How to Be a Safe Space for Our Own Children and Others

In 2023 the CDC released this report, which pertains to data that has since been removed from the CDC’s website, because it referred to what the Trump administration calls “harmful” “gender ideologies.” But here’s the meat of the report. The first statistics are referring to teen girls:

• Nearly 1 in 3 (30%) seriously considered attempting suicide—up nearly 60% from a decade ago.

• 1 in 5 (18%) experienced sexual violence in the past year—up 20% since 2017, when CDC started monitoring this measure.

• More than 1 in 10 (14%) had ever been forced to have sex—up 27% since 2019 and the first increase since CDC began monitoring this measure.

The report also found more than half (52%) of LGBQ+ students had recently experienced poor mental health and, concerningly, that more than 1 in 5 (22%) attempted suicide in the past year. Trend data are not available for students who identify as LGBQ+ due to changes in survey methods.

Findings by race and ethnicity also show high and worsening levels of persistent sadness or hopelessness across all racial and ethnic groups; and that reported suicide attempts increased among Black youth and White youth.

***

Let that sink in. What did you think? What did you feel? I am in tears.

My tears are not because I’m a parent of two beautiful newly-fledged children whose safety I fear for every day. They’re not because I’m a woman who knows from personal experience as well as any woman does that the increasing rate of sexual violence still only begins to touch the true horror of our lives as objects. My tears are not even because one of my children is female, and now attends frat parties. My tears are because this damned report says ‘LGBQ+’. My tears are because there is no T.

My tears are because, among the many children I’ve taught and known and loved over the years are a couple handfuls of trans kids, whose stories and hearts and lives matter. Because the rate of depression, suicide, and violence that looks alarming in this CDC report is much higher for trans kids than for anybody else, and it’s not documented, here. My tears are for Marlin, my beautiful trans cousin who struggled with extreme depression and finally killed himself just after Trump was elected, the first time.

And my tears are pointless. Just like hopes and prayers are pointless. All the billions of tears shed for the children we’ve lost will not save all the children we have yet to lose. Our tears are pointless. We have to act.

And what if we don’t know any trans kids? What if our kids are straight, cisgender*, white, wealthy and male? Why should we care? We should care because, in a world where it’s OK to erase people for being trans, it is also OK to erase people for being gay, disabled, non-white, female, or poor. And eventually to erase anyone, for looking different in any small way; for making a mistake or getting sick. And even if our kids are among the privileged few, that world is not a safe place to be. A safe world values everyone. Even the rich. Even trans kids. And besides, we don’t actually know how our kids identify, especially if we haven’t built a world where they feel safe enough to tell us. So what can we do to build this safe world?

My first act after the gut-kick of seeing trans children erased is to write this article. And I will never, ever shut up. I will write more and open my mouth more, and speak up against every ignorant human who tries to tell me they’re saving the children by persecuting trans kids (yeah this isn’t my first walk around the block, in this regard). I will keep wearing the ally pin my kids gave me a couple of years ago, not only because I’m so very proud that they see who I am, but mostly because I know that some frightened child might see the rainbow on my lapel and know that I care; that I will stick up for them, even when they don’t know about it. I wish I had known what Marlin was going through before he died. I wish I’d been able to help him. I wish millions of us had built a safe world for him to grow into, long before he changed his pronouns.

I’ve been asking myself since I was a teenager how I can support LGBTQ+ people in my community. Ever since a boy my age followed my friend and me home, nagging us—either of us—to date him. So I told him we were gay. It was a lie, and half-joking (I had NO idea at that point the severity of what LGBTQ+ people were experiencing.) I thought I could throw him off by making us unavailable to him. His response was, “well that’s a waste of two beautiful girls!” It stuck with me forever. I still think about it. The fact that we were unavailable to men made us a waste. Worthless. That response lit a fire under my butt that has never been extinguished.

It turned out my friend actually was gay, as was my other best friend at the time. And as the years went on, I discovered that more and more of the people I loved were treading the terrifying social swamp of being unavailable to straight cis white men. At around the same time, I found a porno magazine (in the possession of ten-year-old boys) with a photo-rich article about a man converting a lesbian by raping her. That lit another fire. Literally. I stole the magazine and burned it.

And then I had kids. And I had to protect them from the harms leering at them from every corner. And as the number of trans kids we knew grew and grew, and as my own kids educated me about gender and inclusivity, the fire under my butt grew and grew, too. And then we lost Marlin. And now he and every other trans kid I know has been erased. Now the fire is so big I’m a damned rocket. And what are you?

How are you going to protect your kids? How will you make sure they know that if they come home with a new girlfriend or boyfriend or non-binary partner you’ll be delighted, enthusiastic and welcoming? What about if they come home with a new name or pronouns? Will you learn what they know, and follow? Will you stand up for their rights when they decide to start hormone therapy? Will you wear the trans flag when you take them to the doctor?

We adults often think we’ve learned all the stuff. We think it’s up to us to teach the children, but it’s the other way around. We need them to show us how to use our phones, and we need them to teach us about gender and sexuality. Because they know. Yeah. Sexuality. Let go of your pearls. Our kids knew before we taught them the word ‘vagina’. Some of them were raped before that. We need them to teach us what they know, and we need to be open to hearing it. We also need to admit when we’re wrong.

A bunch of years ago, I was walking home with my young teenage daughter, and announced that I was so proud she was non-binary. I was also proud of myself for having recently learned this word.

“Um...” she faltered. “I’m not sure you know what that word means.”

I swallowed. “I thought it means you don’t see or stereotype people for their genders. Like it’s not all black and white. I’m proud that you see the diversity of people.”

“No Mama.” She corrected me gently. “It means you don’t subscribe to gender binary.”

“Right? That’s sort of what I said, right?”

“No, like personally you don’t subscribe. For your identity. If I was non-binary, I wouldn’t consider myself male or female. I would probably use the pronouns they/them.” She walked on beside me like what she was explaining was just part of everyday knowledge, and I guess to her, it was. “I’m definitely female,” she said. “And Tali is definitely male. Even Marlin was definitely male. But if someone is non-binary they wouldn’t be either one. They’d be non-binary.”

At the mention of Marlin, the conversation became a lot less jovial. I was sorry I hadn’t understood, and I felt very small. Sad. Like suddenly maybe my misunderstanding presented a hazard to my daughter’s safety, even though she is cis. What else did I not understand? But she was forgiving, and understanding of my mistake. “Sorry, Mama,” she said.

“It’s OK.” I swallowed my shame and carried on. “So do you have any non-binary friends?” Out of respect for her friends’ privacy, she couldn’t tell me. And I was proud of that, too.

I’ve learned a lot. It turns out non-binary people can also identify as male or female. The gender umbrella is diverse!! And it’s OK to be confused. It’s a great place from which to build curiosity. My kids moved out a few years ago now, and are still my greatest teachers in many ways, especially where culture, inclusivity, and love are concerned.

graphic used and adapted with permission from Gayta Science

Love. Yes, there has to be a fire under our butt. And it has to be fuelled by love. Where the rise of fascism is tearing at the already-shredded fabric of our diverse society, we have to wipe away our tears and start building, with love.

How do we build a safe and inclusive society? We have to swallow our fear and pride and shame and speak up at every opportunity, to wear the colours that show we’re safe adults, to teach other adults what our children teach us, and mostly we have to listen with open arms and open hearts, because many of our children are light-years ahead of us in doing this work. The answer is openness and curiosity.

What I think this all comes down to is that as people with a certain amount of privilege, and sometimes very little understanding of the LGBTQ+ world, we cis parents can still be part of the solution. We can look at the children we love with curiosity and respect. We can amplify their voices and knowledge and build the world they envision. And we can see and support the many safe spaces that empowered LGBTQ+ people are building, already. Because they are powerful. We are powerful. And when our power comes from love, we are all empowered, together.

My cousin Starry, Marlin’s mother, has been a guiding light for me, in my efforts to expand my mind, following the loss of Marlin. When he died, most of us in the family didn’t even know he was ‘he’, or calling himself Marlin. We hadn’t built the kind of safe space in our relationship that he needed to be himself, with us. It was Starry who informed me who he was, despite her pain. Starry, as you might imagine, suffered deeply with the loss of her child. And as the years have gone by, she not only received support in her loss from trans youth, but has also intentionally made herself and her presence a safe space for LGBTQ+ people. She continuously educates herself, and has three trans “foster daughters”, now. Loving others doesn’t only help those we love, it helps us too. Love is always the answer.

So let’s go. It’s Pride season, but it should always be Pride season. Let’s stoke our fires and make sure we’re building and supporting safe spaces, with love.

***

My own children, as well as Marlin’s surviving family members gave their consent to my mentioning of them, in this article. Consent-seeking is part of building safe spaces. I’m grateful for advice and feedback on the article from my own children, and Starry’s friends. Listening and hearing others’ opinions is part of building safe spaces.

 

Definitions, Links

*The word cisgender (often shortened to cis; sometimes cissexual) describes a person whose gender identity corresponds to their sex assigned at birth, i.e., someone who is not transgender. (Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cisgender)

A transgender (often shortened to trans) person has a gender identity different from that typically associated with the sex they were assigned at birth. (Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender)

Non-binary or genderqueer gender identities are those that are outside the male/female gender binary. Non-binary identities often fall under the transgender umbrella since non-binary people typically identify with a gender that is different from the sex assigned to them at birth, although some non-binary people do not consider themselves transgender. (Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-binary) AKA: gender non-conforming.

CDC Report: U.S. Teen Girls Experiencing Increased Sadness and Violence https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2023/p0213-yrbs.html

How to Be an Ally: https://queerintheworld.com/best-lgbt-ally/

Fascist Ideology: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism_and_ideology

The Safe Zone: An incredibly informative site, which also offers resources and training for allyship. https://thesafezoneproject.com

TransWhat? A very informative site created by trans teen, Adam, which I highly recommend for further reading! https://transwhat.org/

Gayta Science: Using data science to visualize and promote understanding of LGBTQ+ issues. https://www.gaytascience.com/

Shifting Focus

This blog is quieting, now that my children have moved out. I'll keep it here because I know it's a resource for other unschoolers, but I want to let you all know that most of what I publish is now on my art site: https://emilyartist.ca  

It's easy to subscribe to that site, if you want to. Just click the dropdown menu at the top left corner, put your email address in the subscribe field, and approve the email, when you receive it. I don't write a lot, but maybe a couple of pieces per month, which you'll receive by email, if you subscribe.

Emily

Harvest 16: The Shed

The Harvest series was a series of 17 Instagram posts created over the course of the weeks before and after my mother's death in 2024. Since I've stopped using Meta platforms for political/ethical reasons, I'm re-posting one of the Harvest entries, here.

Pappa built this shed in 1983, when I was seven. With his confidant hands he cut the trees on this land, bucked them up, and built a whole life for us, this building being one of the first big things. He used logs for a foundation, and built a frame of scrap wood and home-milled beams and planks. He used a simple froe to cut hundreds of cedar shakes for the roof, and when he was finished he installed the headboard from my brother’s bunk-bed as a ship’s wheel at the end of the hayloft, and he added a little electric propeller to the front door, so we could pretend we were flying a plane.

My brother and I and all our friends slept many nights in the hayloft, convinced there weren’t any spiders, by night, even though by day the palm-sized wolf spiders crouched between many of the shakes over our heads. We could sleep with our heads by the steering wheel and watch the stars run by.

 

This is the shed where we slaughtered rabbits, raised chickens, hosted haunted houses and tea parties, and eventually made some carpentry projects. It’s the shed my own children think of as the steam train, for the way its roof steams in the winter chill. And after forty-one years, its life is over. The logs that support its sturdy plank-floor have rotted away, and the shed is listing dangerously.

 

 

So this weekend, after slowly emptying it of two generations’ worth of tools and other “useful things”, Pappa pushed it over with his tractor. 

 

It’s hard to see it go, in a year that already gutted our family, but in a way, this evening’s hot dog roast over the flaming pieces of the shed was a kind of letting go. Maybe fire leaves devastation in its wake. Maybe it takes and takes ravenously. But it also cleans.

I feel a bit like I was washed by the flames, tonight. I wonder if that’s how my mother’s flesh and bone felt, as it was burning up in the crematorium. Now she’s become the heat that rose up into that spectacular sunset on the night she burned, and her bones, the tiniest white fragments—molecules mixing with the humus and mineral earth. I hope she feels clean, now. Things look different around her without the shed.

The Little Threadbare Bag of Advices From the After Times

When people talk about severely traumatic events, they often refer to "The Before Times". I heard this during Covid, when we could look back at carefree parties and hugs with our grandparents. I felt this when my father died, and his half of my family crumbled, and I remembered all the beautiful times we'd spent together, not knowing they were our last. 

The Before Times are always somehow fanciful. All the negativity disappears and we pine for those Before Times like unrequited dreams. We long for and resent our lost innocence. Before I had Long Covid, I could just walk around on the streets and up the mountains and down into the valleys. In the After Times of Long Covid, I sat in my car and watched people walk by on the sidewalk, wondering how they did it. Walking seems miraculous, now. Those times when I could just call my Dad up to tell him about my day seem like magical memories. Those times when our children played together in the blissful company of grandparents who are now gone seem miraculous, now--now that we're in the After Times, where we are jaded and distrustful and fearful. We're in the After Times, where we are wiser. Supposedly. Wisdom, too, is not what we thought it was, when we were innocent.

I'm still waiting to feel wiser about my mother's death. I know I'm in the After Times, now, but I've just stepped over the threshold and I'm totally lost. People keep offering me pieces of wisdom, and every time I think, "Ah-ha! That's something that can help me on my journey!" And I stick the wisdom into my little threadbare bag of emotional tricks to pull out when it will inevitably be required on my Big Adventure Into the After Times. Like: "It's OK to cry; that means you're connecting with your mother," and "Mourning is a sickness. Like Long Covid. You've learned to integrate and adapt to that sickness; you can do it again." And every time these words feel like they came directly from the Deep Dark Mystical Universe of the After Times, where people are wiser and all the ones who've lost their mothers were apparently waiting around to catch my fall, and pull me into their embrace. Thank you.

And those pieces of wisdom hang out of my little threadbare bag of tricks; their invisible heavy tendrils dragging on the ground as I wander along. This is my bag, now. It was my mother's very fancy purse when I was small. She kept her handkerchief in it, and a thin Lancôme lipstick, and a smaller, matching purse for money. It carries the Memories That Kept Little Me Safe, when it was hers, and not mine, and I didn't understand this little bag. Now it's mine, in the After Times, and I'm filling it with the Advices of the Wise Ones.

One of the things I couldn't have known in the Before Times is the value of tears. I remember my mother's tears hitting this bag, inconceivably, as she reached in to get her lipstick, because they sometimes fell when nothing seemed to be the matter at all. And I remember them hitting this little bag; how it darkened with the damp, and how my mother swore at her own tears. Now I see the tears in the eyes of these Wise Ones; the weight and vulnerability and frankness of being The Ones Who Held Everything Together in the Before Times, but then the tether broke. 

Now we're floating. Lost. Nothing is together and we are free like we never wanted to be. We have tears falling when nothing seemed to be the matter at all, but their dampness leaves stains that are inconceivable to those who haven't yet arrived in the After Times. Now I'm one of these Wise Ones and these tears are my welcome mat. And my wisdom-offerers are crying, because even after all the years of living in the After Times, the sorrow is not less. It's just integrated. And it's good to know someone understands. Accepts my tears. Our mothers are gone.

The sorrow doesn't get less. It just gets integrated. That was one of the mystical advices offered to me in the Before Times, but I didn't understand it. I just added it my little threadbare bag of advices, where it sat unused on my mother's shelf, in the times when I didn't know what that bag was for; nor how to use it or what it meant, or even how it was possible at all. People gave me this advice and I couldn't see it, because I was in the Before Times. We can't fathom what we have never seen. So my bag sat on a shelf in my mother's house, quietly, being hers.

But now I'm here in the After Times. My beautiful Mama was wiped off the earth so that everything that was so real and tangible before feels now like a cruel slap in the face; a memory of wonder and longing: her arms around me; her little red purse and strange assortment of French lipsticks; her mystical explanation that soon it will be my turn to understand; her tears telling me goodbye; her voice and her song and her love. Now I'm the wise one because I live in the After Times, with my sisters and my aunties and even my dead mother. Now I'm the wise one because I have the experience none of us ever wanted to have. 

Now I meet the people whose mothers are aging; dying maybe slowly or imminently or in some far-off unknown and terrifying future, and suddenly they look to me like I'm a keeper of this horrible wisdom. But I look away from their searching gaze and into my Little Threadbare Bag of Advices From the Wise Ones of the After Times, and I wonder if I'm supposed to dispense these now, or wait. The answer is wait. These people who have not yet lost their mothers are still living in that blissful and mystical Before Time, and none of the Advices will help them because they don't yet know the horror. 

This Bag of After Times Advices is like a set of unlabelled keys to a house of horrors. You can't know which keys fit which doors because you can't yet see the doors. We can't fathom what we've never seen. 

Don't think you need to be prepared. You can't look over the threshold. You will have to reach the After Times, eventually. But not now. 

Right now, you still live in the Before Times. Do that, instead. Live those Before Times like they are your last. Because they are; all of them are. Live them with your children and your parents and your friends and the lost ones and the found ones. Because one day you will look back and say "Why did I waste those Before Times not knowing how magical and mystically beautiful they were?!" And you'll put that too into your own Little Bag of After Times Advices, and you will look at those who haven't crossed over yet, and understand that nobody can give advice to the uninitiated, because we can't fathom what we've never seen. 

Anyway, it doesn't matter how much you treasure your Before Times, it will never be enough. The more you love, the more you lose, but the losing is a kind of sublime sorrow that means you loved. So love. Just love.

I went out to see the auroras last night, and I cried. And it was beautiful, and I cried. I had to force myself to leave the house, because my grief feels like a prison, sometimes, but I went anyway. It was the first time ever I saw the aurora dance, and I was heartbroken not to be sharing it with my mother, so I told myself she was everywhere. In the auroras. That's one of the Advices From My Little Bag. Then I met another person on this horrible beautiful threshold of the After Times, and I did not open my Little Bag of Advices. We just cried. And in the dancing lights, I saw her tears.

Reflections on 25 Years of Marriage

Photo by Burk Praël

We didn't get married to "tie the knot"; we'd been living together for a few years, already, and the knot had been well and thoroughly tied the moment Markus stepped off the bus and came over to where my friend and I were sitting waiting for him. He was hiding behind his eyelashes and shaking my hand with a kind of adorable, gentle fear. We went on a vacation we called our "Jellymoon" eight months later, and introduced each other to our families as quickly as possible. We met as kids, basically, at 19 and 26, and we helped each other grow up these past 29 years. 

Photo by Ruben Fleming

But in 1999 we got married, to bring our families together, officially, and to mark our spot in the passing of time. And a beautiful party. That was the idea, but it became so much more than that. In trying to arrange things, we made choices that were meaningful to us, or to the people the involved. The friend who had introduced us was our officiant, and we wrote our own vows. Of course we had to hire a legal officiant, as well, but she allowed us to do the most meaningful parts of the ceremony with our friend. All of the music, photography, food, cake, beverages, bartending, decoration and even table rentals were provided by friends and family. The wedding was hosted by our neighbours--a gargantuan gift that meant we could be married in not only the place I grew up, but also where we would eventually return to raise our children.

As I write this now it strikes me how much (much more than I can list here) was a gift from those who loved us. Somehow I was too busy to notice this during the planning stages of our wedding. It wasn't until just before the ceremony, when I was getting dressed in an upstairs bedroom of our neighbours' home, that it hit me. I was feeling rather sorry for myself, dressing alone for my own wedding, with no time to put on the French manicure I had practised. And I looked out the window and saw the hundred-plus chairs beginning to fill with guests. I watched people file in, sometimes hugging each other; sometimes looking vaguely lost, and all sitting down to wait for... me. Suddenly my nails didn't matter. I was more concerned with the makeup running away in my tears. I've longed for a community all my life, and at that moment I realized I had one. 

Photo by Julia Roemer

Looking at these photos now I feel nostalgic for our innocence. Despite the revelation I had, we were SO young; so oblivious to the life that awaited us, and that's a great thing, because our innocence allowed us to live and learn in the moment. So many of these people have been lost to us, in the twenty-five years since that day. I'm glad we had that day to cherish without knowing there might ever be loss in the future. We've struggled and built and grown so much, as individuals and as a few connected families. Our community has changed, for sure, but the heart of intentional connection that I noticed on that day is still here. And it's what holds our hearts through the challenges, and allows us to keep showing up for our family and community in whatever ways we're able.

We don't have the capacity to host a big party this year, but I think if we did that would be the best way to celebrate this day: to honour and celebrate the intertwined communities that we're so grateful to be a part of.

Listening for Birds: Cancer Is Not a Journey

“Go and Make Yourself Content, My Love” (detail).
Swainson's thrush in my mother’s garden, to the tune of the Unquiet Grave.
Painted with acrylic, graphite and coloured pencil, by Emily van Lidth de Jeude.

I was walking down from my parents' house to mine, over the crest of their driveway where the wind blows steady. Not like the rest of the property, through which it tumbles this way and that, scatters just a few leaves, or bursts out of a single storming fern. Over the crest of the hill at the top of my parents' driveway, the wind passes smoothly and calmly, sometimes crisp and smelling of leaves, sometimes damp with the weight of snow and sometimes full of the heaviness of summer and dragonfly wings. I've walked here alone and with my children after Christmas dinner, my heart and belly and arms full of treasures. I've walked here holding my chest against hidden sobs when I couldn't be what the world wanted of me. I've walked on my parents' driveway even when they lived in a different house and I visited rarely, and always it has been a place of the wind and the gathering and freeing of perception and feelings. A place of reckoning or accepting. Not that night.

I was walking down from my parents' house on the evening we came home from our first trip to the Cancer Clinic, two weeks after the sudden and unexpected removal of a stage-four tumour from my mother's brain. I was walking down that driveway and there was no wind. The driveway felt flat, although it's not, and it's rocky, but the rocks were dead that evening, which they never are. The April grasses and blossoming trees were bereft of colour. Impossibly grey. There was no birdsong, no frogsong, not even the sound of leaves, and when I looked at the hillside I thought it might just go away, if my mother died. When my mother dies. She keeps reminding me: "We all have to die, sometime." But I don't want those words. That was one of the many logical thoughts that evaporated when the doctor told us we won't be returning from this trip. And we stared blankly into the empty air and our tears were silent.

I find the word "journey" as people use it for cancer absurd. We use it like we can pack for a trip and just take in the ride. But it's not that kind of ride.

Glioblastoma. Someone should make a horror carnival ride called Glioblastoma. You get in a little comfy bucket seat and it chucks you out into the sea. Then down a vortex you go, into a drain where you almost drown but NO! You're not allowed to drown! There are things to live for and places to see and you might have a few days or weeks or months or years of good life, so LIVE!!! And you can't feel your right side, and you can't find all the words that were here just yesterday, but now more than ever, you want to, need to LIVE!! So you come out of the vortex on the chemo train, where you get whipped back and forth over trestle and track without warning or reason through whacking slaps of sheer terror and poofy clouds of deep love and acceptance: A bird? NO! Slash! You're going to die! Slash! Maybe not so fast--Slash! Everybody is trying to help you--Slash! You're so strong--Slash!--Take some more pills--Slash! Love, love love--Slash! 

Love can't save you and everybody's talking to you like a child--Slash! Now you're the wise one--Slash! Let's finish your sentences for you--Slash! We could get an ice-cream!

Slash! You get to meet the guy who will administer your death--Slash--but only when you want him to--Slash--Be GRATEful!!

Slash!

Nobody wants you to die!--Slash--Let's go shopping!--Slash

Why are you so tired?           Slash.

Slash. 

You fall out from the carnival ride one sunny morning, and you smile up at the sky and look for birds. 

But there aren't any. 

My mother loves birds. My whole life has been decorated with her hushed exclamations of "oh! A warbler!" and "Did you hear the snow geese go by this evening?" My mother hears things many of us don't notice, like the pips of babies and the tone of ducks that tells her whether they're coming or going. When my father gently delivered a helpless baby owl into my childhood, my mother raised it on chopped liver and caught mice until it grew up and flew to the trees. But she heard its voice separate from the other owls, and she answered it, and taught us to make the hungry-teenage-owl call, too: Psssshhht! Pssssssshhhhhhhttt! That owl and its offspring came back to visit us for decades.

Terminal cancer is a strange thing. We want a timeline. Something to hang a hat on. To work with. To put in the calendar, and at the same time we want to live in the moment and not have to plan for death or even how to visit with all the loved ones. But just to sit and hear the birds. Except the chaos of medical interventions, social supports and emotional upheaval means not a minute exists of just. Peace. 

Until one day, we can't take the chaos anymore. Out of necessity we ignore the forms we're supposed to be filling out and decline the offers of new prescriptions, new dosages, delivered meals and all the services we know are needed. One day we just need to be.

This week I saw my father's eyes in a rare moment of stillness. They used to shine with his intensity; they used to sparkle and shoot beams of aliveness. But recently they've looked tired, and there were big wide tears balanced on his lower lids and he was just making a sandwich. I don't hear so much as I see, and I am starting to see again. I saw my brother's cheeks, this week, taut with small lines of agony as he pulled me into his arms and didn't let go. As he asked if he can take our mother to have her broken arm looked at. Cancer is not a journey. It's a horrible carnival ride, and sometimes we catch glimpses of the world, as we spin. Sometimes, also, we catch glimpses of the beauty that brought us here to begin with; that holds us up through the fear and the changes we didn't see coming. My parents walked out, hand in hand, today, to look at the blossoming of the world they share.

And I began to hear the birdsong, this evening. The teen-aged ravens are pillaging the robins' nests, to a great outcry, as you can imagine. We thought the black-headed grosbeak that my mother says only comes for a short time every spring had left, but it's been singing again. The wrens and towhees are hopping in the bushes, until they flit out to the pine, to make their plans. The offspring of our owl are impressing people along the trails, these days. And for some reason the flickers keep sitting around on the ground. My father says get the aphids out of my apple tree, but I can't reach them and we both know that's OK. Bats are out, tonight, delighting my peripheral vision. And as I walk up over the crest of my parents' driveway this evening, I hear the nighthawks dropping on their prey, all around me. The wind is warm, and it's summer now, and my parents are just watching a movie with a couple of mosquitoes like it's a normal evening. Just living this incredible life in an incredible world, and learning to step off the carnival ride and hear the birdsong.

How We Become

back cover illustration from "Emily and Arthur", 1975

This morning I got up as I have almost every May morning for as long as I can remember, and went barefoot out of the house to wash my face in the dew and pick flowers for my mother. I don't know why I do it, and I don't know that my mother even knows I get that dew all over my face and feel so at peace in the world this way. Something inside me just feels this is right, so I do. I used to take my own children out to do it when they were little, but I don't think the practice has stuck with them in adulthood. Why do I do this? What makes it so important to my identity?

I came back home after visiting my mother to find this old book on my table. Emily and Arthur, by Domitille de Préssensé. It was there because my daughter and I were recently going through the children's books, reminiscing, and I'd pulled out a few of my old favourites. 

In these old books from the 70's, I saw how I became me, and some of how my children became, as well. The girl in the image above is Emily. She's wearing red--always--and holding her beloved hedgehog Arthur among the flowers. She has interesting things in her house like a "long stocking" that I always thought must have been a wonderful thing to have. And because my name is Emily, I grew up thinking this little red-clothed Emily represented me. Is she the reason I love to wear red? Maybe! Red just feels like it belongs with me! I remember feeling a lot like the way this Emily looks, as a child. I remember the feeling I had one May morning when I went out to find my mother some flowers and got distracted looking at woodbugs on the log where I eventually broke off a beautiful Turkey Tail fungus to bring in for her. I remember when I handed her that beautiful Turkey Tail with a couple of flowers how it couldn't encapsulate all the beauty of the woodbugs on the log, or the special curve of the broken wood, or the smell of the bark or the happiness of my heart. But I hoped she knew it meant I loved her. I became that girl on the back of the book--the one who is delighted by small found things--and am now a mother and artist who is also just still Emily. Still wearing red and going into the flowers to be me. How many Emilys have been somehow defined by this book?

As a parent, and former educator, and as an artist I know how much our childhood experiences mean to our identities. I sat wondering this morning how the idea of washing my face in the dew came about. I feel like I've been doing it all my life, but I can't ever remember doing it with my mother. Then I saw another of the treasured childhood books, and I remembered: The fairies drink the dew! When I turned four, my father gave me a book called In Fairyland, Pictures from the Elf-World, by Richard Doyle. In this book the fairies dance and fly and race snails... and drink the dew! I remember trying to drink the dew off the plants as a child, imagining I was one of the fairies. I guess somehow this became part of my personal May Day celebration. This is how traditions are born, how they grow and change and define us. And... this is the power of art!

page 13 of Richard Doyle's "In Fairyland, Pictures from the Elf-World", 1870

I always knew these and other images were drawings made by artists. Even the text of Emily and Arthur is a hand-drawn piece of art. Now I can see its influence in my own birthday-card making, and I can see how Eric Carle's rainbow of fruits for the Hungry Caterpillar informed the way I set up any painting, now. Nothing is complete for me without a whole rainbow.

So what have I given my children through the books I chose for them? Some I'm not so proud of, I confess, and some I can see in their life-choices, now. Obviously they were also more drawn to the books that suited their personalities--this isn't a one-way system of influence. And I chose things that suited them. We know that every move we make as parents will have effects on our children's psyches, that every mistake we make will cost them in self-doubt and therapy dollars, one day, and we hope they'll carry our triumphs forward as courage and happiness into their adulthoods. Our children become themselves in the environment they're given. 

But our sphere of influence doesn't end with our children. It grows from each of us into the world around us, whether we're artists or teachers or foresters, diplomats or farmers. We're all creating and influencing each other every day. The choices we make in the language we use, in every bit of media we consume, and in the products we bring into our lives all influence everyone we come into contact with. And through our contact we become ourselves, in community. Living with this in mind is self-determination. This is how we become, as a species, or perhaps even as a planetary ecology. It's good to remember that in everything we do, we have a choice.

Adult Unschoolers: An update on our kids' lives! (And the Careers Situation)

 

This morning my daughter sent me a photo of her dog, Clara, sulking on the couch. She's not a morning-dog, apparently, and I guess sometimes she just doesn't feel like going for a walk, even if it is to review a new dog park for Rhiannon's work. Whatever "work" is. Clara gets treats no matter what, so should it matter whether she's helping with a reel, going on a doggy field trip with her hiking buddies, or just sitting at home waiting for Rhiannon while she's at her other work? Clara has adapted well to city-living, since leaving her island home with my two unschooled kids, just over a year ago. I'm told she likes to walk up to automatic doors to make them open, and she knows where her favourite treat-dispensing doggy store is, and will pull Annie towards it from many blocks away. Thankfully, my kids have adapted to city-living, too.

About eighteen months ago, my 17 and 20 year-old children started planning to move out, as soon as they could get jobs and a place to rent on the mainland. I encouraged them but carried on as if nothing was happening, because I wasn't prepared to live without my kids. At all. They, however, were absolutely prepared to live without their parents, quickly arranged jobs and a rental for themselves, and moved out on January 2, 2023. 

In the month between them finding a rental and actually moving into it, my heart was crushed. I was terrified for their safety in the city (they'd spent most of their childhood on a small rural island), but mostly I was just bereft. What does a mother do when the greatest joys of her life just up and go elsewhere? Well she uses a phone, that's what. And it turns out I'm OK after all. In large part because the bond that began with pregnancy and was nurtured through attachment parenting and unschooling is secure, so no matter where my children are, we know our hearts are connected, and by whatever means necessary, we're there for each other. Whether that means sending photos of their sulking dog, phoning for advice on banking or tenancy rights, or gleefully texting us photos of the steam clock at midnight on New Year's Eve. It's been an amazing year of growth and discovery for each and all of us, and my heart is just fine!

So last year I wrote something about unschoolers building careers, and people have asked for an update! Here it is. ☺ I won't pretend it's been completely smooth for them, but I do feel that both kids' struggles have been needed challenges that led them to important personal discovery.

“Photo of Rhiannon and Taliesin (not photoshopped)”
... I asked the kids for a photo of them and the dog
for the article and this is what I got. I love that our relationship is silly.

Rhiannon

At the outset, Rhiannon's plan seemed to be the most sound: Following her passions for childcare and dog training, she had arranged a 4-day/week nanny-share job that would cover her cost of living for the first year, while she planned to attain her dog-trainer certificate, work evenings and weekends as a trainer, and build a base of private training clients that would enable her, eventually, to only nanny sometimes. She still held some interest in pursuing her Early Childhood Education certificate, but maybe later. She's a remarkable organizer, and things went pretty close to her plan.

Rhiannon (or Rhi, as she is known) at Raintown Dog Training

Rhiannon lucked out massively (or perhaps she's just very socially astute) with her employers. The owner and staff of Raintown Dog Training not only took her under their wings as a very young new trainer, but continue to treat her as an equal, respect her decisions and values, help her to advance her skills, and to employ her as much as possible, even in slower seasons. Her nanny-share families paid her as promised, including sick-days and paid vacation, provided whatever was necessary for her to care for their children, and shared her values of inclusiveness and diversity exposure for their children. It was, in fact, important to them that she uphold these values, which made her feel she really had something to give. 

What I think she didn't expect was how physically and mentally draining and isolating it is to care for other people's children every day, and the barrage of viruses she'd fall victim to. When we raise our own children we make choices that suit our needs, our routines, and the simple practicality of living. But when we hand our children over to a caregiver, those same choices may not be as convenient, and when that caregiver has two children from different families with different choices, things can get a bit complicated. Rhiannon took this all in stride, and never complained, but quite frequently she and the children were sick, and in those (many) weeks, the complexity became exhausting. Then throughout the autumn, as she transitioned to working full-time as a dog trainer, she was frequently working six or seven days a week--common for young adults now--and she was absolutely drained. 

I think by the end of the year she was grateful to be moving on to a career that would involve more engagement with the public, and really just looking forward to a little free time. She now has a deeper appreciation for the physical challenges faced by early childhood educators, and no longer wants to work in that field. That's not to say she's lost interest in working with children! She's still taking on a few shifts with the kids she's cared for in the past, and is glad to be able to maintain those connections.

Because my Annie seems intent on filling every spare second of her time, she also now volunteers at the SPCA. I get the best deal, here, as she sends me photos and updates of all the adorable dogs she works with, how they're recovering from their various issues, and the great news when one of them finds a home. I'm amazed she finds the energy for this, and am also extremely proud. Not just because she's such a values-driven, generous person, but because she is somehow managing to continue seeing the positives, even when working in a place that often sees so much tragedy. That is a gift I'm constantly impressed by.

And then there are the books... BOOKS!!! If you've followed my kids' story for some time, you will know how important books are to Rhiannon. Maybe you already follow Rhiannon's Reading Corner, where she reviews books with an eye for authenticity, inclusiveness and diversity. So this year, finding herself in the glorious land of thrift stores (the city), she began thrifting children's books, and putting them into the hands of grateful young readers through her Loved Books program. She is intensely morally-guided, so when she feels that she won't have a use for the books she's thrifted, she donates them to free libraries around the city. Financially, this program is still costing her money, but she feels great about it, and that's the important part. She has also recently arranged to read to children at a local kids' and parents' café. You can take the ECE career out of the mind, but you can't take the mind out of ECE...

Taliesin

OK, Let's talk about Taliesin. He saved up quite a bit of money while working from home on various contracts as a digital artist, so when he moved out the plan was to fund the first few weeks out of his savings, until he could find a 9-5 job at a Vancouver office. Well... that didn't go exactly as planned!

Tali wanted to work in games or film, so continued developing his modelling and art skills from home, while diligently applying to every company he could find. As the weeks became months, and a few people told him that nobody in the industry was hiring, he began applying to remote jobs, even as the situation of building his portfolio at home, alone while his sister was out working, became more and more isolating. The last thing he wanted was to be stuck behind his computer, working from home. But he persisted. As the months dragged on, despite fears of his savings running out (and the worst-case-scenario of having to return home loomed) he kept himself sane by going out daily for walks and photography inspiration. He got to know his city, and began experimenting with all the great food and entertainment options he now has around him. If I caught him at home while applying for jobs, he sounded unhappy, but if I happened to call while he was out jaunting around his city, he sounded the happiest I've heard him in years. He sent us photos of sunsets from the bridges, and kilometer-counts from his increasingly frequent runs. He bought himself a new tripod and proper running shoes. He made new friends and in a very non-career way, I think he found a piece of himself that had been missing during his recent isolated years at home on the island.

And then he got a writing job. Yes, this once-upon-a-time kid who used to abhor writing assignments (but who has a wonderful grasp of communication and language), got a job writing Blender tutorials! I think he was more surprised than we were, but there he was, financially limping along through last summer, employed as a writer! It didn't surprise me at all that this was so easy for him, but it was completely delightful to watch him gain confidence in an activity that I had, unfortunately, accidentally turned into a childhood misery for him with the likes of the "Painless Junior: Writing" workbook (yeah... that was never going to go over well with my wildly creative son, despite and because of the book's front cover declaring "Don't be a chicken, it's fun to learn!" 🙄) Well, he overcame that particular learning-injury, and became a paid writer! ROCK ON, Taliesin!!

But writing is what he uses to communicate, and his heart is in science and art. So all this time he continued applying for modelling and other digital art jobs, exploring his city with a camera, and making unabashedly science-related art for his portfolio. 

And then... He got my dream job!!! You know how sometimes you look at a kid and you think: "Wow--I can see his career written all over him!!" And for my son the career I saw was science educator... but then that little person grew up and did other things, and lost his passion for science, and I thought... wait... what? Where did that little boy go who I was convinced would be an interpreter at the planetarium?! I thought he would become one of those tall gawky long-haired science geeks doing explosion shows!!

And then last fall my son video-called me to practice his interview performance for the Space Centre, where he demonstrated Newton's laws and how they apply to space travel, using a little flashlight with some "fire" taped onto the end... And my heart exploded because that kernel of inspired joy that I remembered so well was growing right out of my son into the world around him!!

Tali's first-day selfie at the Space Centre.

Of COURSE he got the job, even though his confidence has taken a big hit through his teen years, and last December I found myself sitting in the audience watching him demonstrate explosions and rocket propulsion on the stage at the planetarium, and tears were running down my cheeks. I watched my son up on that stage and I saw that he shares the gift of every gawky science geek I looked up to as a kid. He has the spark of childish excitement of my first science teacher, Mr. McAllister. He has the gentleness of his beautifully geeky father in the way he acknowledges and responds to kids in the audience. And he has back his own confidence in the astounding base of knowledge he holds about physics. It was a joy to watch him.

So, what many of us don't realize (I certainly didn't) is that our non-profit agencies are always in financial crisis. Those inspired science interpreters can't earn enough to live on, and despite their vast knowledge and serious dedication to educating our children, they can't afford to do their jobs. After my son leaves a day of running physics and astronomy workshops for school-groups, shows in the Star Theatre or Ground-Station, telescope nights, or long sleepless overnights with a hundred Girl Guides, he comes home and has to make money. So, like most of the interpreters, Taliesin will shortly only be able to work one day a week at the Space Centre, as he's finally landed a full-time job as a digital artist. He's creating car accessory advertising for a company called Protex. It's maybe not the most inspiring job, but it allows him to use his art skills, and he'll finally stop using up the dregs of his savings! What a relief!

How did unschooling play into all this?
I asked Tali and Annie about this. 

Taliesin says, "[I have] a wide variety of interests that keeps me learning things even if I’m not in university or at work, and I’m used to having to figure things out myself so I’m able to adapt to new situations." He also credits unschooling with enabling him to maintain a "great relationship" with his sister, but feels that it also made it very challenging for him to find friends.

Annie says, "I like what I’m doing right now and what ended up happening in my life, so if I had the chance to go back and change stuff, I wouldn’t. But I don’t know what specifically causes the things I’m doing right now to happen; it could have been benefited by unschooling or not... I don’t know. I feel like sometimes it’s harder for me to relate to other people, or to feel like I know what to do in different situations because I just haven’t been in them before, but I wouldn’t want to change anything, because I like my life right now!"

I think it's totally fair to say that unschooling as we did in a small community without other unschoolers set my kids up for some social hurdles. In their teen years they missed out on a lot of social events and rites-of-passage that their peers enjoyed, from school to birthday parties, to sharing the drudgery with a cohort of same-aged kids. We tell ourselves they also missed out on all the things we don't like about school (bullying, competitive education, coerced learning, lack of time to follow passions, etc.) and we don't regret our choice to unschool them at all. In fact, I believe their success in living independently at 18 and 20 is largely due to the lifelong-learning, agile thinking, and self-motivation that unschooling instilled in them. But the fact remains that they're quite unique in this. Most of their peers are off at universities now, or still living with their parents. It can be hard to relate, and my kids are among the youngest of the young professionals, so they don't easily fit into any of the major groups in our society. Still, unschooling also provided them resilience, and they are finding their way: managing not only to make new friends, but also to continue developing their very solid sibling relationship, now living as room-mates. They're finding themselves in the city and within the context of their society, and they meet challenges with courage and a solution-seeking mindset. I can't hope for anything more.

I always said that the only important thing I wished for my children was that they would be happy. I now know that happiness is not a goal but a mindset. My kids are learning to find satisfaction in the diverse activities they've occupied themselves with while simultaneously holding multiple jobs to afford Vancouver's increasingly unaffordable rent. They're unschooling adulthood. They're becoming emotionally and financially resilient, and when things are just too hard, they have each other, their parents on the phone, and a big fluffy dog who will snuggle the love back into them. Even when she's lazy in the morning.

Clara hogging the blankets.

Playgrounds, Gaza, and a Forest: How Competition Impedes Prosperity

One damp autumn day, I crossed the dirt and wood-chip playground to the swings, where I saw a girl a couple of years younger than I was, and also the bottom of her grade's social heap, swinging on the best swing. You know the best swing? It's the one that is for some reason not spun up out of reach by the older kids, and the most visible to the playground supervisor, so other kids don't bother trying to haul you out of it. During those years, I spent all recesses and lunch hours either hiding on the bluffs, up in a tree, or firmly glued to that swing and swinging fiercely back-and-forth, back-and-forth, daring people to come near me with a glare they never noticed. But this day, this younger girl's thick brown hair flew back-and-forth, back-and-forth over her raincoated shoulders. I stood at the pole of the swing-set and ground my boots into the dirt. When nobody was looking, I told her passing face that I was magic and would turn her into a rock if she didn't get off and give me the swing.

When I was a kid I was near the bottom of the social heap. The kids who hurt me the most were also hurt the most by their parents, or by other kids at the school. It's normalized, in our culture, to turn and dish out to someone else a cruelty that was served to us. School, career-building, politics, capitalism--they're all just games of getting ahead of others, and put us in a position where we feel that "getting ahead" is the same as "prosperity". It's an illusion, but our longstanding capitalist social structure leads us to believe in it at the cost of vision and community. 

Israel is flexing its playground seniority in Gaza. It feels heartless to compare genocide to playground bullying, but I want to point out that in accepting what we see as insignificant cruelty in our privileged day-to-day as a necessary cost of getting ahead, we also pave the way to accept greater and greater atrocities. I understand from my playground experience how easy it feels to commit some lesser act of cruelty against another person when I've been hurt. So by extrapolation, I get that maybe if your people has been persecuted for thousands of years, and even in living memory was the pointed victim of horrific acts of genocide, it might seem less than horrible for (some members) of that people to commit genocide against the next victim down the chain. I mean, aren't we all just making gains by stepping up upon the backs of those just below us in rank, privilege, or esteem?

Well no--not everybody is doing that. Some of us from every race, religion, and social ranking in the world are in fact trying very hard not to be that kind of monster. Some of those in my circles who are most vocally supporting freedom for Palestinians are my Jewish friends. Because fighting to get or stay on top of a social pyramid does not equal prosperity! Because some of us learned this important lesson in childhood.  

Back in my elementary school playground... I have never forgotten the look of horror on that girl's face, and my triumph at seeing her run away, so I could get to safety on that swing. My triumph was the worst. I remember the sick feeling in my stomach, after she left. I didn't know where she had run to, or who might be kicking her, feeding her dirt, or holding her down and whispering the most vile threats in her ears. I remember thinking we looked rather similar and maybe she could have been my friend if I hadn't been so desperate to get that swing. I felt that getting the swing gave me safety, but it also took away hers. I remember that my triumph came with a horrible cost to my feeling of righteousness, and that year I became one of those people who knows better than to pass the bullying on to the next rung down the ladder. Sometime after that I bravely spoke a few words to my bullied-mate in the classroom. We had a breath-holding competition. So for a couple of minutes we found common ground in an environment of terror and ladder-climbing, and I think in some small way we both learned to transcend the hierarchy of our class.

We can ALL learn from our mistakes. We can all look at our leaders and our cultural and personal privileges and refuse to make progress at the cost of others. Sure, we're trying to survive in what is, at its root, a culture of competition, and to some degree we have to participate in the status quo to survive. But we can also work to change it. Those of us with more privilege have more ability to effect change. We can change the ways we look at others; we can choose to befriend the people who make less money than we do, the people whose lashes lower when we speak to them; the people who seem least likely to improve our social status. We can look critically at our privilege and resources and belongings and ask ourselves what we actually need, and how we can change our lives and share the excess to achieve a social balance in our community. We can remind ourselves that a balanced community means prosperity for all. 

Does prosperity mean a lack of suffering? Of course not. We're all going to die. We're all going to hurt. We're all going to lose loved ones, and health, and hope. But a balanced community is exactly the only thing that will sustain us through these challenges. And we can look to the ecology just outside our city limits for inspiration in achieving prosperity through social balance. 

A tree in a forest. If a maple drops ten thousand seeds on the forest floor, all but a few hundred of those are likely to be eaten by insects, rodents and birds before they ever sprout, and of those that do sprout, most will be eaten as spring greens by the likes of deer, and others. And maybe five will grow to be saplings, and maybe zero will live to become trees, most years. Until one day the mother tree has crumbled under the weight of some winter snow and in the mess of her fallen limbs, one of last year's saplings will grow sheltered and become a tree, itself. But you know what? In all those years where not a single one of those seeds grew to maturity, that original tree fed the ecosystem around her, and reached her roots through the landscape to share nutrients with the neighbouring trees. All the other plants and animals' droppings and dead bodies fed the soil, and now that soil is rich with microbial life and nutrients, and that new maple tree will grow strong--not on the backs of all those it conquered, but in an ecology of giving and dying and growing. The maple tree has no fear of falling behind. She is a sanctuary for mosses, ferns and all kinds of insect, microbial and animal life--she is part of that life. She's just growing and giving and crumbling and feeding her ecology. And that is why she prospers. I want to learn some of that wisdom.

What if there was no fear of falling behind in human society? Would we carry, feed, and connect with each other; with our ecology? Would we relish those connections instead of conquering others? I feel like I've experienced this when I sing in community. When my own voice drowns away among the voices of others, but together we're a beautiful sound. I experience it when I play with children in the wilderness. We're each so insignificant in the big forest, but our play changes the landscape and we see the impact of our being there; we learn to play carefully. We learn that if we destroy the stream-bank, then the water downstream will be muddy, and then we'll have no clean water for drinking, anywhere. We learn that affecting anything (anybody) will have impacts on ourselves.

If my life depends on privilege gained through competition, and supported by people who aren't being supported by me, then when those people's lives falter, so do I. We can't build a pyramid to stand on, then rip out the stability of the base, and expect to keep standing on the top.

And from another perspective, when we've prospered exponentially at the cost of the ecosystem that supports us without honouring it, giving back to it, and living in harmony with it, the ecology we depend on is faltering underneath our ridiculous pyramid, and we're all beginning to discover what happens, then.

Our system of pyramid-climbing is not a strong one. A strong system is lateral. Like a forest, or a group of people singing. A strong system loses a limb and regrows to heal the wound. A strong system has no leaders, but many trusted and equal members, all giving instead of taking. Giving is not sacrifice, it's prosperity.

It's scary to think of not having enough (food, money, land, power, achievement, influence, etc.) In a hierarchical culture, "not enough" equals failure, threat; fear. For those near the bottom of the cultural pyramid in my community it means no shelter; no food. For those on the bottom in Gaza it means abject trauma every day. It means death. Is this an acceptable cost for my "getting ahead"? I don't want this kind of unstable throne. I don't want to support a global society that prospers on hierarchical oppression, because in that kind of culture, everybody is a potential pawn, or enemy. Everybody is unstable. 

I want to transcend capitalism and find joy in uplifting others instead of uplifting myself at a cost to others. I want to stop prospering as an individual, and when I fall, I want to fall down in community, knowing that others will grow into my wounds. I want to be worth more than what I own or who bends under my feet. In a lateral community I will be worth the whole of us. I want the mirage of hierarchy to disappear and I want us all to be free.

Free Palestine.

Death and Grace

My reflection in the vase of flowers I had just set on my grandmother's grave, Geldermalsen, the Netherlands.

I think the first death of my memory was my cat Katykins, who arrived dead in the trunk of our green VW beetle. My friend and I looked at his little stiff body and I wondered at how similar and still utterly different it was from the rabbits my family routinely slaughtered for food. He was soft and black on the outside, but not like food or rabbitskins, and also not at all like the weak, leukemia-ravaged friend who had left for the vet that morning. More like a stuffy, not that we called them that, at the time. And my mother was inexplicably upset, and I'm sorry now that I didn't understand why.

Then there were relatives like Uncle Joe. All I knew of his death was that I had to have a TB test. And my aunts who I was supposed to visit in France and South Dakota, but both died just before I was to leave. When people we rarely see disappear, it's like a traffic-light in the distance that turns yellow, then red, and then green again before we ever even arrive. And we're young and life just keeps keeping on.

When my dog was shot, more compassionately than the pigs, I ran away and hid. I never saw her buried, and today I remember my father's agony more than my own. I still look for her in the brown-eyebrowed faces of living dogs, and the softness of their ears and paws that gently pad my legs and say "save me from the thunder", and the eyes that recall the innocence of that time before all the most confusing deaths began.

Then there were the car-crashes. The friend crushed on his motorcycle under a semi. Cancers. Children left motherless and the one who drank himself away before the cancer could get him. And those whose lives turned out to be more painful than death, so they left us lost and bewildered and guilty and frantically watching for signs, like maybe next time we could save someone. Be the net or the soil or the held hand at the last moment, or preferably the whole life long, so that life might have been preferable, after all.

Those deaths left me knowing I was powerless. 

In the days before my grandmother died, I said "Grandma I'm scared", and she looked at me through half-open eyes said "me too, honey, but it'll be all right" and I struggled to believe her, as I held her unbelievably soft hand and nursed my tiny son, and then walked away from her for the last time.

I was terrified of death all my life, until the day I watched my grandfather die, on a hospital gurney in a supply closet. He said, "well how 'bout that!" and the pinkness slowly slid off his face, and neck, and hands, and he was gone. In that stunned moment our whole family was graced by his positive outlook and gentleness. I miss him, but in his final act, he transcended fear by giving us a window to gratitude.

I've lost so many people since then. My Dutch grandmother was the first. She drowned so suddenly and so far away that it took me years to accept she was gone. I lost my father like a great explosion that impacted every aspect of my body, being, and life. I lost people violently and sometimes gently and even gratefully. I've taught myself to kill for food and for mercy; I've become accustomed to recognising that sudden but graceful draining of life my grandfather introduced me to in a chicken's head in my hand, in a deer who hit the fence, or in my dog on my lap. I know how quickly the flies come. I know the suddenly-odd vacant smell of dead animals and dead people and the pain and the relief and the sheer terror of things not being as we expected. And I've taught myself to imagine that feeling onto the people lost from afar.

The horrors of war and climate change and all the other capitalism-induced crises are not horrible because of death, but because that death is founded on greed. I am teaching myself to accept death as a part of life, but never as a symptom of greed.

Nearly nine years after my father died, I still long to phone him--like he's just a short distance across the water and I haven't been to visit in too long. But I've stopped reaching for the phone, and instead I caress the memory of his voice asking for news. I hear some aspect of his voice when my nephew speaks, and his cultivated patience in my daughter. Like in my garden the dead plants become feed for the compost, and resurrect from seeds and water and sunlight, next year, to bloom, and die. I now see the continuity of love and life that transcends the deaths of our bodies. I see my father's toes on my own feet; his funny little wry smile between my son's cheeks, and I see his own and his father's quiet gentleness in my partner's manner. Sometimes we choose people who carry forward the things we need to hang on to from those we've lost. 

Death is not just a part of life, but an opportunity to savour it. It's an opportunity to question how we live in and of the world; how we create the world, and how we build futures for ourselves and our children. It's an opportunity to hold our loved ones dear, and to let them go. To hold the hearts of those who are grieving, and hold our own grief with respect and compassion.

Tonight, as so many cultures celebrate the thinning of the veil between the worlds of living and dead, I'll stand with my partner in the darkness and think of those people we've lost and loved and of how we might carry their goodness forward with grace.