Waning Crescent Moon of Winds     

                                  The Christian liturgical season of  Lent

Some periods of life seem to have a theme.  Take this last month, the month after I turned to 60.  Bad back laid me low for a week before and two weeks after, then, as I began to feel like my old (should I say younger, or pre-60 self?), the universe visited a nasty infection of my gut.  Wham, another 3 days alternating between agony and embarrassment.  So, far this getting older stuff isn't going so well for me.

Then, today, a nice surprise.  Sort of.  MICAH, an organization I helped found over 18 years ago, has a new anti-racism initiative which required a history.  Somehow, they found me and we met at the Art Institute.  OK, so now I'm part of a history as a founder.  Hmmm.  

We finished lunch and I wandered the galleries getting ready for two tours I have tomorrow.  As I hunted for Picasso's "Baboon and Young" sculpture, the San Francisco Psychedelic show intervened.  So, I spent a bit of time looking at very familiar posters for very familiar bands:  Country Joe and the Fish, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin among others.  Photographs, too.  San Francisco during the summer of love, 1967.  It was my time, my bands, my people.  In a museum.

So, I had this old fossil feeling on two different fronts, both on the same day.  60's a trip, so far.

A very positive aspect of the history taking was a reimmersion in "those days."  Those days being the late 70's, and much of the 80's when the left was going strong.  We were optimistic, hopeful about real change to the system.  The general thrust was to get new and predictable sources of capital for poor neighborhoods.  This was to give them access to money to build new affordable housing, start neighborhood businesses which would in turn create neighborhood level jobs.  Got talking about Jobs Now, Philanthropy Project, the Grupo Sociale, Urban Venture, the General Mills plot to buy Stevens Square.  We had so much going on back then, so much momentum, but the Reagan era, as it gained traction, bled the neighborhood economic development process dry, transferring funds to Reagan's unprecedented build up of  the military.  

It occurred to me that a history of that time might be useful to current neighborhood activists. 

post:turning 60

3/8/07

"Life is a voyage that is homeward bound." - Herman Melville

"We turn not older with years, but newer every day." - Emily Dickinson

         Last Quarter of the Storm Moon   The Christian liturgical season of  Epiphany

Back spasms continue to greet me in the morning.  Sure gets boring.  2 Alleve.  On with the day.

This AM 60th birthday comes up.  A transition.  In this decade I will turn 62, first eligibility for Social Security, then 65, then 66, the full Social Security age for my cohort.  

These are ages that seemed so old, and so faraway.  With many of those who have passed this way before me I do not feel 60.  {With the exception of this verdammit back.)  Instead I feel rich in experience, deep in knowledge, and eager for the work on a Ge-ology, completing the Pilgrimage manuscript, finishing the Docent class, a trip around Lake Superior, and a birthday trip somewhere in the world.

I'm excited about Ruth.

The garden for 2007 has begun to take shape in my head.  It will include more work in the forest, and a way of integrating the garden, woods with my work on Ge-ology.  

The new home re-design by Kate will freshen up our living space and provide us with a beautiful environment.  Our relationship continues to deepen and to provide flexible, unconditional support and love. 

These will be the best years of my life.  In truth, with a few exceptions at the end of college and the end of my first two marriages, I've always felt these were the best years.  And, I'm happy to continue that tradition.

post:turning 60

                       Waning Gibbous Storm Moon   The Christian liturgical season of  Epiphany

The turning of my own clock to its 60th orbit around the sun has begun to occupy my thoughts.  The decadal birthdays affect me in ways I don't understand.  This one follows in that train.

I'll do a longer piece in a bit, but the change from the 50s to the 60s augurs a transition away from something, maturity perhaps, towards aging.  These days it doesn't feel to me like aging really begins until the 70s, still, at 60 the summer of life is past and the autumn has grown full.

Like other ages I imagine I'll like this period, too.  Now I can work without need for results, yet work with experience and breadth.  Glad to be here.

post:turning 60

A month plus a day ahead of Valentine's Day.  Still, this one feels bigger to me, as the decadal birthdays always do.