Clare Consultation, LLCStories on the Night After the Election
Jarred the grocery store guy told me a story last night. We were talking about his work – he’s something of a mid management type with responsibility for ensuring the identification and obstruction of shop lifters. “Yeah. I can recognize them because I’ve been there. I wasn’t there long and I’m not proud of it, but that’s a big part of how I know them when I see them.” Jarred is in… Read More
We are Different & We are the Same: Voting from Here
The United States is voting. Or at least that’s an option for the next four days. Because of the way my mind works…I’ve been thinking about that. Voting. In the past 48 hours or so I’ve been in more-than-passing conversations with people – all American citizens – who, in the history of our country would not have been eligible to vote. That means they were variously (or in some combination) immigrants, women,… Read More
Gay Teen Suicide: Yes, Listening is a Matter of Life or Death
I’m from Texas. I haven’t lived there for 22 years, but I am from Texas. And I love very much about the State. There are also things – particularly things political, educational and environmental that get me a little crazy about my homeland. Then this week I found a you tube video that made me so very proud to be from Texas – proud of the elected member of the Fort Worth… Read More
Generations of the Social Network
I’m on Facebook. So is EX:Change. This is all because I have a daughter in her early 20s. She lives across the pond – far away from Oregon. I, of course, want to keep up in all the ways that work for her. Mostly we Skype, but FB, her I-phone, a smattering of e-mail and (very occasionally) the international postal network all come into play. Given my generation, being on Facebook may… Read More
What the Land Holds Up
Just home to Portland from a week in the Texas Hillcountry. I did lots of my growing up on the land that stretches out either side of the Guadalupe River. This week I returned to that river and those hills to see friends I hadn’t seen since all of us were 15 years old. That’s a long time. There’s a word used to describe this aspect of human systems – equifinality (thanks… Read More
Like Water, Like Air — the Voices of Change Don’t Go Away
There’s this – the EX:Change blog. And there are my still-steady attempts at catching the attention of the trade publishing industry. And then, proving that like water or air the EX:Change voices are here to stay, there’s the stealth-EX:Change…. From the beginning, dozens of volunteers have donated time, energy and BRILLIANCE to the EX:Change project. Most recently, two of these near unimaginably talented people (really – no overstatement is possible here) have… Read More
When our Greatest Hope is Boring
There is a quickening in human consciousness. Yep, right here in and among the species of which readers, bloggers, warriors and prophets are a part. I saw this quickening on the road and still see it daily. I heard it in American voices across the 100 days of the EX:Change interviews and daily I continue hearing it. A quickening is an acceleration, a vitalizing, a coming or returning to life. Ours is… Read More
“It says ‘Islam'”
I met Cheri Carter on February 11, 2009 in a coffee shop in Tucson, AZ. We were seated in the two cushiest chairs in the place, both hooked up to the shop’s wifi. She looked to me to be a white woman in her 60’s, carefully dressed, of slight build and great earrings. At one point, still a stranger, she leaned over to ask me something about my laptop. It was the… Read More
Hearing : Listening as Ground-Zero-Mosque : Islamic Community Center
The EX:Change is about listening across differences. Differences in political views. Differences in values. Differences in social circumstances due to income, education, ethnicity, personal relationships, physical ability, age. Beyond hearing what people have to say, it is about listening to get a sense of how life looks from another person’s perspective. We call this communication and it tends to be used to support understanding, cooperation, strong and generative community…stuff like that. The… Read More
8-9-10 — Right on Time
My friend, Jessica, is training for a half marathon. She’s never really been a runner before. Lately her body has gone through a vast transformation. A tall woman weighing in around 200, she’s nearing half her former size. That’s living change. Jessica is training for a half marathon because she can. Her body is ready for something like that. Her primary goal is not to lose more weight. In fact, Jessica is… Read More