OnLine With Zoe

Moral Bankruptcy

I have never cared for DJ Trump. I suppose there will be a rush to step away and try to authenticate one’s revulsion. People will find pride in when and why they spat him out. Long before any US mayors declared their city would not allow DJ in their limits, reasonable people, everyday people refused him safe passage into their homes via NBC. The tower, the golf course, the fully augmented gold encrusted life was enough for people who work for a living. Surely his vile talk about Rosie threw me off with no returns.

 

However when he began to run for political office, there was something nagging me, like a low battery light deep in my internal library. It needled me. There was something chirping which came into focus the day DJ Trump lied about his love for the bible and its second place winner, The Art of the Deal. BINGO. 

March, 1995, I found a book, What Really Matters by Tony Schwartz. It was pricey. It must have been reviewed in one of the dozen spiritual magazines I got back then. I was diving deep into Ken Wilbur and Andrew Harvey at that time and Tony Schwartz was swimming in that pool of conscious mindful seekers. He was on the physical journey that I was taking through books.

In 1988, Tony took a 4 year road trip to discover what really moved Americans. He crossed the country making inquiries with all of the named luminaries of the day.  From Esalen to the Enneagram, from Ram Dass to Betty Edwards, from Maslow to Kornfield; Tony was making his way on a starship, through a galaxy of the mind.

Why did this NY Times reporter and Newsweek writer get bitten by the bug of spiritual inquiry? He explains it clearly in the forward. Tony Schwartz had been the ghost writer for The Art of the Deal.

A few disparate sentences:

• It was in the aftermath of The Art of the Deal that I became interested in meditation.
• I began to look more widely for wisdom. Only much later did it dawn on me that I was following a tradition that dates back thousands of years: the search for the Holy Grail, for meaning for the true self—the path that Joseph Campbell calls the hero’s journey.
• I was determined to identify a path and a set of practices that truly led to a more satisfying and meaningful life.

At the publication party, Tony was in a receiving line with DJ & Ivana. Gold everything, champagne everywhere. Leon Spinks, Michael Douglas, Cheryl Tiegs and Norman Mailer made their appearance. “I’d spent two years seeing the world through Trump’s eyes, and I’d grown accustomed to living at his dizzying pace, cramming my days full of action and activity." 

It is a BIG dream but I am capable of BIG dreams and I am dreaming that this whole country takes the escalator down, leaves the golden tower and the moral bankruptcy of DJ Trump and begins a meaningful pilgrimage for wisdom and, “pursues a richer, more authentic and more complete life.”

The Joy of Serialization

Admittedly I began writing in serial format out of impatience.  I wanted to begin ASAP.  I want the reader engaged ASAP.  My mind, most minds, work in serialized form.  We collect information and it keeps collecting and then crystallizes ~ something I call the Diamond Process.  We certainly don’t wait for an entire life to be lived before we can learn from it.  We prioritize, arrange by topic and love to wrap our minds around a single expanding idea.

A few readers have written me to point out that I have left things out of Alice Paul’s chronological life.  It never interested me to write a biography of Miss Alice Paul.  I want to use her lessons, her strategy and, truly most important, her NEVER waning dedication to a singular issue.  From her first visit to a Settlement House, this banker’s daughter decided that constitutional equality was the only lasting, full answer.  No matter how the question was posed or discovered, Miss Paul would not step one toe beyond her mission.  That interests me.   

Of course no biography has come even near to knowing her.  After more than two years in Alice Paul submersion, I feel qualified to say that the best information is 1) the interview with Amelia Fry, 2) articles and things that pop up from google alerts, 3) interviews with women who knew her, and 4) mad curiosity.  Susan Ware may not like her, people definitely found her to be stern, I found her to be the pinnacle of etiquette and tenacity.  I adore her.   Do not misunderstand, as I have written, she was often very unlikable.  I have never held back from digging beyond the hat and fur.  Test your love with inquiry or it is not real. 

What I find so disturbing, so frustrating, so maddening can be illustrated with comparing any decent bibliography of hers with any of her fellow student, Mohandas Gandhi.  There are countless books on the lessons and strategies of Gandhi and zero on Alice Paul.  There are books about Gandhi’s hybrid faith of Islam and Hindu but none on the Mindful Enlightenment of Miss Paul’s Quakerism.  In other words, there is an inherent sexism that shouts from my two principle library collections.  Of course, the fact that they both were taught by Mrs. Pankhurst is almost unknown. 

Serialization allows me to pick a subject and dig deeply.  First I built a foundation simply so I would know where to look and see who knows what.  You need to separate the light bearing jewels from the muddy lop-sided opinions.  That took a lot of reading and a lot of aggravation.  Miss Catt did all she could to bury the light.  Mrs. Belmont wielded her check book like a cattle prod.  Some authors have no interest in what Miss Paul did after August 26, 1920.  The NWP Board of Directors voted 25 / 0 to not financially assist her when she reached her 90’s.  To know her fully, you need a wide lens.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman, (Herland free online) Alexander Dumas, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Charles Dickens all wrote in serial format.  I am not comparing my writing to theirs in any way.  I am admiring the writing process.  I have already discovered the meditative and prayerful reading process of Lectio Divina.  Now I can apply it to non-linear topical writing.  It is the form I prefer ~ the essay but with a central character whom I admire more everyday.  And, there is the added bonus of bridging her strategy and inspiration to current day activism.  

I spent a month reading, thinking and writing on:

1)     Activists' inspiring relationships
2)     Actvists' core
3)     Use of the public sphere
4)     Breaking convention

Now I get to spend a month on Silence, an asset Miss Paul used so very wisely.  Something the Women in Black and Standing Man used.  Zen Buddhists master.  Musicians treasure by surrounding it with notes.  Life is episodic, sitting in the pickling juice.  I get to sit in the light, wait for what surfaces and write the next chapter. 

My Fifth Book, Miss Alice Paul ~ The Heart of an Activist

My fifth book.  I am thinking my last book.  Not because of a time element but that I have chosen a different literary device and delivery system.  It took me years to build confidence about this content and another year to really suffer over the method. 

Of course, it is about Miss Alice Paul.  She is my primary muse.  I have invested forty years in knowing her, understanding her and, sometimes, unintentionally emulating her.  I mean much more than fasting.  She was a force of nature.  She was single minded, unrelenting, often rude and always challenging.  Miss Paul was not at the front of the march but in the office drawing maps, listing components, assigning tasks.  She was the brains of the operation and if it did not go her way, she was not happy.

On the other hand, she had her reasons as most often when things went off the rails it was because people did not listen or, worse yet, did not ask.  She was not a diva.  She did not attend final votes or bill signings.  She was arrested, fasted, was force-fed and served the longest prison sentence.  She was prosecuted by the Department of Justice and labeled as mentally ill by the jail psychologist.  She was not austere but deeply intentional.  She was privately conservative but publically the most radical.   Well known to be unappreciative, however she would say that the work is for equality not for her, so she did not have to say thank you.  To know her, you have to face a lot of facts. 

I have read over fifty books now and have another fifty on the table.  I have learned that many authors have no idea who she was.  I would hit a story and think – whoa – wait, that isn’t right.  Much of the best information was in articles or footnotes or the outstanding phone interviews with women who knew Miss Paul.  Can I even say that one included my fast pointing out that it was in the lineage of Miss Paul.  FLIP ME OUT!

The Challenge,

• to write about Miss Paul as an activist.  She was an activist and I am an activist
• to compare and apply Miss Paul’s methods into current day activist practice 
• to write this without an end, a deadline, a coda
• to not spend a year writing and then be broken hearted that there is so much more to say

The Solution

• write it in serial format
• publish it online as I go
• keep this open ended and see where it goes

BOOM   I just got to thinking – why stop there?  Just keep adding more 

• My speaking information – PowerPoint and youtube
• Bibliography – the most comprehensive I have ever seen
• Guest page for you to submit something
• Miss Alice Paul Shop with contemporary designs

I hope you enjoy my every expanding universe.  The introduction and first chapter are up now.  The second chapter will be up in a few days.  Come by often as it is constantly growing.  I love showing Americans that Miss Paul is our very own Non-Violent Direct Action expert.  She has a lot to teach us. 

http://MissAlicePaul.com

 

Teaching Myself to Read Again

Recently on a long drive on surface streets I noticed that I was looking at things on the sides instead of letting them float by.  I started noting what was happening.  I was driving 35mph on a major street, catching a sign or shop and turning my head 90 degrees to see it.  I never did that before, not as a consistent practice.  I realized that it was mimicking exactly what happens on Huffpo or Buzzfeed or most information sites.  

The street had become the middle column and the storefronts became the sidebars demanding my attention and demanding that I release my focus on what lies ahead.  Reading a long piece on a site became a game of ping pong – eyes pulled to the right and my will to read the article were in opposition.  It is not just a “look over here" v. “look over here.”  It is stop concentrating on the middle.  Stop looking for continuity.  Stop forming intelligent inquiry about the essay.  I needed horse blinders just to follow the writing and, now, to drive on a busy street.

Somewhere between embedded cookie-driven ads in the facebook newsfeed and flashing animations on news sites, I had lost my natural analytical reading eye-scroll.  Maybe I would not have even noticed but I wanted to read in full, for content, beginning to end.  There were topics I wanted to dive into and I could barely read the table of contents without searching the periphery for more stimulation to pull me off center.  It was as if I was searching for relief from the intensity of reading in depth.  The whole debilitating process was working against me; pulling me off center.

My relentless desire to read everything on the life and times of Alice Paul was way out of reach until I could teach myself to read comprehensively again.  First I relocated my entire reading universe away from all moving distractions: tv, computers, phones, even clocks.  Then I got my favorite markers and tabs.  And I placed my chair facing away from the window.  

The process itself is very similar to pure meditation.  Focusing on a breath, a yantra, a mantra requires pulling that compass needle back to the center.  Inside the mind a ticker runs constantly with escalating, titillating distraction; running above, below and sides.  For hours and hours, the effort is -- Back to center.  Back to center.  Back to center.  One by one the distractions lose their magnetic shine and one begins to actually meditate; not conceentrate but meditate -- to experience no thought. 

The big difference in reading is one wants to accumulate content.  Reading includes comprehension and building understanding sentence by sentence.  That payoff is the ultimate motivation.  It took me weeks of willing my concentration to stay in the center lane, to ignore the light beams in the room, resist the urge to get up and see if I had email, the puny ease of taking my eyes off the page just leave the meaty long-winded paragraph. 

Ah sweet reading.  I am so sorry I forgot your elegance, your transporting richness and your page turning thrill.  I am so glad you can be learned again. 

Life, After All, Is Episodic

2011 in one of my fits over the use of real lives as scaffolding for commercial *fiction, I wanted to do something.  There is no law or social agreement that a movie or book, labeled bio-doc or biography, stay on any historic course.  Additions, omissions, artificial plot devices creating required arcs are just part of the landscape. 

My push back was to write a full life memoir (I was advised in no uncertain terms to NOT use the word autobiography a la james frey).  I spent a year organizing my chronology and writing. 

I had no intention of ever printing it but a friend asked and my kick campaign financed it.  It was an experience I recommend though motive is the lynchpin; a whim will never see one through.  I was not driven by self-importance but a red-hot desire to show respect for those who dig and search and glue and list and listen to a person’s life so it can be shared.  I have been on excavations for Gandhi, Magdalene, Kahlo and Paul.  It is a Sisyphean task. No ending in sight.

I learned many things in my year of writing about my life but mostly I learned that ending such a book is outlandish.  It is an imposed and insincere writing destination.  (invoking the great Lillian Hellman’s title, An Unfinished Woman).  It imposed an inaccurate idea that December 2012 was an ending of sorts.  It is as if August 26, 1920 Alice Paul was done, like a quilt.  And how many of us are despondent when a book ends, shouting what then?  What then? 

Now is a curious time for books.  It is the reversal of printed books’ birth when paper was cheap and literacy on the rise.  Today, paper usage is declining and technology drives our attention.  Books are delivered to devices silently, poured through headsets, loaned with an expiration date.   Monopolies are dictating who is read and who is tasked with distributing their own work.  It is Jeff Bezos who decides, not a refined educated editor on Avenue of the Americas.  Authors United may want to rise up against this Amazon but the reality remains, Napster already told the modern day story of the intersection of Art and Industry.  (maybe books with ads – but isn’t that the disappearing literary magazine?)

Lately I have been thinking about episodic writing.  It is all the rage on TV as water-cooler heads ask what the hell is happening on Leftovers.  Even Sundance is currently holding a lab on episodic writing as movie goers beg Mr. Big and Carrie to report in.  Who can even think about anything else but Pats and Edina coming to the silver screen.  

It was good enough for Dumas and his 139 installments of The Count of Monte Cristo.  Good enough for Harriet Beecher Stowe’s 40 weeks of Uncle Tom’s Cabin.  Installment writing also informed the storyteller what was riveting and what was a snooze.  They could take it all into consideration or not.  In fact, wiki lists 764 novels delivered in installments.  Take that Mr. Bezos!

Titillating interest delivered on the internet in episodes?  Oh the tragedy bibliophiles lament.  And yet it is already in full swing on your iphone and android with Juke Pop, Wattpad and Fiction Press.  2015 we are going to learn a whole new way to tell our stories and, most importantly, to store our stories.  Our ancestors might have had elders as libraries, sitting around a blazing fire but we will learn a whole new way in the doing.  Life after all, is episodic. 

*Iron Jawed Angels and Milk

You Decide Now What the Future Will Believe

I have been reading about the nature of writing history.  I don’t mean writing a book but in creating what the future generation will know about what people before them did.  In that knowing, they build their footprint.  I don’t want to get too fancy here but what Miss Catt and Miss Paul set on the river of time for us to know creates who we are today.  Only visionaries and ice cutters imagine beyond the givens but even they breathe within certain boundaries.   

A lot is being written criticizing elitist books in the TLGBQ world – Boise and Becker for starters.  And many flip out over black-tie, $500 plate award dinners celebrating people who never held a sign or walked on pavement.  I agree and now I see that future generations will only have these points of view represented.  In twenty years, when students read about how gender equality happened, it will appear that politicians, legislators, wealthy organizations and shiny famous people did it all. 

Here is the deal.  You can change that.  You can write this history.  You can write a history that actually expresses the equality that is being born right now.  If every organization, every community TLGBQ Center, every College and University Center had their own awards, their own dinners, bestow honors which DEMONSTRATE what you want to be history. 

If you want greater diversity to be your pen-stroke, then honor a diverse group of people.  You are not limited by needing a bestselling published book about grassroots activism.  It can be done in other ways.  Think about what you want people to believe about this time and make that the banner, the footprint, the celebration.  Who made all this happen and who do you want the class of 2050 to know as the activists of the turn of the century.

Alice Paul ~ Claiming Power, new book reviewed

I began making serious inquiry about Miss Paul in 1980.  She was my touchstone for my 37 day fast for the ERA in 1982.  It was because of her, we drafted legal papers making certain the state could not force feed us.  Her friend, Doris Stevens’ book, Jailed for Freedom was our primary reference.  My interest in Miss Paul never waned and, in 2012, I set out to read contiguously everything I had access to - calling it AP immersion.  Since that time, I have read 40+ books, 100+ articles and interviewed 10 women who knew her.  The most enchanting source was the November, 1972 taped interview by Amelia Fry.  I carefully read every word in the 664 page transcript.  I bought CDs of the first two hours of the interview just so I could hear her voice and I grieved that Amelia Fry passed on before completing her book on Alice Paul.

One day I got wind that the work was going to be completed by American / Women’s Studies scholar, J.D. Zahniser.  I pre-ordered it instantly and waited six months.  It was published Tuesday, June 3, 2014.  It arrived Wednesday, June 4, 2014.  I collected my favorite reading tools; felt tip pens, color tabs, magnifying glass and notebook.  The scripted order of my adventure; copyright, index, footnotes, bibliography, acknowledgements, introduction, chapter one. FORCE FIELD - DO NOT INTERRUPT ME.

Page after page, line after line.  Sheer perfection.  The backstory, the reason, the lineage, the culture.  Her letters, her family, her home, her schools.  Even her hats!  It was all there, explained as no other book came near.  Her first friendships that lasted a lifetime; Lavinia Dock, Rheta Dorr, Maud Younger, Elsie Hill.  I knew each and every one mentioned but never embraced with this depth.  Every question filled in as never before.  Miss Paul’s letters lavishly quoted, letting us all inside her thinking.  Bicycle through France, study in Germany, first apartment, encountering her icon - Christabel and the portentous meeting of Miss Lucy Burns.  From Gandhi to all the Pankhursts.  From Alva Belmont to Doris Stevens to Dorothy Day to Rose Winslow to Jeanette Rankin and the squirrely Mr. Wilson.  From biology to economics to social work to quintessential leadership – disappearing just when the applause begins.  From WSPU to NAWSA to CC to CU to NWP.  From Paulsdale to Lafayette Square.  And the steadfast architecture of Hicksite Quakers; Forward Into Light. 

If you want to know Miss Alice Stokes Paul, the Quaker genius who masterminded the American Suffrage victory, this is the book. Finally you can follow the unfolding of her inspiration, her deep understanding of power and get inside of the political complexity of the “First Wave.”  So much here to find for the first time and find familiar.  Within it all; Miss Alice one step ahead, widening her domain, examining her motivations but always the Equality of Women.            

Of course I have to rate 5 stars.  It is the best and I have read them all. 

 There are three things I wish were different. 

1)     I wish for 100 more photos. There are a few, some I have never seen, but it is not enough. 

2)     I wish more was said about Miss Paul or AP (as Miss Paul often signed) believing the vote was one of many steps on the path to full, global equality.  Her vision was for all women, for all time. 

3)     I am bereft that this book ends in 1923.  Alice Paul Claiming Power is more than worthy and brilliant which is why I wanted it to cover more than 35 of her 92 years.  Her last 57 years is distilled in a four page epilogue.  I will always long for such a wonderful book to include Miss Paul going to Geneva, founding the World Women’s Party, her resistance efforts during the war, the maddening journey with the ERA, her closing years with her greedy nephew and her rescue by the Jews she hid 30 years before.   

 Let there be no mistake, I will always look for that full life biography.  Miss Paul did not vaporize with the success of the suffrage campaign.  She cannot be reduced to this ten year segment.  In fact, to the activist, her longevity with sustained purpose is her greatest legacy.  I love Miss Paul.  I am so grateful for this book.  I have to stop now and read it all over again.

The Engaged Heart ~ On Sale Now

The day has finally arrived.  The Engaged Heart ~ An Activist's Life is now on sale. 
The Trade Paperback is available at Lune Soleil Press
The Kindle Edition is on Amazon

Sally Miller Gearhart, Professor Emerita San Francisco State, Author and self-described, "recovering political activist."
The Engaged Heart is a profoundly intelligent book, written with passion and wit.  Zoe Nicholson vividly chronicles her experiences as a combatant in the struggle for Equality and the book thus constitutes a virtual manual for feminist & LGBT activism, complete with defeats and triumphs, mistakes and miracles.  For those who lived over the last 50 years, the book will spark wonderful memories; for those who didn’t, it might well inspire a volcanic eruption of serious commitment on the part of those of us who treasure dreams of justice.  Be ready, America!

Erin Matson, Author & Activist
The heart of the equality movement is authenticity. It is additive, diverse, individual, maddening and vibrant. It refuses to be permanently overcome by discrimination or "custom." The Engaged Heart is a shattering piece of authenticity. Zoe's life has power to empower yours. 

Overwhelming Gratitude

Sometimes I wonder if I say too much.  Do I talk too much about myself.  It is a funny thought when the fact is I often go happily for days not speaking to a soul.  In three weeks, my memoir will come back from the printer and, though it is out on kindle right now, it appears readers really want the paper book in their hands, on a table, in a backpack.  Maybe it should come with a pen as so many have told me they want to write in the margins. 

I have taken to hand wringing with both nerves and excitement.  Right now I am entirely overwhelmed which is a word on my self-imposed forbidden list.  (No, I won’t say what the other words are.)  Ever since I read Esther Hicks explain the repercussions  of saying and believing the word overwhelmed, I do all I can to not use it. 

A feeling of being overwhelmed is your indicator that you are denying yourself access to all manner of cooperation that could assist you if you were not disallowing them. 
Abraham-Hicks

Today, it is irresistible.  I am overwhelmed with gratitude.  It is hard to imagine that I am in the way of any outpouring of support.  Kickstarter money is spent.  Rewards are mailed except for the ones for this book.  Books ordered.  Whew.  My Valentines Day is going to be unforgettable. 

The Self Interview Unchained

I am not a fan of chain mail, email, posts.  I don’t respond in five minutes with six people I want to hug or send angels to rescue.  I don’t want to tell you my last meal choice, the one word to describe you or post what ten words I would say if you called for bail.  But ask me about writing, about my books, about “Intellectual Activism” in the words of Patricia Hill Collins and I will clear my desk. 

This fine morning Shannon Drury, The Radical Housewife, included me in a facebook post.  She had been enlisted by Sonya Huber, who asked about The Next Big Thing.   Sonya says, “Basically, I get to answer these questions and then tag five writers who I think are the Next Big Thing. Very cool!”  I concur.

What is the title of your book? 
The Engaged Heart ~ An Activist’s Life. 

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
How did I get from there to here? 

What genre does your book fall under?
Political Memoir
(I want to use Lerner’s phrase, Political Autobiography but Frey robbed us all of using the word autobiography and, frankly, memoir leaves a lot more latitude) 

Where did the idea come from for the book?
My practice is Engaged Buddhism.  I think the best way to talk about it is through the demonstration of a life.  I hope that my life, my story, my passion, as manifest in my political activism, will inspire, inform and possibly ignite a few activists who just cannot stop.  No, you can’t when it is your calling.  Lucky you.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
Microsoft Word took care of that, 1,410 hours at the keyboard and about the same amount of time sorting through my life.  I looked at every photo, every document, every Filofax 1985 – 2012 and all 515 blogs I had written over the last 14 years.  I made a 25 page-  two column outline of events of my life and then began to color outside the lines, off the page and on the walls. 
The most interesting thing was watching the events stream by like cars in a train, passing through some type of selection machine, awarding or discarding importance.  At 64 I was constantly surprised with what was significant and what was entirely forgettable.  Many things  I thought valuable deserved no remark and were flicked away forever.  Like sorting the attic, I organized my life.  It was industrial strength roto-rooter self-discovery.  I highly recommend it.     

Who or what inspired you to write this book? 
Doris Stevens, Lillian Hellman, Beatrix Potter, M.K.Gandhi, Paulo Friere, so many, so many.  But more honestly the answer is the tragedy, the broken heartedness of wanting to read a person’s own life story to find there is none.  What did SHE think about this or that.  How did She manage that disappointment?  Where did SHE find the courage to continue when nothing was working?  How did SHE not give up? 
The most incendiary thing for me was the movie, Iron Jawed Angels.  How could anyone represent Alice Paul as such an insipid fool?  And the movie, Milk which portrays Harvey as a single faceted human being when he was infinitely more.  The true story is always so much better than some watered down, product-placed piece of cheery fiction.  I don’t want to see the newly released acclaimed Lincoln once I read that the Black characters are slivers of their true selves. 
I want to know that Alice hid a copy of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s poetry in her skirt when taken to jail and threw it at a window in the suffocating dining hall for a bit of air.  What was to be gained in showing her throwing a shoe as done in the movie.  Why invent a boyfriend?  Was Hollywood so unable to make a movie about a woman without a boyfriend?  Where is your political memoir, Alice?    

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
In 2001 I submitted my book about fasting for the ratification of the ERA.  I have a file of 28 rejection letters which all say the same thing, Dear Ms. Nicholson, Thank you for all you have done for the ERA and this wonderful book.  We could not sell a book on feminism in the current market.  Wish you all the best.  I did what I always do, what I like a lot about me – I did it myself.  I learned all I could about the professional production of books and started my own publishing company, Lune Soleil Press.  LSP is publishing The Engaged Heart. 

What other works would you compare this book to within your genre?  (I would amend this to say books that inspire)
Fireweed, A Political Autobiography
My Experiments with Truth
Autobiography of a Yogi
The Sun at Midnight
Cave in the Snow

What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
I would so prefer a documentary, like the Times of Harvey Milk or Last Call at Maud’s.  But if I had to choose, it would be Rosie O’Donnell.  Maybe she could gain some weight for the role. 

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
The provenance of change is what consumes me.  How does it occur?   What pushes it forward and why does it stall or reverse?  Since change occurs from the inside out, the only way to see how it happens is to look inside.  I have dug deeply, told the truth and never opted to sweeten a telling. The goal was to excavate how a mind and heart change. 

Who or What are your Next Big Things?  
Wilder than any rollercoaster – I am a wreck waiting for it to come out.  I handed my pdf off to the designer, finished a successful Kickstarter campaign to finance it and contacted my printer.  Readers, reviews, who’s pissed because I did or did not talk about them.  Yikes! February it will be out in paper.  It is currently available in Kindle.

Now I am working on a new presentation, The Provenance of Change.  We need to understand change and consciously join with it.  Reproductive Autonomy, Full Federal Equality, Gender Equity and political representation = change at the speed of light rushing through the intergalactic Wi-Fi.  What a time to be alive. 

YOU - you are the next big thing.  What are you going to do now?  I want to see and cheer.  What is going to happen to women who want full access to political process?  What is going to happen as LGBT are visible in all segments of society?  What is the oppressor going to do as the oppressed are finding one another and uniting to say, ENOUGH is ENOUGH?  YOU are the Next big and best thing!