I held my fourth You Speak, We Listen: Together We Stand in August. (And I meant to post this article here ages ago.) You Speak, We Listen: Together We Stand (YSWL) is my quarterly virtual storytelling event for womxn. I created this virtual stage for womxn and their stories, last spring as we were under…
THE BACKSTORY My bestie and I — you know her as Maggie from Dear Universe (page 57 if you want a specific reference) — got together for the first time since December of 2019. The last time we were face to face, unmasked, swapping what’s happenings, we were sitting in a booth at a restaurant,…
I just held my third You Speak, We Listen: Together We Stand a couple of weeks ago and the power of the stories reminded me of why I believe in this event. You Speak, We Listen: Together We Stand (YSWL) is my quarterly virtual storytelling event for womxn. It was born out of my want…
When you end up in your 30s post-divorce and stuck in a job that ignores your potential and would never suggest you paid time and money for higher education, you wake the fuck up. You look back on all the things you thought you would do, all the aspirations you had, and realize your life…
Fast forward to my early twenties and I found myself in the safety of the trees once more, finding a path to hope in the wake of my sexual assault. I was in grad school, living for the first time on my own and still a long way from home. It was a year and…
From relationships taking a turn for the worst; to crappy jobs and scenarios; to other internal interpersonal conflicts, I’ve spent a lot of time ignoring my instincts. What have I learned from this? Two things: 1) trust your gut; 2) when the Universe calls, listen. The times I ignored my gut-feelings about something always ended…
We gathered at the top of the hill in the building called the WIG, taking off our shoes on the porch and entering barefoot. The pine boards were cool beneath the arches of my feet. Last year at this time, we had joined Otha Day for a drumming circle. There was sisterhood woven together with…
If someone had said to me that attending a facilitated session called Dance, Draw, Write would overwhelm me with emotion, or that I would rediscover a part of my childhood spirit, I would be extremely skeptical. There I was Sunday morning, the last day of women’s weekend, saddened by the knowledge that in a few…
I was supposed to get to camp much earlier Friday morning than I had arrived. As that morning went, nothing was going according to plan. By the time I did check-in, I had already missed the morning sessions, but I had arrived in time for lunch where my weekend would be kicking off with a…
This is the first post in a series of reflections about attending YWCA VT Women’s Weekend. 2017 was a terrible year. Liken to a country music song or Lifetime movie except no one ended up in jail. Just about everything else happened. I had a miscarriage. My marriage fell apart and resulted in divorce. As…