We're Going to Miss You, Molly

Molly Cliff Hilts, 62, one of our mission-driven, founding members, died January 21st. She had been suffering with cancer for 18 months. She passed peacefully at home, holding her husband Dave’s hand. 

When Deborah Edward and I wanted to explore how to launch ninety-nine girlfriends, we decided to tap into a creative, connected, expert group of 12 women for advice on how to start. Molly, artist and consummate host, volunteered to be one of the 12 and to hold what turned out to be a very dynamic and formative conversation on her veranda. Molly supported and cheered us on as we launched the girlfriends. She wanted to do whatever she could to get the project off the ground.

When we were young and scrappy and the organization had zero money in its event budget -in fact it didn’t even have an events budget - Mol jumped in and helped set up our launch event bringing rugs, twinkly lights and so many other things from home and then put on one of her famous little black dresses and was a greeter at the front door. She was part of the heart and soul at the inception of ninety-nine girlfriends. Molly volunteered to be on the first Arts & Culture Grant Review Team and, from all accounts, that team owned “the fun quotient.” She continued her personal commitment to the arts by supporting many of the girlfriends’ arts nominees and grantee partners. She “fell in love with,” (her words) and supported My Voice Music, Open Signal and so many more.  

Molly believed in the power of bringing talented, diverse and fun women together because “when you foster community, anything can happen.” Many remember her from the girlfriends’ events she hosted at her home - the fancy cocktails, the festive parade with well over 100 women crossing the street from one house to the other - to have our senses surrounded by young musicians on her backyard stage and the stars at twilight. 

Molly was an extraordinary encaustic painter and had recently been captivated by illustrating crows and ravens. See her website to enjoy her work online or visit Brumfield Gallery in Astoria. Brumfield is featuring an exhibit by Molly through March 7th.  One of our members, Lisa Smith, hosts a program on KMUN community radio and featured Molly’s work on the second half of her January 12th broadcast of “All About Folk”. Enjoy it at Coast Radio Archives.

On January 8th Molly found out that her painting titled Eagle Creek was placed in the Portland Museum of Art’s permanent collection of Northwest Art. This was a huge honor for Molly. The painting is a premonition of the fire that started in Eagle Creek and spread to the Gorge, as the hills are depicted in a smoky orange. She painted it in 2016 and the fire started in 2018.   

Molly’s commitment to the arts pales only to her commitment to supporting young women. She mentored many women who were hoping to find their footing in the arts community. She believed that connecting talented women who may not have connections in that world would ignite relationships that impact the lives of all involved. As a result, in ninety-nine girlfriends she was a supporter of our Fellows Program and sponsored many members. If you are moved to make a contribution to our Fellows Program in Molly’s name, please do. You can learn more here.

Molly leaves behind her loving husband, her sons and her daughter-in-law to be. Molly will be missed by so many and her contributions to our community will be felt for a very long time to come. 

— Eileen Brady, co-founder, ninety-nine girlfriends

Forced in the Silence to Listen

Thank you to member S. Renee Mitchell for sharing her thought-provoking poetry with ninety-nine girlfriends and the world.

Forced In The Silence to Listen

when this threat of harm has passed whether through death disease or determined intention my goal is to be different more purposeful more aware

today I am allowing seemingly immaterial moments to become a mirror

inform me of the ways I need to

adjust fine tune & confess the names of people I should forgive

with this forced silence prompted by an invisible enemy I am learning

& eusocial insects

to serve as sages

with open heart to turn inward to discover wisdom

love

who would have guessed the clamorous buzzing of bees which once stirred fear frustration fury even could teach life lessons about whom I decide to allow into my life whom to let go of & who to just let be

more & more I am asking myself what can those who are annoying

disrespectful callous & unkind
teach me about the peculiarities within myself

healing & to graciously

let go of the habit

to go outside of myself

for self-soothing

in each moment I can allow myself to get caught up

in the insistence

irritation & distraction of someone else’s way of being

- or -

I can unattach to an outcome

decide not to uncomfortably shift deliberately swat

or demand they be different I am becoming better at recognizing that heated words

are emotional billboards

hiding in plain sight displaying a longing to be seen

heard to feel safe & anger absence annoyance is sometimes / most times

ALL times just an expression of distress tightly wrapping itself

around the weight of anxiety or the horror of relentless ruminations

your buzzing about is rarely ever about me

& not even a worldwide crisis will prompt some folks

like most humans bees cooperate in the caring for one another each bee’s existence leverages an intentional interconnectedness an individual contribution toward the collective good

as they collect nectar to make honey their rapid wing-beats stir vibrations that agitate a plant’s pollen which fertilizes the next visited flower

eventually bees return to the hive carrying reserves to feed the larvae & even though most die before the fruit of their labor is realized reciprocity is mutual survival

to show affection beyond

their capacity to love themselves folks can’t give you something they don’t possess

or graciously receive something

they don’t believe they deserve

so I am listening better now yesterday I could easily

so consider, if you wil

the next time you are confronted with an irritating animation of energy you have a choice, you know

each encounter with another

have found blame

and assigned it a home

is an opportunity for an unfolding of a new truth an invitation to re-see reality

but today I chose to choose differently I decide to see purpose

& pose a self-reflective question which can shape one’s becoming:

in our crossed paths

a deeper reason

for our relationship a richer purposefulness for our friendship

am I hearing or am I listening?

© 2020 S. Renee Mitchell

A Different Harvest

This August, in the loneliness of quarantine, I sold the farm in Yamhill County where I had lived for almost thirty years and moved into the city. The fruit trees my toddlers helped me plant were in the bountiful glory of their maturity. Livestock sheds, pasture rotations, and manure management had all been honed to clockwork function. Planning and labor and more than two decades of growth had brought the farm and me to the time of harvest, but instead of pressing cider and filling the basement pantry with jams and pickles, I filled two dumpsters with the odds and ends a farm and family collects.

I had thought I would always live there, and I relished the accumulation of seasons and my ever-growing intimacy with the old forest at my back. But my children grew up and moved on, and my husband and I reached the end of our road together. For the last five years, I managed the farm alone. Feeding animals twice a day, cleaning the barn and keeping up with the weeding and pruning and the maintenance of a large old house became harder to sustain and justify. Still, every plant in the sprawling garden had been placed by my hand. The wildflowers that bloomed in the forest persisted because I kept the ivy at bay. What real distinction was there between me and my place? How could I ever leave?

As if I would live forever. As if the farm would last forever. The truth was, I would leave that farm one way or another. Dead or decrepit or sooner, through catastrophe or thoughtful design.

I chose thoughtful design, and I think of this radical change in my life as practice for the changes I will meet in a radically changing world. We all face a future we might not have imagined, one that is different from the future we had planned for. We can hang on, pretending until circumstances end the game, or we can take stock and seek new opportunities and a new way of doing things.

Do I miss the farm? The way I miss childhood, fondly but with no real desire to return. I’m cultivating a new love and a new household, in a strange new neighborhood filled with people and dogs wearing raincoats. For now, the farm still grows in the shape I gave it. May it prosper! The farm will always live in me as I ripen the seeds planted by my engagement with it. I saw an owl in the middle of the afternoon down on 22nd and Johnson. A pack of crows pointed it out, those perennial tattle-tales. The owl, imperturbable despite the scolding, was not to be turned away. But as I age, I grow less fierce and less determined. My harvest is different than I once imagined, not the comfort of hearth and home but the ripe experience that bears new seeds. I hope to be ready, with an open heart and open mind, for whatever’s next.

— Jane Carlsen

Unbridled Joy

Yesterday, I was letting my dog out for the twelfth time in less than 30 minutes so she could chase a squirrel in our backyard.  I was muttering about this not helping me get my work done.  I was thinking about the paw cleaning that would be required (again) when Cindi  wanted to come back in.  

I also realized I was smiling.  Not grinning; a full-on, whole face smile--because Cindi approaches squirrel-chasing with unbridled joy.  Unfettered  jump, wriggle, run, bark each and every time.  It doesn’t matter if it is the first chase of the morning or chase 25 of the day, she is equally and gloriously excited.

Most days I seek contentment, calm, a sense of purpose, a way to stay grounded as time continues to be wobbly and the world swirls out of my control. I have actively happy moments of dancing while making dinner or singing  or laughing at something one of my kids just said...   But unbridled joy isn’t something I experience ofen, and living it vicariously through my dog is a gift.

Cindi isn’t shy about seeking her joy.  If she doesn’t feel we are paying enough attention to her requests to go out (or come back in) she jumps repeatedly on the sliding glass door.  We have paw and nose prints going up to four feet high on both sides of the door.  If that doesn’t work, she will seek you out, dance on you or around you.  

Once outside, the best description I have to offer is an antelope or Max, the dog in “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” when he is leaping and soaring. Gravity seems to disappear, overtaken by boundless happiness and zeal.

What amazes me most is that her happiness is not tied to achieving a goal or novelty. She revels in the activity itself. She doesn’t care about catching the squirrel. Honestly, it doesn’t even matter if there even is a squirrel. Sometimes she chases invisi-squirrels.  Sometimes she runs to the wrong tree, stands looking up and barking. Meanwhile the squirrel looks on with  disdain from a different tree. She chases the same three squirrels who live in our yard (PJ, Gus and Mr. Blue Sky) up the same three trees and down the same fence every time.   

Cindi has something to teach us all. Here’s to more unbridled joy in each of our lives.

— Kaye Gardner O’Kearny 

If We Each Do Our Part

Are you doing your part for the planet?

Lisa Adatto, member and environmental activist, credits her father, a scientist at the University of Oregon, with first sparking her interest in the Greenhouse Effect, and later in the broader sustainability movement. Now, says Adatto, “it’s my children and grandchildren who keep me involved.” 

Lisa is passionate about increasing accessibility to the sustainability movement because, “We need everyone pitching in. It’s a matter of survival.”

Luckily, she continues, this is an easy movement to take part in because it offers so many entry points. Most schools have a Green Team. Many houses of worship host an  Environmental Committee. Sometimes, it’s as simple as working together with your family or friends to see how you can make changes that impact the planet in a positive way. The NW Earth Institute has challenges and discussion resources that show how changes in everyday habits can make a difference. 

“For over 200 years we’ve been depleting and dirtying our resources to the point where sustainability has become an urgent issue,” Lisa notes. “But it’s not insurmountable if we each do our part.” 

The idea of saving the planet is finally gaining some traction with the masses even though scientists and climate activists have been raising the alarm for decades. Are you doing your part? If not, why not spend 10 minutes reading the Green New Deal to learn more about what’s needed or listen to the podcast How to Save a Planet or, better yet, listen to climate activist Greta Thunberg at the U.N.’s 2019 Climate Action Summit. She’ll tell you how it is in about five minutes and she does it with heart.

If we each do our part...

— Tammy Wilhoite

Be Afraid and Do It Anyway

Several years ago, I started using this motto, “Be Afraid and Do It Anyway.”  A friend  had stage 3 cancer, and you know what happens when you get that wakeup call that says, “What am I waiting for?” It’s served me well, especially when I listen to my heart. 

Most recently my partner and I purchased a farm in Gaston, Oregon, and we have been busy making it our own. We both want to learn to grow our own healthy food in hopes of being able to share it with the community. There are hundreds of reasons to grow locally, organically and sustainably, and not a darn one that I can think of not to do it. Except, of course, that it involves a lot of unknowns and is a lot of hard work. Hence the motto. We pushed through the soggy spring with muddy boots to make sure we had a garden area ready for summer. We bought 20 baby chicks in April and raised them to be egg layers. We are putting in a goat barn and fence with the goal of one day offering an eco-friendly goat-brush-clearing service.  

I’m happy to report that we now have more tomatoes and squash than we can eat. We’ve offered up our excess on the Forest Grove free classified Facebook group and the community has responded with a demand that I find both heartwarming and heartbreaking. People want organic, fresh produce and there are hungry families out there. It was scary to put the offer out there - will they come? They did. We will keep going. We are already talking about what we will do differently next year.

 We’ve also eaten our very first three eggs, and they were yummy. We don’t have enough to share yet, but by October we should be getting about a dozen a day. We are looking at how those eggs find their way to deserving customers. We will sell some in order to give some away. Raising chickens feels a bit scary, too.  It’s a big responsibility, taking care of them, keeping them safe from predators and getting up every day (early) to let them out. I love watching them and learning their chicken behaviors and the funny thing is I find them very calming. Maybe there is a chicken therapy offering in my future? 

In my spare time, I’m an Executive Leadership Coach and I also work for Social Venture Partners Portland running the Encore Fellows Program. My partner is an Early Childhood Education teacher at Adelante Mujeres. When the garden and chickens are all quiet we also collect toys and shoes for Latino kids in need in Oregon and Mexico. It’s not a nonprofit yet, but someday maybe it will be if we follow the motto, “Be Afraid and Do It Anyway!”

Grateful and constantly inspired to be a part of Ninety Nine Girlfriends.

— Linda K. Williams

Finding Purpose and Pleasure in the Pandemic

Photo by Deborah Edward

I’m a relatively unruffable person. When COVID-19 lockdown began I got ready. My closest family and I, living blocks apart, figured out how to organize our worlds where they could get groceries for me, I could hang with my 5-year old grandson, and together we could let the story unfold. I started a few good habits, like reading Heather Cox Richardson’s “Letters from an American” each morning and doubling my meditation time. But time began to work differently, and the wrong things began to creep into my thinking: fear, doubt, despair, alarm, suspicion, grouchiness. So I turned to finding things that could distract me, engage me, inspire me, and allow for action, results and success. And there was ninety-nine girlfriends’ calendar - waiting for me.

When the COVID-19 lockdown began. Ninety-nine girlfriends was in the midst of lots of what I call high-touch membership recruiting--meaning in-person events where we could shake hands and hug. Our calendar of activities  scheduled out the work of my committee – Member Education. We’re charged with presenting programs around an annual learning question as well as offering other favorite programs.  Over the course of four years, the education calendar had settled into a rhythm of a few spring events, a summer break with assorted social activities and then a ramp-up of autumn programming. Wrong calendar for COVID-19.  The prescience of other girlfriends who had friends, family or personal experiences giving them a better forecasting sense about when we’d reopen made it clear quite quickly that in-person activities would not be happening  anytime soon.  

Early in lockdown the Women’s Foundation of Oregon invited  ninety-nine girlfriends to join a zoom seminar about a relief fund for those affected by the early implications of COVID-19. The new Relief Fund was supporting domestic violence shelters needing to find safe alternative housing for their clients, the child care centers losing business but trying to retain jobs and others who were at immediate risk of having to close critical social fabric services. We jumped at the chance, and got a quick lesson in Zoom technology. The event reached more than 150 members. This response showed us there was a thirst for connection, for information and for ways to take action. It provided evidence that we needed to do more. Our Member Education Committee quickly pivoted to embrace the virtual technology. We produced our Discovery Forum online, and  created new summer programs that could be online, but would also be interactive, informational, supportive and fun.

Being a member of an all-volunteer women’s group with a very fluid structure means doing things differently than I did as an Executive Director, a consultant or a college teacher. I was guided by a few maxims that reflect our ninety-nine girlfriends culture and decision-making style:

• Always learning

• Err on the side of generosity

• Strive for consensus, but majority rules

• Recognize that although we all have different lived experiences, we share common values

• Build on strengths

• Diversity in perspectives creates deeper, richer, better results

When the news cycle made me despondent, I signed on to Linked-In and sleuthed the backgrounds and interests of new ninety-nine girlfriends, to find potential candidates to share their passion, expertise or experience in our “Let’s Talk About….” Series.  When I awakened with a sense of impending doom, I’d pop onto my computer and clean up files and folders related to ninety-nine activities. I read up on what was happening across the world in other collective giving circles and supported my colleagues as they created new paths to get things done in our grantmaking and communications. I was lucky that I kept being invited to run a seminar, to answer a question, to speak with a new member – all worthwhile endeavors that could help me feel my agency, my worth, my value, that what I was doing was helping someone else.

Turning my despair to action resulted in a lively calendar of programming for ninety-nine girlfriends this summer. One of the most enjoyable activities was working with Kathy Masarie and her husband Chip to organize our “Unconference” – a delightful medley of online activities one summer Sunday afternoon that invited members to share their passions with other girlfriends, to co-create together and to appreciate the amazing energy that comes from being together. That experience, watching Chip write code to make our Unconference work, inspired me to sign up for an online class to learn the “python” coding language.

This summer I didn’t reach my goals in long-distance bike riding. I didn’t become a better piano player or learn to knit or crochet. My bread baking still falls flat, although my attempts to harvest my backyard fruits and make jam turned out well. My attempts to learn basic computer programming ended in tears. But my ninety-nine girlfriends activities yielded pleasure, pride, and purpose.  

--Deborah Edward