Category: June 2024

In June I went to a retreat in Durango with a group of Quakers from the intermountain area: Colorado, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and parts of Texas. A few of you know, I have been attending Quaker meetings off and on since I was in my early 20’s. I like to go because services are primarily meditation. I will also sometimes meditate with Buddhist groups. In fact recently, I’ve been meditating weekly with a Buddhist group who happen to meet at the local Quaker Meetinghouse.

I’m not sure why I don’t write much about that side of my life. I’m guessing that religion/spirituality is a bit like politics – a topic to avoid in a blog with the tagline of “The lighter side of life – staying in touch with friends and family by celebrating the ordinary.” Although politics, wow, I may comment at some point because what a wild ride recently.

A quick note about Quakers, in case you are unfamiliar: yes, there are still Quakers out there, and no, they do not wear gray wool skirts and funny hats. They also don’t have any extremely unusual or outdated religious beliefs.

There are two main types of Quakers here in the US; programmed Quakers who have services much like typical Christian church services, and unprogrammed Quakers who do not hold a Christian service. It is the unprogrammed variety that I will sometimes attend.

Instead of traditional church services with a priest or preacher or pastor, when unprogrammed Quakers meet, they sit in silence and meditate. Or more accurately, they are not meditating quite in the same way as Buddhists – instead, they are listening. Quakers listen to that “still small voice within” that connects us to each other and the greater universe (and whatever you may envision as god). If someone feels led to speak, they do. In larger meetings, a variety of people may stand and speak. In smaller meetings, in can be common to sit in silence for the entire hour.

Although Quakers come out of the Christian tradition, some of the unprogrammed Quaker attendees are also Buddhists or other faiths, or even agnostics or atheists. On the other hand, the programmed groups tend to be more Christian. Those groups are more common on the east coast, and even more common in other parts of the world, such as Africa.

The common core is that Quakers have always been active in the pursuit of social equity. You may have heard of their role during the underground railroad (that was all I knew about Quakers when I first discovered a small group meeting on campus at the University of Idaho over 30 years ago). There is also a strong tradition of pacifism, but the nuances of that vary between individuals. It is not a simple topic with easy answers. Nowadays Quakers work to improve our society in areas such as racial equity, immigration, poverty, homelessness, prison reform, healthcare, LGBTQ+, and anywhere else where underprivileged people are suffering due to inequalities in our system.

There is no hierarchy in an unprogrammed meeting, just volunteers. Everything is done by committee, and final decisions are made by the entire group in business meetings. Those meetings are slow, with silence after each time anyone speaks, in order to take the time to really hear the message. I’ve never met any group who listens even half as well as Quakers. Quakers deliberately, patiently listen to each other as well as their inner voice.

Quakers can be wonderful people; thoughtful, caring, humble, mostly introverts – quite a few of them on the autism spectrum, I’m sure! The reason you may never heard of them is that there is a culture of not proselytizing. That has been the Quaker tradition for a long time, but I think they’ve taken that too far. I can understand not wanting to try to convert people, but I think they should at least let people know they exist, in case people want to join.

The only reason I know they exist is I saw a handwritten directional sign on campus all those years ago. It wasn’t even an announcement flier, it was just an arrow and a room number and a date and time with the word Quakers. Quakers? Whaah? I got curious and crashed their meeting. And of course they were welcoming.

Now, all these years later, I find myself at a Quaker retreat in Durango, CO. It turned out to be quite a lot more intense than I expected! Both more difficult and more amazingly wonderful. On one hand, I don’t really have the temperament for large gatherings. But on the other hand, the personal connections meant so much more to me than I had even anticipated.

The entire reason I went to the Quaker gathering was to connect with everyone. People, people, it’s all about the people. This is coming from an introvert on the autism spectrum. So yeah…do we see an inherent conflict here? People, people…too many people! That and the dorm-style living, were by far my biggest challenges of the trip.

I had not expected it to be as overwhelming. Quaker activities are quiet and thoughtful. Our group wasn’t all that large (maybe 150?), and we were scattered across a small, pleasant, rural college campus. There were a few summer students and others on campus, but in general it was quite empty. The events were optional – I imagined myself skipping many of them and sitting quietly on a bench under a tree.

For that matter, Quakers do as much outside as possible (just like me), and many of our small groups gathered in circles of folding chairs scattered around under trees on the lawns. And what were we doing in those small circles under the trees? Silently meditating, mostly. Sharing a little, with large silences between sharing. So how could that be overwhelming?

I had planned to go to only some of the activities, but I underestimated how many connections I would be making with everyone. And I volunteered more than I originally intended. The whole thing is run by volunteers. For my service, I had signed up to drive golf carts, to help attendees get around the college campus. It turned out to be a great way to meet people, and I liked zipping around the campus on the carts.

I had planned to only drive golf carts 2 hours each day, but then one day it rained and everyone wanted cart rides to and from the activities. I ended up driving for a total of 5 hours that day. In hindsight, that was too much! But I was glad to be able to help.

Here is a couple of photos of people dancing.

This was in the evening, and was a smaller group than the meetings in the middle of the day. I only danced one simple, silly dance, involving trading a hat. The other dances were a bit too complicated for me. I enjoyed the music and the chance to visit with people informally.

I made some excellent connections including with some people here in Tucson. And it was wonderful to reconnect with several old friends from Albuquerque. Despite my overwhelm, the event was one of the more meaningful things I’ve done this year.

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals

I’m still trying to get caught up with my posts. This is the third installment of our Colorado trip series from June. After John and I stayed at the cabin on Vallecito Reservoir, we split up, and I went on a retreat held at a college campus in Durango, and John and Biska went backpacking.

Since I didn’t go on this backpacking trip, I don’t have very much commentary.

I gather they had a great time. They caught some weather, but missed the worst of it. Biska did overall quite well. Turns out she is spooked by night noises, but is fine if there is a nearby roaring river to drown out all the noises of the nocturnal animals. I can just picture us backpacking with a sleep machine to make white noise for our dog, lol.

Here’s Biska, wondering why there’s no couch. Not even a lawn chair.

At one point Biska was being taunted by ground squirrels, who would pop up and chatter, only to pop back underground as soon as she headed their way. She was so distracted that she refused to come when John called, and he had to hike up the scree and haul her down.

Apparently they made it out one step ahead of the deluge.

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Luckily it did not rain the whole time. The next day we had a lovely, sunny, canoe trip on the lake.

In my last post I misspoke and said we went kayaking, because that’s what we usually do. But we actually went out in a canoe. The lake resort had a variety of canoes, kayaks and stand-up boards to use. We thought the canoe would be easiest with Biska.

The only reason we own kayaks instead of a canoe is because we can rack our small kayaks on the back of the van like bicycles. We can’t as easily transport a canoe. So it was fun to have one we could use at the resort.

Biska wasn’t so sure about the whole thing. You can see she has her tail down. But she did ok.

It was very beautiful, and still calm in the morning.

As usual, John is doing all the work of paddling. We did find the canoe to be harder to steer than kayaks, but that might just be because of what we’re used to.

This photo didn’t exactly work. I was trying to take a picture of John and Biska. I didn’t manage to get either of their faces. Still, it’s sort of cool – one of those real life shots at a crazy angle with everyone looking away. And front and center: a red carabiner.

We were glad we got out on the water in the morning, because as the day progressed, the wind picked up and the clouds gathered. But we were still able to go on a short hike up the canyon and along the creek on the north end of the lake.

I did not much like this ledge. The path was quite wide, but the drop was sheer and a really long way down. Mainly I was worried that Biska would go running off it like an idiot. She can get excited and lose her head sometimes. Squirrel!

I don’t mind a ledge if there’s trees down there. You can see the clouds are building again.

There is a biting insect in those mountains, maybe a type of biting fly, that is found in northern Idaho, Colorado, and eastward, that is not found in the Sierras and Cascades. I happen to react quite badly to this particular insect; they’re much worse for me than mosquito bites. For that reason, I am not such a big fan of the Rocky Mountains. And whatever they are, they were ambushing this trail.

Then when I heard thunder, I was done. Yep, time to head back to the cabin and take more pretty pictures of the lake.

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals

Confusingly, I’m going to blog about Colorado while in Michigan. Because that’s what happens when our trips are spaced too close together. Earlier this month, John and I (and Biska) went on a trip to Colorado. The first three days we spent in a cabin at Elk Point Lodge on the Vallecito Reservoir outside of Durango.

We were very glad we got a cabin because it rained off and on and would have been cold and muddy without one. The cabin was small and cute and had an amazing lake view.

I took a ridiculous number of pictures of the lake.

The light kept changing with the weather and it was always beautiful.

Biska was as entranced by the squirrels and chipmunks as I was by the lake.

(We always travel with a couple of old sheets to toss on top of everything, so she doesn’t get the bed and furniture dirty.)

She also got to play with some neighboring dogs.

The lake was even beautiful in the rain.

The sunset was amazing.

The next day it was even more beautiful. I guess the view of the lake was my favorite part. Right from our very own deck.

We did manage to get out on a short local hike in between showers. Note the hawk on top of the snag in the center, silhouetted just above the mountains.

Biska’s eyesight is excellent and she watched the hawk as we approached.

That evening, the lake was even MORE beautiful.

I could not stop taking pictures of that lake! Of course, there wasn’t much else to do, lol.

Look at that sky!

I could have sat on that deck and watched that lake all day long.

Except of course, for pausing to take photos.

That’s enough photos for one post. Next post – kayaking!

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals

My friend Dana’s oldest daughter’s house burned down yesterday!

Hannah, her husband, and their 5 kids are all fine, thank goodness, they weren’t home at the time. But their house was completely destroyed and they’ve lost everything.

You can donate here, https://gofund.me/3609484e

Apparently it was caused by a neighbor’s fireworks hitting their doghouse and catching it on fire, which then spread to their shed and then their house. It’s hard for me not to be angry when the cause was someone’s fireworks.

I can’t imagine how devastated I’d be if I were to lose everything. I’m very attached to my house and all my stuff.

Here is the picture of her family from the GoFundMe site.

For my older relatives who may not be comfortable or set up to use GoFundMe, just let me know if you want to donate and I can do that for you.

Dana and Chris are going out there to see them on Friday (Indiana I think?), but they’re flying out, or else I would send some of my extra household items out with them. I have too much stuff. But Dana says her daughter doesn’t have a place for household stuff yet anyway. Right now they’re in a hotel. All 7 of them!

I’ve really appreciated Dana and her wife, Chris, who have been very welcoming. I met Dana while volunteering at the botanical garden, and she is the one who told me about the Master’s Naturalist class I took last semester, when I learned so much about the Sonoran Desert. It was such a good course!

Then recently Chris and Dana invited me to start going to the gym with them. Chris does the group classes while Dana has been teaching me how to use all the weight machines and the free weights. I would definitely not be going to the gym if they hadn’t invited me. And the gym is right near my house; I can bicycle there in 5 minutes! Now I’m going to the gym regularly and am enjoying it more than I expected.

Chris and Dana have also had John and I over to dinner a few weeks ago – and it was fantastic. Homemade spanakopita! Grilled steaks! Salad and homemade cake with strawberries! We owe them a dinner when they get back from Indiana – we’ll have to get our cookbooks out and hope for the best.

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals

John and I bought a beautiful quilt at the botanical gardens on Saturday. They were having a benefit sale for https://www.quiltforacause.org/, where proceeds go towards women’s cancer screening and treatment.

The quilt matches my mom’s beautiful paintings we have hung in the guest room.

It’s a lovely quilt, and the price was very low, and did not adequately reflect all the hard work and creativity of the artist. So we were very lucky to be able to buy it.

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals

Yesterday, which was the day after the insanely beautiful sunset, we had our first major monsoon storm.

Water pouring off our roof:

Someday we would like to get a rain barrel to save all that water for slower release into the garden. It was a lot of gallons of water in a very short time! The city encourages capturing it, because otherwise it just floods the streets and causes havoc.

We decided to go for a walk to watch the storm fill the arroyos, even though I was nervous in all the thunder and lightning. I like thunder and lightning, but I’m more comfortable watching and listening to it from under my porch roof than I am running around out in the midst of it.

We were immediately completely soaked through, even though I wore rain gear (so much for my useless rain gear, I might as well of just worn shorts and a t-shirt). Also we nearly ruined our phones trying to take photos; the air was just full of flying rain. The pictures look surprisingly calm and clear. In reality it was loud and intimidating and ridiculously wet.

Here is the footbridge near the school a couple blocks from our house that I’ve posted photos of before. The guy in his bare feet had stopped his pickup truck (because there’s no way even the largest pickup truck could go through that water) and he had gotten out and walked onto the foot bridge to take a photo. It’s a little incongruous to see bare feet in a raging storm, but it was very hot, and he probably left his flip flops in the car so as to not lose them in the water.

The water was actually quite a lot deeper than it looks in this next photo, because the road dips way down at the arroyo crossing, where you can see the standing waves.

The floods can be very dangerous, and Tucson did have one death in the storm yesterday. I don’t know the details, but she was pulled from a larger arroyo a couple of miles from our house. The arroyos (washes) are typically dry, but can be very deep and fast during a flash flood.

By this morning, this arroyo was completely dry again. There was just some soft sand left on the road, that I had to drive my Mini Cooper through.

After the rain quit, we took a second walk to go look at the larger arroyo.

This is also within walking distance from our house.

We saw a small palo verde tree down while on our walk. John also saw some larger trees down when he went on some errands this morning.

All the critters came out after the rain to celebrate. I believe this is a Couch’s spadefoot toad.

I believe this is a desert spiny lizard:

Then this morning, we went on a hike to see the wet desert. We went first thing in the morning but it was still a hot, humid hike. We only hiked for about an hour. The trailhead for this hike is only about a 20 minute drive from our house. It was a nice way to start the day.

We believe this bird is a pyrrhuloxia, also called a desert cardinal.

The saguaro cactus bloomed last month; multiple large white flowers on the ends of the arms. This month you can see the fruit and seed pods split open and showing their red insides. From a distance, they look like red flowers.

Here are close ups of some that have fallen to the ground.

The monsoon rains are an interesting time in the desert.

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals

Not to be melodramatic or anything. But when John and I were standing in our backyard last night, staring into the sky with our jaws hanging open dumbfounded, he asked me what I thought it looked like, and I breathed, “God”.

And then we both had a good laugh because I’m not all that religious.

But if you asked me to tell you what I would imagine God might be like, this is as good as anything I can imagine.

I think this next one is my favorite.

These photos were all taken on a standard, slightly older iPhone, unretouched except a little bit of cropping. Just me standing in the middle of the backyard and pointing the camera pretty much straight up into the sky.

I know it looks like most of them are upside down. That’s mainly because I was pointing straight up, and there is no horizon for reference.

Here are a few with trees in them, to help you orient.

And now to bring it back down to earth.

When I include my backyard swimming pool, it looks definitely less god-like.

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals

John and I went on an excellent trip to Colorado (which I plan to blog about soon, I hope) and next week I’m going to Ann Arbor. But right now I want to write about how happy I am this very moment sitting in my backyard in Tucson, listening to all the birds and watching the morning light play on the pool water.

May and June are my favorite months! The students and the snowbirds are gone, and the mosquitos haven’t arrived yet. The traffic is calm and the weather is amazing. I recorded a dozen different kinds of birds this morning. I am sitting out in my own backyard and it sounds like I’m in Costa Rica. The afternoons are hot, but in the afternoons I swim in the pool. It’s the life! I feel so lucky.

We’re doing a fair number of trips this summer, which is nice, but I think next year I want to try to take a trip or two in the winter instead, and be home more during the first half of summer. Early summer is my favorite season and I want to be here to enjoy it.

Yesterday I was reading a little bit of what I wrote in my journal last winter (this blog is not everything that I write – I also write a journal that is not published online). In my journal, starting in November and going through the first half of February, I kept mentioning depression. I think I even mentioned it in this blog. I tend to get a little depressed in the winter because I don’t get out enough.

Next winter I want to make a point to get out and do some low elevation desert camping and hiking even though it might be cold and cloudy and windy and even wet (we had an unusually wet winter this past year). And I would like to take a trip to Mexico in January or February – and not just across the border, but further south, where it’s warmer. And I want to make a point to visit friends and family even though winter travel is difficult and my friends and family all live where it rains and snows in the winter. I’ll go anyway.

Meanwhile, it’s just glorious here in Tucson in June; the hottest and driest month of the year. I’m really glad I’ve lived here long enough that I’ve met other people here who love the summer in the desert just as much as I do. At first it seemed like everybody thought I was crazy to love the Tucson summers! But now I’ve found a variety of friends and acquaintances who also love the summer in Tucson the best. It’s the best season anywhere! We not only love the Tucson summer heat better than the frigid winters of the north – we love the Tucson summers better than the cool and pleasant winters here! And now I can happily say that without getting gasps of horror and alarm from everyone. Because now I have some friends here who will nod with understanding and agreement. Thank you!

Of course, I am privileged to have a home with air conditioning and a swimming pool. I would not want to be homeless here in the summer. But I would not want to be homeless in the winter where most of my old friends and family live either. Homelessness is a different topic; a hard, difficult, tragic topic.

The fact that we are facing climate change also makes it harder for me to blithely revel in the heat and dryness of the Tucson desert. To celebrate the heat can feel like I’m uncaring about the ills of the world and the lives that will be lost due to excessive heat. But then I need to remember to let that all go and indulge in the sense of gratitude of being amazed and delighted that I recorded 12 different kinds of birds with my Merlin Bird ID app this morning. I feel like I’m living in a vacation in the tropics.

Update: I wrote this yesterday morning and forgot to publish it. Then today we had high winds in the late morning, blowing dirt everywhere, followed by a thunderstorm and downpour, with temperatures in the 100’s the whole time. I will never cease to be astounded by rain in that kind of heat. Rain that is not cold? Hot rain! It just does not compute! If I had a band, I’d call it “Hot Rain”.

Anyway, the storm has blown over now, and it’s beautiful again. Everything is clean and smells like the desert. It’s still 105º. I’m going to get in the pool.

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals

I was running errands today and a car had a vanity license plate that I wish I could remember exactly (better yet, have gotten a picture of). But you know how you can’t write exactly what you want on your license plate because there isn’t room, or someone else already took your great idea. So you compromise and it’s good enough and most people figure it out.

Well, the license plate on the car in front of me, and I swear, it said, “ejaculation”. And I was baffled. Ejaculation? I’m like, really? Is this a Trumper political statement thing, or what? I mean, have we sunk that low?

Or was it “ejection”, as in, the car is like a rocket! And we’re so fast! We’re going to have to eject before we crash and burn! But it didn’t really look like that kind of car.

But then, it didn’t really look like an ejaculation kind of car either.

In Albuquerque we had a lot of rather inscrutable nerdy science jokes on license plates because there’s thousands of hard-core scientists in Albuquerque working at the labs. Some of the smartest people in the world work in Albuquerque. And it’s a low population state, so not everything you could imagine to put on a license plate is already taken. So you get quite the leeway to come up with a lot of dorky puns referencing obscure physics terminology. The periodic table is child’s play; I’m talking quantum physics on license plates.

Or not, as the case may be. I finally decided it was supposed to read “education”. Then I felt sort of sorry for the guy. Because presumably I’m not the only one who read it as “ejaculation.” LOL, I hope not. I mean, for his sake I hope so. For my sake, I hope not!

Then I was nostalgic for when Laura and I were younger and running around Los Angeles like teenagers (she was a teenager and I was still pretending to be). We would have been laughing so hard we would have been snorting our green tea out our noses, right, Laura?

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Life Coaching for Neurodiverse Professionals