Return to the Sanctuary - December 4

Bristol husband and wife team, Jim Stapleton and Diana Bigelow, will present "Return to the Sanctuary" on Sunday, December 4th, 4pm at the Ripton Community Church, Route 125 in Ripton. This presentation is a sequel to Jim & Diana’s program in June, "Sanctuary Reflections". Here again Diana weaves her songs around Jim’s stories. Admission is free and refreshments will be provided. For more information about the Community Church call 388-1634; for information about this program, call 453-5060.  The Friends of the Ripton Community Church are sponsoring this as part of their ongoing Arts and Lecture Series. All are welcome and refreshments will be served.

The seventy-five minute program will feature a new selection of readings from Jim's recently published book, Sanctuary Almanac. and another set of Diana's own songs. During the 1980s the couple lived in the Mid-Hudson Valley at the John Burroughs Nature Sanctuary where Jim was resident naturalist. In 1987 he organized his natural history observations into a book-length almanac of stories and meditations. Diana's songs were written a decade later on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington where the couple then lived. The songs share with the stories a reverence for the natural world and offer a complementary perspective on "sanctuary".

Jim was born in Toledo, Ohio and spent his working life teaching and doing research in environmental science. Since retiring in 1990 he turned his writing to storytelling, theater, and auto-biography. He has produced two audio tapes of original stories.

Diana was born in Cleveland, Ohio, studied anthropology, and worked as a counselor for victims of domestic violence. She has pursued music and theater throughout her life. She released two recordings of her songs in the 1990's.

Diana and Jim sing in the Bristol Federated Church choir and with Wellspring, an Addison County Hospice service group. In February they appeared at the Town Hall Theater in Middlebury in Jim’s play, "Henry and Emily, The Muses in Massachusetts", an imagined encounter between Emily Dickinson and Henry David Thoreau. This summer they collaborated with other Bristol thespians in a production of Oscar Wilde’s "The Importance of Being Earnest", and more recently appeared in the Bristol talent show/fundraiser for flood relief

A Community Discussion of Health Care for Vermonters will be held at 4:00 PM on Saturday, November 5, 2011 at the Ripton Community Church. Vermont’s new Health Care Reform Law (Act 48), which Governor Shumlin signed on May 26, 2011, creates a blueprint for the nation’s first single-payer system. A diversified group of panelists, all with firsthand knowledge of the current health care system, will describe how these laws will reform and improve health care for Vermonters.  

The panel will also discuss the challenges that remain before universal health care becomes a reality. Panel members include Dr. Deborah Richter, past president of Physicians for a National Health Program and co-chairwoman of Vermont Health Care for All, Mike Fisher, incoming chair of the Health Care Committee in the Vermont House, Claire Ayer, chairwoman of the Senate Health and Welfare Committee, Steve Kimball, Commissioner of Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration, and Bram Kleppner, CEO of Danforth Pewters.  Ripton resident, Vermont Representative and House Assistant Majority Leader Willem Jewett will make some introductory and concluding remarks. This forum is sponsored by Ripton Community Church’s Concert and Lecture Series and by Vermont Health Care for All.  For more information, please contact Charles Billings at 388-1634

Gary Margolis Slide Presentation—November 12

On Saturday, November 12 at 4PM, the Ripton Community Church Arts and Lecture Series will host a slide presentation and talk by Gary Margolis titled:

“Seeing the Songs: A Poet’s Journey to the Shamans in Ecuador’s High Andes and Rainforest”. 

Gary Margolis Ph.D, a Middlebury graduate, is Emeritus Executive Director of College Mental Health Services and Associate Professor of English and American Literatures (part-time) at Middlebury College. He was a Robert Frost and Arthur Vining Davis Fellow and has taught at the University of Tennessee, Vermont and Bread Loaf Writers’ Conferences. His third book, “Fire in the Orchard” was nominated for the 2002 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry. His poem, “The Interview” was featured on National Public Radio’s “The Story” and Boston’s ABC Channel 5 interviewed him on the Middlebury campus reading his poem, “Winning the Lunar Eclipse”, after the 2004 World Series.

Gary was awarded the first Sam Dietzel Award for Mental Health Practice in Vermont by the Clinical Psychology Department of Saint Michaels’ College. His clinical articles have appeared in the Journal of American College Health Association, Adolescence, the Ladies Home Journal, Runner’s World Magazine and he has been interviewed on his work with college students by Time Magazine, ABC and CBS News.

His new book of poems, “Below the Falls” is a book that responds to the loss of Middlebury student Nicholas Garza, our country’s wars, and the search for things that  sustain us. “Seeing the Songs”: A Poet’s Journey to the Shamans in Ecuador” is  forthcoming from Green Frigate Press.

Please join us for this fascinating and informative presentation. Refreshments following. All are welcome.