Samain and the Moon of Growing Darkness

Friday gratefuls: Tom. Mussar. Rabbi Jamie. Luke. Ginny. Rick. Great Sol. A blue Colorado Sky. The West. The Rocky Mountains. No Bike Park. The Mountain Meadow remains. Colorado. Livin’ in a Blue State. Mark. Mary. Diane. Riley. Richard. Cut Throat Cafe. Happy Camper.

Sparks of Joy and Awe: The Eagle at Tom and Roxann’s

Kavannah: Friendship

One brief shining: Why did you put on what you’re wearing today, Mindy asked, and we went around the room, learning one wanted to cover her stomach, another takes a shower on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays so she had on what she had on Wednesday, another wore brown jeans and a green t-shirt to look like a tree, and when it came to me I said, I bought a pair of Keens, a lot of white socks, a bunch of jeans, and several plaid flannel shirts so I don’t have to think about it.

 

BTW: I asked chatbotgtp to create An American themed image of a group called the Seed-Keepers whose role is to honor the spirit of liberal America. Anti-racist, anti-misogynist, and anti-homophobic. I’m more interested in the Seed-Keeper theme than anything else

Seed-Keepers. Who among you might become a Seed-Keeper? If you take on this role, expect it to last at least four years, perhaps longer. You can be a solitary Seed-Keeper, dedicated to remembering and speaking who we are as a country and as a people when not driven by fear and demagoguery. One of our Seeds, there are so many, lies in our history. Perhaps you will be the one who goes back to the beginning of our nation and learns in even more depth how we came to be. Warts and all. 3/5ths clause and fugitive slave clause and white, propertied men as voters, the electoral college and all. Enslavement, too. Jim Crow. The Indian Wars. Yet, too, the Civil War. Checks and balances. Federalism. The Federalist Papers. How we became a city on a hill attracting new citizens from afar.

Or, you might choose to have a Seed-Keeper group. Perhaps one interested in the American Renaissance (as I am) when American thinkers and artists began to tease out the distinctive features of living on this amazing land. Reading together the works of Emerson, Thoreau, Parker, Whitman, Poe, Melville, Hawthorne, Mary Fuller. Frederick Douglas, Sojourner Truth, Harriet Jacobs, Emily Dickinson, Louisa May Alcott, Harriet Beecher Stowe. Not to ignore either painters and sculptors like Mary Cassatt, Bierstadt, Henry Tanner, Church.

What might you do as a Seed-Keeper? You might gather those close to you for story evenings, perhaps around the fireplace to discuss questions like what does it mean to be an American? What has it meant? What does it mean in a time dominated by reactionaries and autocrats? You might write essays, letters to the editor about how the other half of the 2024 electorate sees things.

You might locate yourself in the work of a state Humanities council and help them introduce American Seeds through their speakers and book groups.

I’m sure you have more and better ideas than these. A Seed-Keepers primary role is to hold the liberal to radical ideas that make America a nation in which all want to live and to pass those ideas along to family, friends, and others in a digestible manner.

I’m gonna keep spinning up this idea, see if it can gain traction. No where near done with it.