News From An Acorn

Webs of Time

I recently led a retreat at Woolman Hill Retreat Center for Quaker children in which our theme was “Giving Time Time.” On Saturday morning we were about to circle up for morning grace and breakfast when Zosia, age 11, came bounding up to me and said, “Kevin! You’ve got to come right now and see the light shinning through the spider webs in the field!”

Given Zosia’s insistence, my love of photography and having a sense of where the morning light was at that moment, I knew she was right. Besides, I thought, I should follow Zosia’s lead and live into our weekend theme of  “Giving Time Time.” I had no choice but to step away and check this thing out.

As anyone who knows and watches light, it does not wait. At eight in the morning the dew and fog was quickly lifting from the old east-facing pasture, and within minutes the full intensity of the sun would have claimed the land for another day. When I arrived I found not one, but several webs, each waving ever so slowly in the morning breeze with a riot of light and colors passing through each.

Here, giving time time,  was just that, and thus these images. Enjoy.

 

Kevin Lee

Nine-Eleven Since

Ten years ago, in the days following the attacks upon our country on September 11, 2001, our nation was in collective shock and deeply grief stricken. For weeks it was unclear whether or not other attacks were coming, and so I decided to cancel our first fall retreat of the new school year for Quaker children. I felt strongly that it was more important for children to be with their families during the early throws of our national tragedy than for them to be on a hilltop retreat center at Woolman Hill in western Massachusetts.

Understanding how evil can manifest itself in the hearts and minds of the human psyche is challenging enough to unpack among adults. It is ten-times more difficult to make sense of  something like this with children who ask and worry and draw what they felt and saw on that crystal-clear day ten years ago tomorrow. Those of us who work with, and minister among, children and teens in all sorts of tender life situations had our work cut out in the weeks and months following that day.

Weeks later while riding my bike, which was only a week away from our next planned retreat, I was pondering how best to present what had happened on Nine-Eleven. What would be our collective response to the Quaker children in our community? And how would our Quaker peace testimony hold up in these scary and challenging times among Friends overall?  These children, in grades two through six, would certainly want to talk about what happened. And they’d expect not only responses, but honest and direct answers.

During my ride it was especially windy and as I rode through a grove of hardwoods, an even stronger gust blew through. Suddenly it began raining acorns, that fell from the trees, bounced noisily off of my helmet and literally covering the road ahead of me. For several seconds I could hear nothing but acorns bouncing about and I had all I could do to keep my bike from skidding into the ditch.

As fast as that happened it was over. I peddled out of the grove and instantly knew what our approach would be at our retreat on the following weekend. I was struck by the clarity that somehow came to me at that moment, knowing that through reflection and collective prayer, we’d somehow make sense of it all.

As I peddled onward and thought about the “raining acorns” just moments ago, and the clarity that came out of it, I thought, “news from an acorn!” It made me grin. And it was from that moment and phrase too,  that the idea and title for this blog was born.

Now, ten years later, I’m a week away from our first fall retreat at the same location and just as many days after the anniversary of Nine-Eleven. Nearly all of the children coming to this retreat were not even born ten years ago. It’s a wonder just to think about that, knowing all that has, and has not happened, since. Ironically, the theme for our upcoming retreat is “Give Time Time,” which in all honesty was chosen months ago with no deliberate thought to Nine-Eleven. But then again, maybe something else was at work there too.

Last week I asked one of my clients at work what his thoughts were about the upcoming anniversary. “I was three when it happened,” he said. “I wish they’d just stop talking about it, really.” When I asked him why he said, “Because it makes me scared.”

The next day I ran into an old client who is now in college. He’s tall, handsome, bright and confident in his third year of college. Eight years ago at age thirteen he was dismantling and rebuilding old pc’s that people had given him.

When I asked him what he was majoring in he said, “Cyber Security and threat analysis.”

“Threat analysis?” I said. “I’ve never heard of that as a major.”

“Yeah, well…things have changed,” he said. “The next time we need to be ready.”

“The next time?” I said. “I’m hoping there won’t be a next time.”

“That’s why I choose that major,” he said with a grin.

And I believe him, and I believe too, that time brings healing, hope, new acorns and in time, new understanding.

Kevin Lee

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Back To School, Continued

It was mid September when the high school guidance counselor called asking if I knew of Matt’s whereabouts. It seems he never showed up when school began two weeks ago. Efforts to find him, or even to get his step-dad to respond to calls from the school, wasn't happening either.

In July Matt texted me saying he found work helping a local lobsterman doing day trips. I had the boat’s name still on my cell, but not its location. Matt’s doesn't have much family, and I also knew that his stepfather couldn’t care less whether or not Matt ever returned to school, so I focused my efforts on finding the lobster boat instead. A week later I finally spotted Matt off-loading traps from his boss’s truck onto the back deck of the boat. He seemed glad to see me and oblivious to why I might be stopping by.

“So here you are!” I said, trying to appear more casual than concerned. “You’re still lobstering?”

“Yeah, how ‘bout that?” Matt said. “I’m fishing and stashing cash in my pocket, too!”

“You like it, then?” I asked.

It’s pretty good. My boss is cool and pays mad good, too.

Sweet… so Matt, what about school?

Oh yeah….that., he says, as if it were a brand new thought.

Yeah that….you’d be a junior this year. Don’t you want to get at least a high school education?

Oh…I planned to go back…just not yet…been out everyday…the catch is good right now.

Doesn’t your boss know you’re still in school?

He sorta thinks I finished high school.

You mean you told him you graduated, right?

Yeah. You gonna tell him?

No. You’re nineteen, damit…you’re making life choices right now.

Matt continued off-loading traps as we spoke.  After heaving eight or nine more traps, Matt said,

“I’m not sure about school, Kev. Look, I’m 19 and still in high school for Christ’s sake. If I go back I know how it goes. It’s all good for three weeks. Then I start mouthing off, get pissed, get suspended, loose more time and just keep falling further and further behind. Fuck, why bother? It’s not like I’m going to Harvard, yah know?”

But you need a basic education, Matt, unless you plan to flip burgers for a career.

I’ll fish… I’ll do what I’m doing now… just stay here and keep working.

Where you staying? You stepfather doesn’t seem to know where you are

He doesn’t give a damn where I stay or what I do, Kevin. You know that.

I know…but your mother did? If she were here, would you be dropping out of school?

But she ain’t here, is she? So what’s it matter now?

Sensing that the tenor was going south fast, I tried another angle. “How about night school then?’ I asked.

Thought about it. Maybe.

I was about to follow up on night school when Matt’s boss walked up. “You friends with Matt”, He asked?

“Sure  am. He’s a great kid,” I said.

He’s the best damn worker I’ve ever had,” he said. “Always on time, quick learner, easy to get along with. Matt, we set to go?

All set boss.

In a flash the lines were dropped and the lobster boat backed up and out of the slip. Matt waved in my direction and yelled something I couldn’t make out.

As the boat went out of sight I thought, best damn worker, always on time and easy to get along with? Maybe Matt was going back to school after all?

Kevin Lee

 

Knock-Knock… “Who’s There?”

My last post was about the challenges and hidden joys of moving one’s workplace into a new space. (And thanks for the many reads and comments that followed that piece.)

Today’s piece, while in the same department, is more about the inner work involved, that budgets, bosses and the fast moving world at large, might rarely ever consider.

But twenty-five years in one spot has seen its share of laughter, sadness, tears, giddiness, motion and energy that fill up a space and make it real to the young people and parents I work with. Even after several paint jobs over the years, a space lived into develops its own ‘place and power’ that “speaks” and is somehow known and felt by many  who visit. One of the boys (age nine) I work with in his own way alluded to this fact even before the transitions began as he sat, legs dangling over the arm of his chair sipping a juice box. We had not discussed this either. In fact part of me wondered if it had more to do with the way I see and feel the world more than anything else. But when the inner wisdom of a child ‘speaks’ of it, I knew it wasn’t just me being sentimental about old and familiar haunts.

Knock-Knock!

Two weeks ago when most of the painting in our new space was done I was doing some touch-up and detail work that was better left for times when it’s quieter with few people around. It was late afternoon near the end of the school year when I heard a knock on the door. In fact, it was my first knock on the door in our new space. I was on the floor in the bathroom screwing something back in place and yelled out, “Hello! I’m in here!”

In came a girl from one of our groups, who had also helped to scrape and paint the week before. She stopped by to visit while waiting for her mom to pick her up. When she didn’t find me in our old office down the hall, she came down to what will be our new home in a matter of weeks. Chloe* chatted away while I did this and that. Because the new space has nothing in it still, Chloe first sat against the wall, then on a small step ladder as I moved about the new space doing this and that. Meanwhile, in between our rambling chatter Chloe kept checking  her phone about every thirty seconds. (It’s a funny thing these days with teens and cell phones, and especially with girls, that whenever action stops, or things get boring, out come the phones to check texts, Facebook, whatever.  And since watching me doing light sanding or scraping flecks of paint off of baseboards was certainly less than riveting, I wasn’t the least bit offended.)

Then Chloe’s phone started ringing. It was her mom to say that she couldn’t leave work as early as planned so it was agreed she’d hang with me until her mom could get here.. A minute or so passed and I head another knock, this time on the front window facing the front of Town Hall. A woman and her son had just picked up their beach sticker, saw me while leaving, and tapped to say hello through the open window.

After the brief window visit I began to polyurethane a bench that will hold our (hoped for) laptops, when Chloe announced,

”I’m tired. Can I go back to your office and lie down and listen to my music?” 
“Sure,” I said. “Just make sure you hear your phone if your mom calls.”
”I will,” she said, and left.

New wood and wondering

As I treated the new wood I thought about the first “new knock” by Chloe earlier, and the window tapping hello by a mother and her son just minutes ago. For several weeks I’ve had to spend a lot of time preparing our new space and managing the transition while at the same time feeling my way through the process internally. For me, with the work I do, “place and space” are important elements to consider and at times it was challenging to convey this point to my bosses and even to some of my coworkers in the building.

For other offices who will be moving following my relocation, their main concern was wall space for filing cabinets and desks, while mine was meeting the needs of people, as individuals or in groups, who will actually be inside our new space and not standing at a counter looking in. This, and the thoughts of how best to help my clients and group members transition away from what they’ve known and felt secure within, into a new place, have been weighing heavily on me since this project began.

Suddenly the door flung wide open as Chloe walked back in, headphones on, lollipop in her mouth and carrying a couch pillow and blanket from the old office.

“You Okay?” I asked.
”Yep,” she said. “Just weird being there and you over here.”

Without saying another word Chloe spread the blanket out on the floor across the room from me, tossed her pillow down, plopped on her back and continued listening to her music.

At that very moment I realized that the energy and sense of place would indeed follow and that the most important part of “moving in” had just begun.

 

Kevin Lee

 

* “Chloe” was not my visitor’s real name.

 

Parade Route Thoughts

As another Memorial Day unfolds, it is right and fitting
that we pause in prayer and gratitude
for the many who gave and died serving our country in uniform.

That much I get, and appreciate fully.

As a Quaker, however, as one committed to our testimony of peace
and watching the parade roll by on Main Street I wonder
and worry if the Brownies and Scouts and High School Marching Band
in this town and beyond, will one day be next
for the glory of hearth and country.

And who doesn’t love a parade, we ask? These cute, beautiful children leading the route, then twirlers and colorguards followed by Vets who remember.
Me, I think about young life and bodies perfect
who hear only one message…go.

Who will tell them how it is, that men who rule send boys to war?
Who will ask them why it is that old men come to march and keep all they know
inside their uniforms?

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The video below features the late Liam Clancy singing “And The Band Played Marching Matilda.” At it’s core it is a song protesting war, but the way Clancy sings it, and its message for all time and all countries, makes it so much more. ....

 

Twenty-Five Years

After twenty-five years of counseling children and teens in a cozy corner of Town Hall it is time to move down the hall to another space being built for us.

Twenty-five years anywhere, let alone in one location is a heck of a long time. Whenever I start whining about moving my colleagues in this industry laugh at me and say they’ve moved dozens of times in half as many years, from job to job and from one closet-sized office to the next dugout within the same agency. And of course I know they’re right.

I counsel and I teach. And one of the things I teach youth within my care is to pay attention. In twenty-five years, location becomes place, and place becomes life, and life makes memories of joys and tears and everything between. Our present office may be just that, an office with an attached large meeting room for groups, but it has seen people of all ages, some walking in with their week-old babies, or others carrying tragic news of family violence, sometimes death or news that daddy went to jail. The doors of 118 have seen parents and kids aplenty, and spanning twenty-five, have seen State Police, FBI, politicians, good cops, bad cops, the hungry and homeless, newlyweds and immigrants, some lonely, some lost and others to celebrate. They came, all of them, because these doors were open and someone on the other side was there to pay attention.

Tossing, shredding, organizing what to keep and let go of is good inner soul work and there’s nothing like a forced move to make that happen. Town Hall has a mini-fleet of huge, green recycling bins on wheels that are taller than half the young folks in my care. Filling them with youthful help is both pleasant and instructive. I handle everything that goes and think about the circumstances of the persons and events around each thing who’s time has come; a former client’s demo cassette of his garage band in 1988, A once colorful drawing, a gift to me by a second grader that fell in pieces when I took it off the wall, are all handed to eager waiting fingers in a race to fill what they’ve playfully named the “big green monster man.”

It strikes me that almost everything I toss is older than my youthful charges. And as we toss and pack up what to take their wisdom of a dozen-plus years keeps me dealing with the here and now through their chatter:

“You wouldn’t throw away anything I gave you, right, Kevin?”
      “No, of course not, Sarah.”

Kassie, hogging and hovering over her high value assignment, the shredder, says, “When I first came to group I thought you lived here…in this office. Like, when we left and went home, you stayed here until we came back again…”
      “That’s funny, “but trust me, “I go home at night, thank goodness.”

“Wait,” says Aaron, “Twenty-five years in here? That’s twice my lifetime. That’s just weird to think about.”
      “You’re telling me?”

“Mollie, who’s real specialty is watching others work, is plopped on the couch, staring at the ceiling and chimes in, “I think that you should just stay here. I like it here. Why can’t you just tell them you’re not gonna move, Kevin?”
      “Ah, my dear, it just doesn’t work that way.”
“Why not?” she insists.

James, who is slow to speak but when he does his peers are listening, cuts in saying, “Don’t be dumb! It’s just another office just like this one…with new paint. And, its got a bathroom in it too! That’s cool.”
      ”True, bathrooms are good.”

Mollie sat up and stared at James like she had just had some kind of a revelation and says, “You mean we don’t have to use the public bathrooms anymore?”
      ”Nope.”
“Okay,”she says, “I’ll move.”
      “Here then,” setting a box on her lap, “Carry this down to our new home, please.”

Kevin Lee

The Death of Osama bin Laden

I suppose that we knew down deep this day would come
when the man deemed responsible for the death of thousands
of innocent men, women and children would be finally caught
and killed.

My hope and prayer is that this momentous day in history will
bring some added measure of closure, of justice served,
among those who have lost loved ones on 9/11, and also,
among the thousands of other families who’s loved ones died
while in uniform, in this land and beyond.

It troubles me to know in my heart that I am glad bin Laden is dead,
me, the Quaker, exuberant and satisfied to know that the world-wide
leader of terrorism against humanity is finally no more.

For today, I can shelter my discomfort, my discomfort of self,
behind pride of country, for an operation succeeded,
for those lost and for those still fighting terrorism across the land.
I know they are happy and I am happy too, for them.

Tomorrow? Tomorrow comes the lesson, of squaring violence
begetting violence and how we choose to teach our children.

Kevin  Lee

Concrete Parachutes

Not really sure just where I came across this phrase, but it’s been sitting in quotes in my writing notebook now for months waiting for momentum. It finally came.

I typed the phrase, “Ask Me About Concrete Parachutes” using a very large font, set it into a photo frame and put it on the shelf in my high school office. I also made a copy for my Town Hall office, and, lacking an available frame at the moment, just taped it on the wall where people would see it. That did it.

Students, clients, parents and interns all saw it, and the comments ran the gamut from, “Okay, I’ll bite. What’s that supposed to mean?” to, “Well that’s dumb. Who’d ever jump out of a plane with a concrete parachute?”

Of course by then I had them! And the  wakeup dialog rolled along these lines:

I’d ask, metaphorically speaking, “What things in life do we do, over and over, that don’t help, that get us into trouble and we know it and we still do these things anyway?”

“Oh, you mean,” says boy eighteen, “Smoking weed five times a day?”

“That’s like me, on a diet, and I eat two Snickers candy bars at lunchtime,” said one girl, trying to loose weight since forever.

“I suppose my concrete parachute is me staying and thinking my husband will stop drinking and just be like the good man I married,” said mom, with three young children.

“That phrase annoys me, Kevin. I don’t like it…and I still want to quit school and get a job.”

Responding to a question about falling asleep in class; “Listen. You don’t understand. I’ll die without Facebook. It’s my life. My homies are there and I can’t sleep anyway so that’s why I’m still on at three in the morning.”

“I only fight when someone gets in my face. Don’t want to get hit? Don’t get in my f---ing face. How hard is that to understand?” says she at seventeen and suspended from school.

“DCF (Dept. of Children and Families) needs to back off. My kids are fine. I have a right to a life, too. Who I invite over and what we do as adults is none of their business.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve been taking stuff from that store forever and never got caught. Last week I stuffed a bra in my bra because I don’t even have a decent one to wear. It’s not like I’m stealing jewelry or something. It’s underwear for God’s sake.”

Says boy, grade five, “What’s your concrete parachute, Kevin?”

Kevin Lee

Good People

It’s easy to be generous with money. Far harder to be generous with your time.
- Alan Bleasdale

We all know good people.
That is, good people sprinkled
among the many
which makes it more challenging
to “see” them all together.

This past weekend I was honored
to be among very good people who
were also the sum total of everyone
present.

There were children present, and you
know I’m always talking about how good
and precious they are, but this time I’m
talking about those card-carrying adults,
who came some sixteen strong and gave
their entire weekend…forty-four hours…
to be with, care for and work very hard
to make our retreat program a success.

These are the good people I’m talking about.
Each gifted, talented and spiritually present people
(which is why I brought them together!) and that
by and through the Grace of God is why they came, too.

Picture this: It’s 11:20 PM on a Friday night
and with children asleep these good people
gather over tea and chocolate for a staff meeting.
Okay, so maybe the chocolate (Communion) helped
to gather them together, I’ll concede that, but as
we sat there attending to the needs of community,
I thought, my God, how wonderful, thank you Lord
Spirit for the gift and presence of these good people.

Good people. Good people indeed.

Kevin Lee

Handshakes and Hugs

I am saddened to report that I have failed, and so it seems for the so-called right reasons.

Some weeks ago during the first days of school, when everyone was happy to be reunited with friends and acquaintances, I walked into the high school cafeteria chatting with students, former clients and faculty members. There were handshakes, high-fives and fist-bumps all around. Then, from out of the corner of my eye a freshman who had attended one of the groups I facilitate for the past two years, jumped out of her seat, raced towards me and gave me a gigantic, full throttle hug. Fair enough. That was good, and welcomed instantly.

Then immediately after came two of her friends in lock-step, total strangers to me, with the first one saying, “I want a hug too,” and the third friend chirping with, “me too, me too” with nearly as much fanfare and gusto as their friend who knew me well. I instinctively and defensively raised both hands in front of me and said, “Whoa, we’re in school, PDA alert…how ‘bout a handshake, instead?” One girl giggled and said, “Sure,” and stuck out her hand to reach mine. But the third student was noticeably taken aback and seemed rebuffed, though she still offered her hand in greeting. Rather than get into a whole explanation of the why’s and why not's in the middle of the caf I just thanked them for their understanding, made small talk and moved on.

And the experience has been niggling at me ever sense.

Over the years I’ve written volumes on the challenges of being a male working with children and teens. And for the record (again) I will state that it’s a very good thing that we have policies and practices in place to help maintain boundaries so that both youth and the adults who work with them feel as safe as possible, especially within institutions like schools. But still, there are times as a human family, when we could have more and could do better in terms of being real and present in the moment, one to another. And the moment I described above was one of those instances. However, rather than critique how well I carried myself professionally or how poorly I missed the mark, I’ll leave it here with a terrific video clip sent to me many months ago by a long-time friend of mine. Enjoy it. It’s good. And if you watch it closely, you will see, and perhaps feel, everything I’ve spoken of above.

I welcome your comments, and suggest that you consider commenting below, on my blog, rather than through Facebook, so that more people can follow the conversation. Thanks!

Kevin Lee