Clare Consultation, LLCColumbus Day: Do You Know Where You Are?
Yesterday I sat again across a small table from Dr. Dapo, one of the 100 voices of EX:Change (EX:C blog, “What’s in a Name?” 4-13-2010). We had seen one another on Multnomah Ave. several weeks earlier. I was walking fast toward the Max Station and Dapo was driving in the opposite direction. He honked and we stopped traffic for long enough to promise to find yesterday’s tea and coffee. Dapo (as he… 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
Graduation Season: Your Tax Dollars at Work
“It will be good change when any person in the country has a right to get a good public education and to go as far as they want in advanced education.” Sue Klapstein It’s that time again. May and June – when here in the U.S. the landscape is dotted with the cheers and colors, the pomp and circumstance of graduation ceremonies. Across the country schools, families and communities take the opportunity… Read More
Be the Change
“We need to ‘be the change,’ – Gandhi – ‘we want to see in the world.’ I think we’re ready.” Tara Loyd Remember Tara and Brett from last week? You already know they are good at listening to one another even though they often don’t agree – especially on matters political. A thing they did agree on was the necessity for being active parts of the public changes they want to see. … Read More
Listening Across Difference — We’re all in this together, Pt.2
“We’re not as divided as the media tell us we are.” “Good luck. We need this — to know what Americans are really thinking.” baristas at the Starbucks in York, NE Only two days into the EX:Change road trip the Mini Cooper’s front end came between me and the sturdy steel pole of a highway sign. At the time, I was blissfully if distractedly motoring south on U.S. Route 97, the stretch… Read More
Listening Across Difference – We’re All in This Together, Pt.1
“We’ve been majoring in the minors instead of the majors. We can get back to the little stuff. Right now we need everybody together to deal with the big things.” Tommy Business Consultant, Baptist Church leader, Republican Kerrville, TX In the next few days, I’ll meet with two talented and otherwise fabulous grad students who have volunteered to help me with the ethnographic coding and analyses of all of these interviews. While… Read More
Spirit & Faith
“We change up above, on our surfaces, but there’s that underlying constant that travels through all the changes. It’s something I don’t really have the words for. The only concrete thing I have, which isn’t concrete at all, is that deep soul feeling.” Lauren Kraakevik It’s an overcast but warm spring day in Portland, OR. I’m back down the street in the corner Starbuck’s where the staff have been so consistent in cheering… Read More