Here are some images of those good wishes being carried into the wind, from their camp among the clouds…know that many of you – both friends and strangers – were among them.  Click on them to enlarge.

“There are few things more beautiful than colorful prayer flags fluttering in the wind- sometimes waving gently, sometimes raging; a dance of shadow and light. There is perhaps no simpler way to create good merit in this troubled world of ours than to put prayer flags up for the benefit of other living beings. Prayer flags are not just pretty pieces of colored cloth with funny writing on them. The ancient Buddhist prayers, mantras and powerful symbols displayed on them produce a spiritual vibration that is activated and carried by the wind across the countryside. All beings that are touched by the wind are uplifted and a little happier. The silent prayers are blessings spoken on the breath of nature. Just as a drop of water can permeate the ocean, prayers dissolved in the wind extend to fill all of space. By placing prayer flags outdoors their sacred mantras are imprinted on the wind, generating peace and good wishes.”  Timothy Clark

Read the article for sure.  But just glance at the slide show and see how many similarities you spot to Cherry Abbey.

me in my room!

The bike room: our basement. Who knows where they all came from, but they live on unless deemed worth investment, in which case current JVs (cough, Elizabeth) fix one up enough to be rideable.

The fridge: more random yogurt containers filled with even more random leftovers, which have been there for who KNOWS how long.

We may not be an abandoned building, but we are fertile ground for squatting – our ‘guestbook’ is always growing and door always rotating…(our community DOES shine though while hosting guests – reference the photos from the beginning of the year until now)

Reuse and Recycle: ever heard of junk art?  we’re pretty good at it.  Exhibit A – our bent-into-fish-silverware mobile hanging above our table.  Exhibit B – The bike wheel we are turning into our chore wheel.

Large closet called the Free Store? : our basement.  Maria has been known to pilfer through and prize several articles of clothing from the depths…(e.g. the red terrycloth zip up bathrobe/cape, the purple knit poncho with tassels,  ugly Christmas sweaters from the 80s…..)

No attic room, but we do often discuss painting a mural on our white walls…that or a vertical wall garden….

“The dilapidated house has six fireplaces, a cavernous dining room, a library, several enormous bedrooms, servants’ quarters and an in-ground swimming pool filled with soil. Those who stay here often describe the lifestyle as “decadent poverty.”…our house isn’t exactly a mansion, but it allows for all 7 of us to have our own room and our living room serves as excellent space for large parties and potlucks : )

The “bedroom of a long time resident” photo grosses me out entirely.  But who knows what’s behind Robert’s door….

LOVE the photo of Uncle Rick with a meal prepared from Dumpster-diving. Like Freegans, JVs are dedicated to salvaging what others waste and trying to live without much of a currency budget…(Nick – remember us biking up the Cherry hill with milk crates rubberbanded onto our bikes and our backpacks busting with food bank gems??)

the mobile of forks and spoons hanging above OUR table...now if we could just figure out something to do with the bicycle wheel frame....

As we currently are hosting 5 guests, the anxiety of people being grossed out by opening what they think is yogurt and discovering waaaay forgotten leftovers, or encountering a bathroom that CLEARLY hasn’t been cleaned with bleach (I’m pretty vocal about missing chemicals…our bathroom is too) is less immobilizing than what it was 2 years ago, but still…there are some Freegan-esque features of JVC I’m ready to let go of and don’t see myself outgrowing discomfort around.

If I could swing a volleyball net grid....that'd be sweet.

For real though, I have.  We went on retreat two weekends ago – my last official JVC retreat ever – and scored an awesome soft tan, thanks to the wide open meadow, endless games of soccer and volleyball, beaming beautiful sun, and several intentional directives to go soak it up, while reflecting on and SAVORING moments over the past year, both from within community and in the workplace.  (Nice to soak up some pure Vitamin D…living in Seattle grants a tan line similar to ‘blogging.’)

The theme was Ignatian Discernment, and entering with quite a solid grip on those principles, whoa buddy that stuff never gets old.  It’s so applicable to every stage of life and any decision, minor or major, one is faced with.  Do I move home or start anew or stick around?  Do I pursue an MBA, MSW, a JD or MA in French? The take home?  Go with your gut.  The place that lives 3 inches behind your belly button.  After listing out advantages and disadvantages to both options (e.g. Staying in Seattle, Not staying in Seattle – 4 columns total), underlining those that speak to you most, and then pretending to select one of the options and holding that for a few days, how do you feel?  If it feels right, if it feels freeing, DO it.  If not, go back, make the other decision, and sit with that for a few days.  Oh the beauty of a spiritual director to help navigate this ….

We also talked about fears.  Moving out of the structure of JVC, away from the women and men we have come to so intimately know, love, fight with, play with, celebrate and celebrate alongside, what about our intentional lifestyle will I take with me?  How will I hold myself accountable to sustainability?  What are my values now that I no longer have the JV auto-response explanation?

We were offered tons of incredible words for contemplation. When Death Comes by Mary Oliver and Cast All Your Votes For Dancing by Hafiz were among my favorites Jack Kennedy – our facilitator – offered us as we relished over the encounters we don’t want to forget.  Our “liturgy” was amazing – completely orchestrated by us and not really traditional, I think my favorite part was either the music (included Eddie Vetter’s “Hard Sun” and the use of random objects for percussion), or the petitions which we all contributed to /wrote together.  I guess the campfire site was pretty baller too.

Some pics from retreat:

Check out the open space behind us - let the games begin! (Also, worth noting are the homegrown snap peas we were munching on....YUM)

Chabbey crew. gOSH I'm gonna miss these peeps

LOVE the random pick up singalongs

soccer in the background, but you can kind of tell how we were sunk in a valley surrounded by the Cascade mountains on every side - you wouldn't believe the STARS at night

don't be decieved - that water is FREEZING. But it certainly sounds delightful at night from your tent rushing by

Especially the affirmations from Members.  Shout outs from staff and our leadership team are awesome, but coming from the folks without a fancy title really make my day.

I don’t think I have written too much about the running/walking club I started up (massive thanks to Brooks for donating 300 pairs of brand new shoes, 100 tech tees, 40 pairs of socks, 40 pairs of shorts, and thus creating a sense of team, equality, and excitement!), but here’s an email I received from a Member involved (and just generally around making this place so full of brightness, song and personality):

hi liz.
i wanted to thank you for all that you do -
and ask you to help me thank everyone involved with the sole train team.
i made a video

please watch it, and if you think it’s appropriate, forward the link to intersted parties.
mahalo
owen

For real, Owen is so cool, and I should be the one thanking HIM (and the others who participate) for humoring my ceaseless announcements and probes to show up for a mid-morning run or walk before lunch.  I consider it a ‘Recovery Circle’ in motion, not only for Members, but for volunteers and mySELF most prominently.  We have SUCH great conversations on the road – about featured menus advertised in cafes we pass, about the meaning of and intentions behind use of the word “prejudice,” about our struggles with using or eating or reacting, about oil spills, legislative ridiculousness in Seattle or elsewhere(cough, cough, AZ), brainstorming jokes to tell at Open Mic, how much despite not wanting to come today, we know we will feel 1249x better afterwards, or about nothing at all, just enjoying each other’s company.

What’s really great about this video is how much it re-energizes me and re-commits me to this SOLE Train thing.  I’ve lately been a little flustered having to stop right when I get going in ‘super productive mode’ to change, fit people for shoes, and be gone for about an hour an a half and annoyed with having to be sweaty for the remainder of the day (we do not have showers to use post-run), and the lack of assurance in my appearance this causes….ridiculous, right?   Well just like my bicycle fall last week (I couldn’t release my cleats and took a slow motion sideways fall while stopped at a busy intersection en route to work.  Hilarious.), I am learning to let go of my ego a little – this video message makes being hot, unshowered, and not 100% put together Mondays and Wednesdays totally worth it.

I made the group one day smile and kick for the camera for a thank you photo to send to Brooks...

our glee upon returning one day

Some days we have 3, some days we have 13

Last night I improvised and prepared dinner using all leftovers and food bank donation ingredients – lentils, kidney beans and mystery legumes reheated and repowered with taco seasoning + toasted tortillas with melted cheese + homemade guac + brown rice + Trippel (thanks Spiro

But for when my budget and prep time allow, these are my favored pursuits:

Horchata (Seattle favorite gets jazzed up for a day….Mexican flavor + latte or cappuccino)

Makes eight cups

Ingredients
1 c. brown rice
8 c. almond milk (your favorite nondairy milk)
½ c. agave
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. vanilla extract
¼ tsp. salt

1. In a blender or coffee grinder, coarsely grind the rice.

2. In a bowl or any large container, add the rice, milk, agave, cinnamon, vanilla, and salt.

3. Whisk all the ingredients well, making sure cinnamon and agave are evenly distributed.

4. Cover and refrigerate for 3-4 hours.

5. Strain before serving, leaving rice behind.

6. Serve cold.

Crusty Black Bean-Chorizo Subs (Vegetarian!)
Serves four

Ingredients
8 oz. fresh Mexican chorizo sausage, casing removed
3-4 tbsp. vegetable or olive oil (divided use)
2 15-oz. cans of black beans or 3½ c. of home-cooked beans
Salt
4 telera or bolillo rolls*
6 oz. queso fresco or other fresh cheese (feta, goat), sliced ¼-inch thick
1 ripe avocado, cut into ¼-inch slices
Bottled hot sauce (we like Mexican Tamazula, Cholula, or Búfalo) to taste

1. Set a 12-inch skillet over medium heat and add the chorizo. Break up the clumps and cook until browned, about 8 minutes.

2. Add 1 or 2 tbsp. of oil (depending on how much fat the chorizo has rendered) and the beans.

3. Mash beans into a smooth paste as they come to a simmer. Add salt as needed. Stir nearly constantly for 10-15 minutes, until the consistency is that of very soft mashed potatoes. Keep warm over low heat and cover.

4. Set a large skillet over medium heat. Slice rolls open lengthwise. Hollow out the center of each, brush with oil, and lay cut-side down on the skillet until golden brown, about 2 minutes.

5. Smear ½ cup of the chorizo-bean mixture over the bottom half of each roll. (You’ll have about 1 cup of the mixture left over; cover and refrigerate for a midnight snack.) Top with slices of cheese and avocado. Dash on the hot sauce. Set the top of each roll in place and serve.

*There are two buns commonly used in Mexico for tortas: the oval, split-top, crusty French roll called a bolillo and the softer, flatter, three-hump roll called a telera — which is best for tortas crisped in a panini grill.

Mamacita’s Enchiladas Sencillas Rojas
Serves one hungry person

Ingredients
2/3 c. canola oil (divided in two portions)
3 yellow corn tortillas
2 c. adobo chile sauce (*see recipe on next page)
1 c. shredded chicken (roasted preferred; try your market’s rotisserie)
1 c. gouda cheese, grated

1. Preheat oven to 400°.

2. Heat oil in a skillet until a small piece of tortilla sizzles when it hits the pan. With paper towels close by, quickly submerge tortillas, turning once, about 15 seconds per side, until pliable, not chip-like. Set aside.

3. Heat the second portion of oil in a medium saucepan. Add 1 cup of the adobo chile sauce and fry (sauce should make a loud sound when it first hits the pan). Lower heat to a simmer. Add shredded chicken and stew until chicken reddens.

4. Divide the stewed chicken between the three par-fried tortillas and roll. Place ½ cup of adobo chile sauce in the bottom of a pan. Place the three chicken-filled tortillas on top of the sauce, then add all of the cheese and finish with the remaining ½ cup of sauce.

5. Bake in the oven until cheese is golden brown and sauce is bubbling around the sides, about 12-15 minutes.

6. Top enchiladas with whatever condiments you like: guacamole, cilantro, or some delicious queso cotija (a hard, salty cheese known as the Parmesan of Mexico).

Mamacita’s Adobo Chili Sauce
Makes five to six cups

Ingredients
¼ c. canola oil
6 guajillo chiles
3 California chiles
3 Nueva Mexico chiles
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 c. shallots, finely chopped
½ tsp. kosher salt
½ tsp. apple cider vinegar
½ tsp. cumin, toasted and ground
6 c. chicken stock
¼ tsp. Mexican oregano
¼ tsp. white pepper
Salt to taste

1. Heat oil in an iron skillet. Place chiles on the skillet and press down to get a good sear. After 10 seconds, use tongs to turn the chiles and repeat, giving 10 more seconds of heat to the other side. Remove and submerge in the hottest water your tap can give. Let steep for 20 minutes. Remove chiles from water and puree to a fine paste in a food processor.

2. Add garlic and shallots to a hot saucepan, being careful not to let either burn. Add salt and sweat for 5 minutes, until the shallots begin to caramelize.

3. Add vinegar and reduce, scraping off any caramelized bits that have formed on the bottom of the pan. Add chile paste and fry for 3 minutes.

4. Add cumin then chicken stock, oregano, and white pepper. Simmer for 20 minutes or until the sauce has reduced by one-fourth. Remove from heat, puree in a blender, and then strain.

5. Season with salt. Slather on enchiladas.

You bring the ‘stache, I’ll bring the Mariachi?

These Recipes and more from Daily Candy.

We stayed with Robert’s family – Bobbo as they call him, a nickname that elicits punches to the ovaries coming from anyone other than his mother.  The House home, the House house.  Not only was it awesome meeting a community member’s family (not to mention sleep in a WARM, clean, plush home with ridiculously-rad-water-pressure, but adorable seeing 6’6″ Robert – usually 100% business and admittedly a little high-strung – play with his shih tzu Guster AND line his family hallways with hilarious photos (the high school prom photos not lining the hallways, but definitely also whipped out).

We had  ‘family photo shoot’ of our very Cherry Abbey own in the park near Bobbo’s house, which reminded me a lot of the Botanical Gardens in St. Louis, one of the 1,000 Places to See Before You Die – check. The JVs in Spokane also rolled out the red carpet for out of town JVs such as ourselves and had a dance party / grill out / garage keg rally, the highlight of which was definitely the pumpkin chocolate chip cookies of course. (recipe to follow soon)

The long car ride was made tolerable with MGMT’s Time to Pretend, Spoon’s Girls Can Tell, and the always reliable NPR (with some irish music features), as well as some classic chabbey conversations, too close for comfort hand placements and sing-a-longs to Brendan’s classic folk/rock mix. I heart roadtrips.  Next time, we needs something better to snack on than foodbank Frosted Spooners….

cherry abbey (- niko)

My friends needed a little Monday mornings help between the hours of 7-9am.  So this little bundle of joy arrives to Cherry Abbey and greets sleepy heads as they come downstairs, eat breakfast, and try to read the newspaper (apparently she’s academic beyond her years….the paper is her favorite toy).  And her parents are so cool, they named her after a first-century woman named Junia who is mentioned in the bible as prominent among the early apostles.  My identification as a female is glowing   And this recent article in the The New York Times similarly ignited my identification as a Catholic, which has become a topic of defense lately, so this really was too good not to share.

A Church Mary Can Love

I heard a joke the other day about a pious soul who dies, goes to heaven, and gains an audience with the Virgin Mary. The visitor asks Mary why, for all her blessings, she always appears in paintings as a bit sad, a bit wistful: Is everything O.K.?

Mary reassures her visitor: “Oh, everything’s great. No problems. It’s just … it’s just that we had always wanted a daughter.”

That story comes to mind as the Vatican wrestles with the consequences of a patriarchal premodern mind-set: scandal, cover-up and the clumsiest self-defense since Watergate. That’s what happens with old boys’ clubs.

It wasn’t inevitable that the Catholic Church would grow so addicted to male domination, celibacy and rigid hierarchies. Jesus himself focused on the needy rather than dogma, and went out of his way to engage women and treat them with respect.

The first-century church was inclusive and democratic, even including a proto-feminist wing and texts. The Gospel of Philip, a Gnostic text from the third century, declares of Mary Magdalene: “She is the one the Savior loved more than all the disciples.” Likewise, the Gospel of Mary (from the early second century) suggests that Jesus entrusted Mary Magdalene to instruct the disciples on his religious teachings.

St. Paul refers in Romans 16 to a first-century woman named Junia as prominent among the early apostles, and to a woman named Phoebe who served as a deacon. The Apostle Junia became a Christian before St. Paul did (chauvinist translators have sometimes rendered her name masculine, with no scholarly basis).

Yet over the ensuing centuries, the church reverted to strong patriarchal attitudes, while also becoming increasingly uncomfortable with sexuality. The shift may have come with the move from house churches, where women were naturally accepted, to more public gatherings.

The upshot is that proto-feminist texts were not included when the Bible was compiled (and were mostly lost until modern times). Tertullian, an early Christian leader, denounced women as “the gateway to the devil,” while a contemporary account reports that the great Origen of Alexandria took his piety a step further and castrated himself.

The Catholic Church still seems stuck today in that patriarchal rut. The same faith that was so pioneering that it had Junia as a female apostle way back in the first century can’t even have a woman as the lowliest parish priest. Female deacons, permitted for centuries, are banned today.

That old boys’ club in the Vatican became as self-absorbed as other old boys’ clubs, like Lehman Brothers, with similar results. And that is the reason the Vatican is floundering today.

But there’s more to the picture than that. In my travels around the world, I encounter two Catholic Churches. One is the rigid all-male Vatican hierarchy that seems out of touch when it bans condoms even among married couples where one partner is H.I.V.-positive. To me at least, this church — obsessed with dogma and rules and distracted from social justice — is a modern echo of the Pharisees whom Jesus criticized.

Yet there’s another Catholic Church as well, one I admire intensely. This is the grass-roots Catholic Church that does far more good in the world than it ever gets credit for. This is the church that supports extraordinary aid organizations like Catholic Relief Services and Caritas, saving lives every day, and that operates superb schools that provide needy children an escalator out of poverty.

This is the church of the nuns and priests in Congo, toiling in obscurity to feed and educate children. This is the church of the Brazilian priest fighting AIDS who told me that if he were pope, he would build a condom factory in the Vatican to save lives.

This is the church of the Maryknoll Sisters in Central America and the Cabrini Sisters in Africa. There’s a stereotype of nuns as stodgy Victorian traditionalists. I learned otherwise while hanging on for my life in a passenger seat as an American nun with a lead foot drove her jeep over ruts and through a creek in Swaziland to visit AIDS orphans. After a number of encounters like that, I’ve come to believe that the very coolest people in the world today may be nuns.

So when you read about the scandals, remember that the Vatican is not the same as the Catholic Church. Ordinary lepers, prostitutes and slum-dwellers may never see a cardinal, but they daily encounter a truly noble Catholic Church in the form of priests, nuns and lay workers toiling to make a difference.

It’s high time for the Vatican to take inspiration from that sublime — even divine — side of the Catholic Church, from those church workers whose magnificence lies not in their vestments, but in their selflessness. They’re enough to make the Virgin Mary smile.

sweeter than a poetry slam.