Years ago, over twenty to be exact, I started teaching a doula course with another powerful woman who I grew to love and respect. Unfortunately, our relationship ended with some rancor and bitterness, on my part at least, and we went our separate ways. She became very ill and survived Stage Four cervical cancer, and she is still a teacher, a powerful woman, and so much more.

On February 8, 2024, a young student/friend/mentee to whom I had become very attached finally chose to end her life after a struggle with mental illness. It was a tragic blow for everyone around her, and it hit us all that we don’t have much time to live, and what time we have we should make use of.

Her death was the catalyst that brought my estranged friend and I back together: obviously we are both older and one hopes wiser, and over the years we’ve learned to live a little more gently with ourselves. She is indeed a Wise Woman. But part of her wisdom, part of her courage and her fortitude are precisely the things that could (and didn’t, because of a combination of luck, love, and inner strength) have brought her down. The world is a better place with her on this side of the grass, and she is willing to embrace that.

Part of her power is precisely her recovery from her illness. Of course, part of it is God-given and part of it is sheer grit. But how can we imagine that a person we admire for their strength and inner peace and ability to love got that way by being perfect from birth? No, in fact, the women that become strong, powerful, loving, wise, become that way through and because of hardships, scars, disappointments.

One of the women I work alongside completed a Birth Attendant training and she now attends mothers during their childbearing seasons. When she was a recent graduate of the course, she asked a practicing Birth Attendant if she thought it was ok if she’d never had a natural birth. In fact she’d only given birth by c-section and had never experienced a normal birth as a birthing mother. The Birth Attendant told her absolutely not, that she has to now experience a VBAC at home for her to have the validity she needs to accompany women.

Our culture has a weird relationship to scarring. We love the people who have “been through it”: the recovered addicts; the survivors of childhood trauma who speak out; the #metoo women; the women who had traumatic births and unnecessary c-sections who recount their transcendent VBAC or freebirth. But there are just as many people who haven’t gone through to that other triumphant side. The secret substance abusers; the private trauma sufferers; the women who were raped and never said anything; the birth trauma victims who never have that transcendent next birth.

Life is messy and often the world doesn’t care. I believe that my scars and setbacks have turned me into a wiser woman: one who is able to be truly compassionate when I’m accompanying a mother who is making difficult choices. I can say “Who am I? She is the only one who can make this decision. It’s her life.”, and I can truly mean it. I’ve made difficult or complicated decisions that seemed wrong at the time, and even seemed wrong and were painful for years. And the repercussions of my suffering have seemed in some way to have canceled out other people’s suffering.

For example, I had a very traumatic and abusive c-section. I suffered and felt guilty for years. It affected my soul, if I can say that out loud. It affected my relationships with my children and especially the child in question. But because of that terrible experience, I threw myself into attending births in the hospital where I prevented many unnecessary c-sections and gave women that feeling that they were not alone. I couldn’t have done that without having been brought so low myself.

If you are drawn to attend birth, and you’ve had a less-than optimum experience yourself, I am here to tell you that you are amazing!

If you are drawn to attending birth, and your birth experiences were transforming and powerful, I am here to tell you that you are amazing!

If you are drawn to attending women in their childbearing seasons, in whatever capacity and with whatever experiences you have as a woman, I would love to invite you to be part of our 2025 Birth Attendant course.

And if you’re not drawn to birth, and you have scars, and you never got transformed and you never transcended … don’t worry! Feel your power! Jump from misadventure to misadventure! Keep a smile on your face and love in your heart and remember, you are wise!

Let’s unpack a little here.

The phrase came to my attention the other day when I heard through the gossip-vine that someone didn’t want me to attend her birth, because I don’t “trust birth”, because I gave birth in the hospital. I’ll start at the bottom of this pile, and we’ll move slowly upwards. First, I gave birth in the hospital. Yes, ma’am. I also did quite a few other things that I a. am not hugely proud of or b. regret or c. felt pressured to do. Do I feel defensive about this? Well, clearly, yes. Because it’s a pedestal upon which those of us who gave birth at home can dance upon and those of us who did it in the hospital can feel ashamed about. Me? What I did was I felt terrible, I did experience much of the hospital brutality I witnessed as a doula, then I decided to attend women in their childbearing year so I could facilitate them feeling good about their birth experiences.

Does every woman who gave birth in the hospital not “trust birth”? Should she not attend the births of other women, in case she gets scared and fucks things up? Does every woman who gave birth unassisted “trust birth”? Or are things, as so often the case, much more complicated than that?

Let’s break it down even further, and start thinking about the weird binary-based dichotomy “between” the medical system and the story-based knowledge base that supports out-of-system birth. First, it’s looked at as a dichotomy, which isn’t true. Doctors I’ve had the misfortune to work with in the hospital assume that because I’m a doula and support physiologic birth, I also homeschool my kids, don’t vaccinate, and eat raw food. I may or may not, and its none of your fucking business, but we’ve got a bad habit these days of placing people firmly in airtight boxes. If I’ve given birth in the hospital, on the other hand, my package is that I give my children too many unnecessary antibiotics and vaccines, send them to school, and buy my clothes at WalMart.

These are superficial and trivializing examples of a real problem both within and outside of the world of birth. We’ve decided that everything is either/or, and just as when you’re buying internet service, people are seen as “bundles” and not as the intricate, messy, complicated, beautiful creatures they really are.

Now, let’s have a look at what giving birth in a hospital actually means. What it actually means is that many, many women go into the hospital trusting that they will be treated with kindness, respect, care. What often happens is that the people surrounding them in the hospital are coming to birth with a mixed-up, confused, and generally dangerous vision of what actually happens during human childbirth. I won’t go into the details right here (but I’m happy to share them another time!) but for various reasons, the perceived risks and dangers of birth far outweigh the actual factual reality, which is that the huge majority of mothers and babies survive childbirth if they are not interfered with. The fear-based approach, however, actually precipitates emergencies, some of which are life-threatening.

Add to that our cultural and societal weirdness that assumes that women are weak (but not all women: white women are weak and need protecting from themselves. Black women are understood to be very, very strong: so strong, in fact, that when they say something is wrong they are ignored). And our inability to accept the Mysteries, and the paradox that is the sexual and divine nature of childbirth and, well, you have a problem.

But not all women who give birth within the hospital system are abused! That’s great, right? Oh, wait, but I don’t want to hear any stories any more about a woman going in to give birth and ending up with someone else’s fingers in their vagina while she is yelling “Please don’t, please stop”. (Notice she is saying please: we are so polite even in our worst moments).

So as long as there is just one woman who still has to yell like that, while someone does an unnecessary vaginal exam or a brutal placenta retrieval or a killer fundal massage, I’m still convinced that hospitals are not safe for birthing women.

And what are the options? Indeed. It is really lovely to be able to give birth in your own home, surrounded by people you love. Many women also want to have a woman present who has some birth wisdom, some experience, some skill. That woman will mostly be silent and invisible, but sometimes she’ll peep in and make a suggestions or answer a question.

Here’s the role of a Birth Attendant described so beautifully by Lazarus Lake, who is race director for the Barkely Marathon, which is the most brutal endurance run in the world. The decision to simply witness and not interfere is a tough one, but can lead to so much transformation and joy!

“as a race director you have a responsibility not to let an athlete put theirself in danger.

at the barkley that can be a tough call.

the standing joke is that every barker starting lap 5

would be pulled off the course in any other event.

jasmin was damaged when she left on the third lap.

between 3 and 4 it looked like an open question if she would be able to continue.

but between 4 and 5 she initially looked like a corpse.

she perked up briefly getting her stuff together to start the last loop.

then her stomach rebelled.

watching her try and get things under control to leave i had an internal debate going on.

carl was really in charge

and i was supposed to step in and help him when needed.

i couldnt abrogate my responsibilities on a technicality.

so i needed to give the situation serious consideration.

normally it might be advisable to tell her she should get her stomach settled before leaving.

but this wasnt normally.

and every second had counted for a long, long time.

jasmin was not just some ordinary athlete.

she had proven herself many times over.

the weather was not life threatening…

but most of all she was on the verge of a transformative performance.

she deserved to decide the outcome of her race “out there”

so i just watched her head out into the darkness.

the rest of the story the world knows….

if you have not been “out there”

your mind cannot create an image of just how hard it is

nor of the sheer horror that is that course.

whatever superlative you went to apply to her performance,

“most of all she was on the verge of a transformative….” sometimes it is hard to watch a woman birthing her baby. Sometimes mother and baby need to work through so many challenges. Sometimes we have to step back and let the magic happen, and most of all, we have to trust the woman to decide the outcome of her journey “out there”.

“Trusting birth” is another magical language trick that takes the focus away from the powerful woman who is bringing a new human earthside. I don’t trust birth, I trust the woman. I trust her to do the work, to birth the baby, to put in the miles, to make her own decisions.

Originally published at https://dreamchasercan.blogspot.com.

I woke at 6:15 and got dressed. My gear was kind of organized the night before but I still had to dress, use the bathroom, eat breakfast, fill my flasks and get my act together. I filled my water bladder and attached in into my vest, got my maple syrup and salt flask ready, packed my vest with the things I thought I would need for the day: cheerios, candies, salt tabs, wipes in ziplock, pee cloth, re-suable cup, emergency blanket (I take one everywhere, traveled through Africa with it decades ago.) Sunscreen, lip balm, phone and headphones. Watch.

I pinned on my bib, gobbled my breakfast, gulped my coffee and my son drove me to the race start. It was pretty low key over there. Everyone is over 50 who’s involved in the race. There’s a 50k, 50 miler, 100k, 100 miler. The oldest runner is in his 80’s. We had a little pep talk, then we head out.

I am so happy! I’ve studied the course. I know what I’m going to eat. I am in the desert, my favourite place on the planet. And besides, I labored for so many hours to have my five babies, I can run for 50 kilometers no problem!

The trail goes downhill and then along a sandy patch until we reach two large tunnels that go under the highway. I don’t like tunnels at the best of times, but these were the only thing that I dreamed about when I was having anxiety dreams about the race. I got through the tunnel and started my race.

Wait a minute. Why do I feel water dripping down my front? Ok, so a few weeks before the race I was doing one of my long runs and the nozzle of my water bladder froze. I had a note on my list of things to do: dress rehearsal of gear. I was going to put all the gear I was going to use for my race, get it all together and just go for an hour run to final test that everything was working.

I never got to do that dress rehearsal. So in fact, the nozzle from the bladder had not only frozen but also ripped. The damn thing had a hole in it and it was spurting water. I noticed it after the big hill after the tunnel…the front of my running top was wet and water was splashing on my legs. I couldn’t have worked up a crazy sweat already….

First I put it in my mouth and thought I would have a continual water supply. Note: you can’t run with a tube in your mouth. Then I tried blowing air into it to see if that would stop the flow. It didn’t. I ran up to a group of friends running together and asked if they could think of any quick fixes. They couldn’t. I asked if they wanted to hear a joke: “My water broke! I’m leaking and labor hasn’t started yet!”. haha. Then for about a mile, I held the tube up to stop the water dripping, then I realized if I bend it, it won’t drip. So I took some tape from the course markings, tied it around the bent hose, and stuffed it in my pocket.

All good, except that it meant that I only had my 500 ml of electrolyte mix readily available, and I didn’t want to mess around untying tape every time I wanted to drink. Anyway, challenge accepted, and I decided to drink the electrolytes and refill with water.

The next 35 kilometers went by like a dream! I ran, I walked, I thought my thoughts. I spun around at times, just drinking in the beauty. I ate Ritz crackers with Nutella at an aid station. I filled my water flask. I didn’t like my maple syrup so much. I finished my cheerios, throwing the last four remaining onto the desert ground with a small prayer of gratitude. I danced. I saw a butterfly. I met a cow. I missed a turn and went down the wrong road for a little bit until I realized there were no footprints. I turned around and saw three other runners wildly waving at me, so I turned back and got on track. I had some pumpkin pie at an aid station. I was filled with happiness. At around the 30 km mark I started eating candies and salt tablets. They were just what I needed! I decided to drink from my useless bladder, so I untied it every 20 minutes or so and took a long drink.

At Mile 24.6, I reached Overlook aid station, 15 minutes after my planned time. I was happy and tired, and my son was waiting there with my Snickers bar! I gave him the offending water bladder, filled my flask, and headed out. Then the demons hit.

It wasn’t really Courtney Dauwalter’s famous pain cave. It was more like I suddenly realized, at about 42 kilometers, that I was a fat idiot. I was in the middle of the desert, with mountains in the distance, and blue sky above, and for about a kilometer I was literally adjusting my clothing and worrying that I looked fat. I stopped. I stared at the sky. I had a drink of water. I continued. Fat or not fat, I regained my spirits and ran, stumbled, and walked the last ten km.

The final ten k were the hardest in terms of terrain. Very rocky and some steep descents. I couldn’t really run. I slowed down a lot, partly because of my water troubles from the beginning of the race. But my “fat crisis” was minimal, and I regained my smile. I was terrified going back through the tunnel. I kept thinking if someone comes barreling my way in an ATV, what the hell can I do? But no one did, and I survived. I knew I wasn’t going to die, the universe wasn’t going to play that cosmic joke on me just yet.

Bottom line? I made it to the start line! And I made it to the finish line!

The finish line was a bit of a let-down, to be honest. I thought there would be more people there, but it was very low key. I got in the car with my loyal son and race support and we drive back to the RV where we were staying. I had a burger. I recovered, slowly.

I trained. I trained hard, and had some setbacks. Physical stuff (colds, muscle aches and the like). Emotional stuff (challenges with family, feelings of Fatness, Fakeness, and the like). Discipline was ongoing. I needed to get out there, and when I had a run or a workout scheduled, I had to do it. I had to eat a lot, and good food. I needed to reframe my idea about how much protein I need, and how my body should look and act. I had to get 8–9 hours of sleep a night.

There’s a lot of bullshit out there about a lot of things. Particularly about women, as far as I can see. Particularly about what we are or can be capable of. In this instance, I had to unlearn some of society’s misconceptions about older women.

Three little BS turds right here:

• Old people don’t need to eat much, especially protein.
• Old women shouldn’t exercise too much. Lighter weights, not too much running (bad on the joints).
• We need less sleep.

If you’re over 60, please have a look at your diet and make sure you are getting at least one source of protein with each meal. Start lifting weights asap! Your muscles are shrinking every day. And run, jump, ski, or dance whenever you feel like it. Sleep! If you wake up at five am, have a nap later in the day.

This isn’t one of those “I did it, you can too” pieces. This is: shit happens, and usually we can overcome whatever hurdles are placed in front of us to get where we want, but sometimes we can’t.

My race was February 17, 2024. I had the idea of running an ultramarathon for a few years, so this was a big deal for me that I’d been preparing for for months. On February 8, nine days before my race and three days before I was due to fly out, I got a phone call.

I was Mika’s mentor, her teacher, her colleague, and her friend. She sought refuge with me when her demons first started attacking her in the summer of 2023. I tried to keep in touch. She loved the pictures I sent her from my travels. Mountains, desert, my grandson, snow-filled paths. Cactuses. Especially desert. Mika loved the desert, and she loved the outdoors.

I ran my first ultramarathon knowing that my lovely young friend didn’t find solace in the end, not here on earth anyway. She might not ever get to enjoy the beauty of the desert, the blue sky, the solitude and purity of the desert. Saying she’s in a better place is a hopeful platitude, but it’s what I hope. I didn’t do my final test run of all my gear because I fell into a pit of grief, guilt, and fogginess. So I had a couple of miles of water spurting in the desert. The water in the desert reminded me of the fertility and joy and redemption, second chances, life itself.

Did I bring her memory with me? Not for the whole race. Sometimes the grief jumped out at me. But mostly I drank in the happiness I was feeling. That’s the thing about dying: you go somewhere we can’t reach, until we go there too. So we are left over here, earthside, wondering what to do.

I think Charles Bukowski said it better than I ever could. Thank you, desert. Thank you, body. Thank you, family. Thank you, Kristina. Thank you, friends, sun, wind, clouds.

The Laughing Heart by Charles Bukowski

your life is your life
don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.
be on the watch.
there are ways out.
there is light somewhere.
it may not be much light but
it beats the darkness.
be on the watch.
the gods will offer you chances.
know them.
take them.
you can’t beat death but
you can beat death in life, sometimes.
and the more often you learn to do it,
the more light there will be.
your life is your life.
know it while you have it.
you are marvelous
the gods wait to delight
in you.

Originally published at https://dreamchasercan.blogspot.com.

Why would anyone want to run fifty kilometres? And in the desert, no less. Well, me for one.

But why? I think there are many reasons, but the ones I can easily glean for now are these: Firstly, I am competitive. I like to do things others may not have done, or want to do. I like to prove to myself that I am better than last week’s version of myself. Secondly, I do actually love to run. I love how the world moves into focus and becomes clearer and further away at the same time. I love listening to my feet hit the ground; I love the feel of my breath, and the feeling of sweat dripping from everywhere. I love moving through space. Third, my body has disappointed me over the years. I have scars to prove that I wasn’t as strong as I could have been/ wanted to be/ should have been. So now I like to push that same body to chase limits it has never chased before.

This week, I decided I’m going to train for the Grandmaster Ultras that take place in February in Arizona. I looked at the videos of the trail and it looks reasonably terrifying: mile after mile of desert. Then why? Why wouldn’t I be content with my family, my profession (birth attendant), life in general. Does it have to be taken to extremes?

Yep.

First days of training: I’m hugely confident and excited and hugely doubtful and critical both at the same time. Not to jinx, but I really am just a kind of small 66 year old with delusions of grandeur. Small with more shapeliness than I ever had. I used to be more bony, which is good because who wants a bony Granny? And I know my grandson loves to cuddle.

The important thing for me is to stay on track, on a schedule. Today I did hill repeats, where you run up hard and down slower. This schedule idea is completely at odds with the way I lived my life for almost forty years, where my time was at the behest of babies, children, hens, and birthing women. I was on call 24/7 for about twenty years, and could never stick to a plan. But now I find that this task cries out for a plan and discipline keeping to it.

I’m doing strength training too, which is also new for me. I always kept fit carrying large bags of cement, 18 l jerry cans of water, children, bags of flour, stones (building), and all that. But I find the intensity and regularity of strength training is fun and calming.

Life can be so intensely disappointing. It never really works out the way you imagined it: not the little things all the way to the big ones. I’m watching our planet burn this summer and feeling sad. I read about factory farming in gruesome detail the other day in Jonathan Safran Foer’s book “Eating Animals” and I can’t eat them any more, even though when I’m training really hard I could literally take a bite from my dog’s haunch and chow it down. I organized a camping trip for a small group of women but then realized they were all young mothers bringing their kids. I felt like an outsider, and sad, and embarrassed.

But don’t imagine it’s just me labouring under disappointment: we all are. And don’t imagine that I am not also intensely grateful, thankful, and simply joyful to be on this planet with all of you. And that’s what it is: for me, the urge to run fifty kilometres in the desert on a weekend in February opens the possibility to split disappointment down the middle and replace it with joy, victory, satisfaction, and grace.

I have been thinking a lot about my basic values, and I’ve come to the understanding that these five simple words spell out my goals, in terms of my life work with families through the childbearing year, and specifically with women through their reproductive life journeys.

Safe. And. Sacred. Birth. Choices.

Let’s start at the end and work backwards to the beginning!

1. Choices

2. Birth

3. Sacred

4. And

5. Safe

1. Choice

Choices are so important! And in our reproductive lives these days, we do have many, many options and choices. But sometimes we’re presented with choices that we feel have been already made for us, or we don’t understand what choices we have. This is where the idea of informed choice comes in.

Informed choice and informed consent are often used together in a medical setting, but they’re not the same at all. Informed consent means that you’re agreeing to something that someone has explained to you. I said yes to something that you kind of explained was an absolutely necessary thing I had to do.

Consent means I said yes. The informed part can be really vague.

Informed choice can mean that too, but real informed choice means that all of the options are explained to you so that you fully understand them — and their consequences. And then you can make a choice.

A real choice. And that choice, just like in what we like to call consensual sex, might be “no”. “No”, I don’t want to have a child right now. No, I don’t want to be induced. No, I don’t want you to do that.

I want choices to be informed, respected, and real for women during their reproductive lives.

2. Birth

Well, birth is where we all come from so it’s pretty important. But birth choices, for a woman, can also mean making the choice not to give birth. Ever. Or not to give birth right away.

Our choices around birth start with whether to have a baby or not and move through the whole process after that choice has been made, and beyond.

If you decide to have a baby, then the complex choices start: where will I give birth? Who do I want with me during this childbearing year? How do I want to be treated while I am pregnant and birthing? Why am I being offered this medical choice, or another one? When will my baby arrive? Can I decide when I’m going to give birth? Why does my labour not start? Why does this hurt? What should I do?

There is so much education and respect that is not available for women during their childbearing year.

I want every woman cared for with respect, humility, love, and compassion.

3. Sacred

The word sacred can mean different things to different people. Lots of you might feel some resistance or annoyance with the word. That’s okay. Except that this word might be a key to understanding the childbearing year, women’s reproductive life, and even life in general in a different way. In a way that recognizes and affirms that we are not ultimately in control, that there is something bigger and more wild growing and living through us. Even if it’s chemical reactions, or hormones, or nature (whatever that is) or Spirit, Creator, Universe or God…. if we start to imagine that we aren’t the captain of this boat, ESPECIALLY if we are attending a woman during her childbearing year, then that humility will lead us to a place where we can actually provide better care. If we understand that the body isn’t just the body, and it is made up of physical things and also things that we can’t really name, like emotions, intuitions and thoughts. And that the body and those more unnameable things work together to make not only that human being you are accompanying, but also yourself: So that we come as humans to assist, to attend, to accompany other humans, but never as a higher power or an authority.

Sacred care in birth leads to better physical outcomes, happier babies, happier mothers and a better world.

4. And

“and” can open up so much possibility … I just included it because it’s one of the five words …and why shouldn’t a simple conjunction mean as much as another fancier word? And for me, this is the truth of working with women throughout their reproductive life; again, it’s a question of humility. Who am I, fancy person with years of study, to think of myself as fancier than a simple person who has asked for my assistance? If I decide that she can no longer teach me anything, then I’ve closed the door to real healing. That little word “and” can teach us a lot: it’s a little insignificant word but it binds the two parts of the sentence together. Like love.

Every birthing mother deserves to birth in love.

5. Safe

I’m not going to talk right now about the dangers of childbirth. Just ask Dr Google and you can scare yourself silly. I won’t tell you all the scary statistics or tell you the horror stories. But what I will tell you is that our maternity system, the global maternity system that we have in place right now, is hurting women and babies. The affluent women are surviving technology-led birthing practices that take no account of the whole human beings in front of them. The less affluent women, and black and coloured women in the US, are being treated worse than animals and are being denied decent care, either because of poverty, racism or both.

I want a maternity care culture where the safety: physical, mental, emotional and spiritual, safety of the woman who is birthing the child (or children) is the absolutely most important thing in the world at those moments, for the people attending her.

I am working hard towards this goal.

This week, I’m crying for the mothers I’ve served. The details aren’t necessary for now but I’ve spoken to six women this week; one with a tragedy; one with rage against her doctors; one with a potentially fatal diagnostic error; one with a natural birth that was interfered with; one is expecting to birth alone; one setting her boundaries hard and high.

Women shouldn’t have to fight for their right to have good, respectful care during their childbearing year.

My demands are:

Birth attendants (doctors, midwives, nurses, doulas), do you know that there is a whole movement of women who don’t want to be cared for by you, because they don’t want to be treated badly? They are not children, they are humans with whole lives, and they want to be able to make choices that may be different from yours. These women also deserve SAFE care. Here are some suggestions:

Take some lessons in self-care. This is not an option. You can’t care for others, especially for those who are bringing a new life into this world, if you do not care for yourself.

Cultivate your ability to love others. Love is not an option. You must love the woman you are supporting.

Leave your ego at the door of the birthing room. No, you are not in control. No, you are not the captain, and, no, the buck doesn’t stop with you. You are an assistant, a vessel, maybe even a highly trained one. But your job isn’t to provide judgement.

Be honest. If you don’t want to take extra time before you reach in with an intervention, take the time to explain why and ask yourself honestly if you know what the consequences would be if you waited. If you’ve never waited, and there are no studies to show what happens when you wait, then it’s all superstition and you don’t really know. If you say, “I’m not comfortable with not waiting, but there are no studies to back me up” then a dialogue can begin. If you say, “We have to do blah blah or your baby will die”, then there’s no dialogue, just fear and power and ego.

Be curious. Maybe some of the methods and theories suggested by others are actually valid. Have a look; open your eyes; don’t do a knee-jerk “NO!”. This goes for all of you — I’m not targeting doctors here. I know enough alternative practitioners who are quick to judge as well.

Be attentive. Medical practitioners have forgotten how to be attentive with their senses, and not with their machines: Sight, smell, touch, listening are the four senses we use (and we leave taste for dinner!). And intuition, and the important sense of humour! I don’t know of any kind of healer, whether they’re a specialist with sixty years experience or a beginning midwife, who does not value the kinds of messages their intuition will give them, if they’re open.

Listen to the woman who is birthing. Who is she? What does she want? What does she know?

And here’s some advice for all you women out there, trying to navigate the realities of your reproductive lives:

Be curious. Ask around and find the path that suits YOU, not your friend, your mother, sister, or even your partner.

Learn and keep on learning. Knowledge is power!

Reach out! There is a whole world out there, and there are people who might be able to give you the answers you are looking for.

Don’t be shamed! Whatever you choose for your journey is your very own choice, based on who you are, who you were and who you will be. Whether to bear a child, where, with whom, and how are all personal choices that don’t belong to anyone except you and your partner. If you feel shamed by a friend, a group or a professional, stay away!

Listen to your body.

Demand choices! Demand your rights! Don’t be bullied, even when you are labouring. If something doesn’t feel right, stand up and say no! If you can’t do that on your own, then hire a doula. If you can’t afford a doula, find a free one! I guarantee you I will find you a free doula if you want one…

Know that we love you! Find a community, we are around.

For more information about Birth Uprising, leave a comment or reach out, you can find me!

Love, power, peace and love again.

What just happened? For some reason, I survived the first two years of the pandemic very well. 2020 was a great year for me. I stayed home (that is, I didn’t travel … I worked at my cafe though!), I ran a lot, and I felt pretty happy most of the time.

2021 brought the birth of my first grandson, and the joys and chaos that ensues when a new human joins together two families. It was a year of travel, and hard work.

But what happened in 2022?

Was it the moon? The planets? The food?

Climate change? Stress? Karma?

I’m sitting here in the kitchen at my son’s place in LA, visiting once again to care for my sunshine grandson. I look out the window at the bougainvillea and I see a cold, wet sky. Rain is streaming down, trees are bright green, I’m dressed up warm.

In 2022, I felt like my life exploded into many colors, and then burst back into itself, with all the colors intact, but different. The first six months of the year was peppered with realizations about myself and my life up to now. What did I do with the choices presented to me: did I make good choices? Did I make irretrievable mistakes that will only lead to sadness? Could I have been a stronger person? Kinder? Do I live up to my ideals?

Over the summer, I saw my family go through a seismic metamorphosis. I’ve always been proud that I raised five independent humans. Did I raise them? Well, yes, to a point. I carried them in my belly for the required time and then in my arms. I taught them about plants, animals, death, emotions, colors, cooking, bodies, and some other stuff. Of course, children basically raise themselves in a very real way, but I provided fertile ground where that could happen.

Problem is, when you raise them independent, they end up independent.

Part of my job as a mother, and despite my fierce feminism, I was quite a traditional mother, so part of my job was to balance the family. I didn’t want anyone to actually have a physical confrontation and leave. I didn’t want anyone to be estranged from the rest of the family (do you know how common that is? Very.) I appointed myself the United Nations Peacekeeping Force of my family, and I finally handed in my helmet this summer.

What happened? Basically, every single person in the family chose to say: “This is who I am, take it or leave it.” They don’t want the pre-made brotherly, motherly or otherly love any more. They want things real, or at least not dictated by anyone else. And that’s great! It’s important for people bound by blood to be able to connect in a genuine way. But a couple of disturbing things happened:

My micromanaging, people-pleasing and general wanting-everything-to-be-nice persona took a bit of a stumble.

Worse, I couldn’t figure out who on earth I am.

Am I that gal who rode freight trains with the hobos back in 1972? Am I that mama of five, earth mother look-alike, friends with all my daughter- and son-in laws? Am I Rivka? Am I Niki? Can I howl at the moon? Can I get dressed up and go dancing? Or should I take it slow, should I listen to some bullshit from my body saying that I’ve literally been sick since June 28, 2022, with a couple of weeks respite at a time. Nothing serious, thank god, just colds and covid and all that. Can I take on extreme long-distance running? Or should I become a caricature of the empty-nester, and start doing breathing exercises whenever I encounter anything challenging? How about a new religion? I do honestly believe in Peace and Love…

All this to say that 2022 was a year of change, chaos and turmoil. I am looking forward to a fruitful, healthy, and joyful 2023, for everyone. Love to you all, from the bottom of my heart to the top of yours!

As a postscript, I’ve included TS Eliot’s poem, but it is not for the weak of heart.

The Love Song of Alfred J. Prufrock

S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse

A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,

Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.

Ma percioche giammai di questo fondo

Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,

Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.

Let us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherized upon a table;

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,

The muttering retreats

Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels

And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:

Streets that follow like a tedious argument

Of insidious intent

To lead you to an overwhelming question …

Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”

Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go

Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,

The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes,

Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,

Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,

Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,

Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,

And seeing that it was a soft October night,

Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time

For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,

Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;

There will be time, there will be time

To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;

There will be time to murder and create,

And time for all the works and days of hands

That lift and drop a question on your plate;

Time for you and time for me,

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,

And for a hundred visions and revisions,

Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go

Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time

To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”

Time to turn back and descend the stair,

With a bald spot in the middle of my hair —

(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)

My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,

My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin —

(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”)

Do I dare

Disturb the universe?

In a minute there is time

For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:

Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

I know the voices dying with a dying fall

Beneath the music from a farther room.

So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all —

The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,

And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,

When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,

Then how should I begin

To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?

And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all —

Arms that are braceleted and white and bare

(But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!)

Is it perfume from a dress

That makes me so digress?

Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.

And should I then presume?

And how should I begin?

Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets

And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes

Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows? …

I should have been a pair of ragged claws

Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!

Smoothed by long fingers,

Asleep … tired … or it malingers,

Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.

Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,

Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?

But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,

Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,

I am no prophet — and here’s no great matter;

I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,

And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,

And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,

After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,

Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,

Would it have been worth while,

To have bitten off the matter with a smile,

To have squeezed the universe into a ball

To roll it towards some overwhelming question,

To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,

Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all” —

If one, settling a pillow by her head

Should say: “That is not what I meant at all;

That is not it, at all.”

And would it have been worth it, after all,

Would it have been worth while,

After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,

After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor —

And this, and so much more? —

It is impossible to say just what I mean!

But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:

Would it have been worth while

If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,

And turning toward the window, should say:

“That is not it at all,

That is not what I meant, at all.”

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;

Am an attendant lord, one that will do

To swell a progress, start a scene or two,

Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,

Deferential, glad to be of use,

Politic, cautious, and meticulous;

Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;

At times, indeed, almost ridiculous —

Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old … I grow old …

I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?

I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.

I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me.

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves

Combing the white hair of the waves blown back

When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea

By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown

Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

Such a corny trope to want to live somewhere there’s hummingbirds, but there you go.

I didn’t participate too much in the daily life on my parents’ farm. We’d been farming dairy cows since God first invented milk, and they all knew how to do it and loved it. I was the cute little girl with the blue eyes and curls nestled right in the middle of four brothers (trope…I told you). They coddled me, loved me, fed me, laughed at my jokes, helped me put on shows. I hung out with them sometimes and helped with the “girls” but usually I was working hard at school and writing in my diaries.

I had one skill. I was a chubby, smart, spoiled girl. I hated sports. I hated school. I didn’t like the other girls. I hated boys. As I grew older I was disgusted by sex and breasts and menstruating and flirting. I loved my brothers and my parents. Most of all, I loved the “girls”. They smelled like shit, mostly. They were solid. They didn’t get mad easily. They had full bellies and even fuller udders. They ambled to and from their milk stations in a reasonably good-natured way. Though there were slight differences in personality, cows were so easy to love compared to humans, with their complicated and ever-changing personality quirks. Even my favorite brother, who was the slowest of the lot of them, sometimes had moods or didn’t want to be bothered or would get angry over something small and fixable.

I made up stories about people. No, I wasn’t a talented and imaginative creator of stories. But if the shoe fit, I would ram it onto someone’s foot. There was a girl in my class, a complete loser. Long stringy dark hair, a bewildered look. She got boobs before anyone else, and didn’t understand her sexual lure, which apparently made her even more attractive, the dumb bitch. She was Dorothy. She even had a dog.

But that was an easy one, I figured her out when I was 11. The tougher ones were always more unexpected, like why would the most popular, athletic, handsome boy in the school be cast in the role of Oliver Twist? He had secrets. I didn’t know what they were, but he had them. There was a little Twist in his smile. He avoided me, never teased me like the others did; he wouldn’t catch my eye. He knew I knew something.

So in Grade Ten I joined the drama club, and I started working my magic and getting some approval for my talent. There I was, the fat girl from the farm, with some talent! My teacher said I should maybe study drama, but what did she know? Either way, I was having fun. Every play we put on, I would ask my gut to discover which person was the right fit for the role. My teacher started to trust my weird choices, and we won a couple of state prizes. I watched other students date and flirt, and drink and get high. I lived in my imaginary world and enjoyed myself. Nothing was ever better than watching people act like idiots and imagining them cast as Shylock, or Medea, or Forrest Gump. Of course I read: if there was a prize for most well-read student of all time from my high school, I would win it, hands down. I read every book in my high school library and I was working on the town library when suddenly the time passed and I graduated! No valedictory speech for me and no bullshit Prom dance either. I wasn’t going to take a pity date from some fat loser down the road.

I stayed home on Prom Night and wrote college applications. My parents, bless their ignorant little cotton socks, had saved up a little money for me and I ended up getting into the closest college that would have me, and I got myself a degree in English. I buried myself in words and ideas. I joined the drama club and continued to put actors and roles together in truly imaginative ways. I fended off the invitations from my drama prof who clearly wanted to get a big fat white girl into her bed. I ate well, read everything, daydreamed all the time, and decided I would intern in Hollywood.

But there’s the rub: how do you get from South Dakota to Hollywood? I watched and pondered and read some more. I sent my CV everywhere. I begged for internships. I cold called, I badgered, I made videos. Finally I jumped into the professor’s bed and she ended up making some calls. I got a gig in Bakersfield… you can laugh but it’s a damn sight closer to LA than Mitchell SD. I packed my bags, said bye to my parents, my brothers, and my girls, and drove off into the sunset.

And then the big game of Snakes and Ladders really started. The snaky men who live all over the entertainment industry in California, dotting the landscape like poxes on a body. The ladders I had to climb to get the smallest gig. The distances I fell before I could rise even a millimetre. The fun I had! The thrill of finding exactly the right weirdo actor to fit that exact part. The realization that I knew everyone’s dirty secrets. The food I ate! The fancy drinks! I stayed up late. I rented a room. I had nothing, I wore the same two outfits all the time, no one cared. I applied my makeup carefully every morning. My skin was perfect. Big blue eyes and sexy lips, no one saw the fat, or at least, I used the fat to my advantage. I was in heaven when I was sitting in a coffee shop watching the humans and the hummingbirds: assigning roles, marvelling at God’s world.

Until one day I decided I wanted a change.

I lost a bunch of weight. I dipped into my savings and bought some new clothes. I got my hair done. I started hanging out at the parties. I moved around the crowd and started moving and grooving with the cool people. I got more work, I started getting big in name instead of just in size. As my sleaziness grew, so did my reputation.

The thing is, you’re on your feet all the time. Once you drop, someone else is ready to take over. When I was a fat lazy girl with no ambition, the work slid on to my lap and then off in a milky kind of way. When I jumped out of my old self into a thin mirror with different hair and cheekbones, work was hard to get and hard to part with. I became a snatch-and -grabber. I was that busy little hummingbird with so many flowers to suck from! I was assertive! Confident! Attractive! And all the things I thought I didn’t want, I did want; in excess.

And then slowly I realized that the milky way was better. I let my hair grow out and started eating again. I stopped drinking. I slept in my own bed, alone. My old prof phoned and we continued a sporadic long-distance relationship. I even went and visited her a few times. I got lots of work — I’m good at what I do. I’m the person putting the faces to the names, connecting the dots. I’m the puppeteer behind the shiny product you see on the screen.

Until one evening, I was at a nice dinner party in SilverLake. Excellent food, a little red wine, the name of which I’ve forgotten. I looked around at my friends. Good people. Creative, kind, liberal. The kind with that sign on their lawn about Love Lives Here or whatever. These friends actually love me, I realized. I have a life, the kind of life I’d always dreamed of. I can play when I work, I can be my fat old self, I can sleep at night. And yet. And yet.

I went to the bathroom and took off as many of my nice clothes as I could without driving indecently. My fancy jewelry. My expensive coverings. I left my Blahnik sandals. I always keep a pair of sneakers in the car, so I snuck out of the house in my bare feet and slipped them on. On my way to the highway I gathered my identity and threw it out the window: business cards, cold meds, agenda. Hairbrush. Cosmetic bag.

I drove home; it took me three days. By morning I was in Vegas. I slept like a baby for ten hours then left in the evening and drove to Denver. I almost stayed. But home was calling. I drove northeast and found my home. Of course, it was the same as it’s always been and always will be. It was 10pm so everyone was asleep. I didn’t know which brothers were still home, but I tiptoed upstairs to my bedroom, went to bed, and snuck out in the morning to see my girls. There they were, smelling like shit, staring at me with their big brown solemn eyes, not wanting to be anyone except exactly who they were.

When I was small, I wanted to be an astronaut, so I saved my allowance and bought a simple telescope so I could track the stars. I discovered that they moved in the sky from night to night, and even from hour to hour, so I would stay up at night and note their positions in a notebook. I learned then about the mysteries of night time, when no one else was awake.

A few years later, I discovered the magic of dreams, so I would wake myself two or three or four times a night to record my dreams in another notebook. The obvious next step was to explore psychedelic drugs, so I spent many nights awake and awakening with my friends and strangers as we thoroughly cleansed the doors of perception. I learned that time and even space are not as familiar and predictable as I had imagined, and I saw how night and day could blend and swirl like the milky way, or like milk into coffee, with the flick of an eyelid.

I took to exploring the Rockies, often solo, and I found the mountain nights and darkness overpowering and scary. But during the day, magical things happened, and I felt keenly that knife’s edge between the dream state and wakefulness. I had the mountains to myself; my senses were awake and I felt tiny. One sunny afternoon, a cow moose and her calf decided to join me as I walked along a steep mountain road. I had been hitchhiking but of course the mountains were deserted: it was the middle of a week on a school day in early summer. I believe the moose understood that I was a mammal child who needed protecting, so she placed herself between her calf and I, and we walked together for a few miles until they sauntered back into the woods.

The most mundane of my night time explorations were standard student fare: all-nighters writing essays, going to parties, exploring my new city. Those nights were full of chance meetings, ideas, passionate drunken arguments. I learned how to stay up for a night or two and catch catnaps during the day in odd times and places: a classroom, a friend’s couch, the bus.

Babies don’t care about your schedule. They live in a different state of consciousness from most adults. As we mother (and then grandmother), we can tap into that state of consciousness, if we want to, and if we try. The knife’s edge between sleeping and waking; the magical everyday-ness of being befriended by a moose; the ordinary scariness of figuring out who I am, how my body works, and what the hell I’m supposed to be doing: these are the deep springs where motherhood dwells.

Motherhood is deeply, painfully undervalued, and that is as it should be. We don’t need recognition or public honour. Our love is fed from those deeper springs, and it spills over every time a baby wakes. I am writing this piece with pen and paper as a baby sleeps beside me. When he wakes, I will gather him onto my lap and jiggle him back to sleep so I can continue writing. Soon I will have to focus all my attention upon him, and that is also as it should be.

He’ll fully wake, sit on my lap, have some milk and maybe spit some on me, and then he will want to squiggle around on the floor and chew on his toy moose. I guard these awakenings so that every time he wakes he can move more deeply onto earth.

I am sitting on a hilltop in northern Italy, rather completely on my own. My dog is here. I’m surrounded by insects, animals (deer, wild boars, the odd wolf, badgers, and all that). I planned for a very active summer, running at least 40 k a week, which I love doing — running long distances is literally my happy place. But then some stuff happened and I got Covid and now I just feel cellularly tired. So every day I spend quite a few hours just sitting staring out at the view.

And what I’ve been asking myself is that difficult, age old question: Who Am I?

When you spend hours alone, especially in a spot where silence is the overwhelming sound, you get a chance to really “dig deep” and find out what your questions are. I can’t really believe that I have been inhabiting this body and mind and soul I guess for nearly 66 years and I still don’t really know who or what I am. So, let me start at the beginning, well maybe not that far back but …

Names

I guess you all know the story about how Toni Morrison got her name. Toni she decided on herself, after converting to Catholicism at age 12 and naming herself Anthony. Morrison was her husband’s name and she was stuck with it because when her first novel was published she was still using it as her legal name even though they were already divorced. There’s an quote floating around from 1992 that goes like this:

“I am really Chloe Anthony Wofford. That’s who I am. I have been writing under this other person’s name. I write some things now as Chloe Wofford, private things. I regret having called myself Toni Morrison when I published my first novel, The Bluest Eye.”

Well, the same kind of thing happened to me. I’d always been Niki, or Nicky when I was very young. Or Nicola when my parents were mad at me. Then in my forties I had a brush with religion — not Catholicism — and I was persuaded to change my name. So I changed it to Rivka, a name I don’t even like that much, but who gets to pick their own name. And then my work as a doula, birth companion, teacher, author and my whole birth persona grew wings under the guise of Rivka Cymbalist and there I was, and here I am, just like Toni Morrison (ha!).

So, for now, Niki is reserved for my family and people who knew me before the Great Name Change. But I’m kind of getting tired of inhabiting two separate lives so I may just change my name again.

Bodies

Who knew? Bodies change. I thought the biggest change would be that infamous time when I grew breasts and got my period. Pregnancy was fun. I didn’t have such a tough time with it, in fact I enjoyed growing babies. Birthing them was tough, but I really loved having little babies and children around, and breastfeeding, and those body changes didn’t really bother me. Some fibroids, a touch of hyperthyroid. Nothing serious.

Menopause was kind of a relief, no more monumentally Niagara Falls cycles. No more fertility, and I was ready for that, because I was happy with my five children. Did I think I’d overdone it? No.

But then, the thing is, everyone goes on about menopause because it’s when a woman is no longer fertile and I guess biologically speaking no longer useful. But the body changes more dramatically and more quickly after the whole menopause thing is history.

I’ve written about this before, and I have to point out, it’s not specific ailments that bother me — thank goodness — I’m healthy. But just like during puberty and adolescence, and I’m imagining anyone with body dysmorphia, I just don’t feel right in my skin. Its like my clothes don’t fit me right, except they do. My clothes fit, I still take the same size more or less, a medium. But it’s my skin that doesn’t fit. It feels weird, it’s too loose, it’s floppy, it doesn’t feel like its mine. I look funny in the mirror, who’s that old lady? Why is her skin all dry? damn it, why didn’t I wear sunscreen for all those years?

So that’s the tunnel I can fall down when I don’t remember to center and use moisturizer every morning. Yes, it is my body, yes indeed I am very grateful and proud of it, it’s like an old car, just keeps on chugging. But I can’t help it, it feels weird.

Profession

Oh goodness, could I just say I’m a witch? I guess not….but this is weird too because I think I studied witchery and magic my whole life, and science too of course. And poetry, and of course I learned all about having kids and all when I went ahead and had five of them.

But my professional label doesn’t exist, because I’m not a registered midwife. I’m a birth companion or whatever. My Impostor Syndrome kicks in frequently; sometimes I think my actual profession is “Impostor”.

I’ve mostly been a mother.

And the renewal part of this whole exploration? It’s a deep, deep sense that change means pain, and from pain comes change. Life just doesn’t stop, until it does. So, in a sense, my resting, my recovery, my reflections … lead to a renewal of sorts which is a kind of an acceptance of the continually changing nature of my life: child, young woman, mother, older woman, mother, older woman, grandmother, mother, birth attendant, peace keeper, rebel, anarchist, runner, crone…

My mother worked teaching mathematics and then she went to art school, but I always remember her being around in the evenings, ironing, listening to the radio, and whenever I got home in whatever state I was in, she would offer me a nice cup of tea. That meant strong, very strong, hot, with milk and usually sugar. Maybe a piece of dark chocolate along with it that you could dunk.

Anything could be solved with a cup of tea! Or at least, you would feel better if you drank a cup of tea while dealing with your stuff.

I never realized until she died that it was really and truly possible to love someone and pretty much hate them at the same time. Or, that love didn’t necessarily cure all the awful effects of betrayal and those kinds of things that can inhabit a marriage.

I learned from her that life is a long process of learning how to inhabit contradictions.

Back when I was a hipster, before hipsterdom had come into being, I had two outfits: a pair of army pants and a turquoise and black striped cotton skirt. I wore them with a green boy scouts shirt or a neon pink lycra polo. I had a good luck bird tattooed on my chest. I never gave anyone the time of day. I must have been a pain to get along with. I was tough. I tried everything but got stuck to nothing. I was barred from the Alcatraz for throwing a table. I hit an Egyptian man in the chest with a rock when he whispered fucking to me on the street in Cairo.

I inhabited a world where poetry reigned supreme, and justice was always possible, with enough struggle.

I traveled through Africa alone because that’s where I was born.

I got a degree in ten years, because there was always more interesting stuff to do.

I had babies, lived on a self-sufficient organic farm, learned to be a midwife, joined and left a religious cult, kept a marriage going, started running, cooked food for myself and others, left continents and returned, learned and forgot languages, and through it all I have never inhabited the high ground to your low ground. And I refuse to inhabit the low ground to your highs.

There is no high ground. When you imagine that the ground you inhabit is higher than others, you start to sink and that sinkhole, although attractive, is ultimately another illusion. One time we were sitting having tea on our farm, amongst the mess and chaos of small children and a subsistence farm … and my mother’s cup lost it! The cup of tea just dropped in to her lap and she was left holding only the handle. Wipe up, crack up, use the handle-less cup for a paintbrush holder, and get on with it, in true Cockney fashion.

So here’s a cup of tea to you, and here’s to having a cup of tea with each other, and here’s to all the things that may or may not begin with the letter “t”, and here’s to living deeply: deeply within and surrounded by contradiction and paradox. Here’s to continuing to have friendships and relationships with people who don’t necessarily see eye to eye with me, who don’t agree with me, who don’t understand where I am coming from. Here’s to long nights of discussion and here’s to building a strong house of thought using the bricks and mortar of our own imaginations. Here’s to open hearts and open minds, to loving and hating, to sadness and intense joy, to night and to day.