College Here I Come

I sent my first college application today.
Guilford Down
Earlham and Oberlin to go

I am excited to have my first one done because it means the initial thinking is done and now I can use the first essay and adapt it as needed or write a new thing.

hope everyone is well

peace
rebecca

Quilt for Parents

My parents 20th wedding aniversary was on September 20th and Grace and I organized making them a quilt. We did it all over the email to get the fabric and then we made the actual quilt while they were out of the house and at a friends house.

We gave it to them on their anniversary in the Pendle Hill dinning room. It was really nice because they did not have a single idea even though we had hinted at it to my dad's face.

more pictures on flickr.

peace
rebecca

Poems/ Songs of the Week

Disarm by Smashing Pumpkins

Disarm you with a smile
And cut you like you want me to
Cut that little child
Inside of me and such a part of you
Ooh, the years burn

I used to be a little boy
So old in my shoes
And what I choose is my choice
Whats a boy supposed to do?
The killer in me is the killer in you
My love
I send this smile over to you

Disarm you with a smile
And leave you like they left me here
To wither in denial
The bitterness of one whos left alone
Ooh, the years burn
Ooh, the years burn, burn, burn

I used to be a little boy
So old in my shoes
And what I choose is my voice
Whats a boy supposed to do?
The killer in me is the killer in you
My love
I send this smile over to you

The killer in me is the killer in you
Send this smile over to you
The killer in me is the killer in you
Send this smile over to you
The killer in me is the killer in you
Send this smile over to you

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This song reminds me that I am still a child and I should use it as I have it. I wish there was a way for me to become a child again or at least be ale to communicate with more people my own age. I do not know why it is so hared, but it seams like I have different priorities than those my age. I want to understand why I am learning and want to be educated so that I can take part in conversations about the world and politics. The world is important to me, but I do not understand why we have to go to college to make money and be educated. If we went back to the old ways and learned form our parents what was happening in the world I would feel more prepared for the world inform of me. I know vary few people who are still working with what they majored in on less they are a teacher.

Pacific Yearly Meeting

So on August 2nd at yearly meeting a jumped a lot of loop holes for my yearly meeting.

First I actually prayed from my knees and then I clerked the adult plenary.

Wednesday night was Pacific Yearly Meetings Youth Plenary and I and the other five people that were part of Koinonia were asked to seed the meeting. The seeding was very meaning full for me. I knew that was very spiritually settled since Tony Prete had talked the day before and Koinia had held Kristina in the light the night before for her talk. So being asked for our tight knit group share was an honor.

We met with multiple people about how we wanted the plenary to run including the idea that we were going to go at the youth pace which meant we could have been there all night. Because we had everyone from the age of 8 months to the nineties we had to set some limit so we decided that we would end at 10 and let the plenary last for three hours if that was what we were lead to do.

So we opened with people arriving at 6:45 and the Koinonia group sitting in worship after settling. At about 6:45 before plenary had started I was lead to give the Koinonia group a prayer from my knees to open it for us. While I was on my knees the clerk opened the meeting and had to quick items of business and I just continued until I was done even though the rest of the group was just gathering.

Once the clerk was done with his business he handed it over to Diego and Diego introduced Koinonia and the process that we were going to follow and again warning people that plenary could go to 10 o'clock.

Then we settled down into worship and I felt like I needed to do the same prayer with small variations so not to talk about other people to the whole plenary. This prayer lead into what struck me from Koinonia, how much we had become a small group that was deeply connected. We became connected through our daily check-ins were everything was free game and no one really kept anything to themselves. It was at check-in that the true feeling came out and where at the same time we bonded.

Then Darcy and Hank talked about their favorite or most intriguing parts: Meeting for Healing and working at the soup kitchen.

After this we settled into worship and for about half an hour we heard from adults. When I felt like we were moving to fast I would motion to Zac and he would wait a little while before he let the next person speak. It was nice to hear what the adults had to say but what we were trying to do was let the younger people talk.

Finally after Zac asked a few people to sit down and let the younger people have time to figure out what they wanted to say we had our first Young Adult stand. This Young Friend talked about how she really did not know where she belonged in our community. She was too old for Junior Yearly Meeting but she did not feel connected to the Young Friends. The people she connected with the most were not at Yearly Meeting and so she did not really know where she was in the mass of the yearly meeting.

Once she was done and totally in tears Darcy and I went over to her and invited her into the group. It sort of set up the room for people to be willing to tell what was on their minds and teens and young friends were all of a sudden open and willing to tell the adults how hard it was to be a teen this year. All the Junior Yearly Meeting teens talked about how the unity and community they were used to seeing was not here this last year. They did not really understand why but it was not there for them.

When I first heard someone say that I went straight to myself and blamed it on me because I was still the age to be in that group and I had left them to deal by themselves and they did not have adults helping. But then my second response was that no it was not my fault, I tried to help them and gave them all the help I could from the position I was.

When teens opened up some of us from the group in the front would go get them and their friends around them and bring them into the front circle. Finally the circle was cleared and it was all teens and I gave it over.

At first once their were about twelve other people I felt like we were changing the environment and that I did not want to have so many people up front but then I let it go so that God could work his magic.

I was still standing in the front and setting the pace but I did not feel like I was part of the support community I was just the one in the front holding the space and observing what was happening to the Junior Yearly Meeting Community along with all the other people in the room.

Finally we hit 10 o'clock and I took the microphone and told people it was 10 and that it was time for us to close but that I wish we could have gone on. I asked for our minutes to be read. (They are the attached minutes now because they were really long and complete so the clerk asked me if he could make them an attachment.) After the minutes were read one JYMer said that he felt there was a major barrier in the room. There were those in the front and those in the back and he wanted everyone to be in the front like we were one big community. So we ended at 10:40 with about 100 people standing in a circle/ mosh pit but it took us about 10 or 15 minutes to be willing to leave that circle.

It was extremely powerful to have children under the age of 13 be in the room. I thought it was a good example for them on how powerful plenary can be and what they are growing up into.

I have to give Robin M. and Chris M.'s kids the award for the youngest kids to stay. They stayed until 10 and right before they left I gave them each a hug and thanked them personally for staying the whole time and being attentive even if they were talking and playing.

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This whole experience was very powerful for me and it has taken me two weeks to even be able to start writing about it and this blog took about three weeks to write.

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JYM – Junior Yearly Meeting – High School aged teens

Young Friends is after JYM and until you are 35 but our oldest is under 30.

The lines at Pacific Yearly Meeting are not firm so when you feel ready you move up. This year I moved up to the adults and did not participate much in either JYM or Young Friends.

Arrived in Pennsylvania

Yes, my family has made it to Pennsylvania and we are almost unpacked. We are at the next stage in moving, Dad starts his job tomorrow and Grace and I start going to school.

The big things are to come in our life. Not only do we all start our new beginings my mom is going to be out of town this week traveling and so it will just be three of us again.

I will be doing a little bit more of an update later including my Yearly Meeting experience sometime in the next week hopefully.

i have put up some photos of Koinonia and of our travels across some states on Flickr.

peace
rebeccca

Koinonia: the experience of being in community

The last two weeks (July 24 – August 5) I was in Los Angeles. The first week I was living at the Orange Grove Meeting House in Pasadena, California. There were six of us looking at the economic discrepancies in metropolitan Los Angeles.
Five of us took the train down from the San Francisco area. On the train we got to joke around and get to know each other in different ways than when we had hung out with each other before. Our age rang was from 15 to 56 while on the train and then by the end of the week it was from 16 to 59.
While on the train, I stated to read a lot from the Bible. I have never been interested in the Bible until these last few weeks. It became really interested when I went to Bible Study one Sunday and we started talking about how we took the Bible and the practical translations for this day. This really helped me to understand how I should read the Bible and how it can help me now.
The Bible I was carrying with me was only the New Testament and had eight different translations so it was very helpful to me to understand the different ways the Bible can be translated. I was hoping that we might have sometime to do Bible Study while in LA but we filled our schedule in other ways.
Once we got to LA we took the gold line to Pasadena and walked to the Meeting House where we settled in and made dinner at nine o’clock at night. The first night we were so tired that we just decided we wanted to hang out and that the second day would be at the meeting house and scheduling and getting to know each other.
When we got up in the morning we started with meeting for worship and then looked at our schedule and decided what we wanted to do and when we wanted to do it.
My favorite thing about Koinonia was the check-ins that we did everyday during dinner. This is were became totally transparent to each other and update people in how the day went.
My next favorite experience was going to the Los Angeles Catholic Soup Kitchen to serve lunch to the homeless. When we walked down skidrow at 7:30 in the morning but when we walked back at 1 pm we were fine. This change happened because we now new everyone in an intimate way. I felt like I new the people just because I had given them a spork.
One other way that I felt like I was connected over this week was one when I was at the beach and I held Carl in the light. Carl was at Ohio Valley Yearly Meeting and I was sitting on the beach in Santa Monica California. My friend Kristina and I sat there for about thirty minutes and then in forty minutes later I sat in worship again holding him while he finished his speech. This was a very powerful experience because I was totally connected to him and I was more than two thousand miles away.
These are some of the experiences as well as a transformation. I was dealing with getting ready to move and wanting to have some closure with California.

Talking about Blogging In Meeting for Worship

Today in Meeting for Worship I sat down and right away I was quaking and really deep. I did not feel like everyone else was a long with me but I did not care. I was periodically called back to this deep since.

The second message of the day was about what if God was a blogger. God isn’t “God the Father” God is “God the Blogger.” This really stuck me. Some later gave ministry about how when people are in a community they become open and this person sort of said that if all we did was read we would be able to be open in the same way. I disagreed right away but sat with it for a long while.

I started to dismiss the whole ministry thing and then I started having a major feeling that something needed to be said but was sure it was not ministry. I thought most of my feelings were around having to leave this meeting in just three weeks and me grieving.

The strong feeling of ministry came back a last time right before meeting ended and I did not know what to do so I grabbed on to Kristina to try to settle myself but it was not helping so when meeting closed I sat there and took my time in closing for myself. During Afterthoughts I contemplated on what to say and then I just stood up (after being prompted by Kristina) and let spirit talk through me. I talked about how there is a group of people online that have created a community to look at Quakerism and that for me it is my part of my spiritual practice to get on QuakerQuaker.org every morning after I check my email.

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This is the first time that I have spoken in this meeting. I have grown up in this meeting and I think this is part of the reason. Kody and I had this conversation with my dad when he was here this last week about why we do not minister in the meetings we grow up in (maybe a post for later).

I am a member of Santa Cruz Monthly Meeting

Last week was my called meeting for worship for the concern for business. It was extremely nice. Because it was the only business the assistant clerk stood up right before meeting was dismissed and explained the process I had gone through and then asked if there where and problems with this. No one had any problems and no one had brought any forward so it was extremely quick and easy. It was a little hard for me to sit in the meeting because I felt like meeting for worship should not have ended yet even though the time allotment was done.

After the meeting was done I was trying not to stop my worship so that I could got continue worshipping with my friend Kristina but it was almost impossible to get to the other side of the room because people wanted to congratulated me.

Today was the actual welcoming and it was nice as well but again I did not really want worship to end because I knew what was happening afterwards. I was excited but I was also being shy around it because i have been in this meeting since I was three and a half.

The welcoming potluck was fun. My meeting does a membership certificate so I now have a certificate with all the members that were at meeting this week and will take it back in two weeks when I get back from Koinonia and Pacific Yearly Meeting.

Worship on the Train

My sister and I took the Coast Starlight Amtrak train to FGC Gathering. I knew there were close to 40 other Quakers on the train and I thought it would be wonderful to all meet in one spot so we could see who else was on the train.

So on Friday June 30th I talked to some other Quakers about having Meeting for Worship in the empty room down stairs on the last car. A small group of us went down to look at the compartment and the conductor was down there and over heard our conversation. He was interested and agreed that it would be nice and possible to do it in the empty room. Then we asked him if we could make an announcement since we were spread out through out the train. He had to think about it because they are not allowed to make religious announcements. He agreed on "At 3:45 Friends are going to have a Meeting in the last car down stairs and everyone is invited." this way if you are a Quaker you would know what we meant.

Through out the day we make three different announcements/ reminders. We had to move meeting back a little from the first announcement because of lunch reservations.

The car had no windows and the lights did not turn on so we had to put a bag in the door so that light could get in. The car had been the smoking car when smoking was allowed a few years back. About 35 people showed up. We sat on the floor and almost all had back supports. About 5 people sat in the middle of the car and 5 or so people stood in the hall because they had little/ young kids who need to be moving.

Because we were in a small room not totally comfortable but making the chose to sit there, a lot of the messages were about use being willing to take some time away from the comfort of the train and sitting down where we could not see where we were and even if we were really moving until the train jerks around.

For me it was another reminder of how much choice I have on when I want to step out of my comfort zone. Sitting in a car where I am not sure where I am but I know I will end up in Tacoma Washington was a metaphor of my life at the moment; I know I am going to be at Pendle Hill in August but I am not sure about the time between now and then and how it will all play out but I do not really care because I know it will happen. I did not really care that I was sitting on the floor in a little stuffy room because I was sitting in the spirit and everything was going to work out. The conditions were a distraction at first but then it dissipated because everyone was there because they wanted to be.

After about 45 minutes of worship I closed it and thanked friends for coming and joining. We went around the room and introduced ourselves and what meeting we are from. There was on Friend from New Mexico and then the rest of us were from California. We had two non-Quakers join us and leave halfway through.

It was wonderful to know how many of us were on the train (plus more that could not join because of age or mobility) and know we would be on the train for as long as it took us and that we did not really care how long it would take, until we arrived in the middle of the night.

More on Gathering to come soon.

I have made a decision

I have finally made my decision. I am going to move with the family.

Last week we found out that my dad got his job at Penndle Hill so we finally knew where we would be housed for at least a year.

For me knowing where we were going to be staying and finding out that I can still apply for Quaker Schools made my decision easier. So I am glad/ sad to say that I will be leaving the West Coast for at least a year. I will either be going to Friends Select School or the local public high school. Friends Select is a Quaker School in central Philadelphia. My mom and I will take a half an hour train ride together and we will only be about ten blocks away. My sister had visit the local high school and says that it is nice and is about the same size as the school I go to know.

I think this a good decision because I will stay with the family and not have to just have phone conversations with the occasional airplane trip to visit. I will miss everyone in my yearly meeting and it will be hard to leave every Quaker that I know and have been around for thirteen almost fourteen years. I am excited for the new year ahead but it is extremely busy until we move and I hope that I will have time to slow down and check in with everyone on the West Coast.

My family is leaving California sometime around the 15th of August and we will be having a good bye party in Berkeley on the 12th of August.

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Hope to see/ meet some of you on the blogsphere at FGC Gathering in three weeks.

Hard Decision Hits

Two weekends ago, I went to a friends wedding. It was very nice to finally see them have a wedding even if they don't decide to go to the state to be formally recognized.

After the wedding some friends and I went and checked in. This group has been checking in with each other for about five years now but I only recently was added. It was very nice to be able to check in with this group of people. It was hard for me to check in because while listening to everyone else I realized that I now need to make the decision around moving. We are all have close to the same type of changes; we are moving or having large changes in what we are doing in our lives.

I need to make this decision but everything is so complicated. I have to decide if i want to finish high school in the same school district I have been in since kindergarden or if I should move with my family. I am starting to look at quaker school in Philladelphia area and seeing if i can graduate by the end of next year if I moved. It is looking more like I will be moving but it still is in the air.

Koinonia: Community Living Faith in Action

Two summers ago a group of teens and adults gathered before PYM Annual Session, in San Francisco, for a week-long activity and exploration of Quaker theology. That experience was powerful; transformative for many.

This summer, just before Yearly Meeting (approx July 24 - 29th), we plan to gather in urban Los Angeles for a similar week. Koinonia: community living faith in action will be a week of experiential focus on Quakerism, Jubilee Economics, and considering the integrity of our everyday choices. We will visit the LA Catholic worker, MacArthur Park, plus a 14-acre urban farm where we will work together as we consider this issue of Sabbath economics and Quaker Community.

Will you join us for this week of seeking?

Teens from Pacific Yearly Meeting, ages 15-20, are invited to join a group of adult seekers* to explore: how our Quaker container can support us, connections to our Monthly Meetings, and building a community that explores justice and lives the many questions we have about being Quakers in this time. We’ll worship and talk; play games, do yoga, cook and live together; and get our hands dirty doing good work!

*Kristina Perry(SC), Joe Franko(Orange Gv), Paul Harris (Redwd Forst), Darcy Stanley(Straw Ck) and others…
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
For more information – contact Kristina Perry, Humboldt/Santa Cruz meeting at quakerworker AT riseup DOT net or 831. 345-2349 --- or Rebecca Sullivan, Santa Cruz meeting/Past-JYM co-clerk at supersullivan24 AT gmail DOT com.

Return the following to by email or to PO Box 7258 Santa Cruz, CA 95061:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
YES!! I want to be part of KOINONIA this summer before PYM.
Name: Age: Monthly Meeting
Address:
Telephone: Email:
Parent/Guardian Name (if under 18):

Mom Leaves

On Thursday of last week my mom left for Philadelphia because she is the new Conference Coordinator for FGC. It was a little hard on my family last week since she was trying to get ready to leave and we were just trying to live our normal life.

There was planning meeting this last weekend so I had put off the fact that she was leaving because I knew that I would see her over the weekend. But once we started to have farewell celebrations I started to break down. I got to see her over the weekend but we did not really have time to talk because we were constantly in meetings.

It has now been two days since I last saw her and the house is a total mess and we are still trying to adjust.

Letter of Membership

Here is the second letter that I wrote and was taken to Business Meeting in February.

February 6, 2006

Dear Santa Cruz Meeting,

I have started to look into my religion and feel like Quakerism is for me. I have felt a closer connection with the meeting since I went away to Woolman and I would like to ask this meeting to accept me as a member.

I feel like being a member of Santa Cruz Friend Meeting will help keep me rooted in Santa Cruz and Pacific Yearly Meeting while I travel and go to school over the next few years.

Sincerely,

Rebecca Sullivan

My Experience Away at Woolman Semester

Here is a letter that i wrote in February talking about my experience at Woolman Semester at Sierra Friends Center. It is becoming clear that i should start to post for those people who want to have way to figure out how my life is changing and in transition.

This letter was one of two letters that i wrote to my meeting and was read at the February Meeting for Business. This one was the reason for the second but you might want to read the second one first because it leads into this one.

February 5, 2006

Dear Santa Cruz Friends Meeting,

Thank you for giving me a scholarship so that I could take part in the 2005 Fall Woolman Semester. It was a wonderful experience. I learned a lot and grew in many ways.

Three weeks into school, we set out on a wilderness-backpacking trip so that we could get to know the ecosystem we would live in for four months. On the trip, I learned how to read a topographical map and how to set-up a shelter with a plastic tarp, rocks, and rope.

In November, we went on a two and a half week service-learning trip to Mexico. I experienced how stressful it is to drive with a whole lot of people who all have a different opinion on what we should do. First, we think that we want to stop and eat lunch but then some one notices that we are only an hour from a nice park.

We took a week to drive down the Eastern Sierra’s to give presentations on California water issues for our Environmental Science class. I gave a presentation on the Salton Sea, which is twenty- five percent saltier than the Pacific Ocean. One of the reasons for the Salton Sea’s salinity is because the main inlet is agricultural run off, which contains extra salt from the ground. The sea is also evaporating faster than water is coming in so salt is being left behind and the concentration is rising.

We were in Mexico for eight days. Mexico was quite different from the United States; as soon as we crossed the boarder, we saw pedestrians crossing the highway. While trying to caravan with three cars, one of which was an old beat up van, we almost got into three car accidents but we made it safely without touching other cars. Being in Mexico reminded me that poverty around the world is really close and that you don’t need to travel very far to find out how people live differently. It was interesting to see the poverty in Mexico (near the United States) and to remember the poverty I saw in Rwanda seven years ago.

While in Mexico, we worked on multiple projects: finishing a community clinic, tiling a counter, and working on an addition to a building. I mostly worked on the tiling project. While working, I learned that it is really easy to get hurt and make bad decisions when it is late at night and there is not enough light.

In our World Issues class, we learned about media literacy and globalization. Using what we learned in the first ten weeks, each of us wrote a ten-page research paper on whatever world issue we wanted. I wrote about the Second Congo Civil War, which is supposedly done but really is still being fought. The Congo War is a war that was started after the Rwandan Genocide because the genocide perpetrators fled to the Democratic Republic of Congo’s jungles and Rwanda was scared that they were planning another genocide with the help of the Democratic Republic of Congo’s president.

In Peace Studies, I wrote a letter to Selective Services declaring conscientious objector status but did not send it in. I am still trying to decide how everything I have learned informs what I believe and how to best communicate what I believe. Before writing our letters, the class read the Quaker peace testimony from Faith and Practice; I found myself struggling with the wording. This has been one of the major thought provoking parts of my life in school. I do believe in peace but I do not understand why “… all war is inconsistent with God’s will.” (Pg 43). Why would we have war if God had not wanted us to stand up for what we believe? I believe that there is a difference between fighting for food and fighting for resources on another continent. I believe that most of the wars we have been in are against what God would want us to do but I do believe there is a time and place for military help.

We also took Humanities and Ethics where we looked at how the Quaker testimonies fit into our everyday life. This was very helpful because it really made me contemplate how I could change my lifestyle to fit more with my values.

I also grew spiritually. It was extremely nice to be able to go to Meeting every week and have some time to meet with other Quakers. It was wonderful to have Quarterly Meeting at Sierra Friends Center while I was there. Quarterly was extremely moving because spiritual leadings are something that I have been dealing with over the last six months or so.

Woolman was an exciting place for me to explore my spiritual life and learn more about myself. Thank you for supporting all of us who have had the chance to take part in the Woolman Semester.

Thanks,

Rebecca Sullivan

Santa Cruz Friends Meeting