{William Cerf's Creativity Journal
}
Well, here I am at the keyboard. I wonder if I could just do this every day for 30 minutes - morning pages are a good thing. There are wonderful people, professors, cohorts and the Writing Center who have helped me to improve my writing skills during the two years I've been pursuing doctoral coursework. I have to pinch myself when I realize that Januray 2014 will be my fifth academic residency. The academy has offered me a great adventure; new skills, theories, epistemologies and ontologies I'd never before considered. I love it!! Cincinnati, Ohio is an interesting and lovely town that I never would have gone to before I started attending academic residencies there in January 2012. I remember very clearly that first day I arrived at residency, being greeted by one of my fellow newbies and an old-timer. They welcomed me and gave me the opportunity to feel really at home. Having an academic homebase with a cohort of people working to create a community of scholar-practitioners has been a profound part of my life and will continue to be. I take this doctoral adventure one day, one seminar, one semester at a time, although I must admit that I do realize that it won't be long til I take Comprehensive Exams and begin working on Dissertation - my contribution to the production of knowledge.
I want to produce knowlege that contributes to building alliances across lines of difference. Celebrating the five skin colors that make up our human rainbow; White, Black, Brown, Yellow and Red and all of the wonderful faith traditions that lead us to G*d. The production of knowlege for me is the production of empowerment for all people - the poor, the dispossessed, the struggling American who can't seem to get ahead in spite of great efforts, the insensitive plutocrat who has emotional pain but is unaware, the "bad" people in this world who have made mistakes, some of them truly horrific. We are all God's children - we are, whether we realize it or like it, in this together. I pray for healing of those places where hate and prejudice have dominated the discourse; they are the Sundown Towns that offer the possibility of a New Sunrise in the United States; so that we can live out the true meaning of the American creed.
Blessings!