Leisa A. Hammett

A Veteran Voice: The Importance of Volunteering in Local Organizations

We've been through a lot, this friend and I. His son, a year younger than my Grace, was diagnosed about six months after I first heard the word "autism," or at least officially in connection to my daughter. Soon, a friend who began helping us, began telling me about a co-worker of her then-husband whose son was also recently diagnosed with autism. Finally, I met that co-worker of my friend's husband. I met John Shouse in a narrow, long hallway-like observation room as we both said behind two way mirrors--him facing one direction, me the other, our children in the rooms behind the respective directions we both faced, each receiving either speech/language or occupational therapy. John wasn't a happy camper that day. I couldn't get him to talk much to me. But soon, we began a friendship that has lasted all these 16 going on 17 years since then. John's grief turned to passionate advocacy for his son and others. We've both experienced a lot of highs and lows on the autism parent journey and the additional thread that kept us at least remotely connected was our volunteer work for the local autism society. I admire my friend John for many things: his ability to cut through the bull. For his compassion in action. For the inumberable ways he (and his wife, Janet,) have stepped up to the volunteer plate again and again, often at great personal sacrifice, to lead our autism community locally, state-wide and nationally. John is a die-hard volunteer.

John is also many other things. And the word "renaissance" is a good start to explaining just how many. He lives in Nashville, so, of course, he plays a guitar and I imagine crafts a song lyric or two. He's a dang good writer. The kind of which this writer is a bit envious. I have urged him to write a book for years. To start a blog. (He did co-author this book, and I hope he'll compile his personal essays about his life with his son in another book someday. It will be a lump-in-your-throat kinda read from a loving, tremendously involved father's perspective.) Finally, John did start a blog and I'm sharing bits of a recent post of it with you today because it's so right-on. I hope you'll click through and read how volunteering has blessed John (and me) and the many who have been on the receiving end of his service and also those who have served alongside with him. And, yes, he tells in the blog post more about that service. I hope, too, that you'll be inspired to make a difference with some local nonprofit in your community.

Thank you for being you, John. Thank you for writing. For serving. It is an honor to call you friend.

Some excerpts from John's post:

"Here’s what I’ve come to know.  For families affected by autism, positive changes come most often as a result of family-to-family, person-to-person local connection and through the passion and dedication of local volunteers, local organizations, and local professionals.

[...] "It lies in the heart and soul of local organizations and the dedicated, knowledgeable, and tender-hearted people who do “the work,” quietly and powerfully helping to change the life of one individual and one family at a time.  When they share their stories with you, and you share yours with them, it’s a sacred trust, not to be taken lightly.   Our responsibility is to honor that trust, first by loving the people you encounter in “the work” as completely and genuinely as possible.  And then, we further honor that trust by using those stories to bring about even more changed lives.

"THAT is the work that matters.

[...] "Above all, I know this one thing to be true:   If you want to impact YOUR community, it’s going to come from the hard work and dedication of local folks just like you.   Get involved.  Volunteer.  Worthy non profit organizations abound in the disability community right in your town, who could surely use people with a passion for their cause.   You don’t have to be a board member or the president.  Maybe your strength is helping organize events.  Or talking to new families.  Or helping someone strategize for an IEP meeting.  Maybe it’s simply sitting at table and signing people in for a workshop or handing out information packets at a community fair.  Maybe your calling  lies in being that voice on the other end of the phone when someone new to your community just needs to talk.   Whatever your passion or your particular strength, just volunteer, even if you’re not sure WHAT you have to contribute.  And don’t be surprised when you find that giving of yourself in this way will also change YOUR life forever for the better."

Read the rest at: http://www.theverystuff.com/no-idea-back-then/

Leisa's note: by the way, the main local organization to which John and I refer is the Autism Society of Middle Tennessee.

"Hire Me!"

Kudos to filmmaker friend Jon Kent and The ARC of Davidson County. This short video says it all:

"Hire Me" Arc of Davidson County Employment Video from Kent Creative on Vimeo.

 

Sensuous Steele Rolls into Frist this Friday

Looking forward to seeing Sensuous Steel, which promises to be a lush and brilliantly guest-curated exhibit of gorgeous period cars matching the Art Deco period old Post Office that is home to Nashville's Frist Center for the Visual Arts. These people, this Center, just keep getting better. Debuts this weekend.See you there.

1929 Cord L-29 Cabriolet. Collection of Auburn Cord Duesenberg Automobile Museum. Photograph © 2013 Peter Harholdt

 

Will B. Dunn: RIP

Honestly, I never knew a whole-whole lot about Will Campbell, who died yesterday, a life well- and long-lived in irreverence and in service of the just God in which he believed. I had friends who were friends of his, reporter colleague-friends who'd interviewed him, friends who'd met him. He lived on the other side of town, here in NashVegas. My favorite story via a friend who talked to him at a Southern Baptist Convention (SBC):

It was half-a-decade-plus, probably, into the Fundamentalists' hostile corporate-style take over of the SBC, then, at least, the largest Protestant denomination in the country. Something of which they are/were very proud. I know because I worked in the communications departments of their various agencies for 11 years. (Bet many of you didn't know that, did you?) (I try to keep it a secret.)

One particular year, Campbell showed up at the annual convention donning special attire for the occasion. (The collective body of Southern Baptist churches are called a Convention and then The Convention has a convention. Every June.) Since the kick-off of that 10-year successfully waged and won battle to claim The Convention back from the liberals, the Fundies--as we used to call them--made ummm, what's the superlative? Something besides horrific--which they were--declarations each June during their three day (or was it five-day Convention? My memory of the misery is partially blocked). Rev. Bailey Smith of the great state of Texas made the first. (Now remember I'm JUST the messenger here). "God doesn't hear the prayers of a Jew." (WHAT? Ummm. Wasn't Jesus a Jew?) All you little girls who grew up in SBC churches in the golden era of (the liberals, ha!) who decided to become ministers and are about to graduate seminaries?: "Women cannot be ministers." (Or, at least the ministers that lead and preach behind the pulpit of the church every Sunday.) Or, oh, yeah: deacons, either!) "Boycott Disney because they promote homosexuality." (Huh?!) And I think they were at it harping on the gay thing again last year. (And I think a very old Campbell came publicly, with a response, to the defense of love, justice and rights. Bless. The old radical. God love him.) That last proclamation (something damning about the way some people are born, meaning sexual preferences,) was years after they ousted every last damn liberal from the pews. But my memory lost track after "Eve tempted Adam and therefore women caused the fall of man and so therefore if you work for a Southern Baptist agency, you must pledge the Baptist Faith and Message and your wives must submit to you." (That one had a lot of hard-working professional Baptist SINGLE women scratching their noggins about just where in the heck they fit in. (And what about that "wives love your husbands" part and the fact that "submit," in the classical languages--Greek, Hebrew, yada--means "love?" (Great example of culture adulterating the context in which the text was written...Just sayin'.)

BUT, I digress. Or do I? It was the Will B. Dunn's and the Will Campbells (well, there was no other quite like) who kept reminding The Convention of its hypocrisy in the face of the loving God they said they served. And, as for that story I started to tell you a moment ago:

Campbell showed up (about seven-years in to the hostile takeover) sporting a railroad engineer's hat. Somehow the subject came up about the "why" of the hat. I suspect my friend who told me this story didn't have to ask "why" Campbell wore this hat. Campbell told him. Told everybody he encountered, I think . The reason he was wearing a railroad hat, he reportedly told my friend, was "because that's what's going on here!" (Railroading!) (Get it?!) (Ha.)

God is loving. God is love. Humans forget that of which they/we are made. Young women who begin questioning the inconsistencies of religious rhetoric when they are a mere eight-years-old and then find themselves as a young woman being embroiled in the ugliest of religious politics...well, it didn't help in a journey out of Christianity. But it was not the key reason for leaving the faith. Simply, I found, that for me,  God was bigger than one path and one way. And all that railroading that Campbell spoke of? Well, it just helped me get a faster running start to catch that fast train the heck out of Dodge.

During this era, back in the 80s, I heard a prominent minister, the elected leader of The Convention, lie to  the faces of a room crammed full of reporters....I came to realize that despite our human forgetfulness of the God in whose image we are made, we do make "mistakes." (Or, as less than optimal choices. There are no mistakes....Lessons. Lessons.)  God does use even the most cracked and chipped of the vessels She creates. Even the minister of thousands in a downtown Southern mega city who lies to reporters. The one who eventually got caught in another string of lies about a series of affairs with female parishioners. He fell from grace, or at least human doled out grace. The grace of the forgetful. He's back in the pulpit. And back on t.v. And God can even be glimpsed in his messages. Like always.

Part of the journey, for me, is cleaning out the vessel so the light can shine through, in, out and from and remembering the vessel was created perfect, that I allowed life to crack and chip it. That sometimes the lesson is to crack even crack completely in two or into many pieces. And part of that allowance--on whatever level of consciousness--was/is to learn. So despite my disdain for the corporate church of my youth, again, it is MY truth that God works beauty for the best interest of all people, even me, even through the Baptists and other religions, and all people, including me, who too often forget the life and message and beauty of God and God's manifestations.

You can Google oodles about Campbell and his life and about the cartoon and the cartoonist who made him even more iconic. I have another story I could tell about that duo, but I cannot tell it publicly.  I do not begin to do justice here to Campbells life of justice. He lived his faith during the Civil Rights movement when his church body (The Convention) remained stagnant. (Interpret: Segregationist.)

Will B. Dunn. R.I.P. Thank you. I hope you're having a grand time wherever you are out there in the cosmos, whatever form you have chosen or will choose to take in this next life adventure. And, bless. Bless us all. In our forgetfulness. In our woundness. And, when we remember who we are. When we live the words of that which we claim as our respective Truth. Namaste.

My Church of Christ friend, who is a Sunday School teacher, a preacher, a philosopher and a politic-er, Bill Peach, resurrected a couple of his past blog posts celebrating Campbell while he still graced earth with his presence. You can read them here: Brother Will. And, here, Obscenity. Enjoy. Bill's a fine thinker and a hell of a writer.

Shut-Up & Start Writing, A Re-post

 

Do you know how important your voice is to the world? Every person has a story. Really....This is a repost with a slight revision or two as today, I'm, again--now for the third time--last was in Chattanooga--priviledged to join forces with Lacey Lyons, Belmont University adjunct English professor and Courtney Taylor Evans, of the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center. We will present "Sharing Your Stories: Advocacy Through Personal Storytelling," at the 2013 Tennessee Disability Megaconference. There, we coach parents and adults with disAbilites on how to write their story via Tennessee's Kindred Stories project. (I've one on their website somewhere. I think it's this one: "[...]I'm giving this summer the finger!) 

Because this applies to so many people who for one reason or another are not sharing the gift of their voice, I'm posting part of my presentation here on "The Journey with Grace":

Get Over Yourself and Get it Out Your Story!

Folks, you’re gonna have to scrap your ego to be a writer. Writing never happens with a flourish of a magic wand and a sprinkle of fairy dust. Every good story you read in reputable newspapers, books and magazines was written and rewritten and rewritten and rewritten. Did I mention it was rewritten? And, EV.RY.BOD.Y needs an editor. Everybody.

There’s no muse that just poofs a perfect story into your head! It takes work! Writers HONE their craft. And so should you.

In fact, highly successful multi-book author Anne Lamott coined a term: “the shitty first draft.” I wrote a book nine years ago that I’m now rewriting. And the book I wrote nine years ago was my shitty first draft. (In fact, one reputable book agent praised my book proposal profusely, but returned it because of my written samples. Good thing. It's taken another nine years of living and the publication of my actual first book (another title,) to get to where I am now. And guess what, it will be rewritten. And. Rewritten.

Nike came up with a slogan. Bet you know the one: Yes! "Just. Do. It!" Again, having a muse is a myth for most of us writers. It takes discipline. Pure and simple. Sit down on your patootty and JUST DO IT.

If you’re having trouble, pull out a journal or a scrap piece of paper and do “The Artist’s Way.” Dump your thoughts onto paper until you’ve written three pages or 30 minutes. Many writers start out their days with this exercise. Go ahead! Write down whatever comes to mind. Your irritation with your significant other. The memories of the bad tuna sandwich you ate for lunch yesterday. Your to-do list. Anything! It clears the clutter so you can get down to to the real business of writing.

And then, can the critic. Tell that mama to. Shut. Up. You know. That whiny, pointer-finger wielding voice inside your head that’s judging mercilessly every word you put down on paper. Ignore it! Tell it where to go! Remember, just do it. Get the words out and then you can go back and rewrite.

Well?! What are you waiting for?

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Image courtesy of Beth Lehman via Pinterest via Kristen House of A Novel Idea

What Is and the Is-ness of It...

Descending down the long-tall escalator at one of our local cinemas the other night, my friend and I glided by the guragantuan movie posters. We chuckled at the silly characters, such as the one-eyed, green monster wearing braces who was so ugly he was cute. Passing by each, I remarked, "I'll take Grace to see that this summer!" "Yeah, let's do!" my friend exclaimed, excitedly. Reaching the bottom floor, we walked down the corridor toward our theater and it hit me: I'd been dreading this summer.

On one level I knew the dread was there. I'd spit at it in moments of lament about falling off the cliffs of autism services into a black hole of adulthood. And in other ways, it was if I'd unknowingly experienced a home invasion that left toxins that poisoned my entire being....

Negative thoughts are like that, you know. Science shows what we think can become toxic chemicals that destroy not just our attitudes but the very bodies in which we move about on this plane. And, I'd been guilty of that thinking about this summer. And last. And the one before that and the one before that when I first smacked into the wall that I'd been warned about when my daughter was diagnosed at age three. The one that would be there as she sped toward adulthood.

Back to the movies. Thinking about those, the laughter, the silliness, the togetherness it would bring...that brought joy. And, it was accepting What Is. And, the Is-ness of it all. Truth is there's a lot of things we can do. They cost money. They cost more of my time and energy. The energy of a body that's older and a self that yearns to write and create more on her own. And, yeah, I'm not real wild about that, but it Is. And accepting the Is-ness of this new-to-us reality, I siphon the toxin. It also gives me breathing room and the knowing that I must do something about this Is-ness.

This summer, if all goes to plan, I'll spend another portion of another vacation exploring what's working in neighboring North Carolina in the arena of art, entrepreneurship and social enterprise for adults with disAbilities. Specifically, I'm exploring creating an integrated creative arts co-op that offers the options of maybe a fine art studio, quality crafts and a bakery. Not an adult day care. Not a segregated workshop. But, a meaningful work-experience-environment where art by adults with disAbilities can be created alongside typically developing artists who share studio and gallery space. For those who are interested in joining but aren't artistically inclined, there's always packaging, marketing, delivery, etc. This is not an original idea, it just hasn't been done locally, exactly, that I know of, at least. These are trends happening in the field of disAbility nationwide. I'll need a lot of help. Some art-appreciating parent types are with me. Some artists in the greater community are with me. Yet, right brainers need the partnership of left brain cells that can write grants and start up non-profits. I'm a pretty balanced right and left brainer but I know that my energy sizzles to crisply burnt toast rapidly with these types of left-brain intricacies. (Hint-hint.) Just like raising our special children, it takes a village, each bringing their own set of gifts to the project/person.

So, back to Is-ness and What Is. It starts with my attitude. An acceptance of even the things that I might not like. ("Rocks are hard and water is wet.") It's a zen sorta surrender. And in surrender, I release the struggle. And in releasing the struggle comes peace. And, in peace is a very fertile ground for Joy. And to enjoy. Enjoyment of even the Is-ness.

Is there an Is-ness is your life with which you've struggled, be it disAbility or otherwise in this big One we call Life?

Pictured above: GraceArt, Untitled [Heart] by Grace Walker Goad, for sale and currently on view in a all-new 2013 senior artwork solo show, sponsored by VSA Tennessee in the Polk Theater Lobby TPAC, the Tennessee Performing Arts Center.

The Little Drummer that Graduated

About to turn 19, this girl/woman ~

graduated Metro Nashville Public School system yesterday. And she did so to the beat of a different drummer. The same drum beat into which she entered this world. A very different, odd, quirky, funky beat.

And, in Classic Grace....Well, let me back back up a bit....The Valedictorian and Salutatorian of Hillsboro High School, together, gave a very different kind of speech. One unlike I'd ever heard delivered by a school's highest-achieving scholars. In cahoots with the speakers, the beloved teaching faculty stood up on cue and threw, first: candy; then party hats, (which some soon-to-be graduates donned and proceeded to wear through the ceremony atop their mortar boards,) and then...beach balls.

Well, Grace never met a ball she did not like and then subsequently destroy. (Basketballs are the only variety I have known her autism-bionic strength not able to destroy. I'm serious. Trust me.) Luckily, she didn't pop, bite and subsequently deflate any beach balls. Instead, just as she was to stand with her row, she spotted a tiny piece of candy beneath the chair before her. (Grace also never met any variety of food--excepting eggs--she did not immediately consume regardless of where it was found.) To the rescue, her ever-extraordinary teacher, sitting one seat, an aisle away, quickly redirected her, got her to rise and follow her seatmate in the march toward the stage. But, as fate would have it (pardon the cliches but this is cliche of Grace,) just 500 yards before the stage she reached down, ever possessing a set of eagle eyes, and voila! A lusted-after beach ball! (We'd seen her long for one when they were thrown out to her classmates lucky enough to catch one.) So, that lone ball was claimed immediately by our girl, it sides slapped loudly as she tossed it up and down between her hands.

No big deal. Just Classic Grace.

At least it was no big deal to all 22 Hammett and Goad family members--parents, grandparent, spouses, aunts, uncles, first and second cousins, stretched along a section's worth of front row seats. Her family, who traveled from different towns, different regions of Tennessee and two other states--proceeded amongst themselves to guffaw and quietly cheer their only only child, only grandchild, last grandchild, youngest cousin. That? That. Was our girl.

That? That. Was Graduation Grace-style. 

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Stayed tuned. As this tired momma aims to get her groove back on with "The Journey with Grace," the blog, and this week, the book. I really do miss writing substance here. Swollen with pride but relieved this week, this month, this spring is about to be over. Details on the future, Grace-style, coming soon. Don't forget to check out all new GraceArt at TPAC Polk Theater lobby through mid-August. Namaste.

About the photo: this very poor phone picture--doctored in Instagram, as I am currently too tired and dread downloading the 3.75 million pictures I took with my clunky Canon--illustrates well, Graduation Grace-style...facing, during much of the ceremony, anywhere but where she "should" be. The last cue, given by the graduation speakers was some funky music, to which Grace--the girl who also never met a tune to which she didn't break out into a wild dance--proceeded to go behind the chairs, her back facing her classmates and dance toward the onlooking guests. Oy. Teacher, again, to the rescue. Poor Grace, she never understands why we must kill her joy like that. ;)

Another Reason to *heart* NASHVILLE! "Everybody has a Story"

The email account I forget to check? Last night it had an invite to this release party scheduled for this afternoon. No can do. Boo hoo! I'd already decided to post this today anyway. So, WATCH THIS! You'll be glad you did. But first: grab a hankee!

 

Unfulfilled Mothers' Day Wish

A longer version of this ad ran in yesterday's Tennessean:

Here's the link:

http://data.tennessean.com/~adservices/ads/gunad.pdf

Social Entrepreneurialship

Scene: Wednesday after school, Grace delivered freshly assembled GraceArt Notecard II Sets to Tennessee Art League on Nashville's gallery row, Fifth Avenue of the Arts next to The Arts Company. Today, she's off to Disney World with her Dad. I'm traveling to North Carolina to pick up the remains of her solo show there. Hanging two shows this coming week. Details here. Graduation is one week away.