sleep is good food

My 14 year old son slept for 12 hours last night. We've had a hectic and exhausting (although rewarding and delightful!) two weeks of working long hours each at Hogwarts Camp, so it's no surprise and, in fact, is probably something he needs to do more often. Some parenting habits I wonder more and more if I will ever outgrow, like peeking in at my sleeping kids, feeling reassured by their snores that all is well, that they are getting what they need at that moment.

I am reminded this morning of the first time that Nash took a long sleep. It was one of those turning points of early parenthood for me, so I remember it well. It was a Sunday evening after a weekend of meetings and we were at a friend's house in Miami. To be there had involved taking my first road trip with a six week old baby and discovering that really, truly, in spite of what "everyone" insisted about what babies will and won't do, my child hated being strapped into a carseat and would scream, scream, scream if we tried to drive during his wakeful periods.

So we stopped frequently and did the best we could to get where we were going without making the baby miserable. In this case, we also spent a weekend sleeping on a church floor with the babe who, at that point, still needed to be nursed every 2-3 hours. I reminded myself all the time that this was not a permanent scenario, but dude. I was wiped. It had been six weeks (really, more, as the end of my pregnancy was a time of frequent insomnia and anxiety) since I had rested well.

That Sunday evening, those of us who had been in meetings together all weekend sat around our friend's living room, eating, drinking, talking, singing... and in my case, nodding off. Nash was sleeping in my mother's arms and I had reached the state of exhaustion wherein I knew I needed sleep but I also dreaded catching just a few minutes only to be yanked awake by the baby's urgent needs. Folks had to be persistent to get me to get some rest. Finally, our host led me to a quiet bedroom and after lying in the dark for a few minutes with my anxieties, I was able to trust that my family and friends were more than capable of meeting my baby's needs and waking me as necessary and I slept... and slept.

When I woke up, for a second it felt as if the previous several months of my life had never happened. Rested! Comfortable! Alone! These were things I had not experienced in a long, long time. Then my awareness kicked in and I felt panic - how could this have happened? What had become of my child? Did folks lose their minds and, I don't know, take him away somewhere, feed him formula, decide to teach him some harsh life lessons about crying it out, what?! My mind went a step further - suppose the the unthinkable had happened, and no one woke me because, heck, what's the point? My anxiety was paralyzing and I just lie there, approaching full-on freak out. Then I heard Nash's distinctive snuffling noises from the hallway as my mother brought him in to nurse, and, you know, everything was fine.

At six weeks old, my baby had amazingly done exactly what I needed him to do and slept an unprecedented (and until recently, un-repeated) 12 hour night, and all was well.

saucy

I love to make cranberry sauce. I have nothing against the straight out of a can kind, I'll eat it and enjoy it, and I think it looks cute sitting in a bowl in its can shape, but making it at home is so easy, and it makes the whole house smell great.

I tend to glance at a few recipes for some basic parameters and then do what I want. This year I made a ginger-honey-apple juice version. I put in fresh, grated ginger as well as powdered, and a few shakes of cinnamon and cloves. I based my amounts of liquids on a recipe I found online, and I think the juice quantity was really too much - a cup and 3/4. It didn't gel like I'd hoped, but it is tasty.

I'll also make a batch of what I think of as the straight stuff: cranberries, sugar & water. For the non-spicy among us.

time, time, time, see what's become of me

Middle of October already! It feels like I have to get a number of things accomplished in the next two-three weeks: Make the Mama Calendar! Get ready for the Bookfair! Choose a Halloween costume! Collaborate on a Voter Guide! And they all feel equally urgent...

For your part, you could move things along by submitting something for the Mama Calendar. Now! This weekend! The deadline is Monday.

2011 Call for Submissions! pass it around!

the 2011 Mama Calendar is getting underway! people, mothers, fathers, partners, kids, friends & allies, the mama calendar is what it is because of your words, pictures, dreams, visions, rants, raves, recipes, recipes for revolution. send me your best stuff, by October 18, to

the mama calendar coleen murphy coleen@bust.com PO box 741655 new orleans, LA 70174

at this stage, emailing in digital photos in the highest resolution you can get is the best choice. when in doubt, just send it! I'll see what I can do.

calendars will be available on November 6, 2010, in person at the New Orleans Bookfair for $10 a piece and via email & the US mail for $12 a piece, payable by check, cash, money order or paypal. advance orders are what make the calendar project possible. ask about wholesale pricing for orders of ten or more.

the mama calendar is a community building-consciousness raising resource by, of, about and for progressive, feminist, activist mothers and their families, friends & allies everywhere. it is a celebration and a call to action, a thing of beauty to last the year. edited by coleen murphy, the calendar features photos of mamas, babies, children, youth, dads, and friends, as well as a guide to mama-made zines, alternative parenting resources, recipes, recipes for revolution, great dates in radical mama herstory, and the work of numerous artist/activist/mamas. recent editions have featured ayun halliday, victoria law, jessica rigney, nina packebush, brendan flannelly-king, james smith, laurel dykstra, sonja smith, trula breckenridge, china martens, nicholas meyer and heather cushman-dowdee, among others. many others! maybe you!

ferry princess

A few months ago, in Brooklyn, I watched this fellow have a hissy fit when the bus driver wouldn't let him bring his dog on board with him. I was telling John, later at dinner, that in New Orleans you aren't allowed to have or do various things on the bus or streetcar - no pets, no eating, no drinking, no smoking, no playing music - but on the ferry, you can pretty much do anything.

John was like, so you do it all, all at once! And then I added, but the ferry ride is only five to ten minutes long, so he replied, you do it all, all at once, in a big hurry! Hah. Yeah, sometimes.

I love the ferry. It delights me now just as much as it did when I first took it over here to see if Algiers might be the place for me to live, almost nine years ago now. I love seeing the river every day and although I don't smoke and haven't had a need to bring my dog on the ferry, I do often eat and drink on board. I appreciate the space, the taking of some time to get across the Mississippi.

I have this fantasy that some bright entrepreneur will start up a coffee cart just outside of the station... well, and also that we could have actual restrooms there. And that it could be made to smell nice, have comfortable seating, a newsstand, heck, how about wifi... but I also love it just as it is. Grubby and smelly and all.

Ginger is the thing

A few years ago, Rachael, the brilliant herbalist at the Common Ground Health Clinic, advised me to increase the ginger in my diet, as a corrective to being "a little too yin." So, I try to have some every day, in one form or another, to bring some internal heat and improve my circulation. Lots of days I just drink some ginger tea, and add ginger into any stir fry or peanut sauce I'm making. This winter, though, I've branched out a little.

For our Yule Ball this year, I made these chocolate ginger cookies and WOW. I am not vegan but I have had many a vegan cookie in my day (good, bad & ugly), and these were by far the best I've tasted. That's right, not just the best vegan cookies I've ever made, but the best I've ever tasted.

I've also been making an extra-gingery version of the African groundnut stew that I've been eating at camp every summer for several years. I've seen a lot of different recipes for this stew, but I use Rowe Camp chef Dan's basic recipe as my starting point:

Oil. Onions. LOTS of Garlic and fresh minced Ginger. Sweet potatoes and I'll dice up some yukons and carrots to make it thick by the end. Veg stock, diced tomatoes in juice and some apple cider for sweetness. Some PB. Stew til its how you like it and season w/ S & P, Sriracha if you want, and fresh cilantro. YUM! garnish w/ more cilantro and toasted peanuts.

So, no amounts listed, I just eyeball things. Also, I usually make a day ahead, which improves the flavor, I think. For a big pot full of stew, I use about 4 sweet potatoes, 2 yukons, 2 carrots. 1 onion, lots of garlic and even more ginger. 1 big can of diced tomatoes, 1 big can of crushed tomatoes. 1 box of veg broth & another of water. When I add the PB, I pour hot broth into half a jar of PB, stir it well. I don't use cider or cilantro, but I add a little cayenne. Also, when it's mostly soft, I use a potato masher on it for a bit, so it's thick yet still chunky.

I sometimes have it over rice. I always have it with salt and sometimes with peanuts and lime juice.

Love Letter to Brooklyn

I've never lived in Brooklyn. I probably never will. I identify so strongly with the south, I don't know if I ever would really feel at home long term somewhere else. But anyway, for the past eight years I've spent 2-5 days a year in Brooklyn, as part of my comings & goings to/from camp in Western Massachusetts (another second (third?) home), and it's become a favorite, full of favorites.

Nash & I just got home Friday night from three days in Brooklyn, in Crown Heights, Prospect Heights & Park Slope. We revisited old favorites - the Superhero Supply Store, Tom's Diner, Chevella's, Naidre's - and had some new adventures. We schlepped to Fort Greene to shop at Green Light Books, to Williamsburg for coffee at Second Stop, and all the way out to Queens to visit the NY Hall of Science.

We didn't have time this trip to go to that cafe in Boerum Hill where I've had the best Thanksgiving dinner themed sandwich ever, or into Manhattan for borscht at Veselka, or down to Coney Island or out to see our friends who live in Bushwick... but it was good. We saw friends and bought books and ate well everywhere we went.

In my neighborhood, Algiers Point, there is a brochure that calls Algiers "the Brooklyn of the South." I have no idea who coined this or what it is supposed to mean, but I have experienced Brooklyn as a friendly place, way friendlier than, say, New England tends to be. Last summer, Liam & I were in the city for two days, just the two of us, staying with a friend in Fort Greene. We had to take the bus somewhere, and though we'd been told to have "exact change", we both imagined that that meant what it does in New Orleans: A combination of paper dollars and coins that add up to the exact amount required. Not so strange an idea, right?

But, no. We got on board and were told that we needed coins or a metro card and we had neither and I felt a little panicky - going to the park to meet up with friends was totally not going to be worth whatever weird bus humiliation was about to take place! But, again, no. The bus driver said, Are you from out of town? Yes. Then why don't you just have a seat and enjoy our New York hospitality!
Awesome.

Mama Calendar 2010

The 2010 calendars are here! And here, and here.
We enjoyed a lovely debut at the New Orleans Bookfair yesterday and are now poised and ready to mail the rest of these suckers out...

Mama Calendar 2010: Call for Submissions!

pass it around!

the 2010 Mama Calendar is getting underway!
people, mothers, fathers, partners, kids, friends & allies,
the mama calendar is what it is because of your words, pictures, dreams, visions, rants, raves, recipes, recipes for revolution.
send me your best stuff, by October 9, to

the mama calendar
coleen murphy
coleen@bust.com
PO box 741655
new orleans, LA
70174

at this stage, emailing in digital photos in the highest resolution you can get are the best choice. when in doubt, just send it! I'll see what I can do.

calendars will be available on November 7, 2009, in person at the New Orleans Bookfair and via email & the US mail for $12 a piece,
payable by check, cash, money order or paypal.
advance orders are what make the calendar project possible.
ask about wholesale pricing for orders of ten or more.

the mama calendar is a community building-consciousness raising resource by,
of, about and for progressive, feminist, activist mothers and their families,
friends & allies everywhere. it is a celebration and a call to action, a thing
of beauty to last the year.
edited by coleen murphy, the calendar features photos of mamas, babies,
children, youth, dads, and friends, as well as a guide to mama-made zines, alternative
parenting resources, recipes, recipes for revolution, great dates in radical
mama herstory, and the work of numerous artist/activist/mamas. recent editions have featured ayun halliday, victoria law, laurel dykstra, sonja smith, trula breckenridge, china martens, nicholas meyer and heather cushman-dowdee, among others. many others! maybe you!

The Thing for Me About Unschooling

Yesterday morning, while crossing Poydras downtown with my sons, I flashed on this memory from a couple of years ago, a time when a fellow street crosser at that very intersection barreled into me for no apparent reason, and with no apology or remark of any kind. It wasn't the first time that's happened, but it stuck in my mind on that day because I'd been home for just a few days from the Live & Learn Unschooling Conference, where we'd had a wonderful time, and where, frankly, no one was ever quite so rude to me.

Just that morning, though, I'd been reading the online comments of another conference attendee who had some bad experiences, and who described exactly what I had experienced on Poydras as having happened to them at the conference. For this person, the encounter was being held up as an example of those of us invested in unschooling possibly being on the wrong path, being, in fact, on a path to rudeness! Because, you know, it was a younger person (I don't remember now if it was a young child or a teenager or someone in between) who had run right into this person with no apology, no acknowledgment, and so this led them to a place of saying, hey, how are we raising these kids, anyway, are we actually bringing them up to be rude, thoughtless folks in the name of unschooling?

So I read this and then later that very day, pow, a fully grown adult smacks right into me on the street and just keeps going. Rude! Unschooled? Hey, maybe, but you know, I have no idea. This is what I think, though. I think that so often we take encounters - negative, positive, whatever - and we assign characteristics to the people involved based on really, very little. So, if I wanted to, I could take the person who ran into me that day and say, well, there you go, that just proves the rudeness of, say, white people. Or women. Or middle aged people. Or tourists. Or people who walk around downtown New Orleans in the middle of the day for whatever reason.

The thing for me about unschooling, though, is that at the heart of it is a rejection of the small worldview that comes with this kind of instant labeling and boxing in of people, this idea that who you and I are, and who we can be, has already been determined by the categories that we have been put into, by others as well as ourselves, and that we are inherently unable to change, to learn, to grow.

I believe that as long as we are living, there is nothing that can happen to prevent you or I from changing, from learning, from growing. And what I want for all people is for them to know that, about each other and about themselves.

It's no catchphrase, and it would make a lousy bumper-sticker, but it's how I feel.

I'm not much on forgetting

We just got home from seeing Julie & Julia. So good! So fun. I literally laughed out loud for most of the Julia parts, and cried (quietly, don't worry!) during some of the Julie parts. Nash said, That was way better than I expected! All three of us laughed & laughed.

Now I need to bake Liam's cake for tomorrow. I'm using a mix, you can mock me all you want, I know both Julie & Julia would. Gingerbread cake mix, with homemade vanilla buttercream frosting, though, and I'm gonna make deviled eggs, as per the birthday kid's request. It's a tradition of ours to have a belated party for Liam each year when we get home from camp, because his birthday happens while we're away. And four years ago, we were evacuating on the day that his party was to have happened, so, you know, each year that that is not the case, that's a time to celebrate as far as I'm concerned.

The kids are across the street playing with their friends whom they haven't seen in a month, two months for Nash. He was running and jumping to get over there. It reminded/reminds me of how much good we have in our lives here, now.

And how I'm - cheeseball alert - so grateful, for everything that we have, and for my friends, and that very possibly includes you, you know.

I make a conscious choice to avoid overloading myself with Katrina remembrances, to avoid spending a lot of my time revisiting the most sorrowful pieces of that time, but none of that means I've forgotten. It's all in there, there's no danger of my forgetting. What I'm intentional about recollecting is the support I received (cheeseball alert still in full effect) during the toughest parts of 2005, in the way of tangible things and also the sending of good hopes & wishes, from strangers and friends and family members, you know? It was incredible, it was powerful. It sustained me and it still does.

So, today, just thanks. I got to spend most of today laughing with my favorite people in the world. I wish everyone the same.

speaking of photobooths...

it's been a while. I went to California, where it was cold, and then came back home, where it was hot, and then went to Hogwarts, where it was air conditioned, and now I'm back at home, where it is hotter still, and this weekend I'll be checking out the photobooth at this event:

remember, when you put down one mother, you're putting down mothers all over the world



Happy Mother's Day everyone!

Support the Common Ground Health Clinic

The very latest in words & pictures from the front lines of grassroots health care reform.

Support the Common Ground Health Clinic

View more presentations from Coleenm.

mardi gras 2009 was a blur...

February 09 257
Originally uploaded by khollean

and then, just like that, it's Spring already.

MamaPhiles #4 Deadline

Whoa, it's today! Well. We are zinesters, after all. Get it in sometime this week!

Mamaphiles #4 – deadline: 1 March 2009

Mamaphiles is seeking submissions for issue #4, with the theme of "Raising Hell," from mamas and papas who are currently producing their own zines.

Previous themes were “Birth”; “Cutting the Cord”; “Coming Home” and now its time to shake things up! Raising children is hard work and revolution in motion. From rabble-rousing to rampaging toddlers—feel free to interpret the theme wildly.

We are interested in essays, photos, cartoons, or anything else you can come up with!

Because of space limitations, written submissions should be 1500 words or less. Please include a short bio and ordering information for your zine (these will not be part of the word count).

Contributors are asked to edit their own work. Submissions may be spell-checked and reformatted for consistency. Contributors are given the chance to okay any proposed changes before production.

Mamaphiles is a friendly and inclusive project whose goal is self-expression and mutual support. All submissions are accepted. Contributors are invited to join in the collaborative effort, and are asked to assist with marketing and/or production of the zine when possible.

Deadline for submissions: 1 March 2009.

Written submissions: email as a Word attachment to the submission editor, China – china410 @ hotmail.com. Feel free to ask questions.

Visual submissions: email high-resolution images (300-600 dpi) in .jpg, or .tiff to both china410 @ hotmail.com and the lay-out designer, Connie – anarchohippypunk @ riseup.net

For all submissions, please indicate that it's a Mamaphiles submission in the subject line of your email message.

Want to know more about the project? Come on by the Mamaphiles website at http://www.mamaphiles.com. (Or visit the Zine Scene forum at Mamaphonic.com!)

In 2009: Read More Zines

In case you've been cursing your lack of New Year's resolutions, I made one for you. If you're not already reading zines regularly, start now. If you are, expand your horizons with some new works. The two most beloved, thoroughly enjoyed zines in my life right now are The East Village Inky and The Nose Knows. Both are smallish, hand-drawn beauties loaded with humor and depth. I read each one cover to cover as soon as I get it.

I heard about the EVI early on in its ten year history (herstory?), and at first thought, how much writing about life in the East Village is relevant/intriguing for me, living on the edge of Cabbagetown in Atlanta and not likely to visit New York anytime soon? But it was, it was relevant to my life, consistently intriguing and unexpectedly inspiring, nudging me into the realization that my prior perception of zines as a movement powered by teenagers alone (and therefore off limits to newly thirty year old toddler-chasers like myself) was just, well, wrong. The EVI has consistently great recipes & book/zine/music recommendations, besides, and although I relate heavily to the agonies & triumphs of parenting described, there's plenty for the less parental to enjoy, too.

The Nose Knows is a newer find for me, I've only been reading it a year, although it's been around for a few. Published by a prolific foursome, each issue is a somewhat unpredictable brain-dump of words and pictures, relating to whatever is up with each writer, and although it jumped out at me initially because they're New Orleans based, don't let that deter you if you live elsewhere.

The EVI you can get easily via the website, but The Nose Knows takes a little more effort: send an email to nasalknowledge at gmail dot com and inquire. For each of them, if you're feeling splurgey, I enthusiastically recommend all of the back issues you can get your hands on.

I haven't made much noise about it, but Once Upon a Photobooth is also a zine, that I make, so email me if you'd like a copy: coleen at bust dot com. It's true life stories that start with photobooths, and also whatever else I feel like saying.

Finally, here is an update on the Don't Leave Your Friends Behind Project:

(from zinesters/photographers/authors/mothers Victoria Law & China Martens)

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind--work-in-progress zine #2

While amassing submissions for the handbook Don't Leave Your Friends Behind, China and I have made a work-in-progress zine of several contributio ns.

Zine #2 is 31 full-sized pages of stories, experiences and suggestions by both radical parents and their allies on building family-friendly movements, including:

*how theories on early childhood development support our arguments for anti-authoritarian parenting!

*organizing childcare at LadyFest Baltimore!

*providing childcare for children with special needs

*2 stories of parenting in collective households

*a children's crusade in Cambridge

*lessons learned from the mothers & children of the zapatista communities

Send $3 ($5 for two copies--you can give one to the ally in your life!) to:

V. Law
PO Box 20388
Tompkins Square Station
NY, NY 10009

Let's keep spreading childcare goodness to the masses!!
For those of you who missed it, our call for submissions (deadline: Feb 1, 2009) is here: http://www.mamaphonic.com/node/1855

as 2008 winds down...

the time to order your 2009 mama calendar is NOW.
order your copy by sending $12 to
coleen murphy
PO box 741655
new orleans, LA 70174
or paypal to coleen @ bust.com

thanksgiving day 2008

I have a turkey in my oven, ingredients for stuffing all over my table, homemade pies & cranberry sauce in my fridge, and I'm reading this from Rev. Billy:

Reverend Billy's Ten Commandments on Buy Nothing Day 2008

THOU SHALT

1) Forgive people, yourself and everybody else. We all shop too much.

2) Know your Devil. Shoppers are only dancing in the land of ten thousand ads.
Consumerism is the system. Corporations are the agents of the system.

3) Respect the micro-gesture. Magicalize the foreground.
Fore-go the plastic bag and grab that bare banana– Amen!

4) Practice asking for Sweat-free, Fairly-traded products. That's the rude that's cool.

5) Buy less and give more. Giving is forceful, the beginning of fantastic new economies.

6) Buy local and think global. Love Your Neighbor (buy at independent shops) and Love The Earth (walk to, bike to, mass transit to – the things you need.)

7) Citizens can buy or not buy, produce or not produce. We can change
to a sustainable personal economy. Then corporations and governments will change.

8) Envision the history of a product on a shelf. Workers and the earth made that thing. Resisting Consumerism is an act of imagination.

9) Complexify. Don't be so easy to figure out. Consumers tend to regularize.
Shopping at big boxes and chains make us all the same. Viva la difference!

10) Respect the heroes of the resistance. A small band of neighborhood-defenders who staved off a super mall with years of protests? Beautiful.

It's our turn now. Change-a-lujah!

found

a to do list, from a summer at camp, several years back:

*call ranger Tom - left msg.

*call abt. photobooths

*diapers - Martha - double tape - $5

*diapers, wipes - Jeremy - Bread & Circus

*milk, stamps - Jonathon

*drop off film

*candy

I'm thinking that must have been 2001.

ya heard?