Service Python Friend

RantWoman has been called to be faithful to her Light. RantWoman will separately specify exactly what Light she is referring to. The details exist in email and need to be edited for blogdom. The point for this post: so there RantWoman was, after a good bit of wavering and considering other routings, being faithful to Light succinctly described as nonviolent presence on public right of way. The day unfolded with a sense RantWoman has felt a time or two before:  "Do NOT care who gets steaming mad. The world will not blow up just because someone is steaming mad. Plus MANY signs RantWoman is called to be faithful." 

Faitfhulness included:

--Answering a question about someone interested in an important new renter and expecting to find more signage than she did. Yes, she was at the right place. Yes, RantWoman knows one part of the schedule but does not know what else may have been added. RantWoman would suggest a dialogue with the renter about signage, if only because many come to the renter's events with their faces in their phones but might very much appreciate some confirmation that they are at the right place even if not the right time.

    You're welcome.

--Getting to greet at least wave at Service Python Friend, definitely someone RantWoman feels ZERO leading to wait around for a memorial to care about!

RantWoman is very fond of Service Python friend, mainly because the concept of a Service Python just makes RantWoman laugh. When the service python first came up in conversation, RantWoman really needed to laugh. Several years down the line, RantWoman still REALLY needs to laugh.

Put python in the search bar and all kinds of things turn up. Like, GOOD LORD RantWoman, you can be kind of Hard to Take. See: the single standard of RantWoman.

In the meantime, A Fairly recent Snake Charmer / Service Python Friend post

It took RantWoman a couple rounds to squinting to figure out who the person getting the walker out of the car was and that the person using the walker was Service Python Friend. (RantWoman realized the most vigilant parking space patroller is unavailable. RantWoman assumes the car has the requisite disabled parking permit, though if one gets out a walker and goes into Meeting, it should be obvious that one needs the handicapped parking place.)   RantWoman is TRULY glad to see both of them, most definitely would have preferred to greet them, and did not really want to brighten their day talking about "only come to memorials ..."
--Several other good and generous conversations.

There. RantWoman will stop for now. RantWoman feels a ferocious tirade coming on. Service Python Friend used to regale RantWoman with the lame excuses he heard in his role as a hearings examiner in county government. Service Python Friend, at least his former self would probably be amused at the tirade. The tirade may yet hit the electrons, but for now RantWoman will, cross fingers everyone, STOP.

Si A La Vida and Jonathan Roise: Memories in Celebration of Life

RantWoman is doing sort of end-of-year housekeeping, trying to clear outrageous muddles, tending to fundraising appeals or  in this case , to a Friend going online because she did not receive the usual expected fundraising appeal.

Si A La Vida  website about project that began as a project working with glue-sniffing street kids, boys, in one of the markets in Managua and has survived for 25 years as well as morphing into a program serving both boys and girls. The story is pretty inspiring, though RantWoman notes with slight concern for instance that the annual newsletters stop at 2016.


Video memorial about Si A La Vida founder Jon Roise. Sometimes there is no audio. Sometimes the audio is in English, sometimes in Spanish. Cope. And if blind readers find this video, it is worth asking someone to describe the various texts and photos.

RantWoman notes ruefully that Jon passed away several years ago and RantWoman is only now interacting with the news. That does not change eitherJon's accomplishments or the importance of Si a la Vida

RantWoman remembers this project because during her time as clerk of Peace and Social Concerns, the project was in the process of getting its own 501(c)3 tax status and transitioning to an independent organization instead of being under care of a Meeting. RantWoman is humble to have a very small part in helping that along.

Steady Light Day 8 with image and important article

Hanukkah Day 8
RantWoman received the menorah image below with this wonderful quote from Edith Wharton: There are two ways of spreading Light, to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.

And in terms of steady Light and taking care of what we have in particular as far as defense of immigrant rights, consider this link.

LA TImes on role of immigration rights supports in the NW

God, Belching

In the Hanukkah-ish realm of steady and even fierce Light, RantWoman is grabbing these two items from the Barclay Press

Read this one for the belching reference in the title
Where do we hear God s voice?

I Can't Sleep

Is RantWoman LOOKING for signs?

Where does RantWoman come down on the Run with Christ / It's all God within spectrum? RantWoman takes note of the dance in and out of Quaker worship.

The first Fourth Saturday Worship was a gift: RantWoman feels well-rewarded for being faithful to her Light; thoughts of people wanting to talk about prayer. In the future RantWoman will issue several specific invitations; RantWoman will also offer another opportunity to distribute invitations.

There was an image, partly about centering in worship: if you want to dance, you have to roll up the carpets and clear the floor. RantWoman can go SEVERAL directions with that.

RantWoman is left with questions and thoughts about worship and middle-schoolers that probably belong only in email. For her own part, RantWoman was pretty much a nerd at middle school age. First, the RantFamily moved to MT when RantWoman was in 6th grade. Junior High was grades 7-9.  Fitting in was not going to happen in school, and the church where RantDad was choir director already had its cliques too.

RantWoman blesses Sunday school teachers for being shining positive presence and gently biblical lessons; RantWoman would not say they were gifted about child development issues, but Sunday school was pleasant enough. Objecting to going to church would not have been received well; plus for RantWoman church through much of childhood was far preferable to the kid supervision options. RantWoman kind of dug the metaphors of the hymns. A number of feisty women who had worked in nearby Native communities (indian country, in modern usage; thank you Twitter.) kept things lively. At some point RantWoman realized that she naturally has some double-vision and when the service got too dull, RantWoman would spend time tracking the same objects in different images. So RantWoman finds herself just wondering about current local expectations from various directions.

And in the realm of what Lydia X Z Brown calls body-minds and being present with what they do or do not do, RantWoman offers observations from a recent Quaker Christmas pageant.

--RantWoman is grateful for Friends who described what everyone was laughing about: the baby Jesus proxy entered the stage stuck up Mary's shirt and arrived by the shortest and least bodily substance infused delivery ever.

--RantWoman spent time during the performance kind of rolling her eyes because one actor could barely be heard. RantWoman, though, is VERY glad she kept her mouth shut: RantWoman had been at an event where the presenter, someone on the autism spectrum, asked people please not to clap because she finds such sounds disturbing. The presenter asked everyone just to do the Deaf people wave hands thing. Okay sure, but if RantWoman does not have some kind of audio cue, she could be waving her hands all day.

After the holiday pageant, RantWoman learned that the person she was rolling her eyes about is the person whose mother awhile ago sent out an email on her son's behalf asking Friends for awareness and patience. RantWoman is guessing from the email that even standing up and saying a few lines was outside the son's comfort zone. RantWoman can encourage without traumatizing. No just yelling "Louder." Not obvious what to do if one can't hear. Luckily in this case the pageant was not going to be long and Divine mercy can cover conflicting accessibility needs. Luckily.

Invitation: Fourth Saturday Worship: happening December 28.

inning December 28, Fourth Saturday Worship:
Unprogrammed Worship in the manner of Friends (Quakers)
with queries related to prayer.

For December 28,

What do we mean by prayer?
What language do we use to speak of prayer?

An experiment for a few months
3:30-5:00 pm at the Montlake Library, 2401 24th Ave E, easily accessible on Metro Route 48

All who want to experience unprogrammed worship including children of
any age who can come with an adult are welcome.

For more information, leave a comment and please indicate whether you would like your comment published.

The Library's Branch Meeting Room Use Guidelines succinctly state "Meeting rooms are reserved for non-commercial use only; users may not advertise or sell products, memberships or services, and no fees, donations or money may be requested or collected

All meetings must be open to the public.No contact information may be solicited from attendees for the purpose of advertising or selling. 

Alfre Woodard & Aldis Hodge - A Humanizing Look at Death Row in “Clemenc...

Vocabulary: Sometimes people GET IT but Uprooting Racism--While practicing Ableism?

RantWoman wavered about timing for this post. However since this year's theme for dabbling in matters of Hanukkah is persistent Light, RantWoman has decided to go ahead and post it.

RantWoman humbly acknowledges that finding the right path to phone conversation MIGHT be on point here. Please all just hold that problem in the Light. This post reflects things RantWoman feels called to say to anyone who will listen but that RantWoman may not be able to get out of her mouth as directly as she can splatter all over a keyboard.. The post also contains content highly relevant to any Ad-Hoc Committee on Disability that at some point WILL get created. And even though RantWoman would find it frightenly easy just to let her head explode, RantWoman will be TRYING to make sense and not just have a good fit for the holidays. RantWoman will be TRYING.

RantWoman's Meeting thinks it has released itself from RantWoman. One person uses the word "divorce;"  RantWoman would tartly point out that divorce still frequently means shared custody of the planet, common history, and of a future.

RantWoman's Meeting cannot possibly release RantWoman from moral obligation to be faithful to her Light, to attend to Quaker testimonies including continuing revelation about basic terminology related to accessibility. Nor has RantWoman been released from a call to worship in the community and desire to come promptly to a shared understanding about this.

RantWoman's email contains several threads that fill her with DESPAIR. Out of care for her own holiday sanity, RantWoman is trying not to dump the whole sleigh out at once. RantWoman does note word reached her that the last Meeting for Business  approved a minute creating an Ad Hoc committee on Disability, to last a year from whenever Nominating Committee gets around to nominating a committee. The language of the minute is VERY boiled down. RantWoman considers that a problem, but Santa Claus physics or not, that topic gets to stay in the sleigh for another day or two. One clear task though: discuss what has worked and what has not.

Consider the humble monthly newsletter, which RantWoman is not reproducing in its entirety here.

RantWoman has for a long time had a standing reasonable accommodations request to have newsletter editors use headings on all articles in the newsletter. RantWoman has not pushed this request very hard with past newsletter editors but is disappointed that the current editor has fallen away from initial success in this area. RantWoman deeply appreciates the current editor's service and wants as gently as possible to encourage improvement. RantWoman does not want to speculate on what parts of the document preparation process get in the way of document accessibility happening on a consistent basis.

In the most recent issue, two things were odd:

--There is a list of articles at the beginning. The titles run over several lines in a column but instead of one heading per title, each line is its own heading. Not catastrophic because RantWoman and her screen reader can still skip fairly quickly over the extra headings, but kind of a nuisance.

--Bigger nuisance, one article had a title in the same font as other articles but was not marked as a heading. RantWoman reproduces the article below as an additional opportunity for Friends to explore important terminology.

UPROOTING RACISM BOOK GROUP BEGINS FEBRUARY Starting February 2, 2020, Peace and Social Concerns will host a monthly book group on uprooting racism. The group will run initially for six months on the first Sunday of the month from 12:30PM to 2:00PM in the First Day School Room.*** We will usually read one book each month, all of which will be available from either the Seattle Public Library or King County Library in various formats.***** Some titles will also be available to borrow from the UFM library. The topics will include white privilege, white supremacy culture, the impact of racism on specific communities of color in the United States and uprooting racism. The first book we’ll read is Waking Up White and Finding Myself in the Story of Race by Debby Irving, Elephant Press 2014. After that, the participants will select future titles from a curated syllabus, and we’ll publish the complete list in Gleamings and post on our website.   Each session will be open to everyone whether or not you plan to attend them all. Questions? (leave a comment and RantWoman will forward because she has not asked permission to post the contact info)

***Remember one of RantWoman's gripes about the Care and Accountability Committee wanting RantWoman to go hide in places physically inaccessible to people RantWoman might want to have sit with her including her own sister? The First Day School Room is one such place. If someone who uses a wheelchair wanted to participate in this book group, would the group consider a different location? There are several points in RantWoman's thinking about this question. Stay tuned.

****"several formats!!!!" Hallelujah. Praise Jesus. Someone familiar with the concept of multiple formats and getting such from libraries. Now if only the person correctly considering this term did not insist on wanting RantWoman Gone Gone Gone from Meeting life. Please hold the entire fiasco in the Light.

*****RantWoman feels particular call about general Uprooting Racism conversations for one thing because RantWoman is also called to pay attention to matters of intersectionality, including some encapsulated by the various hashtags such as #DisabilityTooWhite.

Consider also the electronic edition of Faith and Practice, delivered in a format accessible to RantWoman only AFTER.... Stay tuned about that issue as well.

In Light and Faithfulness.

RantWoman