Arbitration-Final Day…just waiting for a decision

The final day of my arbitration was held on Thursday, December 10th, 2009 in Coquitlam, British Columbia. I was very impressed with the lawyer for the union (for ME!) as he presented the closing arguments for our case. It was clear that he had developed personal respect for me, a deep and persoanl respect for the environmental issues surrounding the case and ultimately a fine argument in law.

The experience, although harrowing over the years of waiting ,  was indeed INTERESTING and  if nothing else, good or bad,  SCHOOL DISTRICT 36  vs BC TEACHERS’ FEDERATION  ELAINE WILLIS -DUTY TO ACCOMMODATE will ultimately set a precedent in arbitration law.

And my lawyer truly did such a fine job in the end. The professionalism I couldn’t see at all in the beginning shone through in spades.  The beginning of the journey was extremely  rough – he didn’t, I feel, see me as a person – didn’t see past my disabilities. In the end he saw more than that. In the end there was, I believe, mutual respect. He recognized that I am a teacher and quoted me several times. I was touched. His words were sincere, eloquent and heartfelt – and if I taught one person about the environmental impact of chemicals as opposed to my need for a fragrance free workplace, then I did a good thing! So I have to be happy in the end, whatever the outcome.

The battles for those of us with disabilities, and especially for those of us with Multiple Chemical Sensitivity, are huge. There are many false beliefs about our abilities and the nature of our disabilities. The truth remains that we are people, to be treated as all people, with dignity, equality and respect. We are not to be shut away in our homes as society continues to demand of us.

Education is enlightenment. I WILL CONTINUE TO BE A TEACHER!  This process may enable me to do it for a living as well!

Waste to Energy means INCINERATOR -or There is No SUCH PLACE as AWAY

After the community of Port Moody successfully prevented Plasco from building a “Waste to Energy” incinerator in its municipality,  Metro Vancouver’s Waste Management Committee was presented a single option in guise of a choice at its meeting on December 4th. The only voice I heard in a roomful of decisionmakers who recognized the four hour session was a one-sided presentation based on erroroneous and dangerous non-facts was Richmond Councillor Harold Steves. Port Coquitlam’s Mayor, Greg Moore, although not speaking against the incinerators, did state that taking an inventory of our waste was important before beginning the project. He also talked about incentives and disincentives of waste in terms of tipping fees.

The science, although not as extensive as one may like, is clear and available against the creation of incinerators for burning waste. This is just an enhanced second world war technology. It is not innovative and not green. It doesn’t address the issue at the heart of the problem nor does it recognize that big business and big dollars drive its creation. What is missing from the message of their ZERO WASTE CHALLENGE is the message against consumerism – REFUSE TO BUY – the heirarchy should be 6 R’s.

The health of humanity and of our planet depend on not adding any more toxic emissions to the air. This is triage, people. We MUST TAKE CARE OF THE AIRWAY first. When the patient is dying the airway must be preserved first! We are delusional to think that if we can’t see it or measure it at a particular point that it just isn’t there. I am told I have an environmental disease – MULTIPLE CHEMICAL SENSITIVITY DISORDER – Balderdash! This is an environmental issue not a disease. My body reacts, like a canary in the mines, to an overload of toxins in the environment. Do we really want to add more?

The proposal presented to the Metro Board by Director Marvin Hunt, the 2009 Chair of Metro Vancouver’s Waste Management Committee was a classic. We teach parents and teachers working with young children to use this strategy. Provide only two choices and little information. Do you want this smelly old landfill that is closing or do you want this wonderful waste to energy facility that will create money? The simplistic notion that either of those extremes would be true was barely questioned in four hours of extreme,yet seemingly compelling facts. Dioxins, mercury, organochlorines, ultrafine particles, cadmium…not a problem…they told the board – these are at acceptable levels in emissions and ash. So they are not recycled, recaptured or reused. They are released either into the atmosphere or buried in a landfill after all. There is no such place as away… Dr. Milt McClaren, my professor from Simon Fraser University taught me well so long ago…

Community Peace

Conflict…when escalated becomes the stuff of wars, and is this not the opposite of peace?

As a child my sensitive nature caused me to cringe at the mere elevation of tone when arguments began to escalate. At the age of 55, I have recovered some from this response, but only to the point where I have developed strategies to attempt to prevent this behaviour in others.

What is it that we all desire in our community? It would be my best guess that for many of us, and, I believe, for all of our children that PEACE is very high on the list. Being caught in petty divisive conflicts definitely will kill the spirit of community, the spirit of neighborliness and increase hostility…the stuff of war. I, for one, do not want to participate.

I have a very dear friend, Chris,  whose political stripe is quite different from my own, yet we share more similarities than we do differences. Our values coincide on important issues. If I drew a Venn diagram, there would be so many things in the intersection. Amongst those important shared beliefs would be PEACE, integrity, kindness, community spirit, charity, environmental activism and so much more. And what I cherish most is that we can land on opposite sides of a debate with no animosity because we debate ideas. There is nothing personal about those beliefs we don’t share. We both celebrate diversity. Isn’t this the community you want to live in?

Conflict resolution is a modern name for processes and strategies to allow individuals and groups of people to work together peacefully. It allows ideas to be heard without personalizing the content. It allows the ideas to be separated from the personalities. It, in fact, allows the business to carry on where people can disagree and continue to be friends and to be friendly.

Ancient wisdom tells us, “everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry.” Modern conflict management tells us that active listening means we are not planning our own rebuttals while the other person is speaking. It tells us not to choose a side, to be black or white on an issue but to be purposely neutral while listening, open to the content and context of any words. With practice, one can separate one’s ideas about the person, what they may have said or done before from what they are saying at this moment. This is a true openness, without judgment – that is required to be a good listener.

To be a good speaker one needs to avoid using judgmental terms and insults, body language that shows disdain for others, and attempt to discuss ideas rather than the people who present them.

I offer some strategies for those of you who share with me a desire for PEACE. Here are some basic CONFLICT RESOLUTION strategies:

• Establish and follow standards of behavior
• Avoid using the word “YOU” in debate
• Develop respectful responses to disrespectful behavior.
• Listen with respect and respond with care.
• Stick to issues and avoid gossip
• Use empathetic responses
• Count to 10.  Use silence to increase calm.  It’s valuable to “leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.”
• Speak from the “same side of the table.” (find points of agreement)
• Tangible reminders to respond appropriately. (notes, cues from a colleague)
• Build credibility with  language and actions
• Give people a way out.  Establish choices.
• Refuse the win-lose perspective.

Ma Belle-Mere

Amanda Elizabeth Willis,

whose initials and profession I share, has been my mother for the last 38 years. She quickly dispelled rumours about mothers-in-law by welcoming me very warmly into her family as Ted’s wife and then as the mother of her grandchildren, a true place of honour in her heart. When I joined her profession shortly thereafter, and she added mentoring me into teaching to mentoring me into motherhood, the deal was sealed.

In the early years of our marriage, it seems we spent a lot of time living on Garden Avenue, either in the big house at 1789 or in the tiny house across the street. I am sure that’s where my environmental activism and true love of spiders were solidified. Every indoor spider was lovingly named Charlotte by Betty

Betty

and placed outside to carry on its work. Tea leaves were fed directly to ferns, acid-loving plants (did she just instinctively know that this was the right soil enhancer for them?) While others were grooming lawns and gardens against nature, Betty and Bill were working with nature in their garden. Now naturescaping is de rigeur – Betty was a woman ahead of her time.

Betty was a thoroughly modern woman. To some of you this may come as a surprise to hear it, but it is true. She embraced change and understood that new ideas and new technology were inevitable and to be evaluated rather than discarded. This was especially so with ideas which she loved to discuss. As time went by, she became more and more open to new ones, always willing to modify an opinion based on new information. Betty developed little wise sayings which I quote frequently. These were based on her own life experiences and the one which most affected her own life decision was . “People don’t grow older, they grow more so.” With that belief in mind, Betty, I believe, chose to hone her life focus on her beliefs: kindness, positive thinking, family, and intellectual thought. She became more so every day…still my mentor, ever my role model. She quietly affected those around her by taking control of situations with her innate Conflict Resolution skills whether in the classroom or at the dinner table at Harmony Court Care Centre. Her positive attitude attracted people to her and she became a favorite of the staff at the Care Centre.

Betty was a loving mother and grandmother. How lucky I was to be part of that nest. Whenever there was a crisis, Betty was there for me. As my health failed, she was the one who initially managed doctors and hospitals, even if it was by phone. She taught me how to navigate a medical system and advocate for others within it. When I ended up an invalid after an unexpected surgery, my teenaged children packed me off to Betty and Bill’s for tender loving care in the family home. The nursing skills she learned from her mother were always at hand. What good fortune I had to have acquired a second mother, loving and wise, caring and sweet… who aged like fine wine, but I can hear her voice gently say, “I would prefer fine cheese, dear”. The French use the word belle-mere, beautiful mother for this special relationship – the mother of one’s spouse. My Betty, my dear sweet gentle, wise belle-mere. Thank you for all you gave to me and others during your life. You are missed but always with me. I will try to age as gently and kindly as did you, my role model…

I AM a Teacher

I was allowed to present this “STATEMENT” at the second day of my arbitration proceedings. I suppose it is wise not to comment publicly until the proceedings are over. We meet again in December, 3 1/2 years after the back to work process began.

I sit before you today to be judged. I placed myself here long ago when I initiated the back to work process in discussion with my doctor in 2006. My life, my health, my vulnerabilities have been shown to you and I welcomed it for one reason…I felt it was my obligation to return to the workplace as my ability to do so had returned.

What is required for a teacher to work? I learned from a brave, young ventilator-dependent quadriplegic hired by a progressive school district (Vancouver) that a strong will and a functional mind were the only requirements. A functional body was not required. If young Johanna Johnson

Johanna

can do it, I had every obligation to return to my career.

As a visibly disabled person in a school, I give a message to disabled students. They can aspire. They, too, can have careers in what they perceive to be important jobs dominated by the able-bodied. But more importantly, I educate the able-bodied, because they need to know that I am not a mere curiosity. I am not what they see. I am a human being; a teacher…a more than capable teacher, who, given a few environmental adaptations, can more than function in my chosen career.

Most of the people who wrote letters back and forth, made decisions against my presence had never met me or met me only once. With all we know about brain science and the function of “the interpreter” in filling in details missing in actual interaction, I am in awe of this entire process.

There are many things to applaud in the stacks of paperwork I have studied. Some have learned about the use of green chemicals for cleaning. There have been reports from other schools and institutions on scent-free policies, the new policy for Anaphylactic Safety in Surrey School District. … But according to the BC Lung Association 3 out of 10 people are chemically sensitive and the numbers are growing. I maintain that every living organism is “chemically sensitive” given large enough doses in small enough enclosures. The reactions may just differ. Some people break out in cancer after accumulating the chemicals in body organs. I have the GOOD LUCK of being able to detect small quantities and having the need to escape quickly. There are many indicators in our environment that human beings as a species are succumbing to chemical pollution. Sperm counts in humans are at 50% of what they were a few decades ago. Knowledgeable parents would welcome a chemical free school and soon it will be the norm. This year, already, parents are grappling with the need to buy PVC free school supplies and worrying about all the previous years when they did purchase these products.

The paternalistic notion that I am being protected by my employer by not being returned to work is “NO SALE” here. Kathy Wright plainly admitted that she was busy in September, 2006 and that she forgot about me. We met once and in the time that passed my disabilities loomed larger in her mind and more insurmountable by the day.

I sit before you, a human being, flawed, as are we all. My desire…to do what’s right and return to being a contributing member of society despite my disability. I am a teacher.

Botox, youth worship, what’s going on?

I should be packing for my trip to stormy Hawaii. Now we know GLOBAL WARMING is causing the changes to our weather and I can relate all this to the use of petrochemicals…. but this post is about wrinkles. And it’s about youth. And it’s about that little nagging feeling inside me that something is wrong with the way our youth transitions into adulthood.

I was reading a magazine about decorating… home decorating, and there was a full page advertisement for BOTOX to get the wrinkles out of your face. And I had just been thinking about the wisdom of some of the older people I know. This led me to wonder how on  Earth we came to covet youth, youthfulness and wrinkle-free skin.

YOUTH, BOTOX, MADNESS

I am told my skin is youthful looking for my age of 55 years. A compliment. But does my ego bask more when told I am wise….oh yes.  Is this because wisdom is what was prized in my family, my culture? Or is this because I get IT?

There is clearly some confusion about what is important. Why are we here on Earth? What’s life all about anyway? If we look young will we have a longer stay to figure out what it’s all about?

Those who age gently (Hi Ted Ulmer!) are such a pleasure to be around. They have humour and wisdom oozing from their pores. Some cultures have an awareness of the treasures that are their elders.

What’s with us?

Lynn, Me – Jam and Bread

The first time I met Lynn she was smiling up at me from a sea of faces at the All-Candidate Meeting of 2005. I chose her face from the crowd upon which to focus while I delivered my speech. I often advised others to pick a face like that – one offering encouragement. Her smile was sincere, her eyes genuinely reflective of positive listening and endorsement (and all that in the two minute permitted speaking window!)

Unfortunately I had to deliver that speech from my wheelchair, utilizing oxygen and a blue mask. The committee organizing the meeting had not read my campaign literature and was not prepared in any way for a disabled candidate.

Following the speech and the questions, few of which were directed at me, Ted Ulmer, the only other person in the room who appeared to have a mobility impairment, offered to help with my campaign. Wow – this was not an exercise in futility. A smile and an offer of help (and hope).

Outside, the smiling woman introduced herself, Dr. Lynn Burton. We chatted. Other people came up and chatted with me as well. A friendship was born.

Lynn makes jam. Any fruit that makes it into her kitchen is likely to end up in one of her delightful concoctions. There is Peachy Potion, Daisy’s Delight Plum Bum Jam, Love Potion No. 9, Apricot Tipple, Cherry Nefertiti Love Potion (honestly Egyptian ingredients), Strubarb, Ginger Peach (a personal favorite), Rhubarb Rambler (another personal favorite – did I mention I don’t even eat jam!), Backyard Blackberry Bounty, Boozy Boo Berry, Hint o’ Mango Rhubarb (now here’s where my resolve to not eat sugar went out the window! – now my all-time favorite!), Wham Bam Raspberry Jam… okay you are getting the idea. This is not an exhaustive list but you may have become exhausted reading it. Lynn is that rare, right-brained genius who is not only creative but also extremely productive. She tells me she inherited her jam-making ability from her grandmother.

JAM

I learned to make bread from my mother’s mother. She was also a smiling woman and a genius. I remember her being a very kind-hearted, positive woman with twinkly blue eyes. Like Lynn she was not too tall in stature but a giant at political strategy.  Early kitchen memories are of kneading my own little doughy bits in her kitchen. My grandmother learned her breadmaking skills in Russia when she was small; the miller’s daughter.

“How will I know when I have kneaded enough, Baba?”

“When the sweat from your brow salts the dough,” she would smile with her eyes lifted, remembering the words she had heard herself so long ago.

So now I am the bread maker. The kneading is done by a machine, I must confess. But I measure mostly like my grandmother did, with a fist, a pinch and a squinted eye. And I know the dough is right by the feel.

Lynn’s jam and my bread. They make a very nice combination. Like our friendship…

Volunteers at the hatchery can feast on my bread and Lynn’s jam most Sundays.

The Hindsight Years – Ataxia Film Series

Not too much commentary – I will try to let Glenn ter Borg’s film speak for itself. Believe me, there are hours and hours of film that went into making this 10 minute segment of the Hindsight Years. Glenn says mine was the most difficult to date. Here’s the link… enjoy!

The Hindsight Years – Elaine Willis

Red Zone

I am a big fan of Cesar Millan, the Dog Whisperer. He talks about Red Zone dogs as those that can turn on you in an instant. “A red zone is when a dog is in attack mode against another animal or human. The intention is to assault its target until he exhausts it. Until there is no life left, ” says Cesar.

Old Spice makes a product line called Red Zone. It is purportedly aimed at the higher end consumer with its greatest assault product, a time-release deodorant – the chemical that keeps on giving. An aggressive chemical that will attack the chemically sensitive until they are exhausted or the anaphylactic (me) until they have ceased breathing; it must be especially pthalate laden as it seems that frequent wearers have this product enlaced heavily in their clothing with the impossibility of easy removal. Brilliant marketing!

Since 2002 researchers have known that Beluga Whales are endangered and most deaths are due to cancer (including juveniles). The cancer has been linked to industrial chemical pollution. My point with the whales, you ask…

Despite the growing research that shows that humans are experiencing increased toxicity related illnesses, we continue to allow such products in and near our bodies. We seem to forget that the skin is an absorptive organ.

OLD SPICE RED ZONE - knocks me out in seconds… This product will hopefully be thought of in the future like DDT, an embarrassing chemical…we will think “How did we let people use it.. ?” Likely it will be too late. Human sperm counts will be at an all-time low ( fragrances contain endocrine disrupting chemicals ) and Beluga Whales will be long extinct.

See the latest research on Multiple Chemical Sensitivity on The Canary Report by clicking here.

Philosophy but I’m no philosopher…

So here’s the deal…. I want to be a better person… I want to be a moral person, a kind person, a just person. I want to be the kind of person I would like and respect. I want to be a person with principles…oh, and of course I want to be smart.

You see…that’s what I had growing up. I was the bright one. I didn’t really have to work very hard to do well in school…at least not at the academic endeavors but I knew there was more. Injustice always upset me greatly. It still does. Those adults who always said “Whoever said life is fair?” used to truly upset me. Shouldn’t those have been the people working to make it so…

There were others clearly who knew this was life’s big struggle because after all Robin Hood was a popular story for generations. Yet I watched as even those who struggled for equality would get swallowed up by something big, or something evil. I didn’t understand it then, and even now struggle to comprehend.

Some of my FACEBOOK friends just laugh at me when my daily status post is about some deep thought about morality or the state of humanity. They literally “POKE” me or poke fun at me. I do, however, feel that I must work daily, in some small way to improve myself and the world in which I live so as not be swallowed by this “thing”, this little part of humanity which is really a kind of oblivion…a lack of awareness.

Oh, depth of thought…you keep my house from being tidy.