Meeting Guilford on the trail...some quick thoughts after a trip

(I'm not sure why I never posted this..but here goes. This was after an IDS senior camping trip with Maia Dery's class, Aaron Fetrow and Jeff Favolise.)

This weekend I had the pleasant opportunity to be in the woods and on the trail with 18 Guilford seniors, my son,  and three Guilford colleagues.   I looked up "colleague" this morning to see if it actually is the right word to describe my relationship with these three: 

 colleague 

1533, from M.Fr. collègue, from L. collega "partner in office," fromcom- "with" + leg-, stem of legare "to choose." So, "one chosen to work with another."

If  "chosen" is indeed part of this descriptive, then, yes,   I think by "colleague" I do mean that I have chosen, and hopefully, been chosen, by these three people as partners in a work adventure that we are trying to define.   These three are like minded in their passion, humility and cravings for partnership here.  They seem willing to "not know" the answers;  to be shaped by the questions, and by what the "moment" is calling for from them.  It takes courage to lead this way.  It takes a comfort level with vulnerability.  It calls for risk taking, and the willingness to make shifts that call for new, and sometimes initially awkward postures.    So, to be on both the literal and figurative trail with these "colleagues"  causes me to feel an amazing sense of gratitude.   

 Similarly, I feel honored to have walked part of the trail with Guilford seniors on  this weekend trip off campus.  I am rarely disappointed by Guilford seniors, which means, I am rarely disappointed by what Guilford continues to collectively co-create.  I think by that I mean that I see in seniors that this place - Guilford - has taken root somehow, yet again.  Aaron Fetrow says it often...that Guilford continues to be Guilford despite administration, budget challenges, shifting politics, etc.  It is similar to what  Arthur Larrabee, guru of Quaker process, said at opening community meeting a while back:  (and this is my paraphrase) -- in whatever dealings you have with each other here, always consider one more entity at the table and in the room - always consider that Guilford College is in the room.  

Around the campfires in the NC foothills,  it seemed very clear to me that" Guilford College" was there.  It was evident in some anxious questioning from students about whether or not Guilford is changing.  Where else could this question come from besides a desire to protect and preserve the sacred dharma of the College?  Why have countless seniors asked this question through the decades?  What do we all want to make sure is not lost?  We talk about knowing what IT is - but what is IT?  Is it the process that turns naive, wide-eyed, self-focused first year students into inquisitive, tolerant, curious, humble seniors/alumni?  Is it actually and subconsciously the deep hope that first year students will have access to the same transformative experiences that they have had in order to access the best, most deeply spiritual parts of themselves?  How can upper class people make the shift from thinking that there is an administrative plot to undermine our community of free thinkers, to, taking on the responsibility to be part of the process of making certain that "Guilford" is in the room with every first year and younger student?  

That is what I mean by colleague, ah yes!  We must all choose each other as partners in this work;  this work of figuring out what IT is that we want to protect, preserve and promote that is the heart of this rich academic, intellectual, spiritual, experiential crossroads on these 380 acres of dirt.    How do we tell the story to those arriving early, so that they become excellent stewards of the place they have chosen to occupy for four years? And, how do we make sure that each person moving on from this particular plot of dirt knows how precious each of their particular way of preserving the "IT" of this place can continue to be, long after their physical occupation of space here?

Yes, I'm grateful for all my colleagues today who want to keep asking the questions of the community, but mostly of themselves, about their shared responsibility, their part in honoring Guilford in each and every "room."

I'm on the road again, this time in Florida.  In some ways, it feels like I've been gone for a long time.  I think that is because I have a weird relationship with travel.  For some reason, I always find it so disarming to be plucked off my spot of the universe by a jet airplane and dropped down on another one.  And, though Florida isn't SO  far away from my particular spot, it is incredibly different.  Packing was a challenge.  I found it difficult to think about what to take, and not just because of the temperature difference.  Moving from scarves and boots to flip flops seems drastic, and, I didn't have immediate access to my summer gear, and, I'm in winter mode so not that excited about revealing my pale, winterized flesh.  Also, because my life has become more farm-like - I don't know another way to describe it.  Florida is clean lines, sea shells, white carpets, shades of light blue.  My life is wood piles and bark debris by my fireplace, dog fur, hay remnants, muddy boots, and grounds from the occasional hippie coffee shop.  No, I'm not actually living on a farm, but some days it feels as if I'm preparing to do so.  I had scary thoughts of entering my Florida friends' lives looking like "Pig-Pen" from Peanuts with my little cloud of dander!  Ok, that is an exaggeration.  I clean up pretty well I think.  I know I can count on my flexibility and ability to adapt to a variety of situations and being able to  meet whoever I'm with right where they are - right where they live.  But in my mind, my cloud stays with me! Come to think of it, I love my cloud.  It is a combination of the beautiful dander of my children, my animals, my friends, my house, my yard, a farm, a campus, darkrooms, lecture halls, alumni homes, coffee shops of every port, student and alumni campsites, lovely dinner meetings, an old alumni house, classrooms and my rolling Prius home.  It is real and rooted.

There were two really important posts/blog messages I read this week from women I love and depend upon for insight (both Guilfordians!).  One was about community.   The other, about authenticity.  Both seem pertinent to the meaning of why my "job" has relevance -- why I travel to meet Guilfordians "where they live,"  why Guilford College's survival is of importance, and why keeping Guilfordians' Quaker liberal arts education alive and fresh makes a difference in one's daily existence.  My dear friend put (another) this important message on her facebook page this week (thank you Cyndi!):

Don’t change yourself
just to fit in
with a place
or a person.

You risk
becoming an exile
to the luminous plans
that first brought you here.

- Frank Owen, Medicine

Then, there was this excerpt from Patti Digh's blog about community, which really speaks to that place where you find your "tribe" -- where you can honestly and with support explore, and find creativity and innovation for what might become:  

“Community is not a talent show in which we dazzle the world with our combined gifts.
Community is the place where our poverty is acknowledged and accepted,
not as something we have to learn to cope with as best as we can
but as a true source of new life.” -Henri Nouwen

True community is not clever. It does not necessarily speak in Twitter-worthy quips. It is not dazzling or quick or sarcastic or cute. It is not a place to impress people, but a place to be vulnerable about our shared poverty--our human-ness and our frailities and the promises we make to ourselves and often break. It is a place to see that shadow self not as something to be overcome or "fixed" but as the very thing from which new life springs.

I hope you have such a tribe. You will know it when you find it, a place where admitting is met with recognition, not an urge to "fix." Where sorrow is allowed, not swept up in our collective urge toward tidiness. Where showing off has no place. Where your shadows are your gift.

Finding your tribe may make all the difference for you, as it has for me. In a fluid, hyperconnected world of dazzling surfaces and promises, look beneath.


As I'm on the road in the name of Guilford College, I know I am seeking the ties that bind we Guilfordians as a tribe.  I look for what has remained with us, and what continues to influence  we Quaker liberal arts graduates from that time on campus when we too were "vulnerable about our shared poverty--our human-ness and our frailities..."  The place where, hopefully, we all experienced moments where "..sorrow  is (was) allowed, not swept up in our collective urge toward tidiness.  Where showing off has (had) no place.  Where your shadows are (were) your gift."    I have heard from many of us who lived for a time on those 380 acres, at the head of the Cape Fear Water Basin, in the Piedmont, on the edge of those historical woods, that Guilford was a place true to Henri Nouwen's quote above.  A place where "poverty,"  our "poverties, " became a "source of new life."  


How will I continue to bring my own "dander' to the place where I meet another person in a respectful and authentic way?  How will I keep fresh the time when I was in that Guilford campus "tribe" of learners and explorers?  How will I support members of this tribe to keep the tribe alive?  How might I assist in making connections between we tribe members?  I'll have to keep traveling and keep meeting,  even if it means packing flip flops in February.