Season's Greetings from Jack--Holiday 2014

"Tradition is meant to help us enjoy an important part of life without having to make it up all over again every time we do it."

--Joan Chittister from The Monastic Way--

Christmas Eve 2014

Dear Family and Friends,

Greetings from rainy Seattle. No white Christmas this year like 2008 when a glorious snowstorm hit several days before Santa's big adventure. That year I hauled in the newly-purchased tree with help from my neighbor and friend Val. The next day I hosted a caroling gathering at my home as the white stuff fell non-stop the entire afternoon and into the evening transforming my courtyard into a Winter Wonderland.  Meggie, my beloved black and tan cock-a-poo, was still alive, adorned in a red plaid bow. Six dear friends--Tom, Jer, Ray, Val, and Lynelle--gathered round the piano to sing, and we cut out paper snowflakes to hang on the tree. One of my favorite Christmas memories--now six years past.

With good friend Kevin off the
 coast of Roatan, a snorkeling paradise, January 2014.

2014 brought more blessings than I could have ever imagined. Last Christmas Day I flew to Florida with my friend Kevin to meet cousins on my father's side for a New Years' cruise in the Eastern Caribbean. We snorkeled in the famous emerald waters off the coast of Roatan, the largest of Honduras' Bay Islands. We sailed on to Belize for a zipline adventure followed  by adventures with the dolphins in Costa del Maya, Mexico. Plenty of sunshine and family time, a wonderful way to usher in a New Year.

On the heels of that trip I resolved to return to one of my life loves: the theatre. I struck gold twice, first in January when I was cast in Checkoff in the Sun, an ensemble production in the 47-seat Eclectic, a black box theatre, on Capitol Hill where I live. I learned a lot about the playground of performance from my nine fellow co-stars while playing the dying heroine Victoria's husband Harvey, a middle-aged hippie computer geek. 

The Spamalot Family Tree. I'm gracing the top with horns!

In late July I auditioned again at Bainbridge Performing Arts, a community theatre a one half-hour ferry ride from downtown Seattle. This time I was cast in the light-hearted, ferociously-funny musical, Spamalot, based on the 1975 film Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

I've never experienced such physical demands on my body as I learned 5 different production numbers and spent the entire fall rehearsing for the show. One of a cast of 18, I held my own singing, dancing, and  even parading around on stilts playing the Knight Who Says Ni. It was a grand time, and when it ended on Dec 21, I was grateful to have done the show and to be finished. I made some fine friendships in both productions and am looking forward to taking a rest during the first part of 2015. 

Scaling the heights of The Enchantments
July 5, 2014

While theatre dominated my attention this year, I also took time to venture into the great outdoors. Over the 4th of July holiday I joined a half dozen friends from my Outventures Seattle outdooring group to hike and camp for five days in the pristine wilderness area called The Enchantments. We encountered snow-capped mountains, billy goats, ice-crusted streams, and serenity par-excellance. 

My physical endurance was tested while hiking up stone ridges and cliffs with a 33 pound pack on my back carrying only the essentials--food, water, tent, sleeping bag, and minimal clothes. We cooked our meals over a roaring campfire, bathed and swam in cold, crisp mountain waters, and by the end of the adventure I discovered a sense of self-reliance and confidence in the outdoors I hadn't possessed before the trip began. It was a sublime experience.

With family (Andy, Rebecca, Lindsay, and Lin Misencik)
after Lake Erie Open Water Swim at GG9 in
Cleveland, August 2014

In early August another adventure beckoned, this time to my hometown of Cleveland where I registered to participate in the international sports competition Gay Games IX.  Nine other swimmers from my Masters swim group the Seattle Orcas joined me for a week of sporting and cultural events as Cleveland rolled out the red carpet for over 8,000 athletes from far (Russia, Australia, France, and England) and near (Cleveland-Akron). 

During the Games I stayed in my beloved Lakewood with my mother's tennis friend Fay who lives on Clifton, 3 blocks from Lakewood Park, where I lifeguarded as a teenager. I made new friends from South Dakota, California, and other places, in addition to reuniting with old friends from my college and high school days. My family and friends came to watch me compete in an open-water swim in Lake Erie along the beautiful coast of Edgewater Park as the sun rose over Downtown Cleveland and at Busby Natatorium at Cleveland State University. I coined my homecoming visit back to Cleveland my Trip to Bountiful, a rich time full of discoveries and unexpected pleasures. I'd truly come full circle.

Other travels included a trip to San Diego over Labor Day weekend to visit my friend Bret and reconnect with my Seattle swim friend Kathleen. And to Portland to visit dear friend and India travel companion Jenny and reunite with friends Ed and Michelle from our India travels. Jenny and I hope to join them in Portugal in later 2015. 

I also spent lots of time swimming and exploring life in Seattle with new friend Larry, whom I first

Summer reverie, Lar and Jack on my back deck, Aug 2014

met in 1997 through Kevin (see eastern Caribbean trip at top of letter). In addition to training with me  over the summer at the outdoor Colman Pool in preparation for the Gay Games in Cleveland, Lar and I enjoyed post swim picnics at Alki Beach. In September he helped me prepare for my Spamalot callback and ran my lines forward and backward with me during the run of the show. A gifted pianist and fixer of all sorts of gadgets, I'm lucky to have him in my life. Another blessing of 2014.

Wishing you and yours the best holiday ever.

With Love,

Jack

A Lost Job, and A Mother's Legacy

"Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm"

--Winston Churchill--

Last month, just before Thanksgiving,  I was informed by my boss that she'd decided to eliminate my position. It didn't come as a surprise only because as a fundraiser for a community-based nonprofit, I knew what the measure of my success entailed: increasing revenue through growing our base of support.

A New Challenge

A proud biker, outside my Pioneer Square office, Spring 2014

After accepting the newly-created position of Development and Membership Manager with Bicycle Alliance of Washington in March 2012, I rolled up my sleeves and got to work, engaging former board members, donors, volunteers, and the membership. I knew challenges lay ahead with name recognition and an all-too-similar mission with Cascade Bike Club.

Yet we had a loyal core of supporters and donors. I made progress increasing unrestricted revenue. Major gifts, individual giving, specialty license plate sales, and GiveBIG donations--all grew over the course of 2012 and into 2013. Membership continued to remain flat and gradually began a month-by-month decline in 2014, with other revenue sources lagging behind compared to my first two years.

Trouble Ahead
By late September, my boss made it clear we were looking at a significant deficit. We would need to pull out all the stops at our annual November auction to surpass the record breaking years of 2012 and 2013. Early in the summer I began soliciting table captains and reaching out to past sponsors and in-kind donors so we were looking strong on this front. 320 guests attended the auction, the largest crowd we ever hosted. By all accounts a successful evening with engaged bidders and record attendance, at night's end gross earnings stood near $100 K, almost $50 K less than our projected goal. We came up short.

Two days later my boss and a board member sat down across the table from me and said they would need to cut my job out of the 2015 budget. Shock, embarrassment, shame that somehow I'd failed--all these feelings ran through my mind as she and I sat across from each other with glum expressions on our faces.

I'd forgotten the key to my office and suggested the board member follow me home on my bike so I could return it to them. He kindly offered to load my bike on the back of his SUV and drove me home. I gave my boss an awkward hug and thanked her for everything--they would provide November's salary and health care coverage through the end of the year, in addition to paying out my remaining vacation time. We agreed I'd return another day to clean out my desk and complete an exit interview.

At home, I retrieved the key and shook the hand of the board member who dropped me off. During the drive he'd asked if I had any insights about why membership continued to decline, and I shared with him my impressions that younger generations didn't buy into a membership model, especially without the clear benefits--early registration for popular rides and discounted classes--that our chief competitor Cascade Bike Club offered.

A Sistine Chapel Sky--Riding on my bike down 16th Ave.

Laying the Groundwork
On that sunny fall morning, I began the process of laying the groundwork for my future. First I called my former professor, mentor and friend Hubert to schedule lunch and let him know of my predicament. He immediately offered to serve as a reference for me, as he had in the past. I logged onto the state unemployment website and filed a benefits claim.

Then a small voice whispered in my ear, "This is a sacred time." I paused for a moment and allowed the words to sink in. Grateful that I would receive a month's salary, vacation pay, and likely qualify for unemployment, I rested in the knowledge that everything would be okay. I'd completed a chapter in my life journey. Now the time had come to follow the next fork in the road toward something new, maybe even better.

Being Led
I opened the door to my living room closet and there hung my yellow tennis bag with my Wilson aluminum tennis racquet. A few minutes before noon I changed into a pair of shorts, t-shirt, and my favorite white Izod tennis sweater, and slid into my tennis shoes. My bike still parked in the building hallway, I threw the tennis bag on my shoulders and headed out to the street and Volunteer Park.

The sun shone above me, the blue sky lit like a Sistine Chapel overhead. The autumn leaves still clinging to trees formed an umbrella as I rode down 16th toward Volunteer Park.

Parked at Volunteer Park

Arriving at the park, I passed the water tower, my favorite Black Sun sculpture by Noguchi and the glass-encased Conservatory. I could see the tennis courts in the distance and a smile spread across my face.

The green pavement, still damp with morning dew, glimmered in the light. I'd not visited here since spring time, why had I waited so long? Leaning my bike against the inside of the fence, I pulled out my racquet and a few used tennis balls from my bag. I had the place to myself.

"Now, you know the drill," I heard the small voice whisper again. I approached the pounding board and began hitting the tennis ball against the board, over and over again. I fell into a rhythm, almost hypnotic, that carried me back to my years in middle and high school growing up in suburban Cleveland and riding my bike to the Linden Park Tennis Courts.

The warmth of the fall day softened my neck and back muscles, and my legs pushed forward and back to the ricochet of the tennis ball bouncing from the board to my feet for another return.

I looked up to see the glistening orange, red, and yellow leaves clinging to the trees, a looming cloud covering the sun, and then evaporating, allowing brightness to reemerge.

An epiphany on the court

The Special Voice
And then I realized the voice, the prodding, the call to return to the tennis court came from my mother. Mom had introduced me to tennis at the tender age of 5. Dad, she, and I played on-and-off as a family on Sunday mornings during the warm weather months usually from May through early October.

My mother derived such joy from the game that she wanted to share it with me, much like she taught me how to ice skate and at a later age, cross-country ski. These three sporting activities, like old friends, reside forever in my body, as natural as the earth, wind, and sky.

As I continued serving the ball and wielding the racquet with greater accuracy and force, I could hear her voice egging me, encouraging me, reminding me. "Let it out, Jack," she'd say when experiencing the typical frustrations of adolescence.

"Grab your racquet, bike to the court, and let it out." She regaled me with stories of her own youth and how when she felt down or upset about a life event, she'd march down to the tennis court with her racquet and hammer the pounding board. Here I was all these years later following my deceased mother's advice.

"I failed," I thought. And yet I didn't fail. I would never have known had I not tried. Maybe that realization was good enough to know.

From deep within, a resonant sigh emerged. Like a steady wind seeping from a cracked window, I allowed it to escape.

Grounded on the Tennis Court

Pride and Joy
On this stunning autumn day I raised my head again toward the trees and blue sky and saw my mother, felt her presence, peering down on me with pride and joy. Her 51-year-old son concluding that losing his job would neither destroy him nor damage his life.

Over the past few weeks I've realized how losing a job, and applying for unemployment, feels like a death, a la Elizabeth Kubler-Ross. There are different stages--I first experienced acceptance before anger, denial, and depression reared their ugly heads. I'm still sorting through some of the more negative emotions.

The important lesson for this good Catholic son is to allow myself the chance to feel them.

Life and Love

Mom and me, Polaroid snapshot, August 1969

In the meantime, this past year I've returned to another childhood love, the theatre. Over the next two weekends I'll continue my performances in Monty Python's Spamalot at Bainbridge Performing Arts. Singing, dancing, and walking on stilts as the persnickety Knight Who Says Ni has given me a purpose this holiday season plus great comfort and satisfaction during this time of life change.

Who knows what will happen next? What I do know is that as I mature and gain wisdom I'm less enamored with sitting in an office behind a desk.

On this sunny December day in Seattle I'm hoping to return to the tennis court soon, where I have a sneaky suspicion new directions will reveal themselves.