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  LOVE DOES THAT All day long a little burro labours, sometimes with heavy loads on her back and sometimes just with worries about things that bother only burros. And worries, as we know, can be more exhausting  than physical labor. Once in a while a kind monk comes to her stable and brings a pear, but more than that, he looks into the burro's eyes and touches her ears and for a few seconds the burro is free and even seems to laugh, because love does that. Love frees. Meister Eckhart (1260 - 1328) Today I spoke to my Cousin, who has taken on the work of caregiving for my 98 year old Aunt and my 101 year old Uncle. Aunt has been taken off of medical supports to prolong life and put on 'comfort care' as her body cannot survive the pneumonia she contracted after hip surgery from a fall.  Although we had not talked for years, our conversation picked up where it left off, insightful, empathetic, spiritual, and extremely funny.  I am remembering the winter that my Cousin g...

  The work I do at my art desk speaks an allegorical language. It speaks to me as I am in the midst of collecting and then working on drawing the image. It speaks to me after I step away from the image. It speaks to others in its various stages of completion. It speaks a visual language. The subject of the image. The quality and organization of the pencil lines. The comportment and composure of the composition. The size of the work, the scale of the image. The relationship between figure and ground. The relationship between light and darkened areas.  It speaks in a language in constant dynamic formation between centrifugal forces that seek to keep things apart and centripetal forces that strive to make things cohere (Bachtin et al., 1981). It speaks in a language that is fragile, with meaning emergent and declining in relation to our individual reading and understanding, but also the context within which we encounter the language.  I may not necessarily have the words to ...

  One of the most important things I learned during my graduate studies at UBC was how we are always in relationships. We do not exist without relationships. Our lives depend on our relationship to nature. Our lives depend on our relationships to each other and to other living things. The quality of our lives can be understood by the quality of our relationships. We have a great deal of influence on the kinds of relationships we form, we foster, we endorse and we live by.  I find it comforting to know that I can create the world I want to live in through the relationships I develop - with myself, my family, my neighbourhood, my community, my professional and non-professional affiliations, etc.  We are entering a time of greater challenge for our elders, our aging selves, and our young ones coming up in the world. I believe we will prevail, we will solve, and we will become a better adapted species through our intention to support each other to achieve our best versions of...

  It can happen at any age. We need to make a change. The pressure of our current situation reaches a tipping point, where the uncertainty of change becomes more palatable than the certainty of remaining stuck, still, unmoving. Change entails movement. Movement from certainty puts us into a state of uncertainty. Our need to initiate change can happen at any point in our lifespan, from pre-verbal to frail elder. In order to activate change to improve our current circumstances or conditions, we need to activate our internal capacity and capability to implement and sustain change. Our internal capacity and capability to identify issues, define needs, adopt new perspectives, practice new behaviours and implement new boundaries requires inputs from outside our field of perception. We cannot change what we do not understand, we cannot put into words, and we cannot discuss with supportive people to help us find a new way of being in our current situation. We benefit from hearing others' e...

  New year crow contemplates the new year ahead. Thinking about what is the situation, what are the circumstances, what are the pressures that are coming to bear on what is known but uncomfortable, and what is unknown, and also uncomfortable.  We don't always know what is our next right step. That is when we need to struggle to find the words.  Where we are.  Where we want to be.  How we are going to get there.