Clare Consultation, LLCWho are you? What are you here for?
I’ve run across a poem. I want to set it up for you. Some of you know I’ve been giving lots of consideration to the stage of development that follows Adulthood. To Elderhood. In part, it’s a selfish inquiry – what with watching my very own toes cross the line into that kind of age. But Elderhood has become much bigger with investigation. So big, it seems vital to every life no… Read More
Keeping Calm
Here’s a paradox for you. We do better as individuals and communities if we calm down. We do better if, instead of anxious monitoring, overwork, worry, agitation and heated opposition we opt for calm. We know this but, these days, practice it too rarely. Instead, we either withdraw or lash out. Another thing about calm – it, like any other great way of being, can be trivialized. Alongside the truth of calm’s… Read More
Why Write?
I’m sitting in a coffee shop. It’s high summer in Portland. There’s the usual backdrop: coffee beans surrendering their abundance to the grinder, barista utensils clattering into motion and that burst of steam that, today, sounds most like the explosive exhale of a kid who’s held her breath as long as she can. Threading through is the canned music. The current crooner observing: “Everyone is lonely.” I’ve just looked back on my… Read More
Chatting with Eric
Sometimes it feels like a former life. The days I was riding city buses to and from my years as a professor. The time later in that career when I was living all alone – my daughter off to graduate study in Scotland, single-parenting a thing of the past, and my new husband not yet a person I knew. During those days – those years – I got my social sustenance in… Read More
The justice possible with knowing we (white people) do not know as much as we think we do.
We know Roy Moore is a monster, a total embarrassment to our state. But in the eyes of black voters, what makes him more of a monster than the parade of sleazy politicians who have stood against black interests for generations? So yes, I’m voting for Doug Jones but only because it’s a vote against Roy Moore. And that’s not good enough to rally a base of voters who are already stricken… Read More
Mentor of the Highest Order – A Precious Elder has Passed
An hour ago, this text message from my dear friend, Charles Hudson: Roy has passed. In immediate loving memory, I am reposting this blog from October 10, 2014. Before you read this, though, I want you to know this man is one of the very few about whom no one can exaggerate upon his death. Roy Sampsel is truly a Great Tribal Leader. Daily, he touched the world and its people… Read More
Testing Limits
UPDATE: 6/7/17 Accounts from people present on Sunday must come into play. Late in this blog, I suggest that the “protesters should not be dismissed as childish.” The photo above also implies these officials as proxy for the balance I describe. The new information indicates that undue force was used by the police – physical force, tear gas, rubber bullets. It indicates that once again, people of color among the counter-protesters were… Read More
My Nephew’s Body will be Buried Today
“It will always be important to have a community of people who support each other and work together for the struggle. Yes, for the struggle for all people.” Bruce McQuakay Saturday Memorial Day weekend, 2017 Seven years ago, on Fathers’ Day, Bruce McQuakay and I saw one another at the annual Delta Park pow wow. Bruce, who described himself as Tlingit and Apache, was not a father yet – that was still… Read More
Duck – Duck – Eagle
Remember the game we played when we were little? The one who was “it” walked around the outside of a kiddo-circle tapping every next person on the head. “Duck.” “Duck.” “Duck.” “Duck.” “Duck.” “GOOSE!” Then the running commences. The “it” child takes off like a shot – running around the circle. The “goose” child tries to catch them. If caught, “it” stays “it” – if not, the new “it” starts making the duck/goose… Read More
Why Bother with Peace & Quiet?
It’s loud. Have you noticed? If not crashing into your ears, then careening around in your thoughts – in your dreams. If you live urban, maybe you’ve noticed the sirens on emergency vehicles being given more volume to break through earbuds and .. well .. all the other competition. Birds are calling out to each other with more volume, too. There’s a lot out there demanding adaptation. Some of it is… Read More