sabbatical logs

​I have been working on the website and editing the interviews.  I have compiled photographs for each woman in the interviews which will be added in the video I am creating and which will eventually be on the website.  I went back to Janina’s home, the Polish woman I interviewed in July before going to Italy.  She allowed me to take some personal pictures to add into the video and we talked again.  Well, actually she talked again.  She added more story to her story.  I didn’t record this time.  I just sat and listened and again was so moved by her experiences.  She spoke more about her life in the United States and her husband and losing him when she was in her early 60’s.  What I found and find so inspiring about all these women is how they talk about their life experiences, especially their losses.  It’s sad yes, but they don’t speak with sadness, they speak with such truth, with such directness and say without using the words, that life has loss yet they are still here, living, loving, laughing, crying and telling their stories.  They are strong and they’re at an age where, as my Grandmother says, there shouldn’t be any ‘bull-a-shita’.
 
When I say these women don’t speak without sadness, I don’t mean they are numb to the loss.  I just feel that as they speak, they know and do not deny the reality of loss in life.  Oddly, as I write this, I am hearing of ANOTHER mass shooting in California.  I can’t help but ask, have we become numb to loss?
 
I came across an organization called StoryCorps.  I encourage everyone to check it out www.storycorps.org .  It’s a non- for- profit that collects stories and then archives them at the Library of Congress.  I will be looking into this more and possibly see if I can incorporate it into my project.