“Tell me what does democracy looks like?”

“This is what democracy looks like.”

Yesterday, Susan Robbins, founder and Artistic Director of Libana, sent her e-mail contacts a link to a TED talk she described as “strangely moving.”

Strangely, huh?

Although we all know TED talks are not brief I watched it immediately.

And, yes, it was moving and yes, Susan Robbins, who is ALL about the power of music to build community and the synergy created when voices join one another would find a “virtual choir” strange.

Irony: an excellent jump-off for a blog.

Maybe I’ll begin by describing that first heart-sinking moment at a Midsummer Sing. Susan had already led the twenty-five or so women in the circle through some community-building exercises, we’ve warmed our voices and now, it’s time to sing. Something filigreed, hauntingly beautiful—perhaps in Hebrew or French or Swahili. A complex round, perhaps. Or in four-part, intriguingly discordant harmony.

Yeah, right!

But we do it. Together. And it’s incredible.

I won’t belabor this. You get the point. Amazing things happen in community.

Conversely, icky things happen when we’re not face to face. Twice, this week, I’ve been called on e-mails their receivers found hurtful.

Ouch.

Being in the same room: vital.

And staying in the same room: Critical. How resilient is a community of men and women who have never met, never grappled with the hard stuff, never spent the time learning one another’s back story? Not very, I’m thinking. It ain’t fun to hang in there when the people you’re trying to build community with are pissed or annoying and what you really want to do is leave, dramatically slamming the door behind you. (Just to be clear: If your Fight or Flight alert is activated, get the hell out of there!) But I’m pretty sure that when Marin Luther King talked about “beloved community,” his back story was all about the squabbles, pettiness, shouting matches, etc. he’d encountered—and endured—among his associates, parishes, and his own family.

I’ll close with this: face time might mean praying together. Intentionally taking the time to collectively acknowledge Something/mystery/The inexplicable which operates when two or more are gathered.

Just sayin’.

Like thousands of others, I’ve been avidly watching the nesting red-tailed hawks in NYC and like thousands of others, rejoiced when, waay, waay past its due date, one of the 3 eggs in that messy, citified nest actually hatched.

Pre-hatching, this live feed often offered longish moments to reflect and contemplate.  For hours, Violet stoically sat on her nest, a Greenwich Village breeze occasionally riffling her magnificent feathers. Big Drama: When she’d turn the eggs over or when Bobby, her mate, brought her a tasty mouse or a rat.

But, oh, my, post-hatching! To watch Violet feed that flapping, hugh-eyed bundle of fuzz? Nothing like it.

There’s more drama: Somehow, about the same time the egg hatched,  a metal band around Violet’s right leg became infected. The leg’s swollen; she can’t put her weight on it so uses her wings sometimes to stabilize herself as she’s tearing pieces of mouse or rat to feed the hatchling—unflappable at the sight of mama’s broad wingspan.

The New York Times posted this live feed (Thank you, NYT) but does a lousy job of maintaining the site. (C’mon!) So for updates, like thousands of others, I’ve been reading the comments. A while back, during the bucolic, not-much-happening days, one viewer reminded us that we weren’t watching a Disney movie. This real-time video was live. This was real. And he (partially) quoted Tennyson: “Nature, red in tooth and claw. . . ”

So, now, thousands of us both coo and ooh as Violet feeds her baby AND wring our collective hands over her ghastly leg: “Somebody DO something!”

And, like  thousands, millions of people, I wonder how we “live-feed” the heres and nows so many of us so easily don’t see (as in both viewing and being mindful of). For starters: the ravages of poverty and racism, the relentless destruction of this planet; war.

Re that last one, let’s let Jon Stewart have the last word. (The last bit, right after he slams David Caruso. That’s what I’m talkin’ about.)

This past weekend, I went to Muse and the Marketplace, an intensive, two-day seminar/publishing advice/opportunity to network extravaganza run by Grub Street. And am still processing it!

A couple of take-aways: Ron Carlson, the keynote speaker, urged writers to “stay in the room,” to stay with the mystery and the doubt that are so much a part of the writing process.

And as a direct result of what I heard in a couple of workshops, am now tweeting (@PatriciaWild1). Unlike, say, my husband, I did NOT read the manual first; I simply opened an account without knowing much about what I’m doing—except, of course, what we ALL now know re the power of this social networking tool vis a vis the Arab Spring.

But, today, Day 3 of Twitter-ish, am beginning to intuit stuff (I really need to read the manual, like soon!)

Like: Thanks to Twitter, now know that the ACLU is trying to get the Corrections Dept. of —oops, not sure which southern state; doesn’t matter—to allow inmates to receive books OTHER THAN the Bible. Why doesn’t knowing which state matter? Because the process by which inmates receive books here in hip, progressive, Nyah, Nyah, we’ve got a health plan Massachusetts ain’t much better. But I betcha 90% of MA writers have no clue that their books and the books written by their colleagues can’t be mailed to MA prisoners unless coming directly from the publisher! Sounds like an organizing opportunity.

I really, really need to read that manual!

First thought after hearing that info re Osama bin Laden’s whereabouts came from “enhanced interrogation”: “Oh, Lord, how long will it take for Chaney to assert on Fox News, ‘See, America? Torture works!’ ” (Answer: hours.)

So was delighted read this by Rachel Kleinfeld in the NYT:

I know, some people are saying . . . that torture helped us get the intelligence that ultimately led to the courier who worked for bin Laden. But the facts simply don’t support the claim. Torture produced a lead, but it took nearly five years between that lead and the end-game, which simply shows that torture produces intelligence leads that can’t be trusted and must be verified through other means.

Let’s take a moment to celebrate Ms. Kleinfeld’s conclusion, shall we? Let’s take a moment.