Vows and Bows for Black Lives

July 7, 2016

Today was the day I had scheduled to write  how changing the Unitarian Universalist First Principle from the inherent worth and dignity of" every person" to "every being" can aid human beings, not just in terms of spirituality, wholeness, and becoming fully who we are, but specifically in terms of alleviating the multiple oppressions facing humans.  As an advocate for humans and other animals (wildlife veterinarian and Unitarian Universalist minister) I believe that my perspective and experiences can help clarify the moral morass of how we live in a world where harm and benefit are interwoven into the very fabric of all life on this planet.  In light of this week's shooting of Alton Sterling in Louisiana by police, the shooting of Philando Castille in Minnesota by police, and the targeted shooting of Dallas police officers by one or more gunmen during a peaceful protest, I don't know how to write through the pain, let alone have that writing be of help to anyone.  So I write for myself, to make sense of something that cannot be undone, this unraveling of human community that shreds families and lives without end.  

Perhaps, if I am honest, I also write to speak to other people of privilege who think that by announcing our take on things we can nullify the anguish.  As a white person, isn't it time, as Black Lives Matter commends, that I make a safe space for black people to come together and then  go  to the back of the room, keep quiet, listen, and have my heart break open?  I don't feel silenced. I am silenced.  There is a longing for wholeness that washes over me when I am given my marching orders on how to be present to the lived experiences of others.  It is no easy task. These events of the last year, and this last week, hit me like a whiplash, my attention ripped from my daily concerns to see more deeply the lives, love, and hurt of others.  May I not return my gaze where it once was directed, but draw on agitation and awareness so that my actions angle my path forward ever more towards reconciliation and justice.

So today I try to hold the anguish in a very specific way for black lives in the United States. I want to know, I want to feel despair and then anger, and then the thrill of action. But let me be so very human, though a privileged one to be sure, I cannot turn from the pain of police officers.  My son, a person of color from Honduras, serves as a police officer in North Carolina. Confusion and anger, his or mine, it's hard to know, seeps into me with every phone call and text between us.  He is on the front lines, battling racism as his job calls him to protect, to be safe, and to control situations   How can any of us protect those whom we love and create safety when it has all gotten so out of control?

I can only imagine how the family members and loved ones of those who have died and been injured might have woken up this morning, petitioning with a heart too broken perhaps to rise out of bed, "Can't we take back the violence and bring my dear beloved back?"  And those of us more removed, did you ask yourself like me this morning, "How can I take back all those years of inaction, of not being completely and soulfully swept up in the beauty and the suffering of the other?" 

It's not that I have been idle. I have dedicated my life towards improving the lives of parrots and people in Central America, including witnessing and being in solidarity with marginalized indigenous groups and those descended from slaves. The trauma of those experiences knows no bounds, nor does the beauty.  I get that there is no hierarchy of pain and suffering, and do not judge my efforts and experiences as inconsequential.   Even so,  I suspect that though I have studied "intersectionality" where the various forms of oppression link to each other, I carry the burden of white supremacist enculturation  that demands, "Look at the suffering of this group, now, in the way that I see it!"  I have not made or had enough room to love, listen, learn, and act all that I could have.

I vow to do so, as I bow down before the agony of our times.  The very act of bowing down low causes to rise up from the body into awareness a sense of humility and interconnection .  These I ache for.  So I bow before you, dear black lives, dear life, dear earth, dear many others of all species, mourning, and longing to really see the beautiful other, and in holding that beauty, be able to hold their suffering.  I want to see the other's point of view, and I want to see it before things get further out of control, before there is any more violence or pain.  I pray that we can really see each other, and in that furnace of beauty and suffering, may we find the strength to start again, and again, until we humans find a way to live in humility, awareness, peace, and love.  

My prayer finishes with this music video, "Could We Start Again Please?" (This is from the musical, JC Superstar.  It was inspired during my time serving as minister to the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Gainesville, Florida, and transmits my hope of how UU congregations can be a place to start again.)

I've been living to see you.

Dying to see you, but it shouldn't be like this.

This was unexpected,

What do I do now?

Could we start again please?

Now for the first time, I think we're going wrong.

Hurry up and tell me,

This is just a dream.

Oh could we start again please?

I think you've made your point now.

You've even gone a bit too far to get the message home.

Before it gets too frightening,

We ought to call a vote,

So could we start again please?

Please?

LoraKim

Vows and Bows for Black Lives

July 7, 2016

Today was the day I had scheduled to write  how changing the Unitarian Universalist First Principle from the inherent worth and dignity of" every person" to "every being" can aid human beings, not just in terms of spirituality, wholeness, and becoming fully who we are, but specifically in terms of alleviating the multiple oppressions facing humans.  As an advocate for humans and other animals (wildlife veterinarian and Unitarian Universalist minister) I believe that my perspective and experiences can help clarify the moral morass of how we live in a world where harm and benefit are interwoven into the very fabric of all life on this planet.  In light of this week's shooting of Alton Sterling in Louisiana by police, the shooting of Philando Castille in Minnesota by police, and the targeted shooting of Dallas police officers by one or more gunmen during a peaceful protest, I don't know how to write through the pain that could be of help to anyone.  So I write for myself, to make sense of something that cannot be undone, this unraveling of human community that shreds families and lives without end.  

Perhaps, if I am honest, I also write to speak to other people of privilege who think that by announcing our take on things we can nullify the anguish.  As a white person, isn't it time, as Black Lives Matter commends, that I make a safe space for black people to come together and then  go  to the back of the room, keep quiet, listen, and have my heart break open?  I don't feel silenced. I am silenced.  There is a longing for wholeness that washes over me when I am given my marching orders on how to be present to the lived experiences of others.  It is no easy task. These events of the last year, and this last week, hit me like a whiplash, my attention ripped from my daily concerns to see more deeply the lives, love, and hurt of others.  May I not return my gaze where it once was directed, but draw on agitation and awareness so that my actions angle my path forward ever more towards reconciliation and justice.

So today I try to hold the anguish in a very specific way for black lives in the United States. I want to know, I want to feel despair and then anger, and then the thrill of action. But let me be so very human, though a privileged one to be sure, I cannot turn from the pain of police officers.  My son, a person of color from Honduras, serves as a police officer in North Carolina. Confusion and anger, his or mine, it's hard to know, seeps into me with every phone call and text between us.  He is on the front lines, battling racism as his job calls him to protect, to be safe, and to control situations   How can any of us protect those whom we love and create safety when it has all gotten so out of control?

I can only imagine how the family members and loved ones of those who have died and been injured might have woken up this morning, petitioning with a heart too broken perhaps to rise out of bed, "Can't we take back the violence and bring my dear beloved back?"  And those of us more removed, did you ask yourself like me this morning, "How can I take back all those years of inaction, of not being completely and soulfully swept up in the beauty and the suffering of the other?" 

It's not that I have been idle. I have dedicated my life towards improving the lives of parrots and people in Central America, including witnessing and being in solidarity with marginalized indigenous groups and those descended from slaves. The trauma of those experiences knows no bounds, nor does the beauty.  I get that there is no hierarchy of pain and suffering, and do not judge my efforts and experiences as inconsequential.   Even so,  I suspect that though I have studied "intersectionality" where the various forms of oppression link to each other, I carry the burden of white supremacist enculturation  that demands, "Look at the suffering of this group, now, in the way that I see it!"  I have not made or had enough room to love, listen, learn, and act all that I could have.

I vow to do so, as I bow down before the agony of our times.  The very act of bowing down low causes to rise up from the body into awareness a sense of humility and interconnection .  These I ache for.  So I bow before you, dear black lives, dear life, dear earth, dear many others of all species, mourning, and longing to really see the beautiful other, and in holding that beauty, be able to hold their suffering.  I want to see the other's point of view, and I want to see it before things get further out of control, before there is any more violence or pain.  I pray that we can really see each other, and in that furnace of beauty and suffering, may we find the strength to start again, and again, until we humans find a way to live in humility, awareness, peace, and love.  

My prayer finishes with this music video, "Could We Start Again Please?" (This is from the musical, JC Superstar.  It was inspired during my time serving as minister to the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Gainesville, Florida, and transmits my hope of how UU congregations can be a place to start again.)

I've been living to see you.

Dying to see you, but it shouldn't be like this.

This was unexpected,

What do I do now?

Could we start again please?

Now for the first time, I think we're going wrong.

Hurry up and tell me,

This is just a dream.

Oh could we start again please?

I think you've made your point now.

You've even gone a bit too far to get the message home.

Before it gets too frightening,

We ought to call a vote,

So could we start again please?

Please?

LoraKim

Animal Ministry Explained

The home base of my multispecies ministry has now changed to White Plains, NY.  Here we have a local TV show hosted by Rev. Jack Lohr called, "Views from the Pews."  I had the wonderful opportunity to explain what a ministry for all beings looks like.  

Click on the photo below to see the show, and enjoy!

Click here

Saving Birds is Catching

 

There must be something in the air.  Yes, as always, there are birds, but
sometimes they fall to the ground, and that's when people step up to the plate.

Such was the case of Anaheim Angel relief pitcher  Dane de la Rosa last week during a game with
the Oakland Athletics. He spotted a pigeon in trouble in the bull pen area and
did something about it - he picked it up until he could turn it over to someone
who could protect the bird. After he did he went on to retire the next 3
batters with only 10 pitches, and the bird was released back into the wild.  Nicely done!

 

 

In my own world, we had a nest of wrens on our front porch,
which I thought was empty.  The wind blew
down the nest and I taped it back up. In the process I saw that the nest held 4
chicks, which successfully fledged a week later, thank goodness in time before
we were to leave the house for good as my spouse had gotten a church position
in White Plains, NY.  

 

Taped up nest back where the wrens made the nest on our porch

 

A nest for of wren chicks about ready to fledge from our home in Florida, as were we

 

So we left Florida
and on our first full day in New York were told of loose birds in the sanctuary
of the Community Unitarian Church at White Plains.  I was called upon for advice and discovered
that wrens had made a nest in the sanctuary and could come and go from
the outside through a hole in the rafters. I asked the church staff to be on
the look out for fledglings as they would not be able to fly out of the hole and
would be trapped inside. Sure enough, a week later we got a call for the church
administrator and my spouse, the Rev. Meredith Garmon, the newly settled minister at the
church, and I went up to help the administrator, Liliana Keith, catch the chicks, chase the
adults out of the sanctuary, and release the chicks where the parents could see
them and care for them.  It was quite
comical to see a little bitty weeks old bird scamper away again and again from
our hands while a parent was chasing us both with a bug in her mouth.  While on wren duty, we also noticed a robin's nest with 3 chicks.  I was so pleased that our new church home was
indeed a sanctuary for all beings. Nicely done CUC!

 

Successful Robin's nest in outside rafters at Community Unitarian Church (CUC)

 

We can't save them every time however.  That same week my spouse gave me a call from
New York City, only a short train ride from our new home.  He was attending a conference and during the
lunch break was outside at Union Square. Noticing a sparrow unable to right
himself and thrashing around, he wanted advice on what to do. After discussing
possible disease or injury, I told him to catch the bird and place her in the
shade out of the hot sun and under protection from predators. There was a
chance that the bird had run into a building and would recover shortly as long
as she could be safe. So my spouse spent his lunch time standing guard by the
struggling bird, who was joined by another  sparrow. 
 Before returning to the
conference he went to see how the bird was doing, and there, along with the
other sparrow and a couple of other humans, they discovered that the bird had
died.  The three humans bowed, hands
together to honor and mourn the life that had passed.

Another three humans honored a long dead wren chick we found in the sanctuary when we were chasing live chicks. Apparently this bird was from a previous clutch of wrens that had not been as fortunate as the ones that the CUC staff saved.  After a moment of silence we placed the still form up in the church's memorial garden.

 

Sometimes all we can do is witness, and that's
important.  To be present to life, to
death, to beauty, to suffering, and to compassion is a gift we all can give the
world.  It's a gift that can be catching, even for pitchers, and can free us all, birds included.

 

Stone sculpture at CUC with plaque that reads, "Roots hold me close, wings set me free."

A Prayer for Chickens

Here I reflect on how we might think of what to do about the plight of chickens in factory farming.  I ask whether factory farming is "wrong" and conclude that based on my experience and understanding, it is, and that it is on the verge of being condemned as immoral by the society at large.  This video was inspired when I was recently passed on the road by a truck full of chickens on the way to a slaughter house. This led me to a sense of prayerful reflection.  How might we reduce their suffering?  I suggest we can do this not through feelings of guilt and despair, but through a sense of interconnection between the beauty within and the beauty without, in chickens, and in all of life.

 

 

Dare To Rise To Compassionately Care for All Beings

Here is a music video I produced that speaks to the wondrous interconnection of all life.  By truly seeing and feeling, we humans can dare to rise to compassionately care for all!

 

Starlings are Startling

 

 

The common starling (Sturnus vulgaris) evokes definite reactions in people. Described as a "Marmite" bird, "you either hate them, or love them."  In the United States they are frequently disliked.  Often considered a nuisance, where introduced they compete with native birds for nest cavities and food, consume agricultural crops, and with their immense winter flocks can soil urban areas and endanger air planes during takeoff and landing.  They also have benefits: they consume agricultural insect pests, imitate human speech, are dazzlingly beautiful, and their large flocks display incredible patterns in the sky (known as murmurations).

 

 

Although they may be plentiful in some areas outside of their historical range, their numbers have dropped dramatically in Britain.  In the last year the population there in the last decade as dropped by over a third, and by 80% since 1979.  "In total,  40 million have vanished from the European Union since 1980 - at a rate of 150 a hour - with the crash triggering concern about its future as a widespread and familiar bird." In some countries, they are listed as vulnerable or threatened.  The reason for their decline is unknown, and research is currently underway to understand this species' ecology and the threats to its existence.

The world would lose something splendid if these birds were to diminish before our eyes.  I admit to being bored by them in the past, their apparent sootiness doing nothing to cheer one's mood in the dim city winter days.  But upon closer inspection and introspection, I have yp agree with Mary Oliver who in her poem, Starlings in Winter, describes how starlings can show us the way to improbable beauty.

 

Starlings in Winter

Chunky and noisy,
but with stars in their black feathers,
they spring from the telephone wire
and instantly

they are acrobats
in the freezing wind.
And now, in the theater of air,
they swing over buildings,

dipping and rising;
they float like one stippled star
that opens,
becomes for a moment fragmented,

then closes again;
and you watch
and you try
but you simply can't imagine

how they do it
with no articulated instruction, no pause,
only the silent confirmation
that they are this notable thing,

this wheel of many parts, that can rise and spin
over and over again,
full of gorgeous life.
Ah, world, what lessons you prepare for us,

even in the leafless winter,
even in the ashy city.
I am thinking now
of grief, and of getting past it;

I feel my boots
trying to leave the ground,
I feel my heart
pumping hard, I want

to think again of dangerous and noble things.
I want to be light and frolicsome.
I want to be improbable beautiful and afraid of nothing,
as though I had wings.

Common starling (photo by Philip Heron)

Slime Mold Has Arisen

 This Easter morn I arose to see what surprises I might award. Acting as the mid-morning bunny I placed brightly colored eggs and chocolate rabbits on the dining room table.  My actions I guess were not all that unexpected. 

 But what awaited me outside was startling.  As part of my morning ritual, I looked out over the gopher tortoise mound in my back yard. The tortoise was not yet awake, but something else caught my attention.  There on top the sand was what looked like a bright yellow piece of plastic.  Who, I thought, was littering this sacred space?  Maybe, I mused, my family had gotten up early and placed a plastic Easter egg there for me to stumble upon.  Perhaps it was a bit of refuse unearthed by the tortoise yesterday evening.  She had been rolling stones up and away from her tomb like home.  The nearly phosresece yellow object was none of these things.  What I discovered, upon closer inspection, was that some time in the night, a slime mold had arisen.

 

 

 Slime molds are colonies of protozoan that feed on bacteria found amongst decaying vegetation.   If I were to disturb this slime mold, any displaced cells would find their way back to re-unite.    Professor John Tyler Bonner, who has spent a lifetime studying slime molds argues that Slime molds are "no more than a bag of amoebae encased in a thin slime sheath, yet they manage to have various behaviors that are equal to those of animals who possess muscles and nerves with ganglia -- that is, simple brains."

What a gift these beings before me.  Though they are separate individuals,  they cooperate together to advance their life giving agendas, which if you give it some hard thought, includes predating upon other beings. 

That’s what we do too.  Might we also find ways to cooperate even though we evolved to harm and experience tragic displacing and despairing events in our lives?

Two thousand years ago the followers of Jesus were abruptly and violently displaced, yet they came back together. After looking into the dark tomb, they did not find death, but the good news of what our species may yet obtain or evolve to. 

This morning I did not see grandmother tortoise coming out of the ground as I expected, but I did see life of another kind. Sure it’s slimy and predatory, but it’s beautiful.

As a predator, sometimes too slick for my own good or others, I pray for the wisdom to stick together with others, so that our kind may arise, arise!

 

Gopher Tortoise - No better church!

I have fallen in love with a gohper tortoise in my backyard.  She makes all my days glad, and here I hope this time with her brings joy to your life too!

 

 

Zanesville Massacre

 

In this video, I offer a short memorial service for those 49 animals that were killed in Zanesville, Ohio on October 18, 2011, and for Terry Thompson.  May we know that their light is always with us.

 

 

 

Snakes Over a Plain

While in Belize last month I witnessed a small snake attacking and carrying off a frog, whose size was much greater than the snake's head.  I reflect on how we all are caught in the predatory/prey cycle and if we can nurture this nature, perhaps we can find a way to live sustainably as we live the solution.

 

 

 

What I'm Looking For - La Moskitia, Honduras

 

 What are you looking for?

 Meaning?  Love?  Belonging?  Beauty?  A way to save the world?

 I invite you to watch this video about my recent time in Honduras where a group of us came together to build a world that we all are looking for.

 

 

 

 

Food, Justice, Hope

 

 

Recently as we Unitarian Universalists seek to bring justice to the world through food, I have heard pain and discouragement regarding how much we wish for the well being of all humans and nonhumans, and how far off that dream of the beloved community seems. Even after the passing of the Ethical Eating SOC, or especially so.

I know intimately this despair regarding the challenges of nourishing a world, let alone my companions in Unitarian Universalism.  For the hope of offering support to you, I would like to offer these words. I was going to speak them from the “pro” plenary mike in support of the statement, but we ran out of time right before my turn. Here are those words, only slightly changed to account for a future not asking for the passing of the statement, but for the implementation of the statement.

 Hello. I am the Rev. LoraKim Joyner and I am a delegate from the UU Fellowship of Gainesville.  I come before you today as a Community Minister in Multispecies Ministry and Compassionate Communication. I have also served as the president of the UU Animal Ministry for 8 years and am their current Reverence for Life Coordinator.  I also enjoy serving on the Ethical Eating Core Team.  In addition, I am a wildlife veterinarian working largely in Latin American conservation. I say all this to let you know that I know how difficult it is for us to talk, and to take action on food.  We doubt that we can love enough to take care of all beings given what we perceive as a perponderance of needs and claims that compete with one another. 

They do not.

I have just come from 2.5 months working in Latin American to support environmental justice and conservation of birds.  The people there who live close to the land know that their well being is tied closely to the well being of animals. One group of indigenous people with whom I work, the Miskito people of Honduras, are literally dying to protect their wild birds, while they themselves do not have enough to eat.  To insure that they have enough to eat and can nourish their families, birds, and trees, they have opened their hearts to protect all life, together.  Everything is at risk they told me, and so they are willing to risk everything.

Their hearts are big enough.

Our hearts are big enough. 

The needs are urgent; there is no time to lose.

Everything is at risk.

So let us risk everything we can today.

Let’s implement this statement by using it as a tool to crank open our hearts so that the world can fall in and fill our lives with ever increasing love and compassion.

I and others remain dedicated to what is not just a 5 year Study Action Item process, but an effort that will span our lifetimes. 

We will find a way to breathe hope and justice into this statement, making it a living covenant with all of life.

 

Rio - Liberating You and Blue

Rio, the top box office draw over the last two weekends, is a story of liberation. The main character, Blue, is a large blue macaw and the last male of his kind. He was taken forcibly from the wild as a chick and raised in the U.S. by a caring human; however, he never learned to fly. Now 15 years old, he volunteers to go back to Brazil to meet up with the last female of their species, Jewel, who trapped from the wild and now residing in a large flight, is desperate to escape.  

 

Blue and Jewel in Rio

 

These aren’t the only two characters who are trapped. The woman who came of age with Blue, lives a happy, though apparently solitary and staid life. She meets up with the Brazilian conservationist, who is caught up in his own narrowly focused and urgent need to save a species. The foils of the story, the “boss” of an illegal animal trade business and his two henchmen, unable to rise above their favela (slum) origins, are caught in a web of desperate business adventures that often turn to violence. A temporary member of their gang is an orphaned street boy, who out of necessity aids the trappers, and then regrets his actions.

The movie shows how birds and humans are not living the good life, except for the wild birds in the opening and closing musical number who joyfully dance and sing “Rio” in a jungle scene reminiscent of the Garden of Eden. Their paradise is shattered when humans enter their realm and catch them, including Blue as a chick. We see the contrast of a beautiful nature without humans, and a devastated earth with humans. Reminding us of the movie Avatar, this movie screams “pop culture” in that it raises the question increasingly before us, “How are we humans to escape a future where we are so caught in our consumerist ways that we threaten all lives around us?” I don’t mind trendy movies at all, and in fact adore them when they help us understand who we are, especially in terms of parrot conservation.

I especially find Rio poignant because human ownership of parrots has tenaciously been before me in the last two weeks. The weekend the movie came out, I was amongst many captive birds. I was invited to be the guest presenter at The Avicultural Society of Chicago during a fund raising dinner for my conservation work (thank you!). After all day staffing a booth on behalf of One Earth Conservation and Lafeber Conservation and Wildlife while it snowed (yes in mid-April), we gathered in th evening to learn about the people and parrots of Latin America, and what we might together do to preserve the splendor of the earth. Though I never brought up the inherent tension between birds in homes and birds in their native habitats, many people did. It was on their minds, for they spoke of how much they wanted their birds to fly free, and the inappropriateness of caging their beloveds. I suppose they also wished that for themselves, for like the humans in the movie Rio, they too are trapped, each in their own way. They wanted to know what I thought of the movie, and I believe also, what I thought of their lives. 

Kaieteur Falls, Guyana

Their lives are in sharp contrast with where I had just come from, a land of wild jungles, indigenous peoples, and free flying parrots – Guyana. For the last 12 days I had been traveling in Guyana with Foster Parrots, a bird sanctuary as well as a leader in Guyana conservation. While in Guyana we saw amazing jungle scenes, replete with startlingly and awe inspiring free flying parrots. They might not have been singing to a calypso beat as did the cartoon birds in Rio, but observing them inspired awe and a sense of liberating joy, much like the opening and ending scenes in the movie.

 

Red and Green Macaws Flying in Front of Falls

 

What haunts us though is whether the real life trappers and resource extractors of the Guyana forests will win out. It has already in fact happened at least with one macaw species much like the movie depicts. The Spix Macaw, also all blue in color, used to fly over the northeastern landscapes of Brazil. Their numbers declined due to trapping until there was only one lone male left in the wild. A female bird was found in captivity that had originally been caught from the wild, and she was relocated to the jungle, and then released in the area of the lone male. Unfortunately the female disappeared before a successful union took place, and the male died in 2000. Now there are no birds in the wild, only captive birds who are hopefully the beginning of a new flock, and not the end of a species.

 Last Known Nest Site of the Spix Macaw

 

This movie shows how we might bring about a different ending than what happened to the Spix Macaw. Though the birds are repeatedly caged, chained, and grounded, Blue eventually learns to fly, and in so doing, frees his new love who has an injured wing. Blue discovers the thrill and passion of flying and he elects to stay free. With his new mate, they return to the wild and live happily ever after. So too do Blue’s woman companion, the conservationist, and the orphan boy who become a family. The trappers end up defeated and their evil days come to an end.

 

Let be me so pedestrian as to suggest some underlying themes that jump out at me in this movie:

1. Many of us do not know we are trapped, or that life could be more wonderful and liberating.

2. If we don’t know we are trapped, we cannot free ourselves, or others. If we are trapping others, we ourselves are trapped.

3. We are interrelated in our imprisonment – the tragedies wrought by humans damages humans who end up orphaned and in slums, or birds who never know of flight. If any one of us is imprisoned, so are all of us.

4. We are interrelated in our liberation – in freeing others, we become free. To free everyone, we must work together and be in solidarity with the plight of both the trapped and trapper.

5. There are no clear demarcations between the trapped and the untrapped. Some free flying birds suffer greatly, while some others in cages lead what looks to be good lives and seem to flourish. Ultimately, only the individual his or herself can know what is missing, or where the wounds are. Even though we may never know the “other” or even ourselves with much clarity, we can always offer freedom to ourselves and others by cultivating choices.

6. We are trapped by our evolution and culture, yes, and we are freed by our choices in how we wish to live, grow, and give to others.

Am I saying that the story of our 21st century can end like the movie Rio with happy, joyful humans and birds frolicking together in a beautiful forest? In so many ways we already do, at least that’s what it feels like sometimes during my parrot conservation work in Latin America. However, I am ever so cognizant of the dual reality of how much we are losing, and how fast; birds and humans are frantically trying to survive. Even if we somehow make it eventually in some century, we won’t ever vanquish the reality that the jungle is a harsh place, with our without humans. There will always be sadness, loss, harm, pain, and yes, the cruelty of our ways, and evolution’s.

 

I accept this reality, and so reject the surrealism of Rio which suggests that we can totally excise suffering from our world. However, knowing this, I believe we come begin to accept what we as a species have wrought, and open ourselves to all of who we are, the good, the bad, and the ugly. In this embrace of a world both wondrous and terrifying, we can intentionally find the ways to guard our failings without trapping beauty, unlock our potential, and set ourselves free, and all beings with us.

 

How will you gain your freedom, and offer it to others?

Going to Guyana

Eco-lodge where we will stay (built by donations from Foster Parrots)

 

The day has finally arrived. Tomorrow I head north to New York to catch a flight to Guyana, where as the guest of Foster Parrots Project Guyana I will see what beauty I may, in the hopes that I will find ways to keep beauty ever present in Guyana in the form of the people, parrots, and the other species there.

In so many ways, this will be a unique trip. One, as I wrote last week, they are home to the Hoaztin, a bird I have always wanted to see. Marc Johnson of Foster Parrots read of my desire, and has so arranged that we will stop at a place where they work with these birds in the wild.  Another special attribute of Guyana is that they are only one of two countries in Central and South America that speak English. (and the other one is...........).  Furthermore, they still allow legal trapping, harvesting, and exportation of their flora and fauna. From 1900-2002 about 175,000 parrots were exported, and 2003 quotas allow for over 20,000 to be exported a year (this does not include in-country trade for birds that never leave the country).

While there I will also be conducting an ethno-ornithology survey where I will conduct interviews that seeks understanding about the relationship between humans and birds in a given country and a given people. For this aim, I am going to win the biggest luggage award because of all the video and camera gear. I'm already practicing my usual reply when people stare at my big blue duffle luggage, "It's all gear, not shoes!"

Along the way there will be only one opportunity for internet access so I don't know if I will be able to blog until I arrive back in the USA on April 13th. There won't be any phone service either so I can't tweet either. However, one of our companions is packing a gizmo (Spot Satellite GPS) that allows you to track where we are in Guyana on Facebook. You can begin tracking now by clicking here.

With beauty before me and all around,

LoraKim

 

Flying Free with Intimate Conversations

Blue and Gold Macaw (photo by Sander van der Wel)

 

In January I attended the Parrot Festival in Houston Texas. While there I heard a presentation by Rick Jordan, “The Future of Aviculture.” He expressed views that if we lose the ability for people to own and breed birds in captivity, we will lose a great good for the people involved, and for conservation and avian medicine. Throughout his talk, he said that we all needed to talk to one another, even though we may have different views.

 

In the spirit of his invitation that we should all talk, I met with Rick alone later in the day. I wanted to hear more about him and if he was willing to hear my story. We began talking of our common roots, of how we both had worked at the Aviculture Breeding and Research Center (ABRC) in Loxahatchee, Florida in the late 1980′s. This was a very large avian breeding facility that only in my last months there began to sell the hundreds of birds that hatched there to collectors and to pet owners. I left in part because these birds were so precious to me and I was not comfortable for them to enter the pet trade where many would end up in situations where they would not be adequately cared for over the span of their lives. I spoke of how much I had been a part of aviculture then, like him, and how after listening to him I could see the good that came of it: relationships between people, building a vibrant human community, income, contribution to science, conservation, and veterinary medicine, and fostering human-nonhuman relationships. He agreed and seemed to appreciate this common understanding we had.

 

Rick Jordan, Sharon Wolf, Julie, and Trent at ABRC in 1989 (mock fighting)

 

I then told him that after leaving ABRC I had begun to work almost exclusively with wild parrots, and I had changed. Seeing their complex and beautifully compelling behaviors and social structures, I found it increasingly difficult to work with birds who were not free flying. It was as if the birds had become the “sacred other” and that I longed to be in relationship with them not on my terms, but based on their evolved natural states. I wanted to be part of a system where birds were granted the utmost consideration, compassion and care, and nothing less, and not one that often treated birds as objects of human desire and not as subjects with their own inherent worth and dignity. I claimed this story as my own, and did not mean it as a statement of what Rick should or should not do.

 It was then that Rick amazed me by saying how he resonated with what I had shared. He told of how he had the chance to see free flying Lear’s Macaws in Brazil. When he saw them, he thought, “I’m glad that there are no Lear’s Macaws in the pet trade. They should be free flying.” Rick then told me that when he returned to the U.S. he was depressed with the reality of seeing his parrots in captivity. The beauty of a flying macaw had shaken him to the core. After several months he then had a chance to see a staff member of his bond with a parrot chick, and the love and care expressed by the human to the bird was also a beauty that deeply reached him.

 

Lear's Macaws

 

What surprised us both is how similar we were and how we could get to the heart of what motivated our behavior and relationships with birds. What I also saw was that if we can slow down and hold conversations about our deep appreciation of birds with respect and empathy towards one another, we might harvest the power of relationships between humans, and between humans and birds so that we can make a better life for all. We need all of us at the table to listen and to contribute, because the task before us in conservation and avian welfare is no easy one. There are tragic consequences to our human presence here on this planet, but together, we might just be able to preserve the magnificent splendor of this earth.

 

I am grateful for our conversation for it is with the telling of these kinds of stories that we engage in a process of narrative ethics. We place ourselves in the situation of others, and by being there, work out what is ours to do on behalf of others in this complex world.

 

Thank you Rick for sharing your story with me, and giving me permission to share it with my readers, for I believe that our conversation will help others share likewise, for the sake of all. 

 

Green-winged Macaws (photo by Ricardo Sanchez)

Naming Birds, Taming Egos

 

Don't mind my inexplicable delight

in knowing your name,

little Wilson's Warbler

yellow as a lemon, with a smooth, black cap..

 

Just do what you do and don't worry, dipping

branch by branch down  to the fountain....

 

A name is not a leash.

-Mary Oliver (in Swan)

 

 

 

Just two days ago a man came up to me brimming with ideas for a "bird ministry."  He wanted to teach troubled youth bird identification as a means to connect, focus, and move towards wholeness.  Without dropping a beat I said, "Count me in."  I'll do anything to get people to enjoy beauty, so that they can respond to it.  Though I have degrees in birds and they are my vocation and calling, I've never been overly concerned with their names, or teaching people names.   Beauty is beauty no matter what you call it. In fact, I have seen the pursuit of adding bird names to a "life list" detract from the objective wonder of the bird itself as the ego asserts its control in the field.

 

In this case, however, teaching the names to young people and helping them recognize the individuality of species is a discipline that is liberating.  Identifying birds gives them a choice to contribute as citizen scientists, and is a means to better understand their world.  Naming unleashes the wild possibility within.

 

Here comes the paradox.  We need to "know" names to contribute to this world, and we don't need to know names to contribute wholeness and healing.  Name it and then let go knowing anything about the bird so that you can meld with pure interconnection. 

 

Dogen the Buddhist might write (if he were a Birdist):

 

There is a Wilson's Warbler.

There is not a Wilson's Warbler.

There is a Wilson's Warbler.

 

What might you un-name today?

Owls Get a Kick Out of Soccer

 

There is nothing as liberating as a good soccer game.  It can also be dangerous in parts of the world as soccer has been the inciting stimulus for riots, death threats, murder, and in one case, a war between Honduras and El Salvador. Recently this harm extended to an owl.  A tame barn owl, the mascot of a Columbian soccer team, flew down to the field during a game and was hit by the ball.  While still stunned, Panamanian footballer Luis Moreno kicked the bird off the field.  The bird died two days later, suffering a broken wing and shock. The crowd yelled "murderer," and Moreno had to leave the game under police escort.  Since then he has received threats.  He won't be prosecuted because Columbia has no laws against animal cruelty, although the soccer league penalized him by requiring a fine and banning him from the next two games. 

 

 

This is a painful reminder of how humans in their worst moments do not have the capacity for compassion and care, even when beauty of game and bird surrounds them.  But sometimes we do.

In a 2008 soccer game between Finland and Belgium, a great-horned owl visits the game, flying around the stadium and landing on the goal posts. The officials stopped the game and the crowd cheers and applauds the owl. Smiles and laughter abound.

 

 

 

In another instance, rescuers remove another Great-horned Owl that had become entangled in a soccer net.

 

 

 

There is beauty all around us, and there is nothing as liberating as people responding by loving and saving the birds of our world.  How though do we make sense of our complicated natures where we both get a kick out of birds and kick them?

Sufi poet Rumi writes, "There is a field out beyond wrongdoing and rightdoing. I'll meet you there."

On that soccer field, great apes and owls are neither wrong or right. Instead  we are caught up in our goal directed lives, and make tragic choices that harm ourselves and others. 

May we this day see the beauty within and without, and in our gratitude, not penalize the beings of this earth.

 

 

Owl Ethics - Spotted Owl Versus the Barred Owl

 Spotted Owl (photo by USFWS)

 

The northern spotted owl is in the news again, this time as linked to the death of 1200-1500 barred owls.  This summer, the USFWS may release in an environemental impact statement their reccomendation to kill barred owls. This is in response to the increasing range of the native barred owl who pushes out the the endangered spotted owl. 

"It's a wrenching decision that splits wildlife biologists and environmentalists. Killing one native animal to benefit another is such a leap that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service hired an environmental ethicist to guide its discussions."

"There's no winner in that debate," says Bob Sallinger, conservation director with the Portland Audubon Society. 

Making difficult decisions is not new in wildlife management and conservation.  Federal workers have killed comorants, terns, and seals to protect salmon and in Puerto Rico, Red-tailed Hawks are killed to reduce their predation on the endangered Puerto Rican Parrot.

As a wildlife veterinarian I have been faced with the moral dilemmas present in this work and have been severely challenged as I wade with others through the ethical morass of wildlife care and management.

For this reason I recently finished a chapter, Wandering Through the Wilderness of Ethical Discourse, in the book Topics in Wildlife Medicine: Ethical Considerations in Wildlife Medicine. This book will be published by the National Wildlife Rehabilitators Association (NWRA).  In it I suggest that our lives are full of tragic decisions and that to care for ourselves and others we must improve our skills in ethical deliberation, and we need to do it together.

 For this aim I am traveling to the NWRA 2011 Symposium in Albany, NY next week to give a seminar on Compassionate Rehabilitation.  My hope is that we can learn and practice together how to talk to one another so that we use our community resources to arrive at the best decisions to help the most species and individuals.

One way I suggest we do this is to practice Needs Based Ethics.  In this approach we do not say that one species or individual is of more worth than another.  Instead we bring to the table a deep appreciation of the worth and dignity of all of life.  What guides our discussion is discerning and empathizing with the needs of all species and individuals within a given situation.  By keeping our hearts and minds open, which I admit is difficult given the loss of life resulting from our daily activities, choices, and conservation management decisions, we can come up with creative solutions. 

In the end, not all beauty may be preserved in the way we'd like.  We may howl over owls, but not at each other through the tactics of shame and blame.  In the end, we will have one another with which to mourn and can claim that at least we did not turn from the splendor that is ever present to us in owl, human, tree, and fish.