Our House in the Middle of Our Street

camping with friends at Cultus Lake  What is your favorite color? Blue Who are some of your friends? Cole, Zac, Kate, Joshua, Matthew, Mattias, Kellan, Ethan biking the Glen Valley dyke trail  What do you want to do when you grow up? undecided What is your favorite animal? dog  hiking somewhere in Maple Ridge around Christmas What is your favorite thing to do with Anikka? .... (long pause)... skiing What is your favorite thing to do with your friends? talking and playing video games  meeting the new farm members What do you like to do outside?  garden, bike, drive the truck, ski,  What do you like to do inside?  play my piano, read, watch TV Calvin jokes are still favorites around here What is your favorite food?  steak or pasta What is your favorite drink?  fizzy drinks Snow day forts! What is your favorite restaurant?  Olive Garden  What is your favorite subject in school?  math (WHAT?!) Trying to fix mom's old laptop What is...

photo credit Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi -  I can't believe this is Gyasi's debut novel that she wrote in her early 20s. It's stunning, complex, beautifully imagined, and very raw. It's a story that weaves through history and follows two women and how drastic their lives are once divided: one gets put onto a slave ship, the other married to a slaver in Ghana. The historical novel traces one generation per chapter from the 1700s and jumps the reader back and forth into present day at the story's end.  The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead - This book is probably the most graphic fiction book I've ever read. It's a Pulitzer and National Book Award prize winner, and the writing is absolutely searing. This book is about Cora, a woman who escapes slavery but is running from state to state via the magical realism of a train on the underground railroad, complete with flowers in a vase atop a checkered tablecloth waiting with a basket of food for her at some of t...

photo credit If you read the first part of this series, you will know that this post will be about non-fiction books that have helped me understand the perspective of black, biracial, and indigenous people. I will make a note with each one as to which perspective it is written from, and why I included it. Following each post will be a few books that I am wanting/waiting to read.  Reading is the primary way we can be put in another's shoes, understand a different perspective, and grow in empathy and compassion for those I do not share the same views with, or have just never been exposed to. It's one of the most influential acts we can do, as humans: read -> think -> grow.  I've Been Meaning to Tell You by David Chariandy - This book is slim -it may not take you more than an hour or two to finish, but it's a father's story-letter to his daughter about his growing up as a minority and the roots of racism, along with infusing hope into the next generation for a ...

Artist Jane Mount The first night of the protests that started after George Floyd's murder by a Minneapolis police officer had my mind racing. I was reading and listening to news reports on and off, and have been for nearly two weeks now. I have been online way too much than is good for me, but I can't  stop reading because I am learning so much. In such a short amount of time, I've learned all about some of the systems that protect the police, what happens when the social contract is up, and that moment of realization that I'm someone to fear , and most importantly, what it looks like to be(come) anti-racist .  I know I am learning so much about racism just in the last two weeks alone, and here I thought I was someone who 'knew'. Dang, I was so wrong. So misinformed. So clueless and ignorant--still am. I am committed to learning more, speaking out when appropriate, and shutting up when appropriate. The only way I can try to help in the immediate time period,...