her a wealth of knowledge and most of it the enticing blend of experience and theory.  I have known Doris for almost four years as we have served on the Northwest Council of Family Relations board together.  Doris was earned tenure and promotion at WOU this year and so her website will soon read Associate Professor.  Congratulations Doris!

 Juan Pablo is an accomplished winemaker.  J.P. came from Argentina where he was educated in agriculture science and vineyard management.  He has traveled widely in wine producing regions around the world and has settled in Oregon.  He is now head winemaker at Silvan Ridge Winery, outside Eugene.  My memories of this visit include seeing J.P. being a busy father with Francisco and Eva, a loving husband to Doris and a son-in-law to Doris (my friend's mom who lives with the family) and a competent, enthusiastic and award-winning winemaker.  Doris took me to the winery on a sunny afternoon and J.P. and his staff in the tasting room treated me to sips from some really good wines.  The Tempranillo was divine and sold out!  I had sipped Malbec, an Argentian speciality of which I am fond over dinner at their home.  J.P. offered to give me a short tour of the barrel room and to taste straight from the oak barrels.  It was really a treat to learn more about how the wine is aged and to taste the difference in the varieties.  I have always been somewhat mystified about why so much fuss was being made about Pinot Noir.   I understand so much more and now can appreciate it not only for its taste but also its color and its fine scent.  I will practice the swirl at home to release the wonderful aromatic mist that enhances each sip of wine.  I have begun to rethink my wine glass collection as a result!  J.P. was really generous in gifting me with a bottle of the Pinot Noir to take home.  I am enjoying it very much!

I was quite taken with the demands and accomplishments this busy professional couple manage and wish them well in all they pursue.  They are about to celebrate their 40th birthdays and their 10th wedding anniversary.  What a glorious time that will be for them and all their loving family and friends.  I regret that I did not get a picture of the family together but it is no surprise since it took four adults (me included) to manage meals and the children each evening!  I did add pictures of Doris and the kids in previous posts this week.

I shadowed this busy family all week long!

Doris and J.P are very connected with the international community that surrounds Corvallis, Eugene and the academic and viticulture worlds of the mid-valley region and beyond.  Doris shared with me several insights from her experiences.  

• There are insiders and outsiders with Latino groups.  I asked her more about this after she first mentioned it to me.  She explained that there is an undercurrent, sometimes obvious, sometimes subtle, in pan-Latino relations.  She connected it to immigration patterns.  I have been learning so much about the pattern of immigration and settlement of Latinos in this country that I was really glad to get her perspective and to understand it more fully than I would have six months ago.  She explained about the path to citizenship and that Puerto Ricans are already citizens because PR is a US territory.  Cubans are the next on the citizenship ladder because they are well educated and it takes only 2-3 for a Cuban who has arrived in this country (and not been caught on the boat) to get citizenship.  The next wave of immigrants to NYC were the Dominicans and they have mostly been naturalized.  The Mexicans and I would add the Haitians (more creole in make-up) are at the bottom of the citizenship barrel.  Most who have come to this country since 1996 and especially since 9/11/2001 have crossed the border in desperate circumstances or have overstayed a visa to visit.  Not all who are undocumented are survivors of the long journey north through the borderlands.  Those with more education are seen more favorably by the federal system but can also be excluded from local insiders because of country of origin issues.  Doris has observed issues of distrust that arise from regional differences (place in Mexico where people came from), personal friendships and exclusions based on what reminded me of the cliques of middle school culture, and country of origin differences.  She told me that it is not uncommon for a sense of territoriality to exist in the workplace that can create a barrier if people believe that no-one but one of their own country or region will be able to understand the clients they serve.  
• Doris stated that even Latinos need cultural guides to gain trust in the community.  The surface connection of skin tone, hair color, and speaking Spanish is not enough.  Spanish language varies from country to country and region to region.  One of our local programs folks learned Spanish in Nicaragua in the Peace Corps and always laughed when our local Mexican parents and program folks helped her understand the phrases they use to describe things that are different.  
• Doris talked to me about the wet feet/dry feet phenomenon in relation to Cuban nationals who have been coming to this country since the Castro regime began.  If one is caught in a boat or in the water, one is referred to as having wet feet (not landed) and will be deported back to Cuba and if one is caught on land, they have dry feet and can stay.  I had never heard the terms used before and it added one more puzzle piece to the immigration dilemma we now face.
• Doris is also concerned about qualified first generation Latino students gaining entrance and acceptance into the allied health professions in Oregon.  She is advocating within the nursing profession for more inclusion.  She told me that the admission rates were disproportionate to the population and that qualified candidates were being overlooked.  She is a fierce advocate and yet found that as a Puerto Rican it took her several years to gain the trust of the Mexican origin students at her university.

I share this picture I took I visited the Statue of Liberty to remind us that we are not all equal.

Three posts this week.  I think I am in a last minute flurry of writing to make sure I get everything recorded before the end of my sabbatical.

Thanks for reading!

65

Just a quick note today.  It is my 65th birthday.  I was born on Father's Day, June 18, 1950, in Omak, Washington.  I honor both my parents, Jim and Donna Daulph, and my three sisters, Dana, Tia and Betsy.  I have heard from my Dad and all three sisters today.  My mother suffers from dementia and has not remembered my birthday for several years.  She never liked to be reminded that her oldest child was aging, probably because it marked her own aging.  She will be 86 on July 1st.

A gorgeous June rose.  I love them and consider them my birthday flower.  I love them in gardens so much more than in a bouquet.  Rose scent is one of my favorites.

One of the gifts of this sabbatical time is having space to reflect on what is next for me and although I am in process with the reality that I have reached an age that was formerly associated with retirement, I am not ready for to let go of my work.  I have been re-energized and have lots of ideas rolling around about where I might take what I have learned on this sabbatical into my work with WSU Extension.  I will not write about that yet because it will be premature.

I am in the process of checking in with wise friends and counselors about some ideas I have and asking if they make sense.  So far, everyone is positive and has had some helpful suggestions and insights.  I look forward to continuing these conversations as I complete the sabbatical and return to the formal workplace.  My journey is also wrapped up in my generation.  I am a baby boomer and I am having lots of fun watching what my fellow boomers are up to as they hit their late 60's.  It is very encouraging to me.  I am probably not a person who will just fade out but will choose to be active for as long as possible.


Yesterday I went to one of my favorite swimming places on Lake Whatcom, Euclid Park, and enjoyed my longest swim of the year there.  Probably a little over a half mile round trip.  No power boats buzzing around and so the water was not as rough as it can be.  There was little wind.  I spotted one of the eagles who frequent the cove roosting in one of the "eagle" trees as I call them.  While I was in the water it flew out across the water and then back into the forest that borders the cove into another favorite tree.  While I was swimming I spotted an osprey in the distance.  Osprey are my favorite birds, so curious and beautiful.  I am obsessed with Explore website that has live cam on an osprey nest in Maine.  I watched three babies grow last year and this year there are two new babies and an unhatched egg.  I wonder what happens to that egg if it does not hatch?  I will be checking in each day to find out.  Explore is a great site, funded by Charles Annenberg Weingarten and his family's foundation.  I love watching the bears in Alaska, the walruses, the elephants, the pandas and more.

To my great delight I moved into the backstroke and just overhead another osprey, a male by the markings, flew right over me.  I could see it looking at me as I looked up at it.  Not the first time this has happened to me by a long shot.  Each time is magical.  The bird was no more than about 75 feet above me.  I watched in fly away into the distance and felt blessed by the visit.

Thanks to Spirit Animals for the picture.

This afternoon, Mike and I will take the darling dogs to the Northshore trail and we will walk and I will swim with them.  Tonight, Ben, Mike and I will go to Keenan's on the Pier for a celebratory dinner!

It feels good to be 65!

As always, thanks for reading.