News Update Nov 13, 2011

It’s Sunday morning, after my first pot of green tea. I’ve obtained cheap tickets to a Trey McIntyre dance performance and tidied my lofty aerie. Feather pillows are plumped; my few choice books stand stoically in ordered arrangements; fresh flowers brighten the table, and last night’s clutter is put away. There’s a place for everything here and everything must be in its place. If it’s otherwise, I feel edgy, so I keep a tight ship. My world has shrunk to a space so tiny that nothing is overlooked. I’m on the fifth floor…. a loft with extraordinary high ceilings and windows that fill an entire wall. From my perch I hear the bells of the Central Presbyterian Church chime “Onward Christian Soldiers…marching as to war….” and, following the sound to the bell tower across Sandy Boulevard, I notice a seagull perched on the Celtic cross and am reminded of the Sunday mornings when a small Ruthie McLean used to stand next to her parents and siblings and sing these old Christian hymns. It was the only thing I liked about church, but the words and the memory of the experience bring a smile to my face all these years later. “…with the cross of Jesus going on before….” I used to love adding my small voice to that of my mother and father’s. In fact one of my great joys of driving between Ashland and Portland is singing with my favorite singer/songwriters! Allison Krause, Guy Clark, the Dixie Chicks, Everything But the Girl, Amos Lee…their voices embrace mine and, windows open, we belt it out just like those Christians across the street are probably doing this morning.

The trees far below resemble a pallet of watercolors. Messy and variegated, the glossy sweet gum reds blend with the shocking burnt oranges and softer yellows and browns. Auggie and I can’t not collect leaves! We gather as many as our hands and pockets will hold and bring them home to sort according to shape, color, size and degree of perfection.  When our playtime is over, we leave the projects on the table to curl and  change, each in its own delicate and final way. I love child’s play…. we never save anything for very long and we never look back with sadness. Every moment is a new ah ha! Around every corner there are discoveries and giggles of delight.

Today for me is a day of rest. No one will knock at my door. The codes and keys keep unexpected visitors away, and, although I’ve always loved unexpected visitors, there is a different calmness to knowing no one will interrupt me this morning. This, on the heels of two weeks of visitors, feels regenerative. I have a routine starting to fall into place. I volunteer for Writing Workshop in Jude’s second grade classroom Tuesday mornings. His teacher is a master teacher and the writing his kids are doing is not very different from many middle school writers these days. Ah that all kids could have this kind of teaching at the second grade level! He teaches, demonstrates, and expects the kids to perform…. and they do! All of them!

On Wednesdays I’m working my way into “Teen Space”, an afterschool program for middle and high school at-risk kids who are part of the Friends of the Children program. I’m hoping to start a writing group with these kids, but right now I’m just trying to form relationships.  Here’s the information on this organization:


Friends of the Children – Portland is a non-profit organization that provides Portland’s most at-risk children with intensive and long-term mentors. We take a preventive, early intervention approach that breaks the cycle of poverty and abuse by helping children in need overcome the many obstacles in their lives.

There are three key elements that make Friends of the Children – Portland so unique:

• We mentor the children in our community who need us the most. 
• Our mentors (called Friends) are full-time, paid and professionally trained. 
• We make a twelve and a half year (12 ½) commitment to each child, selecting them in kindergarten and guiding them through high school graduation.

In partnership with schools, children are identified for the program during an extensive six-week selection process during the spring semester of kindergarten. Selection factors include a low level of family resources, poor performance in school, poor social skills, and high instances of poverty and violence in the neighborhood where our children live.

Once selected, the child is assigned to a Friend. This Friend will spend a minimum of 16 hours per month with the child both in and out of school engaging him or her in a wide range of academic and enrichment activities designed to build basic life skills, self confidence, academic success and resiliency.

 We want each of our children to have a bright future, and we believe they can. Our work is guided by three long-term goals that we set for each child in our program:

Goal 1	Goal 2	Goal 3
Success in school with a minimum of H.S. diploma (preferred) or GED	Avoid involvement in the juvenile justice system	Avoid early parenting

On Thursdays I am spending a couple of hours with another nonprofit called “Write Around Portland”. This week I worked on putting their anthology together, and there were some very cool ways of doing it! They had a stack of about 150 pieces of writing that had been put in file folders according to “genre” or category i.e. “Nature”, “Family”, “Memories”, “Transitions”, etc. My job with another volunteer was to read all the pieces and put them in order that makes sense: strong first and last pieces and a variety in between. Avoid “black holes” where several downers are together, and mix up prose and poetry. Once that was done we needed to reread the pieces and from them draw out a word or phrase that could be used for the title of that section or the title of the entire anthology. So, for example, I had the folder with “Memories” papers in it and I went through those papers and came up with these suggestions:  “Like it was yesterday”, “Cemetery among the Roses”, “Held in Place”, “Leaking Tears of Joy and Pain” and “Enter My Closet”.  Fun, right!  Next week a group of volunteers will select one title for each chapter from our list and the final anthology for fall’s writing groups will go to press.

Here is a description of WRAP:

Welcome to Write Around Portland.

Transforming lives and our communities through the power of writing

In homeless youth shelters, senior centers, schools, hospitals, prisons and treatment facilities, we bring 10-week creative writing workshops to nearly 500 adults and young people each year. We provide journals and pens, bus tickets, snacks, childcare and all workshop materials free of charge to remove obstacles to writing in community. Workshops culminate in community readings and three beautifully designed books annually. 

We also offer unique generative writing workshops designed for new and seasoned writers who want to participate in a Write Around Portland workshop and support the communities we traditionally serve. We offer two workshops with an associated fee: Prompt at Powell's City of Books and monthly workshops at HOTLIPS Pizza.

All is quiet at the church now, traffic on Sandy Boulevard is slow, but the occasional emergency siren lets me know life goes on down there. It’s time I rallied and headed out to greet the day. Perhaps I’ll have a chat with my homeless friend David or try what’s being served for free at Whole Foods, or perhaps I’ll head straight up hill to Alameda and see what the boys are up to this afternoon. No agenda feels just right…and so unlike where I always used to be….in the midst of the fray!

From My Window