A Life Like This One

Rise Up: Stories from the Mother Net

As I mentioned when I started this project, I will intersperse personal essays with the interviews.  I wrote this when Noah was sick a few weeks ago, and as I was sitting beside his bed tonight (yup, sick again)...I thought of it; there is something about the deep pains of the world, and how we deal with them, that I think is deeply tied to being able to act up with joy...

I am standing in the middle of a snot-filled, tissue paper minefield next to my son’s bed.  There are wadded up bits of white all over the floor.  His wastebasket, strategically placed six inches away from the edge of his bunk, is empty.   Armed with expectorant and elderberry lozenges, I lean in with a quiet, “Hey love.”

Noah peaks out from under his blue blanket and suddenly, I’m more aware of my physical heart.  Specifically, of my heart donning those weird, heavy weights that eek into my chest whenever my children are sad or sick or hurting.  His cheeks are flushed porcelain doll-red, while his skin has taken on a bad Polaroid hue.  Still, the thermometer reads 98.9.  My exhale rides on a wave of relief.

Noah coughs and sits up a little.  “Mom, I can’t take it anymore,” he barely gets the statement out before his eyes rim red and his lower lip gets swallowed up in an effort not to cry. Sitting beside him, I start to get nervous and want to know how much worse he feels.  But before my pang of panic forms words, he spills into a dramatic, half-choked monologue. “I mean, I am so alone up here.  There is no one talking to me. No one to tell my thoughts to or to tell a joke with or to simply look over and say ‘Hi. How are you doing?’ I’m a people person mom.  I need people.”

This is where I do a half-choke of my own, except I’m sucking back laughter. I tell him it has only been three hours since he woke up and was exiled with a head full of mucus.

The look I get in return is wide-eyed and indignant.  “Don’t you see how hard this is for me?  I feel sick, and on top of that, you don’t even want to stay in here.”

Two tears slide down from the outer edge of one eye before he rubs them both with annoyance.  Almost 11 year-old boys, no matter how sensitive their nature, are not so into crying. For a moment, I think about calling my mother to pick up my younger two children, or calling Justin home from work so that I can camp out on Noah’s floor.   I imagine eating popcorn and watching our latest Netflix arrivals, the second season of the Brady Bunch, discs one and two. Getting up just as he falls asleep, I would look back at him and a silhouette of my body, like a carpet snow angel, visible amongst the sea of Kleenex.  Instead, I hand him the elderberry I know he hates and watch his mouth contort and his throat lurch as if I’ve poisoned him.

“Get some sleep,” I murmur as he slides back down under the covers.  My movements are deliberately slow as I edge out of his room, but as soon as I hit the stairs, I’m almost leaping three steps at a time.  One glance into the living room, where Max is reading books to his enamored little sister on the couch, and I’m slinking cat-like into the kitchen. 

Because secretly, Noah might be right.  I’m almost giddy about the quiet produced by a silenced, sick child and strangely quiet four and two year-old.

Even as I write the words, I feel a rush of bad-parent emotion.  I quell it by telling myself every home schooling mother who has no time to pee in private-- let alone work, finish matching up socks from the dryer or just drink a cup of lukewarm coffee-- would relish this too.    Maybe if this whole scene was playing out a month ago, I would have already moved passed the guilt that comes with taking advantage of alone time produced by a sick child.  Maybe I’d already be making another round of coffee and reading about what my fourth grade lunch buddy had for breakfast via Twitter, or how an old professor is bringing back the art of the mixed tape, because Facebook is the new place to launch your book ideas.  But not today.  Because today, when I open my Internet browser, I see images of weeping mothers holding limp babies on my 13-inch laptop screen. 

It is only 15 days after the earthquake hit Haiti.  There are still photos pouring in of women with tears cutting like rivers across their stained cheeks, children dazed beside them, or worse, no children in the picture at all.  Like a triangle chime in a divine symphony, Noah coughs hard upstairs.  I click on a particularly bad photo.  It is of a man, wearing a basketball jersey and what was once a white visor.  He’s crouching in a sort of spring-loaded position, pulling a set of small legs from a collapsed building. Everything is covered in dust.  The legs are covered, the man is covered, and their skin seems more grey than brown because of it. 

Before I know it, almost an hour has gone by. Max and Lizzie have fallen asleep side-by-side on the couch and I’m still sitting in the kitchen, pouring over photo after photo.  Clicking on one caption takes me to the blog of a family doing mission work in Haiti. A family that knows people who are missing and who are talking about sleeping outside with their own five children curled around them like prayer shawls.  From the blog I click links to more news stories and more eyewitness videos.  I am overdosing on tragedy; binging on horror, and the only reason I come up with (because yes, I do ask. Stupid double major in psychology) is that I’m mind-flogging in retribution for my corrupt sense of joy. 

How could I be so willing to soak up an afternoon of only having to do the parenting work of two children, while the other one is sick in bed?  How could I have already lost the urgent need to hug my babes close and smell their hair and watch the rhythm of their breathing; a need that all but consumed me the day of the earthquake? 

It’s a rabbit hole, this acknowledgment of how lucky we are.  I think of our sponsored children and the letters they write. From Nairobi, Isaac assures us the slum riots are miles from his family’s home (which consists of four mud walls and a rotting tin roof).  Watuma writes about displaced loved ones in war-torn Uganda or crops failing from lack or rain.  Caroline just draws pictures of flowers and chickens. How I got to become a mother in a lakeshore town surrounded by 80-percent of the world’s freshwater is a mystery.

“Mom?  Can you come here? I’ve got a question.”  Noah is sitting on the stairs.  I notice his pajama bottoms stop three-inches above his ankle.  They were too big just months ago. 

Looking at this boy, his wild mess of bed head and freckles bridging across his nose, I understand why my vow of eternal awareness and gratitude after the recent earthquake faded, just like it did when the tsunami hit, or when I watched Michael Moore’s Sicko and heard stories of children who died because of inadequate health coverage.  As mothers, we wear bits of our soul outside our bodies.  To live each moment of each day in the deepest well of gratitude for their health and safety requires us to acknowledge the equal and opposite end of that statement.  

“I made up a poem,” the hope in my child’s voice is clear.  “Can you come up and hang out with me?  I’ll tell it to you,” he says, already heading back toward quarantine.  “Oh, and I can also tell you about the enormous loogie I hacked up a minute ago.  I’ve got another question: how do boogers get so big exactly?  Oh, and I want to show you the hilarious Calvin and Hobbes strip I read last night.  Did I tell you we’re dancing to Michael Jackson for our Hip Hop recital? Or that I can do a perfect seal impression with my cough?”

Listening to his non-stop explosion of language, there is a clear sense that my rejoicing in the quiet came simply because I knew the noise would return. We  sit on Noah’s bed, our shoulders almost matching. He puts his hand against mine; it is the same hand that used to sock me from inside the womb, but now, it almost overtakes my own. I bite my lip and look out the window.  Tears pool, water against water in my eyes. 

Until Noah clears the rasp from his throat and recites,

“There once was a boy named Noah,

who was wound up tight as a boa

From his nose there did rise

Something green worth a prize.

(he pauses for a laugh/cough/laugh combo)

It grew into a blob

And ate him like an angry mob

But barfed him back up

With a big ker-chup

And that is the end.”

 Again I’m struck by the randomness of it all—how one mom gets the easy road and another gets ground that still shakes beneath her feet.  Although this time, I don’t go any further.  Instead, I pick up used tissue papers to throw in the trash.  The back of my hand pauses at Noah’s forehead and I ease with the way our body’s temperatures match.  And then, I settle in, just to listen.

Rise Up: Stories from the Mother Net

Meet Ory Okolloh

 
The day is cold and gray.  There is a dampness in the air that comes with late winter. I'm watching snowflakes as large as doilies fall with slow grace, and also, I'm marveling at the way the world has changed since I was a child.  When I was 10, I had pen pals in Texas and France.  I remember feeling like my frenchman (oh, yes, it was a boy) lived in another universe.  Our letters took forever to reach each other, and the idea of knowing more than one person from the other side of the world seemed next to impossible-- unless we got married and I moved to France, which I might have told him just before turning 11. Funny, we lost touch shortly after that.  

But still. I'm thinking about how the world has become something I can hold in cupped hands, the way the boys and I hold lake water filled with stars. I just finished reading the interview responses of Ory Okolloh, a Kenyan activist that left a six figure job at a law firm in DC to live in South Africa, working on systemic change for Kenya through the use of technology-- blogging! She is making an incredible impact on so many levels; her blog, the Kenyan Pundit, is a go-to source of political information that also connects Kenyan bloggers.  Her Ushahidi project (Ushahidi means "testimony" in Swahili) has become a critical part of information gathering in political hot button areas.  She's a mama, a dreamer, a powerful, smart, super cool "nerd." 

 I first discovered her work via TED TV (part of her speech is linked below).  One google and hours later, I had poured through interviews by Forbes Magazine and Global Voices Online and more, had read with utter amazement her blog and what it is doing in terms of giving voice to a generation crying out for a government that is honest and open and good...and is doing so by taking accountability for their voices.  Wow.  We could all use such inspiration.  I sent an email to Ory, thinking I'd never hear back-- but I did, and within 20 minutes no less.  The interview came easy-- though I hope it won't be the last time we talk-- and within a day, we had bridged a gap an ocean wide. I got to know a tiny bit of her story, and it made me want to know her more--  because she's funny and obviously a serious multi-tasker, not just because she's an incredible activist.  And that makes me wonder: does the power of these interviews come from accomplishments or from the fact that we're getting a glimpse of another mama's voice?  I think it is the connecting, the learning of stories. 

~~~

 

Your road to activism started more as a child-- how did it strengthen when you became a mother?

 

Once my "activist tendencies" strengthened - it is important for me to both do what I can to make sure that my children live in a better world, or to be a role model for them as far as getting them to understand that it is always important to be an active citizen of the world in whatever way you can.   My parents weren't really activists, but I better understood the sacrifices they made.  

 

The story of your life does include some of the "buzz words" often associated with Africia; there is poverty, discrimination, AIDS.  And yet, this is not the way you define yourself-- or the way you define Africa.  This blog has readers from around the world, but many are from the United States (where we like to throw big parties and big money at problems without being fully informed)-- could you describe your vision of Africa?   I used the buzzwords to describe my life deliberately to underscore that there is no one single story about Africa...my life has been complex... just like there is no one single story about anywhere else - what if people looked at Europe and all they saw was colonialism? Or the United States and all they saw was slavery? I highly recommend that people watch Chimamanda Adichie's TED talk to get what I'm talking about.   There is a lot that's negative about Africa, but it produced me and thousands like me...so we must be doing something right :-)

My vision for Africa - where young Africans don't have to suffer the indignity of struggling to travel/immigrate elsewhere in order to fulfill their destiny...leaving would be out of choice, but otherwise they would feel that they could be who they wanted to be without leaving the continent. 

Could you please tell us a little about Ushahidi is and how it came to exist? Ushahidi is a freely available open source crowdsourcing platform that aggregates information received via different modes, e.g Email, SMS, twitter and web reports. The information is then collated into a dashboard where the administrator of the instance or group of approved volunteers can approve the message (in essence geolocating it on a map) and thus making it display on the map front end as a red dot and/or icon. Each report includes location, date, time and description and allows users to posts additional information as comments.

The idea came about in the aftermath of the post-election violence in Kenya. I had been covering the election and following crisis on my personal blog, and became increasingly concerned about the lack of mainstream news (especially local news) coverage about what was going on on the ground.  I had invited people to share their reports, observations on my blog but that quickly became overwhelming...I then thought what if people could submit their reports to a website directly for purposes of sharing information, recording what happened etc. and if these reports could be then visualized to add context.   I'm not a coder myself so I posted the idea on my blog and asked Kenyan techies to get in touch with me if they were interested in building such a site and that's how we got started.   Blog post is here http://www.kenyanpundit.com/2008/01/03/update-jan-3-445-1100-pm/

What other projects are you currently working on?

I'm working on revamping the Kenyan Parliament watch project Mzalendo www.mzalendo.com  

Are there times that the work seems overwhelming?  How do you maintain energy for sustained activism?

I'm lucky that I'm able to spend my days doing what I love to do so it's easy and though it gets tiring at times...I never really struggle to maintain the energy for activism/working on change...it's in my blood I guess. 

The Internet has been central in your work-- how do you see things like blogs continuing to shape our children's futures for the better?

Our kids will be like "blogs" what are those?   Seriously, technology is changing so rapidly it is hard to predict what the Internet will look like for them - all I can say is that technology will be much more embedded in their lives - and that's both a good thing - because there is so much innovative stuff happening and a bad thing, because it might shift things too far from important non-virtual stuff that still needs to happen to improve the state of things anywhere e.g. organizing, leadership etc. 

You have spoken publicly about the importance of making personal connections-- noting that relationships can be more powerful than aid.  How can we, as mothers, begin to connect and build global communities of support?

Look for those stories that are of interest, get out of your comfort zone, try and find out more about what you are interested in supporting and listen more to being to figure out what people really need in terms of support.  

If you could give people a daily action to make a difference-- be it in Africa or America or anywhere else-- what would it be?

Be curious, be engaged.  

 

~~~~

Here's Okolloh's TED talk.  It's 16 minutes long, and it is worth a listen.  

 

 

And here's Chimamanda Adichie's talk that she mentions-- totally amazing as well.

 

If you are so inclined, here's a link for contacting our elected officials.

It's amazing, isn't it, the way we can connect?  The way we can use the immediacy of a blog or a twitter account to make changes that matter in this world....The way we can learn the stories and truths of so many mamas. Such a thing to celebrate-- this tightening of threads in the Mother Net.

 

 

 

Rise Up: Stories from the Mother Net

Yesterday, I spent one hour of my morning parked at the beach, staring at the slate blue waters of our just-frozen bay.  By the time the hour was up, my right ear was warm and I was tired, but full of peace.  Because I had been talking to my therapist (who happens to live in Oregon.  Sometimes, I really love cell phones).  Once a month I do this, either shut my bedroom door or take a drive to a place that slows my breathing, and I call to get the course corrections we can all use on occasion in our lives.  

I'm telling you this because my conversation changed my post for today.  Instead of bringing you another interview (look for it next week) by a truly inspired mama, I realized what I really needed to write was personal.  This journey is important to me. Yet, as interview requests have continued to be granted by famous and not famous, fabulous women from all across this planet, I simultaneously began picking up more and more freelance work, and in doing so, I grabbed a few potato sacks full of anxiety as well.  It wasn't something I set out to have happen, but as one taste of professional "success" led to another, I forgot myself somewhere between to do lists and emails. What I'm trying to say is that I stopped breathing.  Not literally of course-- because I would be passed out right now while my body took back control from my brain--  what I lost was the awareness of my breath.  I jumped into a closet filled wih half the world, piled with old stories of maybes and should haves...and the more I began taking on, the more laundry and doubt and dirt from living room floor stacked up inside it.  

I'd like to blame it all on professional aspirations, but in my monthly dose of hitting the reset button, I realized that activism has been known to do this to me too.  

Kind of a big statement for a girl collecting an anthology of voices all speaking to the heart of activism. But still.  It feels all the more important to say. 

When Lizzie was 10 months old, I strapped her to my back and raced around the Northern Michigan Mothers Acting Up Alternative Gift Fair in December for six hours straight.  Despite my good friend and Gift Fair organizer's plea for me to step down because of the newness of my third child.  Despite the wary looks I got from Justin as he listened to me whimper and whine in the months leading up to the event about having too much on my plate (his looks were only wary, as he knew better than to complain I was right).  Despite the way I found myself crying for no reason, snapping at my children, and generally feeling anything but holiday happy.  As I paced back and forth, checking on the various non-profits, greeting shoppers, feeding volunteers, I found myself staring out the window a lot.  Snow was falling in huge, clumsy clumps.  The parking lot was full, music and chatter and a sense of community was all around me-- I knew it was there-- but I couldn't really feel any of it, because the weight on my back was heavy and my heart and mind were simply exhausted.  Truth be told, I was looking at that snow, wishing I was home on my couch. 

But then came the end of the day and a rush of sugar from eating any and all leftover cookies in sight.  When the cashiers handed us the final total-- some $42,000 raised for local health and human service non-profits, I heard myself saying something about a Mothers Day event and next year's gift fair and...and...

And there it is.  That hook.  A work of activism met with success breeds an energy to do more.  Just as work met with success breeds an energy to do more.  But when I'm sitting here on my living room floor (still dirty) eating dinner at 10 p.m. and realizing I haven't taken a shower in three days (sorry for admitting that mom), the question remains:: at what cost? At what cost does the energy to serve or create or be part of systemic change come when self care, family care, daily life-- breathing-- isn't brought into the picture?

This is what I was talking about in the car as a flock of docks waddled carefully-- still slipping--across the ice.  I've been feeling totally off kilter the last few weeks.  While part of that is because of community tragedy, part is also deeply personal.  It is me feeling like I can't balance a work life and a family life.  It is me living in this teeny, cramped box in my mind. A box labeled, homeschool and be a good mama and wife or have a career. So I've found myself up until one or two or three, staring at blank computer screens or logs in my fireplace.  I've told myself that when summer comes, I can get organized.  I've told myself I hate working at all, and also, that I hate not working.  I've told myself there is always a cost.

But for one hour yesterday, I had to face that stuff. I had to sit and breath in the silence.  I had to find the tense parts of my body when I said out loud "there does not have to be a cost.  there does not have to be anything."  I had to find my truth, which is, in this moment, I want to breath.  Not I have to breath. Not I should be breathing.  I want to breath.  Because when I do, that little room I'm living in begins to show me a door. And through that door is the possibility that work (or activism) and family life can live together in peace. 

Right above my forehead, and in the space between my lungs, is where I felt the most tense during my time of breaths and silence.  I focused my inhales and exhales into these places-- not forcing a change of thought or a redirection of energy-- but simply sitting with my fears. Because that's what was lurking: a fear of failing.  I am saying all of this here, as part of the Rise Up series, because I think we all have a little of this within us.  We want to be strong women. We want to be strong mothers and advocates and creative, professional people.  We want to make a difference, large or small, in this world.  And by sitting with our self-doubts, by recognizing our old, ego-minded patterns, we can begin to move forward.  We can begin to recognize that what we accomplish in the moment-- it is simply that. There is no "enough" and no "too little."  There is only what we do.  Don't we want this work to be joy-filled, especially when it comes to caring for the small children in our homes and global community?

I want to take this opportunity to invite you to slow down today long enough to hear the truth of your moment.  And I want to say that Rise Up: Stories from the Mother Net is dedicated not only to bringing tales of women doing amazing work throughout the world, but also, wise words from women who understand that old Thich Nhat Hahn saying, "The earth will be safe when we feel safe within ourselves."

This net we are part of, its fabric is only as stable as the hearts and minds that weave it.  Let's celebrate a slowing down, a discovery of contentment, an ability to help when we are able, and to simply send our candles of thought when we are not.

This week's giveaway is all about finding balance.  Leave a comment here and you'll be entered to win a copy of one of the following (you pick!) Thich Nhat Hahn's "Being Peace," Sarah Napthali's "Buddhism for Mothers of Young Children," or "Mojo Mom: Nurturing yourself while raising a family" by Amy Tiemann.  The winner will also receive a package of Sunday Morning loose tea by my favorite local tea company, Light of the Bay.  Contest will be open until next Wednesday, at which time I'll choose a winner:) 

Rise Up: Stories from the Mother Net

 

 

Four years ago, a friend of mine, Copland, and I had sushi and attended a lecture that  focused on the urbanization of Africa, and specifically on the slums of Nairobi.  The former peace corps worker speaking described  with vivid details the pit toilets, plastic bag-strewn roadways, and dilapidated shacks that made up the infamous slums.  Sitting in the parking lot after the lecture-- one that ended with a plea for everyone to do their part to no longer allow people to live in such squalor-- I noticed how cold it was for a spring night.  It was March, and the chill felt more like December, when there is still more dark than light.  It was a bit surreal, really, getting ready to drive home and kiss my two boys, undoubtedly asleep in warm beds.  We had spent a hour looking at images that made the humanitarian in me weep, and the mother in me rage.

I felt paralyzed enough that I'm not sure I even turned the car on when Copland began to speak.  She told me about a calendar she'd received in the mail-- a beautiful weekly planner that had stories of women making a difference in this world on every page.  As she spoke, her words began tumbling out with greater and greater purpose: a very specific idea was now being articulated.  The organization that put out the calendar, Mothers Acting Up, was dedicated to joyfully and passionately advocating for the world's women and children.  The group was based in Boulder, Colorado, and was just beginning to branch out-- and we could form our own chapter in northern Michigan.  

Which we did, almost immediately. And in addition to being able to connect more than 80 local women to the important work of using our collective voices for change, we were able to fund a village bank in Haiti, purchase a Playpump for a South African village, and in three short years, raise $100,000+ for local non-profits during an annual Alternative Gift Fair.  Copland went on to host a restorative yoga session and spearhead a campaign that brought over four hundred Stand for the World's Children signed postcards to our local representative.  We've met with politicians.  We've spoken to reporters.  We've acted up-- with a joy like I've never known. 

And it all started with a feeling of solidarity. A supportive nudge and a connection of hearts.  A movement that will quite possibly change the world. And that movement is Mothers Acting Up.

I'm blessed and honored to present an interview with Joellen Raderstorf, director and one of the four founding mamas of this now internationally known non-profit.  Mothers Acting Up does the important work of helping women find their voice-- and giving them the tools, support, and community to help exercise it.  Without further ado....

How did becoming a mother spark your passion for advocacy?

Joellen: I began asking questions, like: What will the world look like when my children, my grandchildren are adults? I wanted to actively participate in answering those questions, I wanted to help shape the world my children would inherit.

In what ways do you think women in general have the power to make positive changes in the world?

Joellen:  1) We are raising the next generation. The seeds we plant and the choices we model will live on forever.

2) We spend the money. Every purchase ripples out into the world and has an impact. It's important for us as mothers-- and the most courted consumers-- to demand that our purchases are having a net positive impact. 

3) We are a large voting block, therefore if we engaged fully in our democracy, our elected officials would have no other choice but to listen.

Could you say a bit about Mothers Acting Up-- how it started and where it is going?

When we started Mothers Acting Up, we’d didn’t focus much on goals. It was truly an in the moment endeavor. We knew deep down that if we could in engage enough mothers in advocating on behalf of the world’s children, we could create a world worth handing over to our children. Mothers have the ability to see connections far into the future and we know the importance of taking care of everyone. Whether we have 4 or 40 mouths to feed, we know that we must feed all. Leaving some behind is not an option. 

 

While MAU has reached mothers in all 50 states and 24 countries, the movement is just beginning to take hold. We just launched the first 100+ Mother Leader Mamafesto, a template/structure of how 100 mothers in communities can reach a million mothers in order to shift policy for millions of children. MAU recently coached 100 mothers from around the country to engage their community and their Member of Congress to call for the designation of a Children’s Ambassador – reporting directly to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton – to prioritize, and coordinate critical children’s programs in the foreign aid budget. MAU is partnering with a coalition of organizations that are part of Global Action for Children. We hope to apply this structure to some of the many issues that need to be addressed in the coming years, from the preservation of precious ecosystems that clean our air and water, to the education of children, especially girls, as a way to create a more secure world. 

In the busy world of being a mother, how do you sustain your heart for activism?

 

Joellen: In truth, activism is the only thing besides my family that truly feeds my soul. It’s an antidote for all the bad news. I can’t bare the thought of handing a mess of a world over to my children. And while this is probably not the most healthy motivation, I try to balance my activism with dinner every night with my family, long walks with my dog, and Qigong (it’s all about breathing).  

Sometimes mothers-- especially mothers of young children-- simply feel too overwhelmed to do much in the way of activism.  Do you have some advice to share, or some small actions they can do to feel involved? 

Joellen: This is really the hardest realization for me. Young mothers often see the interconnectedness more clearly, as if it’s a physiological ability to see that happens at birth, and then gradually fades away as societal norms require us to take on other priorities like school choice, snack calendars, birthday extravaganzas and kitchen remodels. Acting up doesn’t mean we need to give up volunteering in our child’s classroom. It means finding a balance of serving our own children and working to shape the world they will inherit.

Spending 5 minutes a day envisioning the world they want for their children can be enough for young mothers. 1 hour of action a month in the form of sending a letter to our members of Congress, a letter to the editor, or hosting a movie night for friends showing (M)other or Girl in the Café can and will make a differnece.

Other advice:

Trust yourself.

Spread love. 

Hold on to your vision for the world no matter how many people tell you that you are being unrealistic or naïve. 

Try not to judge your value as a mother, just love being one. I once asked a wise mama friend if she ever asked herself if she was a good mom. Her answer, “No I don’t; I love being a mom so it doesn’t matter if I’m good at it.” 

This year especially, Mothers Acting Up is helping people engage without it feeling overwhelming. Tell us a little bit about your Daily Action campaign. 

Joellen: Start integrating action into our lives daily without judgment of ourselves. MAU offers small bite size educational bits accompanied by bite sized actions. We want to put a large statement -- proclaimer  (a positive disclaimer) -- assuring mothers that they don't have to worry about to keeping up with the actions every day, because the right actions will find them. 

 

Before long, each of us will begin to take advantage of daily opportunities to make the world a better place for our children and their global peers. By joining together with other mothers acting up we can show up on the radar screen of policy makers, a massive leveraging of our impact. 
-----

Amazing, isn't she?  There will be other opportunities to read more of Joellen's wise words soon, and I'm working to include a few more amazing MAU mavens in this series along the way.  Right now, I'd like to invite you all to add this button:

 

which links to MAU's website and their daily actions, to your blog.  Become part of the collective voice...because my, when we roar together, we are heard loud and clear.  Also, I'd like to leave you with this video, which brings tears of hope to my eyes...

 

Visit Mothers Acting Up-- become part of this amazing group of women who are answering the call Julia Ward Howe set forth when she said "Arise! Arise all women who have hearts..."

Rise Up: Stories from the Mother Net

I remember the wee morning hours after giving birth to my first baby.  I sat so still, taking in tiny fingers and toes as if my life depended on committing every inch of this new being into my memory.  I felt like we were the only two people in existence.  

10 years, and two more babies later, I know that something else happens each time we welcome a new life into this world.  There is a moment, just as those tiny lungs fill with air, when time seems to stand not still, but together.  It is a split second of connection between centuries of mothers and babies; a primal thread that rises up and explodes, leaving shrapnel in the form of instinct and community behind. I mused over this idea last year with a friend as we sat having tea one afternoon at her kitchen table.  We had been watching through the windows as four of our children sloshed around in rain boots, fresh spring mud catching their heels and spraying up onto their hands and faces.  Lizzie slept nestled against me. The cadence of her breathing was calm and slow.  
“Becoming a parent creates a whole new level in our well of emotions,” my friend said.  “It gives us this protective roar, one that can turn the world upside down in the most amazing ways.” I thought about that for a moment—the notion that mothering brings forth a desire to protect and care for not just our babies, but all children.  “We have a collective voice.”  I said, sipping my tea slowly, as I added up in my mind the many women who are making a difference.  There are those in my community; grandmothers who serve as mentors to elementary school girls, young mothers that stock food pantries with their babes slung around them.  There are those on the global stage, from Wijdan Salim, the Iraqi Minister for Human Rights; to Jean Shinoda Bolen, an activist convinced that women can, when connected, bring peace to the planet.  

And in that moment (though I did not yet realize it), Rise Up: Stories from the Mother Net was born.  It's a project that will in some ways return me to my journalism roots, and will begin as a series of interviews and essays focusing on Mothering and joyful activism for this blog.  As it takes shape, there will likely be additional components too, and there's a good chance it will end up in a much more tangible format (as in one with a front and back cover).  These stories will be made of the transformative power of birth; the stuff of the net we form as women who work to make a difference; the words and actions we use to teach our own children empathy and good works.  It will document the many ways we rise up singing in joy and love and fierce protection.  

I'm so excited about the ever-growing line up of amazing women you'll be hearing from, including Peggy O'Mara (I know!), founder and editor-in-chief of Mothering Magazine; Joellen Raderstorf, one of the founders of Mothers Acting Up, an internationally-reaching organization encouraging women to publicly and passionately advocate for the world's children (I know! Again!).  I'll also be sharing stories of hope from women like Bhavia Wagner, founder and director of the organization Friendship with Cambodia.  And I'll be sharing stories of everyday actions-- big and small-- that are impacting communities in amazing ways, from women just like you and me.  These voices are the threads of our net.  And they are strong.  And they are beautiful.

Next Wednesday I'll kick off the interviews with Joellen Raderstorf, because her organization embodies everything I want this project to be about:: support, celebration, collective voice and personal action. With her interview, I'll also be kicking off the first of a slew of giveaways-- books, magazine subscriptions, action toolkits, crafts-- all tying into whatever essay or interview is on tap that week.  I'm hoping this is going to be a space filled with joy and inspiration....and a call, mamas, to arise! 

Arise, mamas, arise.

"Arise all women who have hearts."
--Julia Ward Howe

Yesterday I woke up to pans banging, loud giggles, and several "sssshhhh's" as three little heads took turns peeping into my bedroom. And from the moment I pulled back the sheets, I was washed over with sweet hugs and words and pampering from my children and their daddy.

There was the traditional breakfast and morning cup made by the boys in the house. There were the marvelous handmade cards.


(yes, that really is us if we were a family rock band. My favorite part? Even as a lead singer in said rock band, I still carry a tote with an apple inside).
There was the quiet moments I got (instead of cleaning or changing diapers or making lunches) to sit and focus on my breath, my gratitude, my blessed life.

There was the time spent together, just playing and being. It was perfect, really. But I must confess: my Mothers Day was all weekend long, and perhaps the stuff that I will carry with me most happened away from my children, on Saturday morning in a yoga studio across the bay.

While the very fact that I was doing restorative yoga without my normal, um, helper

was glorious, the truth is, the morning's power came far more in the reason for the gathering.

For four years now, my good friend Copland and I have been part of the national organization Mothers Acting Up, a mama-led, mama-fed movement that inspires people to act up-- with joy-- on behalf of the world's women and children. Each year, we've put on a Mother's Day event focusing on international initiatives working for the betterment of those who so often do not have a voice of their own. We've opened a village bank in Haiti and put in a PlayPump in Tanzania. Our community of women in a town of 1,500 people has come together in ways we never imagined; a collective uprising rooted in love that is truly making a difference. This year, Copland organized a morning of restorative yoga, tea and conversation as a way to give back to these women, and as a way to kick off our part in the Stand for the World's Children campaign.

The campaign is aiming to reach one million people-- through postcard signings and online petitions-- to Stand for the World's Children by asking elected officials to prioritize so that the world's most vulnerable children are cared for in the following ways: 1) to see President Obama appoint a Children's Ambassador, a person who would report to Secretary of State Clinton and oversee programs and funding dedicated to caring for the children of the world. 2) To see congress fully fund programs benefitting orphans and other vulnerable children on this planet.

Sitting in a circle on the yoga studio floor with this diverse group of women-- conservative and liberal, young and old, mothers and others-- I was able to breathe in the incredible gift of the collective spirit. It gave me hope. It encouraged me to step forward and to open my heart with a compassion that requires action outside my own four walls.

Driving home Saturday morning, I spent my time thinking about these beautiful children:

Caroline, Isaac and Watuma-- sponsored family members-- who live in Kenya and Uganda. I know of the fear their own mother's face; I know they worry about having enough food, about violence and school fees and illnesses that run rampant in the slums of cities like Nairobi. I recognize the innocent and pride of these children, as they learn to draw pictures with English captions like "chicken" or "This is cow."

It is hard to not feel overwhelmed and yet, it is hard to ignore the fact that my blessed life can only truly be honored if I am doing what I can to ensure that all children are cared for, that all children can curl up in their beds at night and fall asleep feeling full and safe and warm.

Mothers Acting Up provides me with the fuel to stand up for these children. I can connect with other women, can share my frustrations and my dreams. Together, we are able to open space in our lives to dig deeper, to uncover the well that is at mothering's soul-- a universal web that binds together anyone who has loved a child as we do. This place within us, the place where the heart and art of mothering lies, shows us an undeniable truth: all the children of the world are our own. All the children of the world need nurturing and love and the protection of someone bigger. It is not our burden, but instead, our gift, to know that we can stand up in their honor.

I encourage you to spend a few moments by your child's bed tonight. Watch the peace of their sleep, the way the rhythm of their breathing becomes your own, the way your body feels like it radiates the most beautiful light as you look upon them. Soak in the gratitude, and then ask yourself, "how can I give this to someone else?"

The answer? It can be as simple as signing a petition.
http://www.standfortheworldschildren.org