Marie was a powerful woman. I hope you enjoy the poem.

Click here. The link will take you to the poem, found in its entirety, at the end of this month's Story Sparks.

  Actually every month could be mental health month. I had the joy this May of joining the Everett Women's Book Club's annual gathering. They celebrated their 120^th  year of service and were responsible within five years of formation in 1894 of starting the library in Everett, a pleasant Boeing-related town north of Seattle. The evening before, at the Everett library, I met a cousin I didn't know I had! What a treat. She got a picture of us together but I didn't get one so I'll have to hope she signs up for the newsletter so I'll find her again. The library at Tillamook, Oregon, home of that great cheese, brought more than 100 people out to celebrate stories this May. And what I spoke about often was the story of Dorothea Dix, an early reformer in mental health. One of the curious things believed  in the 1840s was that democracy was one of the causes of mental illness, a conclusion drawn from so many people becoming agitated by having to make their own choices and being responsible for the consequences, unlike in dictatorships. These agitations and worries appeared to increase during election years. I mused that perhaps some things have not changed. What has changed is a steady slipping backwards with fewer services being available to the mentally ill.  I work toward informing people of the great need to extend Mental Health services into the most underserved population of mentally ill people who now populate our prisons. Much work is left to do but I am hopeful. As the first president of the Czech  republic  Vaclac Havel once wrote about hope, that it is an "orientation of the heart, an orientation of the spirit. It's the ability to begin something not just because it has a chance to succeed but because it's a good thing to do." May you make your mark in May and all year through on behalf of improving the lives of others.

 

Above the Tree Line: A Memoir by Mary Montanye, Wild Ginger Press

 

Here's the blurb on the back of this fine memoir. "The traumas and losses of childhood are often buried. The child grows up appearing normal, unscathed and perhaps even successful. But often what is buried comes back to attack at the very moment when life is reaching its pinnacle. This is the story of one woman's spiral downward into physical and mental breakdown and her return to wholeness by courageously, and some would say recklessly, following her intuition."  

 

This memoir kept me turning pages. It's about a mother-daughter relationship and about marriage and about the beating down and coming back of the human spirit. It is authentically rich and emotionally grounded. I know it's about one woman's journey but I want every young girl to read of how easily we give up ourselves and how we leave our "home" and may never find it when we allow others to make choices for us, become addicted to pleasing others at the expense of our integrity. I had to keep breathing deep for Mary's vulnerability. There were a few too many parallels with my own life (she's also a clinical social worker, also came west to Colorado while I made my journey to Oregon. There was a first marriage that failed). I applaud  her clear prose and storytelling. I wanted more about her dogs earlier in the narrative  (I'm a dog person, what can I say?) and an occasional nod to that dramatic opening scene of a fire that begins the story in 2012, but these comments in no way detract from the intensity, grace, honesty and satisfaction of reading this memoir. If I had Mary's phone number I would have called. I'd like to be her new best friend, that's how honest and celebrating of life and finding home this book is. Highly recommended.

 

Jerry has moved all the things we brought from the ranch and stuffed into a horse trailer and a used U-Haul truck that we purchased into his new shop! My nephew came to get the old horse trailer that had been my parent's trailer years ago so it's seen better days. A business here in town got the U-Haul and they're very happy with it. We hired a young man to unload them both and now Jerry is trying to sort through what he has. After all, others packed up his tools and shop because of his illness. I tried to get him to think of it as a delayed Christmas, getting to see all those familiar things again. This shop journey has been interesting. One day he said he hoped it wasn't a mistake building it because he doesn't always have the energy to go out there and work. I assured him that as far as I was concerned, having a place he can call his own is a gift we've been given. Even if he doesn't go out there much, to know that if he feels like turning something on the lathe, he can. It's just another chapter in the "leaving the ranch." And I think this chapter has yet another happy ending. 

 

Warmly,

A Tribute to Madam Dorion - on the Occasion of the Dedication of An Historical Marker on French Prairie

You walked this land

Child in hand

Another carried on your back.

 

You walked this land.

They called you "Walks Far Woman."

You left familiar fields and oxbows;

Crossed rivers like the Wisconsin and the Mississippi.

Challenged the Missouri, Snake and John Day,

Dozens more.

Reaching the Columbia,

breathing the Pacific.

Finding home

beside the Willamette and the Pudding.

 

You walked this land

Daughter of the Ioway,

Sister to the Kalapuya and Chinook,

Carrying memories

rising Like the mists of mornings

Telling tales of love and loss and rescue

of human flesh and bones,

And spirit.

 

You walked this land

Cut black prairie earth with kapn,

Digging sticks of antler.

Fed your family and your village.

You stripped beaver hides, packed soft gold bales

the Company sold to clothe a continent.

You settled a territory and nation, flying

A flag of friendship, always.

 

You walked this land

On quiet moccasins,

leading Hunt and Astor by influence,

And then French friends, priests and sisters

New immigrants. You fostered children.

You healed. You laughed. You formed community

Exchanging burdens carried in the basket

Of deep love.

You accepted baptismal waters

And marriage blessings.

 

You walked this land and

leave behind a legacy

Of strong wisdom,

mother-love to many, your descendants, yes;

And we who claim your spirit as a light

Against an often darkened world.

You we honor, Madam Dorion.

You we salute with gratitude.

You: Woman, wife, mother; Marie

Jane Kirkpatrick , May 10 2014

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