economics Archives - Ann Hedreen, Writer Teacher Filmmaker

American Infection

therestlessnest2019-11-07T14:50:44-08:00Categories: economics, health & medicine, human rights, immigration, politics, Seattle, Uncategorized|Tags: antibiotics, Cantwell, democracy, foot surgery, Manka Dhingra, Murray, tax bill, Trump, Tukwila, Zak Idan|

Sometimes we writers search too hard for the perfect metaphor. Sometimes, it’s right under our nose—or, in my case, right under my blue, Velcro-strapped boot. Infection: that’s what Trump is, I thought this morning, as I took my nineteenth of the twenty Amoxicillin tablets we brought home from the pharmacy ten days ago. Trump has infected our vigorous, 241-year-old democracy. And like so many infections, this one is fire-engine red and spreading, unchecked and unmedicated. Meanwhile, the patient is hot with fever one day and shaking with chills the next. Nothing tastes right. Muscles ache. Vaguely flu-like feelings abound. Waves of determination to soldier through—we’ll get over this!—are followed by languorous apathy: let’s just give up. Speaking as one who tried to ignore an infection for several days, I can tell you it is not a strategy that works. After foot surgery on November 6, I assumed the three incisions on my right foot were healing up nicely under all those bandages, just the way they had on my left foot, last May. And they probably were, for the first several days. But then something somehow went wrong along one of those neat lines of stitches. At that point my foot was in a plastic cast, so I couldn’t see it. And for reasons I cannot explain, I chose to believe that feeling like my foot was on fire was probably “normal,” that fever and chills were a “part" of healing, and that I would magically “get over it.” Wrong, wrong, wrong. Thank God for antibiotics. [...]

In Real Time

therestlessnest2019-11-07T15:27:56-08:00Categories: economics, hiking, memoir, midlife, politics, travel|Tags: Brexit, China, Condé Nast Traveler, France, Iceland, In Real Time, Korea, United Kingdom|

Home. I’m home. The #TravelBinge2017 Tourist has Halted. However: she lives on inside me, and she has given my brain a much-needed adjustment. I don’t much like the word “tourist.” “Traveler” is the word I’ve always preferred, with its hints of Martha Gellhorn and Graham Greene. But in the eyes of the Chinese, Korean, French, English and Icelandic people who tolerated me tromping through their countries this past month, I was not fancy or special. I was a tourist. And that’s OK. No one would mistake me for a native in any of these nations, except perhaps Iceland. And being a tourist is not what it used to be. Or it doesn’t have to be what it used to be. You can break free of the pack, even in China, even without speaking Chinese. People are ridiculously busy in China these days, but if you flag them down, they’ll help you buy train tickets, or get off at the right stop, or order dumplings. And sometimes, if they want to practice their English, they’ll flag you down. Outside Guangzhou--a city of 12 million in southern China that appears to be adding a skyscraper a day--my friend Lindsay and I were hiking up Baiyun Mountain when two young law students, Carry and Pelly (their “English names”) asked if they could walk and talk with us. It was a national holiday: Tomb Sweeping Day, when Chinese families gather to clean and decorate the graves of their ancestors. Carry and Pelly, both 21, came from a [...]

Stay Hungry

therestlessnest2019-11-07T15:31:01-08:00Categories: economics, education, faith and doubt, feminism, human rights, immigration, journalism, politics, Seattle, Uncategorized, urban life, women's rights|Tags: #Election2016, 2017, New Year's resolutions|

2016 was a hungry, hungry year. Month after month, we hungered for justice and peace and hope, and we just kept getting hungrier. We thought November 8 might take the edge off; might give us a little encouraging broth for the journey. But no. Now we’re more famished than ever. And it’s very easy to feel like the best solution might be to simply curl up in a fetal position and hoard what little energy we have left. But we can’t, can we? We owe it to ourselves, our children, our neighbors down the street and around the world, to stay hungry. To feel that driving bite in the gut, that ache, that howling growl that demands attention. We are going to be offered pablum and junk food and we’ll be tempted to take it. We’ll be told to eat this, calm down, stop your bellyaching. But we can’t. We’ve got to stay hungry. Yes, 2016 feels like the Worst Year Ever. But as one friend brooded on Facebook, what on earth makes us think 2017 is going to better? Lest you think my only goal here is to write the most depressing post in Restless Nest history, I offer this morsel of optimism. Here’s what could be better about 2017, if we all stay hungry: this could be the year that we all do more than we ever have to make the world a better place. Instead of giving money to presidential candidates, we can give it to the people who are in the trenches, [...]

How Trump Made Me Love My Day Job

therestlessnest2019-11-07T15:33:47-08:00Categories: dementia, economics, film, health & medicine, human rights, politics, Seattle|Tags: 2016 Presidential Election, Donald Trump, immigration, Mary's Place, poverty, work|

As I write, Donald Trump supporters are lining up outside a stadium about thirty miles north of here for a rally that begins many hours from now. This is confusing to me. Lining up for Trump? Who are they? Yesterday, my husband and I met an immigrant family of nine and talked to them about how a local non-profit is helping them through their grief over the death of their baby girl. Last week, we visited an Adult Day Health Center that serves people who have dementia or have suffered brain trauma. We talked to a woman in her fifties whose face lit up with joy as she described how the time she spent at the center had given her the courage to go back to work after a stroke. The week before that, we interviewed a Seattle teacher who found an affordable apartment for herself and her son, with the help of a housing non-profit. This is our day job: making short films for non-profits to help them raise money and spread the word about what they do. August is always a busy time for us, as our clients get ready for their fall events. We feel very lucky that we get to do this work for a living. That we get to hear, and tell, stories about people helping people. Stories that debunk, over and over again, the American myth of rugged individualism; that show how much we Americans can do, when we pay attention to one another’s needs. When we are able [...]

Mangers Everywhere

therestlessnest2019-11-11T09:15:30-08:00Categories: arts, economics, faith and doubt, film, human rights, urban life|Tags: construction boom, Ed Murray, homelessness, Macbeth, Seattle|

Two days shy of the darkest day of the year, silhouetted against a rainy twilight sky, I watched a young woman emerge from a tent, tugging a stroller behind her. A young man followed. They turned the stroller around and bumped it down a muddy knoll, lifting it over a ditch and onto the sidewalk. Their tent, pitched next to Interstate 5 at the 50th Street exit in Seattle’s University District, flapped behind them, sagging under the relentless rain, leaning half-heartedly against the wind, ready to cave in to the next good gust. As we waited for the light to change, all I could see of the baby in the stroller, across the two lanes of traffic that stood between us, was that at least she or he was covered with a blanket. My husband and I were on our way to see the latest movie version of Macbeth. The very first shot in the movie is of a dead baby. And the weather in medieval Scotland, as seen on screen, was only slightly worse than the weather outside the theater in mid-winter Seattle. I shivered at the thought of living in such brutal conditions: no heat, no light, mud everywhere. But that is exactly how the young couple I’d seen coming out of their tent were living. Right here in my own high-tech hometown. Right now, in 2015. As we drove home, we took in the sparkling lights of all the construction cranes in South Lake Union and downtown. It’s as if they’re competing this [...]

Hot Water, Big Boxes: Workplace Nightmares

therestlessnest2019-11-07T15:42:34-08:00Categories: economics|Tags: big box stores, Labor Day, waitress, work, workplace|

It’s the yelping that comes back to me across the decades: the sound of an old man yelping after I spilled hot water in his lap. I was the greenhorn waitress, the clumsy college girl, always several steps behind the professionals. I was working the breakfast shift in a busy hotel restaurant in downtown Seattle. It was the late 1970s, a time when busloads of tourists—who all wanted breakfast at the same time—were a new phenomenon in our city. I was rushing, of course, with too many plates in my hands, of course, and as I reached in to set down a tiny teapot full of hot water on the table of a solo diner, I fumbled, somehow, and the water poured into his lap. He yelped, loudly, several times, as he tried to push his table out from the wall so he could stand up. All I remember saying is, “Oh! I’m so sorry!” as I helped him squeeze around the table from his bench sit to a standing position. The manager came rushing over. I tried hard not to cry as I explained that I had just poured scalding hot water into a customer’s lap. She fixed her eyes on him. “Sir, would you like me to call a doctor?” “No, no,” he mumbled. “I’m all right. I just need to go to my room and change.” I watched as she escorted him to the elevator, her arm lightly around his shoulders, her voice soft and reassuring. She didn’t stop talking until he got [...]

Race: a work-in-progress

therestlessnest2014-01-15T11:30:08-08:00Categories: economics, family, human rights, Seattle, urban life|Tags: American Anthropological Association, memoir, Pacific Science Center, race, RACE: Are we so different?, redlining, white privilege|

Race, as a concept, is hardly a work-in-progress in the construction sense of the phrase. On the contrary: the concept of race is in what you might call a state of rapid DE-construction. Debunking, Demythification, De-pseudo-science-ification. What I’m working on is copping to how little I understand, how little I have ever understood, about white privilege and the way it has shaped my life. If you missed the Pacific Science Center’s recent exhibition called RACE: Are We So Different?, make sure to visit the exhibition’s provocative website. A project of the American Anthropological Association, RACE: Are We So Different? has traveled, or will travel, to more than 30 venues in the United States. That adds up to a lot of conversations about a subject none of us are very good at talking about. If, like me, you’re white and over 50, or even 40, you probably didn’t grow up talking about white privilege. It was just there, so deeply woven into the fabric of our lives as to be invisible. To us. If you are not white, you might have had “aha!” moments of a very different kind as you walked through the show. Maybe you nodded your head in recognition, anger, sadness. Maybe you looked around at all the white visitors and thought: at least they’re learning a little about my reality. Here’s my easy example of how white privilege works: so easy it embarrasses me. When I travel, I’m always on a budget, but I have perfected the art of strolling into a five-star [...]

Impatience

therestlessnest2013-04-03T08:00:31-07:00Categories: arts, economics, education, midlife, parenting, Seattle, women's rights, work, writing|Tags: Ada Williams Prince, GeekGirlCon, Jennifer Stuller, Kristin Rowe Finkbeiner, Lean In, Lori Pfingst, MomsRising, OneAmerica, Sandra Jackson-Dumont, Seattle Art Museum, Sheryl Sandberg, Town Hall Seattle, Washington State Budget & Policy Center, Women's Funding Alliance|

“Patience is a virtue.” Who first said that, and why? A quick Internet search points to a few “medieval poets.” Let’s leave it there—in the dark ages—and move on: to why patience is on my mind, and not in a virtuous, well-behaved way. I just spent an evening at Seattle’s Town Hall listening to five dynamic women speak at an event, sponsored by the Women’s Funding Alliance, called “Fresh Perspective: Women Lead a Changing World.” Good title; wish it were true. The speakers had some good news to share—the dramatic increase in the numbers of women obtaining bachelors, masters and PhD degrees; the previously unheard of opportunities for women in government, science, technology, sports. But “Women Lead a Changing World?” No. Not very many of us are leading. Not by a long shot. And the world may be changing, but it sure is taking its time. And we’ve been far too patient. It is time we made a virtue of impatience. When eight of every ten corporations in Washington state have fewer than three women on their boards, it is time to be impatient. When women in Washington* earn 75 cents for every dollar men earn—73 cents, if you have kids; 60 cents if you’re a single mom—it’s time to be impatient. When Washington slips from first to eighth in the nation for female political representation, it’s time to be impatient. When 415 thousand women and girls in our state have no health insurance, when reproductive rights are under assault, when one out of four children [...]

Foiled Again

therestlessnest2013-03-05T17:17:08-08:00Categories: economics, midlife, urban life, women's rights|Tags: age discrimination, Emmanuelle Rivas, hair color, middle age, Oscars|

Wow, there was a lot of gray hair at the Oscars this year. Kidding! Sure, George Clooney’s silver head was in every other cutaway shot. And French best actress nominee Emmanuelle Riva looked fabulously un-dyed on this, her 86th birthday. But even Jane Fonda and Shirley Bassey (75 and 76 respectively), do not dare bare their true hair. Barbra Streisand (70), Meryl Streep (63)—no way. I thought of them all as I sat in a salon chair, 50 or so squares of foil shooting out from my head, flipping through More magazine. Looking like an extra in a low-budget sci-fi film. Feeling morally deficient. I really want to be the kind of woman who can own the gray: Emmy Lou Harris. Jamie Lee Curtis. But I’m not. I’m just not. Not yet. I tried. I stopped coloring my hair for about two years. I thought I was doing OK with the gradually emerging, real, salt-n-pepper me, until I saw a photo in which I resembled my grandmother. Not my stylish Seattle grandma: no, I resembled my dear, frumpy Finnish-American grandma, whose hair was the same steely gray I now saw on my own head. And what is so wrong with that, you might ask? What’s wrong is that I often work with people 10, 20, even 30 years younger than I am, and I can’t yet afford to frighten them away by resembling their grandmothers. I literally can’t afford it: in the often arbitrary world of self-employed creative professionals, the wrong first impression could cost you [...]

Generation Squeeze

therestlessnest2013-02-12T16:57:03-08:00Categories: dementia, economics, midlife, politics|Tags: boomers, Generation Squeeze, Grist, recession, Sandwich Generation, sharing economy|

This just in from The New York Times: the “sandwich generation” is now also the “squeezed generation.” Visualizing this is making me feel very claustrophobic. But boy, do I get it. The “sandwich generation” years started early for me. Just as I began having babies, my mother began losing bits of herself. Bits of memory, judgment, common sense, intuition, drive, mojo; all her legendary coping skills, honed through three marriages, six children, a decade of widowhood—all of them began to peel away like old paint. Now, it’s easy to look back and see it was the disorienting (for all of us, not just for her) beginning of her long Alzheimer’s-induced crumbling. Then, I was deep in the trees and had no way to see the forest with any clarity. I only knew I was sandwiched between the needs of young children and of my mother, who wasn’t even old—early sixties, that’s not old-old! And my own parental coping skills were forming in what felt like a funhouse mirror: no day ever the same, what with Mom’s escapades—losing the car, locking herself out—mixed in with the usual preschool zaniness: why can’t I wear my tutu to school in this snowstorm? So: I know, I am, the sandwich-generation. I’m just not in the thick of it right now like so many of my 50-something friends are. Mom is gone. My dad and step-mom, still in their late 70s, are doing generally well. Ditto my mother-in-law, who’s 82. Meanwhile, baby boomers have been awarded a new moniker—the “Squeezed Generation”--that [...]