Teacher Training Graduation — 9/11/2020. I couldn’t be happier about this. As one of the three coordinators, I graduated, too, in a sense — though I will never finish learning about antiracism as an expression of compassion, wisdom and ethical practice.

Here is our group on its 2018 visit to Washington DC, where we ‘studied’ the Dharma of collective activity. Our study included visits to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, the National Museum of the American Indian, and the US Capitol, where Rep. Jamie Raskin kindly met with and inspired us (and a few of the teachers shared an elevator with Rep. Ilhan Omar…) There’s a video of the training graduation embedded in the Lion’s Roar story that reveals more of the spirit that moved through this group. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Historic Class of Diverse Dharma Teachers Graduates

https://katewheeler.com/362-2/

On Indigenous People’s Day, Sunday, a group of students from Tufts with their Prof. Sharon Kivenko ( at right) next to my husband, David, in his vest, plus a bunch of friends and family marched in the Honk! parade.  As a symbol of the melting and dying Earth the students chose a melting ice cream cone, which you can see sort of.  Oddly, the beach ball that was meant to represent the earth collapsed by the end of the parade, due to contact with wires and tree branches.  I hope that’s not a symbolic prediction for our future.  Most of the Honk! groups yesterday were pro climate action including Extinction Rebellion genocide at the foundation of our country.  We all need to reverse the forces that lead to ecocide.   Perhaps if we’d respected the Indigenous civilizations who were in the Americas at the time of European conquest we’d be doing better, since indigenous ideas about living in harmony with Nature were much better than European ones.

Tonight, I plan to go to the Extinction Rebellion’s meditation meeting https://xrmass.org/action/buddhist-and-meditator-meetup/ to see how as a meditator, perhaps I can help out more.

How_to_Love_Enemies_Kate_and_Jeff_2018

http://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=likTDNXjwrwThe Bermuda Petrel, or Cahow –another bird named for the sound it makes — had a record breeding season this year!!   Such wonderful news from the London Review of Books.  Long article there reminded us that a 17thC shipwreck in Bermuda was the model for Shakespeare’s The Tempest.  Disaster for the birds, though — they were not afraid of people, so, like dodoes, they’d gather arond humans’ feet and get clubbed to death and eaten.  They were believed extinct, until a few were discovered on a remote island and given support by one, then a growing number of well informed and careful people.  The URL above shows the gentle activity of a parent bird taking care of a baby.  I can’t embed video but it’s worth a watch.