Day 30 - Hello Portland!

Day 30 = June 8

The morning began with a beautiful train ride after goodbyes w/Cassandra which were bittersweet. Has been so nice to catch up, and we hope it won't be as long again until we catch up next time!

So, I arrive in Portland & make my way via bus to Ally Spotts' home. I didn't know Ally but she was a friend of Tommy's via some story about music & him playing drum for her friend Sharaya? She is pretty fascinating actually - she'd just returned, the day before I arrived, from Alaska, the last of the 50 states she and Sharaya traveled to together. Here is a pic, which I cannot take credit for (stolen from her FB):

You should read her blogs: Packing Light (on the 50-state travel) & Ally Spotts (subtitle is 'Quarter Life Crisis: Averted' & is much about dating...& yes, I did tell her she needs to chat w/the IKDH girls in Brooklyn!)

So, of the few folks I know in Portland, Cory Kaufman (who was on my 'brother floor' back at Moody Bible Institute) is one of the most talented, and I was on a mission - both to catch up w/him & meet his fam, and to beg him to let me use his photography in one of my future poetry chapbooks. I was successful on both counts! Please see Exhibit A below which shows some of his photographical awesomeness:

The following pics also show his adorable family: he & his wife Debbi, along w/their kids Rachel, Ben & Charlie (not sure I'm listing the twins in the right order there!), and his mother-in-law Esther who was by for the eve, w/their darling dog, Smokey.

Finally, as he was showing me some recent projects, one of them is that he is now designing & making hammers for hammered dulcimers. I thought they were very pretty. Here is a pic.

He is available for your hammered dulcimer needs in the Portland area & is looking for folks to play with. You can also view his website which features the hammers here.

Cory drove me over to the night's show and when I arrived at the venue (the Hawthorne Theater), I connected up with Tommy & our mutual old friend Laura Kucera who lives in Portland. Here are some cute pics of them:

We met up with another friend of theirs and wandered over to a smaller version of Powell Books to kill time before the show, which is supposed to be a solid mile of books or something! Since I was only in town for 1 day, it was nice to at least get 'a taste' of it. There was also some Stumptown coffee consumed and discussed. This is big Portland news, and they are reportedly opening a store in Brooklyn soon.

The show itself was excellent. I danced a good bit, couldn't help it. I told them afterward, it was such a 'complete experience' I wanted to say "Amen!" at the end.

My friend Rich Blatt, who came to the show, droveth me home, & we stopped for hot dogs & discussion of the years btwn now and the other concert we met at once about 7 yrs ago (or so) - The Violet Burning, somewhere in CA. Nice to catch up. He is recording a solo album right now - I have never heard him perform and the music player at myspace is not working now - but if it ever is, you can hear him at www.myspace.com/theirondog.

Day 27 - Seattle: Shopping, Street Fair & Open Mic!

Day 27 = June 5

My friend Rachel Nichols (who I know from my bluer days), lives in Seattle but was too busy to meet up. However, she did give some suggestions - to go to Pike's Place Market and then Fremont Market on Sunday. Cassandra & I enjoy this type o' shopping and the weather was great both Friday and Saturday, so a great deal of shopping transpired, including - on Sunday - purchases of a blue tee w/an elephant, an earring/necklace set, and various presents for friends & family. We also consumed some lovely pizza while sitting on the grass. We did not buy this troll, but Cassandra wanted it. :)

After the market, we headed over to do some power-shopping at Target/Kohl's for a certain little sis who is getting married soon. A care package was in order. Mission accomplished - go team!

We returned home for dinner (Tom cooking again - mmm! :) ) and then sped off to see my friend from college, Naomi Wachira, perform for the Conor Byrne open mic (it's an Irish pub). It was her first time, and she was a little nervous. It was also Cassandra's first time attending an open mic. The place was packed; we were lucky to get seats near the front!

I was pretty psyched to find some videos of the songs that were played on Sunday - here is a video of Naomi's friend Holly singing 'Orphan Child' w/Naomi & and another girl singing backup (tho' she just sang it solo at the open mic)...and a video of Naomi singing the first song she played at the open mic (which was recorded outside the venue that night!) I cried during both Naomi's songs. It's so wonderful to see your friends doing something you can see is exactly what they were made to do.

There was some decent talent there (which isn't always a given for open mics), and even bands doing promo for their shows. We heard a few songs by great little bands with adorable names like The Gloria Darlings, and The Local Strangers. Actually, here is another video (sorry I'm getting carried away, but this is another song performed that night)...by The Local Strangers:

On the way home, Cassandra drove me out to a dock where there was another beauteous view of Seattle. A nice last shot before bed. :)

Day 4 Take 2 - Chicago, Chicago!

In the morning, we drove into Chicago. First stop at noon was Pockets - it wasn't the same location I'd frequented in the past (since we only had 1 day there there wasn't really time), but it was the same chain and the food was just as good as I remember. Got a half calzone and a salad for the road.

Then we loaded in at the Stark residence. Wen Yi Ko Stark was a friend in college also - who I haven't

kept in touch with almost at all, other than a little bit of Facebook stalkery, so I was very happy that she agreed at the last minute for us to come stay with her family. Her husband Jeromy was busy at work when we came in (he runs all the technical stuff for Moody Church), but the kids were home - there were 4: Ethan, Sierra, Megan and Wesley, although only Sierra is pictured here. As we settled in and caught up, Sierra eagerly served Jamie and I small cups of imaginary tea and plates of toy pie. Quite the little hostess! :)

Right about then, I received a phone call that my grandpa was dying. I suppose some people will think it heartless that I continued my trip until I could manage to fly home, but Grandpa would have wanted me to, I think, and I forged on, though at times it was with rather wet cheeks, particularly in moments of interim, like trips on the El. I couldn't have made it home in time to make any difference anyhow, it was just a matter of waiting.

I had a 3 pm appointment to meet Dr. de Rosset, one of my favorite profs in school. I had her for 'Images of Christ in the Novel', 'Violence and Grace in the Novel' and 'Homiletics'. Many favorite books and authors were discovered in those classes. We had a sweet little visit and talked about the school and friends in common and books. For those who will want to know, I asked for some book recommendations and she gave me the following:

• Mad Men by Tracy Groot
• Peace Like a River by Leif Enger
• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
• Christ-centered Preaching by Brian Chapell (we read this in homiletics class)
• Men and Women in Ministry by Sara Sumner

She is always good for these. I will have to check them out when I have time.

One of my favorite moments of our visit was when I told her how my old poet friend/student of hers David Huckfelt is now living in Minneapolis, and in a band called The Pines which is doing quite well. She looked them up online right then, and liked the music so much she intends to purchase a CD. That must be the greatest thing about teaching. Watching and seeing who all your young persons grow up to be. We are all such curious mysteries.

During my visit, I received the call that my grandpa had died. When our visit ended, I took some time by myself in The Commons (a new cafe they have on campus) to sit and require nothing of myself. Tommy checked in to make sure I was ok, but otherwise I let myself sit and be alone for awhile, for the first time since I heard it was coming. I was very tempted to go back to Wen Yi's and bury myself in bed for the rest of the day, but somehow when Jamie and I met up again about an hour later I felt ready to go explore this home of my past a bit more. It had been at least 10 years since my last visit.

The next stop in the order of events was to return to Wicker Park - where I helped start my first 'church plant' in a coffeehouse, and was in the poetry and arts scenes, probably for the first time in my life. Jamie and I met back up and took the El over. We first went to the Flat Iron building to peruse all thestudios (where artists live and work). It was lovely, but my old friends no longer resided there. I even crashed a private art reception (while Jamie waited outside, feeling under-dressed) and no one batted an eye. :)

We then did some shopping, and stopped by the space that used to be The Salvage House (coffeehouse where Urban Chapel Ministries had our church, and where I lived in summer 98). It had become a spa, and I was told, had been a shoe store before that. The whole area was gentrified and not very likely to be sporting the prostitutes etc. that we were helping back in the 90s, nor perhaps as many of the artists as once could afford to call that area their home.

At the top of the actual park in Wicker Park, we ran into a man who was standing by a sign which offered "Free Prayer/Prayers for Encouragement". We availed ourselves of this and received prayer for our trip. Well, actually we just stopped to tell him about my old church there and how we'd used to have street prayer ministers (of which I was one), standing on the street corners in the evenings, wearing clerical collars with our street clothes (plaid shirts, jeans & big earrings for me in those days). But we got some prayer all the same. He was with a new church there called 'Church in the City' which is pastored by South Africans - which I only later thought of as interesting as our worship leader had been South African and the other female student minister, Lisa DePalma, had received her training in working w/prostitutes in Cape Town, and now lives there and does that full time. Strange coincidi.

The last project of the evening was to read at the Heartland Cafe open mic - In One Ear - which was formerly the No Exit Cafe open mic which I read at in '97-'98 some time I believe. Though we were only in Chicago for one night, it was imperative that I find somewhere to perform a poem I wrote that was inspired by Vickie Williams, who I'd never met in person, but who runs the Happy Rhodes fansite and who is friends with my friend Paul Huesman (who used to play w/Happy, and who I met while he was playing w/Michael Sweet of Stryper while I was working 'crew'). Whew, that took a long time to explain. I'd written a poem - 'The Arc of Beauty' while at work in NY about 5 yrs. ago when a co-worker challenged me to write a poem ending with the words: "welcome from afar". Since Vickie and I'd been corresponding around that time, it became about her, and since I wrote it I'd always dreamed that someday I would go to Chicago and she would be in the audience when I read it for her. Finally happened! End of a perfect day. (Photo courtesy of Jamie)

Day 3 Take 2 - Guns, Beer & Custard in Wisconsin*

1^st Stop:

Danica Johnson & family in New Berlin, WI

L to R: Silas, Ella, Danica, Myra (not pictured - Charlie the baby, who was sleeping)

Danica's husband Matt

I went to Moody Bible Institute w/Danica, and she was on the same floor in my dorm. We just reconnected via Facebook recently and it was lovely to stop in for pulled pork sandwiches and meet her hubby & family!

2^nd & Final Stop of the Day:

Brian & Tiffany Lorence in Brookfield, WI. Brian and Jamie and I are all friends from a young adult church by the name of bluer that I helped start back in 2000. Brian and I co-led a small group in Uptown, and Jamie was in a ministry internship I co-led in the summer of 2002. This was the only stop on our trip where we BOTH knew the visitees/hosts in advance (except we hadn't met Tiffany yet), which was extra nice. They treated us to a meal at the famous Water House Brewery in Milwaukee. They also attempted to settle the debate about what is the best frozen custard in Milwaukee by taking us to Kopps. Apparently Milwaukee is famous for frozen custard. Who knew? Though we did not try any of their competitors' custard, we concluded it is certainly of superior quality. We stayed w/them in their marvelously large apt/condo (?), met their cat & dog who both had some major personality, and talked into late in the night about church-planting, theology, how they met etc… :) As you can see from this pic, they are a cute couple of characters!

* no guns were shot nor beer consumed in the making of this post (except for the beer Brian had at the brewery - and the root beer the rest of us had?)...however, the frozen custard was excellent and I am afraid it was eaten alive. sTOP thE vIoLence!

Day 2 - The Wonder That Is Jennifer Falk Gray

Woke this morning in Jennifer Falk Gray's lovely home. Pictured here with her are her hubby Eric & little ones Norah & Teddy (/Theo).

Jen is a friend of mine from college. I don't know when we met. *Pause - asks Jen*

Jen's story: "I heard about the poetry ministry you were doing..." [Me: it was called 'Incarnational Ministries' and we were just a raggle taggle group o' kids from Moody Bible Institute that went out and attended poetry readings/performed weekly in the Chicago scene there, and then would meet once a week for dinner and pray for the folks we met/knew through it - I think it was both good for us to get out of the 'Moody bubble' as we called it, as it was good to be challenged by all sorts of viewpoints and also just how much it stretched us artistically, and for the folks we met as we kinda challenged their worldviews/

stereotypes of Christians as well.] Jen (continued): "...and I came with a friend." Later, I apparently told her that I didn't know about her at first, "because you seemed a little preppy...but you're ok!" In my defense, I don't remember saying this. :) She became one of the inner circle of 12 or so in our group of 'regulars' in the scene.

Somewhere in my senior year, in the course of my relationships in the poetry scene, I experienced a fairly serious faith crisis, and Jen was kind of the 'listening person' during that time. I can't remember anything she said, but I do remember her not making me feel like an alien while I processed my questions. That was worth its weight in gold. It didn't panic her; she and I were both big fans of one of our lit profs, Dr. de Rosset, who emphasized 'process' - and doubt, I guess really, is just a phase in the process of faith. There's a quote I like in Doctor Faustus by Thomas Mann (and don't judge me on the context, which refers to alchemy and sorcery which I am not advocating) that says "Apostasy is an act of faith, and everything is and happens in God - falling away from him most especially." I survived my crisis, with a new brokenness and humility that came from looking at faith from the other side - the desperate lost feeling of losing your best friend and finding yourself on the slippery ceilings of a universe that had no floor, feeling as though "[your] own hand might fly up and strike [you]" (The Man Who Was Thursday, GK Chesterton). Though I had the horror of looking over into a deep darkness of a Grand Canyon sized hole held back only by a thin metal bar that could not possibly keep me from falling into its magnetic depths, it turned out God had a hold of me from behind and let me see it for a reason. And Jen was a friend in that dark moment - I will always be grateful for that. :)

Well, we're nearly done watching a reality show about the Judds - Jen's guilty reality show pleasure. Jen says Ashley Judd's memoir All That's Bitter and Sweet about her past and helping women escape sex trafficking/educate them about AIDS was surprisingly intelligent, powerful and spiritual...not just a movie star telling her story - nor does it make almost any mention of her movie star lifestyle...Did you know Ashley went to Harvard for her graduate degree? Who knew? Jen had to use a dictionary to read her book, and she's pretty darn smart herself, so that's saying something. Anyway, Jamie's off to have some Jamie-time, and I'm going to spend some time reviewing poetry for the upcoming shows and maybe do some sharing of it w/Jen. :) Yay! Catch y'all later...

Jen's blog - www.loriensleaf.blogspot.com