“Where did you learn Spanish?” The Amazing Next Chapter

February 2023

This Story popped up on my phone earlier this month and I realized that it has been on year since I wrote the piece about how I learned Spanish and my time living in Chihuahua, Chihuahua, México.

At the time, I thought I’d write the original piece (found below), and leave it at that. What I did not anticipate was the memories and feelings that going through that album whose pages have lost all adhesive, so the photos slipped out as I opened. I found myself flooded with memories, feelings of such deep tenderness, the fierce homesickness mixed with fierce gratitude for my new friends and family who welcomed me with such open arms. I thought of how different my experience than that of so many people in other countries around the world. Mexico wrapped its arms around me with friendship and love. I studied the fresh faces of all of us, still teenagers. I was 16-years-old when I went to live in Mexico.

One early morning magic hour, as I looked at the photos it came to me, “Now, we have social media. I wonder if I can find anyone?” I had the newspaper clipping from my going-away party, so I had first and last names. I searched on social media. One-by-one, I started to find friends from the past. I didn’t have married names, nor some of the second last names. I connected with many people with similar names with no luck. I had a stroke of luck when I was successful in connecting with David Fernández, who opened the door to phone numbers of my friends. I reached out. “I don’t know if you remember me, but…”

It had been 37 years. Names lifted from the photos and the newspaper clipping from all those years ago came to life—Lupita Siqueiros, Margara García, Claudia Fernandez, Lucia Guerrero, Luisa Prieto, Abril Chávez, Manena Alzaga, Teresa Martínez…

Claudia, Lupita, Margara, me

What I did not know at the time was what a profound experience of connection, love, gratitude, heart, soul, spirit, and connection would follow. To say we lit up WhatsApp would be an understatement. We shared photos of our families—children, spouses, parents. Most friends still lived in Chihuahua. Lupita had moved to Guadalajara. So many years to try and catch up on. WhatsApp video calls became regular rhythms of our weeks.

Carlos, Margara, Pepón, Lupita

Lucia, Claudia, Margara

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I pored over the photos that I received, seeing the 17-year-olds I had known, now in the faces of adults. I simply loved. We spoke one-on-one and in groups, each reunion bringing a stronger sense of connection. ¡Pero, Dawn, apenas estabamos en Santa Fe hace dos semanas!, me dijo Lucia. “But, Dawn, we were just in Santa Fe two weeks ago!,” Lucia told me.

Lupita Siqueiros y familia

Margara Garcia y familia

Lucia Guerrero y Sergio

David Fernández y familia

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tentatively, we began to share the chapters of our lives. As with all lives, we’ve experienced joy and heartbreak, beauty and tragedy. There have been marriages, births, illnesses, deaths, and all else that happens over the course of years and decades. My sense is that they are our experiences, the perspectives gained through the many chapters of our lives, that instill the deep sense of gratitude that of our reconnection. I know this is true for me. My sense is is due to, yes, the joyous life chapters, but perhaps especially because of the difficult life chapters, that makes all of these reconnections and my gratitude so profound.

I see the kernel of 17-year-olds we were the last time we saw each other, an essence within each of us. It is as if all that each of us has experienced since that time caused that essence, that emergent spark, to deepen and grow. A solidity, a depth, shapes and contours the adults we have become. The essence of each has expanded exponentially into the richness of adulthood.

Las Amigas en Chihuahua

Manena y familia

Manena at our favorite—frozen yogurt at Zum Zum!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gorgeous piece by @claudiafernandezarte

Las Amigas

David y familia

 

Abril Chávez y familia

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It has now been one year. I continue to be filled with intense gratitude for these reconnections. The photos from the years that I lived in Chihuahua still rest on the dry pages of the worn photo album. However, my phone and computer now fill with vibrant images of dear friends, their families, and happenings.

It is said that you can’t go back. I suppose that is true. What is true is the possibility of the past unexpectedly enriching the present in magical and real ways.

We’ve all sworn not to lose touch again, our connections now treasured. It is only a matter of time until we reconnect, talk, and hug in-person in México. I can’t wait!

¡Los quiero mucho!

 

“Where did you learn Spanish?”

February 12, 2023 by Dawn Wink 22 Comments

First Day of School, Instituto La Salle

“Where did you learn Spanish, Dawn?”

This question pops up often. I was asked again recently, which had me looking for the photo album that I made the year I lived in Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico. The stickiness of the album pages long since dried and disappeared and the photos now slide out from under the clear film that covers them. I hadn’t looked at those photos in years and memories came tumbling back.

I knew that I wanted to be a foreign exchange student when I was 13 years old. It took me two years to convince my parents to allow me to go. I was so surprised when decades later a dear friend from high school said to me, “Oh, I thought that you parents made you go.” The time and energy it took to convince them! When they at last agreed, my mom said, “There is too much water between Arizona and Europe. You can go to Mexico.” I will be eternally grateful for this decision. I cannot imagine how different the scope and trajectory of my life would have been if I didn’t speak Spanish.

Mi hermana mexicana, Tere

These were my growing up years of books, braids, and riding on our ranch in southeastern Arizona. My dad raised Brangus cattle and during that time, there was a lot of collaboration between Brangus breeders in northern Mexico and the US. My parents had many colleagues and friends in the ranching communities of Chihuahua and put out the word that I wanted to be an exchange student.

The sister of one of these ranching friends had a daughter who wanted to come to study in the United States. The two families swapped daughters for a year. Teresa (Tere) came to live on the ranch with my family and became my hermana Mexicana. I went to live with her family in Chihuahua and became her hermana Americana.

Don Benito, Señora Miriam, Angélica

 

I was 16-years-old when I arrived in Chihuahua to live with the family of Benito and Miriam Martínez. Don Benito came from Spain originally and la Señora Miriam Creel de Martinez came from a family with deep roots in Chihuahua. Their daughter, Angélica, lived at home and did all she could to make me feel welcome.

The first months were a swirl of new experiences, new friends, excitement, homesickness, and really not understanding much of anything that was said. I remember coming home from school every day with my head pounding. I attended Instituto La Salle. Students immediately welcomed me, invited me to their homes and parties, and did all they could to make me feel welcome. I think of this often when I hear how immigrant kids are often treated in the US.

My new friends were kind as I stumbled through Spanish and laughed with (mostly) me as I made mistake after mistake, including asking my new friend, who was eating a chocolate covered marshmallow on a stick, “¿Cómo está tu pedo de monja?” I’ll never forget her stopping mid-bite, looking at me, and laughing, “¿Qué?” I had learned that marshmallow in Spanish was pedo de monja, literally “fart of a nun.” Turns out, that is absolutely not the word for marshmallow in Chihuahua. That’s the day I learned the word bonbon and it’s stayed with me ever since.

By Christmas I could understand the gist of things and say enough to convey the main idea of what I wanted to say. I learned to only use Usted with anyone older than me or in a position of respect. It still sounds like fingernails on the chalkboard when I hear people use the informal tú with people who deserve Usted.

Angélica and Mama Lila

I learned very soon to always use Usted with Mama Lila, Señora Miriam’s mother. She was a grand lady in a grand house in a beautiful area of Chihuahua. We drove through a canopy of trees to drive up the winding driveway to her home. I can still remember the smell of her perfume, the soft paper-thin texture of her cheek when I kissed her in greeting. An elegant staircase wove up and around the wall to the balcony bedroom doors above. Sun steamed in through the kitchen windows at her home, sometimes dappled by leaves.

 

Libradita and Raramurí woman

Libradita cooked and cared for all of us within our home. Oh, what I would give to be able to go back in time and watch as she made flan! I was so taken with the Raramurí (Tarahumara) women and girls of the mountains surrounding Chihuahua. Their many layered skirts moved as they walked, sprayed around them when they sat. Our class took a field trip up into the mountains for a weekend not long after I arrived. I hardly understood a word of anything said around me. What I remember was the incredible generosity how my classmates treated me, how bitterly cold it was at night in the mountains, and the two young Raramurí girls who came with babies on their backs.

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This was years and years before I began to learn of Linguistic Human Rights (LHRs), the marginalization of languages and people, and the impact on the world. I know that when I began to learn of LHRs, these two girls came to my mind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I turned 17-years-old in March of that year and my friends celebrated with a cake. I look at this photo now and wonder where these now women and about their lives. Oh, and mi querida amiga, Manena. Oh, did we laugh! And, we loved to go get frozen yogurt at Zum Zum. I always added mango and coconut to mine.

17th birthday

Manena Alzaga

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lupita took me to the market and showed me what to look for in the fruit, how to choose the vegetables. I still hear her voice, her laughter.

Lupita

My classmates, Instituto La Salle

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ve had many other chapters in Spanish of my life. All builds on my life and experiences in Chihuahua. When I went to study in Spain, I learned that my Spanish was filled with Mexican expressions and vocabulary. In Costa Rica, I learned that my accent sounds Mexican.

When I began to learn about second language acquisition, I scrolled back through my memories and experiences and the theories found fertile and familiar places to land.

I wonder now that I listen to so many audiolibros narrated by Spaniards, Argentines, Mexicans, and Chileans what impact this has on my Spanish.

I will always grateful for this time—the experiences, friendships, inspirations, and love that have come from when I was 16-years-old and experiencing all. I feel the world would be an infinitely kinder place if all could experienced living and learning in another language, another culture. I imagine the empathy this might create if those who know experience the dominance of their own language could experience life through the lens of other languages and cultures.

A shared language opens worlds and windows of connections and relationships.

I am forever grateful.

 

Don Benito y Señora Miriam

Home Run Books and Meadowlark

 

The journey of writing Meadowlark was one of years of research, writing, reading, and writing some more. The writing journey is a solitary one—we write in the early morning darkness, the snippets of time between other demands, and never really knowing what will become of our heart and spirit that we pour onto the page.

Once a piece is published, we set it out into the world and know that it is now on its own journey. There is an element of putting a note in a bottle and casting it into the ocean inherent in writing and publishing. What an honor and gift when that bottle with the note finds its way a heart where it lands deeply.

Oh, to learn that like so many books that have shaped my own life, when your book lands deeply in the heart of a reader.

Thank you, Emmaleigh! Such a blessing to share the journey with you.

 

 

 

 

Mom has written extensively of “home run reading books.” What a gift and blessing to discover that Meadowlark was one. Here is Mom’s piece:

Another Home Run Story: “Meadowlark” by Dawn Wink

February 15, 2024

Dear WinkWorld Readers,

If you are a reader of WinkWorld, you know that I love it when someone discovers their own home run reading book. This is what recently happened. In this WinkWorld, I will share three previous examples of home run reading, and I will add a new example.

What is a home run reading book?

A home run reading book is that particular book that opened up the joy of reading to you. It is the book that made you want to read another book. The idea is that none of us are readers until we find our own home run reading book. We parents, teachers, and caregivers just keep sharing books with the hope that someone else will discover their home run reading book. Thank you, Stephen Krashen, Professor Emeritus for sharing this idea with us.

Joan Wink

A Personal Example

Some of you are aware that my home run reading book was The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. This happened when my own two children, Dawn and Bo, didn’t want to hear me read it one more time. I remember how sad I felt. It was at this moment that I decided to read it just for myself. Eureka!  Up until that time, I read every assignment any teacher and/or prof told me to read, but I was not a reader.*

However, after The Secret Garden, all of that changed. From The Secret Garden, I went straight to a decade of reading all of Hemingway and Michener. Bo, our son, immediately went on to motor bike magazines, and from there he jumped to Stephen King. Dawn, our daughter, went on to read chapter books by the tens and tens…

Recently a friend of mine reached out with some questions about MEADOWLARK. Her name is Sandy and she’d given the book to her daughter Emmaleigh, a college sophmore at Northern State University in Aberdeen. It turns out that Emmaleigh is NOT a reader, and never has been, even though Mom is a reader and Dad (Pat) is a middle school teacher. After reading MEADOWLARK, Emmaleigh texted her mom, telling her… continue to the piece.

 

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The Unsaid Between the Lines

New year, new journal

As I composed the pieces that created the constellation of the spectrum of the year and sat with my journal to begin 2024, again and again I found myself thinking of all the unsaid between the lines. We all experience those chapters in life when the energy of the events and experiences of the unwritten, the unsaid, outweigh all expressed in words voiced or written on paper. Those chapters in life when each word is measured and those that make it to the world rest upon a sea of the unsaid, the unwritten. We all experience those chapters of life when there is a weighted pause that meets others’ questions, before we respond. What to say, and mostly, what we choose not to say.

This was such a year for me and I felt it acutely as I reviewed the pieces written from the past year, each a feel a sliver of life amidst the vastness of the reality of all else happening.

We all experience this and I share here, because it can be easy to feel alone in these challenges when looking at others’ lives from the outside. I remind myself that we all have lives and chapters laden with the unsaid, the unwritten—even writers.

Meadowlark

Yet it so often all between the lines that carries the most energy, that drives and shapes our days and nights. All happening between the lines sculpts our lives. These chapters often feel to be happening to us, rather than from us. Days, weeks, months feel swept away in reaction, rather than proaction.

In Meadowlark, I write of Lakota wisdom of turning into our fears, our pain. This is the meadowlark’s song, a reminder for us to turn into what we fear, what brings us pain, as a way through it. When I sign copies, I write, “May we always listen to the meadowlark’s song.” This came to me in the candlelit darkness as I sat to write of my intentions for the upcoming year and became so exquisitely aware of all the unsaid and unwritten of the past year. There is a feeling of power in listening to the meadowlark’s song. The idea of turning into, rather than running away from. The powerless feeling of reacting to shifts into a glimmer of groundedness. Turning into all between the lines, listening to the meadowlark’s song, allows light into the darkness. We reclaim our own narrative, our own life story.

Rosca de Reyes y Champurrado

Yesterday, we celebrated El Día de los Reyes Magos/Three Kings’ Day. In this photo, I fell in love with this corn husk doll in Oaxaca and brought home. The beautiful cup was a gift de una amiga mexicana muy querida.

I didn’t grow up with the tradition of the Reyes Magos, and learned of it from a dear friend from Mexico who gathered our families together, with kids everywhere, to cut the rosca and and see who got the piece with the baby Jesus. We celebrated this sacred time of LOVE, gratitude, friendship, and family. I loved seeing the kids gathered around the rosca and then the excitement of who received the baby Jesus im their piece. From her I learned that whoever had the piece with the baby Jesus was to host the following year’s festivities. I’ve come to embrace this tradition in our family. Last night was extra special, as I got to hold a 6-month old throughout the meal. Oh, that feeling of a baby in your arms! There was such healing as he smiled, wiggled, chortled, and roared through the meal in my arms.

We received this beautiful sage bundle as a gift this year. Today I’ll light the bundle in honor of all the unsaid and unwritten between the lines of the past year and and invite good energy, healing, and intentions into this New Year. As the smoke gently lifts, I will hold you and your unsaid, unwritten between the lines in my thoughts, along with my own. I envision the smoke lifting the weight of the unsaid away and making space for active creation, intentional actions, a sense of sculpting our own lives. I’ll hold hopes of light and of beauty.

Here’s to a New Year.

 

Spectrum of the Year 2023

Robin in the bird bath outside my writing room.

Santa Fe, Dec. 2023

I am so very grateful to you for sharing our life journeys together.

I sit looking out at a robin splashing in the birdbath outside my writing room window. The three doves that visit us flew to the fence—and for the first time in years, quails! Oh, do these birds bring me exponential amounts of joy.

Oh, this year, this year…

More on thoughts for our upcoming year in the next piece.

Our lives are rife with humanity, obligations, tugs and pulls in so very many directions. We so often need to be several places at once to tend to the ones we love and the work responsibilities that need tending.

More on all of that in next piece. For now, a time of reflection and companionship.

Where did you learn Spanish, Dawn?

1) Happy New Year 2023 and Deep Gratitude: Year in Review— As I enter the New Year writing my gratitudes in the early morning hours of darkness, sanctuary, and solitude, I think of you and this community. I am so deeply grateful to and for each of you reading this. I am profoundly grateful for our connection across the miles, years, landscapes, and seas.

2) “Where Did You Learn Spanish, Dawn?”— This question pops up often. I was asked again recently, which had me looking for the photo album that I made the year I lived in Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico. The stickiness of the album pages long since dried and disappeared and the photos now slide out from under the clear film that covers them, memories came tumbling back.

KSAALT Keynote Speaker Series

3) Wildness, Beauty, and Imagination of Language within Translanguaging— Video of presentation exploring these ideas to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Association of Language Teachers (KSAALT).

4) Language, Ecology, and Story: Follow the Energy — The published piece, “Artistic expressions of language, ecology, and story: Language and landscape as explored through watercolor,” in Language & Ecology.

NABE Presentation 2023.

5) Decolonizing Research Through Wildness, Beauty, Imagination, Lilyology, and Scholarly Personal Narrative — I was beyond grateful to share ideas with the National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE) Conference 2023. I share the video of my presentation with you here.

6) TESOL Convention 2o23: Intergenerational Highlights and Conversations About our Lives in TESOL —This intergenerational panel of professionals within multilingual education highlights panel members’ experiences within academia and publishing, the distinctive path each has taken within the field, and the unique dynamics of sharing a profession with one’s parent/child.

7) Pedagogy Tree and Academic Families Comes to Life: TESOL 2023 — Pedagogy trees include and extend far beyond academia. We all have one whatever our life path. Academic families refer to the relationships created within our personal and professional learning communities, and like all families, are quite complex.

Dawn Hummingbird © Julie Morley

8) First Hummingbird of Spring — I heard the distinctive trill of a hummingbird flying above. The sound was so out of place on our cold high desert day in Santa Fe that it took me a moment to register what I heard. I listened more intently. Symbols of beauty and joy, hummingbirds have a special place in my heart.

9) Walking the Pilgrimage to the Santuario of Chimayó — I looked up to see the iconic New Mexico contrast of brilliant blue skies against shades of adobe. This year we walked to lift thoughts and prayers of gratitude for blessings, as well as for healing for those within our circle of family and friends.

AERA 2023

10) Story, Lilyology, Scholarly Personal Narrative, and Magic at AERA 2023  — Sometimes the stars align to create magic and this was one of those times. When I discovered Lilyology, created by Dr. Nerida Blair, the ideas resonated with my spirit across the ocean and miles from Australia. Add Mom, Dr. Joan Wink, to the presentation and the magic expands.

11) Woven Into Every Stitch —‘Tis the season for graduations of all kinds and in all places! As graduation season approached, I remembered something that Mom had said to me earlier in the year. “Hunny, we want to give you doctoral regalia for your graduation,” Mom told me when I completed my PhD.

Sunrise on the ranch. 2023

12) Invisible Stories Embed the Land: Wink Ranch 2023 — Invisible stories thread the land, their roots create the bedrock of foundation beneath our feet. Our time on the ranch this past week brought this home to me.

13) Trail Runs, Dear Ones —“Hunny, this is not only a trail run, it’s an obstacle course!” I called out to Wyatt on mile four, as we ran down a washed-out trail in Colorado. “Mom, that’s what a trail run is,” he called back over his shoulder.

A transcendent, transciplinary creative life.

14) A Transcendent, Transdisciplinary Creative Life — I was well into adulthood, before I learned a word that seemed to make so many elements and experiences in my life make sense. My professional and personal life resembles a brightly pieced quilt or a mosaic of different colors and textures, far more than a streamlined and linear path.

15) A World for the Moment: Flowers of Summer — “When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it’s your world for the moment. I want to give that world to somebody else.” ~ Georgia O’Keeffe. I came across these thoughts by Georgia O’Keeffe last week and they give voice to one of my favorite rhythms of summer—planting flowers, so I can give people bouquets.

Dr. Helen Kara, creator of International Creative Research Methods Conference

16) Sunrise Over the Atlantic: Creativity, Research, and Flowers — I write from my hotel room in Manchester, England. This photo was taken somewhere over the Atlantic. I’ve never been called “luv” or “dahling” so often in my life. I headed here to present at and attend the International Creative Research Methods Conference .

17) Creativity, Research, and Passion at the International Creative Research Methods Conference (ICRMC) —  I have followed conference creator Dr. Helen Kara for the past several years and was thrilled to see the announcement of the upcoming conference. The conference was in the UK, I thought, “I’ll submit a proposal and if accepted, I’ll figure out a way to attend. I was over the moon when my proposal, Beyond the Brick Wall: Transdisciplinary Research Through Creative Methods was accepted. I was UK bound.

I am with the banned.

18) Read Wildly: Banned Books Week, Let Freedom Read Day — I spent my childhood either horseback or curled up reading a book. This time reading opened my world to places, times, events, people, and ideas far beyond our remote ranch in the Arizona Sonoran desert. Read wildly. Read in beauty. Read with imagination. Read freely.

Why do you love Harry Potter? King’s Cross Station, London

19) “Why do you love Harry Potter?” —Harry Potter, Hagrid, Hermione, Ron, and Dumbledore are all members of our family. Most people don’t know why. It’s because, they saved us.

20) Altar as Landscape, Love Lives On: Día de los Muertos — The landscape of our altars reflects the landscape of our lives.

21) Travel, Teaching, and Tampico for MEXTESOL: MEXTESOL Press Special Edition — I am thrilled to have a chapter included in the MEXTESOL© Press 50th Anniversary Special Edition. This publication includes such impressive research and writing about teaching and learning in multilingual settings.

Love is… sunlight shining through glass.

22) Love is… — Love is endless skies. Love is sunlight through glass. Love is an offered gingersnap. Love is sitting in silence together. Love is hard decisions. Love is waiting.

23) Practicing Terraphilia: Landscape and Language — We woke to snow in Santa Fe this morning. What a delight to also wake to Susan J. Tweit‘s piece on our shared love of Language and Landscape.

With Susan J. Tweit, Women Writing the West Conference, Language to Landscape

 

24) A Shared Cup of Christmas Tea — A Wink family tradition for Christmas is to read the gorgeous book A Cup of Christmas Tea by Tom Hegg. While this is titled Christmas tea, the story holds for all traditions. This is a human story of roots, memories, and love. I read for you here.

Practicing Terraphilia—Landscape and Language

Language and Landscape, Women Writing the West Conference, 2022

We woke to snow in Santa Fe this morning. What a delight to also wake to Susan J. Tweit‘s piece on our shared love of Language and Landscape. We wrote a piece together, Mother Tongues: Two Writers Explore That Shape Their Connections to Place (Langscape, 2016).

I share Susan’s piece here. Enjoy.

© Susan J. Tweit

Practicing Terraphilia with Susan J. Tweit

Landscape and Language

This morning at dawn, I walked the draw below my house in a steady rain of falling snow, with several soft inches already on the ground. And I thought about an ongoing discussion I’ve had for many years with my friend Dr. Dawn Wink, an extraordinary gifted author and teacher, about how language defines landscape, and landscape defines language. This morning, I pondered the terms for the shallow drainages that have provided my daily walking routes since I returned to New Mexico last winter and how those terms shape my understanding of these landscapes.

At my condo in the foothills, I walked an arroyo every morning. An arroyo is a streambed that is usually dry, sometimes with steep sides, and with a wide sandy or rocky bottom that stays clear of plants because during spring snowmelt or after summer rains, water may flow down it in a torrent, carrying enough sediment to grind the soil clean. In my favorite encyclopedia of landscape terms, Home Ground: Language for an American Landscape, edited by the late Barry Lopez and his wife, Debra Gwartney, Arturo Longoria writes that the word arroyo comes from the Spanish word for creek, even though these creeks are most often dry on the surface.

Here on the edge of the Southern Plains at the house I moved to earlier this month, I walk a very different sort of usually dry watercourse: a draw. A draw, Conger Beasley, Jr., writes in Home Ground, “is a small natural watercourse or gully, shallower and more open than a ravine or gorge [and I would add, or an arroyo]; also known in some areas as a blind creek… A draw is typically dry and subject to flooding in heavy rains.” The draw below my house is shallow, thickly vegetated with a blue grama grassland, and studded with the darker polka-dots of short one-seed junipers and a few piñon pines. (That’s the draw in this morning’s snow in the photo at the top of the post.)

Why does it matter that I call this shallow, grassy declivity in the rounded edge where the plains meet the mountains a draw rather than an arroyo? To some people it doesn’t. To them, the landscape feature I am getting to know is likely a mere blip in a featureless expanse. But to me, it is home. And I want to be able to know it intimately, to gain, as Lopez writes in the Foreword to Home Ground, “[T]he comfort that a feeling of intimate association with a place can bring….”

I see this house as my final one for what a friend of mine calls the “home stretch” of our lives, the few decades remaining in my allotted span. (If I am fortunate in how long I live; as the widow of a vigorous, healthy man who died of brain cancer at age 61, I am well aware that there are no guarantees to the span of our lives.) This house and this landscape are my chosen place, and I want to know them in a way that respects their individuality.

Thus, my interest in describing the shallow, grassy valley traced by the trail I walk more specifically than the generic term valley. It is a draw, a classic dry watercourse of the western Great Plains. I want to know its particulars: who lives here in addition to the shrubby junipers, the semi-circles of blue grama grass, the singing coyotes and the sapphire-backed western bluebirds. How their lives interweave. How the draw changes through the seasons.

I look forward to the surprises I find on my daily dawn walks, whether they be wet snow coating me and the landscape, the roaring sweep of winter winds, or the first flush of green come spring.

In short, I want to know this place in a way that says I belong: me to the place, the place to me. Belonging does not imply possession, more a relationship that expresses my terraphilia, born of familiarity and respect. I want my existence here to honor all the place is, and to be part of its interwoven community of lives.

What specific term(s) would you use to describe the landscape where you live? Do they conjure the spirit of the place as you understand it? Hit the “comment” button below and let me know!

Thanks for reading Practicing Terraphilila, and supporting my work! I write these occasional Thursday pieces specifically for you, my paying subscribers, because I want to thank you for your belief in me and my writing. This writing is my gift to you. If you are so moved, you are welcome to share it with others. Spreading the word is another way of supporting my writing, and I greatly appreciate it and you! Blessings. Susan J. Tweit

View from my desk in my writing room right now.

Love Is

Love is endless skies.

Love is an offered gingersnap.

Love is sunlight through glass.

Love is sitting in silence together.

Love is hard decisions.

Love is waiting.

Love is a vintage Fiestaware cup with tiny chips.

Love is mugs of hot tea around a table.

Love is warrior women.

Love is fierce.

Love is gentle.

Love is listening.

Love is laughter.

Love is unexpected airport appearances.

Love is shared history.

Love is family stories.

Love is moving through the ebb and flow of life together.

Love is joy.

Love is pain.

Love is bearing witness to the shifts of life.

Love is promises and keeping them.

Love is indoor picnics.

Love is accepting change.

Love is accepting what is and working toward what can be.

Love is black and white photos.

Love is your spirit horse growing old.

Love is leaning hugs.

Love is driving together through pastures.

Love is helping with the tough gates.

Love is hoping.

***

Love is a new day.

Always a new day.

Sunrise on the ranch.

MEXTESOL Press Special Edition—Travel, Teaching, and Tampico for MEXTESOL

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am thrilled to have a chapter included in the MEXTESOL© Press 50th Anniversary Special Edition. This publication includes such impressive research and writing about teaching and learning in multilingual settings. I wrote this piece, “Travel, Teaching, and Tampico for MEXTESOL” after my time with the MEXTESOL Tampico Conference 2017 in Tampico, Mexico. This piece published within MEXTESOL Press means a lot to me, due to the very special place that I hold the MEXTESOL community in my heart. Thank you ever so much to editor, Jorge Torres Almazán, for inviting me to contribute!

MEXTESOL@Press 50th Anniversary Special Edition—MEXTESOL Press Oct. 2023

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Arriving to Tampico, Mexico

Travel, Teaching, and Tampico for MEXTESOL

We landed in Tampico, Mexico for the MEXTESOL Tampico Conference 2017 “Evolving and Involving.”

Our hosts, Jorge Torres and Kim Soriano, and I studied together during a workshop intensive in Puebla, Mexico. It was lovely to reconnect and continue our shared journey of teaching and learning. Jorge and Kim invited us to the gorgeous campus of The American School of Tampico where we met with teachers and talked about Informal Assessment: It’s All About Authenticity. 

With hosts Jorge Torres and Kim Soriano, The American School of Tampico

With teachers of The American School of Tampico

Gorgeous tree at The American School of Tampico, Mexico

During our time in Tampico, the earthquakes in Mexico City and Oaxaca continued. We felt nothing where we were, but watching the news learned of the volunteer rescuers of Los Topos (the moles). We never watch news in the US, but did watch in Mexico and learned so much about the courage and heroism of these volunteers, whose initial volunteers began spontaneously in the aftermath of the 1985 earthquake in Mexico City: Who are Los Topos Volunteer Rescuers. Héctor Méndez, one of the original founders of Los Topos, “”Society changed in 1985 after that earthquake. It was a kind of cleaning. Because suffering cleans your spirit… So Mexican society now is a kind of catharsis — kind of a social catharsis, you see.”

The next day we were off to the MEXTESOL Tampico Conference in the gorgeous Casa de la Cultura.

Casa de la Cultura, Tampico, Mexico

We dove into ideas around Teaching Passionately Passion, Freedom, Structure.

Talking and making meaning ©MEXTESOL

MEXTESOL Conference 2017

Mil gracias, MEXTESOL Tampico, Jorge, Kim, and teachers. Here’s to all of our shared journeys!

Headed home over Tampico, Mexico

I so so very grateful to be appointed to serve as incoming Chair for the 2024 Nominating Committee of TESOL International Association. I look forward to the shared journey with the committee of encouraging vibrant participation and leadership within the organization and beyond. Congratulations to all elected! 2024 TESOL Election Results

Altar as Landscape: Love Lives On — Dia de los Muertos

Our altar.

Dia de los Muertos, All Soul’s Day, approaches. I’ve made the pan de muerto and begun the composition of this year’s altar. As we reflect and prepare, I share again this piece that I wrote during the pandemic on how the landscape of our altar reflects the landscape of our livcs. This essay went on to be published in For the Brokenhearted: Poems, Prayers, and Essays, compiled by Robin Whitley. More on this year’s Dia de los Muertos soon.

Día de los Muertos, All Soul’s Day, November 1st. In Latino tradition, Día de los Muertos honors our loved ones who have passed with altars laden with flowers, photos, and candles. I first learned of this tradition when I fell in love with Frida Kahlo in my early 20’s. Día de los Muertos is an integral element in our family’s life rhythms. Composing the altar this year felt especially sacred amidst the pandemic and so many people lost. So many new souls honored on the altar by Latinos in the US and throughout Mexico.

Mom’s hope chest creates the foundation for the altar. As I placed each piece, I had to smile. When my Grandma Mary embroidered Van Gogh’s Sunflowers, when my Great-Grandma Grace ground the coffee before dawn in the sod hut on the ranch, never could they have imaged these pieces where they are now. The landscape of our altar reflects the landscape of my life. Yo soy fronterista. I am a woman of the borderlands, as used by Gloría Anzaldúa. My life is one of a fronterista, where worlds overlap: prairie and Southwest, rural and international, landscape literature and linguistic human rights. Here on the altar, prairie and farmland come together with the Southwest; German, Welsh, Irish, and English with Latino; Protestant with Catholic; past with present. The worlds, each with a distinct culture, come together to create the mosaic of the whole.

As I place the flowers for my German Lutheran grandparents, Grandpa Wink and Grandma Anna, I hear my Grandpa Wink saying the Lord’s Prayer in German to delight my cousins and I as children. So many historic heritage languages and cultures fill the altar. Never did the great-grandparents and grandparents that I honor imagine a Día de los Muertos altar. The unimaginable—as I placed each piece, I thought of how very much like this expresses where we find ourselves in life right now around the world.

Grandma Janet’s wine glass, St. Agatha, Virgen de Guadalupe

Grammie Lucille

The altar holds a treasured wine glass of my mom’s mother, Grandma Janet, as Janet’s mother, my Great-Grammie Lucille looks on as a teenager from a black-and-white photo above. The glass rests between St. Agatha, Patron Saint of Breast Cancer, Nurses, and Women’s Issues, and Our Lady of Guadalupe, La Virgen de Guadalupe (Artist, Jil Gurulé). The beauty and delicacy of the glass reflects Grandma Janet’s life. St. Agatha is new to the altar this year. Breast cancer has touched many women’s lives in my family. My Grandma Janet passed far too young. Her wine glass honors her life, as well as represents my decision to remove wine glasses from my own table on November 1 last year, so I could focus fully on healing.

Corn honors my Uncle Ray, a farmer who lived life with such kindness, generosity, love, and a twinkle in his eye.

In our college community, we unexpectedly lost a well-loved colleague and dear friend. Luke defined himself as a spiritual being, imbued with the traditions of Peru where he lived and climbed for so many years. Eagles represent Spirit. Fly, Luke, fly.

For all of those lost to coronavirus, a collection of leaves I found under the heart-draped tree along my running path, tucked into the bird’s nest.

In honor of those passed to coronavirus.

Forever love.

Pan de Muerto

“Mom, did you make pan de muerto this year?” Wyatt asked me hesitantly on the phone in mid-November last year. It was the first year I had not made Frida Kahlo’s recipe (we use honey from the ranch) for pan de muerto in the kids’ memory. This annual ritual grounds our family.  With the health journey of last fall, I did not make the traditional sweet bread. When I realized last year that it was November 1st and I hadn’t made the bread, in an attempt to lift my spirits, Noé said, “Don’t worry. It’s okay. They won’t miss it.” I felt somewhat better in that moment. I also worried that they would not miss it. The sticky dough of pan de muerto helps to hold us together as a family.

Manuela and Amadeo Villarreal

When Wyatt asked if I had made, I was overcome with both maternal guilt at not making and a sense of deep gratitude and joy that he had missed! We altered our traditions last year and made when all came home for Thanksgiving. The spirits were just fine with that. This mommy’s heart smiled to watch all gathered yet again around the counter, creating their small figures of dough, sprinkling with colored sugars and decorations, and then the smiles on their faces when they each took that first bite of the bread fresh from the oven.

Noé’s parents, Amadeo and Manuela Villarreal, always center our altar. I was not fortunate enough to meet them. We missed each other by a few years. Their spirits remain alive through the countless stories of laughter, hard work, family love and dedication, and irrepressible and irreverent senses of humor! How I wish I had been blessed to sit around the kitchen table, drinking coffee from the pot that was always full, to hear of their lives and their stories. Whenever Manuela is described, the sentence usually ends with, “She was quite the character! No la tenía miedo de nada.(She wasn’t scared of anything).” When Amadeo passed, he pointed to the corner of the room and told his kids gathered around, “Allí está tu mamá. Viene por mí.” (“There is your mom. She’s come for me.”)

Treasures through the generation grace the altar. Mom gave Grandma Mary’s blue glass flower vase to her friend, Mary Ann, who then gave it to me many years later.

Grandma Mary’s blue glass flower vase

I received a photo that so reflects el Día de los Muertos for Latino children in the US this year. Noah’s mom, Patricia, sent me this photo and wrote, “Living always in two cultures—Harry Potter and Día de los Muertos. Here Noah connects for his morning meeting in elementary school online.”

Noah Grillo De Dios © Patricia De Dios

Our Dia de los Muertos books, collected through the years and well-worn.

A few of books of the indomitable Frida Kahlo, La Gran Friducha, for whom Día de los Muertos represented so much.

A page from Frida’s journal:

I had very mixed feelings when I first heard about the movie “Coco.” Disney producing a movie about Day of the Dead, thoughts of cultural appropriation ran rampant through my mind. There are no princesses in the Day of the Dead. I was anxious when we sat to watch, in much the same way I’m anxious when I start a movie of a book I have loved, worried that the movie will mar the beauty and power of the original. I was delighted to discover a beautiful honoring of this sacred tradition. “This makes me think of my parents,” Noé said when the movie ended, a tear rolling down his cheek.

Trees of Life are often found on Día de los Muertos altars. We received desperately needed moisture through snow earlier this week, as seen here through a Tree of Life.

Snow through Tree of Life in my writing room.

As I composed the altar and lit the candles this year, I gave thanks to each person represented and all they brought to our lives. We all live with the weight of 2020, the isolation, the restrictions, the lockdowns, the unknown. All lend an extra resonance to the creation of the altar and an honoring of how we are not alone and how the love and lives of others continue in our own.

As I placed each piece, lit each candle, arranged the flowers, memories of each washed over and through me.

While our loved ones pass, their love does not die.

Their love lives on through us and into the lives of those we love.

 

Why do you love Harry Potter?

Platform 9 3/4 ©Gerry Gritzman

Harry Potter, Hagrid, Hermione, Ron, and Dumbledore are all members of our family.

Most people don’t know why. It’s because, they saved us.

Wyatt, Luke, and Wynn were born in the years that the Harry Potter books were published. We were among the generation that anxiously awaited the next volume in the series. We read the entire series together aloud not once, not twice, not even three times, but a four times. What began as shared time of connection became a lifeline in later chapters of our own lives.

Reading with Luke, Wyatt, Wynn (2003, ©Joan Wink)

“Mom, I think I’m going to be transparent for the first time in the role that Harry Potter plays in our lives,” I told my mom when I returned from England. While attending the International Creative Research Methods Conference in Manchester, England my dear friend, Gerry, who lives near London, and I went to Buckingham Palace and Platform 9 3/4.

As we stood in line at Platform 9 3/4, I could hardly believe that I was there.

Harry Potter collections, Hedwig, and kids’ stuffed animals on Mom’s Hope Chest

The kids and I started reading Harry Potter aloud when Wyatt and Luke were so young that what I remember is the three of us curled up together at naptime with me reading aloud, nestled together. Bedtime brought more hours of reading aloud, this time the clean scents of fresh baths, jammies, and wet, clean hair. Soon, Wynn soon joined us, as I read and nursed, Wyatt and Luke on either side. We fell asleep together during naps and at bedtime, with me then easing my way out from the tangle of bodies to go and write.

Platform 9 3/4

In later years, as the books kept coming out, our own chapters of the Forbidden Forest entered our lives. Those were the years of divorce and separation. The kids and I were apart every other week for 12 years. Other moms said to me, “I could never do that.” All I could think was, “You could if you had no choice.”

When the kids came home, we curled up and read and read and read Harry Potter. Hogwarts was the world that we escaped into together, ours and ours alone. I made popcorn and we read for three or four hours a day/night. Harry Potter was our world where we reconnected, spoke the same language, laughed, and cried together. We shut our all else and took refuge. No matter what was happening in our lives outside of Hogwarts, when we entered the Chamber of Secrets, the Quidditch World Cup, and the Gryffindor Common room, we left all else behind for a time. Later, when Wyatt came home from school one day in 2nd grade and said, “I’m stupid. I can’t read,” and I pulled him out of school for 6 months on nothing more than intuition, he was reading Harry Potter within a month.

Platform 9 3/4 ©Gerry Gritzman

To stand on Platform 9 3/4 brought all of these memories tumbling back.

At one point, there was talk that Harry would die in the final book. I thought of writing a letter to J.K. Rowling, begging her for Harry to live. We barely recovered from Harry’s godfather, Sirius’, death. I couldn’t imagine what that would do to our self-contained little world if Harry were suddenly gone. Thankfully, Harry lives on.

We still have Harry Potter movie marathons during the winter when it’s snowing outside and the day unfolds before us around the holidays, accompanied again by popcorn and hot cocoa.

Luke called me one time and I saw that I am, “Mrs. Weasley” on his phone. I love this. One of my absolute favorite Mrs. Weasley lines that never fails to bring tears to my eyes, “Not my daughter, you b*tch.”

“Do you want to be Fred or George?” I asked.

Luke has been George Weasley on my phone ever since.

What I know is that Harry Potter and Hogwarts were the safety net that caught us during the many years that the ground felt ever-shifting under us. When we curled up to read together, our world settled and the ground strengthened and firmed beneath us. Together and safe, we entered the fictional narrative to escape our own. As we read, I felt all of our bodies gradually relax, our breathing deepen, and a softness and light return to their eyes.

In the car we listened to initially cassette tapes and then CDs of all of the books. Harry, Hermoine, and Ron were with us in the car on the 14 hour drives to the ranch. Through the years the CDs became jumbled together in a basket. It didn’t matter which one we put in. We immediately knew exactly which scene in which book. Jim Dale read the kids to sleep at night and to me as I cleaned. I now have the books on Audible on my phone. I listen to them when I seek comfort.

We continue to be bound together by this magical world in which the four of us live with Harry, Hermoine, Hagrid, Dumbledore, and all that surrounds them. Even Snape, once we learned of his journey, is now a welcome member of our world.

I read somewhere that when asked about Harry Potter, a 10-year-old simply said, “Harry Potter makes me happy.” In the years of darkness, we lived our own Marauder’s Map, an unfamiliar and frightening world. We took sanctuary as the familiar footprints appeared on the map and followed where they led. They led us back to ourselves, and to the connection of us.

Our Time-Turner – A magical device used for time travel.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read Wildly—Banned Books Week, Let Freedom Read Day (October 7)

I’m with the banned t-shirt

“Language changes most graciously through poets and storytellers, and most clumsily when it is being manipulated by reformers and committees.” Madeleine L’Engle, A Stone for a Pillow

I spent my childhood either horseback or curled up reading a book. This time reading opened my world to places, times, events, people, and ideas far beyond our remote ranch in the Arizona Sonoran desert.

Read wildly. Read in beauty. Read with imagination. Read freely.

I honor Banned Books Week (October 1-7). October 7, 2023 is Let Freedom Read Day. The American Library Association highlights, “Banned Books Week celebrates the freedom to read and spotlights current and historical attempts to censor books in libraries and schools. For more than 40 years, the annual event has brought together the entire book community — librarians, teachers, booksellers, publishers, writers, journalists, and readers of all types — in shared support of the freedom to seek and to express ideas, even those some consider unorthodox or unpopular.”

Madeleine L’Engle spoke of censorship in her talk in 1983 to the Library of Congress Dare to be Creative, “We all practice some form of censorship. I practiced it simply by the books I had in the house when my children were little. If I am given a budget of $500 I will be practicing a form of censorship by the books I choose to buy with that limited amount of money, and the books I choose not to buy. But nobody said we were not allowed to have points of view. The exercise of personal taste is not the same thing as imposing personal opinion.”

“It is the ability to choose which makes us human,” Madeleine wrote in Walking on Water. “People must be free to choose, even if they sometimes choose badly or wrongly. Others cannot make those choices for someone else. It is bad enough when individuals or institutions vigilantly guard their borders: When we censor out most of the world in order to protect our own little version of it, we are creating a kind of hell,” wrote L’Engle in Penguins and Golden Calves.

Long-time educator and my dear friend, Dr. Patty Lee, read her poem “Dear Moms of Liberty,” with eloquence, poetry, and power at her local school board meeting:

To those who would ban the books of memoirists, poets, and Nobel Prize winners.

 

Who are you to take away the teachers?

To prohibit their words from reaching me?

To decide which parts of history 

I cannot bear to see?

 

What master do you bow to

Who deems what works belong?

Prohibiting my discernment

Of knowing right from wrong?

 

Do you think I will be safer?

Do you suppose it will be pure?

To prescribe what I can know about,

And which truths I must not endure?

 

Why ban the stories of Maya, 

Rosa, Alexie and J.K.

From the intelligence of students

Seeking to find their own way?

 

Such works have been my lifeline

In realizing that I belong,

That our history is rich and fertile

When we hear each other’s song.

 

These are not your lessons

To dictate nor dole out

These are the lives we’re living,

Ours to sing and write about.

 

We need to know that others struggle,

That Magic happens all the time.

That if you switch the names in stories

What has been yours, is mine. 

 

We are all amazing members 

of this species, Humankind

Who need truths from every corner

Not the rule of narrowmind.

 

We need all of our perspectives,

Without battles to win or lose.

Freedom to hear from one another

Let the teachers, librarians and students choose.

 

© Patty Lee

Gig Harbor, WA

April 24, 2023

 

Banned Books

 

Creativity, Research, and Passion at the International Creative Research Methods Conference #ICRMC

Creative Researchers gathered the inaugural International Creative Research Methods Conference on 11 and 12 September in Manchester, UK. I have followed conference creator and creative researcher Dr. Helen Kara for the past several years and was thrilled to see the announcement of the upcoming conference. The conference was in the UK, I thought, “I’ll submit a proposal and if accepted, I’ll figure out a way to get attend. I was over the moon when my proposal, Beyond the Brick Wall: Transdisciplinary Research Through Creative Methods was accepted and I was UK bound. And the people, creative methods, and ideas that filled the upcoming days filled my transdisciplinary  heart and spirit! My hope is to highlight and share the amazing creative research possibilities and work of the conference.

With Dr. Helen Kara

Conference creator Dr. Helen Kara welcomed all and kicked off the conference dedicated to exploring creative research methods with researchers from around the world. After reading and admiring her work for years, to actually meet and HUG her was a gift and a blessing.

Keynote speaker Dr. Pam Burnard opened the conference with her her presentation on Performing a Rebel Yell: Doing Rebellious Research In and Beyond the Academy. Dr. Burnard encouraged us to write rebelliously, described how to Depart Radically in Academic Writing (DRAW), and I loved her thoughts and visuals on “lines of flight.”

Pam Burnard

© Pam Burnard

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Conference attendee Suzanne Faulker created amazing visual maps of the sessions.

Visual Map of Pam Burnard’s presentation by © Suzanne Faulker @SFaulknerPandO

With Caroline Lennett.

Keynote presenter Dr. Caroline Lenette spoke on The Importance of Being Disruptive: On Decolonising Creative Research Methods. Dr. Lenette shared her anti-colonial work, “I want you to honestly evaluate how you engage with creative research. If you don’t, you may perpetuate the creative methods of colonisation.” She spoke of the three stages toward decolonisation: Cognition: critical self-reflection and reflexivity; Commitment: Indigenous-centered research/majority-world knowledge and ethics; Conduct: Changes in practice. Dr. Lenette is the creator of the Anti-Colonial Research Library, “a collection of open-access articles and books, websites, and YouTube videos on Indigenous and anti-colonial research methodologies. If you are looking for practical examples from different parts of the world and want to know more about these research methodologies, start here!”

Visual Map of Caroline Lenette’s presentation by © Suzanne Faulker @SFaulknerPandO

Dr. Laura Pottinger explored research through the lens of Making, slowly, as method: piecing, steeping, stitching. What a feast for our the textural senses to think about research through her work that “focuses on the practice of natural textile dyeing, investigating the relationship between slow, creative practice and environmental care. Working with textiles practitioners, it examines the diverse modes of collaboration taking place in slow processes of colouration, and the novel environmental sensitivities that may be developed by creating colour with plants and living materials.”

Dr. Laura Pottinger

© Laura Pottinger

My presentation focused on Beyond the brick wall: Transdisciplinary research through creative methods. We explored transdisciplinary creative research methods through the lenses of wildness, beauty, imagination, Lilyology, and Scholarly Personal Narrative (SPN.)

Dr. Dawn Wink

Lilyology by Dr. Nerida Blair, art by © Dawn Wink

Dr. Irene Gutiérrez Torres and Dr. Silvia Almenara Niebla presented their work and documentaries through their presentation Using Audiovisual Methods in Borderlands: Empirical, ethical and methodological dilemmas. Dr. Gutiérrez Torres and Dr. Almenara Niebla presented their research and documentary work along borders around the world, including “Border Diaries,” a documentary that “intersects a personal journey back to her native Spanish town, on the border with Morocco, with the lost images of other migrants.”

Dr. Silvia Almenara Niebla and Dr. Irene Gutiérrez Torres

<p><a href=”https://vimeo.com/507888504″>Diarios de Frontera // Border Diaries (Dir. Irene Guti&eacute;rrez, 2013, Spain, 25′)</a> from <a href=”https://vimeo.com/user112368850″>Culturas del Cine</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a&gt;.</p>

Here, another of her documentaries, this one focused on the USA-Mexico border: Connected Walls

An extra special time connecting across borders with Silvia Almenara Niebla and Margarida Borras Batalla. Irene Gutiérrez Torres, you were with us in spirit!

With Silvia Almenara Niebla and Margarida Borras Batalla

The conference and time in the UK was so rich, this will take at least a couple of Dewdrops in hopes of honoring all. Too much richness to fit into a single post—more soon. Bravo and bravo to Dr. Helen Kara for creating this phenomenal conference and to the incredible presenters and attendees!

Conference Programme: 

Sunrise over the Atlantic—Creativity, Research, and Flowers

Sunrise somewhere over the Atlantic, off the coast of England

I write from my hotel room in Manchester, England. This photo was taken somewhere over the Atlantic. The flight from the US to the UK went as well as possible. I’ve never been called “luv” or “dahling” so often in my life. I simply loved it.

I headed here to present at and attend the International Creative Research Methods Conference . Ever so much more to share about that soon.

The program is here. Enjoy with me!

Speaking of writing and research, I finally did a long overdue refresh of some of my publications in:

• Researchgate
• Academia

There, you’ll find, among others:

Invisible Borders of the Heart

Mother Tongues: Two Writers Explore Their Words and Culture that Shape Their Connection to Place

Language, Culture, and Land: Lenses of Liles

Artistic Expressions of Language, Ecology, and Story: Language and Landscape as Explored Through Watercolor

Duel Language Models and Intergenerational Aspirations

And more. I’m not caught up yet, but will.

I arrived to Manchester and enjoyed a lovely cappuccino, before heading out to find my hotel.

I’ve spent the past day ensconced in my hotel, working on a big project, writing, and preparing.

Yesterday afternoon, I took a few hours to explore the city. Vibrant and alive. It seemed all were out walking the city center, people of all ages, and tables filled with groups everywhere throughout the city.

Laughter, walking, noise, conversation with such a distinctive lilt, jostling, and movement everywhere. A feast for the senses!

I also somehow managed to stumble upon an international floral show! I took far too many photos, of course, but the beauty was amazing.

More on the conference, creative methods, England, flowers, and all else soon!

A World for the Moment—Flowers of Summer

Messy garden bouquets for colleagues/dear friends and our shared day-long meeting. Day-long meetings need flowers!

“When you take a flower in your hand and really look at it, it’s your world for the moment. I want to give that world to somebody else.” ~ Georgia O’Keeffe

I came across these thoughts by Georgia O’Keeffe last week and they give voice to one of my favorite rhythms of summer—planting flowers, so I can give people bouquets. I love leaving bouquets at friends’ doors, bringing to our campus office and for my classes and colleagues.  There is something about this that makes me exponentially happy and hopefully create a bit of beauty and joy for the recipient.

In honor of the final throes of summer and summer bouquets, I share this piece of the joys of messy bouquets in mason jars.

More bouquets here:

A World for the Moment—Flowers of Summer

A Transcendent, Transdisciplinary Creative Life

Happy Book Lovers Day – August 9

I was well into adulthood, before I learned a word that seemed to make so many elements and experiences in my life make sense.

My professional and personal life resembles a brightly pieced quilt or a mosaic of different colors and textures, far more than a streamlined and linear path. Dewdrops reflects this reality, which is something I’ve thought quite a bit about.  Should I write only about creative writing, or the ranch, or academia, or languages, or visual beauty (sunsets and sunrises, flowers), or any of the other multitudes of passion and beauty that compose the world?

Marketers, and my own observations, would stress to stay within a single area.

Alas, that is not reflective of my life, nor the life I’ve created. My passions entangle together. I’ve spent most of my adult professional life in multilingual education and academia. I am also a creative writer. These two worlds often view each other with a healthy dose of suspicion. In my own work, I’m not streamlined in academia in the ways of so many of my admired colleagues. In my creative writing world, academia is perceived as lacking creativity and relevancy. In many cases, both worlds view each other as “the other.” Yet, my life and world are firmly grounded all. In these worlds, the influence in my writing in the other is often not welcome. In the academic world, much of my work walks the fine line of being too creative, not linear enough, doesn’t follow the expected norms. In my creative work, I winnow the vocabulary influenced by academia.

Garden beauty

In the academic world, the word is transdisciplinary, work that transcends disciplines in a harmonious way. When I first heard this word in an academic setting, and that it is valid, the skies parted and the angels sang! In a culture that prizes discipline-specific expertise and experience, this way of walking through the world has historically been marginalized. I’ve spent the vast part my adult life staying very quiet about my other kinds of work, depending on the setting. Until very recently, when I was in the academic world, I stayed quiet about my creative writing. In my creative writing world, I kept my academic work out of conversations. I became very good at mumbling in response to questions.

Ranching is also a massive part of my life, even though I have lived in town since high school. Those roots and experiences run so deep and are such a foundational strand in who I am that not to include that element would be incomplete. The readership of Dewdrops spans a wide spectrum of readers—from dear friends, to those in multilingual education, to ranchers, to teachers from around the world, to ecolinguists, to passionate readers, to former students, and so many other passions in life. I decided, ultimately, to write what has energy for me in that moment, whatever that may be.

Santa Fe sunrise on my run.

I struggled against my own in my professional life for many, many years, which resulted in me feeling ripped in many different pieces. I sat down one evening and started to draw what I was feeling in my journal. Stark and jagged lines of separation and many dark colors poured from the pencil. I decided then and there that from that day forward, I would be my full self in whatever the venue.

I began to speak about my creative writing in my pedagogy classes for the first time. I shared about multilingual education, linguistic human rights, and ecolinguistics in creative writing settings. This was years before I’d learned about transcisciplinarity. I just wanted my soul to be at peace. I was exhausted with holding back and pretending to experience the world in a way that I just couldn’t, hard as I had tried to do so. It was that old cliché of trying to fit a round peg into a square hole. I could do it with a sledgehammer and often did. Now, I recognize that our brains and spirits have their own energy and lenses of living.

View from my writing desk.

All deepened with that decision. I, at last, brought my full self into whatever venue, teaching, writing, or life. I experienced the mosaic of my life through a different lens, one of a sense of wholeness, rather than inadequacy for not choosing the streamlined professional path that so many thrive within. Thus, my dissertation of exploring language and landscape through wildness, beauty, and imagination came into the world. My writing and publications reflect this lens that feels authentic.

I continue to try and think of a word that I can use within my creative writing work, where transdisciplinary would stand out like a red flag waving on a natural landscape. I do think that the whole of my writing, work, and life does fall within how I describe my work, as exploring language and landscape through wildness, beauty, and imagination. I sit right now and look out at the flowers and birdbaths outside the window of my writing room. How about transcendent? A transcendent, creative life. I’m going to keep playing with this. For right now, this word feels right.

I write this piece in hopes that others may embrace their own innate way of experiencing world, whether trandisciplinary, discipline-driven, of whatever natural composition feels authentic.

I believe that whatever holds the energy and passion for each of us has the potential to be our unique gift to create beauty in the world.

***

 

Trail Runs, Dear Ones

With Wyatt and Natasha, Anya and Angus.

“Hunny, this is not only a trail run, it’s an obstacle course!” I called out to Wyatt on mile four, as we ran down a washed-out trail in Colorado.

“Mom, that’s what a trail run is,” he called back over his shoulder.

Natasha’s braid of beauty.

Well, there you go, I thought, and concentrated on the path ahead. The trail was rutted, filled with rocks, and twisted down a steep slope. It took all of my concentration to watch where I was putting my feet down in hopes of not twisting an ankle, falling, and/or wiping out. It was fabulous!

We stopped to stay with Wyatt and Natasha in Colorado on our way up to the ranch. Natasha just completed her Doctorate of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) degree and is now practicing. Wyatt into serious rock climbing, exploring, skiing, and pretty much anything outdoors. He has taken up trail running. While I’ve run for years, I haven’t done many runs that weren’t on fairly established paths. Lately, I’ve been focused on running deeper into language during my runs.

I was thrilled when he suggested that we hit the trail together.

Wyatt, climbing in Utah.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wyatt, Idaho.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The trail started out with a steep incline, but even, with a gorgeous surrounding view.

Golden, Colorado

We crested the top early into our 7-mile loop.

Wyatt spied deer on a ridge above. We were focused on looking up, when movement directly under Wyatt’s open stride caught my eye—a rattlesnake lay across the path and had just started to coil. Most runners where there are snakes are familiar with the “rattlesnake hop,” where you find that you suddenly have the power to levitate.

We continued on, rounded a corner, and met with a couple who warned us of a rattlesnake on the path ahead. We warned them of the one the the direction they were heading. No photo of the next snake. We edged around and kept going.

Drawn to taking photos whenever there is beauty or energy, I tried this to capture this photo of Wyatt and Natasha on the trail. The two of them running through sunlit grass was too tempting to resist.

A photo worth the tumble.

What the photo doesn’t convey is that the first time I raised my phone to take a picture, I tripped spectacularly on a rock, and flew into a nose-dive on the ground, my phone scattering across the rocks and dirt ahead of me.

“Mom?” Wyatt heard the tumble, and turned to see me still face-down on the trail.

“My phone, hunnies!” I said. Wyatt found it tucked under tufts of grass several feet ahead of me. A quick dusting off and I got the photo.

We completed the trail and I discovered a whole new element of running. It was marvelous! The next day I woke with sore muscle not be used on my normal runs.

I hope this will be the first of many trail runs. I loved the physical challenge and need for cognitive awareness.

Mostly, I cherished running with these two dear people that I love.

I’ll run any trail with you, including those with rattlesnakes and rocks that leap out to trip you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Photos from my run this morning in Santa Fe. #11miles

Invisible Stories Embed the Land—Wink Ranch 2023

Sunrise on the ranch. 2023

Walking the land

Invisible stories thread the land, their roots create the bedrock of foundation beneath our feet. Our time on the ranch this past week brought this home to me. Last year’s trip to the ranch had Mom and me on a road trip heading north. My dad called and asked, “Am I speaking with Thelma or Louise?” This year’s drive north surprised us with the green casts on the land. Drought has gripped the American West for the past several years and terrain once dusty, barren, with a few tufts of wheat-colored grasses now unfurled into expanses of multi-textured greens in a spectrum of hues. Dams long dry, their deepening “bathroom ring” surrounding the ever-shrinking water within, now had gentle waves lapping the shores, filled to capacity, no ring in sight.

The ranch received those spring rains for the first time in many years. “Look at the north dam!” I exclaimed when we headed down the lane. Last year I ran through the dry basin of this dam during a run on the ranch. What joy to see it now filled! “There are grasses growing and flowers blooming here that we haven’t seen in years,” my dad said.

©Dean Wink

©Dean Wink

©Dean Wink

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Almost) the whole famn-damily made it to the ranch this year.

Lisa, Bo, Garrett, Dad/BopBop, Mom/Grammie, Wynn, Wyatt, me, Noé (missing Luke and Austin)

Soon after arriving, I slipped away to be with the horses Mom and Daddy had brought in from the pasture for just this reason. I eased up, my hand out, to rub the soft velvet of their noses, move my hand up along their necks to feel their hair and manes under my fingertips and gather their scent on my skin. I then leaned forward to rub my hands along necks, backs, and bellies, opened my button-up shirt to rub the fabric on their hair to gather that unique scent that can only be described as “smells like horse,” a deeply comforting scent for we who love horses. A scent that smells like home, whether physically or in our hearts.

Horses smell of story.

Tove Skutnabb-Kangas

The world lost a great sharer of stories with the passing of Dr. Tove Skutnabb-Kangas. Tove dedicated her life work, along with her husband Robert Phillipson, to linguistic human rights, ecolinguistics, and multilingual education. Tove’s work has been a foundational influence for me for the past 30 years. Her metaphor of the waterlily as reflection of mother tongue and additional languages was at the heart of my dissertation. Her voice, presence, and spirit shifted the way we think about languages, cultures, ecosystems. Healthy diversity is vital for thriving, whether in languages, ecosystems, or human relationships. The abundance of diverse grasses and flowers on the prairie this year embodies this. Throughout the years, Tove and I shared many, many chapters. We shared photos of our garden and wildflowers throughout the decades. I learned of her passing the day my neighbor invited me to create a posey of her peonies. When I learned of Tove’s passing, the bouquet took on new meaning. In honor of the fierce beauty Tove brought to the world.

 

Mom and Wynn explored together.

Later, we slipped down to the southern part of the ranch to see the breaks along the Cheyenne River.

As I stood and looked out on the prairie, filled with grasses again after years of drought, I thought of the interconnections that underlie all, no matter how separate things may appear. Each individual component, whether root tendril, blade of grass, species, language, and person is intimately interrelated with the health of the whole.

As always happens when I am here, I think of the invisible stories embedded in the land. I think of the beauty and sadness, unfolding life chapters. In the audiolibro/audio book (Lejos de Luisiana por Luz Cabas) that I’m listening to now when I run, the author weaves a character’s reflection how human life stories are like rivers—the flowing water is always changing, never the same. When wind blows over the grasses of the prairie, it looks like waves, like rivers. Somehow the blades, each unique, wend and move together as a whole, like families. Each unique person within the community of a family touches the others, moves, bends, and impacts in the rhythm of the whole.

We each move with the winds of our lives, doing our best to dance and align with strength and energy. What happens with winds suddenly blow in an unexpected direction that leaves us disoriented and scrambling to find the rhythm in unexpected directions?

The land teaches us, yet again. Listen, bend, stay connected with those roots that are strong in whatever composition they may grow, and always, always turn toward the light.

There is always, always light.

Prairie grass roots in Daddy’s hands.

Even if they are pinpricks through the darkness, that light is no less real than the full rays of the sun. During the darkest of times, it is those gossamer thin tendrils that lead us forward. Dust mosts dance on those delicate threads, so fragile it feels impossible that they may survive, yet their strength lies somehow in their apparent fragility, like the roots of the prairie grasses the hold the land together. How is it possible that these tendrils hold the land amidst temperatures of -40 and winds so fierce they whip serenity apart and leave anxiety in their wake?

Yet, they do.

I look to the tendrils of roots, the tiny pinpricks of shining light shafts slicing the dark and try glean their lessons in strength.

So many of our true stories embed the land, invisible to the naked eye. The chapters of generations unfold upon their surface. My sense is that every generation feels our perspective unique. And yet, as I progress through generations my perspectives expand and shift and make way for new undertandings. The particulars may change, but I’m convinced these shifting senses thread the generations throughout time.

I envision those thread-thin root tendrils, holding the land together, creating and sustaining life, following the natural rhythm of the seasons.

Invisible stories embed and thread the land, to hold us all together.

If those roots can do it, then so can we.

Rainbows ushered us on our drive home.

Woven Into Every Stitch

Dr. Joan Wink

‘Tis the season for graduations of all kinds and in all places! As graduation season approached, I remembered something that Mom had said to me earlier in the year.

“Hunny, we want to give you doctoral regalia for your graduation,” Mom told me when I completed my PhD. There was no urgency amidst the pandemic and no graduation ceremonies.

As the ceremonies began again, Mom continued to use her regalia for the various commencement addresses she gave as she served on the South Dakota Board of Regents (BOR).

When she offered to gift me regalia again, we knew that she would be stepping down from the BOR.

“Mom, you know what I would really love, if you are not going to be using then anymore? I’d love to wear your regalia.”

The next thing I knew the original box and receipt (only my mom) arrived.

Wearing Mom’s regalia

As I lifted the regalia out of the box, I thought of the history, memories, and roots enfolded within and threaded throughout. “My regalia was a gift to myself, ” Mom told me. “I didn’t walk for graduation for either of my Master’s at the University of Arizona (not counting the one that she walked away from in Wyoming), nor for my PhD at Texas A&M. I didn’t buy them for my first several years as a professor. I wore what the university loaned to us. It wasn’t until I achieved tenure that I allowed myself. When I bought the regalia, they meant so much to me. They were my gift to myself.”

Interwoven within these threads are years and years of teaching full-time and parenting, while completing two (three with the Wyoming) Master’s and a PhD on ranches and in towns in several states. When I unzipped the garment bag to feel the fabric, it wasn’t just cloth that I felt. I felt the years of Mom’s growing up where education for women, much less a PhD, was so far down on the spectrum of priorities that it barely registered. These threads were woven from Mom’s coursework done at the kitchen table or tiny counter desk in the early morning or late evening hours while teaching, parenting, and ranching.

Arriving in a pickup

The cobalt blue of the doctoral stripes signify a PhD. I think of the cobalt blue of tiles of our kitchen on the Cascabel ranch in Arizona. Tiles from Mexico of cobalt blue and canary yellow created the counters and backdrop under the cupboards throughout our kitchen. It was simply stunning. Memories of that time make this color combination one of my favorites to this day. Wearing these colors represent not only a PhD for me, but also the memories of my childhood on that ranch, in that kitchen. I added texture to these threads through my own PhD and life journey, again so interwoven with working full-time, parenting, and the ranch.

I brought the regalia to Santa Fe Community College graduation hanging in the back of our pickup. Not the first time these have arrived to the ceremony in the back of a pickup! It felt only right.

Unos mariachis led all out after the ceremony’s completion.

Outside, we gathered with graduates of our Spanish-language Early Childhood program, whose extraordinary life stories never cease to leave me humbled and inspired.

The threads of this regalia now hold the incredible stories of women and men who came to the United States from throughout Latin America to create better lives for themselves and their families. Graduates from Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Guatemala, and many more Latin American countries walked the stage. Karina Tovar worked for years in our custodial staff, before entering the program to receive her degree for her career as a bilingual teacher. The message on her mortar board says it all:

Por mi familia

For my family

Woven into every stitch.

Karina Tovar

For my family

Story, Lilyology, Scholarly Personal Narrative, and Magic at AERA 2023

Sometimes the stars align to create magic and this was one of those times. When I discovered Lilyology, created by Dr. Nerida Blair, the ideas resonated with my spirit across the ocean and miles from Australia. The more I learned, the more I loved. Little did I ever dare hope that Nerida and I might present together one day. Add Mom, Dr. Joan Wink, to the presentation and the magic expands. Nerida, Mom, and I presented on Scholarly Personal Narrative (SPN), Lilyology, and Story at the American Education Research Association (AERA) Annual Meeting in Chicago, IL  this week. The title of our presentation, “Education Research Through Indigenous Frameworks, Story, and Scholarly Personal Narrative in Pursuit of Multiple Truths.”

Chicago airport

Nerida was born in the Kulin Nation and lives and connects most to Darkinjung Country on the Central Coast of New South Wales. Her father’s Country is Wullil Wullil Country central Queensland. Nerida’s journey to the conference began from her home in Terrigal Country in New South Wales. Mom headed out from the ranch in South Dakota and I from Santa Fe, New Mexico. Mom and I found each other in the airport and headed into Chicago and the conference.

The morning that Nerida, Mom, and I sat talking about our presentation, I found myself in disbelief and awe to be sharing this moment with these two phenomenal women.

Joan Wink, Nerida Blair, me

Decolonizing Research: Indigenous Storywork as Methodology, 2019

When my dissertation chair said to me, “Dawn, I was looking through methods books at a conference and told myself that I had no business doing so, since I have shelves of methods books already at home, one particular book captured my attention. I hoped it and read about something called ‘Lilyology,’ and thought of you.” I felt an instant spark of energy. “I have no idea what that is,” I said. “But, I love it.”

Now, these years later, I sat having coffee and talking ideas and life with Nerida and Mom. I would speak about Scholarly Personal Narrative and how Lilyology came into my life. Nerida would share about Country and Lilyology. Mom would a deeply personal story that I heard for the first time.

Magic does happen.

LILYOLOGY AND COUNTRY

Nerida shared wisdom about Country.”Acknowledgement of Country is an important act of connection and connecting. It is an act of relatedness to Country. An act of ensuring relatedness to each other,” (Blair, 2015, p. xxii).

The connective spiderweb that brought us together across oceans, miles, years, and life.

STORY

Mom shared a deeply personal story that I had never heard. “I haver never written about this before, but one of the problems of growing up mother-less is that you have no stories. The reason that I love this photo so much is that it makes me wonder: Who put those curls in my hair? Who bought that dress? Where was I going?”

She began with the heart of why story matters and carried us deep into broader theoretical and life connections.

This was a profoundly moving experience for this daughter of the mother-less little girl in the photo. Mom shares this story and presentation here.

A woman at in the front row and drew and wrote throughout the presentation. When we spoke with her after, Mom asked if we might see what she’d drawn. Infinite gratitude to Dr. Ingrid Anderson of Portland State University for sharing her drawing with us. This incredible piece flowed throughout our sharing of ideas. The more I sink into what Dr. Anderson created here, the deeper the experience of all. Sheer creativity and beauty!

We celebrated our life paths converging, our presentation, and our time together with a gorgeous Spanish/Catalán meal. Sheer gratitude for all. As Nerida would say, “Too deadly!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I write this in the early morning magic hours and hear the twirl of a hummingbird outside the window, encouraging me to head out for my run. Oh, how I love that sound! I could write and write and write about the magic and wonder and depth of this experience. To share my time with these two extraordinary women was a lifetime gift. I shall leave it here. I hope that the feeling and energy will shine through.

Magic happens.

Nerida Blair, me, Joan Wink

 

 

 

Photo Journal of Walking the Pilgrimage to the Santuario de Chimayó

El Santuario de Chimayó, 2023

I looked up to see the iconic New Mexico contrast of brilliant blue skies against shades of adobe.

Noé and I parked at the church in Nambé to again walk  the pilgrimage to the Santuario de Chimayó. The history of the origins of the pilgrimage vary, so include a couple of them here for you to explore.  Nestled within the mountains of northern New Mexico, Chimayó remained sacred space for centuries for the Indigenous people who call this area home. Later, Spaniards built a sanctuary here. It is believed that the dirt of this area is sacred and holds healing properties. El Santuario de Chimayó has been referred to as the French Lourdes of the American Southwest.

We drove to Nambé and parked to walk the 10 miles to the santuario. We’d already driven by streams of people walking along the side of the highway. It is an extrordinary sight to see the hundreds of people walking along the side of the highway. I mused what people who happened to be passing through this area must wonder as they pass. Ten years ago, Noé and I walked 20 miles in honor of Mom’s five-year anniversary of being cancer free.

Family walking.

This year we walked to lift thoughts and prayers of gratitude for blessings, as well as for healing for those within our circle of family and friends. Like so many of us, we have much to be thankful for and much to pray and lift healing energy around. Water bottles tucked into a backpack, we joined the stream of walkers alongside the road.

People of all ages walk and ride the route, including this family with kids on bicycles, baby in a stroller, and two toddlers in a wagon.

The first hints of spring are just arriving in northern New Mexico. These were the first tree buds I’ve seen this year. Seemed perfect for a day spent in gratitude and prayer. We passed an old house with exposed adobe and I wondered about the lives that lived there. Winters can be cold and long in northern New Mexico. I looked at the long window-less wall of the building and thought of the women, men, and children whose lives unfolded within the walls.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many walkers leave their cars at various places along the road to walk and hop in the back trucks for the ride back to their vehicles. It is known that anybody with a truck coming back down the hill will pick up whoever needs a ride back and drop them off. We see a steady stream of trucks, their beds filled with walkers, curve down around the bends and corners.

We wound up and out of the Nambé valley to where the lands open into stark, gorgeous plateaus and lines framed by mountains on either side. Something that deeply intrigues me about this pilgrimage is the threading together of the Indigenous and Hispanic traditions. One of our Indigenous friends spends several days walking from his home in Cochiti Pueblo to the santuario. He is a holy man within his pueblo and is one of those who prays in the kiva throughout the year. We learned from him that have been people praying in the kiva continuously for at least the past 800 years. “So you were praying in the kiva when the Spaniards came, and then the Americans,” Noé said. “Yes, we prayed for them, too.”

I imagined this pair a grandmother and grandson.

Throughout the journey, people set up stands to offer fruit, water, granola bars, and sometimes coffee and warm food with chile.

Noé

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a quiet time of walking and contemplation. The soft sounds of murmurs or soft conversations carries on the wind. Descansos dot the walk alongside the road.

Descansos

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The landscape along this route never ceases to amaze me with its beauty.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A woman walking behind us asked if she could take our photo, so she could see what she saw.

Descending into Chimayó.

The transition from the quiet walk into the tiny town teaming with people, sounds, cars, and voices happens gradually as you descend the hill. Harley Davidsons rumble along the road with their music pulsing through the air. Antique cars and low rider vehicles shine along the roads.

As you enter town, stands with t-shirts of the Virgen de Guadalupe (yes, I wanted all of them) frame the road. At first, I chafed at the commercialization of all on this sacred walk. Then, I caught myself. I am not any expert on pilgrimages, but I have to wonder if this aspect hasn’t been part of the destination for a long time. Perhaps it used to be to barter or offer tired pilgrims food and other wares. I don’t know, but I can imagine this may have been the case.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The courtyard around the sanctuary overflowed with people. Vendors selling ice cream and paletas, popcorn, and chicharrones dotted the outskirts. Somehow the atmosphere was both festive and solemn at the same time. Interesting and difficult to explain, yet true.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dancers mingled with people carrying their crosses.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then, it was our turn to find a truck with room in its bed to carry us back down the hill.

It had been a number of years since we’d walked due to many life reasons including studies, the pandemic, and health. I am grateful that we did walk this year. The time of intention on gratitude, beauty, surrounding others in prayers of health and hope felt deeply nourishing for my spirit.

Hopefully, all of that combined intention lifted the healing energy of the world a bit, as well.

 

 

 

 

First Hummingbird of Spring

Dawn Hummingbird ©Julie Morley @juliejmorley

March 29, 2023

I heard the distinctive trill of a hummingbird flying above. The sound was so out of place on our cold high desert day in Santa Fe that it took me a moment to register what I heard. I listened more intently.

Yes, definitely a hummingbird. The first hummingbird of spring.

I came home and filled the feeders in the yard, inviting these tiny sprites of zest.

Symbols of beauty and joy, hummingbirds have a special place in my heart.

“If Hummingbird is your personal medicine, you love life and its joys,” write Jamie Sams and David Carson in Medicine Cards. “Your presence brings joy to others. You join people together in relationships which bring out the best in them. You know instinctively where beauty abides and, near or far, you journey to your ideal. You move comfortably within a beautiful environment and help others taste the succulent nectar of life…Hummingbird hears celestial music and is in harmony with it. Follow Sister Hummingbird and you will soon be filled with joy and experience a renewal of the magic of living.”

It has been a long winter for many of us. Wishing hummingbird energy to you and yours this spring.

Here’s to beauty, joy, and the magic of living.

©Julie Morley @juliejmorley

 

 

Pedagogy Tree and Academic Families Come to Life – TESOL 2023

Poppies, Oregon Convention Center, Portland, OR

Just home from TESOL 2023 in Portland and wanted to share some of the ideas, community, and magic of the time together.  I wrote of last year’s international convention as layers of language, ideas, and love. Those layers deepened with this year’s conference and took on new roots and branches.

Off to present!

Mom presented her ideas of Academic Family Trees. Pedagogy trees include and extend far beyond academia. We all have one whatever our life path. Academic families refer to the relationships created within our personal and professional learning communities, and like all families, are quite complex.

A pedagogy tree, as conveyed here by one of her former students, illustrates the ideas, people, books, and events that influence our experiences of learning. Each of our trees draws nourishment from the roots of our foundational experiences, reading, learning, talking, and understandings. As we live and grow, new branches form, extend, leaf, and blossom.

The tree continues to grow throughout our lives.

Ann Ebe, Mary Soto, Yvonne Freeman, David Freeman, me, Mom, Shelley Taylor

This year’s TESOL embodied a dynamic, living academic family tree. Our intergenerational presentation intertwined along such organic, natural lines. I affectionately came to call our group “The TESOL Rock Stars and Their Tagalong Children.” David Freeman graciously referred to the Tagalongs as “Shooting Stars.” Thanks, David!

The four families had a sense of what the other would present, but how all interwove together as we each presented was not planned and came together with such synchronicity that they felt like the unfolding of an integrated whole of our shared roots. Mom began with the academic family tree and I continued with with my ideas on weaving wildness, beauty, and imagination into language, teaching, and life. Yvonne and David Freeman, along with their daughters, Ann Ebe and Mary Soto, illustrated the narrative arc of life experiences with a looping spiral connecting the ideas throughout the years and the mutual enrichment of their individual and collaborative work. Shelley Taylor brought her own rich academic family tree to life and highlighted how these experiences dip and weave throughout the persona and professional, formal and informal. Sonia Nieto and Alicia López spoke to their shared love of writing and writing together.

With Burak Aydin

The branches of my own academic family tree came to literal life at the presentation and throughout the conference.  During the presentation, I looked out to see the faces of different branches of my own academic family. Each face you see in these photos represents a treasured branch, some long-established and others emergent.

With Dilawer Khan and Mom

Other branches sprang to life through newer connections I was meeting in person for the rest time. An incredible new branch this year was to meet some of my colleagues that I have only known online. This was the first time to meet in person Burak Aydin, attending the conference from Turkey. Here’s to our future collaborations!

Dilawer Khan, visiting the conference from Pakistan, was a participant in a course I taught focused on integrating critical thinking and culture into English foreign language teaching. Dilawar gifted Mom and I both with a Saraiki Ajrak. Dilawer wrote to me that a, “Saraiki ajrak is a traditional block-printed fabric that is native to the Saraiki region of Pakistan, which includes parts of Punjab, Sindh, and Balochistan provinces. It is a type of ajrak, which is a shawl-like garment. Saraiki ajrak is not just a piece of clothing, but it is also a cultural symbol for the people of the Saraiki region.It is often given as a gift to honor guests or as a sign of respect.” Blessings to cherish.

With Austin Odour

A complete surprise when colleague and course participant, Austine Odour, attending the conference from Kenya, connected and we were able to meet in person for the first time. Incredible to imagine that what began several years ago and in distinct countries around the world would come together. What a lesson that we never know what ripples we cast and how they may come to life, the magic that may unfold.

Oh, what beautiful branches, all!

We closed our presentation with thoughts on how we hoped our experiences might contribute or inspire others. Mary Soto shared that while our experiences are those of parents and children, she hoped others would take away the sense of inspiration sparked through our collaboration and lifting others up. I shared that it had taken me a long, long time to find my own voice within the TESOL community. I hoped that what people would take from my experience is stay true to their own knowings, even when they don’t seem to fit, and eventually you will find your way to what you’re meant to bring into this world.

Mom and I had our annual TESOL birthday slumber party. Mom’s birthday is March 20th and mine is the 28th. TESOL always falls sometime around our birthdays. We celebrate together in whatever city the conference is held that year, packing gifts, balloons, pretty napkins, and other cards and treasures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Treasured branches and roots on my academic family tree.

With Mary Scholl and Suzan Kobashigawa

Sandra Mercuri and Andrés Ramírez

 

With Victor Arízabalo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This has me thinking of drawing/painting my own academic family tree. I haven’t yet done that and now look forward to reaching for my watercolors to see what emerges. Already my mind is thinking of the roots of those who influenced me in those early years, of all I read and how blessed I’ve been with the relationships and mentoring along the way. What I love is how the tree continues to grow, expand, lift, and extend in often unexpected ways. The fun is in the element of adventure!

I think I’ll reach for my watercolors today and begin to paint my tree…

Frida Kahlo came to TESOL, as well. Dear Mary visited her house, La Casa Azul, and brought me these treasures. Seems only appropriate that Frida, so foundational in my own pedagogy tree, would join us.

TESOL Convention 2023—Intergenerational Highlights and Conversations about Our Lives in TESOL

Off to the International TESOL Convention 2023 in Portland, Oregon next week! I look forward to seeing some of you there! I am thrilled to share in the panel Intergenerational Highlights and Conversations about Our Lives in TESOL with Mom (Joan Wink), Yvonne Freeman, David Freeman, Ann Ebe, Mary Soto, Sonia Nieto, Alicia López, and Shelley Taylor on Wednesday, March 22, 10-11:15am, OCC, D136. This idea has been percolating for several years and we decided that this was the year to bring to fruition. Last year’s TESOL in Pittsburgh was filled with layers of ideas, language, and love.

This intergenerational panel of professionals within multilingual education highlights panel members’ experiences within academia and publishing, the distinctive path each has taken within the field, and the unique dynamics of sharing a profession with one’s parent/child. Panel members reflect a spectrum, with each bringing their own lens of understanding.

Dr. Joan Wink

Dr. Yvonne Freeman

Dr. David Freeman

Dr. Shelley Taylor

Dr. Sonia Nieto

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Dawn Wink

Dr. Ann Ebe

Dr. Mary Soto

 

Alicia López

 

 

 

 

 

 

This session will be divided into two sections:

1. Each educator shares research, pedagogy, and ideas of multilingual education.
2. The second half of the presentation will be an engaged conversation of their professional and personal intertwined lives. Topics will include what drew each member to the field of multilingual education, graduate school experiences, teaching and professional experiences throughout their careers, and stories around the unique dynamics of sharing a professional field with family.

The intention of this panel is to share experiences and lessons from lifetimes in education from a variety of perspectives and generations. This will be a time of reflection, stories, laughter, wisdom, and probably more than a few surprises.

Dr. Joan Wink is a professor emerita of California State University/Stanislaus. Throughout her career she has focused on languages, literacy, and learning in pluralistic contexts. Author of Critical Pedagogy, Visions of Vygotsky (with LeAnn Putney), and Teaching Passionately: What’s Love Got To Do With It? (with Dawn Wink.) Her latest work focuses on Academic Family Trees.

Dr. Yvonne (Bonnie) Freeman is a professor emerita of Bilingual Education at the University of Texas Río Grande Valley. She has published books and articles on biliteracy, literacy for multilinguals, children’s and adolescent literature, ESL methods, second language acquisition, and linguistics. She has presented nationally and internationally on these topics.

Dr. David Freeman is a professor emeritus at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. He has written books and articles on teaching ESL methods, second language acquisition, teaching reading and writing to emergent bilinguals, and linguistics. He has presented on these topics nationally and internationally.

Dr. Sonia Nieto is a member of the National Academy of Education, Nieto is Professor Emerita of Language, Literacy, and Culture, University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The recipient of 9 honorary doctorates, she has written or edited 13 books including a memoir, Brooklyn Dreams: My Life in Public Education (2016), and a co-authored book with her daughter, Alicia López Nieto, Teaching, A Life’s Work: A Mother/Daughter Dialogue (2019).

Dr. Shelley K. Taylor Professor, teaches in the graduate TESOL/Applied Linguistics program at the University of Western Ontario and has conducted research on multilingual language education and language policy in Canada, Denmark, Greenland, and Nepal; as well as on plurilingualism in TESOL, EMI in the Nordic context, Nepali-Bhutanese refugee children in Canada, and postsecondary youth refugees’ language and literacy development. She is President-elect of TESOL (until this Friday!).

Dr. Dawn Wink is writer and educator whose work explores the wildness, beauty, and imagination of language, culture, and place. Wink is author of Meadowlark, Teaching Passionately: What’s Love Got To Do With It? (with Joan Wink), and “Wild Waters: Landscapes of Language,” and “Language, culture, and land: Lenses of lilies.”

Dr. Ann Ebe began her work as a bilingual elementary school teacher, reading specialist and administrator. Currently, she is the Coordinator of Childhood Education Programs at Hunter College in New York City. She has worked in schools in California, Arizona, Hong Kong and Mexico. Her primary research interests include exploring the reading process of bilingual students, translanguaging, and the use of culturally relevant texts to support literacy development.

Dr. Mary Soto is an assistant professor in the Teacher Education Department at California State University East Bay in Hayward, California. She works with teacher candidates as well as teachers working toward their master’s degree. Her research interests include using authentic texts and project based learning to teach emergent bilinguals and long-term English learners and is author of “A Self-Study of Teacher Educator Practice: Strategies and Activities to Use with Authentic Texts.”

Alicia López, PhDc is an ELL teacher at Amherst Regional Middle School. Her 26 years in the classroom span 2 states and 3 subjects (French, Spanish, ESL). She is also a doctoral student in the TESI program, and a lecturer in the ESL Licensure program in the Professional and Graduate Education program at Mount Holyoke College.  Alicia is the co-author with Sonia Nieto of the book Teaching: A Life’s Work, a mother-daughter dialogue (Teacher’s College Press). She reflects on teaching on her blog, Maestra Teacher.

 

I will also be participating with the Leadership Pathways in TESOL as a member of the TESOL Nominating Committee. I was over-the-moon to be elected to serve on this committee this year. That gathering takes place on Thursday, March 23, 10:30 – 11:15am, Hyatt, Willamette 8.

 

If you are at TESOL in Portland, I’d love to see you!

And I’m still chasing the sunrise…

 

 

 

Decolonizing Research through Wildness, Beauty, Imagination, Lilyology, and SPN

I was beyond grateful to share ideas of Decolonizing Multilingual Education Research Through Wildness, Beauty, Imagination, Lilyology, and Scholarly Personal Narrative with the National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE) Conference 2023.

I share the video of my presentation with you here.

This further explores the ideas that I presented on wildness, beauty, and imagination within Translanguaging and Transdisciplinary Resesarch in ELT to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Association of Language Teachers (KSAALT) TESOl, as part of their keynote speaker series.

Thank you ever so much for sharing the journey of language, landscape, wildness, beauty, and imagination.

Language, Ecology, and Story—Follow the Energy

Waterlily, Dawn Wink

These past few weeks for me have been lessons in how we never know which seeds we plant may flourish. This unfolding is as true in our professional lives as the personal. Yet again, stories/writing as seedbombs.

A gift to the spirit has been that since the writing of “Where did you learn Spanish?,” I reconnected with dear friends from that time, low these 38 years that have passed since I lived in Chihuahua. Sparkles and smoke flew from WhatsApp as we left messages and sent photos to one another!

What a gift to hear people I last heard when we were 17-years-old and to now recognize their voices. There is a special place in my heart held only for this time and these people that sighed and smiled.

To receive photos now and see the 17-year-olds that I knew within each face is such a gift. I think of the chapters of life lived and now shared—a true life treasure to reconnect. And as my friend said of the style of the 80’s, “Ay, los pelos y los cintos!” (Oh, the hair and the belts!)

She conveys the essence of the 80’s beautifully. One of my daughter’s friends wrote me, “Your hair is iconic.” I laughed out loud. Well, that’s a gentle word for it.

In another lesson of how we never know what will unfold or open if we follow the energy, I had a piece published in Language and Ecology

“Artistic expressions of language, ecology, and story: Language and landscape as explored through watercolor.”

I begin, “This creative work began with no intention of publication, but rather my own attempt to deepen my understanding around ideas vital to my research. The watercolors displayed here are a reflection of a private journey to make meaning for myself.”

This reminds me to trust when we feel that flow of good energy and follow where it may lead. Following the energy led me to writing the piece about learning Spanish and reconnecting with friends from that time.

The days have been unusually dark here in Santa Fe. Inspired by a friend, I bought yellow tulips to bring cheer to our home and hearts. Spontaneously, I held them up against the cobalt blue wall (inspired by Frida Kahlo) for a photo and shared. I did not realize that I shared on the eve of the one-year anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine.

Follow the energy.

 

Wildness, Beauty, and Imagination of Language within Translanguaging

(Sound begins at around 21 seconds and Mom joined us!)

There are words, ideas, and phrases that make my heart happy just to hear. Some of of these include the wildness, beauty, and imagination of language, translanguaging, and transdisciplinary. My heart simply sings when I hear or read these words! I loved time shared talking about these ideas with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Association of Language Teachers (KSAALT) TESOL . as part of their keynote speaker series. The above video shares the presentation and our time together. Thank you ever so much to Fayyaz Malik and Fatmah Azam Ali for inviting me to share this time and ideas.

Here are some of the ideas shared. A friend just told me, “You lost me at translanguaging,” to which I replied, “#youhadmeathelloandlostmeattranslanguaging.” I hope the video and the presentation will turn translanguaging, wildness, beauty, and imagination into a “Hello.”

The ideas are fully explored during the presentation in the video.

We used to think that languages were separate within the brain, that they existed as solitudes, side-by-side (Cummins, 2019).

Any bilingual or multilingual person will tell you that languages intertwine together and are not separate at all, much like the roots of the banyan tree. The interwoven and dynamic nature reflects the complexity of bilingualism (Garcia, 2008).

I love how Varela describes “the loopiness of the thing,” and García applies to language as a network that “cannot be separate one part of life from another, one named language from another.”

We explore translanguaging from the perspective of minority language speakers.

What is the difference between interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary? Interdisciplinary is like a braid where distinct fields work together, but remain distinct. Transdisciplinary is like a braid made of sari strips woven together where they weave, fuse, and meld together to create a new whole.

I delve into language and ecolinguistics through the lenses of wildness, beauty, and imagination. These are other ideas and words that simply make my heart sing!

We explored Scholarly Personal Narrative and Lilyology and how all applies to teaching and life.

 

I loved how writer and journalist Michelle Ciani (Letters from Rome) expressed her experience with these ideas:

I’ve been able to put words to a life-long experience as a bilingual/bicultural human, and have to say that my favorite keyword from your presentation today is “wild”. In my current context, both professional and personal, it deeply resonates.

Here’s to wildness, beauty, imagination, and translanguaging in all of our lives!

 

References

• Baker, C., & Wright, W.E. (2017). Foundations of bilingual education and bilingualism(6th ed.).
  Multilingual Matters Ltd.
• Cummins, J. (2017). Teaching for transfer in multilingual school contexts. In García, O. et al.
  (Eds.), Bilingual and Multilingual Education, Encyclopedia of Language and Education,
  Springer International Publishing AG, 103–116.
• Cummins, J. (2006). Language, power, and pedagogy: Bilingual children in the crossfire.
  Multilingual Matters Ltd.
• García, O., & Wei, L. (2014), Translanguaging: Language, Bilingualism and Education,
  Palgrave Macmillan.
• Garcia, O. (2014). Translanguaging as normal bilingual discourse. In Hesson, S., Seltzer, K., &
  Woodley, H.H. Translanguaging in curriculum and instruction: A CUNY-NYSIEB guide for
  educators.CUNY Graduate Center.
• García, O. (2018). Translanguaging, pedagogy and creativity. In Erfurt, J., Carporal, E., &
  Weirich, A. (Eds.). Éducation plurilingue et pratiques langagières: Hommage à Christine
  Hélot (pp.39–56). Peter Lang.
• García, O. & Kano, N. (2014). Translanguaging as Process and Pedagogy: Developing the
  English Writing of Japanese Students in the US. In Conteh, J. and Meier, G. (Eds)
  The Multilingual Turn in Languages Education: Benefits for Individuals and Societies.
  Multilingual Matters Ltd.
• García, O., Lin, A., May, S., & Hornberger, N. (Eds.), (2017). Bilingual and Multilingual
  Education, Encyclopedia of Language and Education. Springer International Publishing AG.
• Garcia, O., & Lin, A. (2017). Translanguaging in Bilingual Education. In García, O. et al.
• (Eds.), Bilingual and Multilingual Education, Encyclopedia of Language and Education,
• Springer International Publishing AG, 117–128.
• García, O., & Kleifgen, J.A. (2018). Educating emergent bilinguals: Policies, programs, and
  practices for English language learners, (2nd ed.). Teachers College Press.
• Garcia, O. & Wei, L. (2014). Translanguaging. Language, bilingualism and education. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Hesson, S., Seltzer, K., & Woodley, H.H. (2014). Translanguaging in curriculum and instruction:
  A CUNY-NYSIEB guide for educators. CUNY Graduate Center.
• Jaspers, J. (2018). The transformative limits of translanguaging. Langu7age & Communication, 58, 1-10. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langcom.2017.12.001
• Lin, A. (2006). Beyond linguistic purism in language-in-education policy and practice: Exploring
  bilingual pedagogies in a Hong Kong science classroom. Language and Education, 20(4), 287–305.
• Otheguy, R., García, O., & Reid, W. (2019). A translanguaging view of the linguistic system of
  bilinguals. Applied Linguistics Review10(4). 625–651; doi.org/10.1515/applirev-2018-0020
• Wei, L. (2018). Translanguaging as a practical theory of language. Applied Linguistics. 39(1); 9–30.
• Vogel, S., & García, O. (2017). Translanguaging. In Moll, L. & Noblit, G. (Eds.), Oxford Research
  Encyclopedia of Education. Oxford University Press.

“Where did you learn Spanish?”

First Day of School, Instituto La Salle

“Where did you learn Spanish, Dawn?”

This question pops up often. I was asked again recently, which had me looking for the photo album that I made the year I lived in Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico. The stickiness of the album pages long since dried and disappeared and the photos now slide out from under the clear film that covers them. I hadn’t looked at those photos in years and memories came tumbling back.

I knew that I wanted to be a foreign exchange student when I was 13 years old. It took me two years to convince my parents to allow me to go. I was so surprised when decades later a dear friend from high school said to me, “Oh, I thought that you parents made you go.” The time and energy it took to convince them! When they at last agreed, my mom said, “There is too much water between Arizona and Europe. You can go to Mexico.” I will be eternally grateful for this decision. I cannot imagine how different the scope and trajectory of my life would have been if I didn’t speak Spanish.

Mi hermana mexicana, Tere

These were my growing up years of books, braids, and riding on our ranch in southeastern Arizona. My dad raised Brangus cattle and during that time, there was a lot of collaboration between Brangus breeders in northern Mexico and the US. My parents had many colleagues and friends in the ranching communities of Chihuahua and put out the word that I wanted to be an exchange student.

The sister of one of these ranching friends had a daughter who wanted to come to study in the United States. The two families swapped daughters for a year. Teresa (Tere) came to live on the ranch with my family and became my hermana Mexicana. I went to live with her family in Chihuahua and became her hermana Americana.

Don Benito, la Señora Miriam, and Angélica (far right)

 

I was 16-years-old when I arrived in Chihuahua to live with the family of Benito and Miriam Martínez. Don Benito came from Spain originally and la Señora Miriam Creel de Martinez came from a family with deep roots in Chihuahua. Their daughter, Angélica, lived at home and did all she could to make me feel welcome.

The first months were a swirl of new experiences, new friends, excitement, homesickness, and really not understanding much of anything that was said. I remember coming home from school every day with my head pounding. I attended Instituto La Salle. Students immediately welcomed me, invited me to their homes and parties, and did all they could to make me feel welcome. I think of this often when I hear how immigrant kids are often treated in the US.

My new friends were kind as I stumbled through Spanish and laughed with (mostly) me as I made mistake after mistake, including asking my new friend, who was eating a chocolate covered marshmallow on a stick, “¿Cómo está tu pedo de monja?” I’ll never forget her stopping mid-bite, looking at me, and laughing, “¿Qué?” I had learned that marshmallow in Spanish was pedo de monja, literally “fart of a nun.” Turns out, that is absolutely not the word for marshmallow in Chihuahua. That’s the day I learned the word bonbon and it’s stayed with me ever since.

By Christmas I could understand the gist of things and say enough to convey the main idea of what I wanted to say. I learned to only use Usted with anyone older than me or in a position of respect. It still sounds like fingernails on the chalkboard when I hear people use the informal tú with people who deserve Usted.

Angélica and Mama Lila

I learned very soon to always use Usted with Mama Lila, Señora Miriam’s mother. She was a grand lady in a grand house in a beautiful area of Chihuahua. We drove through a canopy of trees to drive up the winding driveway to her home. I can still remember the smell of her perfume, the soft paper-thin texture of her cheek when I kissed her in greeting. An elegant staircase wove up and around the wall to the balcony bedroom doors above. Sun steamed in through the kitchen windows at her home, sometimes dappled by leaves.

 

Libradita and Raramurí woman

Libradita cooked and cared for all of us within our home. Oh, what I would give to be able to go back in time and watch as she made flan! I was so taken with the Raramurí (Tarahumara) women and girls of the mountains surrounding Chihuahua. Their many layered skirts moved as they walked, sprayed around them when they sat. Our class took a field trip up into the mountains for a weekend not long after I arrived. I hardly understood a word of anything said around me. What I remember was the incredible generosity how my classmates treated me, how bitterly cold it was at night in the mountains, and the two young Raramurí girls who came with babies on their backs.

This was years and years before I began to learn of Linguistic Human Rights (LHRs), the marginalization of languages and people, and the impact on the world. I know that when I began to learn of LHRs, these two girls came to my mind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I turned 17-years-old in March of that year and my friends celebrated with a cake. I look at this photo now and wonder where these now women and about their lives. Oh, and mi querida amiga, Manena. Oh, did we laugh! And, we loved to go get frozen yogurt at Zum Zum. I always added mango and coconut to mine.

17th birthday

Manena Alzaga

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lupita took me to the market and showed me what to look for in the fruit, how to choose the vegetables. I still hear her voice, her laughter.

Lupita

My classmates, Instituto La Salle

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ve had many other chapters in Spanish of my life. All builds on my life and experiences in Chihuahua. When I went to study in Spain, I learned that my Spanish was filled with Mexican expressions and vocabulary. In Costa Rica, I learned that my accent sounds Mexican.

When I began to learn about second language acquisition, I scrolled back through my memories and experiences and the theories found fertile and familiar places to land.

I wonder now that I listen to so many audiolibros narrated by Spaniards, Argentines, Mexicans, and Chileans what impact this has on my Spanish.

I will always grateful for this time—the experiences, friendships, inspirations, and love that have come from when I was 16-years-old and experiencing all. I feel the world would be an infinitely kinder place if all could experienced living and learning in another language, another culture. I imagine the empathy this might create if those who know experience the dominance of their own language could experience life through the lens of other languages and cultures.

A shared language opens worlds and windows of connections and relationships.

I am forever grateful.

 

Don Benito y Señora Miriam

Chasing the Sunrise

 

I spend most mornings chasing the sunrise.

I guessed that it was going to be a stunning sunrise on the morning that I headed out for my run and took the above video. Faint hints of light just started to touch the underbellies of the clouds as I left home. I turned on my audiolibro . Angus and I settled into our pace. I kept my eyes on the horizon, waiting, watching. The sun’s glow crested the horizon, light and color bleeding into the clouds. Colors emerged, opened, and deepened, shifting and glowing from within.

I kept my eyes on the light, watching and waiting. There is a patience to every sunrise, waiting for that moment with light and colors at their zenith, before the shifting colors pale and mute, and eventually settle into light pastels and then fade away.

I adjusted my route as I ran, watched, waited, and guessed when the sunrise would reach its peak. I wanted to be somewhere with a wide open view when the colors of the sunrise shone with brilliance.

How very like life, this chasing the sunrise. That awareness and hope for the impending opening of light, creation of beauty.

I chase the sunrise in many elements of my life during this chapter, watching, waiting, preparing for that moment when colors flood the clouds to create an opening for beauty.

Sometimes we notice sunrises as a fortunate coincidence we happen to witness. Certain chapters of life invoke a dedication to beauty, an intentional chasing of sunrises, a mindful awareness and guessing of the brightest moment of illumination.

And, then we run toward it to dive fully into that moment of potential and possibility.

Sunrise scarf from my parents.

KSAALT-TESOL Keynote – Methods, Language Acquisition, and Engaged Story-work

In this virtual presentation, I’ll take research and ideas that I’ve worked with previously and expand into opportunities for language acquisition within English Language Teaching (ELT), advocating engaged story-work as an integral element of research.

Thank you ever so much Fayyaz Malik for this invitation. I look forward to our shared time exploring these ideas.

“It is a moment of pride for Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Association of Language Teachers (KSAALT)TESOL to announce the opening of registration for the second session of the Keynote Speaker Series.

Here’s the link to register for the webinar:

https://us02web.zoom.us/…/tZAldOqqqzkoGdEE3aYguLaaNmlCT…

Day: Saturday 21st January, 2023

Time: 7 PM Riyadh Time (9 AM Santa Fe Time, MST)

Platform: Zoom (Registration link is given above)

Our next invited keynote speaker is Dr. Dawn Wink, Santa Fe Community College, USA.

Dr. Dawn Wink PhD, is an educator and writer whose work explores the beauties and challenges of multilingualism, TESOL, ecolinguistics, and pedagogy. Dr. Wink is Director of the Department of Teacher Education at Santa Fe Community College.

The purpose of this presentation is to enable participants to have new understandings of translanguaging;

In that regard, she will explore the wildness, beauty, and imagination of language.

She will delve into the methodological frameworks of Scholarly Personal Narrative and Lilyology; which is grounded in ‘story’ and provides expanded opportunities for language acquisition within ELT, advocating engaged story-work as an integral element of research.

Later, she will explain specific steps of practice, procedure and ideas on how language teachers can apply translanguaging and interdisciplinary practices with relevance and meaning to their own research and/or classrooms of students of all ages and language levels.”

Happy New Year 2023 and Deep Gratitude—Year in Review

As I enter the New Year writing my gratitudes in the early morning hours of darkness, sanctuary, and solitude, I think of you and this community. I am so deeply grateful to and for each of you reading this. I am profoundly grateful for our connection across the miles, years, landscapes, and seas. We came into each other’s lives through a spectrum of experiences. You, your presence, and your incredible spirit enrich my life and world in exponential ways. Thank you and thank you for sharing your life path with me. I read and cherish every comment. I always hope to respond to each. Sometimes other things in life pull me away. You taking the time to write and connect lands in my heart. I know how rich and full all of our lives! I thought I’d create this piece with all of the Dewdrops pieces from 2022. I reread all of your comments. What marvelous gifts of spirit and heart—such a reflection of you.

Wishing you and yours a wonderful new year! The chapter of of this New Year is ours to write.

Much love and deep gratitude,

Dawn

Stories of Language, Landscape, Wildness, Beauty, Imagination I sit in the early morning time of sanctuary and solitude, candlelight and coffee, darkness and dreams. My journal fills with an ever-growing list of Dewdrops pieces that to write—all swirling around language, landscape, wildness, beauty, and imagination; the most recent trip to the ranch; Lilyology; Scholarly Personal Narrative; translanguaging; beauty; books; family; and so very many other musings and bits of beauty.

The past few months have been a time of many presentations, writing, and sharing of ideas. My passion for all things language, landscape, wildness, beauty, and imagination continues to grow. I spoke recently about these ideas and stories…

TESOL Convention—Layers of Ideas, Friendship, and Love I hope to share the spirit of the time, as well as some ideas that I took away. TESOL has been a big part of my life for many, many years and in multiple ways. I believe my first TESOL was in Salt Lake City, 2002. Throughout the intervening years, TESOL serves as a foundational stone in my own professional understandings about all-things-multiple-language-acquisition. Ever since my first meeting with the Bilingual-Multilingual Education that segued from the meeting to salsa dancing in New York City, I knew I met my people. Professional colleagues became dear friends.

Creative Processes—Follow the Spark I always love learning about others’ creative processes in all forms. I learn, I study, I weave some of those elements into my own. I find creative processes makes my heart smile and my spirit soar. I share some of my own creative processes here in hopes of contributing to all of us who love these. My own processes take multiple forms with some common threads. They almost always begin with that energy spark of an idea that can happen anywhere and at anytime. Yes, it can be while I’m writing in my journal, often they happen when I’m running, and they are also equally as bound to happen while in the grocery store looking for my favorite tea.

Running Deeper Into Language We know that language is not learned, it is acquired through relevant and meaningful use. As I listen to the narrative, I focus on the story, as well as the pronunciation and cadence. Initially, I let myself look up three unfamiliar words in one run. To look up more would’ve made my runs take too long before the work day. So, for approximately 1 – 1.5 hours a day, I listen to gorgeous, oral Spanish. The voice of the narrator mades a difference. I’ve listened to listen to a sample first, so it’s a narrator that I like. Now, I have some real favorites. I have listened to books from Spain, Mexico, Chile, and Argentina. Thus far, the narrators come from the country of origin, so speak with the particular rhythm and pronunciation of each country. I love this.

Wink Ranch — Photo Journal 2022 Mom and I made a quick dash to the ranch together on her way back from Tucson. We headed out early for the drive to the ranch. The sun peeked over the horizon just as we crested the hills around Las Vegas, New Mexico. Daddy called a little later and asked, “Am I speaking with Thelma or Louise?”  Up through the mountains of New Mexico, over the plains of southern Colorado, and up to the sagebrush valleys of Wyoming, we drove. We in the Southwest have enjoyed amazing rains this summer, which has helped our drought-scorched country immensely. New Mexico hasn’t had our traditional summer monsoon rains, nor the heavy snows of winter for the past few years. The Rio Grande River is nearly dry. Here, some photos of our time, both of the land and the ranch and the bits of beauty around the ranch house that I love.

Language, Culture, and Land: Lenses of Lilies in Langscape Magazine At a pond’s edge, a woman muses about waterlilies as metaphors for mother-tongue languages and their power to anchor story, wisdom, and heritage.

Waterlilies hold a special place in my heart. I did not grow up with them, though. I grew up on a remote ranch amid the sand, rocks, cacti, and dry beauty of the Sonoran Desert in the southwestern United States. I love the intense heat, the plants that thrive on periods of drought interspersed with torrential rains, and the vast open horizons that cup the wide basin of the desert…Little did I ever imagine that those read-about and imagined waterlilies would have a profound impact on both my professional and my personal life. More…

Running on the Ranch: The Road Less Traveled I love running on the ranch. There isn’t always time to run when on the ranch, but I always hope that there will be and arrive with my running tights, shoes, and gear. I am used to and love the expansive views and horizons of my high desert running trails around around in Santa Fe. The prairie of the western South Dakota plains holds a whole different kind of space. Surrounded by sheer prairie, there is a sense of running under the great blue bowl of the sky above.

Beauty, Ideas, and Connections: International Ecolinguistics Association Conference Graz, Austria

I have followed the work the International Ecolinguistics Association through the past years. I hoped to attend their conference one day, but life was rich and full of much else that needed tending. This year as the request for proposals for the conference went out, I decided cast my fate to the winds and submit a proposal to present at the upcoming conference at the University of Graz, Austria. I decided that if my proposal was accepted, I would figure out a way to attend. My proposal to present on “Ecolinguistics Through Wildness, Beauty, and Imagination—Transdisciplinary Research Through Scholarly Personal Narrative and Lilyology” was accepted.

Día de los Muertos—Altar as Landscape, Love Lives On Mom’s hope chest creates the foundation for the altar. As I placed each piece, I had to smile. When my Grandma Mary embroidered Van Gogh’s Sunflowers, when my Great-Grandma Grace ground the coffee before dawn in the sod hut on the ranch, never could they have imaged these pieces where they are now. The landscape of our altar reflects the landscape of my life. Yo soy fronterista. I am a woman of the borderlands, as used by Gloría Anzaldúa. My life is one of a fronterista, where worlds overlap: prairie and Southwest, rural and international, landscape literature and linguistic human rights. Here on the altar, prairie and farmland come together with the Southwest; German, Welsh, Irish, and English with Latino; Protestant with Catholic; past with present. The worlds, each with a distinct culture, come together to create the mosaic of the whole.

A Shared Cup of Christmas Tea We were all set to be on the ranch with Grammie, Bop Bop, and the Wisconsin Winks this Christmas, but the record setting cold hitting the Great Plains put an end to those plans. “We don’t want our family traveling in these conditions,” Mom and Dad let us know. And, they made that call even before the entire state of South Dakota closed all travel. Predicted temperatures of -70 including the wind chill factor anticipated for this week. The North Pole has nothing on the Wink Ranch!

A Wink family tradition for Christmas is to read the gorgeous book A Cup of Christmas Tea by Tom Hegg. While this is titled Christmas tea, the story holds for all traditions. This is a human story of roots, memories, and love. I thought that I’d read to you.

 

 

 

A Shared Cup of shared Christmas Tea

 

I hope this holiday season of all traditions finds you with loved ones whether in person or in spirit.

We were all set to be on the ranch with Grammie, Bop Bop, and the Wisconsin Winks this Christmas, but the record setting cold hitting the Great Plains put an end to those plans. “We don’t want our family traveling in these conditions,” Mom and Dad let us know. And, they made that call even before the entire state of South Dakota closed all travel. Predicted temperatures of -70 including the wind chill factor anticipated for this week. The North Pole has nothing on the Wink Ranch!

A Wink family tradition for Christmas is to read the gorgeous book A Cup of Christmas Tea by Tom Hegg. While this is titled Christmas tea, the story holds for all traditions. This is a human story of roots, memories, and love. I thought that I’d read to you:

Mom’s book is covered and filled with photos of treasured friendships. Every Christmas Mom begins to read this book aloud. In my experience, she has yet to make it through the whole story without the wave of tears that has another reading the final pages.

Here is my well-worn recipe card from Mom. That is Wyatt, Dad, and Bo in the photos. I love stirring the ingredients together. This has always reminded me of the sands of the desert. I’ve also heard this tea called Russian tea and friendship tea. I’m thinking that this would make a lovely Solstice tea, as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wishing you and yours a lovely holiday season of all traditions and the spirit of many shared cups of Christmas tea.

With love,

Dawn

Dia de los Muertos—Altar as Landscape, Love Lives On

Día de los Muertos, All Soul’s Day, November 1st. In Latino tradition, Día de los Muertos honors our loved ones who have passed with altars laden with flowers, photos, and candles. I first learned of this tradition when I fell in love with Frida Kahlo in my early 20’s. Día de los Muertos is an integral element in our family’s life rhythms. Composing the altar this year felt especially sacred amidst the pandemic and so many people lost. So many new souls honored on the altar by Latinos in the US and throughout Mexico.

Mom’s hope chest creates the foundation for the altar. As I placed each piece, I had to smile. When my Grandma Mary embroidered Van Gogh’s Sunflowers, when my Great-Grandma Grace ground the coffee before dawn in the sod hut on the ranch, never could they have imaged these pieces where they are now. The landscape of our altar reflects the landscape of my life. Yo soy fronterista. I am a woman of the borderlands, as used by Gloría Anzaldúa. My life is one of a fronterista, where worlds overlap: prairie and Southwest, rural and international, landscape literature and linguistic human rights. Here on the altar, prairie and farmland come together with the Southwest; German, Welsh, Irish, and English with Latino; Protestant with Catholic; past with present. The worlds, each with a distinct culture, come together to create the mosaic of the whole.

As I place the flowers for my German Lutheran grandparents, Grandpa Wink and Grandma Anna, I hear my Grandpa Wink saying the Lord’s Prayer in German to delight my cousins and I as children. So many historic heritage languages and cultures fill the altar. Never did the great-grandparents and grandparents that I honor imagine a Día de los Muertos altar. The unimaginable—as I placed each piece, I thought of how very much like this expresses where we find ourselves in life right now around the world.

Grandma Janet’s wine glass, St. Agatha, Virgen de Guadalupe

Grammie Lucille

The altar holds a treasured wine glass of my mom’s mother, Grandma Janet, as Janet’s mother, my Great-Grammie Lucille looks on as a teenager from a black-and-white photo above. The glass rests between St. Agatha, Patron Saint of Breast Cancer, Nurses, and Women’s Issues, and Our Lady of Guadalupe, La Virgen de Guadalupe (Artist, Jil Gurulé). The beauty and delicacy of the glass reflects Grandma Janet’s life. St. Agatha is new to the altar this year. Breast cancer has touched many women’s lives in my family. My Grandma Janet passed far too young. Her wine glass honors her life, as well as represents my decision to remove wine glasses from my own table on November 1 last year, so I could focus fully on healing.

Corn honors my Uncle Ray, a farmer who lived life with such kindness, generosity, love, and a twinkle in his eye.

In our college community, we unexpectedly lost a well-loved colleague and dear friend. Luke defined himself as a spiritual being, imbued with the traditions of Peru where he lived and climbed for so many years. Eagles represent Spirit. Fly, Luke, fly.

For all of those lost to coronavirus, a collection of leaves I found under the heart-draped tree along my running path, tucked into the bird’s nest.

In honor of those passed to coronavirus.

Forever love.

Pan de Muerto

“Mom, did you make pan de muerto this year?” Wyatt asked me hesitantly on the phone in mid-November last year. It was the first year I had not made Frida Kahlo’s recipe (we use honey from the ranch) for pan de muerto in the kids’ memory. This annual ritual grounds our family.  With the health journey of last fall, I did not make the traditional sweet bread. When I realized last year that it was November 1st and I hadn’t made the bread, in an attempt to lift my spirits, Noé said, “Don’t worry. It’s okay. They won’t miss it.” I felt somewhat better in that moment. I also worried that they would not miss it. The sticky dough of pan de muerto helps to hold us together as a family.

Manuela and Amadeo Villarreal

When Wyatt asked if I had made, I was overcome with both maternal guilt at not making and a sense of deep gratitude and joy that he had missed! We altered our traditions last year and made when all came home for Thanksgiving. The spirits were just fine with that. This mommy’s heart smiled to watch all gathered yet again around the counter, creating their small figures of dough, sprinkling with colored sugars and decorations, and then the smiles on their faces when they each took that first bite of the bread fresh from the oven.

Noé’s parents, Amadeo and Manuela Villarreal, always center our altar. I was not fortunate enough to meet them. We missed each other by a few years. Their spirits remain alive through the countless stories of laughter, hard work, family love and dedication, and irrepressible and irreverent senses of humor! How I wish I had been blessed to sit around the kitchen table, drinking coffee from the pot that was always full, to hear of their lives and their stories. Whenever Manuela is described, the sentence usually ends with, “She was quite the character! No la tenía miedo de nada.(She wasn’t scared of anything).” When Amadeo passed, he pointed to the corner of the room and told his kids gathered around, “Allí está tu mamá. Viene por mí.” (“There is your mom. She’s come for me.”)

Treasures through the generation grace the altar. Mom gave Grandma Mary’s blue glass flower vase to her friend, Mary Ann, who then gave it to me many years later.

I received a photo that so reflects el Día de los Muertos for Latino children in the US this year. Noah’s mom, Patricia, sent me this photo and wrote, “Living always in two cultures—Harry Potter and Día de los Muertos. Here Noah connects for his morning meeting in elementary school online.”

A few of books of the indomitable Frida Kahlo, La Gran Friducha, for whom Día de los Muertos represented so much.

A page from Frida’s journal:

I had very mixed feelings when I first heard about the movie “Coco.” Disney producing a movie about Day of the Dead, thoughts of cultural appropriation ran rampant through my mind. There are no princesses in the Day of the Dead. I was anxious when we sat to watch, in much the same way I’m anxious when I start a movie of a book I have loved, worried that the movie will mar the beauty and power of the original. I was delighted to discover a beautiful honoring of this sacred tradition. “This makes me think of my parents,” Noé said when the movie ended, a tear rolling down his cheek.

Trees of Life are often found on Día de los Muertos altars. We received desperately needed moisture through snow earlier this week, as seen here through a Tree of Life.

Snow through Tree of Life in my writing room.

Some of you may recognize this piece from a couple of years ago. This is now published in “For the Brokenhearted” (https://nappingdogpress.org/2022/09/01/new-release-for-the-brokenhearted/).

Our altar this year awaits. There are new people to honor this year. As soon as I send this, I shall prepared for dear ones on their way to honor their own loved ones who have passed.

The candles are lit.

Love lives on.

 

 

Beauty, Ideas, and Connections at the International Ecolinguistics Association Conference in Graz, Austria

Styria, Austria

©Yana Vermenich

I have followed the work the International Ecolinguistics Association through the past years. I hoped to attend their conference one day, but life was rich and full of much else that needed tending. This year as the request for proposals for the conference went out, I decided cast my fate to the winds and submit a proposal to present at the upcoming conference at the University of Graz, Austria.

I decided that if my proposal was accepted, I would figure out a way to attend. My proposal to present on “Ecolinguistics Through Wildness, Beauty, and Imagination—Transdisciplinary Research Through Scholarly Personal Narrative and Lilyology” was accepted.

The stars aligned and I followed.

The beauty of place, inspiration of ideas, spectrum of experiences, and connecting with others created a feast for all senses. One particular delight that surprised me was exploring the cobblestone streets of the city. I lived in Germany for a year and attended the University of Göttingen for one year while studying International Relations. I spent Christmas in Austria with dear friends. This was many years ago and I rarely have opportunities to speak German and have not been in Germany or Austria since. I didn’t anticipate the cascade of memories exploring the city would bring back and loved that feeling.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I arrived in Graz mid-afternoon on a gorgeous fall day and immediately headed out to explore. A landmark of Graz is the fortress with its iconic Clock Tower, first mentioned in the 13th century, perched on a hill overlooking the city. I headed in that general direction and happened upon the stone staircase zig-zagging up the cliff. Up, up, and up the staircase climbs. A runner passed me as he headed up the steps. And me without my running clothes! As I ascended the stone steps the cityscape unfolded and expanded, until at last I reached the top. I stood and drank in all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

@Yana Vermenich

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of the elements that I savored about the conference was how multigenerational and multinational the attendance and presentations—from prominent leading scholars of several decades, to those of us around my generation, to a whole younger band of emergent ecolinguists bringing new perspectives and lenses to these ideas. The generational span exchanging experiences and ideas created a vibrant, rich environment! The conference program is included at the end of this piece for you to explore.

Francesca Grasso, Lorenzo Buonvivere, Arianna Del Gaudio, Martina Russo, Me, Yana Vermenich

Arran Stibbe, Sune Steffensen, Me, Yana Vermenich, Allan Baggs, Linnea Hannell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

©Martina Russo

Graz, Town Hall

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In addition to the ideas shared through presentations and conversations, our time included meeting with a representative within beautiful interior of the Town Hall.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We took an excursion to the mountains of the local wine region of Syria, where we looked out toward Slovenia.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Conversations and connections flowed throughout all. I pulled out my journal as I waited to board the plane home—so very much to write about.

Conference Program

 

Language, Culture, and Land: Lenses of Lilies in Langscape Magazine

Waterlily painting by Pilawuk White, an Aboriginal woman artist from Daly River in Australia’s Northern Territory and a friend of Nerida Blair’s. Photo: Nerida Blair

I am delighted to share my essay “Language, Culture, and Land: Lenses of Lilies” was just published in Terralingua‘s Langscape Magazine.

Language, Culture, and Land: Lenses of Lilies

At a pond’s edge, a woman muses about waterlilies as metaphors for mother-tongue languages and their power to anchor story, wisdom, and heritage.

Waterlilies hold a special place in my heart. I did not grow up with them, though. I grew up on a remote ranch amid the sand, rocks, cacti, and dry beauty of the Sonoran Desert in the southwestern United States. I love the intense heat, the plants that thrive on periods of drought interspersed with torrential rains, and the vast open horizons that cup the wide basin of the desert. While I am sure that I knew of waterlilies during my growing up years, they remained something to be read about in books, not anything as real in my life as the towering saguaro cacti, rough bark of the mesquite trees, and treasured green of the rare cottonwoods found near water basins and rivers that only filled and flowed after the monsoon rains. Little did I ever imagine that those read-about and imagined waterlilies would have a profound impact on both my professional and my personal life. More…

A coy fish passes under a waterlily in my neighbor’s pond. Photo: Renee Upston

This piece was inspired by the amazing works of Tove Skutnabb-Kangas and Nerida Blair.

Langscape Magazine was my first choice for publication of this piece for all the reasons detailed here:

“Langscape Magazine is an online publication with a beautifully designed print and digital edition issued annually. It is an extension of the voice of Terralingua and supports our mission to educate minds and hearts about the vital importance of biocultural diversity for the survival of life on earth.

As Indigenous Peoples tell us, stories create and shape our world. Langscape Magazine uses the power of story to bolster our efforts to bring about a radical shift in human values that will make sustaining biocultural diversity a primary societal goal.

It features unique, authentic stories from all over the globe that celebrate the bounty of diversity in nature and culture — all told by the people who live and breathe the realities they portray. Novel insights. Stunning pictures, videos, and art.

That’s what Langscape Magazine offers that you can’t find anywhere else: a cornucopia of biocultural diversity. We hope that Langscape Magazine can help create and shape the just, sustainable world we so urgently need. Read, enjoy, and be inspired!”

Wink Ranch 2022—Photo Journal

Thelma and Louise

Mom and I made a quick dash to the ranch together on her way back from Tucson. We headed out early for the drive to the ranch. The sun peeked over the horizon just as we crested the hills around Las Vegas, New Mexico.

Daddy called a little later and asked, “Am I speaking with Thelma or Louise?” Up through the mountains of New Mexico, over the plains of southern Colorado, and up to the sagebrush valleys of Wyoming, we drove. We in the Southwest have enjoyed amazing rains this summer, which has helped our drought-scorched country immensely. New Mexico hasn’t had our traditional summer monsoon rains, nor the heavy snows of winter for the past few years. The Rio Grande River is nearly dry.

Drought has touched throughout the West of the United States, with devastating results. The incredible rains of the Southwest has the dry desert literally springing to life! Our rivers are not yet filled, but we see wild grasses and wildflowers everywhere that we haven’t seen in years. Unfortunately, the rains haven’t made it very far north with devastating results that became obvious as we drove. So many heartbreaking sights. The green grasses of New Mexico gave way to the parched and bald lands of Colorado and the farther north we drove, the dryer the land. 

It has been two years since I was last on the ranch. I kept trying to make it, but work life and Covid had other plans. My big take-away from my own time with Covid was to embrace the philosophy of “Stop, Drop, and Nap.” A great philosophy for life when one thinks about it! 

Just arrived!

My time on the ranch was far too short, only three days. We fit as much as possible into that time. Mom and I pulled into the ranch exactly 14 hours (if you only stop for gas and coffee) after leaving Santa Fe. We tumbled out of the car just as the sun was setting to one of my favorite things—sitting outside on the screened-in porch on the East side of the ranch house to talk and just be together. In our family, it takes a ranch. 

The first morning on the ranch, Daddy and I drove around to check waterlines and cattle. Bouncing around in a pick up with my dad is one of my earliest memories, as I delved into here when I reflected on what it means when your dad’s a cowboy. 

Here, some photos of our time, both of the land and the ranch and the bits of beauty around the ranch house that I love. 

A majestic presence

When cows are introverts

When cows are introverts.

Ranch house

My ranch shirt — and life philosophy.

Bouncing around in the backseat with Mom and Dad on our way to the Cheyenne River breaks.

Read her shirt closely, “Just a Ranch Wife.” In sparkles.

Hauling water

A few bits of beauty—

Mom’s beloved Frankie

Window of beauty

Moss roses have a long history on the ranch.

Sunset on the ranch

Sunset on the ranch

Our time together ended way, way too soon. As I drove south in the early morning, the sunrise cast shafts of light through the clouds. It will be much less than two years when I return to the ranch again. My heart, spirit, and soul need it too much. 

For other prisms and lenses on ranch, academic, multilingual, and literary life with my incredible mom, please dive right in to WinkWorld.

Running Deeper into Language

Did you take up running recently, Dawn?” I was asked recently.

“Not really,” I smiled. “It’s been 35+ years now.”

I started running when I began college and no longer played high school sports. Running was just so easy, and inexpensive, to pick up. I didn’t have to go anyplace else or be anywhere at a certain time. There were no monthly dues. All I needed was a pair of running shoes and out the door. I’ve been running ever since. I’ve run in several states, a few countries, and with a number of running strollers. I’ve run the cement sidewalks of Chihuahua, the cobbled streets of Oaxaca, through the dense green of Germany, and the humidity and heat of Costa Rica that made me feel like I was running in a sauna.

Wynn and Luke in the runner stroller.

Throughout these many years, I have never run while listening to anything except the musings of my mind and, for many years, the musings of the babies and toddlers in the strollers that I packed with books, toys, and goldfish. I loved, and continue to love, the time away from all to simply sink into whatever thoughts may come my way. Everything I have ever written has been mused, crafted, and refined while I run. Many of the emergent ideas came to me first to the rhythm of my footfall. Running has been my steady companion through good times and bad. Many a tear has been shed along the trails, along with laughter, dreams, planning, and more than a few choice words as I suddenly remembered something that I had forgotten or needed to be done. Through every season, I always ran in silence, until about a year ago…

About a year ago I started to listen to audio books in Spanish when I run. Some backstory—our family are big listeners of audio books. This began with cassette tapes of stories for the kids. We grew into hundreds of CDs of The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and more stories and books than I can remember. The kids and I listened to books-on-tape (as I still call them) constantly—in the car, in our home, before bed. We all still have audio books going. Those free Audible credits are gold in our family

About a year ago, the thought came to me to start listening to my audio books in Spanish on my runs. I let that thought simmer for quite a while, but it didn’t go away. So, I started listening and have since that time fallen in love with this new rhythm.

We know that language is not learned, it is acquired through relevant and meaningful use. As I listen to the narrative, I focus on the story, as well as the pronunciation and cadence. Initially, I let myself look up three unfamiliar words in one run. To look up more would’ve made my runs take too long before the work day. So, for approximately 1 – 1.5 hours a day, I listen to gorgeous, oral Spanish. The voice of the narrator mades a difference. I’ve listened to listen to a sample first, so it’s a narrator that I like. Now, I have some real favorites.

Santa Fe sunrise run.

I have listened to books from Spain, Mexico, Chile, and Argentina. Thus far, the narrators come from the country of origin, so speak with the particular rhythm and pronunciation of each country. I love this. I love sinking to the familiar sharp staccato of Mexican Spanish, hearing the crispness of Chilean Spanish, the iconic “zzzhhhh” of the “ll” in Argentina, and the “th” of the zeta and “c” of Spain. I have wondered what influence this may have on my own Spanish pronunciation. This, I do not know. What I do know is that the adventures throughout time around the the Spanish-speaking world in the past year deepened my fluency and fluidity in Spanish. I feel it.

For those of us who live in the world of languages, we know that language acquisition most effectively happens when there is a combination of natural acquisition and focused learning. The vast majority of my focus is on natural acquisition. I do season this with some specific learning when I hear something in the narrative that gives me pause, which usually revolves around the grammar rules that my high school Spanish teacher (aka Mom) says I rarely had much interest in, as long as I could communicate. I now dive into the details of the subjunctive and other grammatical puzzles that peak my interest. My Spanish teacher will be proud!

Aquí, hablo del tesoro del libro EL INFINITO EN UN JUNCO, escrito por Irene Vallejo:

This experience of sinking deeply into Spanish story for the sheer beauty of the language and narrative is one that I treasure. While running the trails of New Mexico, I have walked the streets of Madrid during the Spanish Civil War, revisited Berlin in the final days of WWII, absorbed Isabel Allende’s wisdom through a character, walked the literary streets of Barcelona at night, and so very much more.

As a learner of languages and teacher of language acquisition, this experience fills my writer’s spirit and informs my understandings of language.

This is a journey of joy, learning, and discovery.

What book shall I listen to next?

“If you can be anything in the world, be kind”
Thank you to my Auntie Ace for this shirt!

Creative Processes—Follow the Spark

My most recent journal

I always love learning about others’ creative processes in all forms. I learn, I study, I weave some of those elements into my own. I find creative processes makes my heart smile and my spirit soar. I share some of my own creative processes here in hopes of contributing to all of us who love these.

My own processes take multiple forms with some common threads. They almost always begin with that energy spark of an idea that can happen anywhere and at anytime. Yes, it can be while I’m writing in my journal, often they happen when I’m running, and they are also equally as bound to happen while in the grocery store looking for my favorite tea.

What I have learned over the years is to trust that energetic hit that comes with the spark. That is the deciding factor whether I heed and pursue the idea or let it go. If I feel the resonance of the idea, I trust. If it feels flat, I let it go. These decisions are based on my intuition and my heart, not my mind or head. This is key for me.

When the spark hits, I scribble it down somewhere or text it to myself on my phone. This is also key. I have also learned that no matter how much I feel that idea is brilliant in the moment, life is FULL and it is likely to be lost in the tides if I don’t write it down.

From there, the idea goes into my journal. Once it is written in my journal, no matter how cryptic it may be, I breathe a sigh of relief. It is now safe. Of course, that is only the beginning.

After that comes many, many pages in my journal playing with these ideas in an intuitive way. Loads of circles, arrows, single words, quotes, and arrows drawn to connect ideas that may seem they flow together. It is all quite messy! And, I love it.

Right now I am working on several different pieces all focusing in some way on language, landscape, wildness, beauty, and imagination. Those pieces are sketched out in my journal in varying stages, along with proposals for several presentations, along with books, essays, and chapters.

One I’ve clustered the ideas, I often add color to highlight emergent themes.

I sketch out main ideas to remember from the work of others to make meaning for myself.

Mother tongues as waterlilies by Tove Skutnabb-Kangas, Lilyology by Nerida Blair

I no longer take my journal to the grocery store with me. One too many times, I wrote my grocery list in my journal and took with me to the store. One time I left my journal, of course decorated with a gorgeous watercolor that I loved and choc-full of more ideas and sketched essay that I want to let myself think about, in the grocery cart. I did not realize until the next morning and when I returned to the store it was nowhere to be found. Never again. Grocery lists now go on pieces of paper ripped from a spiral journal.

I do travel with my journal. Leaving it behind feels like leaving my security blanket behind…or a limb. I have learned on planes never to tuck into the elastic pocket in front of my seat, no matter how tempting. It is on my lap or in my bag.

I often will then start playing with watercolors to add texture to the ideas in my own head. Plus, I love playing with these paints, colors, and textures. The visual adds to my own understandings, as well as for others (hopefully) to see visually. I take loads and loads of photos and play with those images, colors, textures, and what they convey, along with the words.

From there I move to the actual piece of what I’m writing, of what wants to be written. I follow that sparkling thread of energy to wherever it leads.

It is only now that I really begin thinking about shape, form, the craft of written pieces. Dorothea Brande refers to this process as “the advantage of the duplicity of writing,” in Becoming a Writer (1934). First the intuitive, energetic, wild, wonderful listening to ideas, open to all. Next, putting on one’s editor hat, using the skills muscles of the craft.

If there is one thing that I’ve learned along the journey is to trust that energetic, intuitive energy spark of an idea. I don’t have to understand it, just trust it, follow it, and give it oxygen and space to grow.

An elemental space that I create to listen to ideas are the early morning hours of coffee and candlelight, solitude and sanctuary, with my journal. This time is sacred. In these early morning hours, before the fullness of the day begins, I listen, write, muse, dream, play with ideas, and find connections.

Currently, I am at several different stages of the process on several different pieces. I keep track of all in my journal. I look forward to sharing more of the journey with you along the way.

Speaking of journeys, I completed one of my own with a virtual graduation. We gathered on Zoom as a family first and then I shared my screen, so we experienced as together as possible.

Gathered together

Flowers from Noé

What is now one of my all-time favorite photos of my parents—the moment when my name was read during the ceremony.

I mentioned that learning of others’ journeys with creativity makes my heart smile and my spirit shine! I think there are many of us. Would love to hear more about yours!

Love,

Dawn

TESOL Int’l Convention — Layers of Ideas, Friendship, and Love

The famed Andy Warhol yellow bridges of Pittsburgh

I had not attended a conference in four years and I attended two in the past few months. They were simply glorious! I set conferences aside when I started the doctoral work, as I needed every single weekend to keep one nostril above the water of coursework. Then, came the pandemic. So, to attend conferences after such a long lull was a feast for all senses! I hope to share the spirit of the time, as well as some ideas that I took away from all.

First, TESOL: TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages) International Convention, Pittsburgh, PA

TESOL has been a big part of my life for many, many years and in multiple ways. I believe my first TESOL was in Salt Lake City, 2002. Throughout the intervening years, TESOL serves as a foundational stone in my own professional understandings about all-things-multiple-language-acquisition.

Mom and me, TESOL 2018, Chicago

Ever since my first meeting with the Bilingual-Multilingual Education Interest Section that segued from the meeting to salsa dancing in New York City, I knew I met my people. Professional colleagues became dear friends.

Another layer of professional colleagues to dear friends happened when I studied at the School for International Training and became a member of the incredible SIT global educator community.

TESOL always happens at the end of March—it is so wonderful for the organization to plan such a grand shared birthday party for Mom and me with our birthdays on March 20th and March 28th. TESOL also means slumber parties and birthday celebrations with Mom in whatever state the convention takes place that year.

As with learning and language, all begins with relationships. I treasured the reunions with dear friends. Sandra Mercuri, Sandra’s husband, Alfredo, Andrés Ramírez and I talked, laughed, and shared stories in that beautiful way that happens when you’ve been too-long apart. Oh, did we laugh. Especially after the pandemic, it felt so good to laugh with dear friends from the depths of your soul.

Alfredo Mercuri, Sandra Mercuri, Andrés Ramírez, me

On my walk to the Convention Center:

Sandra Mercuri shared her creation and work with CLIFF (Content Language and Literacy Integration Framework):

Me, Sandra Mercuri, Andrés Ramírez

After Sandra’s presentation, Andrés proclaimed, “I’ve been CLIFFed.” Me, too!

A highly engaged conversation is happening around Academic Language. I attended a dynamic panel presentation on these ideas with Luciana C. de Oliveira, Ruslana Westerlund, Andrés Ramírez, and their colleagues. Luciana and Ruslana wore yellow in honor of Ruslana’s native Ukraine.

Luciana C. de Oliveira, Andrés Ramírez, Ruslana Westerlund

Memories of other TESOL Conferences lifted as I sat in sessions, including this time with my dear friend and mentor, Tove Skutnabb-Kangas, when she gave me the author’s socks that she knitted for me. Yes, I still wear. Amazing what they do for one’s writing!

Tove Skutnabb-Kangas, TESOL Salt Lake City, 2002

More time to connect with colleagues and friends from around the world, including Jorge Torres Almazán of MEXTESOL, of the incredible team from World Learning:

Jorge Torres Almazán, MEXTESOL

Evening light over downtown Pittsburgh

The World Learning Team, including Erik Tancorov, Danielle Mistretta, Kara McBride, Aziza ElKolei, Germán Gómez

When not absorbing the ideas of the presentations or connecting with friends old and new, I was taking-in the beauty of the daffodils, which bloomed throughout the city.

Daffodils of downtown Pittsburgh

Next, AERA…

Connection and Creativity on Place Well Tended

Oh, to take the time to sit with other artists and talk about how the land and life shapes our creativity. I had the complete pleasure to talk with Jodi Shaw and Molly Noem Fulton on their podcast Place Well Tended.

“You’re joining Molly + Jodi as we talk with folks about creativity in plains country: what it is, and why it matters that we’re here doing it. Place Well Tended is about love of a place, and tending that place through creative work.”

I was amazed—and momentarily speechless—when Molly read a piece that I had written that goes to the heart of my writing, creativity, life experience, and how they weave together. “I wrote that and put it out into the world?” I asked. I love how Molly and Jodi so beautifully describe our conversation.

Our conversation: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1923909/10391618

Jodi and Molly explore life through the lenses of artists. Jodi finds beauty and meaning in the landscape of the western South Dakota ranch where she raises her family and creates art gathered from the land and life.

Molly’s work of patterned lines and bright colors explores “the people and places that shape us, forming our identity and values.”

This sunset yesterday evening felt the perfect note for our conversation on creativity, place, and beauty.

Stories of Language, Landscape, Wildness, Beauty, and Imagination

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  Journal, 2022

I sit in the early morning time of sanctuary and solitude, candlelight and coffee, darkness and dreams. My journal fills with an ever-growing list of Dewdrops pieces that to write—all swirling around language, landscape, wildness, beauty, and imagination; the most recent trip to the ranch; Lilyology; Scholarly Personal Narrative; translanguaging; beauty; books; family; and so very many other musings and bits of beauty.

2022 is off to a grand start with loads of good energy around ideas. I share some of those ideas here, along with some beauty from my runs and other found beauty along the way.

The past few months have been a time of many presentations, writing, and sharing of ideas. My passion for all things language, landscape, wildness, beauty, and imagination continues to grow. I spoke recently about these ideas and stories:

At last I held a bound copy of my dissertation in my hands.

Another year of the Wink Family March Madness (Luke-10th, Mom-20th, Wyatt-25th, Me-28th, and Wyatt’s girlfriend, Natasha-6th) has come and gone. We ran the Birthday Gauntlet and survived! So very many treasured memories and gifts. I had to share this piece from Daddy, who when he saw it months ago knew that I would love. He was right!

Stories at the Intersection of Language and Landscape Through Wildness, Beauty, and Imagination: A Scholarly Personal Narrative — Dissertation Defense (Video)

What felt like an impossible dream for so many years came true on October 6, 2021. I successfully defended my dissertation, “Stories at the Intersection of Language and Linguistic Literatures Through Wildness, Beauty, and Imagination: A Scholarly Personal Narrative.”

The journey of the past four years of coursework and dissertation writing held many explorations, discoveries, dear new friends, amazing ideas, unexpected challenges, and all else that composes life.

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The defense begins…

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My inquiry focused on stories at the intersection of language and landscape through wildness, beauty, and imagination.

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The whole experience of the defense was was so much more than I ever let myself hope for or dream. A truly joyous experience! I remain forever grateful to my phenomenal dissertation committee: May Elawar, PhD; Jennifer Wells, PhD; and Luci Tapahonso, Professor Emerita. A recording of my defense here:

The marvelous word for dissertation in Costa Rica—chifladura—expresses a powerful vortex of the coming together of natural powers and energies. This symbolizes my dissertation experience exquisitely.

After my defense, Mom and I cried… beyond words to be able to share this with her 30 years after her own dissertation defense. Dr. Wink squared celebrated in fine form on the swings!

And, I promise to take this t-shirt off someday…maybe…I’ll think about it…

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A Shared Cup of Christmas Tea

 

 

 

 

I hope this holiday season of all traditions finds you with loved ones whether in person or in spirit.

I shared this book and recipe last year. The rhythm of the seasons of each reading brings us together again.

A Wink family tradition for Christmas is to read the gorgeous book A Cup of Christmas Tea by Tom Hegg. While this is titled Christmas tea, the story holds for all traditions. This is a human story of roots, memories, and love.

I read to you here:

Mom’s book is covered and filled with photos of treasured friendships. Every Christmas Mom begins to read this book aloud. In my experience, she has yet to make it through the whole story without the wave of tears that has another reading the final pages.

Here is my well-worn recipe card from Mom. That is Wyatt, Dad, and Bo in the photos. I love stirring the ingredients together. This has always reminded me of the shifting sands of the desert.

I’ve also heard this tea called Russian Tea and Friendship tea. I’m thinking that this would make a lovely Solstice Tea, Jewish Tea, Your Tradition of the Sacred Tea.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I invite and encourage all of us to be intentional about our blessings and gratitudes. In the ebbs and flow of life, sometimes we give and sometimes we receive. I hope that those able to give of their spirits and blessings to others may do so, and for those in the chapter of receiving, to receive without shame or guilt. In the ebbs and flows of life, we’ve all experienced each. I wish for all of us to embrace whichever chapter we find ourselves in this year and experience with intention.

Wishing you and yours a lovely holiday season of all traditions and the spirit of many shared cups of Christmas tea.

With love,

Dawn