rivervision

oh goodness i’m certainly writing about this a lot, huh?  but still, to reassure myself, most of the personal details are kept to myself.  but the quaker agitator has a great post on the stigma associated with the damn illness, he calls it “i’m still bugged.”

to whom it may concern 1:  if someone is sitting on the bench at the bus stop with her head in a book, then you sit down and then they get up - with head still in book - and move away, oh and they have a frown on their face - it really isn’t appropriate to walk over to them and talk to them about which order to put bikes on the bike rack and then go on to tell that obviously-not-wanting-to-make-any-kind-of-conversation person how you are getting off at the end of the line.  obviously you can’t take social cues, or you just don’t care or can’t respect her space.

and to whom it may concern 2: when you are putting your bike on the bike rack and that grumpy looking woman goes to put her bike on the rack and snaps at you to back off because she doesn’t need help, don’t be an ass.  you obviously don’t understand social cues either, because it really isn’t appropriate to approach the grumpy looking woman.

further - twimc 1 & 2 - it is sexist to call women girls.  and yes, i realize that there couldn’t be a more patriarchial state than utah (and i know, not all of utah is patriarchial and sexist, but i can tell you that there is more patriarchial b.s. in utah than any other place i’ve lived, and i’ve lived in the south), and that you are just acting within the norms of your culture, but one day you are going to come across a grumpy not so silent woman and she’s going to tell you how incredibly sexist and patronizing you are being, and it won’t be nice.  or, you will run into the very grumpy woman that you ran into this morning, and like this morning she is not going to be grounded in her pacifist roots.  in fact i bet you will run into her on the eve of her comps when she is stressed, tired, and nervous, and this woman who was silent will speak up and tell you to back the fuck off, that you are being sexist, that your language which was ment to make her feel guilty and shamed for not being open to what you think is chivalrous behavior is going to tell you exactly what she thinks of your behavior.  further, she is going to have to resist the very strong urge she has to grab you by the balls and squeeze them hard, because she knows that that would really go against her pacifist roots, plus she just might get in trouble - because goodness knows you get in trouble for putting your feet on the seat in front of you on the bus here! - and get thrown into jail or something like that.  but you should know that after she has told you how extremely sexist you are being and that she is not going to be shamed by you because she is not interested in your lame attempts at chivarly she will sit on the bus and imagine, in her very vivid imagination, what it would be like to squeeze your balls and watch you sink to the floor and cry in pain begging for mercy from the pain, begging for the same kind of mercy that her sisters have begged for whenever they have been faced with consequences of living in a patriarchial sexist culture.  yes, this pissed off woman will imagine what it is like for you to have the tables turned on you, for you to feel the shame that you put on every woman you encounter with your sexism, and though she has roots in pacifism and knows that her vivid imagination is going against all that she truly believes about how people should interact, she will smile with glee at what she can see in her minds eye, and for a few moments she will find some joy in her very unpacifist, unChrist-like thoughts.

from cpt net 
AT-TUWANI: March from At-Tuwani to Tuba a success

On 2 August, more than one hundred children and their parents from the South Hebron Hills marched from the village of At-Tuwani to the village of Tuba, calling for an end to settler violence and settlement expansion in the area. The march was a part of the annual South Hebron Hills summer camp for children and a response to recent settler attacks on children walking to the summer camp in At-Tuwani.

The children and their parents, accompanied by a few Israelis and internationals, took the most direct path to the village of Tuba. For the past eleven years, school children escorted by the Israeli military have been the only Palestinians able to use this road. Palestinian parents organized the march to call attention to the violence faced by school children, the failure of the Israeli army to protect them and the effects of Israeli settlement expansion.

The march initially attempted to take the path that children use when unaccompanied by the Israeli military, around the settlement outpost Havat Ma’on (Hill 833)—which the Israeli government ordered dismantled in 2006. The Israeli military then declared the whole area a closed military zone and restrained the march with force, targeting leaders. Seeing a soldiers attack and try to arrest a Palestinian man, a CPTer tried to intervene. Soldiers knocked them both down and started choking the CPTer. Other participants in the demonstration then intervened nonviolently and stopped the attack. An Israeli and Kristin Anderson—who has worked both with CPT and Operation Dove (an Italian peace group that, with CPT, forms the At-Tuwani team)—were arrested.

Palestinian organizers negotiated with the soldiers, and the Israeli military agreed to accompany the children and parents on the short path, using the road between Ma’on settlement and Havat Ma’on (Hill 833).A large group of settlers came out of Ma’on and harassed the marchers. A smaller group of settlers followed directly behind the marchers, but Israeli military and police prevented them from attacking the group. One village elder accompanying the children walked this road for the first time in years. Surprised by the settlement expansion, she shared with a soldier about how she plowed this land years ago.

Participating in the march were children from the villages of Tuba and Maghaer Al-Abeed, whom settlers have regularly attacked as they walked to primary school in At-Tuwani. The children rely on an Israeli military escort to accompany them to school and prevent Israeli settlers from attacking them, but the Israeli military has recently declined to carry out the escort for summer camp. The most recent settler attack took place on 27 July, when the Israeli military refused to escort the children. Settlers flung rocks at the children with slingshots and physically assaulted CPTer Joel Gulledge, inflicting a head wound requiring stitches.

hey all -

just a note.  i didn’t realize people were acutally commenting these days!  i just went through 504 comments to deal with spam.  anyhow - at some point soon i’ll do something about not having to deal with so much spam, but until then i’ll actually try to stay up better with my comments.  :)

as i wrote in the previous post, i’m in the middle of it with this damn depression.  when i’m in the middle of it with this damn depression i really don’t feel like cooking, even though it’s something i really do enjoy.  well, today after church i felt pretty good - this has been a pattern since i started going to the little red brick church down the street.  the pastor’s style of delivery and way of being (and his politics) fit just in to my way of listening and needing a pastor to be (and my politics) and so whenever he’s delivering his message i can really hear it.   my favorite part of his services aren’t even in the program - he ends every service with the proclamation “And the children of God said amen!” and the congregation all says together “Amen!”  i find this very endearing, especially because he says it with such a feeling of hope and steadfast knowledge that yes - we are all children of God (disclaimer: at least from my perspective.  i know i have friends who don’t believe in God, and that’s okay, i don’t care, it doesn’t bother me, i don’t want them to believe what i believe, etc…  why i love his steadfast knowledge that yes, i am a child of God is because i am struggling with this and i’m glad this wonderful man has this confidence that i don’t have right now.  enough said.).   

when i got home today, after spending some time with my new literary friend, dietrich bonhoeffer, i felt good enough to make some Yumm! sauce, from a recipe i found on the web.  and it has turned out not exactly as Yumm! sauce should, but it turned out close enough that i am now going to get to eat Yumm! sauce here in logan, and not have to pilfer my friend jane’s when i’m home in eugene.  for any eugenians who are curious - or anyone who is curious what Yumm! sauce is, here’s the recipe i used: 

• 1/2 cup canola oil (preferably cold pressed)
• 1/2 cup almonds (for a creamier sauce, use almond flour)
• 1/3 cup nutritional yeast
• 1/2 cup chickpeas or garbanzo beans, cooked
• 1/4 cup soybeans, cooked (not green edamame beans)
• 1/2 cup water (important for flavor)
• 1/2 cup lemon juice (fresh is best)
• 1-2 garlic cloves (small to medium size)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons curry powder
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 teaspoon dried cilantro
• 1/2 cup silken tofu

in a blender: blend oil, beans, almonds, and tofu together.  then blend everything else in.               

btw - i used 3 cloves of garlic, because i subscribe to the feeling that it’s hard to get too much garlic.  next time i may use 4 cloves of garlic.   

i put the yumm sauce into 3 8oz yogurt containers.  2 are in the freezer and 1 is in the fridge.  i hope it freezes well.  i’ll update this space with that information later. 

oh, what is Yumm! sauce good on? ANYTHING. well, anything not sweet. my favorite is scrambled eggs with some Yumm! sauce (you don’t need a lot), garlic, rosemary, and some salsa. and for lunch this week i’ve cubed and fried some tofu, made some quinoa, and put some Yumm! sauce + some tomato sauce together. i will also make cheeze toast and put Yumm! sauce on top. my young friend j introduced me to mixing Yumm! sauce and pesto. i really think that that is the best mixture with it. but really, it’s good on anything. and when / if you are in eugene you can get the real thing.

oh, i feel good doing this for myself today. i wish my new counselor/person - i’ve- been- talking- too- to- help- me- with- this- depression / life- change stuff were in town this week so he could see me feeling good - or at least hear a story about me feeling good. since he’s known me he’s only seen me down in the dumps.

a little personal confession.  depression is something i’m familiar with.  i don’t know if i’ve written about it here - and really it’s not my intention to write much about my own experience with it except to say - i am more familiar than anyone should ever want to be with it, i’m currently walking through it, and today, just for my own record - i spent time with my new counselor  and i left with a bit of hope and peace (i hope it lasts awhile).   that’s all you are going to get from me, but from ben you’ll get a lot more.  ben has the courage to write about what the damn illness feels like in his post - pathos, and in his post ‘night inside mind‘ he quotes stephen k1ng who also describes the illness so succinctly.   and lastly - while you are reading ben’s posts, go read the eulogy he wrote for his mom.  i’m jealous, i wish i felt that way about my mom.

i’ve said this previously, but i feel the need to repeat it this morning.  the news out of palestine is simply heart breaking.  the news from the west bank - water shortages, continuing settler incursion into palestine that the state of israel refuses to stop, daily attacks on innocent children, the wall - is bad.  the news from gaza is so much worse.  the most populated stretch of land in the world - little food and water, refusal of the israeli’s to open the borders, families separated - it is a humanitarian crisis, and unless something changes soon it is only going to get worse.  i don’t understand why the israelis are doing this and i am furious at my government - and all western governments - refusal to stop it, refusal to make the israeli government stop this crisis. i was reading this article about breaking the siege, by boat, and in it i found this paragraph about the palestinian army.  i’ve found an inability to explain this very important point very eloquently.  people in the west need to understand this important point about the situation and why it can’t be called a conflict.

 Israel is the fourth largest military power in the world. In contrast, Palestinians don’t even have an army, just lightly armed rag-tag militias. When Palestinians respond nonviolently to Israel’s 60 year experiment in ethnic cleansing, they’re ignored by the world press and the protests are brutally suppressed by the occupation forces. When they respond violently, they’re demonized as “terrorists” in the same way that Native Americans were denigrated in the past as “savages.”          

 this is one of the stories that needs to get to the west.  rather than feeling sorry for the israeli’s everytime there is an attack, people need to understand what the palestinians are up against.  no - i do not approve of any kind of attack on either side, and i condemn all acts of violence, but for those who do believe that violence is an acceptable means to solve conflicts i think that there needs to be an understanding of the fire power on each side of the ‘conflict.’   i also think that for all those who care about world peace, people need to understand why those who are oppressed act out against oppressors and why those who are being oppressed do take up arms and do things like blow themselves up on a busload of innocents.  sometimes people just don’t think there is any other option, and for the palestinians - up against the 4th largest army in the world, though i don’t like it, i do understand.

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okay, enough palestine.  on to another part of the world.  my friend good friend clint is over in uganda right now.  he’s over there organizing a conference and doing all sorts of other things that he does to change the world.  i’d like to write a bit of an ‘ode to clint’ right here, but i fear that may swell his head even more than it is (tounge in cheek).  but i will say this - he’s a good man and in just the short time i’ve known him, watching him move about in the world has inspired me to be more compassionate, giving, and forgiving in the world.  

he posted a wonderful story about getting to know some ugandan children.  it’s part 2 of possibly? a multi-part story.  you can read part one, which may be helpful to understand the context of part 2.  though his story may seem insignificant, what is significant is that he told the story of these young men that he met - a story that doesn’t get told enough.  and he made a few young people a little less anonymous to a bunch of folks, many white westerners, who may never get the chance to meet these young people.

thanks my friend.  keep writing.