Category Archives: strength

The Creative Epiphany – Colorado’s Current Biblical Flood

Posted on by Jo Ann Brown-Scott

                       Evergreen Lake

Big Thompson Flood July 31, 1976

I have lived here in Colorado nearly all of my adult life, starting with my college years at CU in Boulder, and with the exception of  a few blocks of time when I had to be somewhere else. As most of you know, I just returned here, finally and permanently, after 6 years in California. Just 2 months ago I found a lovely place to live and re-settled back in.

Fast forward to now. I have never in my life seen unrelenting, violent, biting rain like this, and I have lived in some rainy, swampy places. A good year of precipitation in the Denver, Colorado area is around 12 inches of rain – we are considered the western “high plains” where tall grass naturally grows and herds of antelope used to roam by the thousands. Peaceful rivers run through us and Indian camps were plentiful along their banks just 100 years ago. In the high mountains, situated just right there in your face to the west, we almost routinely accumulate snow in the hundreds of inches, and we love that. But in this past 4 days, we along the “front range” of the Rockies, (an area which parallels and hugs the first steep hills that hint at the larger mountains to our west) have become a flooded area that stretches over 150 miles long from approximately Ft. Collins to our north down south through Boulder and Denver and its suburbs to Colorado Springs.  It also extends to our east, into those flat farming plains. I experienced 7 inches of rain two nights ago! 7 INCHES! And we were told to expect additional staggering amounts in the following 3 nights, and the weather guys and gals were correct. Since then, I have been drying out and waiting to see when the second shoe drops. I am in sunshine right now, at this nano-moment, here in south Denver, but the rains continue to the north and east of me. They are calling this a flood of Biblical proportions.

The charming mountain community of Evergreen, just 45 minutes west of Denver, where we raised our kids, has a dam at one end of Main Street that holds back the friendly, peace-loving, agreeably contained Evergreen Lake where fishing and ice skating are a few of it’s seasonal pleasures. The lake is  Evergreen’s water supply. Bear Creek flows into that lake from farther west and its water continues over the dam and down in a normally civilized and quite picturesque creek-form, along whose banks you can dine at outdoor cafes and sample wines at funky little wine bars. Farther into the village of Evergreen you can have a bawdy old time at the Little Bear Saloon where Willie Nelson used to drop in and play a set for free back in the day. If you are having an especially great time there, and you wear a bra, you might be invited at some point in the evening to remove your bra (either modestly pulled out from under your t-shirt or taken off proudly in full view) and sling it up over the rafters where it will live for the remainder of its bra life. You can shop for unique clothing, including a new bra, that you’d never find anywhere else, visit art galleries and eat ice cream at the Baskin Robbins where my son worked after school. Evergreen still has Fourth of July parades down Main Street where the street lamps are festooned with flower pots and America flags. Bikers show up and line their Harleys up against the wooden rail outside the Little Bear exactly where stagecoaches used to tie their horses. The history of Evergreen is fascinating and available in many nicely done coffee table books. We loved it there.

About 20 years ago – maybe longer – the dam was repaired, in spite of skeptical minds, to be capable of withstanding a 100 year flood. This week we are there……as some one said in the news today, “This could be the one that brings us to our knees.”

I just heard this minute that the Evergreen dam is holding and safe, but uncharacteristically angry Bear Creek has taken out half of a parking lot located along its roaring and raging  banks, directly across from the Little Bear Saloon. When the water leaves Evergreen it has to race down through Bear Creek Canyon – one of many canyons that pierce the mountains and enabled early settlers to travel west. These canyons are steep-walled and deep. If you would like to read about just one of them, Google the Big Thompson Flood which occurred back on July 31st, 1976, the first year we lived in Evergreen. As the mountain rain water accumulated in a surreal, film visual effects- type event and then picked up speed while careening down from higher elevations, it raced thunderously down the Big T canyon like a liquid freight train monster, widening out in some places and narrowing again at the tight canyon curves where, since it could not be wide, the water had to deepen up, scouring the steep rocky canyon walls of their higher mountain residences along with trees and rocks and mud. This all happened in a flash – thus the term flash flood. Resulting in total devastation.

Last night I experienced one of those reverse phone call warnings coming across on my CELL PHONE! A screeching alarm telling me to head for higher ground. Thank God I am in a community that is perched on a lovely green hill – but the intersection just a mile away from me became an instant lake and the exit ramps from the highway to the street in front of my home were taken out by fast-rising water. They are gone.

Who would have thought this could happen in a city renowned for being 5280′ above sea level? It would seem that no water could accumulate here! In truth, all of our water drains into the South Platte River which runs directly to the Mississippi River and then to sea, where all good water needs to go. But the mud – that is an entirely different story. Like chocolate pudding with debris, it lingers and clogs and traps cars. It sucks things under. We are told to expect a brief respite from the water starting now, until late tomorrow night when it will return, we are told, with several more inches. But one thing of which I am sure – this has not brought us to our knees. Local news pictures are of course all about humans saving humans and people being generous. Animals being rescued and hot meals being cooked. Like others you see all over the world facing adversity, we’ll be fine eventually. The difference is – this is HERE. First time I have ever seen this up close and personal. And now  I have new appreciation for all those other people and what they endure. I thought I knew – I thought I could imagine – but I was not even close. Being wet and cold and homeless and thirsty for clean water, and hungry. Worried to the point of being sick about friends and relatives and kids and elderlies and animals. With no answers for days and days. OK I get it now like I never got it before.  I am living it now. That’s actually how an epiphany happens.

For fine news coverage of this Biblical flood, go to www.9news.com or search for KUSA  Denver

The Creative Epiphany – Wherever You Go, There You Are

Posted on by Jo Ann Brown-Scott

fragile From Northern California back to Denver…..

On the fifth night in my new residence, dead tired from unpacking and lifting and climbing stairs and settling in, I woke in the night wondering where I was. It was as if I had been in a coma and regained consciousness, and had no idea of my location. Without moving a muscle I looked around. There was bright moonlight cutting through the deep purple darkness  in long narrow slices made by slatted blinds I swore I never bought.  I was wondering – which window was it? I don’t have a window like this one, do I? What room am I in? Where am I? Oh yes, I gradually realized. Someone had moved my bed across 3 states and put it down in a room that didn’t make any sense to me…yet.

When you change your residence you don’t have to be half asleep to wonder where you are. Moments of confusion come at unexpected times when you can’t comprehend how it all happened, although it was a 3 month process. You need something from the fridge and you open the pantry, you turn right headed for the bathroom and it takes you into the laundry room. If you get up at night for a drink of water you impact the wall where you thought there was a door with such force that you wonder if you broke your face.

Moving is not easy. But it is worth it, if you are fortunate enough to have done it for all the right reasons. In my previous blog post, titled SURFACING, I gave you enough info to know that this move of mine has been a wonderful leap, coming at a time in my life when recharging the batteries of my heart and soul was the right decision. Moving is always a major jolt and a chaotic endeavor, however, no matter how you plan it and attend to details. The members of my family do a lot of it. We are all gypsies who will leave point A and flash forward to point B for reasons of career opportunities, quality of life and being closer to those you love most. They said one night on Animal Planet that all the great migrations of the animal species are made for just 3 reasons – plentiful food, water and mating opportunities. Some things are just universal.

My brother and sister and I were born in Ohio and we have made our individual journeys to the West with relish and perseverance. Kind of like Sherman’s march to the sea. We burned some bridges behind us in the process but it was worth it and no one was injured. Then one of us moved back east again, but south. We Ping-Pong around.

It is an energizing event in life – the move. It wakes you up at your deepest core, at the very least. It requires a great, complicated  thought process to purge and pack. I have it down to a system, having moved about 25 times in my life. Each of those times, I learned more and refined my process. I have dozens of tricks and short-cuts up my sleeves by now, learned in the deep trenches of relocation suffering. My sister says I ought to write a book about it. But I am too busy doing other fun stuff.

I actually enjoy waking up in the night wondering where I am. I look around for clues and it comes to me eventually. And maybe some far off night when the clues in the darkness make no sense at all to me, and the familiar answers as to my location do not filter into my mind, well then…..my moving days will be over.

message

The Creative Epiphany – Little Jo and the Devil Pony

Posted on by Jo Ann Brown-Scott

youngjo Thunder is the one with the wild look in his eye..

It was bright and early on any Saturday morning when I was six or seven years old, down by the barn on our country property. I was skinny and small, maybe 60 lbs, not sure. Fresh out of bed and still not really awake. Wishing I could be listening to my Saturday morning radio shows up at the house. Strawberry blonde hair that curled up with summer perspiration  and blue eyes, unrevealing as yet of the budding determination behind them.

I knew it was time to ride Thunder again, probably get thrown off and lucky, I hoped,  to land safely without fracturing my neck. Mom was sure I would be injured. Dad was fearless, and I was caught in the middle somewhere. I knew the perils of horseback riding, had been taking formal riding lessons for weeks, so I also knew that, in spite of my size, I would rather be riding any full grown normal horse (we had two of those in the barn, just 3 stalls down from Thunder…and I loved them both) using an English saddle than to have to get on the back of that black devil pony from hell and that damn western saddle.

If I heard it once I heard it a thousand times, as I picked myself up off the ground and put my hat back on, trying not to cry after being tossed like a pillow over the top of Thunder’s head,  “Jo, show that pony who’s boss! Get up on him and try again! Come on, hurry up. He’ll warm up to you.” But actually he never did. I learned to ride him, but with great respect and constant  trepidation for what might transpire at any given moment, if he decided he didn’t like some bird or some weed or some sneeze…he was unpredictable. He had a consistent wild look in his eye, because he was nuts. Like a cowboy’s bad dream. Truly demented.

Those mornings eventually taught me more than how to get Thunder under control, but of course I didn’t know it at the time. I now know, however, from that time on, confronted with any problem whatsoever, I choose to walk through it over the hot coals rather than around it. The lesson was learned, more out of wanting to NOT look like a chicken than from wanting to be brave. I would rather hunker down and weather the storm than sneak around it going sideways to avoid the issue. But honestly, sometimes walking through the center to the eye of the tornado and out the other side  is nothing but crazy and I am just saying that you can get tossed around and badly bruised every once in a while with your perhaps foolhardy bravery. It does not work 100% of the time, to look a situation right in the eye and decide to challenge it. Violent situations with people and guns or wild animals are a couple situations that are best not confronted armed only with your steely-eyed determination and your slightly red hair.

But down through the chapters of your life, as you face adversity and all the problems that life brings, if you are engaged and truly living it, you must take it all on like a champ. You learn what to accept as a challenge, what to avoid at all costs, what to stand and fight for and what to flee. Which battles are worth engaging and which to ignore. You learn what can be negotiated and what cannot. You learn that some people are reasonable, and can be “talked off the cliff” and some will never know what reason is. You learn that sweating all the small stuff will just wear you out over time and that you need to save your energy and your big guns for the life-changing battles.

Yes, Thunder has become a symbol for me. Black as night, hoofs like thunder, the maniacal look in his eyes and the ability to run like the wind…you have to give that kind of life-form a lot of respect.

The Creative Epiphany – Life is a Three Ring Circus

Posted on by Jo Ann Brown-Scott

 

oct11 002 Painting by Jo Ann Brown-Scott titled Red Sea at Night, Sailor’s Delight

As I was having dinner with a couple friends the other night we happened upon the subject of getting older – a subject we don’t dwell on here where we live but it does rear its gray and wrinkled head from time to time. We live in  a  lovely 55+ active senior community of over 7,000 households that affords us many choices for how we might enjoy spending our leisure time. Sun City here in Lincoln, CA is a state of the art senior retirement area that has it all. We are located in the rolling hills leading into the Sierras, halfway between SF Bay and Lake Tahoe, so we can certainly keep ourselves busy when we go “off campus” as well. There are many people here who still work, and many who do very well at staying productive and relevant although they are completely retired. I have had a part-tine job here for the past 3 years teaching adult art classes, so I fall somewhere in the middle. The lifestyle we wake up to every morning is a positive example for anyone over 55 who is dedicated to staying active and young at heart for as long as possible.

One of my friends mentioned that she doesn’t like to volunteer her age in social gatherings because some rude harsh realists instantaneously make a judgment to themselves about her when she does – mentally placing her in a category they see as appropriate to that number, thus stereotyping her based upon no actual factual information. It drove her crazy – she could see it happen before her eyes. They either made remarks of utter amazement at her ability to stay looking and acting so young, as if she was some mutant who had drunk from the fountain of youth, or they saw her as doomed any minute when her age finally caught up with her. So she made a conscious decision to be “age-free” similar to some people who never discuss their weight and refuse to acknowledge a scale.

They said recently on TV (and sometimes we want to believe what we hear on TV) that 70 is the new 50. Well! That got the attention of many people I know. You can call this denial or readjustment of numbers a silly tactic or you can call it clever marketing….. I happen to believe it is no one’s business how old you are or how much you weigh. Who cares. I certainly don’t. But I will say this – when you arrive at certain pivotal markers in life, you do begin to realize that you may no longer be in the “center ring”. You pick up on subtle clues…in a heated discussion of some topic, for instance, involving a group of people of which you are the oldest, you realize that no one cares what you think. No one asks, no one wonders, no one directs the conversation your way. Or perhaps a group starts making plans for an activity that is quite physical, maybe a hike, and instead of asking if you’d like to participate, they assume it’s going to be too strenuous for you and leave you out of the plans. No one wants to be dragging your sorry ass up the trail. And maybe it is too strenuous, but an invitation would still be nice. Please let me hold onto my dignity; I will decide what is too strenuous for me. Maybe I’ll die trying but that’s for me to decide. Maybe I’ll just stop halfway up and eat my lunch.

It is difficult to start feeling irrelevant long before you really are. Many cultures include the older members of the family in their extended living arrangements, and that seems to me a great way of elongating  the productive years for seniors. There is usually something we seniors can contribute to the family whole that is valued and helpful, and being included in daily conversations and activities of the people you love is a crucial to feeling relevant. It has been proven that longevity is far more likely if accompanied by a healthy and happy quality of life that gives you several reasons to get up in the morning, whether it is a garden to tend, a pet to feed, a child to read to, a porch to sweep or just a friend to have coffee with on a regular basis.

The circus of life does have 3 rings, and even a carnival side-show. The trick is to figure out how you can continue to be productive in some arena. Then after that, be a little assertive about holding your place in the order of things. Don’t vacate your hard-fought territory.  Offer your opinions, laugh and listen to the conversations around you. Insist on being the same you that you have always been. This is not our parents world; this is not Leave it to Beaver or Ozzie and Harriet. This is the brand new 21st century and the statistics say we are going to be around longer. However we choose to handle ourselves as active seniors, you can be sure we are being observed. We are the new Poster Children for active senior living. Let’s make some noise about it and leave everyone proud we were here for so long.

The Creative Epiphany – Distance

Posted on by Jo Ann Brown-Scott

brushes (2)

Distance has  been a challenge for me most of my life. Physical, geographical distance; the distance between me and the people in my life that I care most about. I am part of the problem, because I have moved a lot since leaving Ohio to pursue my love of art at the University of Colorado and then due to my husband’s work – Air Force living led us on a meandering path from South Carolina to Montana to Colorado, with stops at various states in between for weeks of pre-Viet Nam jungle survival training in Mississippi, and much later, missile  training  at Vandenberg AFB in California. Followed, after Air Force life ended, by the solitary life of the traveling salesman’s wife.

But those days are long gone and the distancing continues. I might sound like a whiner now, maybe for just a little bit, but my intention is to present the facts as they are. When the children became adults, thanks to the ease of 21st century travel, their endless curiosity and their ability to successfully combine career and exploration, they both became moving targets. That’s the good news and the distance news.

I have had no choice but to get used to it. Nepal, Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, Chile, Canada, London, Singapore, Yemen, Guatemala, Kurdistan, Thailand, Cambodia, Viet Nam, Panama, The Philippines, Bali, Bhutan, Antarctica, New Zealand, Poland, Turkey, Greece, Africa, Madagascar, and the list goes on. I’m sure I have forgotten some. Oh yes I am very proud! They say the best gift you can give your children is wings, and I was able to do that. This has really been something to watch unfold and I do at times live vicariously through their adventures. It has always positively influenced my art – the stories! the photos! the people they meet! the exotic gifts brought home for me! What a joy it has been to observe! But there are always a couple days here and there when I think, ok that’s enough now. Come home. Stay. Don’t move. Get over it.

But where IS home? Ah that is the catch. They have made homes everywhere to the point where home is not anywhere and yet it is everywhere. And of course I am moving my headquarters – yes me – “house and home” is moving again – a happy move from California back to Denver in mid-July. The saying goes, “Bloom where you are planted.” And I always do. The pieces of the re-location puzzle, looking backward, always make perfect sense in retrospect. An experience in one place affords you a stepping stone to your next move and the ways in which you will continue to be productive there. This time, based upon my three years of teaching adult art classes here in California (on top of literally a lifetime of painting) plus some particular life-long passions and affinities,  and having friends who share them, I see a magnificent possibility on my horizon based out of my new Denver headquarters. As I look back on things I realize that my art has always presented the path that has taken me where I wanted to go. It is my soul’s home place and my anchor. At this point my next adventure is  too far off to be specific about – but too close not to begin moving toward it. This will be my best move yet, and when the dust settles, you will be the first ( well maybe the second) to know what happens! I do believe that everything in my life has brought me to this….this position of strength.

flagart

The painting is by Jo Ann Brown-Scott, titled Strength from her Soul Flags series.