September 10, 2026

“ A bullfrog sat amid the cattails in a pond. I didn’t know he was there till something shifted — not him, but something else.

The wind, the sun, a blip in the water. And I saw him, suddenly still, and once I saw him, I couldn’t stop seeing him.

I think some true part of us is like that.

Sitting very still, unmoving, waiting for something to shift so we can bring our awareness to it.

​enter the wild lands begins this Sunday, Sept 13 A 4 month creativity circle to share in community ​more here idhar aquí​

If I had to add anything to the description at the link, I would say: here is an invitation into a playful creative experiment,

"guts for all occasions"

or

What if you whittle your creative self down to the gut and follow that creative viscera into mystery?

or

if you feel stuck or if you feel pulled in too many directions

if you've often had a sinking feeling of missing out on your own self.

if you're in a time of threshold and wanting to excavate...

​this wild space welcomes you.​

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It is 9/11 tomorrow and I was there, then.

At 8:45 am, September 11, 2001, I was waiting at the Jacob Javits Federal Building in downtown Manhattan for what was to have been my final interview to become a U.S. citizen.

At 8:46 am, a security guard began shepherding us out to evacuate. No reason why. Just gotta go. Everyone was upset - we'd waited years for this moment.

Then we went down to the corner of Varick Street. And we looked up...

Every year, I remember Jeffrey Fox who was the neighbor of my parents in Jersey. His wife and my mother were both waiting for each of us to call them that day. I was 3 blocks away from the Towers and after being evacuated, I managed to find a payphone and call my mother.

Jeff was in the second tower. He called after the first plane hit to say he was fine. And then, the second plane hit. He didn't make it.

Those days in NYC were a daze. Plumes of smoke rising where the towers used to be.

All the ​citizenship interviews were re-scheduled for the month after. ​So on October 11, I had that interview, 3 questions and that was it.

It amazed me that the interviews were rescheduled at all. Would that have happened now? No.

Those moment​s ​are suspended in time. I tell the same story every year. It matters somehow to speak it, not as something rote, but as something resonant.

never forget, always remember - all this is true-yes.

But also, the starkness of what we have become since, what we are living now, and the need -- at least, this is is my feeling -- that we gotta learn, gotta live, gotta get to the heart of who we are or what's it all for? We turn and turn and what is at the still heart? What does it call for?

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in solidarity

Shebana

contact me at info@shebanacoelho.com

To subscribe to this newsletter, go here, click that​

Shebana Coelho

-lost in the love of synanthrope and the racket of ravens

-entered the wild lands

-wrote this about tyrants and animals and starry starry future rivers

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