So there I wasn't either

Vote Yes on I 594; Vote NO on I 591!
RantWoman deeply hopes that closing loopholes about ease of gun purchases will dramatically cut down the number of "idiots with guns" episodes around her!

The latest:
Neighbor: RantWoman did you hear about the shooting?

Which shooting? (Indeed several to choose from.)

Friday night in the parking lot. Two cars, people shooting at each other. About 8 cop cars. The place was lit up like a Christmas tree.

Was anyone h-h-hurt? (Actually if anyone had been hurt or worse yet killed, it would have been all over the building grapevine as soon as RantWoman walked in the door Sunday afterQuarterly Meeting.)

No, thanks you God and Jesus and a bunch of angels. Nobody with guns and no residents either. And apparently the cops got the shooters too.


Indeed, RantWoman was AWAY, away on one of her hours and hours doing something called minutes gigs.

This particular gig, for Friends Committee on WA Public Policy frequently comes with chatter about gun suicides and care of mental health issues. RantWoman is all for care of mental health issues. RantWoman is especially all over this topic because while trying to take minutes and listening to people go on about mental health issues, RantWoman gets to remember Marat the Mopey, a friend who bought the gun he finally succeeded in offing himself with after at least two other suicide attempts in a year. RantWoman's brain usually leaves the room at least temporarily; RantWoman manages to take minutes and say a prayer for some other stories that have emerged in the orbit of the policy chatter.

This time, while all that gunplay was happening in RantWoman's home parking lot, the meeting bounced fast over the message atthe top of the post and headed straight for Climate Change! Ura! Climate change gets its own post or posts. And RantWoman gets to be grateful, once again, to be nowhere near the drama of the moment and to say yet more prayers on repetitive themes!

Encouragement for Women Among Us

Various encouragement for women among us:

Don't Tell me to smile, with additional resources in the blog post
http://questforadequacy.blogspot.com/2014/09/dont-tell-me-to-smile.html


Learning to love criticism
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/09/28/opinion/sunday/learning-to-love-criticism.html?smid=fb-share&_r=2&referrer

And another point of view about criticism
http://bellejar.ca/2014/09/30/no-i-dont-want-to-learn-how-to-love-criticism-thanks/

The Woman's heart attack
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/09/28/opinion/sunday/womens-atypical-heart-attacks.html?WT.z_mob_rel=1

Bad Friend Interest Groups

RantWoman has a MOUNTAIN of gratitudes for Quarterly Meeting this time. They WILL make it through RantWoman’s keyboard, but first…

There was an abundance of interest group choices at this Quarterly Meeting. There were so many offers to lead interest groups that some group leaders reported no one attending. Everyone who reported no one attending was good-natured and grateful for opportunity to test something with themselves or to go to another interest group.

 On top of all that, hours after the end of the official Interest Group time someone from the Association of Bad Friends turned in offers to facilitate the following interest groups. Some of these interest groups actually occurred.

 
Rodent Wrangling with the Queer Quaker Cuddle Puddle. Featuring “Ratty” and sundry other representatives of earthcare unwanted dead or alive, even if skinned in less than 10 seconds.

 Versification in especially vehement Psalms with Walking Encyclopedia Friend. Featuring Psalm 68, RSV, Grade 2 Braille optional.

 Advanced Snarkasm: Sarcasm and Snarkiness for underappreciative noncontemplatives.

 Silent scribble font writing seminar for insomniacs in shared sleeping spaces

 To Heck with recovery in Rwanda Family Irreconciliation Hour with a random therapist and RantWoman’s Flogging Bureau

 Eat your peas; there are children starving in China / india/ S seattle, a gentler version of To Heck with  Rwanda, above.

 Solidarity in Somnolence: elocution for Sleep inducing speakers with fuzzy fleece throws for listeners who fall asleep in multiples.

 Beginning Procrastination with the Sometime in the Next Millennium Committee…

 RantWoman thinks there may have been more offers but has to lay over looking for the rest of the list.

 

 

 

Quotes for Reflection: Worship Sharing Groups

RantWoman is clear to post this for a couple reasons and with a couple caveats:

--RantWoman DEEPLY appreciates Friend Chris for pulling together these quotes, for one reason because RantWoman did not make it through anywhere near all of the Daniel Snyder Quaker Witness as Sacrament Pendle Hill Pamphlet. RantWoman sometimes lets herself be tempted to try to read regular print. RantWoman usually regrets this really fast. That is what happened with this pamphlet, and the quotes here are nuggets RantWoman clearly did not get to. This comment is partly reflection on the realities of RantWoman reading, partly continuing reflection on the question of whether other people besides RantWoman would also enjoy having Pendle Hill pamphlets in electronic format. Meanwhile, RantWoman got plenty of mileage out of nuggets.

--RantWoman is sometimes grateful to be able to share something from a past event. That will not happen reliably if the document sits in email or on some flash drive. So RantWoman posts here giving FULL credit for the work of compiling and developing to Friend Chris.


--These quotes elicited wonderful reflections in RantWoman's worship sharing group. First, we decided that we probably could not both walk and fully follow the directions. Then we took chairs outdoors and reflected in glorious fall sunshine.

--RantWoman is also sometimes a Very Bad Friend. The quotes contributed to some Bad Friend thoughts posted separately.

Quotations for Reflection

NW Quarter, North Pacific Yearly Meeting

September 26-28, 2014

Prepared by Christine Betz Hall

 

                                   

1.           There is an experience of the Eternal breaking into time, which transforms all life into a miracle of faith and action. Unspeakable, profound, and full of glory as an inward experience, it is the root of concern for all creation, the true ground of social endeavor. This inward Life and the outward Concern are truly one whole, and, were it possible, ought to be described simultaneously.    
                           —Thomas Kelly (d. 1982)[1]

2.           True Godliness does not turn Men [sic] out of the World, but enables them to live better in it, and excites their Endeavours to mend it.     —William Penn (d. 1718)[2]

3.           From an inward purifying, and steadfast abiding under it, springs a lively operative desire for the good of others...  And being clearly convinced in my judgment that to place my whole trust in God was best for me, I felt renewed engagements that in all things I might act on an inward principle of virtue and pursue worldly business no further than as Truth opened my way therein.                                                   —John Woolman (d. 1772)[3]

 

4.           For one thing, the legacy of John Woolman invites us to be open to recovering more fully the collective dimension of meeting for worship. We are summoned to “dwell deep.”
         For another, we are invited to see our activism as a species of worship. For activists, this is an invitation to root our activism more fully in the transforming power of meeting for worship and the love of God we encounter there. For those who are more of contemplative than an activist orientation, it challenges us to broaden our understanding of the boundaries of the meetinghouse, and the boundaries of worship itself.
                           —Michael Birkel (contemporary)[4]

5.           “The Society of Friends,” says Evelyn Underhill, “has produced no great contemplative.” This is true if, by a great contemplative, we mean a person primarily engaged in contemplation. The Quakers set aside regular times for contemplation, both individual retirement and public meetings, but contemplation has always been for them the inner side of a complete action, which to be whole must represent perfect balance of inner and outer. Real experience of the divine Presence has the result of sensitizing the conscience so that the worshiper could rise from quiet waiting with the feeling that a new and sometimes very difficult task had been laid upon him.            
                           —Howard Brinton (d. 1973)[5]

6.           There is a journey that some follow by starting in prayer and others follow by starting in action. It is the witness of our tradition that those who are naturally inclined to begin in prayer will eventually feel led into outward action, and those who are naturally inclined to begin with action will eventually feel called more deeply into prayer. However, it is sometimes the case that those who pray do not act, and those who act do not pray. There is an unfortunate tendency among some Quakers to separate prayer and action rather than to integrate them.
                           —Daniel Snyder (contemporary)[6]

7.           The activists in our groups <in classes at Pendle Hill> kept us grounded in the real and urgent needs of a broken world. The contemplatives in the class challenged us to resist the temptation to carry the world’s problems on our own shoulders. The activists were challenged to season their sense of urgency in prayer. The contemplatives were challenged to bring their faith to outward visibility. Together we began to discern the contours of hope, for although we yearn to see and to celebrate the visible results of our work, we dare not anchor hope in the visible, for we are working toward a future that we may not see in our lifetime… —Snyder[7]

8.           …being awake to the Presence of God does not take us away from the world but allows us to be even more deeply in it <paraphrasing William Penn> …We came to understand this inward/outward path as sacramental. Quaker witness is an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible Grace. This is the classic definition of a sacrament. It means to live, walk, speak, and act in the world, not as our anger, guilt, fear, or despair shapes it for us, but as it is re-shaped, again and again, in our ongoing encounters with God. To live sacramentally is to fall so completely into God’s infinite Love for us and for the world that we come to see, to know, and to act in the world in light of this Love. —Snyder[8]

9.           Every one of us is called to be a contemplative—not in the sense of a particular vocation we call “the contemplative life,” but in the sense of a holy habit of contemplative love that leads us forth in partnership with God into creative and redeeming work.  
                           —Richard Foster (contemporary)[9]

 

 

LAST WORD ACTIVITY: Worship group members review the quotes above separately. Each one chooses a sentence or passage that means something to her or him.

1.   One person reads aloud the passage she or he chose without commenting on it.

2.   One at a time around the circle, the other group members may talk about that passage/quotation for a brief minute—share thoughts, feelings or questions.

3.   When others have finished commenting on the quotation, the person who introduced it shares why they chose it and what it means to them. The person who brought the passage has "the last word."

4.   The next person reads aloud the quotations they have chosen, and all comment.

5.   Repeat until everyone has shared their quote.

 

---

[1] Kelly, Thomas R., and Douglas V. Steere. A testament of devotion (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1941). 65

[2] in Snyder, Daniel O. Quaker witness as sacrament Pendle Hill Pamphlet 397. Wallingford, Pa.: Pendle Hill Publications, 2008, 35.

[3] John Woolman, “Journal,” in The Journal and Major Essays of John Woolman, Ed. Phillips P. Moulton. (Richmond Ind.: Friends United Press, 1971), 38.

[4] Birkel, Michael. “Mysticism and Activism: On Learning from John Woolman” Wider Quaker Fellowship: Voice Of Friends, Friends World Committee for Consultation, Web. 30 July 2012. Southeastern Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, Annual Michener Lecture, 2002, 19.

[5] Brinton, Howard Haines. Friends for 300 years; the history and beliefs of the Society of Friends since George Fox started the Quaker movement.. [1st ed. New York: Harper, 1952], 27.

[6] Snyder, Daniel O.. Quaker witness as sacrament Pendle Hill Pamphlet 397. Wallingford, Pa.: Pendle Hill Publications, 2008, 22.

[7] Ibid, 29-30.

[8] Ibid, 31.

[9] Foster, Richard J.. Streams of living water: celebrating the great traditions of Christian faith. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998, 58.

Leaving the Quiverful Movment: blogs, etc.

Blog as Filing Cabinet Item about woman who left Quiverful movement of conservative Christians / abusive family dynamics. Mentions several other blogs. Possibly of interest to people who find themselves entangled in or recovering from such connections.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/09/656002/

Interest Group List, Fall 2014 Quarterly Meeting

Interest Group Title	Interest Group Presenter	Interest Group Description
US Immigration Policy Then and Now	Mary Ruth Petzing	Working together and speaking from our own histories and experiences, we will explore immigration to the US from colonial times to the present. Then we will discuss current issues including the unaccompanied children from Central America
Junior Friends in Guatemala	Hannah Billen and other Junior Friends	Come join a small group of Junior Friends to hear all about our service trip to Guatemala. We will tell stories, pass around photographs and share the valuable lessons this incredible country and its people have taught us. Suitable for all ages: YES
Ways of Working on Climate Change in Your Community	Lynn Fitzhugh	Things 350Seattle.org has been doing during its first 18 months of existence with an emphasis on what you can do in your community. We will talk in depth about the threat that oil trains traveling across ID and all of WA pose to community safety Suitable for all ages YES
“Forest Bathing,” in Japan also called “Shinrin-yoku”	Sol Riou	In Japan, “Forest Bathing” or"Shinrin-yoku" is prescribed by doctors. We will practice walking with full awareness, using our five senses, in the forest for relaxation and recreation. Suitable for all ages: YES
Let’s Change the Criminal Justice System in Washington	Tom Ewell	Support the Friends Committee on Washington Public Policy (FCWPP) work in prison reform." We will look at the current legislative agenda for FCWPP in the coming legislative session and suggest ways you can help. There is a real chance for change this time.
Way of the Spirit	Christine Hall	Way of the Spirit—a study-retreat program from the wisdom of the Quaker Tradition. Interest Group: Try a meditative exercise with Isaac Penington, meet people who’ve experienced the program, share and question together. Is 2015 the year to come home to who you are meant to be? In Way of the Spirit, you’ll deepen faithfulness, explore leadings in life-changing community. Challenge yourself to spiritual growth. Begins January 16-19, 2015 in Mt. Angel, OR.
Collect Print and Paint from Nature	Laurel and Polly Boyajian	We will make egg tempera paints with natural earth pigments. We will collect leaves, needles, sticks, cones to use as brushes, resists, and prints If younger than 8, please bring an adult too.
Nature Walk	Ellie Duffield	Seeing, learning about the geology, plants, animals, their names, history and how they interrelate to each other. Intended for Adults
Coming of Age Celebrations for Quaker Youth	Debbie Townsend	Interest Group Description: Many religious traditions have a way of marking a child's transition out of childhood: confirmation, bar or bat mitzvah, etc.  Now, quite a few Quaker Meetings around the country have created or are exploring ways to mark coming-of-age. Share your ideas, and learn what Eastside Friends Meeting has planned for their eight-graders this year. Adults, Jr. Friends
Business Meeting? Continuing Committee? What Quarterly Meeting Decisions Get Made Where?	Don Goldstein, sponsored by Continuing Committee	We will review the history of what kinds of decisions have been made by Meeting for Business and Continuing Committee for the operation of Quarterly Meeting events, including the Silent Retreat. We will consider whether those present would like to change the division of decision-making authority and if so how. For a background document, contact Don, dnx6309@gmail.com

 

Secular Jewish Circle Rosh Hoshanah September 24

RantWoman got asked weeks ago about wording for a bulletin announcement. RantWoman suspects she flubbed the proofreading. Here is what RantWoman wishes the announcement said:


On Wednesday September 24th UFM will welcome the secular Jewish  Circle who have rented the social hall and worship room from 6-10 pm to observe Rosh Hoshanah. 

Midweek Meeting for Worship will be held in the library.



RantWoman further inquires:
Would it maybe be possible to put up some signs, maybe a  computer-generated LARGE FONT sign or two? I know illegible and handwritten is "simple" and even often does the trick, but....

In the Light?
--Why the question mark?
--Does RantWoman mean put the sign up in the light where it can be read?
--Does RantWoman mean she is unsure where to put the signs?

Please hold the whole event in the Light, legible signs or no legible signs.

Please also hold RantWoman in the Light for being an insufferable editor who sometimes maybe just maybe takes for granted certain verbal gifts and does not want to seem as overbearing as she probably comes across. Sigh!

Anna Fritz performs October 11

Quaker Cellist / Folksinger from Portland, OR to GIve Concert at UFM

On Saturday October 11th at 7pm, UFM will host a performance in the Social Hall by Quaker cellist and folksinger, Anna Fritz.

On a tour of Friends Meetings in the Pacific Northwest, Anna will perform her original songs for cello and voice, touching on themes of gender, justice, spirit, and connection to the natural world. Her performances are intimate and vulnerable and invite audiences to be enlivened, connected, and singing!

Her performance will be preceded by a set of alt/country folk music by Friend Natasha White Marsh.

There will be a suggested donation of $8 - $20 with no one turned away.

Childcare and light refreshment will be provided.

Anna has played the cello and worshiped among Friends since she was a small child in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. After decades of classical training and years of touring with rock bands, the 35-year-old Portland-based musician has embraced a leading as a cello-wielding folksinger. The Spirit-led nature of her songwriting and performance have found her work a natural home among Friends.

Although Anna continues to teach and to record with bands like The Decemberists and My Morning Jacket, the heart of her work is to follow the path of her musical ministry. She has performed for Friends at meetings in Oregon and California, including offerings at the Pacific Northwest Quaker Women's Theology Conference and the midwinter gathering of Friends for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Concerns. Her most recent recording is an album of original songs called The Gospel of Tree Bark.

To hear her music and for a full schedule of her upcoming performances, visit http://annafritz.com .

The last fuzzy-edged scribblings

RantWoman isn't your brain back from Annual Session YET?

Think of it as RantWoman cleaning some fuzzy-edged papers out of her purse / RantWoman bag
From before Annual Session:

"B-b-b-but he hasn't C-c-clerked anything before."
Turns out, knowing how to manage a room ful of first graders and help the crowd have a good time a bluegrass festival are GREAT preparation for clerking plenaries. And yes, that should summon thoughts of entering the Kingdom of Heaven as a child and RantWoman does not care at all whether that might be too much God / Bible for some people.

Showers:
RantWoman wrote about how awesome her shower was last year. RantWoman was in a different building this year but the shower in her shared suite was equally magnificent. RantWoman has a perfectly adequate shower at home but does not mind at all getting to appreciate the gap between adequate and fabulous once in awhile.

Family Affordability:
At RantWoman's Meeting, discussion of Family Affordability occurred at a Meeting for Business where few people had context to evaluate some of the issues. We gathered what data we could based on the questionnaire but there was a sense of some voices not present in the conversation. At Annual Session RantWoman spoke with Friends from other Meetings who had a similar concern. In retrospect, though RantWoman was happy to let the Family Affordability Committee mostly work without her, it might have been good to hold an interest group about it at Annual Session to see what ideas fed upon each other from people being in the same room together.

Accessibility
RantWoman has different accessibility issues than Endless Accessibility Advocate Friend. Endless Accessibility Advocate Friend, a wheelchair user, was not fond of the most recent Annual Session venue. Endless Accessibility Advocate Friend passed away a few months ago. RantWoman indulged in a few minutes wondering "why are we back here?" On top of that, this year there was construction. There was woe. There was irritation. And you know what:
1. After about the first day together, everyone decided to stop complaining and just celebrate being together.
2. RantWoman made some mental notes about things to pay more attention to next year.
3. Bridge City Friends captured the spirit brilliantly for Community Night.
http://rantwomanrsof.blogspot.com/2014/08/hallelujah-as-rendered-by-bridge-city.html

One interesting Child-themed Datum:
RantWoman listend to the report by age group of people attending and people attending for the first time. A large percentage of Friends in younger age groups were attending for the first time. But only a couple of the 30 or so high school age, Junior Friends were attending for the first time.

Northwest Yearly Meeting
Many NPYM Friends attended NWYM Annual session or held in Light. So even though the Family Affordability Committee never made it onto a plenary agenda, RantWoman was glad for time to hear reports back that sexuality the issue Friends were dividing about is being held in care for 5 years without more planned discussion in that interval, and that sentiments among Friends are considerably more varied and supportive that are sometimes framed.
Minute to end the Authorization to Use Military Force:
RantWoman is really glad Annual Session was able to support FCNL and unite about this minute. RantWoman admits to wondering whether Friends will do anything more about this minute than nod quickly in passing in plenary.

Closing Worship:
RantWoman continues to reflect about the dance between the social good of marijuana legalization and the challenges of substance abuse. RantWoman thinks it would be just awesome and terrific if some of the revenue stream from legalization in WA were to be used to help fund more badly needed mental health services and spiritual care. Hold that thought in the Light.

Word Nerd Light Walking

Un chiste andaluz, a joke from Andalucia which came to RantWoman while RantWoman was on the last walking leg of her weekly trip to Meeting.

Word nerd digression: Andalucia is a region in Spain. The adjectival form above translates Light walks. RantWoman simply wishes to note that and will TRY to resist the temptation to further Word Nerd delving. RantWoman will try.

RantWoman has told this joke in 3 languages in several different countries. A LARGE percentage of the time, the verdict is "Don't quit your day job." Hold that problem in the Light. RantWoman posts here in faith that if the joke also needs to appear in person, people who have read it will be able to bear with repetition. Also hold in the Light that both parties in the joke below agree that the fly is there.


Two guys are walking along a road.
One of them says to the other "Look. See that very tall tower way off in the distance. There is a fly walking on the windowsill."
The second guy responds: "I cannot see the fly in spite of these thick glasses I am wearing, but I am sure it's there because I can hear its footsteps."

This joke makes both RantWoman and Ferrener Husband laugh and laugh. If why and further digressions are needed, the topic of "passing" will come up. As will learner's permits and learnign to drive.

It's possible that RantWoman should just leave the joke as is, like a spiritual smoke ring hovering here.

RantWoman famously does not know when to quit and will tread cautiously forward.


Recent dialogue
"RantWoman, you talked to much"
(elaboration on concern; RantWoman chose to hear as "We need your cooperation")

"So I have been told"
("Okay, let's cooperate.")
How about you, group leader, articulate some norms like people waiting to be called on and leaving space between offerings? 

See RantWoman is sometimes a jumper-inner.

RantWoman usually is not the only such sinner in the room. In this case, the norms were articulated. The discussion moved forward. That is, the first time a query was posed to the room, about three people jumped in without waiting to be called on. Can anyone guess the gender of the three people?

RantWoman managed enough demure to put her hand up and wait to be called on before suggesting that "You and you and you" need to wait to be called on.

Many things went MUCH better, including elements of presentation that invited people to speak to experiences and generated different experiences to start from. Now RantWoman would like to hear the verdict of others in the room.


Another word nerd visitation to Planet RantWoman: besides all the entanglements of the word "Oversight" around Quakerdom, among those who shepard meaning back and forth between English and Russian, "Oversight" exists in a meaning cloud with administration, supervision, and several words. The words and meanings clump differently in the two languages and the meaning shepards can dither for hours about which word is right for a given context.

Okay, RantWoman tries not to overdo this. In fact, the midlife vision meltdown rather severely impedes RantWoman's capacity to obsess in this way. Unfortunately the midlife vision meltdown does not always impede RantWoman's desire to investigate and fuss.

Recently RantWoman was in a conversation explaining her one unresolved monumentally fixated issue remaining from Meeting's effort to rename the Oops Well Committee:  Research was done. The names this committee is called in several places were listed. WHY OH WHY was Rantwoman not happy?

RantWoman asked Not Nearly As Much of a Word Nerd Friend in Business Meeting for what she hoped might be a tiny bit more commentary about whether Oversight comes with the same baggages as Overseers. Somehow the question got lost, lost from notes, lost from minutes, disappeared entirely from subsequent presentations.

RantWoman heard all three other people in the recent conversation go "Ohhhhh."
Not Nearly as Much of a Word Nerd Friend was also busy, busy, busy keeping many hats on her head, tending to important family medical matters. Clearly this Word nerd momement, this moment fantastically important to RantWoman, this point RantWoman had VERY little capacity to research on her own, this very point just went winging right by Not Nearly As Much of a Word Nerd Friend

Now, months later, what might help RantWoman just "Get over it"  or at least move on to the next opportunity to be true to Light / er , get monumentally stuck over something?

Spoken ministry.

Spoken ministry from someone who kept wondering why it was important enough that the topic came back and came back and kept coming back to Business Meeting. Spoken ministry about how the coming back and coming back and coming back made someone think a LOT about privilege.

Can you still hear the giant long "ohhhhhhhh...." from RantWoman? There would also be some mumblings of gratitude to whichever Friend(s) helped tend the conversations about privilege.

Hold this all in the Light.

No New Youth Jail in Seattle: Hearing September 18

Campaign against the construction of a new youth jail:

We are rapidly approaching a critical opportunity for community members to raise our concerns publicly about the new youth jail. Youth Undoing Institutional Racism, End the Prison Industrial Complex & European Dissent need YOU to speak out in front of the Seattle City Council THIS WEEK.

PUBLIC HEARING

Thursday, September 18th 2:00 - 3:00pm
600 Fourth Ave. Seattle, WA 98104
City Hall Council Chambers

The Planning, Land Use and Sustainability Committee of the Seattle City Council is holding a hearing to decide whether or not to grant the permits that are needed to build the new youth jail. Up until now, the "community input" that King County has gathered has been from an all White group of neighbors. The current design reflects the cosmetic needs of this group and ignores the voices of those who will be most deeply impacted. Tell the City Council to listen to community and VOTE NO on all youth jail permits.

What can you do?

1. Attend the hearing on Thursday, September 18 from 2:00 - 3:00pm at City Hall and share a 1-2 minute testimony about why you oppose the building permits being issued.
   
2. If you cannot attend, write a brief statement about why you oppose the building of the new youth jail.
   
3. Help us with outreach and forward this email widely (flyer attached).

Talking points:

Incarceration harms young people. There are many alternatives to incarceration that have been utilized in other places such as Multnomah County. We should be working towards a future in which caging our children is not necessary rather than continuing to pour money into a broken system.

We need community accountability. Community accountability has been completely lacking during the process of deciding to build and design the new youth jail. Those who are most affected by the juvenile justice system have a critical perspective that has been silenced.

An anti-racist approach is needed. 8% of young people in King County are Black. The current youth jail is 42% Black. The disproportionality of our current youth jail is the result of systemic racism. The King County jail will continue to incarcerate youth of color at higher rates unless we fundamentally change the system.

Questions? Contact James Williams at Jamesatdu@hotmail.com (253) 883-9548

A Sign?

Free Will Astrology for the Week of September 10
CANCER (June 21–July 22): If you surrender to the passive part of your personality, you will be whipped around by mood swings in the coming days. You will hem and haw, snivel and procrastinate, communicate ineptly, and be confused about what you really feel. If, on the other hand, you animate the proactive side of your personality, you are likely to correct sloppy arrangements that have kept you off-balance. You will heal rifts and come up with bright ideas about how to get the help you need. It's also quite possible you will strike a blow for justice and equality, and finally get the fair share you were cheated out of in the past.



Hmmmm. RantWoman can either invoke the long departed memory of Friend who made Xylophones and give herself a lecture about the silliness of astrology OR RantWoman can grab whatever initiative she can get. Hmmm.

Meanwhile RantWoman is thinking about Friend Who Made Zylophones. He was a Co-worker of a long departed Blind Friend from RantWoman's meeting. He had a wife and daughter, but he was always particularly attentive to Blind Friend's needs around Meeting. RantWoman will hold this memory in the Light.

RantWoman will also discern about what initiatives to grab. In other words, RantWoman is a difficult student.

Pronoun NUMBER

RantWoman is still getting used to someone she knows having a new pronoun gender preference. RantWoman is doing okay about pronouns and is nowhere near being smooth about nouns.

RantWoman is still getting used to the pronoun gender preference and now RantWoman gets more publicly to bend her brain around someone's pronoun NUMBER preference.

Amazing Artist Friend is coming to town. 
Amazing Artist Friend is on her way to:
The 2014 Trauma and Dissociation Conference.
http://igdid.org/

Amazing Artist Friend frequently refers to herself / selves as "we" and "us." RantWoman is clear: being friends with Amazing Artist Friend means being friends with all of who are she. Amazing Artist Friend says RantWoman has met some of these. RantWoman has not been able to tell and is, to say the least,, curious.

RantWoman is glad to have an air mattress and to live near the Light Rail. Stay tuned.

Shameless Book Plug: Warm cup of wisdom. Dori Jones Yang

Full disclosure: RantWoman learned of this bookthrough her college alumni network. RantWOman has something else more pressing on her mind from the college alumni network and may or may not make it to the in-person author event in a couple weeks. But a fast skim of the website and the eBook options land this book smack on RantWoman's mean-to-read list; RantWoman would be thrilled if the promo inspires some else to read the book and share whatever makes the biggest impression.

http://www.booksbydori.com/index.php/books/warm-cup-of-wisdom

Warm Cup of Wisdom

- Inspirational Insights on Relationships & Life
Imagine you could have a cup of tea with some of the wisest people you know. They are a lot like you, except a generation older. You can ask them tough questions to help prepare for what comes next in your life.
For Warm Cup of Wisdom, Dori Jones Yang interviewed nine women she admires and asked them to share their wisdom about issues we all think about: joy, anger, loss, forgiveness, hope and peace. With humility, honesty, and humor, these wise women opened their hearts to her with warm advice and touching stories. She also asked life questions about finding your calling, midlife transitions, aging, and making a difference, as well as relationship questions about raising teenagers, relating to adult children, making marriage last, and dealing with difficult people. Their answers, she found, were both insightful and inspiring.
This book may inspire you to start your own "wisdom project"!
Warm Cup of Wisdom is now available in paperback and kindle, through Dori's store. Yes, this is Amazon. They give some publishers a hard time, but they are wonderfully supportive of authors. If any of you want to support Dori and indie publishing, please post a review on Amazon (if you like this book!) If you prefer, you can order a NOOK version and review it there. It's also available in other e-book formats through Smashwords. (Click here.)
For Author's comments, check out Dori's Wisdom blog.
To see what questions Dori asked, click here.