Heart of Childhood

"Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain
and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond."
"Is There a Santa Claus? [Yes, Virginia...]" - NY Sun 1897
Young dancer, impromptu on Smokestack's stage, 2017

Fifteen years ago, while driving back to Brooklyn after a long weekend in the country, I was sure Scott's and my relationship was over and I was glad. Our rental van was chock-full of stuff, two adults, one of our two preteen children, and unbelievable tension. We stopped for dinner, the two of us barely speaking except to snipe at one another on the way to the table. As we all began eating in uncomfortable silence, the insightful man with us - we met him that weekend and have never seen him again - asked the two of us one question and so saved our relationship, "How did the two of you meet?" By the time we were done telling him and the table of our chance meeting in 1997 with all its twists and turns, the meal was over and we were laughing and smiling, committed to one another again and committed to the task at hand of getting us all home safely. We may have seemed on different paths for a time, but we had one true end and would get there together, something that has happened again and again in our experience these last four years in Dubuque, with saving these buildings from the wrecking ball, with letting wonderful people into our lives, with creating Smokestack. Despite "the skepticism of a skeptical age," everything does fall away and we again see what truly matters.

Smokestack's pocket park and tower entrance 

And so the last of Dominic Velando's questions from his unpublished 2016 interview with us for Grain, the magazine of the Dubuque Area Arts Collective.



Dominic
Are you any less in love with the building and/or your business than when you started?


Scott & Susan
No, but what’s most important is that we are still in love with one another, perhaps more than ever. Our life together has been one of things coming together seemingly guided by some other hand, beginning with our chance first meeting in Fort Greene Park in Brooklyn while sledding with our respective children twenty years ago. That hand, that small and true voice which speaks to all of us and wants to be heard, was shouting at both of us on our first chance visit to Dubuque, six weeks later when we first saw this property, through our move to Dubuque from NYC five months later, through every stage of our work on this project, and then it brings critical people into this project and our life in ways we could not imagine and we are stunned when we see them, but we recognize them and think “Where have you been all my life? I am so glad you are here now.”

Smokestack, aerial view, both buildings,
with rooftops and pocket park 

This entire project is our only child together and we have to let it grow and affect others in positive ways. We joke that we are starving artists in the midst of an enormous performance art piece called Smokestack, but this truly is our work of art, filled with incredible and memorable moments that we celebrate, yet we also recognize the difficult experiences are moments of learning that are needed as we fulfill our vision for this forgotten corner in Dubuque. We are artists ourselves, but our time for other art is limited because of this project: Scott is a professional musician, carpenter, periodic visual artist, and was a rescue paramedic who is among FDNY’s 9/11 survivors while Susan was last working in educational non-profit fundraising for a Brooklyn private school as a historian and director of alumni, but also writing and dancing even if just around the house.

We had plenty of extreme challenges in our lives in NYC, but this project in Dubuque is worth our present struggle - it is the struggle of our life - because we do love Smokestack, this building, revealing this property and its history, Dubuque, and Iowa, and we love the people who truly make it all possible. All is still not fully revealed, but we continue in faith that “all shall be well” and that we have been led to share this project and our love with the people who come into our life.

Related posts: Smokestack Q&A 1, Smokestack Q&A 2, Smokestack Q&A 3, Smokestack Q&A 4, Smokestack Q&A 5, Smokestack Q&A 6

Better Dig Deeper

People always ask us, "How did you get the lights up that 
smokestack? You must have rented an enormous lift!"
They are near-speechless when they learn the method Scott
devised and pulled off. Scott and his son Leon, on a
calm Sunday in 2015, floated large helium balloons
attached to a very long string way up in the air, then
maneuvered the string between the smokestack and one of
its lightning rods and pulled the string down into place. 
They then attached string lights to a rope and the rope to the 
well-positioned long string at the top of the smokestack. 
They pulled the balloons down so as keep the string in its 
"channel' and the string went up, then pulled the string down 
and the rope went up, then pulled the rope down and the 
string lights went up, and finally wrapped the string lights 
around the smokestack by walking far around the stack. 
I could not watch it, but I knew Scott's idea would work. 
In 2017, Scott, his teenage carpentry trainee Senna, and I 
replaced the lights in about an hour because Scott planned 
ahead for eventual string light replacement back in 2015. 
Some visions are worth the effort. Some people don't give up.

Some of the most personally rewarding times in my life were incredibly challenging, often frightening. True of certain aspects of our life in Dubuque, but my first thoughts actually go to helping my mother in 1995 and my in-laws in 2012 and 2013 through their end-of-life journeys. Quitting was impossible at those moments in my life because other human beings were dependent on my not walking away. 

There have been times when Scott and I have wanted to walk away from our corner of 7th and White Streets in Downtown Dubuque. Those moments still happen, but giving up is simply not something Scott and I will do. For four years, we've depended on each other's strength to get through those moments of wanting to throw in the towel. Plus, as I've indicated in another post, there are a lot of wonderful people in Dubuque who inspire us to dig deeper. Scott and I are grown-ups and we can take it. We know that if we give up, it is possible that nobody will try again. We know we have faith in Dubuque, in our property, and in why we are here. 

So Dominic Velando's unpublished Q&A #6 from 2016 is focused on wanting to quit. We chose to focus on four moments. 

Dominic Velando
What’s a memorable moment when you wanted to quit?

Scott & Susan
Seeing some of the most exciting young creatives and professionals we’ve ever met anywhere choose to leave Dubuque month after month for other cities, and then hosting some of their “Goodbye Dubuque” parties at Smokestack. Some days it seems that Dubuque is following precedents instead of setting precedents, not being bold enough when bold action is needed to retain the demographic all communities need desperately and are losing right now to larger cities.

Garbage that had to go sadly included
a McCrays Chicks plywood sign ca. 1965-1971

The surreal moment when we were asked, “Why aren’t you going after that financial incentive?” for the building one year after that exact person warned us away from that very incentive, telling us then that it was “not for you” and “they only like to work with people they know.” The “we don’t know them” reasoning is something we have encountered numerous times, even in spite of our repeated efforts to get people to know us and being upfront about our project. Our project seems completely in line with what Dubuque and Iowa state they desire: we have read time and again how big business and connected others are treated quite well, how “The Arts Mean Business,” how young creatives and professionals are a highly desired population for many reasons including economic, how a vibrant nightlife and Downtown scene is needed for many reasons in Dubuque, and even more. Still, we have been almost completely alone in our chosen city, even when we were told and believed otherwise. We have encountered myriad obstructions and obstructionists in our journey, so this was not the first such disappointment, nor will it be the last.

Perhaps it was the day we realized that not one of the Dubuque leaders we had tried to work with for years had contacted us after we first made the Telegraph Herald’s front page, above the fold. The TH continues to be a pleasure to work with and that article went national thanks to the Associated Press because a crazy story like ours is newsworthy and might be considered a public relations opportunity elsewhere. Meanwhile, legions of individual citizens had read the article and reached out to us, including two people who had taken the time to laminate that article for us. One was a good friend, but the other was a cashier we knew only in passing who kept her laminated copy near her register for a month so she could give it to us when we next came in that hardware store. Experiencing such kindness, thoughtfulness and grace from individual community members is beyond humbling, yet it contrasts with much of our experience with those with power and privilege. In The Bible, Jesus is quoted as saying: “I was a stranger and you welcomed me” - while some did not, many individuals have truly welcomed us here and we are ever mindful and grateful.

Favorite ads on an urban blight billboard next to
our Downtown building have included
"Mary Queen of Peace Pray for Us" and this one.
Pre-2016 photo, before the stair tower and dome.

Having to continually tell young and hopeful people that it is okay and part of our journey as they express disappointment and shame in their hometown to us when they put our struggle together on their own, despite our holding back for fear of discouraging them in their own efforts. In those moments, they realize that Dubuque did not get on board with us when we walked in the door, played it safe and was not open to making new friends, misunderstanding or simply not seeing our vision and story as compelling, not seeing the potential benefits that outside-the-box thinking can bring to communities, even happening elsewhere now in Eastern Iowa. We do not want an ending of “We believed in Dubuque, but Dubuque did not believe in us.” We never think it’s too late, our door is never closed to those who might wish to get on our bus further down the road.


Next is Dominic's Q&A #7, the last one and it's about love.

Related posts: Smokestack Q&A 1, Smokestack Q&A 2, Smokestack Q&A 3, Smokestack Q&A 4, Smokestack Q&A 5

Sharing Privilege, Collective Energy, Identity

Scott on top of the dome during installation, Summer of 2017

People regularly share comments with us that relate to Smokestack's identity in Dubuque. So often, it's the encouragement we need to go forward. Just a few to share, mostly from customers who have become friends: "The two of you have created a safe space in Dubuque," and "Change [needed to achieve greater equity] is happening in Dubuque and it's happening faster because you are here and doing this," and "I feel safe in two places in Dubuque: my apartment and Smokestack," and "Because the two of you are here in Dubuque, because you are doing this in Dubuque, I can be in Dubuque." 

Scott articulated long before Smokestack opened that he wanted it to be a place where people of all kinds would gather together for shared positive experiences. That has mainly happened and we feel part of it is due to the energy of this property, but part of it is Scott and me and our having grown up in New York City. I view us as citizens of the world, which kind of defines the word "cosmopolitan." I stunned a Dubuque friend last year by calling him "cosmopolitan" while stating that I feel Scott and I are cosmopolitan people with a cosmopolitan idea in Smokestack. He was stunned that I would think of him as cosmopolitan. He considers himself an "Iowa farm boy,"and that may be true of him in one way, but all people have many layers. To me, this man and so many others I know from this region are at least as cosmopolitan as he apparently thinks Scott and I are. There are times in my four years in Dubuque when I have felt that being a "citizen of the world" has meant that I am without a true home, but that's another aspect of Scott's and my story that may or may not be shared one day.

Underground, inside the real smokestack

Last June, I was asked to speak at an Inclusive Dubuque event about how we try to be inclusive at Smokestack. Inclusion, to me, is basically an aspect of being a citizen of the world - that you accept and respect new people and new experiences in your life, even though it may sometimes be difficult to be truly open. I spoke about a lot of things that day, like how we view employees as colleagues, that we strive to make Smokestack a place that is inclusive and respectful of everyone and that it does not always work even when trying our hardest, and that we've personally experienced a degree of inequity in Dubuque that we did not anticipate and that I often think experiencing that is part of why we are in Dubuque in the first place. I ended on the subject of privilege, that Scott and I recognize how privileged and fortunate we are, that just being able to pick up and move as we did for the purpose of creating something like Smokestack is an undeniable privilege, but that we both believe the real point in having privilege is to stretch your hand out and bring others up with you, that there is no point in having privilege if you don't share it to the benefit of others.

Scott and I are not one person, but we are basically like-minded and agree on most things though we challenge each other all the time. We adapted an Armenian wedding tradition for our wedding ceremony in the front parlor of our Brooklyn home in 2005: we placed our foreheads together in a moment of silence so that we would be of one mind in our life together. I do think this small action had deeper impact on us than we thought it would, even though we already held similar beliefs. Those shared beliefs have helped shape Smokestack and its identity, just as the property itself has, but much of Smokestack's identity actually rises from others. They imagine Smokestack in ways we have not yet and they help make a fluid, changing Smokestack into reality.

And so, Q&A #5 of Dominic Velando's unpublished 2016 interview for Grain, the former magazine of the Dubuque Area Arts Collective. The last paragraph of our answer is all Scott: for someone who people think rarely speaks, he has huge things to say. 


Dominic Velando
The Smokestack’s identity stands out in this town... How would you describe how that identity has developed? Has it met your expectations for the kinds of crowds and acts you want there?  

Scott & Susan

On the Rooftop with a Manhattan
Imagining can become reality

People at Smokestack and in our life in Dubuque are primarily the young and the young at heart, the dreamers, people open to new things, grown-ups with a sense of whimsy and irreverence - these are personally true of us as well. Smokestack is an “everybody, everyday” place, an authentic and beautiful space to be accepted for your authentic and beautiful self, in which we want all people to be safe, empowered and enjoying life. Our goal is to enable others to have a forum for their own growth, celebrations and creativity, a space used for art and performances of all kinds, private and public events, for just hanging out and being.

Watching the development of Smokestack is fascinating: it’s something we have been in a position to enable, but the course and ultimate result is beyond our abilities and imaginings alone because it is guided by the demands of the building and by the creative input of everyone, the collective consciousness, if you will. Nabokov wrote, “Who knows from whence comes that gentle nudge that jars a man’s soul into motion and sets it rolling, doomed never again to cease.” The collective energy of everyone associated - our patrons, our contractors, our employees, our friends, and others too - has set Smokestack in motion and even if this incarnation of the building eventually falls to the relentless tides of the river or to the steady march of the tree of heaven, the energy that has summoned people to this spot for thousands of years will never cease.

Next is Q&A #6, when Dominic asked if there were a time when we almost gave up. Oh boy.


Related posts: Smokestack Q&A 1, Smokestack Q&A 2, Smokestack Q&A 3, Smokestack Q&A 4

Faith, Dreams, Truth, & Doing the Right Thing

In a particularly prescient moment,
Scott bought a book on construction before
we moved from Brooklyn to Dubuque:
"Working Alone" by John Carroll

Over a year ago, Scott and I were chatting in the sun on our now-replaced driftwood stoop, and he asked me, "What was your dream?" Without hesitation, I turned to him and said, "My dream was to marry you. And I got that." After his usual, "Oh, sweetie...," he clarified, "Actually, I mean here, in Dubuque. What was your dream here?" My reply, "My dream was to save this building." Today, it is pretty clear that Scott and I have saved a culturally and historically significant building from the wrecking ball, in the heart of Downtown Dubuque, pretty much all by ourselves.  

Scott and I have now fulfilled our primary vision in Dubuque. We have also fulfilled the terms of the grants mentioned in Dominic Velando's unpublished 2016 Q&A with us below, including the $75K competitive matching grant from the State of Iowa's Economic Development Authority for Main Street Iowa's Challenge Grant X and a total of almost $19K in matching grants from the City of Dubuque. One day, perhaps we'll have the funding for the facade work our building deserves. 

Restoring water and sewer service to our building, April, 2015.
Our brilliant plumber often works alone also. This excavation
wound up happening during our Architecture Days Tour
with Dubuque Main Street. Some might have though the timing
was horrible, but not us. We got to state to our tour group,
"Thank you for being here. We know both possible entrances are
basically blocked, but today was when the excavator was available
and they surprised us with two crews. So, this gives an idea of
what it really takes to rehabilitate a historic structure."

Achieving our shared dream in Dubuque has been unbelievably challenging for both of us. Plus, there are moments that confirm we are not crazy, like this one: It's always interesting when a representative from a state-wide heritage organization, someone who works with places just like ours, comes for a site visit in 2016, observes that we've installed an ADA platform lift, so you tell her you could barely afford it, how much it cost, and that it had to happen for code compliance, that you needed it to open the 2nd floor to the public, and she sing-songs, "Oh! People get tax abatement for that!" and you get to tell her, "Not us. We've asked and been denied," and then, this seasoned and quite brilliant professional, pauses, gets wide-eyed, reaches out and touches your hand, looks you dead in the eye, and quietly and calmly encourages you with, "You are doing the right thing here. You keep on."

The $35K screwdriver which came with a free platform lift,
Amazingly, the lift does get more use than this screwdriver.
We're happy that all people can be on Smokestack's 2nd level.

Doing the right thing is rarely easy. Sometimes people get nice awards, money, praise, and recognition for doing the right thing, for doing their best, for doing what we as people are supposed to do. Yet, doing the right thing brings a deeper satisfaction and that is the true reward that one can only give to oneself. Hello, again, Brooklyn Friends School and Quakerism, you're not the only place I got that idea, but you are significant to its development in my being and belief system.

This section of Dominic's Q&A from 2016 touches on some lesser-known and more difficult aspects of Scott's and my life in Dubuque.

Dominic Velando
People who know you and frequent your business know that you’re engaged in a challenging struggle to realize these projects. What exactly do you need to achieve your goals?


Scott & Susan
Continued support and understanding from the community as we learn, grow, and continue our path of allowing this project to unfold as it must. We are human and imperfect. They have already sustained us through 2.5 years of intense hardship, disappointments and joys, appearing to offer encouragement when we have needed them most. We are living other people’s fantasies: we know people dream of doing what we are doing, moving to a place knowing nobody, daring to do something incredibly bold, and they rarely take such a plunge.

Scott, through the concrete dust, working alone.

The difficult answer, of course, is money. People incorrectly assume we are wealthy. In fact, we have now depleted everything we once had, despite trying to save money by doing much of the work by ourselves and repurposing whatever possible (well, as much as allowed by the City of Dubuque in both cases). The financial and tax incentives that seem readily available to larger developments and businesses, which were touted to us early on, were, in the end, not available to us for myriad reasons, including difficult timing, being deemed historically insignificant, being marginalized, minimized, misinformed, uninformed even when asking, and being unconnected and new to the area. Still, we are incredibly grateful to the City of Dubuque for allowing us a $10K matching design grant, a partial disbursement of a $5K matching ADA grant, and we hope to fulfill and receive a $2.5K matching community project grant and a rain garden grant of $2K for our planned pocket park behind Smokestack. We also hope to fulfill the terms of the $75K matching Main Street Iowa grant from the Iowa Economic Development Authority that will help us open our second floor and rooftops. 

Exhausted after another day, early into our project
Banjo on his knee...

These matching grants, totaling a little less than $100K from state and city, are the extent of meaningful “help” for this project to date and it all goes back into the building immediately. So many people smile as they tell us that “The City must be helping you with this” and they are stunned by our reality, very often saddened. As with most things, people can and will say what they want, but we intuit what is really said and it is often confirmed later. We further know that others have still harder experiences in this world, so if our experience can help just one person, that has to be enough for us.

It began with a raft ride...
Yes, I was blonde then and we did not plan to match.

It has been said that “All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.” We seem to still be in the ridicule and violent opposition phases, which seems also to encompass being ignored, silenced, and treated inequitably. A woman [Arlene Symons] told Susan many years ago of her path to achieving a near-impossible vision that was the subject of an Oscar and Emmy winning short documentary [Close Harmony], of not understanding why others, particularly those in power, were not getting on board, and her mentor's answer has rung in Susan’s ears daily since we moved to Dubuque, this woman’s mentor simply stated, “When you are a visionary, you are alone. They come later.”

Our struggle in Dubuque is actually a faith journey. Faith in people, in community, in Dubuque, in Iowa, in this property, in this building, in our vision, in ourselves, in one another, in heeding that still, small voice that told us to leave good lives in NYC and move to Dubuque alone, in letting it unfold naturally, and do this.

Preview of the next Q&A:  
How else would you describe how [Smokestack's] identity has developed? 
And Scott quotes Nabokov - why wouldn't he?

Smokestack Q&A 1, Smokestack Q&A 2, Smokestack Q&A 3

Unexpected Words Sustain - Smokestack and Brooklyn Friends School

When your own well runs dry, replenishment often needs to come from a source outside of yourself. So many times, Scott and I have hit that place in our four years in Dubuque. Thankfully, people unexpectedly appear with words and actions that sustain us every time at Smokestack, something I experienced with uncanny regularity in my former work as director of alumni and school historian at Brooklyn Friends School. Affirmation, community and external encouragement is the theme of the third Q&A from Dominic Velando's 2016 unpublished interview with Scott and me. And after? I've got too much to say today...

The Dubuque County Courthouse at night, from inside
the dome on Smokestack's 3rd level rooftop terrace

Dominic Velando
What’s a memorable moment that affirmed the significance of the Smokestack to this community?

Scott & Susan
An insightful young man saying that in all the times he’d driven down Central Avenue, he’d never understood how beautiful the Dubuque County Courthouse was until he stood on Smokestack’s rooftop and truly saw it for the first time.

A man we greatly respect whose desire for positive change and resulting involvement in Inclusive Dubuque is so much deeper than ours, seeing how close we were to giving up this summer [of 2016], forcefully telling Susan, “You have no idea, but you are making a huge difference and positive impact in this community!”

One person after another - who we did not know - thanking us for “being here and doing this” the night of Co Dubuque’s Night of Pride in June, just after the horrific Orlando nightclub shooting.

Long after this interview, I can write this now, that those words said to us during Co Dubuque's Night of Pride were meaningful for a deeper reason. We had been standing outside much of the evening, working the door, checking IDs, concerned by the possibility of copycat negativity, observing two protesters across the street (yup, that's right), yet we were confident that it would be a beautiful night and it was. At one brief moment when we were alone, after being thanked by yet another person, Scott turned to me and remarked with incredulity, "Can you imagine? Being thanked for doing this? These people are wonderful. How could we not do this?" Not that NYC is some utopia or that I was so sheltered in 45 years of living there, but this moment made me realize that there really are people who consider themselves [insert whatever you want here] who do not recognize that people different from themselves are also human beings deserving of kindness and respect and all good things in this world. 

"I'm bored. Put me to work." said Alice.
All children know the awful truth of a-dull-t parties.

Scott and I are fortunate to be able to turn a crazy vision into reality, but we're most fortunate to connect with many people in Dubuque, typically those who are open enough to let us in to their lives a bit, something we know does not happen for everyone here or in other communities, for that matter. We are open to others ourselves, and we want people to know they will be accepted at Smokestack - be fearless and do your thing! I know some in my life have thought I'm a harsh judge, but that appearance is a defensive coping mechanism because the reality is that my harsh judgment is only reserved for myself and, like Scott, I know things go awry for many reasons so I give near-endless chances and forgiveness to people (there is one exception, he's in NYC). Scott and I have both been given near-endless chances and forgiveness in our life and want to do the same for others. Chances and forgiveness often happened for me as a student at Brooklyn Friends School and through my whole life. I also don't judge people by who they were at the age of 14 because people grow up. Besides, who wants to be judged for their 14 year old self for the rest of their lives, not me, so why would I do that to someone else? People are who they are in front of me at that very moment in both of our lives, and that is a direct result of my adult work with alumni at Brooklyn Friends School. 

Annie - I think of the real Ann near-daily

Scott with Annie, Sweethook gig in NYC

A large part of my life immediately before Dubuque and Smokestack was working with alumni at my K-12 alma mater, Brooklyn Friends School, a place that has profoundly influenced who I am. It was an honor and a privilege to return as an adult and work for my school and for my fellow alumni. Like everything and everyone, my school is imperfect, yet it is still an incredible place. BFS alumni are so amazing, so inspiring, and they do incredible work in our world, I had no idea how awestruck I would become by them on a daily basis. And then to realize how much we shared due to our school's influence regardless of our graduation year, eventually understanding some of the how, who, what, and why of it all. Quaker schools do not practice indoctrination, yet I feel the schools are the most important form of community outreach in Quakerism's history. In my eight years as director of alumni I worked with 85 years of living graduates, and my work caused me to sacrifice my personal BFS student experience to better connect with my school, its history, Quakers and Quakerism, and, most importantly, my fellow alumni. It was unbelievably challenging, yet equally rewarding, and I will always love my school and "my alumni" (yes, I still call them "my alumni"). BFS and BFS alumni are still in my head, still positively affecting me daily, and it's far beyond seeing activity in my Facebook newsfeed. I actually had Scott name the 8-string electric banjo he built for himself in memory of one late alumna I dearly loved as she told her daughter that, if reincarnation were real, she hoped to return as a seagull, and that was the bird Scott inlaid in abalone on that banjo's headstock. As soon as he said "seagull," I told him I needed to choose the name for this banjo, which is my favorite. I sent a photo of the finished banjo to her daughter one day when I thought to do it, and her daughter wrote me back, "Did you know it was her birthday today?" I hadn't known. Perhaps her daughter, who I also adore, needed a little encouragement, and it came from her mother that day.

BFS alumni unexpectedly encouraged me when I needed it most with the words that would allow me to dig deep and find path and purpose in what I was doing. How did they know I needed this from them at specific moments when I didn't know it myself? I like to think something spoke to them, they acted on it, and they changed everything for me in one moment, and it happened so often. An alum two years younger than me did this uncannily on several occasions, the first time telling me on Facebook that I was doing a great job when I was so close to giving up entirely, yet he hadn't known my feelings. After another low point of a more personal nature, I thanked a woman I'd never met in person, an alumna 30 years my senior - after a very brief cryptic something I'd posted on Facebook, she immediately responded with four words that simultaneously shattered me and built me back up: "Your world needs you."

2011, BFS Alumni Reunion Day
Two of my unforgettable life teachers: the BFS alumna who introduced
 our honoree, and one of our fave BFS teachers, our 2011 honoree, 
a man who encouraged so many, so deeply including me. 
Wow, my love for BFS and its people...

This January-February marks the sixth anniversary of the bittersweet announcement that I was stepping out of my position as director of alumni to become the school's first historian, helping to lay groundwork for our school's 150th anniversary, a celebration that is happening at BFS this year. Two years later, I ceased my work as school historian working remotely on the online archives and historical blog from our new home in Downtown Dubuque because my work with Scott and Smokestack and Dubuque needed me more which also means we're now at the third anniversary of Scott and I living without meaningful income. Happily, I was in Brooklyn last week, but I had to return to Dubuque, so I missed Monday night's gathering with BFS, when they released the commemorative book, 150 Years of Light. I'd have loved to be there, among my people, celebrating our school, but I trust they know how happy I am for them and, like my daughter and my sister also back in Brooklyn, that I have to do what I'm doing in Dubuque, I must fulfill my calling here.

My joy for this BFS anniversary is unusual as anniversaries are generally painful for me the older I get, perhaps for Scott as well. I become very sad, seemingly without reason, and then I'll remember it's another anniversary, saying things like, "Oh, of course. My mother died 22 years ago tomorrow. No wonder I'm so down." We recently passed the fourth anniversary of our move to Dubuque, and I had a minor depressive crisis, though nothing is as bad as what began in Dubuque for me in September, 2015 and climaxed in December, 2016 with the third anniversary of our move to Dubuque. So bad was that period that this month is the first anniversary of my getting myself external encouragement in Dubuque by going into therapy for the first time in my adult life and going on related medication for the first time in my entire life. That's one reason Scott and I personally survived 2017, but the encouragement we received throughout from Dubuque's residents and visitors is a big reason for why we are grateful to them and why we are able to continue on our path here. 

Prepare yourself for Smokestack Q&A 4: "People who know you and frequent your business know that you’re engaged in a challenging struggle to realize these projects. What exactly do you need to achieve your goals?" 


Related posts: Smokestack Q&A 1, Smokestack Q&A 2