The trees are losing their leaves and changing colors.

Fall in the front yard garden

I love the changing of the season for this neighborhood tree and the newly planted ginko losing its bright yellow leaves, across the street. The mums growing low to the earth, propped up with a repurposed stake, by an unknown Urban Farmer, seem to bloom until the dark gray weather of winter arrives. Winter hasn’t arrived and it’s unseasonably and unreasonably warm weather for San Francisco, California, even for the ‘Sunny Mission’. The bench top shows and still the homemade trellis’.

One of the winter squash seeds I planted, this is the first year from seed for my neighborhood, is poking up through the soil.  I feel like the farmer that goes out to pull the corns ears to make them grow faster, but for me, the Urban Front Yard Garden Farmer, “it’s making sure the plants are alive, showing signs of growing and feeling the responsibility of feeding others.” The neighbors are asking questions, seeds they muse, obviously doubting, so it’s important to me that it not fail.

In my opinion this is some of the best modern public art, a clear memory stated clearly and it’s pretty, really pretty. I hear art must be pretty, this is pretty art in San Francisco, California.  Maybe you have to see it in the street? Maybe it must be seen in real life to feel it’s bigness?

I hope not, because I have one picture of the shaft of the arrow. I am sure it is NOT sanctioned ART, it was free. I cannot show the neighborhood, or even the entire arrow and don’t in the cropped picture below. It is a light pole, the point of the arrow is a glass globe.

A bloody arrow, pointing to the sky, with pretty feathers, a Native Memory and an artists interpretation.

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When I go to a new city I  go to the ‘main drag’, it’s the place where all the tourists are sent.  In Reykjavik, the tourists and the locals go to the same place, this is nice.   Even so, the main drag is not where I like to be. I like to be a bit more remote, on the edge.

I loved everywhere I went in Reykjavik, but I found ‘my people’ on Hverfisgata, a street just off the main drag, nearer to the water.  I know Hverfisgata has a meaning. I know that every little part, of every long word in Islenska gives you the definition of the word, sometimes it is a direction, or who you are the daughter or son of, or maybe that you are on the water side of the city.  That made learning parts of words quite valuable.

I found favorite stickers by artists I admire for their public art and messages, in Islenska, on Hverfisgata!  I was thrilled to see I was drawn to the same areas as these public artists! Here are only a few of my favorites, DCEVE, SPACE INVADERS and OBEY.  I have seen their work in many places, they get around.  OBEY has some recent work up in the Mission District of San Fransisco, USA, not shown here.

What I really want to know is what name the person goes by who uses the symbol of the bird?  If anyone knows please forward it on to me. The birds are my personal favorite; they are placed in just the right spot, some high, some low, but always perfectly placed. Enjoy the

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Cold rain November, 2011 Reykjavik

Whatever the way you spell it and that depends on where you come from, I found Islenska and their Olde English, to be one of the most other worldly places on Earth.  I remarked to my friend about the rocks and big rocks, intersecting, encroaching, entering, the sidewalk or road, making humans go round.  I loved that the rocks got to stay and the humans were detoured. It turns out this is because of the Elves.

One Islenska man told me while we were in the hotpots that if they were to put in a dam or make any changes in the landscape all people of Islenksa would get to vote, because it would make a lake and cover some part of the landscape, changing it, and the Elves, of course the Elves would be consulted. The Elf Woman, I am sure there is a proper name for her, but I don’t know it, is called in and she communicates with the Elves; the Elves live in the rocks. If the Elves approve the move, the change is made, if not negotiations continue. The story goes that one time the Elf Woman was called and she negotiated for an entire night to get the Elves to move from their current rock, to a rock about a mile away, so a road could be built. I told the Insleskan I thought this great.  He said it takes a long time to get anywhere in Islenska because the Elves refuse at times to move, making the roads very wiggly.

The idea, the concept, the wherewithall of communicating with what so many cannot see, but so many Islenska’s believe, my non-Islenska self included, is what I think is so often missing from our American lives.  The idea that things exist even if YOU cannot see them, even if you do not believe in them, is of importance to the Earth. Be reminded that you cannot see an atom, a germ, etc.

So maybe Elves don’t live in your neighborhood, others believe they do live in their neighborhoods and then, though most Islenska’s do not see them they don’t rip the Earth up without the Elves permission.  This takes time, maybe this is why the landscape of Islenska is so beautiful and relatively unspoiled by modern man?

Think about it.

Reykjavik sunset 1600 hours more or less

See the ship to the right, mountains in the back, after dark

Cold rain November, 2011

Reykjavik town center

The southside of Reykjavik

Flat lands

The Atlantic

Snow covered mountains and the Atlantic

The view from Reykjavik

View from Reykayvik

Police raided the OCCUPY Oakland site early this morning and closed BART.  BART is OUR public transportation and Oakland is OUR city!

OCCUPY Oakland Champion Dan Siegel, one of the mayor Quan’s top legal advisers, resigned over the decision to raid the anti-Wall Street protest encampment on Nov.14th, 2011, a civil rights attorney and friend of Quan, he worked as an unpaid adviser. He has been a outspoken critic of Oakland police and also had opposed the Oct. 25th, 2011 raid. What are the rules for closure of BART Dan?

Oppose the raids and the closure of BART!  The government media can focus on cleanliness and the rules made by the police for the protesters at Frank Ogawa Plaza, but as many of us know and saw from the Oct.25th, OCCUPY Oakland raid and from the raids happening across the country, the police rules are in their favor and the force they use has dire consequences. The focus on silly issues keeps the citizens of the U.S. from thinking about the violence perpetrated on the OCCUPIERS in and around the U.S.

This is OUR U.S. government, not Egypt’s, not Iran’s, places we have been taught wrongly that refuse their citizens their rights. This is the U.S. that is refusing us our civil right to FREE SPEECH and PROTEST. This is OUR government refusing us OUR CIVIL RIGHTS, not some place most U.S. citizens have never been, not some other country we’ve been lied to about.

This IS OUR ‘land of the free and home of the brave’, GO OCCUPIERS!

I wrote a letter to Rabbi Lerner, someone I admire and listen, to form my own thoughts and opinions. I am not Jewish  or religious,  but feel inspired by many intelligent people, he being just one of the many. Rabbi Lerner posted an email from a student about the U.S. OCCUPY movement in Oakland and its youth. It bothered me, you can read it and his response to his student here at http://www.tikkun.org and read more and different here at http:// www.spiritualprogressives.org. Here is my email and his response.

Yes, Sarah, for these thoughts!

Rabbi,

I also don’t know why I am writing, but Jordan’s letter disturbs me. Your letter made me rejoice.

Forgive he says and yet?

He was right to speak out against racism and forgive.

I am left wondering how he or anyone thinks these youth, remember what ‘youth’ itself means, of color and not, may have heard of the “legacy before them?” They are creating the legacy, they are the brave.

This group that protests for us all, is all colors of youth, elderly, mentally ill, drug addicted, veterans with and without PTSD, the unemployed, the educated, the disabled and the able, the uneducated, the anarchists and let us be clear ‘not all anarchists are violent’, parents, ministers and the truant.

This protest is not about the individual, it is about the group and though the language of youth and anger may be harsh it must be expressed. Words do not kill. Words let us communicate. Your student educated and that is good. It is also good this person of youth could say his words so he could be educated.

Let us not learn to hold our tongue, but express our feelings and thoughts in a manner that sends a message clearly.

Peace and be well, Sarah Dorrance

Thank you Rabbi Lerner.

In my opinion, the PISSED OFF VOTER GUIDE, shown below, is the only guide needed to help make informed votes in San Francisco, November 8th, 2011.

I am having a few problems uploading the guide.  I will get it posted as soon as I am able.

the only voter guide fit to read

I was on my way home after going to the Mission District farmers market, when I came upon Jeff Adachi walking the streets for votes, handing out literature about himself,  pension reform and fortune cookies. He invited me to come to a local, public event that he was hosting at San Jalisco restaurant in the Mission District, that evening.

Let me say, that even as we spoke I told him my vote was to go to John Avalos for Mayor.  He responded, “John is a good guy”, but here is why you should vote for me…..  After reading his literature I decided to go to his event and ask some questions. His supporters on paper could not be more different from one another, Quentin Kopp, ultra conservative, a reason to not get my vote and then Matt Gonzalez, who seems to not have anything new happening in his life and describes himself as the former president of the city supervisors, but who is clearly not ultra conservative.

I went, a bit late, but not that late, Jeff was gone.  I was pleased that though he was gone, his “Jeff for Mayor folks” could easily handle my questions about labor, his position on unions and questions about pension reform. They were friendly and felt able to articulate Jeff’s positions. Here is what I got from speaking to his supporters.  Jeff Adachi  worked with the unions on the pension reform bill, not all of the unions were happy with the outcome, but many participated. He is not a union Buster He believes that the waste of money in our San Francisco city government could be used to restart many programs, the summer school program being only one of them.  Did you know have not had summer school in San Francisco for the last two summers?  I didn’t.

After the event I opened my Jeff Adachi fortune cookie, though, as many of you know I am gluten intolerant and wasn’t going to eat it, but who doesn’t want to read their fortune? My fortune read “your future is bright, vote Jeff Adachi for Mayor Nov. 8, 2011. Is our “future is bright?”

Oakland Police officers strike a defensive position after attacking protesters with truncheons, 10/25/11. (photo: Marc Ash/RSN) Reader Supported News

The Oakland police acted brutally, Oct. 25th in Oakland,California against peaceful protesters.  As it turns out Mayor Quan knew this action was ‘going‘ to happen, but did not know ‘when’ Oakland police would act. He, the police chief acted when she, Mayor Quan was in D.C.  Isn’t Mayor Quan the police chiefs boss? Was she unable to fire the Oakland police chief, because she knew the plan and was part of the discussion?

The Oakland police union released a statement musing her support of the OCCUPIERS and their, the police officers duty, in light of her support of the OCCUPIERS and the general strike being called for Wednesday, Nov.2nd, 2011 in Oakland. This letter by the police union seems disrespectful at the very least, but does call into the light Mayor Quan’s quasi, shifting, support of OCCUPY Oakland

Does Mayor Quan support the right to free speech and the people or will she fall into line? Keep an eye on Oakland, Mayor Quan is Oakland’s ‘new mayor’. She walked the streets and got support from the Oakland community.  She was not the favored candidate, the people voted her into office.

Jason Ditz, Antiwar dotcom writes, An Army spokeswoman said that the military is putting the finishing touches on our media plan, and that the press would be allowed to hear the evidence against the whistle blower.
The finishing touches? Media plan? The press? Is this a bad dream?  While I was asleep my country disappeared.

In my country, Bradley Manning would be a hero, not a prisoner since May, 2010.