Golden Hour

Local artist joins global day of action against climate change.

Tired of the inaction, global arts initiative Micro Galleries held their second global day of creative action in response to one of the biggest threats of our generation. Occurring on to coincide with the United Nations Climate Change conference (COP26) in Glasgow this project will bring together artists from all over the world to tackle climate inaction head on.

The idea was born after Micro Galleries Artistic Director, Kat Roma Greer spent time researching in The Arctic and at Al Gore’s Climate Reality Leadership Corps in late 2018. Kat saw a need for more accessible information about how climate disruption and inaction was impacting the world's most vulnerable people. When Kat put the call out for artists to join her, Tara Chadwick answered the call.

This month and next, the effect of seasonal "king tides" is creating a climate disaster in the form of visible flooding and invisible salt water intrusion into our soil and water table along the banks of this river which have been used for thousands of years by humans seeking to live a good, healthy life. This river has been deemed unusable for human contact several times over the past three to five years due to chronic overdevelopment and problematic decision making on the part of those responsible for ensuring safe and effective infrastructure. We must, as citizens of Mother earth, intervene now to ensure that the trajectory of our species is altered to realign with the geometry of nature. – Tara Chadwick.

Tara Chadwick and Micro Galleries see the need for more accessible information about how climate disruption and inaction is impacting all of us, and art is a great way to do this. An opinion supported by Bill McKibben, best known as the leading American environmentalist’s and ‘world’s best green journalist’. When Bill heard about this global day of art action in 2019, he threw his support behind it stating, ‘environmentalists are good at bar graphs and statistical tables.. but that’s only half of the human brain. We also need art and music to reach our more visceral core. That’s why this initiative from Micro Galleries is so vital.’

Tara Chadwick’s works streamed live over 24 hours, and will be included in an online exhibition and catalogue at www.microgalleries.org

To find out how you can support this day of action and watch the art unfold, head to https://microgalleries.org/program

End

 

About The Artist

Tara is an Indigenous woman, a member of the African Diaspora, a grandchild of the Maya and Mesoamerican People of Belize, Mexico and Central America and of the original people of the land we now know as Western Europe. It is her vision that we can all return to a life of harmony with the cycles of nature.

You can see Tara’s latest work at The Missing Paart in Wynwood during Art Miami Week and in “Neo.Rev,” a city wide public art exhibition by Save Art Space from Nov. 22 to Dec. 18. Later this winter, Tara will be launching “Proyecto Papalotl,” engaging Golden Age Adults in the art of Mesoamerican Danza, made possible with support from the Broward County Cultural Division and sponsored in part by the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Arts and Culture and the Florida Council on Arts and Culture.

Updates and details at taraalomachadwick.blogspot.com or www.instagram.com/wabigun.

 

About Micro Galleries

Micro Galleries is a free, independent global arts initiative that uses art as a vehicle to create positive change. We do this through creative interventions in public spaces, workshops, art tours, symposiums, think tanks, and residencies.

www.microgalleries.org

www.facebook.com/microgalleries

www.instagram.com/microgalleries

 

Media contact details

Local:                   Tara Chadwick                 wabigun@yahoo.com

Global:                 Claudia Lee                       media@microgalleries.org

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Golden hour

Tara Chadwick

New River, Fort Lauderdale, Florida

 

This month and next, the effect of seasonal "king tides" is creating a climate disaster in the form of visible flooding and invisible salt water intrusion into our soil and water table along the banks of this river which have been used for thousands of years by humans seeking to live a good, healthy life. And this river has been deemed unusable for human contact several times over the past three to five years due to chronic overdevelopment and problematic decision making on the part of those responsible for ensuring safe and effective infrastructure. We must, as citizens of Mother earth, intervene now to ensure that the trajectory of our species is altered to realign with the geometry of nature.

“Golden Hour” seeks to support, stimulate and encourage action oriented solutions to the current climactic conditions including public awareness, personal responsibility and biological accountability. We put ourselves in to this mess. By examining what we do, individually, collectively and globally, we can get ourselves back on track with the original instructions all human beings received at the beginning of their time on earth. This message will be shared with the community on the historic banks of the New River in a public participative, interactive installation incorporating the interconnectedness of sound, movement, land, water, people and the concept of the golden repair on a local and global climate scale.

Multiple forms of art including sound, movement and visuals are used in collaboration with citizen science based sea level rise research, action and solutions.

We have a vast capacity to effect change especially due to our large proportion of global tourism. By creating this model of interactive public art, visitors and residents will be inspired to engage in work that questions the status quo and access new avenues of creative problems solving in areas of climate resilience, climate policy and climate change mitigation.

As I reflect on the various actions taking place today, and those we engaged in ourselves, it dawns on me that humans have a great capacity to make giant leaps in conscience and practice. At one time in our history, we learned how to harvest the power of the sun in an element we now call fire. At another time in our history, we learned how to coax a grass into a seed that now feeds the world! At this time, our challenge is much simpler and doable: restore our technology and daily living to practices that do not harm the earth.

 

November 6^th, 2021

9:00 AM to 7:00 PM

 

The Beginning

FIU Sea Level Rise Solutions Day – Engaged in Citizen Science with the Institute of Environment at a location determined by the FIU research team to monitor urban flooding at King Tides

Upon arrival at 9:30 am on Saturday, November 6, 2021

 

The level of street flooding above storm drain at 10 am on Saturday, November 6, 2021

         

Refractometer reading indicates salinity is 10% in sample 1 from 10 am

 

 

Second samples were taken at the appointed time of 10:30 am on Saturday, November 6, 2021

Street flooding rose ¾ inch in 30 minutes.

One golden marine life was observed struggling to survive but still alive sending ripples of urgency

  

Salinity of the standing water above the storm drain increased by 2% in 30 minutes.

The photo on the right was taken by group member Ihiyo Chadwick (age 10).

By the time we left at 11 am the street flooding was up to four inches and still rising with an observed increase in oil mixed into the flood water.

 

The elevation of the surface of the sea water is well above the level of the roadway.

 

A little after 11 am, we packed up and drove the water samples to the FIU Campus at Oleta River and Biscayne Bay where they were refrigerated to preserve the viability for testing protocols. We are awaiting the lab results. On the way back, we stopped to observe a few other local residents engaged in their own creative contributions to the global day for climate repair

 

 

The Middle

The Bees’ tree with Golden Skirt Bridge

Me and Tree

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CWFZhVbFOrS/

Moss (video)

Golden Orb Weaver

https://www.instagram.com/p/CWFZeqjvEwi/

Butterfly (video)

Concha

Canoeing

Then we returned to the New River to complete our documentation of the Golden Hour

https://www.instagram.com/p/CV_nZ5aJv7Q/

Water (video)

 

The End

Water and Golden Bridge

Restoration is a collaborative venture!

#NeverAgainWhen?

This week as I blissfully go about my daily business, it is with a little more deliberate effort at intentionally blocking out the sights and sounds associated with yet another school shooting massacre here on our own soil.

It should not be so surprising, and yet the horror of it, children being massacred in their own classrooms, by their peers, is the stuff that can stomp hope out of the most optimistic of hearts.

My teenager has almost no recollection of a time when school did not involve violence. There is of course, the daily meanness and bullying that seems to have happened in public schools since they were instituted in this country as a mechanism for socialization into the melting pot. But then there is also the unimaginable lockdown drills practiced on a regular basis that my son tells me he cannot talk to me about because it will be too upsetting to me. And then there are the drills that only the teachers prepare for... Teacher prep time used to be for grading, lesson planning, and designing the best hallway bulletin board in the school.  Now it's for laminating dark poster paper to darken windows in the hopes that it will reduce the chances of an active shooter taking aim at a classroom window.

Yes, I have been putting a lot of effort into not thinking about it this week. Since I heard of the Santa Fe shooting last Friday, my approach has been, just don't think about it... I wonder how many of our business leaders, legislators and lawmakers follow suit with my attempt at self-imposed apathy? How many of our children have to do their best this week to "just not think about it..."? Is that the solution to problem solving that we are role modeling now?  "Just don't think about it." If we do just pretend that the problem does not exist... will it actually cease to exist? If we wish to take the approach of the legendary ostrich in the sand... that is our choice, however, as we have learned from Columbine and Sandy Hook and Red Lake, and Pulse and Parkland and Santa Fe, we can forget and pretend and ignore and deny, but sooner or later, the reality is going to hit us too. If we continue to do nothing to support the action required to successfully ensure that gun violence never again plucks the hearts out of parents and siblings and peers who will never again touch the hands or kiss the cheeks of their loved ones, then inevitably this preventable public health epidemic of disasterous proportions will eventually touch each of us. Like one of the parents of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School said, "We didn't think it could be us."

We have choices to make. Sit and do nothing, or stand and deliver change into the waiting arms of our young people. Their ability to live is determined by our perseverence in maintaining our level of civic engagement in the process of democracy which by its very nature requires us to participate, share our views and work together to provide solutions. Together we can solve this crisis. Today if we all wanted to. Re-authorize the collection, compilation and analysis of gun violence data as the public health crisis that it is. Apply standard epidemiological, intervention and prevention procedures and practices. Fund local grassroots, community organizations to provide outreach, case management and harm reduction services. Do what has been proven to work through science. Replicate successful programming, not just in the property-tax-rich schools but in all neighborhoods, schools and organizations.

My 6 year old is counting the number of days left until the end of the school year. Today marks the 97th day since the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School at the northern edge of our public school district. How many more days will go by until we can all assure our Kindergarten children that it is safe for them to go to school....? What are we doing to ensure that day comes?

This Friday at Miramar Cultural Center, I will join with students from Parkland and throughout our Broward County School District and Miramar Mayor Wayne Messam to stand with them, listen, and help form a plan for action. What will you do...?

Poem dedicated to students of Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School

by Francis Vernon

http://thewestsidegazette.com/i-vote-we-vote/

Listen to @elstentorres new song, "Never Again" here: https://t.co/dVO3wr2aYH

— WLRN Sundial (@WLRNSundial) May 22, 2018

How do we move forward? #WhatNOW?

Healing crisis is a constant necessity in today's complex, stratified, divisive society. The events that unfolded 9 days ago in #Parkland, near Coral Springs, Florida have pushed many of us to the tipping point. And yet, in communities throughout Florida and the US and around the world, crisis, especially children in crisis is an ongoing issue that has required attention for a very long time... generations in fact.

A post shared by Tara Chadwick (@bawshkeengwabigun) on Feb 15, 2018 at 11:53am PST

This week, while our attention south of the border has been on dealing with grief, funerals and the immediacy of school safety issues within the nation's sixth largest public school district, our neighbors to the north were dealt two completely independent court decisions in which the killing of two Indigenous youth by two different people, in two different provinces, in two very distinct circumstances, both resulted in European males receiving not guilty verdicts, while the children victims are no longer alive to tell their side of the story.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/tina-fontaine-verdict-march-1.4548692
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/09/world/canada/canada-saskatchewan-murder-indigenous.html

It is imperative that we all employ our intrinsic critical thinking skills in everyday decision making. Especially so in this day and age. It is equally important that we also take time to allow the growth, repair and healing of our emotional skills as well.

We need both, together, integrated and healthy. After a week like this, wholeness and restoration of wellbeing is going to take some time and effort. The students, teachers, healers, counsellors, administrators and decision makers must all be included in efforts to intentionally regain wellness, within our selves, families and communities.

Here are a couple of resources courtesy of thunderbirdpf.org that have helped other communities move forward after experiencing traumatic crises. Check em out. See what you think. Call,text, msg. Reach out. Let's chat. Let's build together!!

Preparing for earth time

For parents and everyone the advent of Summer inevitably brings along with it a string of seasonal wonders and a certain set of challenges, scheduling changes, and out of school time activities to determine and implement.

Finally got my sisters to @FrostScience ♡♡♡ pic.twitter.com/sd27tFYL5U

— Tara Chadwick (@wabigun) June 13, 2017

For me and my family this summer was no different. There was camp to organize. Summer trips to consider. Summer work schedules to juggle. And the age-old question of what to do with a teenager, camp, work, volunteer, or couch potato?

...wi deh pan di road!

A post shared by Tara Chadwick (@bawshkeengwabigun) on Jun 26, 2017 at 2:15pm PDT

I don't think you ever know as a parent whether you're making good decisions at any given time. You can only ever do your best to consider all the options and Hippocratically hope that at the very least your choices do no harm to your children.

And so it is that we model through the beauty and Heat that is the south Florida summer in search of shade from the intense sunshine and splashes of 85 degree water which we consider cool.

The search for balance is epic and continual. Just as you think you've got things figured out, something else happens to make you start from scratch.

#sustainable #water #transportation #canoe #dugout #dorey #wood #tree #carving pic.twitter.com/OoSFiGguB5

— Tara Chadwick (@wabigun) June 20, 2017

Summer blooms

Marie Huntley, aka Ms. Peaches is a force to be reckoned with in the Sistrunk community of Fort Lauderdale.  An extremely talented singer, doer and community historian, Ms. Peaches is one of those people who is alway encouraging good stuff to happen in her neighborhood.

I've been thinking a lot about stories, storytelling, history and how we each find inspiration and encouragement to keep going in times of difficulty, and to go as far as we can in times of joy...  about how we can see mirrors of our story in the histories of others... and how important our stories are, to ourselves, our families, and our communities.  Together, our stories are our true history.

So often, we tell versions of history that have been learned from books, or elders, or the land and geographies that we've come through... but every once in a while, we get to reflect, and tell a little bit of the story that comes through us, from our own life experience. It is these nuggets of light, understanding, memory and insight that I find most impactful when listening to the words people share.

So, in the spirit of reclaiming our own narratives, telling our own stories, and with the encouragement of Ms. Peaches... here goes:

My story begins in the hearts of the continents we now know as America, Africa and on that island we now call the UK. My heartbeat began in the womb of a woman who survived a thousand wars, over six continents, from a seed planted by the grandson of a hunter who'd been on his island for almost a million years.

My parents remain one of the most unlikely odd couples to make it through 45 years of marriage in the most dire of social realities.  One of the things they had in common was that they were both immersed in the lifestyle of 1950s anglican ministry.  My mother talks about attending church sponsored after school activities every single day of the week.  My father was an altar boy, though I don't ever remember his mother, my grandmother speak about church, except for christenings, weddings and funerals.  But for all their early involvement in church, almost all my early memories are of being with my parents at parties, gatherings and outside on the land, either in the back yard, on a beach or near a river.  I spent almost all my summers either scouring the Scarborough Bluffs or scampering up the steps of the Maya "pyramids" and sometimes, both! I didn't play video games or even board games, really, my toys were twigs, flowers and found objects.  And my favorite pass time was sauterning along the edges of the water and the wilderness... in that respect, not much has changed.

My earliest memory of school is walking along the fence, picking up sticks, and using them to play the chain links like a piano, listening to the different sounds the metal would make depending on the size, length and width of each stick.  I still remember a few of the songs and poems I learned in pre-school.  My mother tells me that once, when I was four, we were walking in "The Guild Inn" and she couldn't find me anywhere... only to look around a large boulder to find me teaching a group of German tourists my favorite nursery school song, and they were singing it too, despite the fact that they spoke no English, nor I German.  Art and teaching are in the blood.  My mom and dad met teaching, I spent a year living with my Aunt while she was an art and history teacher, my sister taught art and, despite my mothers advice to the contrary, I also taught math and social studies through art for 7-12 graders.  My passion now, though, is community based education. Those formal and informal learning opportunities we place in front of folks to learn something new, whether they thought they wanted to know or not. This translates well to a variety of interests, like community outreach, social media, museums, health, wellness, prevention programming and community building.

The work my mother put in to making sure that I know as fully as possible who I am propelled me to pursue a career in anthropology, archaeology, art and wellness. At the tender age of 17, I won an entrance scholarship to York University in my hometown of Toronto.  Working my way through college, I spent my summers at the Government of Belize's Department of Archaeology, and winters working part time at the front desk of the Royal Ontario Museum and as a research assistant to Dr. Elizabeth Graham.  I had so many wonderful women helping me learn during these adolescent years: Pauline Shirt, Deanna Sheridan, Sadie Buck, and the late Shirley Shilling & Irma Martin, just to name a few of the feminine forces that helped shape my world.

#tbt #marchbreak @ROMtoronto #whereswaldo #sharkweek #letsplayball #intotheheartofafrica who's that #26 & #28 pic.twitter.com/OaXyJlnq51

— Tara Chadwick (@wabigun) March 23, 2017

Eventually, once I finally graduated, I went back to the Belize Department of Archaeology to work as staff Museologist/ Curator as part of the Maya Area Sites Development Programme. When that grant funded project was complete, I took what I thought would be a two month break to spend time with my aging grandparents back in Toronto. That break led to an unexpected two year apprenticeship with one of Indian Country's most well known educators, Dr. Edward Benton Banaise. At the conclusion of working to help develop (and name) his most recent publication: Anishinabe Almanac, I once again thought I'd be heading home to my mother's land in Mesoamerica. This time, it was the opening of a community based school chartered specifically to teach Native American youth through an integrated arts approach that kept me grounded in the Midwest.  It would be another 13 years before I finally got the call from my mother that it was time I returned to their chosen home halfway between Mesoamerica and the Great Lakes: The Greater Everglades region, right here in #OurMiramar.

#mesoamericandanza

A post shared by andy (@bhappyb) on Feb 4, 2017 at 3:05pm PST

So after earning my Bachelor of Arts Degree, being made Midewiwin, earning my Mexica traje, and working alongside some of the very best educators, historians, community builders and storytellers, I packed up the treehouse apartment, and headed back to the Sunshine State. That was four years ago now.  I've completed all my life goals, except one: to relearn one of my ancestral Maya languages.  I know words here and there, from the study of archaeology and danza, but to be able to string those together in a sequence, to speak thought into being through language, my language... that is the one thing I have yet to do on this earth... hopefully before it's time for me to return my borrowed bag of bones to the Mother Earth from whence they were constructed.

We all come to this conscious part of Earth with a gift and for a purpose.  Mine is to be as fully who I am as I can. It's a journey that I'm still on, still struggling with every day, and also one in which I find great joy and satisfaction.  I hope that sharing this small piece of who I am will help to encourage someone out there to pursue their passion a little further, persevere a little longer and reach a little higher, for what we aspire to is what we are here to do.

Have a great summer - catch ya next month!!

Bawshkeengwabigun.

Winds of Change

#MesoamericanDanza presentation at Treehugger Organic Farms

Today we said our farewell to a piece of land that has sustained us and our community here in South Broward County for the past 4 years... a permaculture oasis in the midst of the concrete jungle we know as South Florida, east of the Everglades... a local food sanctuary known as Treehugger Organic Farms, now listed as permanently closed on your google GPS mapping system.

It was a bittersweet walk through the daikon radishes, lesser known banana species, greens, fruit trees, birds and butterflies. This farm felt like home, that safe place you can go to for peace, quiet, and tenderly cared for oceans of green.

@bawshkeengwabigun @treehuggercommunity #togetherwegrow

A post shared by Scott Evan Schlossman (@iloveushutup) on Apr 30, 2017 at 2:34pm PDT

There was a food forest on a mulch hill, a coconut grove interspersed with comfrey plants, florida nopalitos, tumeric and ginger, a spring fed pond that supplies water to the farm, and rotating fields of boniato, tomato, kale, collards, mustard, fennel, spinach, beans, millet, sugar cane, and just about everything in between.

Winds of change... @TreehuggerFarms -> #TogetherWeGrow https://t.co/uRJ5XiRj2L

Sign up for news on how you can help create #foodsecurity pic.twitter.com/y5Sqb5TSzK

— Tara Chadwick (@wabigun) May 1, 2017

One day after the mega #PeoplesClimateMarch in several cities, and on the eve of #InternationalWorkersDay, it seemed like a huge mountain to move.  The reality of agricultural land tenure here in Florida is that access to farmable land is unstable, market based, and temporary.   In reflecting, I realize that personally, I subscribe more to the Haudenosaunee approach to land management whereby we humans are responsible to protect, nurture and strengthen the land/ soil/ earth, on behalf of it's only true owners, that generation of unborn children who has not yet arrived here via the miracle we know as birth.

Miami Herald photo by Al Diaz

What a timely consideration given the fact that I am, for the first time in my life, the biological auntie to one of these not-yet-born owners of the earth.  But in the volatile market economy that most of us are engaged within by choice or necessity, land is but a commodity, like humans once were, to be bought, sold and traded at the will of those who believe themselves to be in positions of power over others.

But this momentary twinge of grief in losing a space in which to enjoy the company of others, and ourselves in the company of Mother Earth and her pretties, is just a reminder that in fact we are owners of nothing, but rather bearers of ideas, thoughts, insights, and the potential to seed a new generation of humans with the capacity to return to a life steeped in nature, health and harmony with the cycles of all living beings including the soil, rock, sand and oil that make up the material we know as earth.

The beginning of Florida Spring!

From north to south on this part of our continent, March is the beginning of the time when the waters begin to flow freely again over the surface of the earth, be they melting fresh, salt or sap.  World Water Day, International Rivers Day and World Water Week fall within this time, as does the beginning of the flow of life giving maple sap in the northern climates of the eastern woodlands, my birth land.

#WorldWaterDay #SpringEquinox #latergram #itsrighthereinmiramar (photo by @adriennechadwick)

A post shared by Tara Chadwick (@bawshkeengwabigun) on Mar 25, 2017 at 8:20pm PDT

Like wise, as beings of the water, we were busy this month, being who we are, remembering from whence life flows... in fact, as we write, there is a four day walk for the rights of mother earth happening right here in greater Miami led by two of the indigenous people that take care of this part of the earth. They are walking to the Miami Commission meeting on April 4th to bring attention to the need for all of us to make decisions that will result in a positive impact for the earth and all of the beings who live amongst us.



May this flow of life continue throughout our season, our year, and the bundle of years that we know as an era. Stand up kind and gentle soldiers, our time to heal one another of our anger, apathy and bad decision making is now. Let us work togther to make a place that is safe for our children.

#tb of artist & dancer Tara Chadwick at the YAA Festival of the Arts,March 11th #Repost @bawshkeengwabigun ・・・ #art🎨 #arts #artsmatter #browardarts #SistrunkAIR #mesoamericandanza (Photo: @rkm_photography_) #yaaarthouse #nwgardenslove #33311 #northwestgardenscommunity #dixiecourt #drkennedyhomes #dance #nativedance #drums

A post shared by Northwest Gardens Community (@nwgcommunity) on Mar 17, 2017 at 2:07pm PDT

And still we rise...

This last month or so has been a whirlwind of emotions and activity, from the largest ever mobilization of women in the United States, to the apparent divide and conquer tactics that seem to be part of the legislative docket... And yet, through it all, I do my best to remain focused, fearless and determined in my resolve to provide a solid path to the future. Not much to say, lots to do.  Here are a few snapshots in that effort. Never give up!!!

Guess who won a Puffin Foundation Grant?
THANK YOU

Thx for the embed @WPLGLocal10 @LJLiveTV - standing in unity for a return to harmony.... #TrayvonMartin4Ever pic.twitter.com/xMl9pWWdni

— Tara Chadwick (@wabigun) February 12, 2017

Building unity (Photo: @cityoffortlauderdale)

A post shared by Tara Chadwick (@bawshkeengwabigun) on Jan 17, 2017 at 6:03am PST

Ripples Water Reflection

A post shared by Tara Chadwick (@bawshkeengwabigun) on Feb 26, 2017 at 4:28pm PST

Got the black shirt, long skirt memo! Didn't know I'd be trying something new #Kwanzaa #NewYearsEve #WeAre all #Africa (photos: Steve Vinik) pic.twitter.com/p3UKSFJXu1

— Tara Chadwick (@wabigun) January 10, 2017

#mesoamericandanza

A post shared by andy (@bhappyb) on Feb 4, 2017 at 3:05pm PST

A Return to Turtle Road

Yesterday morning, I pulled up happily up to the entrance gate of John U Lloyd State Park a full half hour earlier than anticipated. Early morning weekday traffic to the South Florida Beach was a lot more user friendly that I thought it would be.  A friend from the South Florida Day of the Dead celebration invited us out to do a presentation on #FTLhistory at the summer camp she coordinates.

Mornings at the beach are a rare beauty for me. A beach visit, however fleeting, without my own children is something I hadn't experienced in over a decade! It is truly amazing the gift that just a few moments can be in one's life. I'd been thinking of a young friend this week, hearing news of the #Moonshot meetings, and missing the amazing person she was... but the intense light of the rising sun on the water and the graceful pose of the maturing sea oat pods distracted my thoughts.  I looked toward the horizon, wondering what beauty might still be ahead on my own journey through life.

As I traversed the few paces along the shoreline back toward the pavilion where my work day would soon begin, a peculiar pattern caught my attention.  I knew this u shaped track from seeing it once before, cradled in midnight darkness.  This was the evidence of a nesting sea turtle.  I was impressed by the realization that several hours earlier, a massive, 200 pound mature female turtle had emerged from the open sea at this precise location of her hatching 5 to 50 years prior.  Soon enough the park ranger arrived to investigate and document the nest. Fifty two days from now, the eggs should hatch, barring any hazards like racoons, coyotes, or overly rough seas.

That 20 minutes may be the most gratifying observation that I've ever made. It provided me with a much needed reminder that in life you may need to return to the slow road of a turtle, but the road of a turtle is strategic, definite, purposeful and carries a message that is intergenerational in its impact. May we all experience the beauty of a return to turtle road...

Turtle Track Pic

More turtle track pics

Last year's #WorldOceansDay #SeaTurtle nesting adventure

The Magical Month of March: Whiz... Blurrr... Wheee...!

Watching the spiral of the seasons change fly by at gale force speed; reflecting on thirty years of work in the field of museums, education and community building; ten years since the water forum in Mexico; feeling gleeful and daunted by that double four approaching just one equinox away...

The struggle of life is a good one, seems that we're always headed up hill, but that's how it is when you're engaged in the process of building, constructing, however, wherever it's possible to carve out a little space for equity, dignity, dialogue and learning.

It's tough at times, intentionally participating in this collaborative venture to prevent oblivion with the few hundred ties we have to other members of this human species we proudly belong to...

And then there are times just like this moment, when in the process of making new connections, you come to realize how delicious it is to enjoy the tattered, frayed imperfection of those old and older relationships that have been there all along.

This month as I attended the annual Baron Bliss Day (aka Heroes and Benefactors Day) gathering of the Belize Association of Florida, I watched the older heads come in, with their grown kids, grand kids and great grands... and I watched my kids play with them the same way I used to play in my day... and suddenly I remembered my spot on the living room floor, folding letters and stuffing envelopes at just about the same age my pre-teen son is now. The memory was so sudden and vivid and it brought back a host of others... of floats & banners, buttons & beads...

The next day I checked the database... 30 years it's been since that moment! The Belize Association has been an active part of the South Florida community and the Belizean Diaspora for thirty years this year. That's my formative training. Do what you must to build something. Make the time. Find the resources. Keep it going. Make it happen. I am so glad that I happened to be here this year. To remember. To appreciate. To mark the anniversary of this work that my mom, dad and their friends did to build something for our community.

Of course, now... the question is... "what will I do..."  #laluchasigue

News Reel on Baron Bliss Day at Belize Association of Florida (minute 1:12 - 1:34)

On Preservation & Restoration

Just a few short words this month - early for a change - because they want to be said now. Here's what happened today at work. I was there a bit earlier than usual - it was my first day of tour listening and we knew we'd have a sizeable group to prep for. After a bit of running to and fro, a glint caught my eye and to my dismay, I saw a beautiful irridescent spotted butterfly fall to the ground just outside the replica of Fort Lauderdale's first school house. I froze in my tracks - worried that I'd inadvertently squished it. However, as my internal frames-per-second slowed down, I took the time to see what was happening in the micro habitat of this hopefully-not-squished butterfly.

To my relief and delight, the swish of my skirt had not squished the butterfly's guts out, but had knocked a recently hatched atala and its chrysalis - to which it was clinging - off the coontie plant that is their home. Upon further observation of the tiny neighborhood - I was treated to a beautiful surprise. What I had stumbled across was an urban neighborhood of #atala butterflies in both pre and post hatching phases of their life cycle.

These butterflies I knew were special because I had heard about them last year and how they are making a remarkable recovery from the brink of human - induced extinction. For anyone who's read my past work, interest in insects should come as no surprise. But to see a whole microcosm of atala life... with their beautiful sparkly wing spots and that remarkable red thorax... just a most incredible gift to witness. And I am so thankful!

Then after the noon day sun began to recede, I realized my second incredible  gift of the day. I was standing on the boardwalk overlooking the wetland trail at Miramar Pinelands. As the soft shell turtles swam over and the waxing moon tipped over the shallows... I remembered that this too was an ecosystem in regeneration - restored to its historical contours and hydrological morphology as closely as possible. By returning the land to the way it was at the time of the first European settlements, the ecosystem has been able to regenerate itself - naturally returning turtles, fish, frogs, foxes, ospreys, even an eagle and untold numbers of insects... (See my Miramar Pinelands media set on facebook)

These two distinct yet comparable success stories in human conservation and restoration practices are just what the doctor ordered in my current, not-so-stress-free analysis of what we need to do to get back to basic respect of each other and this beautiful garden we have the luxury and responsibility to live in and care for. No matter how many cool space travel pics NASA releases, as humans, we are still bound to this earth in a trust relationship with our future generations that we need to seriously reflect on and start acting like responsible adults. 

We may move slowly at times - but it is truly wondrous to see the fruit of an unfulfilled childhood dream come to life before your eyes - that is the miracle we call life unfolding around us each and every moment - if we just slow down enough to notice.