Impassionata

“Guess what: God created beings not to act in a morality play but to
experience what is unfathomable, to elicit what can become, to descend
into the darkness of creation and reveal it to him, to mourn and celebrate
enigma and possibility. The universe is a whirling dervish, not a hanging
judge in robes.”

- Richard Grossinger, *On the Integration of Nature: Post 9-11 Biopolitical
Notes*

I like this a lot, this image of the universe as a whirling dervish and not a hanging judge in robes. I believe that experiencing my own humanity and growing and learning is part of the point of my existence.

I was sorting through my card box looking for cards and found one that says simply:

“some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. delicious ambiguity…” - gilda radner

It seems fortuitous as I start work on a dissertation about ambiguity. I’m delighted by it, and have hung it over my desk.

The other card I found says:

“There’s no use trying,” said Alice; “one can’t believe impossible things.”

“I dare say you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” - Lewis Carroll

I bought both of these cards so long ago, I’d forgotten about them entirely. The other thing I’ve started is my own consulting company, called “Looking Glass Guidance”. I own the domain name, and have registered it with San Mateo County and the city of South San Francisco as an official sole proprietorship - which means I also now count as a woman and minority-owned business. Yay!

There are a  few things behind the name - first, the obvious reference to the Looking Glass from Alice and Wonderland. The second is that one of my first mentors, Glenn Tobe, said a long time ago that sometimes he had executive clients look at themselves for at least five minutes in the mirror, and it was almost a test. If they couldn’t stand to do that, in a deep and searching manner, then it was already a test of their commitment.

Third, there’s the notion of threshold implicit in the looking glass, and what it takes to traverse the land beyond it. Thresholds have threshold guardians, and like Lewis Caroll’s Wonderland, things don’t work there the way they’re “supposed” to. As we find ourselves in tumultuous times, amidst great uncertainty and “delicious” ambiguity, learning to navigate that territory requires a great deal of self-awareness and reflection, as well as the capacity to act amidst ambiguity.

And lastly, one of my very first client sites was going through an outsourcing, and the lead woman named Paula had a poem that she read. Her father had loved the poem, and it was important to her as she was navigating the politics and difficult decisions to abide by the thoughts set out in the poem.

The Guy in the Glass
by Dale Wimbrow, (c) 1934

When you get what you want in your struggle for pelf,
And the world makes you King for a day,
Then go to the mirror and look at yourself,
And see what that guy has to say.

For it isn’t your Father, or Mother, or Wife,
Who judgement upon you must pass.
The feller whose verdict counts most in your life
Is the guy staring back from the glass.

He’s the feller to please, never mind all the rest,
For he’s with you clear up to the end,
And you’ve passed your most dangerous, difficult test
If the guy in the glass is your friend.

You may be like Jack Horner and “chisel” a plum,
And think you’re a wonderful guy,
But the man in the glass says you’re only a bum
If you can’t look him straight in the eye.

You can fool the whole world down the pathway of years,
And get pats on the back as you pass,
But your final reward will be heartaches and tears
If you’ve cheated the guy in the glass.

YAY! I have a working computer again. I made this recipe for dinner a couple times, and the first time, it was just missing something. I was inspired after looking up Tuscan farmhouses, in preparation for this year’s trip to Italy.

Original Recipe from Epicurious:

• 1 pound dried white beans (Great Northern or navy), picked over
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• a 1-pound can whole peeled tomatoes including juice
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh sage or 2 teaspoons dried, crumbles

In a large saucepan soak beans in enough cold water to cover by 2 inches at least 8 hours or overnight.

Drain beans in a colander and return to saucepan with cold water to cover by 2 inches. Simmer beans, covered, until tender, about 45 minutes to 1 hour. Reserve 1 cup cooking liquid and drain beans in colander.

In a heavy kettle cook garlic in oil over moderate heat, stirring until softened. Add reserved cooking liquid, beans, tomatoes with juice, sage, and salt and pepper to taste and simmer mixture, stirring occasionally, until thickened, about 25 minutes.

- my variations: double the garlic, and add pancetta in the initial step (because bacon makes everything better), and use a cup of soup stock instead of bean liquid. I like San Marzano diced tomatoes instead of whole, and 3 cans of Italian white beans.

I also made quinoa last night, with sauteed spinach, an onion, mushrooms, and 2 small bell peppers and while I still feel like that dish is missing an ingredient or two, it still turned out well for an impromptu dish! That was inspired by Ana-Catrina who made this fantastic quinoa dish, along with a chard tart that I really want the recipe for! And this yummy cake!

I celebrated Passover with the Laughlins and a few of their freinds, which was lovely. There’s something about participating in old traditions which I find beautiful, and then also making them personal to the times and circumstances (including and inviting the presence of little ones - though Stacy appropriately drew the line at singing about the 7 plagues to the tune of “If You’re Happy And You Know It” from the children’s haggadah - I was half-appalled, half-amused). The food was amazing, and I’m collecting some additional recipes out of it which makes me happy! Stacy did an arctic char in parchment pockets with goat cheese and leeks on top modified from a Chocolate&Zucchini (recipe book) recipe that I need to get my hands on.

Sedars are interesting from the perspective of learning, and also understanding that you’re intaking history both figuratively and literally (dipping herbs in bitter water, for example) from a specific perspective as well. I simultaneously honor the importance of a history of a people and the acknowledgment of the sufferings of ancestors and the lines we come from while holding a wariness of stories of suffering that comes with an agentic element. It’s neat being at a sedar where the people around the table are knowledgeable and conscious about what they’re creating together - huge kudos to Stacy for that one in her leadership andthe the choices she made.

I’m discovering that having friends over and hanging out chatting and cooking really makes a home! It was definitely a different vibe than Passover though. Matt, Alexis, Kim, Toben, and Dan were over last night sortof impromptu to have dinner, watch “Twilight” (which we refused to do sober and made fun of a lot - SPARKLY vammpires!), and generally chat and have fun together. I loved it.  There’s nothing like good food, bottles of very yummy wines (we broke out dessert wines - YUM), tons of dessert, and really good fun friends!!!  They got leftover peach kuchen, and I made the swiss wieja  with shredded gruyere on top and that turned out really wonderfully! Must make this one again - lots of fun.  2 9″ pies made a great appetizer for 5 hungry people before the salmon and another side.  Toben used the extra dough to make me little moons and stars to put on the pies.

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My friends Susanne, Craig & Beena are visiting this weekend on their way to teach a course at JFK on adult development. Susanne & Craig got in yesterday from Australia. It’s been lovely to have them - Susanne and I just stayed up in the kitchen having late-night tea til near midnight and chatting about various family experiences and significant movements in our own development as human beings and the places where we have different lenses for looking back on our lives. I love hearing about stories of  Susanne growing up in Switzerland!

I made a soup for them today out of whatever was in the house, which was a new experience for me - actually feeding my guests.  I knew enough of the ribolleta-like soup I made before to start to really improvise, as well as work on a base that I know works using pancetta, garlic, onions, and tomato paste with some sliced yams thrown in.

I’m starting to really love cooking as a connection point! Susann taught me to make a Swiss dish of some name I can’t pronounce (wieja? it sort of sounds like va-ha) - looking it up on the internet, the closest is a sort of open-faced onion pie that’s a cross between a pizza and a quiche.

It’s on a base of puff pastry dough rolled out and settled into a pie crust - she taught me two methods of making the edges prettier, using a fork or fluting it. The savory version was made by laying Italian spiced breadcrumbs down as thinly as a layer to soak up the juices of the vegetables that were layered over it. We put in garlic, mushrooms, tomatoes, zucchini, onion, proscutto, and she suggested adding gruyere to melt over the top. There are lots of other variations! I may try an onion and ham variant next…

The very tasty sweet version had a layer of crushed almonds or hazelnut, with fruit layered on top. We used apples and canned peaches this time, but she suggested fresh apricots. It bakes for about 20 minutes before a mixture of 2 eggs, condensed milk or cream, brown sugar, and lemon zest is poured on top and then baked some more!

Yay for adding some yummy native Swiss cuisine to my repetoire! And in addition, Craig shared his biscotti recipe for me - see below:

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I’ve been fascinated by a facebook status Toben posted. He posted, ” Toben had a dream where sacrificing himself would save lots of people or he could save himself and sacrifice those people… which would you choose?”

I’m fascinated by all the “It depends” answers. It’s an eminently reasonable answer and there is no judgment of it. I’m more fascinated by what came up for me. But if you didn’t know who would be saved or didn’t have the choice of whom, and it was an entirely random assortment of people, which would you choose?

My instinctive answer just a simple, “yes” to saving others.

For some people, it seemed dependent on whether or not they could save loved ones. I think that of a random assortment of 50, there are loved ones, whether I personally know and love them or not - they’re all someone’s daughter or son, perhaps a father or mother. I think an implicit question is perspective on humanity - I honestly can’t recall the last time I’ve met someone I couldn’t love.  It seems true to me that I’ve been blessed in my life that way - that the world is full of remarkable people. I can’t even chalk it up to having a small world - my friends are global, on all continents.  In some sense, it makes it “easy” to say in a heartbeat, “yeah, I’d go.”

I’m reminded suddenly of a boatman on the Yangtze river - couldn’t make more than a couple bucks a day, toothless, with a gaping smile, terribly dirty and torn clothes. He pressed a stone from the river into my hand when I was traveling with my tourgroup as a gift. I couldn’t communicate a word with him. I don’t “know” him, but it feels like I’ve known enough humanity to know that we all love, feel fear, feel alone, and for many, just don’t know how to cope with the world in healthy ways so we hobble along, doing the best we can with what we know. There’s a line of my friend Zayra’s poem “I am SHE” where it goes something like, “I am SHE, I am you, you are me.” I’ve noticed that when I look deeply into the eyes of another, there’s a blurring. This “I” that people sometimes call “Gayle” is sort of nebulous anyway.

I think part of it too is something around where one is around death. I love life - I absolutely love it - I love the changing of days, I love the variety of people, I love new experiences, and I think the world has a ton of things I still want to experience. I want to see Petra in Jordan and walk the Alhambra in Spain, and I’d like to meet my grandchildren. That said - my feeling is that I love life so much that I feel like I could be at peace in letting it go. And at that point, perhaps better me that someone else.

I guess it comes down to something really simple for me - I love people. I’m okay with my own endings - and if my death gives others more time to either cope with theirs or not, whatever way their way is, then it seems a small thing.

And could I also live with myself if not?

I think of the book “Field Notes of a Compassionate Life” by Mark Ian Barach who studied those in concentration camps and who suffered under other horrors and yet put their lives at risk, or shared their last pieces of bread - it’s a small group. I’ve asked myself if I’d have the courage to be one of those, because you never really do know under those circumstances how you’ll be until you encounter them. I’d hope so.

From the mythic perspective, there is nobility in fairy tales because there is nobility in the human soul.  I think we have gods and goddesses partly because they embody the worst and best parts of ourselves.  I’ve a particular affinity for Kwan Yin (as I later found out my maternal grandmother does). My friend Julie, that I met this week - another sister of the heart - sold me a beautiful White Tara image for my home. It’s a version of the Kwan Yin, Goddess of Compassion, and she has 8 eyes to better see the suffering of the world - I think that’s where I fail to see much of a difference between one human being and another, and between myself and others.

Had tea with Christy and Angie last week and the frozen blueberry variant of this plum custard that Christy made was TASTY!!! - http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Plum-Custard-Kuchen/Detail.aspx

Also -the IONS cheft made pureed purple cauliflower simmered down with butter and cream (no wonder I liked it), and then with kale and lentils with some cheese and slice of  wild mushrooms. This was YUMMY. I have no idea how to do this, but will have to try this sometime and experiment with getting the proportions right. It looked like goopy purple stuff.

I also really want to get a good recipe for kadoo (sp?)- an Afghani pumpkin dish that is just ridiculously tasty. Toben and I had a date night last Saturday evening, and while the Ethiopian restaurant I wanted to go to was way too crowded to get in, we went to Kabul Afghan in Sunnyvale which was mighty tasty!

I’m retreat-ing, re-treat-ing, re-treating at the Institute of Noetic Sciences campus - beautiful parcel of land north of San Francisco, in a group of 12 exploring the idea of transforming love. I’m often silent about some of my retreats, because to my pragmatic self, they sound a bit woo-woo. The playful title of the retreat is “April Fools’ Day Alchemists’ Workparty” - Alchemists referring to adult developmental stage (see the work of Susanne Cook-Greuter for a description of action logics), not a bunch of people trying to turn straw into gold.

The first question of the day and to the group was “Who are you?” and “Why are you here?”

It’s disconcerting to realize that while I can list things I DO (read,  roles I play (daughter, consultant, etc.), and quirks of this Self (geek, leader, crusader, etc.), who I am becomes more and more unknown to me. There have been times I’ve thought I’ve known myself pretty well and other times I’m aware that they are largely stories I tell myself. I’m reminded of a poet who said, “I have walked through many lives, some of them not my own, though some principle of being abides by which I struggle not to stray.” Some principles of being abide - the rest is still a mystery - and it’s also disconcerting to realize that I always will be to myself. The divorced, unemployed me of my Spring of 33 is different again than the woman I was at 22, and the woman I will be at 44 - and this changes yet with context, and relationship, with the addition of roles and the fluidity or rigidity with which I adhere to them. Another “workparty” member near 70s described it as “wonderment” - there is a bit of wonderment to this “I”.

And the “Why?” If you’d asked me before this morning, I would have said I have no idea. But it felt “laid upon me” to go, and I generally follow the deep intuitions that tell me when something will be remarkable for me even if I have no idea why. I’d say much of the remarkable parts of my life are made of experiences born from the spark of adventure that has no rational clue why I do what I do.

And there’s still something nutty about going to a workshop that explicitly, with very conscious and challenging Others, to explore “Transforming Love”. Feeling  my resistance was fascinating. I wanted very much at times to be too sick to go.  When I think about it, it makes sense - every experience I’ve had of transformational love is a little frightening because it’s inherently been shattering. It’s interesting to note that whatever else I’ve thought I’ve had to gather courage for - it ultimately comes down to loving self-others-life enough to see through the shattering, when in the course of change, it all goes.

Diane Musho Hamilton said that even if you do love “right”, that’s when it hurts the most - not when it hurts the least. Poets and mystics talk about practicing the wound of love for a reason.

In the relative beginning stage of a new relationship with Toben, it’s been interesting to be so conscious of endings and there are moments I’ve wondered why.  It isn’t because there isn’t love there. I think, in fact, it is because there IS. And of everything, as Clarissa Pinkola Estes said, death must have each share though the mortal impulse particularly at the beginnings is to deny it. One of the things that surfaced again tonight was the truth that endings are created at the beginnings of relationships - every beginning has the seed of endings. It doesn’t mean it’s imminent - it just IS. While there are lots of questions within relationships, like how to sustain them, how to sustain each other, I think every individual needs to also take up what it is to lose - lose both relationships, friends, aspects of self, and ultimately life itself. I think it’s one of the reasons I’m considering doing some hospice volunteering.

These groups are an opportunity to practice life and to live life as practice. Everything is a practice.  Relationships are complex - there’s you, there’s the Other, there’s the way you play out archetypal roles, there’s the Relationship as its own entity and unique flavor, there’s the individual and dyads within communities. It really isn’t a wonder they’re hard - and yet, there IS something to having some consciousness around these elements.

We spent the evening dialogue exploring what we personally wanted to take up over the course of the days together and my trio (what wonderful things trios are for the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd party perspectives they can offer) came up with a sort of mutual point of exploration - what is it to explore opening in commitment to a group of relative strangers in whom I trust to carry out this exploration, to be so committed that I feel the loss keenly in the ending of this group and to let myself commit despite knowing that will happen. It’s an interesting act of creation to choose to go down a path you know will hurt because it’ll be the most fulfilling- and this as microcosm, model for life itself.

Coincidentally and very appropriately, in looking up hospice programs, I ran across this on the last words of the Buddha:

The Parinirvana Sutra exemplifies the spirit of our work:

‘O bhikshus! Do not grieve! Even if I were to live in the world for as long as a kalpa, our coming together would have to end.

You should know that all things in the world are impermanent; coming together inevitably means parting. Do not be troubled, for this is the nature of life. Diligently practicing right effort, you must seek liberation immediately. Within the light of wisdom, destroy the darkness of ignorance. Nothing is secure. Everything in this life is precarious.

Always wholeheartedly seek the way of liberation. All things in the world, whether moving or non-moving, are characterized by disappearance and instability.

Stop now! Do not speak! Time is passing. I am about to cross over. This is my final teaching.’

(Note: The Parinirvana Sutra is also known as the Parinibbana Sutta, in the Pali Tipitaka. It is not to be confused with the Mahaparinirvana Sutra in the Mahayana Tripitaka.)

I had my weekly phone call with my Zen teacher Doen Sensei this morning and as always, appreciated the bits of wisdom and encouragement.

He mentioned that any shifts in life are like boat journeys, with their ups and downs.  You don’t really have the option of getting off, and you could spend all your time looking back or trying to figure out how you got on in the first place - or you could ask the question of what it really means to be one with the journey. And of course it’s a little discombobulating!  For whatever reason, the metaphor really resonated with me.

I’m definitely still a bit under the weather. It’s been surprising to me how tired I get!

And on a side note, I went to brunch with my friend Eddie at this fantastic restaurant on Haight Street in San Francisco called Magnolia Pub and Brewery. I totally want to come back here for dinner, as I loved their food and beer! The owners also own Alembic - another favorite food place!

• http://www.magnoliapub.com/
• http://http://www.alembicbar.com/