What an amazing community.
It's such an honor to be here with all of you
and in the same space.
Our bodies, in the same space, appreciating things together,
it's just lovely, lovely.
Thank you so much, Julie, for those beautiful introductions.
And thank you, Tyler and Cynthia and Eleanor and Paola
and lots of other people who have made this such a pleasure.
And thank you also for the students in our class
this morning that we got to visit.
It was so fun to chat with all of you.
You had such great questions.
I'm just absolutely in love with this place,
as was my grandfather actually, who lived here in Tucson until
his death in 2021, actually on January 21st,
just a couple of days ago.
So I'm going to read just a small poem for him.
My step grandmother, who I got to visit today,
wasn't able to come and be in the audience.
But I'm thinking about Judy and thinking about you too, grandpa.
This is called The Year Not Long Enough
to Measure His Single Death.
On the vanishing sand of lake--
So this is set-- sorry, this is set in Sarnia, Ontario, which
is sort of north of Bay City, Michigan, which
is where my family is from.
And they snowbirded down here to Tucson.
On the vanishing sand of Lake Huron,
20 women line up-- by blood or marriage--
to practice their piercing pig calls.
50 years after our last farm sold their fields to the beach--
suey.
And the men and children fling their shoes,
Show off their brightest underpants,
And hop in dusty tater sacks
For the prize of Kentucky Fried Chicken,
Potato salad, and lime jello with shreds of carrot.
It's the Midwest.
This is how my family has prayed
For over a hundred years--
The highest holy day,
The first Saturday of August,
The date chosen for a constellation of birthdays
until his death.
Remember this year, dog year.
The placement of the planets
Triangulate the position of every bovine in Ontario.
His red swim trunks,
Still soaking the wooden floor,
His ashes swimming back on every wave toward shore.
He was a veterinarian also, hence the bovine.
Somebody once said, I think your grandpa
knows every cow between Bay City and Sarnia, Ontario.
And it's probably true.
And he knocked them all up.
[LAUGHTER]
Not to boast, but you know.