Celebration #15

Kate Braestrup:

Whatever I do, I want it to be participating in witnessing to transmitting, receiving this love. That's it. And Seminary was how I learned to practice. What do you actually do to make it more likely that you will respond, notice, pay attention to not miss the love when it arrives or the love that's arriving constantly in various ways.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Hello, this is Dr. Lisa Belisle. Welcome to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast number 15 celebration. This week on our show we're doing things a little bit different in honor of this very special day that many people around the world are celebrating. Whether Christian or not. Today is Christmas. Merry Christmas to those who are celebrating and to those who are not. We hope you have the most wonderful of days. As part of our celebration we have a conversation with best selling author Kate Braestrup who wrote the book Here if youf Need Me and is also a chaplain with the Maine Warden Service. Following our conversation with Kate, we are treated to the musical well, I don't have a better way to say this wonderment of the group Mr. Moon, which includes three girls from the Palermo main area. I don't have to go much further than that. You'll hear them and you'll be amazed. And our Give Back segment is Kurt Holmgren from the Root Cellar talking about the great work that that organization is doing to help people with various needs around the city of Portland. The show is a celebration for us as the team at the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour. It's been 15 sessions of challenge and difficulty and joy and amazement and wonder and togetherness, all of which we're celebrating today and most days that we're together. We hope you enjoy this show. We are fortunate on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast to feature a segment called Wellness Innovations sponsored by the University of New England. This week's Wellness Innovation is about the power of love. Recent studies discussed in Psychology Today Comment on the Power of Love Love is officially the best antidepressant. The less love you have, the more depressed you're likely to feel. According to Psychology Today, love is as critical for your mind and body as oxygen. It's not negotiable. The more connected you are, the healthier you will be, both physically and emotionally. We at the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast see as one of our missions connecting one another and perpetuating this notion that love is the most powerful thing that people have to offer one another personally, professionally. Within families and communities, we believe that love is maybe the best wellness innovation there is.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

As part of our special Holiday Celebration show, we are interviewing best selling author Kate Braestrup. The daughter of a foreign correspondent, Kate Braestrup spent her childhood in Algiers, New York City, Paris, Bangkok, Washington, D.C. and Maryland. She married James Andrew Drew Griffith in 1985 shortly after the birth of their first child. In 1986, Griffith joined the Maine State Police and the family moved to midcoast Maine. Trooper Griffith was killed in a car accident while on duty in 1996. Kate Braestrup was left a widowed mother of four children between the ages of three and nine. As it happened, Drew Griffith had spent the last year of his life thinking about, researching, and finally committing himself to becoming a Unitarian Universalist minister. Unwittingly, he had prepared the way for Kate Braestrup to recognize and develop her own vocation. She entered the Mangor theological seminary in 1997 and was ordained in 2004. In 2006, Braestrup married the artist Simon Van der Van. Between them, Van der Van and Braestrup have a total of six children only, all of whom are now sauntering, tiptoeing, or being pushed up to and across the threshold of adulthood. Kate's latest book is entitled Beginner's Grace. In Beginner's Bringing Prayer to Life, Braestrup explains what prayer is and explores the many ways that we can pray. A new kind of prayer book made for those who may not pray or even know how. Bracetrup includes many examples of prayers to draw from and explains how and why the practice of prayer can open a space in our busy lives for mindfulness, gratitude, contentment, and compassion toward others. As a gift to our listeners, we've asked Kate to read an Excerpt from her book Beginner's Grace

[Unidentified voice]:

On a gloomy November day not long ago, I drove to Augusta for an afternoon meeting. The low winter sun painted the passing landscape in a range of grays and sear browns. Gray sky, brown trees, brown fields bleached

Kate Braestrup:

cold ochre by frost.

[Unidentified voice]:

In Maine, the cold and dark loom so absolutely that anyone with a human soul yearns for warmth and radiance. I felt my kinship with all the ancient peoples who regarded the increasingly brief and pallid visits of the winter sun. With anxiety. I cranked up the heat, even though the air inside the car was warm. I fretted about the cost of oil. Oh God, and whether we would be able to cut and stack more firewood before the snows came. I planned some panicked knitting sweaters, socks, leg warmers, mittens, and hats. Maybe if I encase my loved ones entirely in wool, they will survive the winter. A farm borders the road in the town of Union, and as I passed the place I glimpsed a scene with plenty of biblical antecedents, a flock of sheep abiding in a pasture. Some lay on the ground, padded from its stone frozen hardness by thick fleece. Others clustered around a pile of hay. On the backs of some of the ewes I noticed a streak of color, blue or red, as if a toddler had been let loose among them with a couple of giant crayons. And even before I had retrieved the memory of what those streaks of color signified, I felt the stirring of faith. Even before I'd figured the thing out, I was grinning at the darkening sky beyond my windshield. Yes, the winter has come, I thought, but spring, even in Maine, will surely follow. In the early 1970s, my parents bought a farm in the mountains of Maryland. There my mother kept a flock of 60 sheep. Most were ewes of the breed known as corridales. But mom also kept two rams. One was a huge, solid black headed beast with a Roman nose and an imperturbable disposition. He was known simply as Big John. The other ram was a slight, skinny creature, a cheviot. He looked quite a lot like Gene Wilder with his wild, curly hair. He also had yellow eyes that didn't quite track. This animal mom christened sauerkraut. Sauerkraut spent most of his life hovering on the brink of a nervous breakdown. A laughing child, a duck's quack. Even blowing leaves could startle sauerkraut into a frenzy of bleating and directionless stampede. Any more substantial threat, a barking dog or the arrival of the vet would completely freak him out. And if ever a sheep needed valium, it was sauerkraut. Sauerkraut was also terrified of Big John, and this made for peace in the sheepfold for most of the year. Once a year, however, in late autumn, it would be time for the ewes to be bred. What signal passed from the ewes or from the gods of ovine reproduction into the twitching convolutions of Sauerkraut's tiny brain?

Kate Braestrup:

I do not know.

[Unidentified voice]:

But as the leaves changed color, the flame of some unnamable passion would flare up in Sauerkraut's heart, and a change

Kate Braestrup:

would come over him.

[Unidentified voice]:

Instead of cowering in the corner of the sheepfold, trying to keep a couple dozen ewes between him and various imaginary dangers, Sauerkraut would begin to strut and swagger about on his sprawny legs. If any blowing leaves or quacking ducks happened across his path, Sauerkraut would snort in a threatening manner, then steal a quick glance at the ewes to see if they noticed his bravery. The ewes would go on clipping at the grass with their front teeth, paying

Kate Braestrup:

no attention at all to sauerkraut.

[Unidentified voice]:

Their indifference would drive him to more dramatic displays of machismo. Lowering his head, he would charge at the dogs, who ran, barking and laughing, out of his way. And still the ewes grazed, impervious, his soul on fire. Sauerkraut would draw a deep and desperate breath, and from the recesses of his scrawny chest would come a prolonged, savage snort of challenge. Okay, it sounded more like a savage squeak of challenge, but no matter. It had the desired effect. Big John's black head would pop up above the woolly surface of the flock. He would turn his steely gaze in sauerkraut's direction and emit a more resonant answering snort. The ovine equivalent of.

Kate Braestrup:

You talking to me, boy?

[Unidentified voice]:

Sauerkraut would reply with his shrill squeak. You bet I am, big nose. The flock of ewes would part like the Red sea before the upraised hand of Moses, leaving the ground between the two rams clear and empty. A hush would fall over the sheepfold as ewes and lambs, ducks and dogs held their breath.

[Unidentified voice]:

Thud.

[Unidentified voice]:

Big John would stomp his front feet upon the ground.

Kate Braestrup:

Thud.

[Unidentified voice]:

Thud. An answering signal from sauerkraut, whose expression, insofar as sheep are capable of expression, was resolute. He would not yield. Big John lowered his massive head. Sauerkraut lowered his tiny head, his curls shivering in the wind. And then, as if on some silent signal, sharp as a gunshot, the rams charged. Womp their heads collided. I would love to be able to surprise you at this point, but I can't. The result was exactly as you would predict. Sauerkraut would promptly fall over onto his back, all four feet in the air, just like a cartoon, with little X's where his eyes should be. And Big John would amble away to resume eating completely unaffected. The injury wasn't fatal. Sauerkraut would eventually open one eye and then the other. He'd get to his feet and totter about in a daze for several hours until his head cleared sufficiently to think about demanding a rematch. In truth, the flock of ewes was not a prize for Big John or sauerkraut. To win or lose by any display of foolishness or courage. My mother, goddess of the sheepfold, would divide the flock into roughly equal groups of ewes. One for sauerkraut, whose curly wool was prized for spinning, and one for the meaty Big John. Both rams would be fitted out with harnesses that held chalk. Blue chalk for Big John, red for sauerkraut. When a mating had been accomplished, mom would see the mark on the ewe's back and note the date in her record book. Thus she could roughly calculate when a birth might reasonably be expected. Lambs were the first sign of spring on our farm. They would be born scrawny and steaming into the freezing February nights. It always seemed impossible that anything so small and worse wet could survive birth into such conditions. Some didn't, and that was sad, but most of them did. They would stagger to their soft feet, find their mother's milk and drink. Soon enough, they would grow fat and silly, leaping in the warm air, nibbling experimentally at the new grass in the fresh spring light. Some would have a black face and a Roman nose. Others would have curly hair and yellow eyes that did not quite track. There were sheep in the fields in Union, Maine, and their wool bore a mark made with chalk. It was a sign for those who know of a coming miracle. Spring will come. The green fields and the dancing lambs. The lambs are already on their way, just as the bulbs and seeds that shall be flowers are already waiting in the soil. And the SAP rests even now in the roots of the maple trees. With the winter solstice, the earth will tilt back into the center of that blessed cone of sunlight to warm a belly already pregnant with a new spring. My prayers cannot make the earth tilt or the SAP rise. And neither the tilt nor the rise are mine. In the grand scheme of things, my faith is unnecessary. And so it comes to me as grace.

Kate Braestrup:

Yes. Wow. And thank you.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Thank you for that beautiful piece talking about springtime and hope.

Kate Braestrup:

You're welcome.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Kate, I'm interested in talking to you about this idea of celebration. So you are the chaplain of the main Warden service, and you see a lot of people in times that are not terribly celebratory, I would say. Yes, yes. But one of the pieces that you wrote in your newest book, Beginner's bringing prayer into your life, is about laughter and prayer. One of your chapters is Laughter and prayer. Contrary to anything you might expect, people who've experienced the unexpected death of someone they love are capable of laughter, even quite soon after receiving the news. It is surprising and somehow heartening to see how quickly a person's sense of humor resurrects, declaring the underlying vitality and essential integrity of the bereaved. And do you remember the rest of this chapter? Do you remember the story that you told? So tell us that story.

Kate Braestrup:

Well, it's. You mean the one about the woman whose husband. It just died? This was a particularly nice example. It's not an unusual example, but it stuck with me. There was a woman whose husband had just drowned, and his body had just been recovered. The main Warden service dive team had searched the bottom of the lake until they'd found him, and they recovered his body. And his widow and I went down

[Unidentified voice]:

to the shore to meet the boat

Kate Braestrup:

and so that she could see his body. And we were all standing around, and the wardens were all sort of standing around quietly. And she had sort of gotten over the initial encounter with her husband's body, which is always. Which is hard for other people to imagine. She had very bravely and beautifully encountered her husband's body for the first time. And I was standing there with her quietly and. Or at that point, probably kneeling with her, and I said something actually kind of a little strange, which is I said, you know, he really looks beautiful. And she said, yeah, he was always pretty cute, but I never liked that shirt. And she said when she said it, she smiled. She didn't break out in laughter, but she smiled.

[Unidentified voice]:

It was a joke.

Kate Braestrup:

And it was the kind of joke that a wife gets to tell about her husband or a husband gets to tell about his wife. It was the kind of joke that indicates their intimacy. So it was funny and lovely. I mean, there was nothing. It was a loving joke.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

You had a similar experience with your own husband, I believe.

Kate Braestrup:

You mean that he died? Yeah, my first husband died. Yes. Yeah. And one's sense of humor does. It isn't lost. You would think it would be, and it's not. It's still there.

Genevieve Morgan:

I think that's an important thing to think about when it's Christmas today and there are many of us celebrating. But in the midst of that celebration, there are others who have very conflicted feelings about the holidays and that range of emotion. What do you say to somebody who might be facing today with some trepidation or sadness?

Kate Braestrup:

Well, I think what's hard about Christmas is that it's a day of obligatory happiness. You know, I mean, there are all the Christmas ornaments, say joy on them. And I've never been good at obligatory happiness. I mean, it's why I don't like my own birthday, is you're supposed to be happy. And I like Thanksgiving. You don't have to be happy. You just have to eat.

[Unidentified voice]:

But

Kate Braestrup:

one thing about Christmas that is striking to me, actually, is that it is very much in the original Christmas story. It is very much a celebration in the midst of what you know is going to be a story with a sad ending, or at least an approximately sad ending, if not an ultimately sad ending, which is this little baby, when he grows up, is going to suffer and die at a young age. I mean, this is not going to be a long and happy life. This is going to be a hard life. And that Mary's maternity is going to be hard. And for me, that actually helps. I actually find that it is easier for me to celebrate and to take joy when I understand that this is something we do bravely and

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

well.

Genevieve Morgan:

With the knowledge that it's transient.

Kate Braestrup:

Yeah. With the knowledge that we're gonna lose. And that really, what makes the original Christmas story a beautiful story and one worth telling, and the whole Christian story worth telling is the only thing that makes it worth telling is that it's redeemed by love. So the love that is present in the stable, the love that we have for little babies, hopefully even poor babies and poor mothers, the love that we share with each other is what redeems anything. So to the extent that we can. That I can stay there. I like Christmas. It can be hard to maintain when it starts to feel, like, pressure to be happy, which is different, I think, from joy.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I want to bring us back to your husband's death because it's, I think, a fairly pivotal point in your life, professionally and personally. You became. You were an author prior to. To this.

Kate Braestrup:

Yeah, technically, yeah.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

But it was the book here. If youf Need Me that described your experiences in the face of his dying. You had four children.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yep.

Kate Braestrup:

Yep.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Tell us about. Just tell us the circumstances of this.

Kate Braestrup:

He. Drew was a mainstay trooper, and he died in the line of duty in a car accident in 1996. And I had four. We had four small children. I think my oldest was nine and my youngest was three. And, you know, he was killed immediately. I mean, it was an instant. And so, as it happens, I. Or not, as it happens, as these things play out. I now work very much with people who've lost someone in very. In circumstances that are similar enough, if only in that they're sudden, unexpected, and very absolute. And I came to it out of the experience I had of Drew's death, which the kids and I talk about this a lot, actually. There is the experience of loss, which is enormous and excruciating.

[Unidentified voice]:

But there is also always.

Kate Braestrup:

Whenever we talk about it, whenever I think about it, I think about the loss. And then I can't separate that from the love that we were immediately surrounded by and enfolded by. And it was that love that is the persistent quality and the persistent theme of the story. My story. I mean, the actual story, not just the book.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

And this love actually brought you to a place where you really changed the focus of your life.

Kate Braestrup:

Yeah. I mean, it actually opened out the whole idea of what love is and what its capabilities are. I hadn't encountered a Maine community in this way before. We had lived in Maine for 11 years when he died, and full time. I mean, I'd come up here and summer when I was a kid, but. And I'd never lived anywhere long enough before then to really experience community in the sense that we have it here in Maine.

[Unidentified voice]:

So for me, it was a huge

Kate Braestrup:

experience of just how many people were willing to come and help us and do things for us and just know us and be with us. And that was what I wanted to stay part of. So when I talk about becoming a minister, I know I wouldn't have become a minister had Drew not died because he was going to become a minister. But it can sound as though I wanted to go to seminary and be ordained and all of that so as to kind of stay with Drew. And really, it was to stay with that love that the grief does fade, and it gets softer over time. It's always there, but it gets softer. The love doesn't fade. It gets bigger. And whatever it was that allowed people to be present with us when Drew died, I knew how powerful that was. And so now I get to be part of that and in some sense represent that at other people's pivotal moments. And they're always pivotal moments.

Genevieve Morgan:

The power that you felt of that love, it seems that it comes through in your books. So without saying it's. How is. How has writing influenced your ministry and ministry influenced your writing? Because it seems to me that you have a vast, vast congregation now.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Oh, thank you.

Kate Braestrup:

Yeah, it's. I think that the experience of becoming a minister, the experience of that which I date very much from when Drew died right up through till now, I'm still becoming a minister. That that experience made my writing better because now I know what I'm writing for. I'm not sure I'm a better writer than I was when I was 25. You know, I read the book that was published then, which we don't really have to discuss, but. And, you know, I was still a good writer. I just didn't know what I was writing about in some ultimate sense, and now I do.

[Unidentified voice]:

So

Kate Braestrup:

I like the idea that the books can serve as a window for other people. And I get a lot of feedback from writers that, I mean, from. I get a lot of feedback from readers that it has served to help them, often in very concrete ways.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Do you ever. Is there ever any pushback? I mean, this is Christmas, and of course, it's about the birth of Christ. So there is this whole religious aspect of things which is very different from spirituality. Do you ever get pushback because people might not consider themselves Christian when you show up at the scene of an accident or when people read your book

Kate Braestrup:

or they may think of themselves as more Christian than I am? Oh, that's interesting.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

One or the other.

Kate Braestrup:

Generally speaking, when I show up at a scene, the people who are. Who are that I'm there to be with aren't picky. They are in a moment when they are blown open in a way that I know vividly. And it is a huge honor to be allowed into their Experience. And occasionally I will hear, like, I remember the daughter of someone we were searching for saying to me, coming up to me, and I was in my uniform and was wearing a shirt with a collar, a clerical collar. And she said, you know, I have no. Essentially, I have no use for you. I'm an atheist. Then I just popped the collar out of my shirt and put it in my pocket and said, okay, you know, do you have a bathroom? Do you have enough? Have you eaten?

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you got more practical with her.

[Unidentified voice]:

Well, I always am more practical.

Kate Braestrup:

I mean, there's no separation between taking care of somebody spiritually, taking care of somebody physically. You know, there's a saying, to a hungry man, food can all. I mean, to a hungry man, love must arrive in the form of bread. To somebody who's, you know, out in the woods, standing next to a lake, waiting for the wardens to find the body of someone they love, you know, love comes in the form of lots of practical things. So part of my job is actually to transmit well, first to let them know we're actually here to help you. That's all we're here for. This is not actually. Unless it's a crime scene, obviously, but we're just here to help you. This isn't. Our power is only power for you. And also to try and give them as much power as possible. So a lot of that is information. What are we doing? Why are the divers in the water? Why have they come out of the water? Why is the plane flying over there instead of over there? A lot of it is information that gets repeated again and again because we don't take in information very well when we're under stress. And a lot of it is just being present with them and whatever comes up, comes up. Some people can use their own religious beliefs and religious practices very effectively in those moments, in which case, great, I just support that. Some people don't have any. Or the ones they have fail. And at that point, if I'm asked, I can respectfully suggest an alternative.

Genevieve Morgan:

One aspect of wellness that is difficult for people to understand is spiritual enlightenment. And at the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour, what we try to do convey is that it's about gaining power to what really moves you. And so I'm interested in what you said about finally knowing what you were writing about, because does that relate to your idea of wellness at all? Personal wellness?

Kate Braestrup:

Oh, absolutely. But I think. I mean, I should make it.

[Unidentified voice]:

I don't.

Kate Braestrup:

I mean, you probably define this all the time. I define spirituality as the sensation, the feeling, the Experience of the numinous or of God or of vastness or whatever. And religion as practice, it's what we do. And so I will sometimes say I'm religious, but I'm not particularly spiritual because I feel like I don't really have the kinds of experiences that people talk about when they talk about religious experience. Actually, I probably do. But they're all connected with human beings. We're all connected with these moments with other people when. Like that woman by the lake and telling that joke. That for me, that was this intense experience of, you know, joy and a kind of pride in her. I was proud of her, you know, and awe at her strength. And, you know, I just loved her. I was in love with her at that moment. I was just madly in love with her because she was so amazing. And that to me, that's as close as I get to a spiritual experience. So the religious part is, what do you actually practice? What do you do every day? And I like the idea of practice, because practice, what you practice is how you're going to play. So just like playing the piano or playing basketball or whatever, if you don't practice, then you're not going to be able to play. And I think that when. That one of the things I was doing when I went to seminary was learning how to practice. Now that I had sort of the target, the direction, you know, whatever I do, I wanted to be participating in witnessing to transmitting, receiving this love. That's it. And seminary was how I learned to practice. What do you actually do to make it more likely that you will respond, notice, pay attention to, not miss the love when it arrives or the love that's arriving constantly in various ways.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

What would you consider to be the most transformative element of the Christian story?

Kate Braestrup:

Well, I'll tell you what isn't to me, which is the idea of heaven and hell, I personally find those almost useless. And I'm always very practical and concrete. So that is irritating to many people who are more spiritual than I am.

[Unidentified voice]:

I mean, it's useless in the field.

Kate Braestrup:

It's been useless to me. And it's surprisingly often of no comfort to grieving people and that their loved one is in heaven. And in fact, anxiety about what has happened to their loved one's spirit. For instance, he wasn't born again. Does that mean he's in hell? Is a question that I've been given. And it's given in this kind of heartrending fear that someone they love has been, is now suffering instead of not so. And that just strikes me as just useless. So those I would say would be the least useful and transformative. The most useful and transformative is simply that love comes to us and we are capable of participating in love in many more ways than we imagine. And what I like about the Christian story is, and I mean the whole, you know, from Jesus birth to Jesus death is that the complexity of it and the difficulty of it is not shirt. It's hard.

[Unidentified voice]:

And the more you know about the

Kate Braestrup:

stories, the parables, for example, you know,

[Unidentified voice]:

the more complicated they get.

Kate Braestrup:

I mean, they are not simple stories. And at the same time they are challenging us to say who is the beloved in this and who is the lover in this? Who is being the most loving in all of these different ways. And that I think is. Well, of course I would think this since it's all about love all the time, but that to me is the most transformative, useful aspect of it.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

We've just been talking with Kate Braestrup, best selling author of Here if youf Need Me and most recently of Beginner's Bringing Prayer into youo Life. We've really enjoyed having this conversation with you on Christmas Day. Kate, thanks for coming in.

Kate Braestrup:

Thank you. Merry Christmas.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

As part of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast, every week we have a segment we call Maine Magazine Minutes, which is hosted by Genevieve Morgan, the wellness editor for maine magazine.

Genevieve Morgan:

Thanks, Dr. Lisa. Today on the Maine Magazine Minutes and our special celebration show, we are really pleased to welcome to the studio the Mr. Moon Singers. Is that what you call yourselves? You guys can just. Mr. Moon. They are three amazing girls who've come up with a unique sound and I want them to introduce themselves and tell us a little bit about yourselves. Girls can go down the line.

[Unidentified voice]:

I'm Rachel Keys.

Genevieve Morgan:

How old are you?

[Unidentified voice]:

Sorry, 19. 19, yeah, just graduated. I just started playing some music with a friend and it sort of went from there and yeah, that's where I am.

Genevieve Morgan:

And you play the mandolin and the guitar?

[Unidentified voice]:

Mandolin, guitar and bass mostly, but we don't have a bass with us today, so.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

I'm Halle Pottle. I'm from Palermo.

[Unidentified voice]:

I'm 15 years old. I've been playing mandolin for about six years and kind of varied off into

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

other instruments as well. And don't you play the ukulele or somebody plays the ukulele?

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah, I think all of us have kind of joked around on the ukulele a little bit.

Genevieve Morgan:

And that's your little sister sitting to your side. So what's your name?

[Unidentified voice]:

I'm Katie Pottle.

Kate Braestrup:

I'm 13.

[Unidentified voice]:

And I don't really play.

Kate Braestrup:

I just sing.

[Unidentified voice]:

I guess she plays the ukulele.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

She's pretty good at that.

Genevieve Morgan:

So, Haley, what are you gonna treat us to first?

[Unidentified voice]:

This song is called the Chain by Ingrid Michelson. The sky looks pissed, the wind talks bad. My bones are shifting in my skin and you, my love are gone

Kurt Holmgren:

My

[Unidentified voice]:

room feels wrong the bed won't fit I cannot seem to operate and you, my love are gone soon. Promise anymore you come around again and I will take and I will take the chain from all the door

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

to

[Unidentified voice]:

say I never love but I don't say all the things and you my love are. You come around again. But then shade away all promise anymore and promise to come around again

Kurt Holmgren:

shame

[Unidentified voice]:

from the doors inside of the doors inside of us anymore in the city. Then I will take Then I will take the chain from off the door and this is who now will sing me Lullabies by Kate Rusby. Lay me down gently Lay me down low Cause here I am broken warm and I know there's one thing I ask when the stars light the skies in oh now sing me love. Now sing me love us. Big world of lonely I am much smaller to care for me at all you heard my heart breaking for it rang through the skies so why won't you sing me? A oh why won't you sing me? I lay here I weeping the stars they have come I lay here not sleeping the long night has begun Mad in the mo can't help but cry the dawn sing me love oh, there's no one to sing me. So lay me down gently lay me down low Fear I am broken old and die there's one thing I ask Stars light the skies. Who will sing me to sleep? Who will sing me to sleep? Who else? Sing me to sleep who will sing me to sleep? Who will sing.

Genevieve Morgan:

So the next one you guys actually wrote, what's the name of it?

[Unidentified voice]:

It's called these doll colors. Richie and I co wrote it, I

Kate Braestrup:

think last fall, couple falls ago.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah, something like that. Hallie came up with a verse and then I went to the bathroom and then I came back and I had another verse and then we worked on the third one and it was pretty fun and we changed it around a little bit and now Katie sings it because now Katie's in the band and yeah, I'm is fer orange leaves Orange leaves Orange leaves. Almonds for orange leaves Orange leaves and red Orange leaves and red and yellow Orange leaves and red Orange leaves and red and yellow Orange leaves and red I like orange best cause orange is the greatest color since you left the world Stella. I miss for rosy cheeks, rosy cheeks, rosy cheeks arm is for rosy cheeks, rosy cheeks and chins Rosy cheeks and chins and noses Rosy cheeks and ch Rosy cheeks and chins noses rosy cheeks and chins I like your nose best rosy is the greatest color but since you left the world and stellar. For clear blue skies Clear blue skies Clear blue skies arm is for clear blue skies Clear blue skies and chills Clear blue skies and chilly winds Clear blue skies and chills Clear blue skies and chilly winds Clear blue skies and chills I like the sky is best Blue is the greatest car since you left the world is.

Genevieve Morgan:

well, I have to say that for such beautiful young girls, you sing songs with a lot of sophistication and meaning that I think everyone out there listening can relate to. So I'm really impressed and so glad that you came to talk with us on this very special show. Dr. Lisa and I are really pleased to have you here on the Maine Magazine minutes for our celebration show. What a celebration it's been.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yeah. Thank you very much.

Genevieve Morgan:

Will you come back?

[Unidentified voice]:

Oh, absolutely.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

People can find you on Facebook.

[Unidentified voice]:

Yes. Www.facebook.com hellomrmoon.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Very good. I'm sure lots of people will be looking out for you.

[Unidentified voice]:

Thank you.

Genevieve Morgan:

And then I think you were gonna take us out with a little Christmas music.

[Unidentified voice]:

Silent night Holy night All is calm High brown young virgin Mother and child Holy infant so tender and mild Sleep in heavenly peace Sleep in heaven. Silent night Holy night Shepherds wake at the sight Glory streams from heaven afar Heaven sing hallelujah Christ the savior is born Christ the savior is born

Genevieve Morgan:

I'd like to take this opportunity to wish you all a very merry Christmas. The family at Maine Magazine also sends their best to you this holiday season. To pick up an issue of Maine Magazine, visit your local newsstand or subscribe@themainmag.com.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Welcome back. We hope you've been enjoying our special celebration show on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast for December 25, 2011. I'm going to read for you today from my own blog, the Bountiful Blog, at bountifulpath.com this post is called Traditions Tweaked. When things shift within a family thinking must shift as well. Traditions once held sacred may need reworking in order to accommodate the changes taking place. This is especially true of holiday related traditions. Change is of course inevitable. Children leave the nest, adults grow older, grandchildren are born, grandparents pass away. And sometimes the change process is accelerated in ways unanticipated. Relationships may end precipitously. Finances may cause us to make difficult decisions. Illness may occur. When these things happen, we may be thrown off balance. It may take some time to understand how we are feeling about a new situation. We may need to be more flexible with our sacred traditions. We also may need to give ourselves space to experience the welter of emotions that bubble forth as our traditions are tweaked to fit a new reality. This is made more complex when others are involved in our traditions, children and other family members, for example. Just as we experience ambivalence over tweaked traditions, so might those around us. Remembering the reason for any given tradition might enable us to deal more effectively with this ambivalence. Remembering that the holidays are more about togetherness, whatever form that takes, than materialism. Remembering that simply being rather than frenetically doing or spending may give us pause and allow us to refocus and first simply being quietly and mindfully with our own selves, rather than forcing ourselves to accommodate to difficult situations without forethought. If we can accept our feelings, new ways of thinking may emerge. And with this new traditions, traditions tweaked which will be all the more beautiful for having weathered the change. This blog post and others like it are available on bountifulpath.com

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

as you know, we do this Give Back segment which some people have wondered what kind of a place does this have in a quote unquote health and wellness show? And I feel really strongly that giving back is an important way to maintain health and wellness. So today we have Kurt Holmgram from the root seller in to talk to us about how his organization is giving back to the community.

Genevieve Morgan:

So hi Kurt.

Kurt Holmgren:

Hi. How Are you?

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Kurt is from Minneapolis, Minnesota. He came to Maine in 1984 and has been the director of the Portland root cellar for six years. He volunteered there for three years, has been married for 28 years and has two grown children. He attends the East Point Christian Church. Kurt, it's great to have you.

Genevieve Morgan:

Well, thanks for having me and Merry Christmas.

Kurt Holmgren:

Merry Christmas to you as well.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

A couple of weeks ago we had on the show Angie Arndt from chime, the Chaplaincy Institute of Maine. And she talked about the spirituality from a more of a non denominational standpoint. As you were saying when we first came in, this is the Root cellar

Kurt Holmgren:

is pretty Christian, definitely faith based, multi denominational again, but definitely Christian. We try to bring. Well, it's really supported by churches from all throughout greater Portland. We have about 200 volunteers in one way or another that come in. Our support, as a matter of fact, is from those places. About 85% of it is from individuals that just want to see this east end of Portland transformed. And so they support that with their giving, but also their time as well as well. And then we have a small. We have a number of churches that just have us in their missions budget to help to do that. And then we have some granting and some businesses as well. We don't have any government funding at all.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

So you do rely heavily on churches then?

Kurt Holmgren:

We do.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Faith is very important.

Kurt Holmgren:

We do. We rely on God to work through those people, to support and to do his work.

Genevieve Morgan:

But you provide services for interdenominational groups.

Kurt Holmgren:

We do. We provide services for anybody in the area. I'll give you a little history if that would work out for you. Root Cellar has been around for about 28 years. It was actually started by a small Mennonite group up on Munjoy Hill. And it started out in the dirt floor basement of a house, thus the name Root Cellar. That's where that came from. And it was a teen drop in center. And as the teenagers came and it was a place for them to get off the streets and. And back in the day, I think it was 1994. U.S. news World Report actually came out with an article in Portland was the second largest white slum in the United States. Quite a moniker for us.

Genevieve Morgan:

What year was that?

Kurt Holmgren:

94.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

That wasn't that long ago.

Kurt Holmgren:

It wasn't that long ago. And a lot of that's changed a lot. Especially on the Hill neighborhood with gentrification, that has happened and that's changed. And Also in around 2000, when we began became a refugee resettlement Site through Catholic Charities. It became quite mixed in the area as well, so we can't use that moniker any longer. But as the kids were dropping in, their little brothers and sisters would hang outside waiting for them to come out. And then the children's programs began. And after that started, there was a local bakery that gave some day old bread and that began our food program. And from there it just connects, continued to grow and grow. And we're in the building we are now on Washington Avenue, which was built in 2001. There are about four locations right in the area that we actually inhabited until we're in the place that we are now. And now there's food distribution, there's clothing distribution, there's dental, there's medical. This is all for marginalized folks who don't have enough to get these things on their own. Jesus, in one of his stories he was telling people and he was kind of speaking about who was with him and who was not going to be with him at the end of time, during this judgment time. And what he did was he said, you helped me when I was in prison. You gave me water to drink, you clothed me when I was naked, you gave me food when I was hungry. And the people asked him, well, when did we do this for you? And he said, well, as much as you did it for the least of these, you did it for me. And that is our call and that's what we want to do. So we want to see him in every eye we look at. And I was talking to you guys earlier a couple of weeks ago during our Christmas time, we have a Christmas angel program where people adopt kids from the community. And these are families that can't quite afford gifts for their kids. So we bring them out to all the different churches and some businesses and organizations, and they help to buy gifts, bring them in. And on that day, we were distributing gifts to help out about 700 kids that were in that time. So that's an example. And when we have we feed about 120 families each Friday.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Well, it sounds like there's a lot of different ways that people can help out. We'll direct them to your website and we appreciate all the good work that you're doing for the city of Portland.

Kurt Holmgren:

Fantastic. Thank you for having me.

Dr. Lisa Belisle:

Each week on the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and podcast, we read from our Daily Tread. Our Daily Tread represents a give back that is dear to my heart. As I've mentioned multiple times, our Daily Tread was written in honor of my Bowdoin College classmate, Hanley Denning who died almost five years ago this month. Her organization, Safe Passage, provides approximately 550 children with educations, social services and the chance to move beyond the poverty their families have faced for generations at the Guatemala City dump. Visit them online@safepassage.org Today's quote is from George Bernard Shaw this is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose, recognized by yourself as a mighty one. The being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap. The being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy. Today's Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast was based on the theme celebration. In Exploring the Theme Celebration we spoke with Kate Braestrup, best selling author of Here if youf Need Me and more recently the book Beginner's Grace. We heard music from the group Mr. Moon and we finished with a give back segment about the root cellar. We hope that you are able to find Inspiration from the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast this week and every week. Let us know what you're getting out of the show and what you might like to hear. We hope that you're celebrating with us. Thank you for being part of our world. May you have a bountiful life.