The Open Road: a learning community

¡Bibliophiles Unanimous!: FOOD! 2/16/25
2025-02-16 15:00 - 17:00 (America/Los_Angeles)
painting by Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1526-1593)

¡Beloved Bibliophiles!

On Sunday, February 16th, from 3 to 5 pm (PST), our theme is FOOD!
Here’s the Zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87614013058

I hope to see you there!

paz, amor y comida

Juanito

peace, love, happiness & understanding 3/6/25
2025-03-06 - 2025-04-02
angel sighted in Plaza La Paz, Guanajuato, Mexico

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

March 6, 2025

We are loved by trees.

—Thich Nhat Hanh, Teachings on Love, p. 5
*

The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.

—John Milton, from “Paradise Lost”
*

Paradise, and groves
Elysian, Fortunate Fields—like those of old
Sought in the Atlantic Main, why should they be
A history only of departed things,
Or a mere fiction of what never was?
For the discerning intellect of Man,
When wedded to this goodly universe
In love and holy passion, shall find these
A simple produce of the common day.

—William Wordsworth, from “The Excursion”
*

Ken Margolis sent this poem:

Bee! I’m expecting you!
Was saying Yesterday
To Somebody you know
That you were due–

The Frogs got Home last Week–
Are settled and at work–
Birds, mostly back—
The Clover warm and thick—

You’ll get my Letter by
The seventeenth; Reply
Or better, be with me–
Your’s, Fly.

–Emily Dickinson
*

Jill Littlewood sent this poem:

The Opera Singer

Today my heart is so goddamned fat with grief
that I’ve begun hauling it in a wheelbarrow. No. It’s an anvil
dragging from my neck as I swim
through choppy waters swollen with the putrid corpses of hippos,
which means lurking, somewhere below, is the hungry
snout of a croc waiting to spin me into an oblivion
worse than this run-on simile, which means only to say:
I’m sad. And everyone knows what that means.

And in my sadness I’ll walk to a café,
and not see light in the trees, nor finger the bills in my pocket
as I pass the boarded houses on the block. No,
I will be slogging through the obscure country of my sadness
in all its monotone flourish, and so imagine my surprise
when my self-absorption gets usurped
by the sound of opera streaming from an open window,
and the sun peeks ever-so-slightly from behind his shawl,
and this singing is getting closer, so that I can hear the
delicately rolled r’s like a hummingbird fluttering the tongue
which means a language more beautiful than my own,
and I don’t recognize the song
though I’m jogging toward it and can hear the woman’s
breathing through the record’s imperfections and above me
two bluebirds dive and dart and a rogue mulberry branch
leaning over an abandoned lot drags itself across my face,
staining it purple and looking, now, like a mad warrior of glee
and relief I run down the street, and I forgot to mention
the fifty or so kids running behind me, some in diapers,
some barefoot, all of them winged and waving their pacifiers
and training wheels and nearly trampling me
when in a doorway I see a woman in slippers and a floral housedress
blowing in the warm breeze who is maybe seventy painting the doorway
and friends, it is not too much to say
it was heaven sailing from her mouth and all the fish in the sea
and giraffe saunter and sugar in my tea and the forgotten angles
of love and every name of the unborn and dead
from this abuelita only glancing at me
before turning back to her earnest work of brushstroke and lullaby
and because we all know the tongue’s clumsy thudding
makes of miracles anecdotes let me stop here
and tell you I said thank you.

—Ross Gay
*

Elizabeth Domike sent this poem:

Joseph Sleeps,

his eyelids like a moth’s fringed wings.
Arms flail against the Ninja Turtle sheet
and suddenly-long legs
race time.

Awake, he’s a water-leak detector, a recycling ranger
who bans Styrofoam and asks for beeswax
crayons, a renewable resource.
He wants to adopt the Missouri river,
write the president
to make factories stop polluting.

They’re old friends, he and George Bush.
He writes and scolds
the president, every month or so,
about the bombing the children of Iraq
(he made his own sign to carry in protest),
about the plight of the California condor and northern gray wolf,
about more shelters and aid for the homeless.
The lion-shaped bulletin board in his room
is covered with pictures and letters from George,
who must be nice,
even if he is a slow learner.

Joseph is a mystery fan, owns 54 Nancy Drews.
Nancy’s his friend, along with Jo, Meg, and Amy
and poor Beth, of course, whom he still mourns.
He also reads of knights and wizards, superheroes,
and how to win at Nintendo.

The cats and houseplants are his to feed and water
and the sunflower blooming in the driveway’s border
of weeds. He drew our backyard to scale,
using map symbols, sent off to have it declared
an official wildlife refuge, left a good-night
note on my pillow, written in Egyptian hieroglyphs.

In my life, I have done one good thing.

—Linda Rodriguez
*

I love this poem by Walt Whitman!

Beginning My Studies

Beginning my studies the first step pleas’d me so much,
The mere fact consciousness, these forms, the power of motion,
The least insect or animal, the senses, eyesight, love,
The first step I say awed me and pleas’d me so much,
I have hardly gone and hardly wish’d to go any farther,
But stop and loiter all the time to sing it in ecstatic songs.
*

While in Mexico, I’m reading the poetry and prose of the English Romantic poets, and critical writings about them—in order to better understand who they were, the times they lived in, and what their ideas were. Kathleen Raine is one of my guides:

[Shelley] is the poet of apokatastasis, the restitution of all things to their essential perfection. In his belief that this possibility lies latent in man and in all creation, Shelley has the unanimous teaching of tradition, both pre-Christian and Christian, with him; besides the interior assent of every spirit not quite dead. Nor was he wrong in believing that love is the transforming principle which alone can bring this about, uniting what is divided, transforming…the hateful into the beautiful….

Love is the agent of apokatastasis; a truth which the Christian church itself acknowledges in the sacramental nature of marriage. His vision of the harmonious co-existence of all things in the state of Paradise (to which love, in whatever form, gives access) he has perhaps communicated (in “Prometheus Unbound” especially) more perfectly than has any other English poet….We can no more object that such poetic evocation of the state of beatitude itself lacks “the sense of evil” than we can make the objection to Mozart’s D-minor quartet. It might be said that the arts exist, finally, for no other end than the holding before us of images of Paradise.

—Kathleen Raine, from “A Defense of Shelley’s Poetry,” in Defending Ancient Springs, pp. 154-155

—Johnny Stallings
*

Upwelling

Dawn in the dark, dream in the mind,
whale in the sea, tree in the seed, seed
in the earth, leaf in the bud, fledgling
in the nest, pollen in the wind, rain in
the sky, pain in the past, love in the heart,
wonder in tomorrow, song in sorrow, song
at the tip of the tongue, mute poem coiled
in the pen aching to ooze forth to find
a reader in need, a listener long waiting,
a generation opening eyes, ready to rise,
birds in the trees singing “Here we are
and there you are and aren’t we all related?”

—Kim Stafford
*

Jeffrey Sher shared this poem by Billy Collins:

The Lanyard

The other day I was ricocheting slowly
off the blue walls of this room,
moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one into the past more suddenly—
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid long thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,
laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hand,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

—Billy Collins
*

Hi Johnny.

Thinking about how we are often asked to show up to get-togethers with an open heart. Such a gentle request.

Here in Santa Barbara where the flora and fauna are desserty and dry, the difference from NW rain effects wakes me with wonder.

There was a refreshing rain recently, so lavender and herbs and bougainvillea are blooming in winter.

Finches and warblers and hummingbirds flitter along with the tiny leaves of the old oaks and sunlight flickers through the tree tops along with them. Quail and chipmunks skitter about. The sudden abundance of new bird songs – feels fleeting . . . .

I think about what I’ll miss not seeing my granddaughter for a week. She is taking her first walk without holding onto my fingers! Impermanence can be heartrending, but this is how it is.

Brian Doyle wrote a book about the heart as a wet engine while he was worrying about his son’s heart health.

Here are some musings by him:

“Our hearts are not pure:
our hearts are filled with need
and greed as much as with love and grace,
and we wrestle with our hearts all the time.
The wrestling is who we are.
How we wrestle is who we are.
What we want to be is never what we are.
Not yet. Maybe that’s why we have these
relentless engines in our chests, driving us forward
toward what we might be.”

—Brian Doyle

“So much held in a heart in a lifetime. So much held in a heart in a day, an hour, a moment. We are utterly open with no one, in the end — not mother and father, not wife or husband, not lover, not child, not friend. We open windows to each but we live alone in the house of the heart. Perhaps we must. Perhaps we could not bear to be so naked, for fear of a constantly harrowed heart. When young we think there will come one person who will savor and sustain us always; when we are older we know this is the dream of a child, that all hearts finally are bruised and scarred, scored and torn, repaired by time and will, patched by force of character, yet fragile and rickety forevermore, no matter how ferocious the defense and how many bricks you bring to the wall. You can brick up your heart as stout and tight and hard and cold and impregnable as you possibly can and down it comes in an instant, felled by a woman’s second glance, a child’s apple breath, the shatter of glass in the road, the words ‘I have something to tell you,’ a cat with a broken spine dragging itself into the forest to die, the brush of your mother’s papery ancient hand in a thicket of your hair, the memory of your father’s voice early in the morning echoing from the kitchen where he is making pancakes for his children.”

—Brian Doyle, from One Long River of Song: Notes on Wonder.

“We’re here for a little window. And to use that time to catch and share shards of light and laughter and grace seems to me the great story.”

—Brian Doyle

May we show up with a healthy and open heart to what comes next.

—Katie Radditz
*

Hope

Peace love happiness understanding…and hope. What’s the opposite of hope? At the least, resignation; at the most, despair. I am not willing to accept either resignation or despair; it’s not in my nature. And how can you experience and live in those four qualities of PLH and U without Hope? Not possible, I’d wager.

So how do I live in Hope? First I think of the men in prison. We talked a lot about hope, and they were inspirational to me. I’d ask them to describe or explain their visions of hope. Initially the talk was not so optimistic, with good reason. The more we all talked, however, the more beauty arose—more examples of the four qualities of peace, love, happiness and understanding…and compassion and gratitude and reciprocity and joy, and…you name it, every positive quality of life, of living rose to the surface as part of their mutual experiences. Those who were low on hope were lifted by others. I was lifted and illuminated by all the shared experiences. I was astonished and humbled; with my fortunate life compared to theirs, how could I be without hope?

I was reminded of the centuries-old German peasant song of revolt, “Die Gedanken Sind Frei,” “(My) Thoughts Are Free”:

My thoughts are free, I proudly profess them.
No fence can confine them,
No creed undermine them,.
They ring from on high:
Die Gedanken Sind Frei!”

I was reminded of Václav Havel: “Perhaps Hope is not something we search for, but something we let in.” and “Hope is a feeling that life and work have a meaning.”

Hope is the embodiment of peace, love, happiness and understanding, and just now we all need to let Hope into our lives.

And if all else fails to give you hope, just look outside right now at the snowdrops and daffodils, springing from the cold, dark earth into the light of day, again and again, year after year. That’s Hope.

—Jude Russell

¡Bibliophiles Unanimous! 3/16/25
2025-03-16 15:00 - 17:00
Naomi Shihab Nye

¡Beloved Bibliophiles!

On Sunday, March 16th, at 3 pm (PDT), our theme is POEMS!
Bring poems to read–your own poems, or favorite poems that other people wrote.

Here’s the Zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87614013058

I hope to see you there!

peace, love & poetry

Johnny

Indigo Small Press Month Reading 3/21/25
2025-03-21 19:00 - 20:30
BOLD Coffee & Books presents:

Indigo Small Press Month Reading

with Kristen Hall-Geisler, Andrew Shaffer & Johnny Stallings

Friday, March 21st, 7 p.m.
1755 SW Jefferson St., Portand

FREE Event

boldcoffeeandbooks.com & indigoediting.com

The Fabulous Deck Boys at Ross Island Grocery & Cafe 3/21/25
2025-03-21 19:00 - 21:00
Brad Price, KC Craine & Jeffrey Sher

¡Hey Everyone!

The FABULOUS DECK BOYS, featuring Jeffrey Sher, are playing at Ross Island Grocery & Cafe on Friday, March 21st!

3502 S Corbett Ave
7-9 p.m.
$5 Suggested

For more info about the DECK BOYS, click here:

https://www.deckboys.com/

peace, love & music

Johnny

WARPed or How I Graduated from the School for Phils 3/22/25
2025-03-22 15:00 - 17:00
“Your head’s a circus, Phil. You should sit back and enjoy it.
You’ve got the front seat.”

WARPed
or
How I Graduated from the School for Phils

Johnny Stallings tells hair-raising tales of performing the longest part in the longest play in the English language.

Saturday, March 22, 3 pm
Muir Hall at Taborspace, 5441 SE Belmont, Portland

this Open Road event is FREE

On the Rocky Road
2025-03-28 19:00 - 21:00
Open Road recommends…

Master Storyteller Will Hornyak presents:

ON THE ROCKY ROAD
in March Live and on Zoom

Dear Friends,

At a time when many of us feel estranged and alienated
within our own land, when people, careers and institutions
are banished daily without debate, I think it’s helpful
to consider the world’s oldest stories on the subject of
outcasts and exiles.

Myths speak to us from the extremes of the human
condition and offer ideas on how to navigate
difficult passages as individuals and societies. The outcast
and the exile are age-old conditions of the soul as well as
current troubles within the culture. There are some
cultures and people all too familiar with the archetype
of the outcast and the exile. Those voices and perspectives
are essential now as they see these troubled times with
a darkened eye and
understand what is required to journey beyond the
current wasteland and return with renewed vision, vitality
and possibility.
In that spirit, please join us for an evening of tales,
songs and poems inspired by wandering peddlers,
itinerant musicians, landless outcasts and banished poets
on Ireland’s long and rocky road of exile. A celebration
of St. Patrick, Druid’s Day and the countless gods and
goddesses of the Celtic Pantheon.

Slainte!
William Kennedy Hornyak

Friday March 28 7 p.m.
Doors at 6:30 p.m.
Taborspace Copeland Commons
5441 SE Belmont Portland
$20.00 Cash/Check/Venmo/Paypal at the Door
Reservations Recommend: hornyak.will@gmail.com
For Information: hornyak.will@gmail.com or
503 697-5808

peace, love, happiness & understanding 4/3/25
2025-04-03 - 2025-04-30
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

April 3, 2025

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) is best known for his essays. Here’s a lecture he gave in 1838. It’s worth taking the time to read. He is confident that “war is on its last legs.” It’s funny—I had the same confidence at the age of 18, in 1969. He wonders: “Cannot love be, as well as hate?….Cannot peace be, as well as war?” I’ve been wondering the same thing for 56 years.

War

It has been a favorite study of modern philosophy, to indicate the steps of human progress, to watch the rising of a thought in one man’s mind, the communication of it to a few, to a small minority, its expansion and general reception, until it publishes itself to the world by destroying the existing laws and institutions, and the generation of new. Looked at in this general and historical way, many things wear a very different face from that they show near by, and one at a time, and, particularly, war. War, which, to sane men at the present day, begins to look like an epidemic insanity, breaking out here and there like the cholera or influenza, infecting men’s brains instead of their bowels, when seen in the remote past, in the infancy of society, appears a part of the connection of events, and, in its place, necessary.

As far as history has preserved to us the slow unfoldings of any savage tribe, it is not easy to see how war could be avoided by such wild, passionate, needy, ungoverned, strong bodied creatures. For in the infancy of society, when a thin population and improvidence make the supply of food and of shelter insufficient and very precarious, and when hunger, thirst, ague, and frozen limbs universally take precedence of the wants of the mind and the heart, the necessities of the strong will certainly be satisfied at the cost of the weak, at whatever peril of future revenge. It is plain, too, that, in the first dawnings of the religious sentiment, that blends itself with their passions, and is oil to the fire. Not only every tribe has war-gods, religious festivals in victory, but religious wars.

The student of history acquiesces the more readily in this copious bloodshed of the early annals, bloodshed in God’s name too, when be learns that it is a temporary and preparatory state, and does actively forward the culture of man. War educates the senses, calls into action the will, perfects the physical constitution, brings men into such swift and close collision in critical moments that man measures man. On its own scale, on the virtues it loves, it endures no counterfeit, but shakes the whole society, until every atom falls into the place its specific gravity assigns it. It presently finds the value of good sense and of foresight, and Ulysses takes rank next to Achilles. The leaders, picked men of a courage and vigor tried and augmented in fifty battles, are emulous to distinguish themselves above each other by new merits, as clemency, hospitality, splendor of living. The people imitate the chiefs. The strong tribe, in which war has become an art, attack and conquer their neighbours, and teach them their arts and virtues. New territory, augmented numbers, and extended interests call out new virtues and abilities, and the tribe makes long strides. And, finally, when much progress has been made, all its secrets of wisdom and art are disseminated by its invasions. Plutarch, in his essay “On the Fortune of Alexander,” considers the invasion and conquest of the East by Alexander as one of the most bright and pleasing pages in history; and it must be owned, he gives sound reason for his opinion. It had the effect of uniting into one great interest the divided commonwealths of Greece, and infusing a new and more enlarged public spirit into the councils of their statesmen. It carried the arts and language and philosophy of the Greeks into the sluggish and barbarous nations of Persia, Assyria, and India. It introduced the arts of husbandry among tribes of hunters and shepherds. It weaned the Scythians and Persians from some cruel and licentious practices, to a more civil way of life. It introduced the sacredness of marriage among them. It built seventy cities, and sowed the Greek customs and humane laws over Asia, and united hostile nations under one code. It brought different families of the human race together, to blows at first, but afterwards to truce, to trade, and to intermarriage. It would be very easy to show analogous benefits that have resulted from military movements of later ages.

Considerations of this kind lead us to a true view of the nature and office of war. We see, it is the subject of all history; that it has been the principal employment of the most conspicuous men; that it is at this moment the delight of half the world, of almost all young and ignorant persons; that it is exhibited to us continually in the dumb show of brute nature, where war between tribes, and between individuals of the same tribe, perpetually rages. The microscope reveals miniature butchery in atomies and infinitely small biters, that swim and fight in an illuminated drop of water; and the little globe is but a too faithful miniature of the large.

What does all this war, beginning from the lowest races and reaching up to man, signify? Is it not manifest that it covers a great and beneficent principle, which nature had deeply at heart? What is that principle?” It is self-help. Nature implants with life the instinct of self-help, perpetual struggle to be, to resist opposition, to attain to freedom, to attain to a mastery, and the security of a permanent, self-defended being; and to each creature these objects are made so dear, that it risks its life continually in the struggle for these ends.

But whilst this principle, necessarily, is inwrought into the fabric of every creature, yet it is but one instinct; and though a primary one, or we may say the very first, yet the appearance of the other instincts immediately modifies and controls this; turns its energies into harmless, useful, and high courses, showing thereby what was its ultimate design; and, finally, takes out its fangs. The instinct of self-help is very early unfolded in the coarse and merely brute form of war, only in the childhood and imbecility of the other instincts, and remains in that form, only until their development. It is the ignorant and childish part of mankind that is the fighting part. Idle and vacant minds want excitement, as all boys kill cats. Bull-baiting, cockpits, and the boxer’s ring, are the enjoyment of the part of society whose animal nature alone has been developed. In some parts of this country, where the intellectual and moral faculties have as yet scarcely any culture, the absorbing topic of all conversation is whipping; who fought, and which whipped? Of man, boy, or beast, the only trait that much interests the speakers is the pugnacity. And why? Because the speaker has as yet no other image of manly activity and virtue, none of endurance, none of perseverance, none of charity, none of the attainment of truth. Put him into a circle of cultivated men, where the conversation broaches the great questions that besiege the human reason, and he would be dumb and unhappy, as an Indian in church.

To men of a sedate and mature spirit, in whom is any knowledge or mental activity, the detail of battle becomes insupportably tedious and revolting. It is like the talk of one of those monomaniacs, whom we sometimes meet in society, who converse on horses; and Fontenelle expressed a volume of meaning, when he said, “I hate war, for it spoils conversation.”

Nothing is plainer than that the sympathy with war is a juvenile and temporary state. Not only the moral sentiment, but trade, learning, and whatever makes intercourse, conspire to put it down. Trade, as all men know, is the antagonist of war. Wherever there is no property, the people will put on the knapsack for bread; but trade is instantly endangered and destroyed. And, moreover, trade brings men to look each other in the face, and gives the parties the knowledge that these enemies over sea or over the mountain are such men as we; who laugh and grieve, who love and fear, as we do. And learning and art, and especially religion, weave ties that make war look like fratricide, as it is. And as all history is the picture of war, as we have said, so it is no less true that it is the record of the mitigation and decline of war. Early in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the Italian cities had grown so populous and strong, that they forced the rural nobility to dismantle their castles, which were dens of cruelty, and come and reside in the towns. The Popes, to their eternal honor, declared religious jubilees, during which all hostilities were suspended throughout Christendom, and man had a breathing space. The increase of civility has abolished the use of poison and of torture, once supposed as necessary as navies now. And, finally, the art of war what with gunpowder and tactics has made, as all men know, battles less frequent and less murderous.

By all these means, war has been steadily on the decline; and we read with astonishment of the beastly fighting of the old times. Only in Elizabeth’s time, out of the European waters, piracy was all but universal. The proverb was,”No peace beyond the line;” and the seamen shipped on the buccaneer’s bargain, “No prey, no pay.” In 1588, the celebrated Cavendish, who was thought in his times a good Christian man, wrote thus to Lord Hunsdon, on his return from a voyage round the world: “Sept. 1588. It hath pleased Almighty God to suffer me to circumpass the whole globe of the world, entering in at the Strait of Magellan, and returning by the Cape of Buena Esperanca; in which voyage, I have either discovered or brought certain intelligence of all the rich places of the world, which were ever discovered by any Christian. I navigated along the coast of Chili, Peru, and New Spain, where I made great spoils. I burnt and sunk nineteen sail of ships, small and great. All the villages and towns that ever I landed at, I burned and spoiled. And had I not been discovered upon the coast, I had taken great quantity of treasure. The matter of most profit to me was a great ship of the king’s, which I took at California,” &c. and the good Cavendish piously begins this statement, “It hath pleased Almighty God.”

Indeed, our American annals have preserved the vestiges of barbarous warfare down to more recent times. I read in Williams’s History of Maine, that “Assacombuit, the Sagamore of the Anagunticook tribe, was remarkable for his turpitude and ferocity above all other known Indians; that, in 1705, Vaudreuil sent him to France, where he was introduced to the king, When he appeared at court, he lifted up his hand, and said, ‘This hand has slain a hundred and fifty of your majesty’s enemies within the territories of New England.’ This so pleased the king, that he knighted him, and ordered a pension of eight livres a day to be paid him during life.” This valuable person, on his return to America, took to killing his own neighbors and kindred with such appetite, that his tribe combined against him, and would have killed him, had he not fled his country for ever.

The scandal which we feel in such facts certainly shows, that we have got on a little. All history is the decline of war, though the slow decline. All that society has yet gained is mitigation: the doctrine of the right of war still remains.

For ages (for ideas work in ages, and animate vast societies of men) the human race has gone on under the tyranny shall I so call it? of this first brutish form of their effort to be men; that is, for ages they have shared so much of the nature of the lower animals, the tiger and the shark, and the savages of the water-drop. They have nearly exhausted all the good and all the evil of this form: they have held as fast to this degradation, as their worst enemy could desire; but all things have an end, and so has this. The eternal germination of the better has unfolded new powers, new instincts, which were really concealed under this rough and base rind. The sublime question has startled one and another happy soul in different quarters of the globe. Cannot love be, as well as hate? Would not love answer the same end, or even a better? Cannot peace be, as well as war?

This thought is no man’s invention, neither St. Pierre’s nor Rousseau’s, but the rising of the general tide in the human soul, and rising highest, and first made visible, in the most simple and pure souls, who have therefore announced it to us beforehand; but presently we all see it. It has now become so distinct as to be a social thought: societies can be formed on it. It is expounded, illustrated, defined, with different degrees of clearness; and its actualization, or the measures it should inspire, predicted according to the light of each seer.

The idea itself is the epoch; the fact that it has become so distinct to any small number of persons as to become a subject of prayer and hope, of concert and discussion, that is the commanding fact. This having come, much more will follow. Revolutions go not backward. The star once risen, though only one man in the hemisphere has yet seen its upper limb in the horizon, will mount and mount, until it becomes visible to other men, to multitudes, and climbs the zenith of all eyes. And so, it is not a great matter how long men refuse to believe the advent of peace: war is on its last legs; and a universal peace is as sure as is the prevalence of civilization over barbarism, of liberal governments over feudal forms. The question for us is only, How soon?

That the project of peace should appear visionary to great numbers of sensible men; should appear laughable, even, to numbers; should appear to the grave and good-natured to be embarrassed with extreme practical difficulties, is very natural. “This is a poor, tedious society of yours,” they say: “we do not see what good can come of it. Peace! why, we are all at peace now. But if a foreign nation should wantonly insult or plunder our commerce, or, worse yet, should land on our shores to rob and kill, you would not have us sit, and be robbed and killed? You mistake the times; you overestimate the virtue of men. You forget, that the quiet which now sleeps in cities and in farms, which lets the wagon go unguarded and the farm-house unbolted, rests on the perfect understanding of all men; that the musket, the halter, and the jail stand behind there, perfectly ready to punish any disturber of it. All admit, that this would be the best policy, if the world were all a church, if all men were the best men, if all would agree to accept this rule. But it is absurd for one nation to attempt it alone.”

In the first place, we answer, that we never make much account of objections which merely respect the actual state of the world at this moment, but which admit the general expediency and permanent excellence of the project. What is the best must be the true; and what is true that is, what is at bottom fit and agreeable to the constitution of man must at last prevail over all obstruction and all opposition. There is no good now enjoyed by society, that was not once as problematical and visionary as this. It is the tendency of the true interest of man to become his desire and steadfast aim.

But, farther, it is a lesson, which all history teaches wise men, to put trust in ideas, and not in circumstances. We have all grown up in the sight of frigates and navy yards, of armed forts and islands, of arsenals and militia. The reference to any foreign register will inform us of the number of thousand or million men that are now under arms in the vast colonial system of the British empire, of Russia, Austria, and France; and one is scared to find at what a cost the peace of the globe is kept. This vast apparatus of artillery, of fleets, of stone bastions and trenches and embankments; this incessant patrolling of sentinels; this waving of national flags; this reveille and evening gun; this martial music, and endless playing of marches, and singing of military and naval songs, seem to us to constitute an imposing actual, which will not yield, in centuries, to the feeble, deprecatory voices of a handful of friends of peace.

Thus always we are daunted by the appearances; not seeing that their whole value lies at bottom in the state of mind. It is really a thought that built this portentous war-establishment, and a thought shall also melt it away. Every nation and every man instantly surround themselves with a material apparatus which exactly corresponds to their moral state, or their state of thought. Observe how every truth and every error, each a thought of some man’s mind, clothes itself with societies, houses, cities, language, ceremonies, newspapers. Observe how every truth and every error, each a thought of some man’s mind, clothes itself with societies, houses, cities, language, ceremonies, newspapers. Observe the ideas of the present day, orthodoxy, skepticism, missions, popular education, temperance, anti-masonry, anti-slavery; see how each of these abstractions has embodied itself in an imposing apparatus in the community; and how timber, brick, lime, and stone have flown into convenient shape, obedient to the master-idea reigning in the minds of many persons.

You shall hear, some day, of a wild fancy, which some man has in his brain, of the mischief of secret oaths. Come again, one or two years afterwards, and you shall see it has built great houses of solid wood and brick and mortar. You shall see an hundred presses printing a million sheets; you shall see men and horses and wheels made to walk, run, and roll for it: this great body of matter thus executing that one man’s wild thought. This happens daily, yearly about us, with half thoughts, often with flimsy lies, pieces of policy and speculation. With good nursing, they will last three or four years, before they will come to nothing. But when a truth appears, as, for instance, a perception in the wit of one Columbus, that there is land in the Western Sea; though he alone of all men has that thought, and they all jeer, it will build ships; it will build fleets; it will carry over half Spain and half England; it will plant a colony, a state, nations, and half a globe full of men.

We surround ourselves always, according to our freedom and ability, with true images of ourselves in things, whether it be ships or books, or cannons or churches. The standing army, the arsenal, the camp, and the gibbet do not appertain to man. They only serve as an index to show where man is now; what a bad, ungoverned temper he has; what an ugly neighbor he is; how his affections halt; how low his hope lies. He who loves the bristle of bayonets, only sees in their glitter what beforehand he feels in his heart. It is avarice and hatred; it is that quivering lip, that cold, hating eye, which builded magazines and powder-houses.

It follows, of course, that the least change in the man will change his circumstances; the least enlargement of his ideas, the least mitigation of his feelings, in respect to other men; if, for example, he could be inspired with a tender kindness to the souls of men, and should come to feel that every man was another self, with whom he might come to join, as left hand works with right. Every degree of the ascendancy of this feeling would cause the most striking changes of external things: the tents would be struck; the men-of-war would rot ashore; the arms rust; the cannon would become street-posts; the pikes, a fisher’s harpoon; the marching regiment would be a caravan of emigrants, peaceful pioneers at the fountains of the Wabash and the Missouri. And so it must and will be: bayonet and sword must first retreat a little from their present ostentatious prominence; then quite hide themselves, as the sheriff’s halter does now, inviting the attendance only of relations and friends; and then, lastly, will be transferred to the museums of the curious, as poisoning and torturing tools are at this day.

War and peace thus resolve themselves into a mercury of the state of cultivation. At a certain stage of his progress, the man fights, if he be of a sound body and mind. At a certain higher stage, he makes no offensive demonstration, but is alert to repel injury, and of an unconquerable heart. At a still higher stage, he comes into the region of holiness; passion has passed away from him; his warlike nature is all converted into an active medicinal principle; he sacrifices himself, and accepts with alacrity wearisome tasks of denial and charity; but, being attacked, he bears it, and turns the other cheek, as one engaged, throughout his being, no longer to the service of an individual, but to the common soul of all men.

Since the peace question has been before the public mind, those who affirm its right and expediency have naturally been met with objections more or less weighty. There are cases frequently put by the curious,â€”moral problems, like those problems in arithmetic, which in long winter evenings the rustics try the hardness of their heads in ciphering out. And chiefly it is said, “Either accept this principle for better, for worse, carry it out to the end, and meet its absurd consequences; or else, if you pretend to set an arbitrary limit, a “Thus far, no farther,” then give up the principle, and take that limit which the common sense of all mankind has set, and which distinguishes offensive war as criminal, defensive war as just. Otherwise, if you go for no way, then be consistent, and give up self-defence in the highway, in your own house. Will you push it thus far ? Will you stick to your principle of non-resistance, when your strong-box is broken open, when your wife and babes are insulted and slaughtered in your sight? If you say yes, you only invite the robber and assassin; and a few bloody-minded desperadoes would soon butcher the good.

In reply to this charge of absurdity on the extreme peace doctrine, as shown in the supposed consequences, I wish to say, that such deductions consider only one half of the fact. They look only at the passive side of the friend of peace, only at his passivity; they quite omit to consider his activity. But no man, it may be presumed, ever embraced the cause of peace and philanthropy, for the sole end and satisfaction of being plundered and slain. A man does not come the length of the spirit of martyrdom, without some active purpose, some equal motive, some flaming love. If you have a nation of men who have risen to that height of moral cultivation that they will not declare war or carry arms, for they have not so much madness left in their brains, you have a nation of lovers, of benefactors, of true, great, and able, men. Let me know more of that nation; I shall not find them defenceless, with idle hands springing at their sides. I shall find them men of love, honor, and truth; men of an immense industry; men whose influence is felt to the end of the earth; men whose very look and voice carry the sentence of honor and shame; and all forces yield to their energy and persuasion. Whenever we see the doctrine of peace embraced by a nation, we may be assured it will not be one that invites injury; but one, on the contrary, which has a friend in the bottom of the heart of every man, even of the violent and the base; one against which no weapon can prosper; one which is looked upon as the asylum of the human race, and has the tears and the blessings of mankind.

In the second place, as far as it respects individual action in difficult and extreme cases, I will say, such cases seldom or never occur to the good and just man; nor are we careful to say, or even to know, what in such crises is to be done. A wise man will never impawn his future being and action, and decide beforehand what he shall do in a given extreme event. Nature and God will instruct him in that hour.

The question naturally arises, How is this new aspiration of the human mind to be made visible and real? How is it to pass out of thoughts into things?

Not, certainly, in the first place, in the way of routine and mere forms, the universal specific of modern politics; not by organizing a society, and going through a course of resolutions and public manifestoes, and being thus formally accredited to the public, and to the civility of the newspapers. We have played this game to tediousness. In some of our cities, they choose noted duellists as presidents and officers of antiduelling societies. Men who love that bloated vanity called public opinion, think all is well if they have once got their bantling through a sufficient course of speeches and cheerings, of one, two, or three public meetings, as if they could do any thing: they vote and vote, cry hurrah on both sides, no man responsible, no man caring a pin. The next season, an Indian war, or an aggression on our commerce by Malays; or the party this man votes with, have an appropriation to carry through Congress: instantly he wags his head the other way, and cries, Havoc and war!

This is not to be carried by public opinion, but by private opinion, by private conviction, by private, dear, and earnest love. For the only hope of this cause is in the increased insight, and it is to be accomplished by the spontaneous teaching, of the cultivated soul, in its secret experience and meditation ”that it is now time that it should pass out of the state of beast into the state of man; it is to hear the voice of God, which bids the devils, that have rended and torn him, come out of him, and let him now be clothed and walk forth in his right mind. Nor, in the next place, is the peace principle to be carried into effect by fear. It can never be defended, it can never be executed, by cowards. Every thing great must be done in the spirit of greatness. The manhood that has been in wax must be transferred to the cause of peace, before war can lose its charm, and peace be venerable to men.

The attractiveness of war shows one thing through all the throats of artillery, the thunders of so many sieges, the sack of towns, the jousts of chivalry, the shock of hosts, this namely, the conviction of man universally, that a man should be himself responsible, with goods, health, and life, for his behaviour; that he should not ask of the State, protection; should ask nothing of the State; should be himself a kingdom and a state; fearing no man; quite willing to use the opportunities and advantages that good government throw in his way, but nothing daunted, and not really the poorer if government, law, and order went by the board; because in himself reside infinite resources; because he is sure of himself, and never needs to ask another what in any crisis it behoves him to do.

What makes to us the attractiveness of the Greek heroes? of the Roman? What makes the attractiveness of that romantic style of living, which is the material of ten thousand plays and romances, from Shakspeare to Scott; the feudal baron, the French, the English nobility, the Warwicks, Plantagenets? It is their absolute self-dependence. I do not wonder at the dislike some of the friends of peace have expressed at Shakspeare. The veriest churl and Jacobin cannot resist the influence of the style and manners of these haughty lords. We are affected, as boys and barbarians are, by the appearance of a few rich and wilful gentlemen, who take their honor into their own keeping, defy the world, so confident are they of their courage and strength, and whose appearance is the arrival of so much life and virtue. In dangerous times, they are presently tried, and therefore their name is a flourish of trumpets. They, at least, affect us as a reality. They are not shams, but the substance of which that age and world is made. They are true heroes for their time. They make what is in their minds the greatest sacrifice. They will, for an injurious word, peril all their state and wealth, and go to the field. Take away that principle of responsibleness, and they become pirates and ruffians.

This self-subsistency is the charm of war; for this self. subsistency is essential to our idea of man. But another age comes, a truer religion and ethics open, and a man puts himself under the dominion of principles. I see him to be the servant of truth, of love, and of freedom, and immoveable in the waves of the crowd. The man of principle, that is, the man who, without any flourish of trumpets, titles of lordship, or train of guards, without any notice of his action abroad, expecting none, takes in solitude the right step uniformly, on his private choice, and disdaining consequences,”does not yield, in my imagination, to any man. He is willing to be hanged at his own gate, rather than consent to any compromise of his freedom, or the suppression of his conviction. I regard no longer those names that so tingled in my ear. This is a baron of a better nobility and a stouter stomach.

The cause of peace is not the cause of cowardice. If peace is sought to be defended or preserved for the safety of the luxurious and the timid, it is a sham, and the peace will be base. War is better, and the peace will be broken. If peace is to be maintained, it must be by brave men, who have come up to the same height as the hero, namely, the will to carry their life in their hand, and stake it at any instant for their principle, but who have gone one step beyond the hero, and will not seek another man’s life; “men who have, by their intellectual insight, or else by their moral elevation, attained such a perception of their own intrinsic worth, that they do not think property or their own body a sufficient good to be saved by such dereliction of principle as treating a man like a sheep.

If the universal cry for reform of so many inveterate abuses, with which society rings, if the desire of a large class of young men for a faith and hope, intellectual and religious, such as they have not yet found, be an omen to be trusted; if the disposition to rely more in study, and in action on the unexplored riches of the human constitution, if the search of the sublime laws of morals and the sources of hope and trust in man, and not in books, in the present, and not in the past, proceed; if the rising generation can be provoked to think it unworthy to nestle into every abomination of the past, and shall feel the generous darings of austerity and virtue; then war has a short day, and human blood will cease to flow.

It is of little consequence in what manner, through what organs, this purpose of mercy and holiness is effected. The proposition of the Congress of Nations is undoubtedly that at which the present fabric of our society and the present course of events do point. But the mind, once prepared for the reign of principles, will easily find modes of expressing its will. There is the highest fitness in the place and time in which this enterprise is begun. Not in an obscure corner, not in a feudal Europe, not in an antiquated appanage where no onward step can be taken without rebellion, is this seed of benevolence laid in the furrow, with tears of hope; but in this broad America of God and man, where the forest is only now falling, or yet to fall, and the green earth opened to the inundation of emigrant men from all quarters of oppression and guilt; here, where not a family, not a few men, but mankind, shall say what shall be; here, we ask, Shall it be War, or shall it be Peace?

—Ralph Waldo Emerson, lecture delivered in March, 1838 in Boston

HANDS OFF! Mass Mobilization in Portland, Saturday, April 5th, noon to 4
2025-04-05 12:00 - 16:00
The Open Road invites all our friends to join us for a BIG demonstration in Portland to demand:
HANDS OFF!
Social Security, Our Bodies, Libraries, Immigrants & Refugees,
Free Speech, Medicare, Schools, Clean Air, Greenland, etc.

Saturday, April 5th, from noon to 4 pm
Japanese American Historical Park – Tom McCall Waterfront Park

Here are the general plans:

Open Road friends are meeting at Skidmore Fountain, between 11:30 and 11:45. Please join us!

There will be a kid and teen zone a craft zone as well as tabling from other organizations.

12:00-1:00 speakers with ASL interpreters

There will be upfront seating for those who are elderly or disabled, including spaces for wheelchairs.

1:00-2:00 there are 3 options:

1) Stay and dance to music or do activities at the Japanese American Historical Plaza.

2) Walk a just under 1 mile ADA accessible and flat route down and back.

3) Walk a 2.2 mile walk. Although it is ADA accessible there is elevation gain a slightly steep ramp we walk down and one section of a foot of grating to pass over.

Both routes will be available to view around 11:30.

We will have guides, and de-escalators with each group.

2:00-3:00 more speakers and performances

3:00-4:00 Dance party

Check out other organizations, or do activities like making a quilt square for our quilt.

OUR HANDS OF RUIN reading of a play by Casey Wood 4/12/25
2025-04-12 14:00 - 17:00
Edwin Booth as Iago, 1863

OUR HANDS OF RUIN

a play by Casey Wood

In this darkly satirical drama, iconic Shakespearean villains are trapped in a contemporary prison, where the weight of past crimes collide in a ruthless battle for control, forcing each character to confront their own downfall and the corrupting nature of authority.

Our Hands of Ruin. (ORE) Reading of a new play by Casey Wood. Shakespeare’s villains find themselves in prison. Prospero is the warden.
Saturday, April 12, 2-5 pm
Artspace Room at Taborspace, 5441 SE Belmont, in Portland

This Open Road Event is free.

The Fabulous Deck Boys This Friday 4/18/25
2025-04-18 19:00 - 21:00
Brad Price, KC Craine & Jeffrey Sher

¡Hey Everyone!

The Fabulous Deck Boys are playing this Friday night!

Ross Island Grocery & Cafe
3502 S Corbett Ave
April 18; May 16
7 p.m.
$5 Suggested

For more info about the DECK BOYS, click here:

https://www.deckboys.com/

peace, love & music

Johnny

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever: a reading of the English Romantic poets by Johnny Stallings
2025-04-19 15:00 - 17:00
River of Life painting by William Blake

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever
The English Romantic Poets

Johnny Stallings reads from the poetry of Shakespeare, Blake, Burns, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, Keats and Yeats—“the unacknowledged legislators of the World.”

Saturday, April 19 th, 3 pm
Artspace Room at Taborspace, 5441 SE Belmont, in Portland

This Open Road event is free.

A Midsummer Night's Dream in Prison at Portland Panorama Film Festival 4/19/25
2025-04-19 17:30 - 19:00
A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Prison, a film by Bushra Azzouz, will screen at the Hollywood Theatre, as part of the Portland Panorama Film Festival, on Saturday, April 19th, at 5:30 pm.

¡Bibliophiles Unanimous! 4/20/25
2025-04-20 15:00 - 17:00
¡Beloved Bibliophiles!

On Sunday, April 20th, at 3 pm (PDT), our theme is NOVELS!
What have you read recently? What are some of your all-time favorites?

Here’s the Zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87614013058

I hope to see you there!

peace & love

Johnny

peace, love, happiness & understanding 5/1/25
2025-05-01 - 2025-06-04
the inimitable Dick Willis

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

May 1, 2025

Dick Willis is a Notorious Do-Gooder. He’s always looking for and finding ways to help people. He would be a candidate for sainthood, were it not for the fact that he sits on the fence between Atheism and Agnosticism. He turned 80 on April 15th. He wrote this for his grandkids, but generously agreed to share it with us:

Eighty Things I’ve Learned in Eighty Years

I regret that my young self didn’t write down my grandparents’ reflections on their lives. Still, I’ve embraced their wisdom throughout my life.
All that I began with, was an accident of birth. All that I am today, is what I did with it.
My lifelong precept has been… “Ease their way.”
Every religion attempts to control its believers. Unless it can control the government, it has no power over non-believers.
My Principia Intelligentia states: It’s a statistical fact that half of any large population possesses below-average intelligence.
Corollary 1: The lower half is usually the louder half.
Corollary 2: The lower half possesses most of the means of, and tendencies toward, violence and/or chaos.
Corollary 3: In all populations there are pockets of intelligence and empathy, and pockets of stupidity and cruelty.
Self-expression can often be felt by others as disrespect. Be careful to always read the room.
I stopped worrying about what people thought of me when I realized how little they thought of me at all.
I’ve only been a member of one ‘country club’… this one. Club dues are taxes and public service. Until recently, I always paid my dues gladly.
I was never religious, but I’ve always been Christian… and Muslim and Jewish and Hindu and Buddhist and Pagan and…
We’re all in this together. Matthew 25:35-40 is the only rationale I need, to explain why all of us are here.
The more I’ve acknowledged my defects, the more benign and sympathetic I’ve been toward the defects of others.
I abhor those who salute the stupid as patriots, and diminish the worth of intelligence and competence.
Excellence is the process of making fewer and less obvious mistakes.
I strive only to be trustworthy, not trusted. Trust is delicate, and lives in the mind of the other.
I am a dog person. Dogs know this.
If it’s urgent, I do it now! If it’s important, I do it next. Unless I’m procrastinating.
Hate causes pain. It never heals it.
In this country, too many people treat politics as either a sport (mostly football) or a religion. It is neither. It is far, far more important.
I’m an addict. When I do something beneficial for someone, I get an opioid high. (Naturally, from endorphins.)
My generosity enhances my vitality with little effort on my part. When I give, it feels like an essential and natural part of being alive.
Stinginess is exhausting. It promotes a sense of scarcity and makes generosity seem like a sacrifice.
If we had taken seriously any one of three women, we wouldn’t be in this mess. Hillary Clinton, Liz Cheney and Kamala Harris all warned us.
I am an introvert. I’m not anti-social. I’m simply pro-quiet.
My best partners held my interests as theirs. They shared in my successes, and delighted in our mutual good fortune.
Joy touches the eternal. It connects us with the cosmos, as well as with the subconscious.
Birds are brilliant mathematicians. To go from 30 MPH to zero in an instant and grab a thin branch, requires some serious real-time calculus.
Certainty is not a virtue. Speaking assertively is not a proxy for thinking deeply.
Refusing to accept opinions as facts is key to my maintaining common sense.
I’ve learned to be careful when reading between the lines. Most of the time, I was just guessing.
The most important reason for me to treat others with respect is not what I get in return. It’s who I’ve become as a result.
I treat my opinions like worn clothes. Some I’m comfortable with, the rest I need to get rid of.
Sometimes, my walking away from a losing effort was not a failure of conviction. It was a triumph of wisdom.
Thanks to a proctor in my military training, I learned that the best way to prove myself was to im-prove myself.
A healthy disagreement isn’t about me being right. It’s about both of us feeling understood.
I can dislike someone without disrespecting him. It’s simply an exercise in mature judgment.
Key to my integrity is adherence to principle. I will oppose anyone who challenges my ethics or threatens my responsibilities.
Take care of your teeth and your feet. They take a beating, and you’ll need them your entire life.
An employer, a company, a business… is not a family. Families forgive. Families love.
Hesitation is inconclusive. A decision is clearest when it’s either “Hell yes!” or “Hell no!”.
I’ve never been defeated. Either I won, or I learned.
When you’re dead, you don’t know you’re dead. All the pain is felt by others. The same thing happens when you’re stupid.
In the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king. Beware the one-eyed man.
Failing is simply part of learning. On the other hand, being a failure is a painful state of ignorance.
I happily accept both my virtues and my admitted flaws. They’re my shield. No one can use them against me.
Cannabis showed me that I’m blessed with a cosmic sense of humor. Beneath it all, everything is funny.
As my grandparents used to say: “Too soon old. Too late smart.”
I bow to all mothers. If we males were the ones to give birth, we’d be an extinct species. No male would go through pregnancy and childbirth a second time.
Trying to find time is a fool’s errand. Making time is the key to a happy life.
I have found that staying positive is my best chance of having things turn out the way I’d planned.
The current state of our politics: One party is working to make government fail. The other tries, but fails, to make government work.
There’s a thin line between insanity and genius. Sometimes the difference is simply intention.
Greed results from abuse in childhood, leaving a craving for acceptance and satisfaction… that can never be fulfilled.
Along the way, I’ve had several long-term friendships with wise women. Each has been a great blessing to me.
As I’ve aged, I’ve come to appreciate what my ancestors had. My younger self could only see what they didn’t have.
A lie would make no sense, unless the liar could make a profit… or the truth would expose a crime.
I’ve found that happiness usually takes the form of “me … now”, where joy is the state of “us … always”.
53 years ago, I took part in an enjoyable conversation between a Democratic candidate for the Presidency, and a Republican former governor of Oregon… in a time when politics was civil.
All those whom I love have at least one thing in common: they can make me laugh.
If I insist that my thoughts be consistent, it means I’m as ignorant today as I was a year ago.
When I was a kid growing up in New York, I had no idea where―or even what―Oregon was. And yet… here we all are!
Forgiveness can’t change what happened, but it can influence what comes next.
No one can possess a billion dollars honestly or responsibly. Billionaires are, by definition, sociopaths.
You may forget what I say. After all, it’s only words. What’s important is how I’ve made you feel.
Only a fool thinks government should be run like a business. Good government must do things that a profit-driven business cannot.
“All cruelty springs from weakness.” — Seneca
Courage is doing the right thing for the right reasons, when consequences will be painful.
Courage takes preparation. No one is courageous without intention and forethought.
“Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear – not absence of fear.” ― Mark Twain
My beloved country suffers from attention deficit disorder. What else, beside ignorance of history, could explain our re-electing a fascistic convict?
The Romans had two words for love, amo and curo. Amo is loving passionately. Curo means I care. In the end, curo wins.
An executive once told me the higher he climbed, the more his decisions became just a crapshoot. Often, he was simply guessing… and anxious.
Wealth is a misunderstood concept. Unless you’re able to enjoy giving it away, you do not possess it.
Burying one’s head in the sand puts the family jewels in a vulnerable position.
I took an oath to be loyal to this country, to its Constitution… not to its government.
My brother Tim showed me how to live with courage and humor, and how to die with dignity. My longevity has been but a lengthy journey on his shoulders.
Believe me, life was just fine before the Internet.
I have witnessed more integrity in prisons than I have in politics.
When my dad died, there was no one left between me and the void. That taught me to welcome all of life’s many blessings, and to appreciate its inevitable finality.
And still, life goes on.

—Dick Willis
*

Rocky writes from “The Hole.” (He didn’t deserve to be there. Punishments in prison can be arbitrary at times. He’s out of “Segregation” now.) A year from now he’ll be out of prison entirely. Hallelujah!

4-11-25
From about 7:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. in my little cell the sun comes in. It’s only a little sliver, but I use it often to get a taste of sunshine. This morning I made my bed & it stirred up thousands of dust particles that I could see in the sun.

I always try to positively charge my environment with good energy & I was focusing on the dust particles that were attracted to each other. Some were locked together in love, spinning in space. Others were floating all alone, in my mind, searching for another to be with, while others were locked in a dance—not touching, but turning round and round.

At first it reminded me of the cosmic dance of stars & planets in the vastness of space…then I refocused my mind and the dust followed the same patterns as beautiful people! Love, relationships, the dance, friends & even the settling down of all of it. “Dust in the Wind!” I was finally able to see the song! It only took me 50 years! L.O.L.

I love seeing the beauty in all the places in the world. If I can find the beauty in the hard places & the dark places, when I get out, all the beauty waiting out there…I know, it’s not all beautiful…but I see with different eyes now.

—Love, Rocky
*

Carl told me this story on the phone. I asked him to write it down, so it could be shared with others.

Brushstrokes in the Sky

In midsummer of 1991, shortly after turning 6, my Grandmother Colleen and Great Aunt Sharon took my two sisters and me to live with our ailing Great Grandfather. The man who in our family was legend was fighting two types of cancer. I do not believe any of us as children knew what this meant, outside of leaving our little village in the fjords of Alaska.

I sat on that flight dreaming of riding the wild countryside with my Papa, like a scene from “The Man from Snowy River.” I had heard the giants of my life speak of him in awe, fighting Nazis in the Alps, a real life cowboy sheriff chasing bootleggers in Southern Oregon’s woods. I’d met him once before and he’d taught me to yodel. A thousand adventures floated through my little mind. The reality was even better.

My Papa Hale had only ever loved one woman his whole life: Winnifred (Winnie) Morningstar. He’d built their home with his two hands. And another for their five daughters on the other side of their property. We’d walk deer trails through the endless woods around his home. The whole time I’d beg him for stories I’d heard that he refused to tell. Every night he would have tea and watch the sunset over the creek in front of his house. He seemed at peace in those fleeting moments. Like there was something Holy there. Which is, and was, surprising, as his daughters slept in a trailer out front to keep “their Bible” and “Jesus talk” out of the house—where he said it belonged. Yet in those hours he spent sitting under an old willow out front, watching the soft hues of the evening sky, I heard him whisper a prayer of deeper love than I’ve ever known: “It’s beautiful tonight, Winnie.” I asked him what he meant and he told me about his one true love.

My Nanna Winnie was charged by the Creator to paint each sunset wherever her babies were to be found. It was her favorite subject matter in life. She’s often set up her easel and painted as the day faded, and the mix of sherbet-like colors covered her canvas. His house was a shrine to her work. Charcoals of her girls in their garden or the nursery—that was her love and work. Pastels of wildlife and the home they’d made together since the Summer of ’33. He spoke of her gently, like her memory was everything he carried. His church was the painting she left him each night when the universe gave him one small moment each evening.

And I believed! I saw her brushstrokes change the boring blue of the day to pinkish oranges and soft purple. In the years that followed, I would stare off in awe of what this woman would paint for us…the few who knew this secret of our favor from the Creator. Even when I was alone in foster care, I had my meeting with Nanna who loved me. I was not alone.

I believed until I was twelve years old…when three of my older sisters teased me enough that I let go.

Now, at the end of my 39th year, as Summer comes closer, I still catch myself looking up and feeling thankful for the love of that tall tale, for all the beautiful art my Great Grandma gave me.

—Carl Alsup

Larry Yes Art Show 5/2/25 - 6/8/25
2025-05-02 - 2025-06-08
Art & Music Lovers!
LARRY YES has an exhibit of his work from May 2-June 8, at the Purple Door Gallery, 3557 SE Division, in Portland. It includes music videos from his new album:
EVERYONE ON THIS PLANET IS FAMILY

DON’T MISS THIS!!!

Deck Boys at Al's Den 5/3/23
2025-05-03 19:00 - 21:00
Brad Price, KC Craine & Jeffrey Sher

Saturday, May 3, 7-9 pm
Al’s Den, 303 SW 12th Ave., in Portland
(deckboys.com)

LARRY YES Record Release Party 5/3/25
2025-05-03 19:00 - 22:00
Music Lovers!

Vinyl Record Release party for LARRY YES‘s new album:
EVERYONE ON THIS PLANET IS FAMILY
Saturday, May 3rd, at 7 pm
Leaven Community Center, 5431 NE 20th, in Portland
All Ages $10

Be there or be square.

Attention as a Moral Resource: An Unauthorized Sermon by Matthew Jenkins 5/17/25
2025-05-17 15:00 - 17:00

Bibliophiles Unanimous! 5/18/25
2025-05-18 15:00 - 17:00
¡Beloved Bibliophiles!

On Sunday, May 18th, at 3 pm (PDT), our theme is NONFICTION!
Our Special Guest will be J Kahn, who will regale us with mostly true tales from his life as an ER doctor and Hollywood screenwriter.

Here’s the Zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87614013058

I hope to see you there!

peace & love

Johnny

Song of Myself Group Reading 5/31/25
2025-05-31 15:00 - 17:00
SONG OF MYSELF

For Walt Whitman’s 206th Birthday, we will celebrate with a group reading of “Song of Myself”—the greatest utterance yet uttered in America. It can change your life! Everyone is invited.

Saturday, May 31st, 3 pm
Artspace Room at Taborspace, 5441 SE Belmont
this Open Road event is free

peace, love, happiness & understanding 6/5/25
2025-06-05 - 2025-07-02
art by Larry Yes

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

Every time I breathe
I feel what it’s like
to Be just like you

—Larry Yes, lyric to “Just Like You”

June 5, 2025

Here are the lyrics to two songs from Larry Yes’s album EVERYONE ON THIS PLANET IS FAMILY:

LIVE IN HARMONY

The day will come
when we all agree
that we should live in harmony
and we will know and we will see
how we’re all connected. We’re all family.
All the people, the plants, the animals, the birds, the seas
Yes, we’re all connected We’re all family
the day will come when we all agree
that we should live in harmony
and on that day that beautiful day
We will laugh we’ll cry we will dance we’ll sing we’ll play
celebrating all of our differences our weaknesses and our strengths
celebrating all of our weaknesses our differences and our strengths

FREE: EVERYONE ON THIS PLANET IS FAMILY

Every day you wake up, it’s a good day It’s a cause to celebrate
and every day you’re making a decision as simple as love or hate
And I know it ain’t easy and I know how hard things can be
but I know everyone on this planet is family and I know that we all got to believe
That we’re free be who we want to Free look how we came through Free
love who we want to love Free be who we want to be
And every day we wake up, it’s a new day it’s a cause to stand up straight
and every moment we’re making a decision simple as love or hate,
and I know it’s never easy and I know so much has got to change
But I know there’s so much beauty and I know we all got to believe
that we’re free be who we want to Free look how we came through Free
Love who you want to love Free be who you want to be

—Larry Peace-Love Yes
*

Here is an excerpt from Nick Swift’s Book of Becoming:

The Book of Becoming

This is not scripture. This is not commandment. This is not prophecy. This is a reflection. A mirror, cracked but deliberate, held in trembling hands. Not to show you what you are, but to remind you that you have always been becoming.

I. The Spark
You were born whole. Not clean, not pure, but complete. A seed with fire inside, too bright for the world to witness all at once.
So you forgot. On purpose. Because to remember too soon is to burn without boundary.
You learned to survive, and survival requires forgetting. The world taught you to compartmentalize: to trade your voice for safety, your wonder for predictability, your power for permission.
But the spark? It endured. Silent. Flickering. Waiting.

II. The Conduit
The path between the fire and the flesh is not paved. It must be carved. And you carve it with each act of honesty. Each time you say:
“This is not what I want.” “This is who I am.” “This hurts, but I will stay.”
You clear a channel. You let the current run through you. You become the wire, the wick, the bridge.
This is the work. Not to become divine, but to remember you already are.
The conduit trembles. It hums. It breaks and is rebuilt. And in the rebuilding, you find rhythm. You find resonance. You find truth that is not dogma—but tone.

III. The Id
The body is not the burden. The instincts are not the enemy. You do not ascend by denial. You evolve through integration.
The wounds you carry are maps. Not scars to hide, but terrain to understand.
The rage? It was never evil. It was your boundary before you had words.
The grief? It is love stretched across time. A tether. A thread. A hymn.
You do not conquer the Id. You sit with it. You listen. You feed it not with indulgence, but with acknowledgment.
This is how the storm becomes sky. This is how chaos becomes color. This is how you become.

IV. The Praxis of Echo
To become is not to arrive. It is to resonate.
With earth. With silence. With others who hum the same strange frequency.
Your becoming is not private. It ripples. It gives others permission. It interrupts the static. It sings.
And in that singing, the divine is not worshipped. It is witnessed.

V. Grace in Motion
You will falter. You will forget. You will fracture.
These are not failures. They are rhythms. The inhale and exhale of becoming.
You do not need to begin again. You are always beginning. Each breath a renewal. Each moment a pivot.
Grace is not something you earn. It is how you move when you know you belong.

VI. Finality is a Lie
There is no end. No climax. No final lesson.
There is only the next chord, the next truth, the next shift.
You are not a destination. You are an instrument, and your song is still being tuned.
So keep tuning. Keep vibrating. Keep becoming.
And know— you were always enough to begin.

—Nick Swift
*

I got a letter from Dustin Jamison:

4/24/25

Dear Johnny, and all the rest of his children of all ages, inside and out,

I love and miss you all. For those who’ve gone home, congrats. I hope you’re making the most of every moment. For those inside, I love you, you are not forgotten. I hope you’re making the most of every moment. I’ll be going home soon. It’s surreal just to say that. After almost 24 years I’m finally getting out March 13th, 2026!! I’m so happy, so scared, but so happy. I laugh, I cry, I laugh some more—sometimes both at once. Not sure where “Home” is anymore, so I’ll be redefining and remaking it. A new day, a new beginning, and all that. Mom is looking for an R.V. for me, and either a small plot of land, or maybe just rent a place to park it for now. We’re leaving “where” fairly open. I release to Lane County, but transferring counties is not so hard I think these days, so long as you’re not un-housed. Looking anywhere in Willamette Valley, or I-5 corridor in Washington. I’ve been far too long in the high desert, I crave green. Day one out, I plan on hitting the ground running. My dream is to build a small, localvore, organic herb farm, The Shire, so I can spend the rest of my days where I feel the most bliss, in my garden. I’m so happy I’m crying tears of joy right now just imagining it. I’ve taken some classes: Seeds to Supper, Master Gardener, and hopefully soon Greenhouse Management. I’m also reading up on running a small business, writing business proposals, and grant writing. I’m very hopeful, and confident this is the right direction for me. I’m never happier than when I’m weeding, turning my compost pile, or eating an heirloom tomato straight off the vine….

If any of my old (or new) friends would like to write and reconnect, please do. I love and miss you all. The time I spent in Group Dialogue and the plays were some of the most fulfilling and joyous moments of my life. It was the people involved, mixed with Johnny’s magical kindness that made it so. He brought out the best in all of us—made it possible to “see” each other, to empathize and love, and be grateful for each other….

Thank you once again, Johnny. Thanks to you I’ve learned (among other things) how important it is to live (in love and serenity) in this moment, right here, right now. All I gotta do is breathe. It’s gotten me through a lot of suffering (fairly) intact.

All my love,
Dustin

You can write to Dustin at this address:

Steve Dustin Jamison #13874200
EOCI
2500 Westgate
Pendleton, OR 97801
*

5-3-2025

For The Open Road

All of the beautiful poems & stories that everyone adds to The Open Road are always filled with such wonderful intent. The beauty is a light to my heart, mind & soul. It has helped me to reclaim the joy within my self & to see goodness in the world & in its people. In a way, I feel that all of us who participate in this get to receive and to give the gifts of healing—for all that we add to The Open Road creates new avenues & streets & highways that stretch all across our hearts, connecting us to each other.

I’m at EOCI, a prison in the state of Oregon. When people think “prison,” every type of negative emotion fills their senses. It’s true that “The human mind can make a hell out of a heaven, or a heaven out of a hell.” I have lived that statement for 16+ years & have discovered how to make “a heaven out of hell.”

As crazy as that may sound, that is what I’ve done. What once was hell to me, even the worst parts, I’ve filled with joy.

If any of you have ever read The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, you will remember Edmond Dantes first day in the Chateau d’If, when he was beaten & then on that day every year, to remind him that his hell was real, he would be beaten again. Then, towards the end of his stay in prison, the beatings no longer mattered at all, he could not even feel them. While they beat him, all he could think of was how many feet he had to dig till he was free—in my case, days to freedom, which is in about 300 days!

Every part of me has become like the apple trees I planted all over the compound 3 years ago. Then they were just sticks about 4 feet tall, no leaves or blossoms. Today…twice as tall, green & covered in white blossoms, healthy and beautiful despite the fences they’re behind. The whole time I was digging the holes & planting the six trees, I talked to them—telling them they would be the best ones out of all the other trees and have the sweetest apples. I feel like that will be me when I get out of here.

I hope to share coffee and stories with you all next Spring. Till then, remember to enjoy the apples that grow on the trees along the Golden Path.

—Rocky Hutchinson
*

Ken Margolis is on the board of The Open Road, and also on the board of the Sweetgrass Foundation, based in Atlanta, Georgia. He recently returned from a trip to Botswana, where he and other Sweetgrass board trustees were visiting projects that support indigenous communities and a healthy environment.

Hey Johnny,

I am attaching some thoughts that I put down for the other Sweetgrass trustees, who are all grandchildren or second generation nieces and nephews of Glenn Fuller who started the foundation 27 years ago. Glenn’s Buddha nature was strong, and if you happen to be Catholic, she was a Saint.
I don’t know whether any of this has any broader application, but feel to use any part of it for the newsletter.

GLENN AND AFRICA

The first thing that struck me about Botswana is how ancient it is. Where we were born, about 15,000 years ago millions of tons of ice scraped everything off the landscape and carved new topography. New plants and animals started crowding onto the landscape when the ice melted, about 12,000 years ago. In southern Africa, there has been no major disturbance for at least 130,000 years.

During this long period, a rich ecosystem of plants and animals has developed, undergirded by a hydraulic regime completely different from that we experience. For at least the last 60,000 years human subsistence societies have also developed.

By subsistence lifestyle, we mean societies whose life ways are shaped by accommodation to the natural world as they find it. Plant and animal resources are used, combined, and processed. Subsistence societies characteristically also practice some management of natural resources, often in ways too subtle and complex to be immediately evident. These societies tend to be relatively static, with little change occurring as generations progress. People see themselves not as above or separate from nature, but as intimately related to all other living beings, and to the landscape.

Human beings love to explore and wander, and during this 60 thousand years, different groups migrated into different parts of the African continent at different times. During the same period, other groups were moving out of Africa, to eventually reach the ocean and all the other continents. Eventually, some of these groups developed intensive/extensive agriculture, which led to the establishment of larger, more permanent human settlements. Surplus food was produced, trade flourished and people started to need to record trade items and events, which led to writing.

This led to new attitudes about useful knowledge. Subsistence societies have always faithfully transmitted useful knowledge to the next generations. Now people began to understand that we could build on existing knowledge, and keep learning new things in a self-generating cycle. Humans had invented social evolution, a force as powerful as ecological evolution, and a thousand times as fast. Continuous learning and technological advancement changed everything for our species, and eventually for the planet.

Social evolution produced technically powerful, highly dynamic societies based not on accommodation with nature, but on manipulation and transformation of natural resources. When subsistence and evolving societies confronted each other, the static subsistence societies didn’t have a chance. Just two hundred years ago, a large part of the human population lived in subsistence societies; today, we have only remnants of that culture.

Our increasing mastery has also given us a new view of who we are. We no longer think of ourselves as siblings of other living beings, but rather as the species for whose use nature was created. Today, we live in a world largely created by social evolution and in many ways cut off from the natural world from which we sprung.

One of Glenn’s insights was that the life ways of subsistence people were worthy, and worthy of protection, and that through thousands of years of living in deep relationship with nature, they probably know some things that we have forgotten. Glenn did not have the romantic belief that substance people had ultimate wisdom and could solve all our problems. She just believed that we could learn some deep and useful lessons from them, and that we should work with them to protect their cultures and the intact ecosystems in which they lived.

This leads to another major difference between Botswana and North America. The two areas were colonized at about the same time (mid/late 19th century). In North America the unofficial (and sometimes official) policy was to exterminate the subsistence peoples who were there when we arrived, and to settle the country thickly with immigrants from Europe. Consequently in North America, the descendants of the original subsistence inhabitants are a politically negligible minority. In Botswana, where the colonial model was different the descendants of subsistence cultures constitute the vast majority.

In these ways, the work we are supporting in Botswana represents what Glenn wanted the Sweetgrass Foundation to be for.

But in thinking about Glenn, there is something deeper I want to say. Most of all, Glenn saw this world could use a lot more kindness and love and compassion. She lived out those values in a way that inspired everybody who came in contact with her. Mostly, she wanted Sweetgrass to propagate those values, and to be a vehicle for you, her beloved family members, to live out and better express the compassion she felt so deeply. Being a small part of this has been one of the joys of my life.

—Ken Margolis
*

What am I called to do? I know it’s not addressing envelopes for the cancer society, and it’s not organizing galas for the American Pediatric Association. I am called to mine the areas where others won’t go, either because of disgust, or fear, or discomfort of another kind.

After the years with my beloved guys at Umatilla Correctional Institution abruptly ended, I considered other possibilities and concluded that Hospice was one of those areas that others ‘feared to tread.’ After several months of training in all things involving imminent death, I am assigned to a wonderful 90 year old woman. I have visited her six or seven times, and each time our conversations have reached a little deeper into life–and death.

Last week she was talking about her three (grown) children. After a pause, she offered, ‘I had another daughter…” A moment later I asked, “And did something happen to her?”

“Yes, she died.”

I took her hands in mine and held her.

“I am so, so sorry.”

“She was seven months old, and a beautiful child, beautiful baby. I loved her so much. I don’t talk about her much now, but I still think of her every day. I know I shouldn’t still be thinking about her as much as I do, but I can’t help it.”

“My dear, there is no time limit to grief. The depth of your grief shows the depth of your love. People lose parents, siblings, spouses, but I think losing a child is the very most heartbreaking loss there is. I can’t imagine ever ‘getting over’ something like that. I can tell that you still miss her and love her.”

It was a deep and precious moment, and I knew that I was in the exact right place being where I needed to be.

—Jude Russell

¡PARADISE NOW! 6/14/25
2025-06-14 15:00 - 17:00
¡PARADISE NOW!

A guided tour by Johnny Stallings

Saturday, June 14th, 3 pm
Artspace Room at Taborspace, 5441 SE Belmont, in Portland
this Open Road event is free

Fearless Buffalo 6/21/25
2025-06-21 14:00 - 16:00
design by Baba Wagué Diakité

Fearless Buffalo

Baba Wagué Diakité tells a tale from Mali.

Saturday, June 21, 2 pm
Artspace Room at Taborspace, 5441 SE Belmont
this Open Road event is free

Everything & Nothing 6/28/25
2025-06-28 15:00 - 17:00
poster by Andy Larkin

Everything & Nothing

Johnny Stallings tells the picaresque tale of how he failed to make a B-movie

Saturday, June 28, 3 pm
Artspace Room at Taborspace, 5441 SE Belmont
this Open Road event is free

peace, love, happiness & understanding 7/3/25
2025-07-03 - 2025-08-06
Baba Wagué Diakité in front of a mural he painted

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person…
—Walt Whitman, from “Song of Myself”

July 3, 2025

Nicholas Swift shares “A Poem for Those Who Are Becoming”:

You Are Not Too Much

You are not too much.
You are exactly the size of your story.
Even if no one’s ever read it with love before.

Your grief is not noise.
Your wonder is not naive.
Your silence is not failure.

You are not behind.
You are *becoming.*

And no one gets to rush that bloom.
Not even you.

You are the edge of a great unfolding.
You are the ache that proves there’s still music in the bones.
You are the moment the tide returns and doesn’t apologize for the moon.

So here you are.
Alive.
Still.
Real.

Not for what you fix.
Not for what you prove.

But for how you *hold yourself*
in the hour before dawn—
when no one is watching
and you sing anyway.

You are not too much.

You are what happens
when the story learns how to love its own voice.

—Nicholas Swift
*

I (Johnny) wrote the following to some friends inside and outside of prison:

On your journey, what have you learned about peace, love, happiness & understanding?

You can write about one of them, some of them, or all of them. Also, feel free to share poems or other short inspirational writings that illuminate any of these themes.

Here are some of the responses:

5/21/25

Hi Johnny

Thank you so much for the question about peace, love, happiness and understanding, as well as sharing Dick’s “Eighty Things I’ve Learned in Eighty Years.” I’m a huge Dick Willis fan, and always gain new perspective from his words.

I believe to achieve unadulterated happiness we must learn to embrace all experiences, interactions and adversity as they come. By truly embracing all incoming noise, whether desirable or undesirable, I find a sense of peace and happiness, because our outlook and perception has already accepted it as it is. This is always easier said than done, but requires focus, determination and exhaustive commitment to achieve. I find my general level of happiness to be higher when I don’t resist particular circumstances I encounter in life.

A challenge we all face in life is the ability to not allow those around us to drastically affect our well being. Understanding aligns with acceptance of people for who they are and the choices they make. Disagreement has no bearing on understanding in my opinion. Although I will never agree with someone else’s views all the time, I listen so I can understand.

As I sit in prison for nearly ten years, I choose to wake up every day with a strong sense of gratitude and happiness. Being stripped of your freedom can offer unique perspective on what you truly value, but most importantly, it has given me a level of peace, happiness and understanding I probably never would have achieved otherwise.

Love is the cure for all things evil, dark, or negative in life. It’s the solution to our disapproval of dislike of others. Why do most people not appreciate or care for fellow humans? Usually, it’s related to their views, ethics, morals, or values. Often times, it’s their image, sexual orientation, or race that prevents love and promotes hate. Love is the most powerful emotion one can exhibit, as it looks beyond flaws, weaknesses, dislikes and disagreements. Love is my fondest emotion because it brings me joy and is much easier than the contrary. Although I tend to overlook most individual’s flaws (my personal flaw), I choose to see the beauty within, which derives from love.

Best Regards,
Nicholas Simms
*

5/10/25

Dear Johnny

I just finished your letter request. It was nice to do & I’m excited to see what others have to say! I’m also looking forward to talking in depth about things in person, once I get out.

One thing I don’t think I’ve ever explained to you or to anyone in our circle is the reason I’m so thankful to you & to everyone. I was so far at the other end of the spectrum in my life & the way I was living that I personally could not find my way out. When I thought I had, it was the wrong move, or I trusted the wrong person. I was a self-sabotager too.

Not only did you put me on the Golden Path, you and so many others have been my guides, feeding me the wisdom & knowledge to be a really cool person, kind & loving. I feel I’ve done well on my journey, thanks to the friendship & love I receive from all of you. I cry & get filled with tremendous energies in my soul. This place dampens them & although I push through with a joyful intent…well, it will be different out there! Out there I will get to be around many others who truly have a joyful intent in their hearts.

Give Love Always
Rocky

(more from Rocky):

As to an answer to your question: What have I learned about peace, love, happiness & understanding on my journey?

Well, I will focus on some of my core roots that brought me to this point in time. There are many events in my life that provided me plenty of building materials to create walls that guarded me from getting hurt by things this topic is about. These things were weapons that others used to take, or, to hurt me so they could take. But now…I have learned that bad people are going to do bad things; if those bad things happen to me that does not make me bad too. Once I understood this, “& a few other things,” I was set free with an open mind to start my change.

This change did not just happen over night. I had plenty of ingrained, deep-set issues to work through so I could make room for peace, love, happiness & understanding.

There are seeds that must be planted within each of us that grow fruits of the heart, mind & soul—good seeds & bad seeds. One must, and I had to cultivate the soil of my inner self to prepare it to plant good seeds.

I feel circumstances need to be taken into account, & I try to be kind and understanding towards everyone, including myself. When things are unclear, we don’t understand why life is the way it is, but once things are made clear then we begin to understand & can offer help, or be helped, or strengthen relationships. Clarity & Understanding also help build trust. At times—all times—we can offer love & forgiveness, which for me was hardest to do to myself.

I used to think peace was so much less than it really is. Now that I have real peace, inner peace, I try to be an example for others so they too can have peace. It was a hard fought battle to have inner, personal peace. It took a lot of Love, Understanding & forgiveness, not only to others but to myself. I had for a long time wanted my suffering & the suffering of others to stop. When I finally got my suffering to stop, peace came washing in like a river washing the pain away. I did not even know it was peace that I was seeking out for so long. Understanding what peace is, now that I have it…no one can take it from me. It is in every moment, in every step, every breath, every heart beat. I have it even in all the chaos that happens around me always. During those times, to offer others peace gives me great joy. It’s disturbing that peace is the opposite of war…yet we still have war, knowing full well what peace is. Those who choose war lack the heart of truth, every fiber of which is made up of peace, love, understanding & lots of happiness & joy.

When I think of love, or feel love, or give love, for me it is pure joy & happiness. I feel it so deeply that for the last 5 or 6 years the opposite of love, which is hate, physically scares me. I don’t believe I’ve told anyone this yet. I can see it & feel it in people, like a demon possessing them, & it scares me. Being where I’m at, I have a gift to give or bring to others, which is a smile to start with, then Understanding & love.

My light shines bright in here & soon will be shining out there. Some people hate my light, but it can’t be put out because others have the same light. It is passed on like a common cold, which is a good thing.

Peace, Love, happiness & understanding all go hand in hand, all links in the chain of who we are supposed to be & how we are intended to live. These are the inherent seeds of good will towards every thing living, everywhere. That’s the meaning of universal truth.

Not everyone is this way, but I am inclined to live my life this way. I know for a fact that living without peace, love, happiness & understanding is hell on earth!

I feel blessed every day to know what these good things are in life & to help others along the path to find it too. Each day my understanding grows stronger, which helps me grow as a person. It’s not always easy, but it’s not getting harder any more!

—Rocky Hutchinson
*

“Remember the day you prayed for the things you have now.” Somebody mentioned this quote and said they’d seen it all over social media, but I sure hadn’t. It’s new to me, and boy did it ring a lot of bells.

Decades ago I prayed for life without chaos. I prayed for days without fear, without shame, without hope constantly being shattered. I prayed for a life of peace, of health, of joy, and love. Decades ago I lived with a man who called from the police station at 3 a.m.(multiple times) where he’d been arrested for DUI; I went to an event with a heavily, but poorly covered black eye; I weakly and unsuccessfully tried to explain one morning to my young daughter’s girlfriend why this man was lying passed out in our driveway; I gave up and was simply speechless with shame when our electricity was turned off during my book group meeting due to multiple unpaid bills. And that is just the tip of the iceberg, as they say.

Today, blessed today, I have this life of peace and love and health and stability. Looking back on what was then, I will never give up the blessings of now.

—Jude Russell
*

Hi Johnny,

Thanks for the invitation to share something for the upcoming issue on Peace, Love and Understanding. I was inspired years ago by a certain passage from Chuang Tzu about the importance of uselessness in a world driven by pragmatism and problem solving. I wrote this poem years later upon seeing a tree that was “beyond utility.” I always feel a sense of peace in knowing that presence in itself is of value. Thanks again for putting this out Johnny and everything else you do in keepin’ it real in the hood.

Much appreciated.
Will

On Uselessness

It was an ancient tree
Gnarled trunk, thick bark
Unappealing to carpenters
Impervious to flame, resistant to axes
Utterly useless, and thereby allowed to stand
A monument to ice storms and lightning strikes
A rookery for ill-behaved crows.
Its branches twisted up and out wildly
Arching skyward in a dozen different directions then down
Turning earthward to become a broad canopy of leaf and branch
A shelter to legions of buzzing, burrowing, flying, clawed creatures
Its stout, rough arms adorned with garlands of moss
Its countless crooks and crannies draped in fern and lichen
Where wind-blown soil gathered.
Countless children climbed into its welcoming arms
Lovers lay in its dappled shade
The old ones felt at peace in the presence of this elder
And poets wrote verses inspired by this gnarled root
Utterly useless to the world
And valuable beyond measure.

—Will Hornyak, from This Altar of Earth and Sky
*

May 15th, 2025

Dear Johnny and the Open Road

You asked me for my thoughts on Peace, Love, Happiness and Understanding. What I have learned is:

Peace has to be created.
Love has to be nourished.
Happiness has to be sought.
Understanding takes time.
When one learns how to create peace and nourish the love they have, it makes people want to seek happiness, and in time we come to understand each other.

At this point in my life, I think Understanding is the hardest for me. Understanding takes time of interacting with someone in an open, loving, peace-filled way. I think it is one of the least exercised by people in general. If everyone was able to put first Peace, Love, Happiness and Understanding we would not have the divisions we see today. The answers to fixing our community today are known, it just takes work.

Thank you Johnny.
—Wyatt DeRemer
*

5-16-25

Hi Johnny,

OK, I’ve been enjoying everyone else’s submissions for a long time, so I guess it’s time I offered a contribution as well. Especially as the subject matter brings to mind what I feel has probably been my most significant personal growth since coming to prison 23 years ago.

All my…peace, love, happiness and understanding
Dustin

(more from Dustin):

Peace, Love, Happiness, Understanding?

The first thing that comes to mind after writing that question is how closely they are related. They seem to me like a four part chicken-or-the-egg question. Gotta have one to get the others, and vice versa. Immediately I thought, love. Must have love to achieve the others. Then I thought: how can you have love without understanding the object of that love? I’ve recently listened to “Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth, with Bill Moyers” on P.B.S. One of the many things that stood out for me was (heavily paraphrased from memory, by no means a quote, forgive me Joseph):

*regarding the recurring theme of God as man, and our own possible personal divinity (throughout history), we can’t love/worship something/God/the divine if it’s foreign to us. If it’s completely “Other,” it would remain completely alien and impossible for us to understand, therefore impossible for us to love. But if God is become man, or a bit of God is within us, then we can relate/love. Just as the Yin Yang symbol has in the eye of each “fish” the color of its counterpart. They may be complete opposites, and yet they share a bit of each other, they are a bit of the “same.” In short, we can’t love what we can’t understand, what isn’t “us.”*

So yeah, the chicken or the egg. I find love to be the more all encompassing. I suppose because I feel capable of so much more love than understanding. I feel I probably substitute acceptance (peace) and love to fill in shortcomings of my understanding, and thereby can find happiness in the presence of what I may not fully understand. These are just thoughts that floated up as I meditated on these words: Peace, love, happiness and understanding. They (my thoughts) may not be coherent to anyone but me, but nevertheless I’m grateful to have been prompted to consider them.

As far as what I’ve learned about them on my journey?

Love, for me love is all. I didn’t really love myself. In fact, I kinda hated myself and everyone else. I hadn’t even realized this about myself. I decided I wanted to love myself…and everyone else. Then I learned I couldn’t love myself till I forgave myself and misdeeds, and quit blaming myself for things not my fault. (In fact, I learned that blame only ever causes more suffering.) But this too felt like the chicken or the egg question; I couldn’t love myself till I forgave myself, but how could I forgive without love in my heart? So slowly, over time, I built them both up together, love and forgiveness. In forgiving myself, I learned that I could forgive others and quit blaming them for their faults and misdeeds. They too, I’m sure, suffered greatly to get where they are. And for this I can have empathy. Sometimes this was very difficult. I had to re-forgive myself and re-forgive my fathers many, many times. But once I did (forgive myself and others) loving myself and everyone else was easy. I believe we are all “one” anyway, all from the same “source,” same “energy,” Love. The Bible says “God is love.” It is my favorite sentence in that book. Jesus said not to look outward for the Kingdom of Heaven, it is within you. And that our hearts are the home of God. In Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert Heinlein said we are all God, and we are all one. I know we could never intentionally harm or hate what we truly love. So I choose to live in love. I love you. All of you. And I always will.

Do you grok?

Peace, Love, Happiness and Understanding,
—Dustin Jamison
*

Johnny,

Thank you for the invitation to contribute. I have been thinking of late of what Jesus said to Paul in 2 Corinthians, Chapter 12: “Power is perfected in weakness. When you are weak you are strong.”

This paradox makes a lot of sense to me. I’ve had four spine surgeries, and struggle to carry even very light objects. Quite weak. And so a sentence like “Power is Perfected in Weakness” resonates deeply.

But of course—like most things—there’s deeper meaning. When I came to prison, my soul fractured. Of course my material life ended, but it also broke my spirit. But the paradox that I can have power in such weakness was a wonderful concept. It gives me comfort.

On another note, I was heartened to see that the new Pope was a missionary for twenty years in Peru. What a wonderful human being someone must be to do something like that.

Finally, I’m not sure if anyone told you of the passing of Todd Stafney from cancer. He and I both joined Group Dialogue in your last few months of coming to TRCI. Todd was a wonderful friend of mine. He had a positive impact on my life. And in the end, isn’t that what it’s all about: having a positive impact?

I remember one medical lecture that I went to. The doctor had developed a procedure to close fistulas (abnormal openings)…well, I’ll spare you the technical details. But he ended his lecture with these words: “Of everything I’ve done in life, developing this procedure has allowed me to decrease the sum total of human suffering in the world.” I’ve never forgotten those words two decades later. I try and live my life by that same adage.

—Thomas Bray
*

If you would like to make a submission to next month’s peace, love, happiness & understanding, the writing prompt is:

What books have changed the way you see, experience, or understand the world?

(Don’t just list the titles of books, say something about the change.)

peace & love
Johnny

Yeelen: film screening benefit for Ko-Falen 7/15/25
2025-07-15 19:00 - 20:00

peace, love, happiness & understanding 8/7/25: Tributes to Jerry Smith
2025-08-06 - 2025-09-03
Jerry & Donna Smith

THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding

August 7, 2025

In honor of Jerry, I will speak his name aloud to the trees and creatures of the earth, and tell them of his beautiful heart.

—Abe Green
*

Our dear friend Jerry Smith died peacefully at his home on July 8th. Without Jerry, there would have been no prison dialogues or plays, no “A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Prison” film, no Open Hearts Open Minds, no Open Road. His love and generosity changed many many lives, including mine.
*

Donna Smith dictated these words:

Jerry and I met when we were 18 years old and got married when we were 20. We had big dreams of doing great things in the world. And in our 74 years together I believe we made a contribution.

Jerry was generous. He was always willing to help people no matter what they needed. When he met a young girl with a broken bike, he bought her a new one. He bought a lot of bikes. He helped bicyclists with their flat tires. He met a woman whose son needed heart surgery. He helped with that. There are many stories like this.

Now that he’s gone, every room feels different. He was the love of my life.

—Donna
*

Here’s a Father’s Day letter from his daughter Marsha:

Dear Dad,

A very “Happy Father’s Day” to you. Want to thank you for being a great Dad. For being the kind of person who doesn’t ask for or want their children to adjust their lives/schedules/political thinking/voting/child-raising philosophy/(insert anything here) to match what you think. I cannot ask for a better gift in life from a parent than this freedom.

Our brunch discussions from our time at Waverley have had such a lasting impact on me. I only wish that I was less dogmatic in my own ideas than I am today and more like you are, and were, when trying to help your children’s thinking through issues such as abortion, the death penalty, taxation, etc.

I thank you so much for that time and for continuing throughout your life with this willingness to see situations through the eyes of the other person.

I love you very much.

Your daughter, Marsha
*

Jerry’s daughter Chris wrote this:

Hey Dad,

I’m so glad you knew how much I loved you and how thankful I am for all you’ve done for the whole family. You were an amazing dad, and I just wanted to say thank you for everything.

You protected me, when I was young, and always made sure I was safe.

You guided me, so that I would know right from wrong and counseled me, when I clearly… “should have known better.”

You gave me a childhood, that most people can only dream of.

You taught me not to judge people too harshly.… “You never really know what someone is going through,” you would say.

You treated me with compassion, when it wasn’t deserved.

You never told me what to think or believe, but instead, you gave me some really thought-provoking ideas.

You taught me how to laugh at myself. You said it was important because, well, we’re all just humans, with our flaws and all, trying to figure out how to make the most of life.

You made my son the most important person in your world. Thank you for that. He’s an amazing man!

Thanks so much for always putting the family’s best interests first. And thank you for being such a great listener.

I know this might sound a bit biased, but I honestly believe you’re the best dad I’ve ever had, and you’re my hero!

I’ll always be so grateful for you.

I miss you a ton,

—Chris
*

Jerry’s grandson Jordan wrote this:

Growing up, I used to feel a bit left out when conversations turned to dads. I didn’t have one around, and it stung. But with time, I realized something important—not everyone gets the incredible gift of having a grandfather like I did.

Most people knew him as Jerry. I had the exclusive honor of calling him Grandpa. He wasn’t just a grandparent—he was a father figure, a mentor, and a best friend. He taught me how to shoot a gun, how to pitch a tent, and how to drive a one-ton truck with a manual transmission. In every meaningful way, I really did have a dad.

He was generous and attentive, always willing to listen. He made people laugh, not with flashy jokes, but with genuine humor and a warm wit that stayed with you. His success in life wasn’t measured by titles or wealth, but by the community he built around him—one rooted in kindness, loyalty, and love. Until the very end, he was surrounded by friends and family who adored him.

As I write this, I’m not only honoring my grandfather, but also speaking to anyone who ever shared a good laugh with him. Anyone who’s ever made someone else smile because of something Jerry once said and those who have changed their lives for the better. Anyone who carries forward a bit of his spirit—his joy, his wisdom, his way of ending conversations with a clever remark.

If you’ve changed for the better after knowing him—if he made you a little happier, a little kinder—then I know he’s smiling. And I know he’s proud of you.

—Jordan
*

Nicholas Swift spoke at the Celebration of Life for Jerry. This is what he said:

Good afternoon.

My name is Nicholas Swift.
And I am one of the living testaments to what happens
when someone chooses to believe in transformation—
not as a theory, but as a practice.

When I was incarcerated, I, like most in that environment, focused simply on surviving it.
I had no roadmap.
No vision of a life worth reaching for—only the instinct to endure.
And I don’t know if I can describe what life looks like when you’ve never seen what possibilities it might hold—
only the realities you were born into.

But then something unexpected took root.
Not because the walls changed—but because someone chose to plant sanctuary in the most unlikely of places.

That sanctuary was a theater program.
Not just as performance,
but as a form of communal remembering—
a chance to become human again in the eyes of others,
to remember that emotion and authenticity still had a place in our lives,
to bear witness to others as they walked towards that same realization,
to watch a rising tide lift all ships,
and see people I never would have thought it possible of
to become more genuine, insightful, authentic versions of themselves.

The theater program gave me more than a stage.
It gave me back my imagination.

It showed me, through the presence of others—
through the quiet, powerful seeing of people who believed in it—
that living wasn’t just something you did once you got out.
It was something you could begin right there.

Each man who stepped into that space became,
knowingly or not,
an ambassador of possibility.
A quiet signpost in the dark that said:
“It doesn’t have to end like this.”

And for every person who walks through that system unconcerned with change,
there was someone else—
someone like me—
holding a hope they didn’t yet have words for.

There was a quiet aspiration towards something we had no words for, no way to describe beyond a felt sense of hope.
Theater gave that hope language.
It gave it form.
And most of all, it gave me a future I hadn’t dared to picture.

Not just a release date.
Not just a plan.
But a life.

Since then, I’ve built a business, become a Mentor, and started working towards my own nonprofit.
I want to offer to others what Jerry, and his family, through Johnny, once offered to me and those like me—
a glimpse beyond survival, toward something more true, more free, towards possibility.

And none of that would have been possible
without the person we’re here to honor—
and the family who trusted him, who trusted us,
enough to let the work speak for itself.

So I speak today
not just for myself,
but for every quiet spark that took flame
because someone believed we were worth the match.

Thank you.
For believing in what we might become.
For giving us a reason to try.

—Nicholas Swift
*

Denise Bare also spoke at the Celebration of Life for Jerry:

Jerry Smith’s Thread That Reached Me

I never imagined I’d be standing here, speaking at Jerry’s memorial.

Not as someone who spent time in prison. Not as someone who once thought her life was beyond repair.

But here I am—because Jerry believed in someone else.

He believed in his friend Johnny Stallings. He believed in Johnny’s wild idea that theater and art could belong in prison. That something sacred could happen when people on the inside were invited to sit in circle and talk about their lives.

Jerry backed that vision before it had a name. Before there were programs or grants or success stories. He believed in Johnny—and because of that belief, he ended up touching my life in ways I still can’t fully explain. He started bringing art into Two Rivers, to Columbia River and finally to Coffee Creek, where I was. Johnny had Carla Grant and Don Kern come and bring in theater and it changed my life.

I joined a theater circle while I was inside. Just a few hours a week. At first I thought it was a distraction. But it became a lifeline. A space where I could be human again. And behind that circle—behind the exercises, the plays, the visiting artists—was Jerry.

He didn’t know me. But he believed in the people who believed in me. And sometimes, that’s all it takes to change a life.

Jerry’s belief in how art can heal, restore, and reconnect helped me find my voice. His giving created a ripple that reached me. And now I get to be part of that ripple for others.

Thank you, Jerry, for trusting your friend and for never underestimating the power of a story shared.

I’m one of many you’ll never meet, but whose life you helped rebuild. My love and gratitude to Jerry’s wife Donna, daughters Christine, Marsha, and grandson Jordan. Your family is special and amazing, and your Jerry has touched my life, and I will forever be grateful.

All my love & gratitude,
Denise Bare
*

Here are some tributes to Jerry that people sent in:

Dear Donna Smith and Smith family,

Early on I was involved in Johnny’s work at Two Rivers Prison and became the first Board president. I watched plays, helped behind the scenes, and marveled at the amazing event of Shakespeare being performed by men who were new to his work, new to theater, new to finding their own deeper voices.

Later I became one of the dialogue group leaders, going out once a month, often with Bushra Azzouz. And like so many in Open Hearts Open Minds. I participated in the work and delight of finishing Bushra’s film Midsummer’s Night’s Dream in Prison and presenting the wonderful premier in Portland.

So much of what happened over the years at Two Rivers and then in other facilities in Oregon is the result of the interest and generosity of Jerry and Donna and the continuing support of all the family through the foundation. I feel grateful not just to have witnessed and participated in the OHOM’s programs but to have seen and benefited from the care of your entire family.

This support did not end with OHOM, in fact it continues, but has also been a motive force behind Open Road. Johnny has stimulated discussions, education and performances with Open Road, taking it beyond prison walls into everyday lives.

I am writing to acknowledge all of this in honor of Jerry’s memory and in respect for all of you. Thank you so very much. So many lives have been changed by your generosity.

With deep regards,
Deborah Buchanan
*

Dear Johnny,

I’m sorry to hear about the passing of your friend, Jerry Smith. I know what a significant person he was in your life.

Over the years I had a few conversations with him at the hotel where we stayed when we went to the plays. In one that particularly impressed me, he spoke about his concern for you in a way that I could only describe as parental. It was clear to me that although he valued the work you were doing, his deeper interest was in you personally, and in your full flowering as a human being.

We often talk about how lucky we have been in life, especially in the friendships we have enjoyed. You were particularly lucky in your relationship with Jerry, and he was equally lucky to have passed some of his time with you.

—Howard Thoresen
*

Dear Donna, Christine, Marsha & Jordon,

I won’t try to speak to your loss, our whole community’s loss, except to lovingly wish you well as you live the coming days of grief and love. But I would like to say a bit about the gifts to the world that Jerry’s and all of your insightful generosity have made possible. I was able to attend several of the plays at Two Rivers as well as the movie of Midsummer Night’s Dream and the short one made by Prabu, and gladly receive news of how Open Hearts Open Minds and The Open Road continue to touch lives as well as Johnny’s monthly “peace, love, happiness and understanding” newsletter. Each of these love-offerings has and continues to remind all who witness and participate of the transformative power of creativity and love of all kinds: power to heal deep wounds and uplift spirits. From the inspired vision vast enough to be a container for all these possibilities and more, to the fragile precious moments of hope: what a wonderful legacy!

With Love and Gratitude,
Nancy Yeilding
*

Johnny, you were blessed by the patronage of Jerry Smith, which allowed you to manifest some of your dreams.

What a legacy he has left. The ripple of his loyalty, love and support will last for generations.

He believed in you!

So do we.

Warm hugs
Brenda Erickson
*

I’ve said it a million times: “You all helped me and saved my life!” Living in a world full of love, wonder and beauty is what you gave me—and Jerry helped make that possible. I see what you all have done…so many of us now live in a world of Joy…

My name is Rocky Delos Hutchinson and although we have only met a few times, the abilities that you all gave to others have been the seeds that were planted in my heart, mind and soul, which provided me with a new life—one I will soon be able to live outside the walls of prison.

I only met Jerry one or two times, and his heart, his infectious smile and his tears of joy will forever be framed in the mosaic of images that make up my soul. I’m blessed to have that be a part of me.

His gift of love and a world full of new and wonderful people who showed me how to be open to everything life is, and how to be human again, gave me a second chance at a life…one I plan to fill full of kindness and beauty. This man provided me with life by his actions. I cry tears of love and joy now.

I cannot imagine the loss you feel. His love has helped all of us to grow. Through him, my tears of all things good cleansed my soul, and gave me a chance to live in love.

with all my heart, thank you
Rocky Hutchinson
*

Dear Donna, Christine, Marsha & Jordan,

I am so sorry for your loss. I remember meeting you, Donna, and Jerry once. I believe at one of the open performances of Hamlet at Two Rivers. I can’t over state my gratitude for the opportunities that your foundation made possible through supporting Open Hearts Open Minds. I saw the peace those programs brought to the participants first hand. Personally, being a part of OHOM completely altered my life trajectory. I learned so much about myself and the world during my time with the folks at TRCI and CRCI. I would not be who I am today without those experiences. So thank you, from the bottom of my heart. Jerry and you all have helped make the world a significantly better place.

With all my love
Victoria Spencer
*

Donna, Christine, Marsha, and Jordan;

I was so sad to hear about Jerry’s passing. There have been few times in my life that I’ve been lucky enough to share space with such a compassionate, kind, human. I was happy for every second I got. For a few years, I was a volunteer through and also a board member of Open Hearts and Open Minds. I directed three shows at Two Rivers Correctional and also helped facilitate a weekly dialogue group at Columbia River Correctional. These experiences changed my life. Because of the generosity of Jerry and your family I was able to see theater as a tool to do good in the world, not just as passive entertainment. That has guided my life ever since. After OHOM, I toured plays to culturally underserved, including incarcerated, audiences across the PNW and the USA. I’ve also recently started my own prison theater program on the medium side of Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Wilsonville, OR. The same magic that existed at TRCI is in full-force at CCCF. I like to think that Jerry and the rest of your family is part of that magic that I’ve taken with me on my life’s journey that is now in full blossom at Coffee Creek. Thank you for everything and please know I’ll always keep Jerry in my heart.

All my love,
Patrick Walsh
*

Dear Donna, Christine, Marsha & Jordon

Since meeting Jerry Smith I’ve cried a million tears. I’m crying now, as I write this. Going to prison broke my heart over and over again. A broken heart works better than a well-protected one, because feelings can get in and out more easily.

Yesterday morning, Carl Alsup called me from prison, and was talking about the time he played Marc Antony. He was having a hard time performing the role, because when he was rehearsing the funeral oration—“If you have tears, prepare to shed them now…”—he couldn’t help crying. Jack Poole, who was playing (the murdered) Julius Caesar complained that Carl was getting his costume wet.

I remember the day in the dialogue group when Carl told me that he found himself crying all the time. It was embarrassing, and he didn’t know what to do about it. Coming to prison at the age of seventeen with a life sentence, he had worked hard to maintain a tough guy persona. Now that was out the window. I wasn’t much help. He knew—all the men knew—that by the end of every performance my cheeks would be wet and my shirt tails soaked with tears. Of happiness!

What does all this have to do with Jerry Smith? Everything! Without Jerry, there would have been no prison dialogues or plays. From the time we first met, we liked each other. Over the years, our love for each other deepened. I miss him!

The love and support of all of you has changed my life. And Nancy’s life. And, thanks to what we like to call “the ripple effect,” it has changed and continues to change the lives of many many people.

It’s some kind of Love Revolution! My gratitude to all of you knows no bounds.

—Johnny Stallings
*

Dear Donna, Christine, Marsha & Jordon,

My name is Alex Tretbar, and while I didn’t know Jerry, his work has meant a great deal to me.

I was incarcerated in Oregon from 2017 to 2022, and during that time I met a number of incarcerated people who were involved with Open Hearts Open Minds, and whose experiences with the Shakespeare plays were transformative. Through them I came to know Johnny Stallings, who has also had a huge impact on my life. We struck up a correspondence while I was inside and that continues to this day. Much of my success and happiness since being released from prison can be traced directly back to Jerry.

I offer you my heartfelt condolences in what I know is a difficult time for you.

Best wishes from Kansas City,
Alex Tretbar
*

Dear Donna, Christine, Marsha and Jordan –

We are so sorry you have lost Jerry. Helping to bring A Midsummer Night’s Dream In Prison to completion and dissemination has been one of the most rewarding experiences of our respective careers. Jerry’s presence on stage at the Cinema 21 film premiere was a joyful moment that will always be remembered by us and the hundreds gathered. Jerry’s passion and support for bringing Bushra, Johnny and the Actor’s vision to life was clearly present in a warm and deeply human way. Along with yours, his love of and belief in this project (and many others) has already brought joy, tears and the potential for growth to several thousand people, with more to come. With the OHOM team, we will continue to help his legacy live on.

We wish you peace and healing.

Ellen Thomas (producer) and Enie Vaisburd (co-director, editor)
*

Dear Jerry and Donna Smith Family,

I am deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Jerry Smith. Please accept my heartfelt condolences during this difficult time.

Mr. Smith was more than just a generous supporter — he was a true believer in the work Open Hearts Open Minds does and the lives they touch. That was evident in his desire to watch the theatre productions at Two Rivers Correctional in Umatilla Oregon through the years. I had the privilege of performing for him during many productions in Umatilla, so I was personally impacted by his generosity in supporting Open Hearts Open Minds and other art programs inside prisons. His compassion and commitment made a meaningful impact, and his legacy will continue to live on through the causes the family foundation champions and supports.

Please know that my thoughts are with the Smith family, friends, and all who were fortunate to know him. May his memory be a blessing and may the work he did through his foundation serve as a tribute to his enduring spirit.

With sympathy and respect,
Josh Underhill
OHOM Theatre participant at Two Rivers Correctional Facility
President of the Board, Open Hearts Open Minds
*

Smith Family,

We at Open Hearts Open Minds feel deeply honored and truly blessed to have known and been supported by Jerry Smith throughout the years.

Every so often, the world is graced by someone whose generosity and spirit leave a lasting imprint — Jerry was undeniably one of those rare souls. His unwavering kindness, compassion, and commitment to others touched countless lives through his generosity supporting Open Hearts Open Minds. We truly would not be here if it wasn’t for his support from the beginning.

Those who had the privilege of knowing Jerry and whose lives that were uplifted by his generosity stand as a living testament to his remarkable heart and legacy.

May you and your entire family find comfort in the deep gratitude we hold for the incredible person Jerry was, and in the knowledge that his light continues to shine through all the good he helped make possible through Open Hearts Open Minds art programs.

Our deepest condolences,

OHOM Board of Directors
Josh Underhill, Dick Willis, Barbra Chen, Prabu Muruganantham, Lauren Scher, Aaron Gilbert, Messiah Shakur
*

I barely have words to express how my involvement as a Group Dialogue volunteer at Two Rivers Correctional Institution changed my life. I am a more open, loving, compassionate person for sitting in circle with those men, and for learning the way of the “Nonstop Love-In” from Johnny.

I met Jerry a couple times and was touched by his smile, kindness, and generosity. My heart is sad knowing I will not be in his presence again.

Love,
Kristen Sagan
*

Dear Jordan, Christine, Marsha, and Donna,

My heart goes out to you during this time of sweet and tearful transition. Jerry was a beautiful soul and will be greatly missed. His way of being had a truly positive impact on so many lives. What a lovely legacy to leave behind.

I remember the first time I sat down with Jerry. His bright eyes and his smile were so welcoming. Don Kern and I had been facilitating the theater program at Coffee Creek for about a year. We were greatly changed by the experience and wanted to continue the work, but knew we could not afford to do so without financial support. That’s when Johnny Stallings introduced us to Jerry Smith. Jerry leaned in to ask pertinent questions. He was not only kind, but thorough. He was a smart man and wanted to make sure we would be responsible stewards. I loved visiting with Jerry. And not just because he always insisted on dessert.

It’s been 11 years since I first stepped into the rehearsal room at Coffee Creek. I get to witness first hand the effect of arts in the lives of our incarcerated community. My life took a completely different turn after volunteering in prison. I have increased my empathy quotient and have learned to embrace the creative spirit within us all. I would not be the person I am today without Jerry and the family. Thank you.

Sincerely,
Carla D Grant
Executive Director
Open Hearts Open Minds
*

Dear Donna, Christine, Marsha and Jordan,

I want to send my deepest condolences for your loss. Even though I only met Jerry a couple times and didn’t know him personally, his kindness and love has forever changed my life in the most important way.

I became involved with Open Hearts Open Minds in 2009 while incarcerated at TRCI. During one of the darkest periods of my life I was lucky enough to be part of the Dialogue and theatre group there. Without Jerry’s generosity and his willingness to want to help the forgotten ones I shudder to wonder where my life would be today. You see in that little room on all those Wednesday evenings I was able to discover who I am and for the first time find true freedom in my life. The best part of it is that I am not the only one that discovered this. Not only the group of guys I was involved with but also continuing to this day, I can’t imagine how many lives have been impacted by OHOM. I know they have branched out into many institutions and are doing some really life changing work. I know this because I am now a board member and am so excited to see where this goes and continue this amazing work, and do my part in carrying on Jerry’s legacy of kindness love and compassion. It takes more than a community to pull this off it truly takes a family and I am so blessed to be part of the OHOM family. I want to thank you again Jerry for the gift of life and freedom. And thank you to your family.

God bless you all,
—Aaron Gilbert
*

What a great opportunity to share my reflections on past memories of great performances presented by the actors at Two Rivers Correctional Institution for several years. My experience, as well as my sister Andrea’s, left us each with great joy. At each performance we were overwhelmed to be given the opportunity to share the experience with those dedicated men. They were professional in every way possible and outstanding in their individual performances.

When the opportunity would come around every year, for five years, we would make our plans to travel from Salt Lake City to Umatilla and attend every performance. It was the highlight of our lives at that time.

It was always overwhelming for us to meet all the actors and have brief conversations with them. That gave me the opportunity to ask each of them if I could write to him and send him a birthday card. I had a strong desire to communicate with them because so many of them were lost or forgotten souls—alone and needing acceptance by people from outside those prison walls.

It gave me great pleasure to correspond with them, to learn how they were doing, and to allow them to share their thoughts, feelings and the successes they were making.

This all was made possible by the dedicated work of Jerry on behalf of the inmates at Two Rivers who took advantage of that great program.

I am always grateful for the joy and fond memories that fill my heart when I reflect back on those days.

Most sincerely,
Sharon Lemm (Momma Sharon)
*

To all,

The Dialogue and Theater Group was a saving grace in an otherwise dreary place. It inspired hope, purpose, friendship and most of all, love. This program influenced the lives of so many individuals from the players to their families and friends, people who were able to witness and experience the meetings and plays, people whom they then spoke to about their experiences and so on. This experience still influences thoughts and discussions far outside the origination. There are not enough kind and appreciative words to express the feelings about Jerry’s contribution and help in making OHOM a reality. Thank you to him and everyone who supported him in his efforts to help establish and maintain OHOM. He truly changed the lives of countless individuals as a result.

With great thanks and admiration,
Sincerely,
Joseph Opyd
*

I don’t know—-do you think Jerry Smith had any idea how his life—-his generosity, his gentleness, his gentle humor, changed the lives of others? Made others more generous, compassionate, aware, grateful? So many others!

I know he changed my life, gave me the blessing of getting to know and understand and admire scores of incarcerated men at Two Rivers Correctional Institution, for seven years (and still counting). Our dialogue group of fifteen to twenty men laughed, cried; we discussed life, talked about forgiveness, redemption, beauty, joy, shame, love, suffering. I left each Saturday I was there, driving home on Cloud 9, exhilarated and joyful, humbled and blessed. If only everyone could experience days like that they would change their views forever on incarceration.

Yes, Johnny started the program, that and the theater program, and was responsible for running both for years and years, beautifully and meaningfully. But behind everything was Jerry—and the whole Smith family. They all were, and are, caring and compassionate human beings.

—Jude Russell

peace, love, happiness & understanding 9/4/25
2025-09-04 - 2025-10-01
THE OPEN ROAD
peace, love, happiness & understanding
September 4, 2025

Ah Love! could thou and I with Fate conspire
To grasp this sorry Scheme of Things entire,
Would not we shatter it to bits — and then
Re-mould it nearer to the Heart’s Desire!

—The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, translated by Edward Fitzgerald
*

A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not even worth glancing at…

—Oscar Wilde
*

To create around ourselves the kind of world that we wish to live in—isn’t that the most important project of our lives?

—the Russian clown, Slava Polunin
*

I will not cease from mental strife
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England’s green and pleasant land.

—William Blake
*

Wandering through Eutopias

On Saturday, September 13th, I’m going to present ¡Eutopias! at Taborspace—the latest in a series of “entertainments.” Ideas of utopias and of paradise have always intrigued me. My original idea was to talk about, and maybe read from, famous utopias like Plato’s Politeia (The Republic), Thomas More’s Utopia and some more recent visions, like Aldous Huxley’s Island and Ernest Callenbach’s Ecotopia.

As I began my researches, the first thing I discovered was that the topic of “utopia” is vast! It was like going down a rabbit hole, and finding endless tunnels branching off. Easy to get lost.

Let’s start with Webster’s definitions:

utopia (noun)

1. often capitalized: a place of ideal perfection, especially in laws, government, and social conditions
2. an impractical scheme for social improvement
3. an imaginary and indefinitely remote place

Again, according to Webster’s, synonyms include:

paradise, heaven, nirvana, Eden, wonderland, fantasyland, Garden of Eden, Zion, Cockaigne, Sion, promised land, Camelot, Elysium, empyrean, Shangri-la, New Jerusalem, bliss, lotusland, never-never land, joy, fairyland, dreamland, dreamworld, arcadia, blissfulness, euphoria, blessedness, gladness

You can see where this is going… There are countless books and scholarly articles written just about “Arcadia” and the pastoral ideal in literature. The last word on the synonym list, “gladness,” is a synonym for “happiness”—which is another endless topic. Where to begin?

In this essay, I’m going to suggest that the utopian impulse arises from the irresistible idea that “things could be better than they are.” Another idea I want to explore is that “utopia” might be more about the way we see and experience the world than about the way things are—or might be. I want to look at literary utopias, like More’s and Huxley’s, and also utopian experiments in what we like to call “the real world.” Webster’s synonyms for “utopia” suggest imaginary places, but I’m sitting in Eutopia right now—The Tao of Tea. More about this later…

A good starting place for our journey together through utopian realms is with Sir (Saint) Thomas More (1478-1535). He was a critic of capital punishment who had his head chopped off. (His original sentence was to be hanged, drawn and quartered, but Henry VIII commuted it to decapitation.) Thomas More coined the word “utopia” when he wrote a long letter (in Latin) to his friend Erasmus about a fictional traveler who had come upon an island in the New World where the customs were different than in 16th Century England. The two friends liked to joke with each other, and “utopia” could be derived from the Greek outopia, meaning “no place,” or from eutopia, meaning “good place” or “happy place.” In this essay, I am “wandering through Eutopias,” but if I had wandered in More’s Utopia, I would have been arrested and punished for vagrancy. No slackers allowed. In many utopias, like Gerard Winstanley’s, everyone was required to work, unlike Harry McClintock’s Hobo Utopia, “Big Rock Candy Mountain,” where “they hung the jerk that invented work.” But I digress… I can’t help it! I’m in a rabbit warren here! (Note to Reader: this essay may resemble the non-linear way my mind works: “that reminds me of another thing, which reminds me of another thing, which reminds me of another thing…”)

On the positive side of the ledger, in More’s Utopia they had NO MONEY! There was free public education for all—including women! There was freedom of religion—as long as you believed in God. War with other countries was to be avoided, if possible. Capital punishment was reserved only for the most extreme crimes, like murder. In More’s day, you could be hung for picking pockets or for being a “witch.”

The first major literary utopia is Plato’s Republic—two thousand years before Thomas More’s Utopia, although Webster’s synonym “lotusland” suggests that Homer’s Odyssey gives us glimpses of pleasant imaginary realms—the Land of the Lotus Eaters, and Calypso’s island, and the land of the Phaeacians. In the Gilgamesh epic, the hero visits the mortal-turned-immortal Utnapishtim, who lives in a magical realm at the End of the World.

One more thought about Odysseus and utopia. The beautiful Goddess Calypso offers him a life of pleasure and immortality (!), but he wants to go home and live out his last years with his wife Penelope. That’s his utopia!

I wouldn’t want to live in Plato’s ideal city-state—(like Stephen Dedalus, I would get kicked out, anyway)—but I want to give Plato full credit for doing something radical and new—criticizing his own society. Aristophanes does this too, in a comic vein, without presenting serious alternatives. That’s not his job. He’s a comedian.

Plato was the first person to write out a detailed rational alternative to his society. Up until that time, my guess is that people accepted the society that they lived in as “the way things are.” Maybe there was some complaining, and even a few suggestions. Of course, as Heraclitus and the Buddhists say, everything is always changing, and especially in Periclean Athens, where there were major innovations in theater, democracy, philosophy and sculpture.

Unlike Homer’s imaginary Land of the Lotus Eaters, Plato was imagining societal improvements that he hoped would actually come about. Even though Athenians were proud of their city and considered it superior to other cities, Plato believed that there was a lot of room for improvement. He missed some obvious things, like the abolition of slavery and equal rights for women. He outlined five different forms of government, of which he felt rule by a Philosopher-King was the best. Democracy was near the bottom of his list.

The five forms of government that Plato outlined, in ranked order, are: Aristocracy, Timocracy, Oligarchy, Democracy and Tyranny. We think of “Aristocracy” as meaning rule by an “upper class.” Plato, who coined the word, meant something different. From aristos, “the best,” he meant rule by the wisest and most virtuous people in the polis. Plato, who devoted his life to Philosophy, the “love of wisdom,” wanted to ensure that the ruler of a city state was, by rigorous training, the wisest person. Someone like him. He spent a lot of his life trying to get his philosophy students to go into politics and to get tyrants to become philosophers. That last project didn’t go well for him. He was arrested and sold into slavery by the tyrant Dionysius I of Syracuse.

Timocracy was rule by (hopefully) honorable military leaders. Oligarchy is rule by wealthy elites—something we are quite familiar with. There has never been a pure Democracy—not here and not in Periclean Athens. Plato thought that because people were susceptible to demagogues, they might actually elect a tyrant. Fortunately, that could never happen here.

Plato had a special, personal reason for distrusting Democracy. The citizens of Athens had voted to put his beloved teacher Socrates to death.

Tyrannos was once a neutral word that just meant “king.” By Plato’s day, experience with tyrants had given the word a negative connotation. They were more likely to be selfish and cruel than wise and virtuous.

A form of government that Plato doesn’t mention is “Kleptocracy,” rule by thieves and conmen who use their political power to enrich themselves. There are many examples in the modern world, including the Somoza Family in Nicaragua, Putin and the other Russian oligarchs, the Saudi royal family, the Trump family, et cetera. Maybe Plato didn’t need the word “kleptocracy” because it was assumed that kings (tyrants) like Cyrus the Great naturally amassed the most wealth.

Plato’s system was rational—too rational. It highlights some fatal flaws in utopian visions: there is no one right way to live; one person’s utopia is another person’s dystopia; good societies are not created by one person telling everyone else how to live. They evolve out of complex collective changes—for better or worse.

There’s a eutopia inside Plato’s utopia, known as the Allegory of the Cave. According to Plato, our ordinary experience of the world is a play of shadows on the walls of a cave. We can break our chains, make our way to the mouth of the cave, and see the Sun. In India this is known as moksha, “Freedom”; in Buddhism, nirvana, which might be translated as “extinction.” Buddha spoke of it as “waking up.” Plato said that if you try to tell the dreamers in the cave about the indescribable reality you have seen, they will think you are mad.

In the two thousand years between Plato’s vision and More’s, people in Europe weren’t writing about how things could be better here on earth. This was seen as a Fallen World. Hopeless, really. Paradise would come for some after death, in Heaven. Jesus’ death on the cross redeemed humanity from Sin and Death. Unless it didn’t. In Dante’s vision, an eternal Paradise of Light and Love for the fortunate few is balanced with a nightmare vision of eternal punishment, pain, torment and damnation for the majority of “sinful” humans.

An Interlude:

For me, The Library is Eutopia!—Multnomah County Library or my own library. Powell’s Books. Belmont Books, Backstory Books & Yarn! BOOKS!!! Every book, like every person, is a World. Some of my best friends are authors: Walt Whitman, William Shakespeare, Susan Griffin, R. H. Blyth, Thomas Traherne, Harold Bloom, William Blake, J. Krishnamurti, Hafez, Han Shan, Lao Tzu… It’s a list that goes on and on and on.

Moving right along…

Another way of looking at utopias is that every time someone, alone or with others, attempts to make something new, something beautiful, something good, it is a utopian experiment—starting a nonprofit organization (there are millions of them on Planet Earth), opening a new restaurant or a new bookstore, growing a garden, painting a picture, making a movie, putting on a play. Eutopias are everywhere!

It’s important to note that some people’s ideas of a better world are at odds with other people’s ideas. In many imagined utopias wealth is abolished and people share everything. That’s definitely not Ayn Rand’s version. And at the worst, some utopian visions, when put into practice, bring about more suffering than we can even begin to imagine. The visions of Adolf Hitler and Mao Tse-Tung, and the deaths of millions, come to mind. Many attempts to make things better, make them worse. The dream of the Industrial Revolution to free us from toil and solve all our problems had ecological consequences that were not imagined.

In fact, there’s always a Snake in the Garden. No matter how good your idea, there will be problems. Because any imagined world, just like “the real world,” has things in it that “don’t work”—that are unfair, unjust, flawed. No matter how clever we are, we can’t avoid suffering or death.

According to the legend, Prince Gautama was already a grown man with a wife and a son before he had any idea that there were such things as sickness, old age and death. He was so troubled by these things that he left his palace in search of some kind of answer. After years of soul searching, he had an experience of perfect inner peace and freedom. He taught that suffering is caused by craving and that when we wake from our delusions we get off the endless Wheel of Birth and Death—we’re awake, we’ve seen the Sun, we’re free! In later Buddhism, the bodhisattvas decided that they didn’t want to get off that Wheel. They wanted to return again and again to the world of suffering mortals in order to help them.

Back in the Hippie Days, a lot of people started communes, where they could go back to the Land, grow organic fruits and vegetables, and live together in Peace and Harmony. This was not a new idea. In the Nineteenth Century there were all kinds of ideas about, and experiments with, making a better world (for humans), like Brook Farm and Oneida. Two impressive examples are The Communist Manifesto of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and the spiritual vision of Joseph Smith and the founding of the Mormon Church.

some notes:

Every society and every culture, from the first homo sapiens till now, is an experiment, a work in progress, that is always changing—slowly or rapidly. And they are all different. Because they are not all alike (impossible!), you will naturally find that in some places people are relatively friendly and happy, and in other places people, on the whole, might be more angry or unhappy. There are countries where practically every adult is an alcoholic! That can’t be good. In Bali, there’s a special ceremony for children when they reach the age of six months. They touch the earth for the first time! Up until then, they are constantly held by mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins, neighbors.

This variety is true not just of countries and cultures, but of states and cities and towns and families. By sheer chance, you can be born into a family where you are loved and admired and valued, or one where you get your teeth knocked out.

Now, back to Marx and Engels and the Mormons…

The basic idea of Communism is: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.” This doesn’t sound so terrible, does it? In fact this idea is as old as the hills. When people lived in tribes and hunted and gathered food, this was the only possible arrangement. Food was shared with everyone—even those too old or too young to get it for themselves.

On More’s island of Utopia, and in many imagined and actual utopian experiments, sharing was preferred to competition. The words “communism” and “community” are related. The dreams of Marx and Engels didn’t turn out well in places like Russia and China because of ruthless totalitarian ideologues who were happy to murder millions of people in order to pave the road to a “better world.” Maybe “mixed-economies,” like those in Scandinavia, provide the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people.

Marx’s vision and Buddha’s and Muhammad’s changed the world. Joseph Smith’s vision changed Utah. Just kidding. But it certainly caught on with a lot of people. According to a statistical report of the Church of the Latter Day Saints, as of December 31, 2024, there were 17,509,781 members worldwide.

Every religion and every country—every town and city!—can be seen as a utopian experiment. They are all flawed. That’s the Snake in the Garden. And the “flaws” are not small. Sometimes they are mind-boggling. Anti-Semitism for the Nazis. Our “Founding Fathers” were in favor of Free Speech and Freedom of Religion. Those are good things. Unfortunately, our utopian experiment was “flawed” by a program of genocide against the people who already lived here, and the most brutal slavery in the history of the world.

And another thing, and another thing…

Our whole civilization is “flawed” by being Patriarchal. The God of Abraham doesn’t have a wife!

Our Scientific-Materialist-Rational-Industrial-Capitalist Civilization is slightly flawed by the fact that in order to make the planet into a theme park for humans, it is bringing about the sixth major “Extinction Event” in the history of the planet. That’s not good.

The world is always everything-at-once. While most people are trying to be helpful, there are always some geniuses that are working on new methods to kill everything that lives. It has been ever thus.

Vladimir Putin could decide—all by himself—to have the Russian military invade Ukraine. The United Nations is the eutopian experiment that’s supposed to prevent that from happening, but, alas!, it’s flawed. Like this essay. Like everything.

On the other hand…

I don’t want to end my essay on eutopias on a gloomy or despairing note. That would be wrong! It is dismaying for those of us with dreams of universal peace and love and happiness to witness seemingly endless examples of violence and greed and fear. It seems to me that the news media and social media relentlessly distort our perception of what is happening. If someone goes into a store or a school or a church and shoots people, it makes the news. If a mother puts her newborn baby to her breast, it’s not news. Is someone grows a carrot, if a doctor in an emergency room saves a life, if a child sings a song, if a poet writes a poem, if people volunteer at a food bank, if a puppy licks your face, it’s not news. You get the idea. I’m pretty sure that what’s happening right now on our beautiful blue planet is that most people are doing good things, things that are useful and helpful—cooking food, teaching school, making love, fixing the plumbing. Mostly people are generous and kind.

Even if some people are trapped in visions of hatred and fear, we can live in love. If hurt people hurt people, we can be part of the healing. We can continue to help co-create a culture that nurtures what is best in everyone. In spite of countervailing forces, we can be kind. We can be good. We don’t have to wait for Eutopia to come “some day.” We can make Eutopia where we are, for ourselves and for others (who aren’t really “other.”)

Spring is expected to come again next year. (A firetruck just drove by and the handsome young firemen waved to the children.) We can write poems, sing, dance, put on plays, meditate, do yoga. We can re-read “Song of Myself.” We can laugh and cry.

If you look for them, you can find eutopias everywhere.

Everything, without exception, is miraculous.

Everyone, without exception, has a radiant beauty at the core of their being.

I’m sorry…

I didn’t get around to talking about Brook Farm, Sankai Juku, Huxley’s Island, Woodstock, Rabelais’ Abbey of Theleme, Gonzalo’s vision in The Tempest, the pastoral eutopias in The Winter’s Tale and As You Like It, Slava Polunin’s Moulin Jaune, Bread & Puppet Theater, The Farm in Tennessee and Plenty, The Big Orange Splot, World Central Kitchen, Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Ko-Falen, Plum Village, Farmers Markets, Homeboy Industries, Shakespeare’s Globe, Elysian Fields, the East Village, Portland, Plato’s Academy, Oregon Country Fair, the Quakers, the Shakers, the writings and projects of Christopher Alexander, pirate utopias, Golgonooza, Shangri-La, Alice’s Wonderland, Transition Towns, Valhalla, Esalen, Las Vegas, Atlantis, The Book of Revelations, Portland’s Japanese Garden…

There are endless tunnels in the rabbit warren. They go on and on…

In Conclusion (for now):

The Multnomah County Library is Eutopia. The Tao of Tea is Eutopia. Thursday morning coffee with my friends is Eutopia. FaceTime conversations with Howard Thoresen in New York and WhatsApp video conversations with Stratis Panourios in Athens are Eutopias. The room where I sit on the couch every morning, across from Nancy, enjoying quiet time and journal writing is Eutopia.

And…

Silence is Eutopia. Samādhi is Eutopia.

There’s a place I like to go every day, a place of deep peace and boundless bliss, a place of miracles everywhere and love without limit. I call it “The Golden World.”

My primary felt sense is that I’m living in Paradise, that Eutopia is my home.

–Johnny Stallings

¡EUTOPIAS! 9/13/25
2025-09-13 14:00 - 16:00
¡EUTOPIAS!

a journey through dreams of better worlds with Johnny Stallings

Saturday, September 13, 2 pm
Artspace Room at Taborspace, 5441 SE Belmont, in Portland

this Open Road event is free
