Friday, December 29, 2017
Kelzie’s School News 2017
KELZIE'S FANTASTIC YEAR
Some years you kick the can further down the road, and some years the can goes sideways from one gutter to the other. When last we spoke, I was talking about how 2016 was the year I became a counselor. I had applied for PhD programs and I was legitimately excited for that process and the opportunities that awaited. I honestly thought that the can was going to go pretty far down the road.
The late January through early May period of 2017 was the longest, most defeating experience of my life. And at the end of it, I had less trust in my peers, less respect for some of the behemoths in my field, less surety about who I should be when dealing with other people - and two finished masters degrees (with straight As, natch), glowing supervisor evaluations, and in my more cynical moments, thoughts that my aptitude for counseling seemed not to count for much toward where I want to go in the long-term.
The day after I turned down the one doctoral spot offered to me at a school that felt more like an anchor than wings, I signed up for a third graduate degree at IU just to fill the time. The licensure for counseling is like that of a medical doctor – beyond the academic degree that was one of my first masters, there are a few years of internship and the legal license – so without this third degree I am unemployable as a counselor under the law. But before I could stomach the idea of starting another degree in the same place, I had to get away for a while. In May my foot forced me back into the boot for the 6th? 7th? time since January 2016, but unlike Summer 2016 when I acquiesced and went on a road trip instead of heading overseas, I said screw it and got on a plane. I really needed to get away.
This summer was two months in Israel and Jordan, walking through history and bombs, all in a medical boot. Do you remember that scene in Shawshank Redemption when they find Andy’s “pick-axe” after he breaks out and it’s worn down to the nub? That’s what my boot looked like by August. I completed the “Yam El Yam” – translated to “Sea to Sea” – a 4-day, 75k hike from the Med. Sea to the Sea of Galilee. The best thing I can say about that hike is that it’s done and I never have to do it again. I walked the Valley of Tears, the site of the 1973 Yom Kippur War in the Golan Heights. I spent 4 days in Petra, refusing donkey rides from the Bedouins.
Jordan reminds me a lot of Thailand: a country that knows exactly why visitors go there, funnels those visitors to those exact spots, and extracts every bit of money possible for things associated with those spots. Still, Petra and Wadi Rum have to be seen to be believed, and Amman is the best laid-out, smoothest traffic, big capital city I’ve ever visited. Other than the nickel-and-diming, the biggest reason I wouldn’t go back is that Arab men living in a fully Arab culture, emboldened by sharia law, and I don’t exactly mesh well. Then again, American men living in fully American culture, emboldened by the Weinstein’s and Neon Cheeto’s of the world, and I don’t exactly mesh well either. It’s sad when I can feel like my rights are more eroded in my own country than in the part of the world where a woman can legally be owned.
And then Israel, oh Israel. Jews individually are nice people, but Israel as a country is an a$$hole. I realize that the Jewish religion lost millions of people in the mid-20th century in ghettos and concentration camps, but in the 21st century they have become the jailors, creating two country-sized ghettos, locking millions of people inside, and effectively waiting for them to die. Hitler would bemoan their inefficiency – but approve of their lack of empathy. I think that was my biggest take-away from Israel as a counselor: it is people gathered into a country unable to take the perspective of others and unable to feel empathy for Palestinians stuck in a horrible situation that the Jews helped create. A thought experiment: say someone leaves a home, but 20 years later they decide they want it back because they’ve had a hard time in their new home and remember their former home fondly and just…move into what is now your home in the middle of the night, bringing not only their immediate family but all of their distant relatives as well. How would you react? Would you welcome them with open arms, or would you fight back? And when you fight back and lose and they lock you in the windowless, airless pantry, how would you feel? You’d probably feel like the Palestinians – because that’s who you are in this thought experiment.
Israelis say you can’t trust Palestinians with a gun – but who gave them reason to attack and use it in the first place? Israelis call Palestinians “dirty uneducated monkeys” – but who cut off their running water and literally built a wall between them and schools? And where has this rhetoric been heard before? It mirrors what Hitler said to explain why Jews needed to be rounded up into his ghettos (and yes, what Americans said to withhold rights from freed slaves and their descendants). Sometimes those who learn – or even experience – history are still bound to repeat it.
I wanted to like Israel, I really did, but I can’t condone what they have done and continue to do. And before you @-me, travel there yourself and, unlike the vast majority of Westerners educated solely by the Israeli hype machine, actually visit Palestine, meet the people, and see the truth. At least in Palestine no one threatened or pointed a gun at me.
Peace in the Middle East will not be found at a conference table. A negotiated, polite peace is not possible between the jailors and those condemned to a life sentence. Ask the European Jews how they would have felt if they were told to just go home while the Nazi Party still existed – and were living in Jewish homes. A clear winner must be decided – for those living in the modern ghettos and for refugees living across the Jordan River since 1947/67/73/2005 – and that winner can only be decided in open combat when the Third (or Fourth or…) Intifada starts. Eventually the jailors and the prisoners will fight, and I imagine Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Egypt – and for a real treat, Indonesia as well – join the prisoners.
Oh and fun fact: the reason that Jerusalem has not been and should not be the capital of Israel is because it’s against international law. After the Six Day War in 1967, Jerusalem was declared to be shared by Israel and Jordan (and then Palestine), and the eastern portion illegally annexed by Israel in 1980 is not internationally recognized as a part of the Jewish state. It legally cannot be the capital of Israel because Israel doesn’t own it. It’d be like the US declaring all of Niagara Falls the capital of the US despite Canada owning and residing in half of the city. Just another law broken by the Neon Cheeto, just another day playing at being president.
After I returned from the Middle East, I attended my first big academic conference (APA) and prepared for the coming semester. This year my funding comes from teaching a class required of undergraduates on academic probation, and my clinical internship was at a local mental hospital helping clients with severe clinical mental health issues. But otherwise nothing else really changed about my life: play bells in the same choirs, play hockey with the same people, work the same jobs, and take classes from the same professors. I turned in all of my PhD applications, and now here I wait, again, but this time wondering exactly how excited I should be. I’m working to open a small, private practice in the Spring and if Ph.D. doesn’t work out, I’ll pivot to that full-time once I graduate in the summer. Here’s to hoping 2018 gets the can a little bit farther down the road.
Kelzie: 617/461-8354
800 North Smith Road - Apartment 2I
Bloomington, Indiana 47408
MARNIE and RICK
After our celebrations of Christmas, including R’s sister Nancy, and New Years, M and R went to a winter retreat in Carpinteria CA- an avocado center 12 miles south of Santa Barbara (and now partially evacuated due to the Thomas fire thereabove). We joined a workout facility, borrowed a bike and travelled - to SF to visit Nepali friends, to Bakersfield and the Kern River oil fields, and to grandparent Bb’s house in Hollywood. We joined the Women’s March in SB and enjoyed the famous pier there, toured touristy Danish-themed Solvang and attended the organizational meeting for Indivisible Carpinteria, meeting activist Sarah Gore (Maiani). The weather was in the 70s and rained every other day-unusual but welcomed for drought stricken CA. In spite of the draw of the area, we experienced (mostly weather-related) burn out and left after 1 month to visit K and Bloomington friends on the way home. Mid-April we returned to Bloomington to help K deliberate grad school and plan the coming year. On to Hilton Head, we visited long-time friends Linn & Al, who was receiving hospice care and, sadly, passed away shortly thereafter. Our thoughts are with Lin. On the way home we attended IU’s Little 5 weekend.
With the arrival of Spring we put the gardens in order and returned to B-town to watch K turn her tassle(s) at IU’s graduation (2 Masters degrees earned after 3 years of toil). Mid-May R took a tour of Cape Cod by bike, early June we attended a friend’s wedding in the historic St. Anne’s Episcopal Church in Annapolis and mid-June R rode to a rainy Zydeco music festival in New Orleans. In late June R and brother Paul rode to Canada to travel the Cassiar Highway (staying at Bell II lodging) and to the Yukon, returning via the Alaskan Highway, across the north plains. On the way out they passed thru the Beebe-Elford home area of Ipswich and Roscoe, SD. Early Aug R/M & K met in Blue Mound, IL so M could join her high school gymnastic team at the premier of Paul Sheriff’s documentary “Hali”, the story of his sister, Hali, his family and the very successful development of the BM gymnastics team, which started Marnie on her athletic career. Getting together with the gym team and attending the hometown Fall Festival made for a wonderful reunion experience. Soon after, Rick rode the Poudre Pass to Walden CO, Lander WY for Sacajawea’s grave, and the hwy 14-14a passes over the Big Horns to Sheridan and home. In Sept Paul and R rode to Bear’s Ears in Utah (over Moki Dugway..look it up) then across CO to the Poudre on the way home. Late Sept we attended R’s 55th HS class reunion-and in addition to the usual festivities we attended a Marshfield (WI) high school football game to recall what it was like 56 years ago at a Friday nite game. When R mentioned the last time he was at a HS game and played, the ticket lady sent us in free of charge.We loved the drama of the whole football/community event. It was great to see and reconnect with classmates and their mates again.
In late Sept a Bb family friend from childhood, Jeannie Wooland Heideman, passed away 2ndary to cancer. We joined many friends and family to celebrate her life of giving, and we continue in thought for her husband, Ed.
Finally, in Oct R started a ride to FL, but age and cold weather blocked him in AL so he reversed to ride home. He had 4 major one-day rides this season – 1057 miles home from CC, 1050 from NO, 804 from WY and 707 from AL. The ’17 season was 21637 miles and a lifetime of 415500 miles since ’99. R was thinking it was time to stop riding… put his bike on the market… but after a day ride took it off the market … we shall see!
The critter problem was acute on Royal Oaks Drive this year and mostly rabbits ate half our perennials. M trapped and relocated to little avail. Again from afar, we have watched IU football, men’s soccer, and basketball through ups and downs and coaching changes. Men’s Soccer playing to the conference championship and NCAA final was especially encouraging (their only loss and only scored on 5 Xs all season).
We have struggled hourly for nearly a year with the embarrassment and demise of america- enough said, but not enough. Our prayers are with those in Texas, Florida and especially Puerto Rico devastated by hurricanes and CA dues to fires. The Packer season created drama but disappointing outcomes and injuries-we are on IR as well.
Most of the fall was consumed with planning and obtaining proper docs and inoculations for the early 2018 month of volunteer work in Cambodia, 3 wks of travel in Vietnam, and 2 wk visit in Mongolia. Thanksgiving day was spent with friends as has been the tradition for years since Kelzie was in jrhi. The Christmas holiday was spent at home with the old folks coughing and sniffling and Kelzie on the couch recuperating from a busy fall semester. Sister Nancy was with us this year, as her work prevented her from traveling to her family in VT until the new year.
We have maintained our rehab sessions, daily gym workouts, and sessions with our trainers and feel better for having done so. Rick has had a very successful run on WW throughout the fall. We endeavored to end the year on a positive note, ringing in the New Year with friends and family and each going our separate way for new and exciting experiences in 2018. Love to all
8906 Royal Oaks Drive
Verona, WI 53593
608/497-1123 hm
Happy New Year
Kelzie, Marnie & Rick
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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