Latina Week

Finally our schedules worked together and I was part of not one but two wonderful workshops with the women at la casa hogar. As you might recall, la casa is a center for hispanic women here in Yakima. They are a resource center which offers such
things as an extensive ESL program and driving lessons. I
was unclear just why and how the their focus on just women was going to work out.
But once I arrived there for a story circle I began to get it.

The deal is this- if you want to offer classes for certain people you have to offer
classes when they can come and then provide what they need to participate. So, and here is the simple genius of the work at la casa - they provide ESL classes
in the morning when women are somewhat free and then offer child care
for them when they do attend. So they get large groups into these
classes and these women are that much closer to freedom and integration
in the adopted culture.

DXM is lucky enough to have access to these women. On the two separate
mornings women showed up and we spoke about their experiences in the
Yakima Valley. I learned so much. A couple of things stand out- When
spe
aking about racism we very soon got to the interesting questions
around whether actions are racist or culturally different. This was
about people's reaction to children. Are those white folks racist
against the noisy Hispanic children? or against children? or just have
very different ideas about how children whatever the color, should
behave in public? Always richer questions.

And then when we discussed the gang situation we almost immediately got to how children are raised and what might go wrong in a family and make those children
vulnerable to gangs. This is a perspective that a lot of white men just
don't have.

In other news the script is actually getting longer
if not better. Have more to do on it this weekend. I am still trying to
write a play that tells the story of all these people. Some voices are getting in their. Hope to get more.

Tragedy avoided so forced to write.

Last week I was hoping to be arrested, run down in the street, a victim of hante
virus, or just about anything and anyone else than a writer with a play
to write. None of the above happened so in the end I had to sit down
and begin. And I love it. And it is going well. I
remember now that I like to write. One word after another and then a
bit later a period.

When I write I always get the feeling that
the story is inside of me but is a tangled mess, a bit like a very long
string of Christmas lights that someone put away last year after not
getting what they wanted under the tree. A few more knots than really
necessary.

So I write and then get up and then lie on the
floor. My friend Bill once said the trick to writing is getting into a
space where you are able to hear yourself. To hear your voice telling
the story. This feels like that kind of process. Of course he also said that the trick to writing anything at all is to find other committments in your life you like even less than writing.

Writing a community based project is to start from the somewhat set plot of the Pastorela
(a typical shepherd meets angel, devil tempts shepherd, angel kicks
devil's butt, all adore the Christ child plot) and then adding info
from the upwards to 80 interviewees from the community. And doing it in
Spanish and English. But you know what? I like it. Just enough
diversity in the task to keep my interest.

In other
spectacular news I met with Arturo, the designer on the project, and he
is having so many good ideas about sound and color. Keep it coming. And
we have a new collaborator in the person of Libby Moore, a music/opera
person with an impressive resume of work all over the country. She has
been staging operas in such diverse areas asindian reservations and abandoned Quaker prisons. We are fortunate enough to have her working on the music for La Pastorela. What could be nicer, I ask you?

Community built on Hops.

The entire town smells like hops. Hops,hops,hops! This is what happens when 77% of the hops grown in the USA are grown right here in the Yakima Valley. Most of this activity is out in the nearby town of Moxee with many of the hop processing plants in Yakima. So when one walks out of an evening here in Yakima the air is filled with the scent of beer. Reason #876 to move here. Just in case you were counting.

The story circles continue! Still lots of info out there that needs to get in here. (you cannot see it, but I am pointing to my head when I said "here") I am meeting a growing number of inhabitants and learning more about Yakima and the pastorela form. Yesterday I met with most of the teachers at St. Joseph/Marquette, sat in a large circle and heard about their lives in Yakima. Very good group of women plus Gregg the principal.

Then last night another circle with the parish folks. Again in Spanish and English with some observers from University of Washington who are doing a similar project and wanted to see how we do here. Again really good. When I say 'good' I mean people showed up, engaged, gave me more information about Yakima and reconnected me to the project of telling this story of these folks right now.

Much of the rest of my time here is spent getting folks lined up to work on the project from a more professional end. And to that end we now have a lighting designer, which is very good news and she came to Yakima last night, sat in on a story circle and saw the space. Very glad to have Diane with us.

And of course the fund raising goes on. Please send cash! That DonateNow button on the website is operable and ready for use!