Death and dying and happiness? Yes, please. Rev. Hollis Walker, an ordained minister who's "passionate about death," and Celia Owens, activist, artist and volunteer coordinator at Casa Cielo in Santa Fe, are in the studio with Melanie.
It sounds heavy, no? It isn't really, not when you're talking with folks who understand the sacred nature of dying a good death.
We talk about:
When Death Comes
When death comes
like the hungry bear in autumn;
when death comes and takes all the bright coins from his purse
to buy me, and snaps the purse shut;
when death comes
like the measle-pox;
when death comes
like an iceberg between the shoulder blades,
I want to step through the door full of curiosity, wondering:
what is it going to be like, that cottage of darkness?
And therefore I look upon everything
as a brotherhood and a sisterhood,
and I look upon time as no more than an idea,
and I consider eternity as another possibility,
and I think of each life as a flower, as common
as a field daisy, and as singular,
and each name a comfortable music in the mouth,
tending, as all music does, toward silence,
and each body a lion of courage, and something
precious to the earth.
When it’s over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.
When it’s over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.
I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world. Mary Oliver
information about Casa Cielo here
more about Dr. Melanie Harth here
Yay, Arte (Artemisio) Romero y Carver is back for one more show before he heads off to the wilds of a semester in Napa Valley, Cali.
Melanie loves the fast-paced, youth-oriented, artistic, and activist points of view that Arte shares so eloquently.
Talking points include:
Cree Indian Prophecy
Only when the last tree has been cut down, the last fish been caught, and the last stream poisoned, will we realize we cannot eat money.
powerhouse book recommendation from Melanie: The Overstory, by Richard Powers
YUCCA (YouthUnited4ClimateCrisisAction) website here
Executive producer of the PBS Ageless Living Series, George Cappannelli, returns for another in-depth conversation.
Some of the questions?
We spend billions of dollars in this country every year trying to pretend we're not getting older or ever going to die .. what do we lose in the total denial of aging and eldering?
How do self-responsibility and self-empowerment fit into aging?
What's the real truth about aging?
Why is it important that ageism continues to be challenged?
Are we, as a collective, prepared for what we're facing?
As usual, it's provocative, fast-paced, informative.