My Future Husband

The Future Me

In my next life, I’d like to be a girl-bird. That way, for a change, I can let the males of the species preen and prance and display and try to impress me with their great beauty, dancing, and nest-building prowess, while I kick back — comfortable, relaxed, and happy in my plain brown feathers.

It's All Good

Since getting accepted into the MA in Counseling program at Sonoma State, the first question I’m usually asked by friends is, “How’s grad school?” and I never know how to answer. I’m tempted to go with an old cliché (variously attributed to war, law and science) and respond, “Grad school consists of long periods of boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror,” but that doesn’t quite capture it. The experience of sitting through a 3 hour and 40 minute lecture is not truly boring, because all of the subjects are close to my heart and are training me for my chosen profession. But it does tax the brain to listen and take notes for so long, especially on days with back-to-back classes. So chalk up one accurate adjective: Graduate school is challenging.

But how else to describe it? Shall I talk about the countless hours of meaningful but wearying reading, writing, test preparation and vignette analyzing, or the practice counseling sessions and triad experiences? Should I mention the dread I felt when I learned that some advanced students have all-day classes in Carson 30, requiring them to sit in those hard plastic torture devices called “desks” until 7 o’clock at night, knowing that is my destiny as well?

Or should I skip the negatives, focusing solely on the rich rewards? And there are so many. I’m being trained by some of the best and brightest professors on campus. I’m reading materials by brilliant psychologists who are becoming my new BFFs, people like Irvin Yalom and Eliana Gil. I’m absorbing information, skills, and techniques at an exhilarating rate, moving rapidly in the direction of my dreams.

And then there is the unexpected blessing of this community, consisting of all of the professors, staff, and students that make up the Counseling Department. In my life thus far I’ve been a part of many circles – the legal world, various performing arts groups, and the freakishly delightful subculture of Renaissance Faire workers. But this program has introduced me to a community I find the most extraordinary of all because of the kindness and caring which are evident in countless ways. There are the little things – taking notes for each other, sharing helpful and/or inspiring articles or websites – and then there are the more meaningful selfless acts: A group of women helping a student with child care by taking turns watching over her infant during class while the mom, in turn, takes notes for her sitters. And I’m not the only one who’s noticed the kindness phenom: I’ve discussed this with several classmates and they share my delight in being immersed in this new world of heart-centered souls who want to make a positive difference in the lives of others, to be — as characterized by Professor Doolittle in class one day — “merchants of hope and empathy.”

Psychologist/philosopher William James wrote that “the aim of a college education is to teach you to know a good man when you see one.” Perhaps the next time someone asks me how graduate school is going, I’ll reply simply and honestly, “Every day I’m surrounded by good people with whom I share common dreams and goals. What could be better ?” That really does say it all.

Written for and published in the Fall 2011 edition of ‘Semester Spotlight,’ the newsletter of Sonoma State University’s Counseling Department.

NOT AN OPTION

If there is one quality a therapist must bring to the counseling session above all, it’s attention. Even if this weren’t being drummed into us on a near-daily basis — in professors’ lectures, in video demonstrations, and in our textbook readings — it’s pretty obvious that a therapist needs to offer “presence” to a client. How would you like to bring your most pressing concerns to a mental health professional who glanced out the window, gazed at her fingernails, or picked up a book mid-session? Not so much.

Until a practice counseling session I had last week, I didn’t figure this would ever be a problem for me: I seriously enjoy the eye contact I make with clients; I want to give that person my full attention. For one thing, that attention will help me to notice ever-important nonverbal cues. But during our triad session on Thursday — I was the counselor, another student was my client, and yet another was our observer — during one of the most intensely emotional segments of our time together, I felt something crawling on my right arm. Instinctively I glanced down for a second (aware that I was pulling attention away from my client and incredibly anxious as a result), and saw a spider making its way up my forearm.

Now, had I not been in a therapy session, I would have jumped up, perhaps knocking over my chair in the process, slapping my arm repeatedly saying things like “ick ick ick” for good measure. In this moment, none of those things was an option. Even brushing the spider away would have caused my client to wonder what was going on and destroyed the attention. And my usual method of dispensing with spiders — getting a container, scooping them up, and depositing them outside — was clearly out of the question. So, eyes back on my client, I smoothly placed my left hand on my right arm and squished the spider dead.

After our session as we walked to the elevator I confessed to her what had happened, primarily concerned that she had seen my attention break in the moment that I glanced down and saw my little intruder. We are there, after all, to learn, and I wanted to check in with her to see how much she had noticed. To my relief, she hadn’t seen me look down and then, to my great surprise, she was hugely impressed by my sacrifice: “YOU smashed a spider on your arm for ME?!” When I nodded my head like, “Yeah, what else?” she seemed genuinely touched and then told me in no uncertain terms: “You should put that on your resume.”

And you know what? I just might.

I'll Take You There

Without pushing, I said gently, “You know, we have counselors here; would you be willing to talk to someone there first?” To my great joy and relief, she nodded assent. That’s when I realized I had no idea where psychological services was located on campus. I told her honestly that I was new to the MFT program, was on my way to that department, and invited her to walk with me so we could find Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) together. As we walked, I asked her some questions, found out where the “home” was that she wanted to go back to, determined what her primary concern was, and who she had been talking to on her phone. I wanted to keep her engaged — and with me until I could get her some assistance.

In the department, I recruited someone to take the student over to CAPS while I went into my meeting. Naturally, I told my adviser what had happened and we talked about it. Afterwards, not only did I go in search of CAPS but, once there, I walked around the outside of the building to get a sense of where it’s located with respect to other campus facilities. After all, this is what I’m in school to learn: how to guide someone to mental wellness. In perfect metaphor for my learning process, today I was only able to take that person part of the way. Before too long, I’ll be taking clients the distance. Meanwhile, thanks to the on-campus presence of trained counselors, this morning a lost soul was given some direction. I’m sending her blessings for a positive outcome, because I don’t think I’ll ever forget her. In a way, she was my very first client.

The Eel, The Eel, What a Rotten Deal

Camp Seabow Songbook
A Work in Progress by Ann Clark [formerly Patty Clark]
From my memories at Camp Seabow, @1962 – 1967

Some of the following songs were sang only on the bus or in the dining hall (Noble Duke of York), some were exclusive to Camp Seabow, some were simply old folk songs, and I suspect that some of them came from Mrs. Armand’s childhood. How many do YOU remember?

*

She sat on the veranda and ate chocolates, ate chocolates, ate chocolates,
she sat on the veranda and ate chocolates, ate chocolates.
He sat down beside her and smoked his cigar [repeat etc.]
She sat there beside him and played her guitar…
He told her he loved her but oh how he lied…
She told him she loved him, but she did not lie…
They went to be married, but she up and dies…
He went to the funeral, but just for the ride…
She went up to heaven and flip flop she flied…
He went down below her and sizzled and fried…
The moral of this tale is never to lie…
Or you, too, may perish and sizzle and fry…

Ding ding ding there goes my wagon, my wagon,
I hear the keeper calling me
Ding ding ding ding there goes my wagon, my wagon,
to take me back to the nutty factory.
Like all the little nuts that fall, I’m a little cracked that’s all
Ding ding ding ding there goes my wagon, my kiddy car, my bus, whee!!

*
Oh I stuck my head in a little skunk’s hole…
And the little skunk said well bless my soul
take it out take it out take out, remove it
Well I didn’t take it out and the little skunk said
If you don’t take it out you’ll wish you were dead
Take it out take it out take it out….Psssssssss
I….removed it.

*
In a cabin by the woods, little old man by the window stood
saw a rabbit hopping by, knocking at his door
Help me help me, sir he said
Or the hunter shoot me dead,
come along and live with me, happy we will be.

*
[Chorus]:
Four strong winds that blow slowly
Seven seas that run high
All these things that don’t change come what may
Now our good times are all gone
And I’m bound for moving on
Ill look for you if I’m ever back this way

Guess Ill go out to Alberta
Weather’s good there in the fall
Got some friends that I can go to workin’ for
Still I wish you’d change your mind
If I asked you one more time
But we’ve been through that a hundred times or more
[Repeat chorus]
If I get there before the snow flies
And if things are going good
You could meet me if I send you down the fare
But by then it would be winter
Nothing much for you to do
And the wind sure blows cold way out there
[Repeat chorus]
Yes, Ill look for you if I’m ever back this way

*
Oh he cannibal king with the big nose ring
Fell in love with the dusky maid.
And every night in the pale moon light
Across the lake he came.
He hugged and he kissed this pretty little miss
Under the bamboo tree.
And every night in the pale moon light
It sounded like this to me.
Boom Boom [kiss kiss], Boom Boom [kiss kiss]
Honey won’t you marry me
Boom Boom [kiss kiss] Boom Boom [kiss kiss]
Honey won’t you marry me,
We’ll build a bungalow big enough for two,
Big enough for three my darling, big enough for four
Walla walla walla
And when we’re married how happy we’ll be,
Under the bamboo, underneath the bamboo tree.
If you’ll be m-i-n-e mine I’ll be t-h-i-n-e thine…
And I’ll l-o-v-e love you all the t-i-m-e time.
You are the b-e-s-t best of all the r-e-s-t rest…
And I’ll l-o-v-e love you…all the t-i-m-e rack ‘em up, sack ‘em up,
Any ol’ ti-ime!

*

Use Ajax, boom boom
The foaming cleanser, bluddabluddabludda
Foams the dirt, right down the drain [blbbbllb]
You’ll stop paying the elbow tax
when you start cleaning with Ajax
So use Ajax, boom boom
The foaming cleanser [blblblblbllb]
Foams the dirt, right down the drain
Spoken in high falsetto: [And it smells good, too!]
So…use Ajax…boom boom.

*
Make a face mask each time you sing the words, “Junior Birdmen” by
lacing your fingers. Then, with thumbs under the chin, twist your
hands outwards so that you make goggles for the eyes.

Up in the air junior birdmen
Up in the air pilots too!
Up in the air, Junior Birdmen;
Keep your eyes up in the blue up in the blue
And when you hear the big announcement:
to receive your wings of tin.
Get on the ball you Junior Birdmen, and send your box tops in.
It only takes four
Send your boxtops in
that’s only two more
Send your boxtops i-i-in.

*
Waaaaay up in the sky the little birds fly
while down in the nest the little birds rest
Wiiiiiith a wing on the left and a wing on the right
we watch the dear birdies sleep all through the night
[Shhh they're sleeping!]
The….bright sun comes up and the dew falls away
(in a very high voice) good morning good morning
the little birds say.

*

Oh, I’d rather suck on a lemon drop
Than to trust my luck with a lollipop,
‘Cause I always drop my lollipop,
And it gets all over icky! Oh icky.
I’ve tried, and tried, but never could find
A lollipop that’s halfway refined,
So I’d rather suck on a lemon drop
Than to trust my luck with a lollipop,
‘Cause I always drop my lollipop
And it gets all over icky!

*
Boom Dee Adda, Boom Dee Adda
I love the flowers, I love the daffodils, I love the mountains, I love the rolling hills
I love a fireside when all the lights are low
Boom dee adda boom dee adda boom dee adda boom dee adda
I love you [boom boom boom]

*
Seabow Marching-to-Church Song:

There’s a church in the valley by the wildwood
No lovelier spot in the dale
No place is so dear to my childhood
As the little brown church in the vale
(Oh, come, come, come, come)
Come to the church by the wildwood
Oh, come to the church in the vale
No spot is so dear to my childhood
As the little brown church in the vale
How sweet on a clear Sunday morning
To listen to clear ringing bells
Its tones so sweetly are calling
Oh come to the church in the vale.

*

The noble Duke of York
He had ten thousand men
He marched them up the hill
And he marched them down again
And when you’re up, you’re up
And when you’re down, you’re down
But when you’re only halfway up
You’re neither up or down.

*
EVENING SONGS [AROUND THE CAMPFIRE]

The Call of the Fire

The call of the fire comes to us through the shadows
That follow the close of the day.
Its flames bring us peace
And a calmness of spirit
That drive all our troubles away.
We are thankful for days
And the joys that they bring us
For nights and the rest that they bring.
May we go on believing
In this love we’re receiving
Just now ’round the fire as we sing….

Tell me why the stars do shine
Tell me why the ivy twines
Tell me why the sky’s so blue
Tell me Camp Seabow, just why I love you
Because God made the stars to shine
Because God made the ivy twine
Because God made the sky’s so blue
Dear Old Camp Seabow, that’s why I love you…

Seabow Prayer

If I have wounded any soul today,
If I have caused one foot to go astray,
If I have wanted my own selfish way,
Dear Lord, forgive…
Forgive these sins I have confessed to Thee,
Forgive the secret sins I do not see,
But guide me love me and my Keeper be,
Dear Lord, Amen…

Good night, Mrs. Armand,
Good night to you,
[still seeking lyrics]

Goodnight song

And now it’s time to say good night, time to say good night to you!
We wish you happy dreams dear campers (or campmates?)
May all your dreams come true!
May all your dreams come truu-oo-ooo, Oh, may all your dreams come true.
We wish you happy dreams dear campers, may all your dreams come true.

So run along now and jump into bed,
Say your prayers and cover your head,
The very last thing I say unto you, is
“If you’ll dream of me, then I’ll dream of you-oooooooo!” (rising to a screech)

*
I’ll take the neck from some old bottle
I’ll take the arm from some old chair
I’ll take the legs from some old table
and from a horse I’ll take some hair I’ll take some hair
And then I’ll put them all together
with the aid of string and glue-ue-ue
And I’ll get more loving from that gosh darn dummy
than I ever got from you!
(Get out and walk, don’t slam the door, and you’ll be mine
forever more [forever more!])

*
We’re up at Camp Seabow the land of our dreams
Where the brooklets just trickle and sparkle and stream,
So come along and join us for we are never blue
Be a member of our happy laughing crew, you too!
With burns on our fingers and bells on our toes
Oh we’re the jolly Camp Fire Girls now what do you suppose?
With fancy beds to sleep in and rags to blow our nose
Oh service is the motto of our camp, mmm mmm.

Now don’t get excited when you hear those dishes crash
Our scheme is economical it saves a lot of cash
The cook picks up the pieces and slings them in the hash
Oh service is the motto of our camp, mmm mmm.

[slow, sentimental]

Now when we are leaving…and our eyes are filled with tears
It helps to ease the sorrow if you take some souvenirs: [pick up speed]
Our fancy Western silverware will last throughout the years
Oh service is the motto of our camp, mmm mmm.

*

I don’t want to get married I’m having too much fun
I don’t want to get married to any certain one
I go with all the fellas and treat them all the same,
To marry one and leave the rest would be a dirty shame.
Rickety rick, uh huh! Wanna get hitched? Uh-UH!
I don’t want to get mar-air-eeeeeed….! I’m having too much fun.

*
Swimming, swimming, in the swimming hole
When days are hot when days are cold in the swimming hole,
Sidestroke, breaststroke, fancy diving too!
Oh don’t you wish you didn’t have anything else to do but,
[repeat]

*

Green Stamps

I met my love in a grocery shop
Selling pickles and eggplant and bottles of pop
She asked me to try her asparagus tips
And I fell for the smile on her ruby red lips.

Green stamps was all she gave
Green stamps was all I took
Green stamps was all I saved
And I pasted them all in my green stamp book.
Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha.

Tongo

Tongo! Tongo!
Jim-diddy-my-o-my-i-oh!
Tongo! Tongo!
Oompy oompy oom pa pa!
Ooompy oompy omm pa pa!
Oooh -uh -lay
Oooh uh lay
Molly moll moll ooh way
Molly moll moll ooh way.

*

Alice

Alice, where are you going?
Upstairs, to take a bath
But Alice, with legs like toothpicks
and a neck like a giraffe-raffe-raffe-raffe- etc.
Alice, get in the bathtub
Pull out the plug
Oh my goodness oh my soul
There goes Alice down that hole!
Alice, where are you going?
Glub glub glub.

*

Walked right into a movie show
Sat myself in the very first row
Put my arms around my waist
Got so fresh I slapped my face
I’m a nut [click click] I’m a nut [click click]
I’m a nut I’m a nut I’m a nut.

*

Did you ever see a [toilet bowl] [match box] etc.
Now you tell me one!
[Call and response]

*

Cookie, cookie,
Listen while we sing to you
Cookie, cookie
you’re a part of Camp Fire too
Anyone can make a bed
Anyone can sweep
But it takes our cookie
To make us things to eat,
Cookie, cookie,
Listen while we sing to you! [Answer]

*

Banua

Won’t you come to me baby? Oh won’t you bring me my bail?
For a drink and a fight on a Saturday night they put me down in the Banua jail,
Chorus: Banua, Banua, Banua oh-oh, Banua, Banua, baby I don’t know.
Didn’t mean to be fightin’ and causin’ you all that shame,
But the tongue of Jonathan Brighton was scandalizin’ your name.
[Repeat chorus ] Banua, Banua etc.
Now the Banua jail is cold and damp and them rats they cover the floor,
Just ten and three is gonna set me free and I’ll be yours forever more.
[Repeat chorus]

*

Ack-GOOM went the little green frog one day
Ack -GOOM went the little green frog,
repeat first
and his eyes went ack-ack-GOOM!

*
Oh Mrs. Armand, come out and play with me
and bring your dolly three, climb up my apple tree,
Call down my rain barrel, slide down my cellar door
and we’ll be jolly friends, forever more – Answer!

*

Mrs. Armand had a dog and Sammy was his name-o,
S-a-m-m-y [etc.]

The Eel [to the tune of The Seine, the chorus of which went: “The Seine, the Seine, when will I again meet her there, greet her there on the moonlit banks of the Seine?”]

The Eel, the Eel, what a rotten deal
I see you there, feel you there on the
washed out banks of the Eel.

*

Oh how I hate to get up in the morning!
Oh how I hate to get out of bed!
For the hardest thing of all is to hear the bugle call:
“You gotta get up you gotta get up you gott get up” in the morning.
Someday I’m gonna murder the bugler
Someday you’re not gonna find her there
For I’ll amputate her reveille and stamp upon it heavily
and spend the rest of my life in bed! [Answer!]
[Usually sung in the Dining Hall to our bugler]

In the Bus:
R-I, R-I, R-I-C-H! M-O-MO-MO-N-D!
R-I-C-H-M-O-N-D, R-I-C-H-M-O-N-D!
Richmond, Richmond, yay, Richmond!

*
[In the bus, on arrival at camp]
Oh here is to the bus driver, the bus driver, the bus driver,
Oh here is to the bus driver, now you tell us one.

*
This is a very fun round in four separate parts. Each group takes one of these parts, sings them individually, and then all four groups sing their parts in unison:

(1)
Fish and chips and vinegar, vinegar, vinegar,
Fish and chips and vinegar, pepper pepper pepper pop.
(2)
One bottle of pop two bottle of pop three bottle of pop four bottle of pop
five bottle of pop six bottle of pop, seven bottles of pop.
(3)
Did you ever see a lassie go this way and that way
Did you ever see a lassie go this way and that?
(4)
Don’t put your dust in my dust pan my dust pan my dust pan
Don’t put your dust in my dust pan, my dust pan’s full.

*
Do your ears hang low?
Do they wobble to and fro?
Can you tie them in a knot?
Can you tie them in a bow?
Can you throw them over your shoulder,
Like a continental soldier?
Do your ears hang low?

*
And miscellaneous folk standards:
500 Miles
House of the Rising Sun
Dona Dona Dona
Sloop John B
Michael Row the Boat Ashore

601 Pages of Amazing

I hesitate to foist books on friends. What I love will either be loved with the same ferocity (as when I asked my friend Ranse to read London’s “Call of the Wild”) or it will be sheepishly returned with some variation of “Sorry, I didn’t have time” (translation: I hated it by page two). It’s a crap shoot.

I fell in love with John Steinbeck’s “East of Eden” just about ten years ago after it was recommended to me by Rabbi Lawrence Kushner, and have spoken of it enthusiastically to those I think may appreciate it, but I’ve stopped pushing it and I’ve stopped loaning it. However, in doing some Life Coach work this week I was asked to write about the common themes in my favorite books, movies, and poetry, and I pulled out my treasured copy of EOE and re-read the passage which resonated so deeply with me that it was absolutely life-changing.

The balance of this blog post is just that: my favorite passage from Steinbeck’s novel.

If you haven’t read the book, it’s possible that an unfamiliarity with the context and characters will render you unable to appreciate it as enthusiastically as I do. However, in the interest of sharing its beauty, I bring it to you nonetheless. You will connect with it more meaningfully if you’ve ever sat slowly and patiently with a book (whether Bible or “Fellowship of the Ring”) and studied every word to mine for richness. You’re going to appreciate it more if you’ve read Genesis. But I don’t think you have to have done any of these things to resonate with this passage, so long as you love learning. It explains why I still love a deep reading of some parts of the Bible, though I consider myself “spiritual but not religious.” It speaks for me in countless ways, and ends by addressing why I’ve chosen a career as a mental health professional: I believe in the resilience and healing capacity of the human spirit.

I’ve taken some editorial liberties for brevity’s sake, but I believe that nothing is harmed in the abridgment. It’s a conversation between Lee, the long-time Chinese housekeeper/nanny (my favorite character in the book), head-of-household Adam, and their friend Samuel. Lee begins:

“Do you remember, nearly ten years ago, when you read us the sixteen verses of the fourth chapter of Genesis and we argued about them? Well, the story bit deeply into me and I went into it word for word. The more I thought about the story, the more profound it became to me. Then I compared the translations we have — and they were fairly close. There was only one place that bothered me. The King James version says this — it is when [God] has asked Cain why he is angry. [God] says, ‘If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin [crouches] at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.’ It was the ‘thou shalt’ that struck me, because it was a promise that Cain would conquer sin.”

“Then I got a copy of the American Standard Bible. It was very new then. And it was different in this passage. It says, ‘Do thou rule over him.’ Now this is very different. This is not a promise, it is an order. And I began to stew about it. I wondered what the original word of the original writer had been that these very different translations could be made.”

Samuel put his palms down on the table and leaned forward and the old young light came into his eyes. “Lee,” he said, “don’t tell me you studied Hebrew! I want to know why you were so interested.”

“Well, it seemed to me that the man who could conceive this great story would know exactly what he wanted to say and there would be no confusion in his statement.”

“You say ‘the man.’ Do you then not think this is a divine book written by the inky finger of God?”

“I think that the mind that could think this story was a curiously divine mind. We have had a few such minds in China, too. Well, to go on, I went to San Francisco to the headquarters of our family association. I went there because in our family there are a number of ancient revered gentlemen who are great scholars. They are thinkers in exactness. A man may spend many years pondering a sentence of the scholar you call Confucius. I thought there might be experts in meaning who could advise me. I respectfully submitted my problem to one of these sages, read him the story, and told him what I understood from it. The next night four of them met and called me in. We discussed the story all night long.”

Lee laughed. “Can you imagine four old gentlemen, the youngest is over ninety now, taking on the study of Hebrew? They engaged a learned rabbi. They took to the study as though they were children. Exercise books, grammar, vocabulary, simple sentences. You should see Hebrew written in Chinese ink with a brush!”

“I went along with them, marveling at the beauty of their proud clean brains. I began to love my race, and for the first time I wanted to be Chinese. Every two weeks I went to a meeting with them, and in my room here I covered pages with writing. I bought every known Hebrew dictionary. But the old gentlemen were always ahead of me. Mr. Hamilton, you should have sat through some of those nights of argument and discussion. The questions, the inspection, oh, the lovely thinking — the beautiful thinking.”

“After two years we felt that we could approach your sixteen verses of the fourth chapter of Genesis. My old gentlemen felt that these words were very important, too — ‘Thou shalt’ and “Do thou.’ And this was the gold from our mining: ‘Thou mayest.’ ‘Thou mayest rule over sin.’ The old gentlemen smiled and nodded and felt the years were well spent. It brought them out of their Chinese shells too, and right now they are studying Greek.”

Samuel said, “It’s a fantastic story. And I’ve tried to follow and maybe I’ve missed somewhere. Why is this word so important?”

Lee’s hand shook as he filled [their cups with ng-ka-py]. He drank his down in one gulp. “Don’t you see?” he cried. “The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin, and you can call sin ignorance. The King James translation makes a promise in ‘Thou shalt,’ meaning that men will surely triumph over sin. But the Hebrew word, the word timshel — ‘Thou mayest’ — that gives a choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open. That throws it right back on a man. For if ‘Thou mayest’ — it is also true that ‘Thou mayest not.’ Don’t you see?”

“Yes, I see. I do see. But you do not believe this is divine law. Why do you feel its importance?”

“Ah!” said Lee. “I’ve wanted to tell you this for a long time. Any writing which has influenced the thinking and the lives of innumerable people is important. Now, there are many millions in their sects and churches who feel the order ‘Do thou’ and throw their weight into obedience. And there are millions more who feel predestination in ‘Thou shalt.’ Nothing they may do can interfere with what will be. But ‘Thou mayest’! Why, that makes a man great, that gives him stature with the gods, for in his weakness and his filth and his murder of his brother he has still the great choice. He can choose his course and fight it through and win.” Lee’s voice was a chant of triumph.

Adam said, “Do you believe that, Lee?”

“Yes, I do. Yes, I do. It is easy out of laziness, out of weakness, to throw oneself into the lap of deity, saying, ‘I couldn’t help it; the way was set.’ But think of the glory of the choice! That makes a man a man. A cat has no choice, a bee must make honey. There’s no godliness there. And do you know, those old gentlemen who were sliding gently down to death are too interested to die now?”

Adam said, “Do you mean these Chinese men believe the Old Testament?”

Lee said, “These old men believe a true story; and they know a true story when they hear it. They are critics of truth. They know that these sixteen verses are a history of humankind in any age or culture or race. They do not believe a man writes fifteen and three-quarter verses of truth and tells a lie with one verb. Confucius tells men how they should live to have good and successful lives. But this — this is a ladder to climb to the stars.” Lee’s eyes shone. “You can never lose that. It cuts the feet from under weakness and cowardliness and laziness.”

Adam said, “I don’t see how you could cook and raise the boys and take care of me and still do all this.”

“Neither do I,” said Lee. “But I take my two pipes in the afternoon, no more and no less, like the elders. And I feel that I am a man. And I feel that a man is a very important thing — maybe more important than a star. This is not theology. I have no bent towards gods. But I have a new love for that glittering instrument, the human soul. It is a lovely and unique thing in the universe. It is always attacked and never destroyed — because ‘Thou mayest.’”

A Photo Opp Waiting to Happen

I’m exceedingly pleased that the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat published the Close to Home piece that I recently submitted for publication, in which I express my gratitude for my time at our local community college. What follows is the article in its entirety.~Ann

GUEST OPINION: A bittersweet farewell to SRJC

By ANN CLARK

Published: Wednesday, May 18, 2011 at 6:26 p.m.

“Good parents give their children roots and wings. Roots to know where home is, wings to fly away and exercise what’s been taught them.”

— Jonas Salk

On Wednesday, I walked away from the Santa Rosa Junior College campus for the last time, ending an almost 20-year relationship with that institution. I’m already missing the school I fell in love with from the first time I laid brains on it, in August of 1992. But it’s time to move on, time to “exercise what’s been taught” to me there.

In the early 1990s, my husband, Neal, and I moved into a cottage two blocks west of SRJC. I had long harbored dreams of a college degree so I enrolled in Psych 1A and was instantly hooked not just on the subject matter but on the entire SRJC experience. I was charmed by everything about it, from its oak leaf logo to its lush tree-rich grounds to its quality professors and high standing in the academic community.

After successful completion of the Psych 1A class, I kept going. The next semester I took 13 units, which included another psych class, stellar astronomy and pre-algebra. The late Jerry Waxman was my astronomy professor, and he coaxed from me a previously unrecognized awe for the magnificence of the natural world and cultivated in me latent, surprising skills: I never imagined that my math-challenged brain could triangulate the distance to a star.

I have specific and wonder-filled memories of practically every corner of the campus and every moment of my experiences there. Both my personal world and the larger world have transformed during my tenure there.

It was at the phone booth in front of Plover Hall in 1993 — then the library — when I discovered that my son’s wife was in labor. And in the spring of 1995, when I had to give an informational speech, I chose “the Internet” as my topic. It was so new then that I was one of the few JC students with a modem. My visual aids were posterboards explaining domain extensions such as “dot gov” and “dot edu” and predicting that “within five years the majority of households in America would have a modem in their homes.” Now, of course, we’ve essentially outgrown modems and most students are connected online, wireless or otherwise.

The highlight, however, was my May 1996 graduation where, as a valedictorian, I stood under a canopy of oaks on a hot May morning, quoting from Robert Anton Wilson’s essay “Ten Reasons to Get Out of Bed in the Morning” and telling my classmates how critically they are needed. I truly felt like a child of the college, wanting to honor my “parent” by doing her proud.

I was away from the college for a few years, but in 2007 I returned to add some general education classes for my bachelor’s degree and two psychology prerequisites I needed for my desired graduate program. Now I’m finishing a social psychology course at the JC, I’ve been accepted into the graduate program, and in August, I’ll be going back to my other beloved alma mater, Sonoma State University, as a graduate student. But being forever finished with SRJC is bittersweet indeed.

“Alma mater” is Latin for “nourishing mother,” and SRJC has indeed served as my educational progenitor — my starter school, my training wheels, the “parent” institution that gave me roots and wings. I leave forever changed and eternally grateful.

Ann Clark is a Sonoma resident.

Copyright © 2011 PressDemocrat.com — All rights reserved. Restricted use only.

At one point a girl sitting just behind me raised her hand and provided a brief but insightful answer. When the professor asked her to repeat what she’d just said but loudly enough for the entire class (of 61 students) to hear, the girl shook her head, smiled shyly and said, “Never mind then,” adding, “I’m not the kind of person who speaks out.”

At which point my brain made a noise like the arm of a record player scratching over the entire surface of an LP. I was horrified, hearing a 20-year-old female college student announcing to the world that she doesn’t, can’t and/or won’t add her voice to any discussion. I wanted to stop the class right there and impart 30+ years of experience to her on the spot. I wanted to get all wise-old-auntie on her: “Oh honey. You have a big noisy mind in there, cooking up all sorts of fabulous ideas and points of view and opinions, and the most important thing happening in this room right now is happening between your ears. You said something good, and meaningful and worth sharing! But even if your comment hadn’t been that interesting, you should have said it anyway. Loudly. From now on, I want you to speak up and speak out. I want you to look around the room while you do so, make eye contact with a few people, smile confidently. Let them know that you, [insert name here], plan to be taken seriously. That you have something to say. You let them know you have a VOICE and you plan to use it so they’d better listen up or else. I’m talkin’ here; you shut up!” Like that.

Of course I didn’t. Didn’t stop the class; didn’t change her mind or her life. I can’t. She has to learn that lesson in her own time and in her own way — if she ever does. If she doesn’t, she’s going to spend an entire lifetime being just another bystander.

She Has the Secret

My niece reports the following conversation she had with her two-and-a-half-year-old daughter:

Mama: “Hannah, how did you get to be so smart?”
Hannah: (a slight pause) “Cookieeees!”

I’ve always suspected that creme filling had unique and unexplored properties.

What happens when a sheltered, middle-class, mildly neurotic 33-year-old embarks on her first backpacking trip?

When my friend Stuart invited me to go on a seven-day backpacking trip in the Sierra Nevada, my first instinct was to politely decline. I am, after all, what could be called a Protestant Princess. I used to require a nap after a trip to the grocery store. I once made my father drive six miles to flush a terminally ill goldfish because I couldn’t bear to touch it…even with a net. “Adventure” to me meant trying to make it to work and back on less than a quarter tank of gas. So, even though I knew better, I agreed to accompany Stuart and his friend Richard, and before I knew it I found myself shopping in stores with tents pitched in the middle of them, patronized by people who could distinguish Gortex from polypro.

First of all, let me tell you that it costs more to go on a one-week backpacking trip than it does to spend a week on the French Riviera. I spent more on my hiking boots than I did on my wedding dress. Then I proceeded to lay out another hundred dollars or so on woolen socks, long underwear, and alpine sunglasses and a safari hat which, when worn together, made me look like Teddy Roosevelt.

I had consented to go on the trip on one condition: that there be no bears. Stuart had assured me it would be too cold or too damp or too late in the season for bears and I, like an imbecile, believed him. When we arrived at Kings Canyon National Park wherein lurked the 43-mile Rae Lakes Loop, our destination, I noticed that the garbage cans looked like they were built to contain radioactive waste materials. They were fortresses of lead and steel bolted solidly to concrete platforms. That was my first inkling that I had bitten off more than I could chew, and I fervently hoped the bears weren’t intent on doing the same.

Our first morning on the trail started without a hitch. We were a party of three — Stuart, a self-proclaimed Renaissance man, Richard, a botanist who wore tie-dyed t-shirts and said “yahoo” a lot, and me. I had practiced hiking carrying heavy books, and when we got to the trailhead I was relieved to hoist my pack and discover that it weighed right about 32 pounds, my practice load. Then we stopped to fill our water containers. Do you know how much water weighs? (That’s a rhetorical question, of course, but I’ve discovered that people who backpack regularly can accurately answer questions like that, and other questions no one really wants the answers to.) All I know is that my filled water bottle felt like a car radiator was strapped to my hip, and I began the hike with an uneven gait reminiscent of Dennis Weaver’s “Chester” on “Gunsmoke.”

The first part of the trail wound with deceptive ease through lush green meadows past the sparkling Kings River. As I walked, I was lulled into a false sense of capability, and I was just beginning to plan my Everest trip when suddenly a boy of about 11 came pounding down the trail, panting and pointing behind him, yelling, “There’s a bear on the trail about a half mile up!” as he passed us hell bent for election. Underestimating the determination of two nature-lovers who had planned this trip for six months, I assumed we would immediately turn around, get in the car, and drive back to the safety of a city full of muggers. It wasn’t to be. Stuart seemed unperturbed.

“Okay,” he whispered, “get your Sierra Club cups and spoons and, if we see him, we’ll bang our cups and scare him away.”

Now I was no expert, but it seemed to me that the sight of three suburbanites playing percussion on tin cups in the face of a 500-pound bear would hardly “scare” him. Nevertheless, I clutched my place-setting and marched onward and upward toward the jaws of death. In my mind’s eye I could see headlines like, “Woman Tries to Fight Off Killer Bear With Spoon; Remains Found in Three Counties.”

Suddenly Stuart shouted, “There he is!” and we were all banging our cups and whooping and hollering and, unbelievably, I watched as the bear turned and ran away from us. A bear ran away from me ! Well, I thought, that’s one less thing to be afraid of: apparently, Sierra Nevada bears are wimps.

About the fourth day on the trail I was getting pretty cocky. I had terrorized a bear, eaten food cooked in a coffee can, and had shared my morning bath with a water snake, and I was beginning to think the Donner Party women had been a bunch of crybabies. That’s when we started gaining elevation, and it got cold. Bitterly cold. The verdant meadows gave way to a bleak landscape of granite and dead trees, the harshness relieved now and then by a tuft of grass and a patch of half-frozen wildflowers which backpackers have imagination enough to call “alpine meadows.”

We were hiking that afternoon when suddenly the wind kicked up and dark clouds started forming. Stuart and Richard began considering campsites for the night and finally settled on a smooth granite mesa. Surveying our surroundings, I realized that every single tree on the ledge had been struck by lightning in its lifetime, so that we were in a kind of forest of four-foot high blackened stumps. As the sky grew darker, I found myself slouching around the camp casting furtive glances at the thunderheads, trying not to be the highest object on the mountain. I longed for a campfire for warmth and cheer, but we were above 10,000 feet now, where backpackers are no longer allowed to make fires. (That’s a Forest Service rule. They tell you it’s because of the scarcity of timber but they don’t tell you it’s because the lightning fires have burned up whatever the merciless cold will allow to grow.) Stuart and Richard, in the meantime, strolled about appreciating nature, extolling the beauty of this incredible fern and that exquisite pine cone. The trip was a little more than half over, and if I heard one more exclamation of the miracle of nature’s handiwork, I was going to be sick — even at the risk of losing my Freeze Dried Mushroom and Rice Pilaf Instant Dinner (High Carbohydrate).

By lunchtime Tuesday, we were heading down the mountain and decided to stop at Bullfrog Lake to eat the remaining peanut butter and broken crackers. (I noticed that whoever named the natural wonders of the Sierra Nevada chose innocent-sounding names like Bullfrog Lake and Glen Pass. They couldn’t have called a spade a spade, or those places would have names like “Giardia Lake” and “Shin Splint Pass.”) I was just thinking how much I’d endured when we smelled smoke. Forest fire smoke. At first I couldn’t believe it. I had survived so much and now I was going to die like a character in Bambi?!

“Do you think it might just be someone’s campfire?” I asked hopefully, as great clouds of smoke rose from the canyon floor, threatening to obscure Stuart and Richard from my vision. As the smoke grew thicker, even my brave friends, seasoned backpackers who were accustomed to facing death hourly, allowed as how we should pack up and mosey down the mountain. While they painstakingly rewrapped the food (as if we would live to eat another meal!), I flung my gear into my pack like Prissy leaving Atlanta.

To this day, I don’t know what the last ten miles of the Rae Lakes Loop looks like. I saw it, but at breakneck speed through peripheral vision. Despite the choking smoke and the fact that we did not know where the fire was, Stuart and Richard continued as they had begun, stopping to “ooh” and “ahh” over rocks and berries and mistletoe, while I danced on one foot and then the other.

Well, despite their lollygagging, we did manage to make it down the mountain in record time. I think I startled a couple of rangers back at the trailhead who had apparently never before seen anyone on hands and knees kissing an asphalt parking lot. I’m still making monthly payments to the doctor who treated both my knees for patellar tendonitis. (He said going down a mountain ten miles and 2,000 feet in one day wasn’t a real smart thing to do.) The sunburn finally healed. (I didn’t use sunscreen that last day — who would have thought that ultraviolet rays could penetrate all that smoke?) I took three showers upon arriving home and haven’t touched peanut butter since last September. I still have the urge to run when I smell woodsmoke, but my therapist says I’m making progress. In fact, now that I think about it, it wasn’t so bad…maybe next summer…after all, I do have those fancy Italian hiking boots and I have to get my money’s worth, don’t I? Besides, there’s a ten-mile stretch of the Rae Lakes Loop I’ve yet to see, and I’ll bet it’s beautiful.
______

Originally published in the May/June 1987 issue of Sierra Life magazine under my former married name Patricia Patterson.