If you’re in the DC area, come see new drawings of mine at the Jerusalem Fund Gallery.

The Jerusalem Fund Gallery
April 9 – May 7
2425 Virginia Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20037
202.338.1958

It has been months since I have posted anything, so writing this feels a little like putting a message under a rock. However, I am heading back to the Middle East and figure I should get back into the habit of writing blogs.

For four weeks, I will be conducting interviews in both Palestine and Israel. The interviews will revolve around the subject of home and belonging. In addition to gathering stories, I will take photographs of the interviewees inside and outside their homes, some of these will include the surrounding landscapes and streetscapes. Upon my return, I will create an audio documentary and a series of paintings that I plan to present together in venues throughout the US.

With Dave’s help I will be updating this website before I go and will be able to download audio clips while I am there.

If all goes well, Charlie will be joining a wagon trip while I’m gone, riding across the midwest with a couple cowboys.

More to come. Ellen

We’ll be in New Jersey by tomorrow night. First presentation is on Friday with The Pennington School Middle School. Before the presentation I will meet with the 6th graders who will be holding a Middle East Peace Summit. I get to be one of the judges for the plan.

A good turnout tonight at Grinnell College. A good end to the fall tour.
Tomorrow I head to South Bend, Indiana, for a reunion with a few friends I studied with in Jerusalem in 1989. Then to NJ to return my mother’s car and join my family for Thanksgiving.

Denver, Colorado

Mazin Qumsiyeh on the bus.

Boulder, Colorado.

Palestinian Night at Colorado State University

(left) With Maysoon Zayid, the self-described Palestinian Muslim Virgin Comedian from New Jersey. Check out her website and go see her perform if you are able.

(right) With Mona one of the organizers of the event. Mona is from Gaza City and a student at CSU.

Camp Casey, Fort Collins, CO

San Luis Valley

One of the most remarkable places we visited was the San Luis Valley in Colorado. The valley is the size of NJ and gets an average of 6″ of rain a year. One afternoon, Charlie and I walked for a few hours in the valley. The weather changed quickly from warm and sunny, to cool with snow flurries, and back to warm and sunny.

We only passed a few homes and an occasional sign….

We drove from the San Luis Valley west into the Rocky Mountains to get to Paonia. This is Kevin our bus driver and one of the sunniest people I’ve met. He often led Bea and I in songs from the 70’s and 80’s.

There is a path Charlie and I walk every morning and evening in Paonia. It runs beside an elevated irrigation ditch on the North side of the town. In the morning, Christina walks with us and points out where the coal is mined, the gas station with three generations of gas station owners, the apple orchard, the Chaka shoe plant.

Yesterday a reporter from a local paper came to Christina’s house to interview the Wheels group. Charlie may have made more of an impression than the rest of us. “What kind of dog?” she asked while scratching his head. And wrote down my answer. The best kind.

When we went in the bus to take pictures, Charlie climbed into the driver’s seat. The reporter jumped off the bus and began shooting him from the street. “Hey, chould you open the window?” she asked, pointing to the glass beside Charlie’s head, “I’m getting a glare.” This happened once before. We left Charlie in the bus while I gave a presentation at a charter school in Denver. When Bob and I returned to the bus there was a group of kids standing by the front of it, taking pictures. As we got closer we saw Charlie, sittting tall in the driver’s seat, occasionally turning his head as if offering different poses.

Today we are heading to Glenwood Springs . On Friday, back to Denver and the end of the Wheels tour. A day or two of rest and Charlie and I will begin to head back to the east coast.

Kristina took this shot of Charlie and me on the irrigation ditch path. Charlie has a stick in his mouth that he has just subdued.

With Bea (tour manager) and Kevin (bus driver) about to leave Paonia

About to meet with a group of art students at Vision School, an alternative high school in Paonia. We have two hours so I’m hoping it’s a talkative group.

Paonia is a small town in the middle of the Rockies. Many artists live here.

A day off. Charlie and I went for a long hike this morning. Just two minutes of sunshine and they were spectacular. It was just as the sun was lifting above the horizon. It hit the Rockies making them glow red. And the clouds behind were stormy, grey, so it looked like the red light was coming from within.

It’s been a full week of events. My favorites have been high school classes. On Wednesday, the Wheels tour went to a charter school in Denver. After our presentations, a few of the kids in the class made it clear they were planning on enlisting in the military in order to go to college. One wanted to hear from Kelly that they could enlist without being sent into a war zone. Another lives in a rough neighborhood and said he’s likely to get shot there anyhow, so why not take his chances in Iraq and get the benefit of the G.I. bill.

Bob left the bus yesterday. Our new bus driver, Dan, has been to Iraq and Palestine and is more eloquent on the issues than any of us. He has a good sense of humor and often uses it to diffuses combative energy when it enters the dialogue. Candy, a vet from the Gulf war, also came on board yesterday. She mostly gets around in a wheelchair, wears a crew cut and “S-W-E-E-T C-A-N-D-Y” tatoos across her fingers. As she spoke last night to the group in Lyons, she listed a dozen ways her body and mind have “fallen apart” since the war, including intense pain in the muscles and joints of her legs which make it difficult to walk. She attributes many of her ailments to shots she was required to get before heading over to Saudi Arabia, including one that contained anthrax.

Tabling with Bea, Dan, and Candy at Columbia College

Dan

I’ve been on the Wheels of Justice Tour for four days. The tour pairs eyewitness accounts from Palestine and Iraq. I have been speaking with two women who have spent time in Iraq. Kelly is from the Colorado National Guard and served as an mp. Dahlia is an Iraqi American doctor with family in Baghdad and Basra. It’s been intense, listening to their stories and to the stories of those in the audience. I did an event on my own at the Best Charter School. The kids were great. We have a bus driver named Bob who is funny and loves Charlie. They often hang out in the bus together while an event is going on.

Dahlia (Kelly behind her) speaking to students at PS 1, a charter school in Denver

Students at PS 1 listening to Kelly tell her experiences as a soldier in Iraq

When we arrived at the lounge at Tivoli Auraria campus, where we were giving our presentation, there was only one vertical person. Dahlia is holding up a publication entitled “Sign of the Times.”

With students and teachers from the Best Charter School in Denver

With Bob outside Wheels bus

Writing from the back of the Wheels of Justice bus. The Sabeel conference finished a couple hours ago. My wheels friends went out to dinner and Charlie and I shared a sandwich I had saved from from lunch and then went for a long walk.

The conference had excellent speakers–Phyllis Bennis, Mark Ellis, Jeff Halper, Michael Tarrazi. My workshop was during the final session which worked well. Most of the people who came had had enough analysis and were ready for art and storytelling.

A highlight for me was sitting and talking with Cindy Corrie. Cindy is the mother of Rachel Corrie who was killed in Gaza in 2003, trying to prevent the demolition of the home of a Palestinian family. I met Craig and Cindy Corrie at the Atlanta Sabeel conference last February. Since Rachel’s death they have been tirelessly asking our government for a US-led investigation into her killing. And in March they initiated a lawsuit against the Israel Defence Force and the government of Israel, to seek justice for Rachel and also information. (Unfortunately, the Israeli parliament, counter to international law, has passed retroactive legislation making it impossible for most Palestinians and others to file suit against the IDF for injury that occurred in the occupied territories after September 2000.)

The Corries breathed life into a conference that was heavy on analysis. During lunch Cindy played a video of a press conference Rachel took part in two days before her death, then read some of Rachel’s correspondences from Gaza.

To read a recent article by the Corrie’s go to www.counterpunch.com/corrie10102005.html

With Craig and Cindy Corrie at Sabeel Conference