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To Crazy Wisdom Community Journal’s Readers and Advertisers –
In the spirit of responding in a practical way to what is happening, we have postponed the publishing of our Spring/Summer Issue (May thru August 2020 – Issue #75) due to all the reverberations and fallout from the Covid-19 Pandemic. Our editorial content is all set to go, but so many of our advertisers are closed for business currently, and they’ve asked to postpone their advertisements. Additionally, so many of our 235 local/regional distribution spots are closed that we wouldn’t be able to distribute most of our 11,000-copy print run.

Posts from our Blog

Blog
A Conversation With Harambe the Gorilla
A Conversation With Harambe the Gorilla

Harambe was a 17-year-old 450-pound male gorilla at the Cincinnati Zoo. On May 28, 2016, a three-year-old boy climbed under a fence and fell into the gorilla enclosure’s moat. Overwhelmed and distressed by the uproar from panicking humans, Harambe tried to move the boy to a more protected part of the enclosure. Because of Harambe’s size and strength and the potential for accidental harm, he was shot and killed by zoo officials. The incident was caught on camera and became a major viral meme and cultural phenomenon. It also sparked intense international debate over zookeeping, animal rights, and parental responsibility in public spaces.

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Wildflowers: Childhood Spaces
Wildflowers: Childhood Spaces

As my great Aunt Wanda braided wildflower stems together, her hazel eyes sparkled and a mysterious, yet playful, grin danced across her lips. She told me stories of wood fairies, who were shy and hidden just out of our sight, yet deeply inquisitive and always listening. She described them as gentle yet volatile, delicate yet strong. They were connected to the woods and nurtured plants and forest creatures. Their protective nature also came with quick tempers; they would play tricks on those who were greedy or destructive.

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A Conversation With the Oversoul of Omaha Beach
A Conversation With the Oversoul of Omaha Beach

“Omaha Beach was one of the five main landing areas during the Allied invasion of German-occupied France on June 6, 1944 (D-Day). It was the most heavily defended and deadliest of all landing sites, with roughly 2,400 U.S. casualties out of 34,000 troops. Today, it is a place for reflection with memorials and the nearby American Cemetery.”

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Seeking Guidance
Seeking Guidance

When I was in my mid-20s, I had a brush with cancer. The diagnosis led to a series of tests and seemingly endless appointments with various specialists. I sat in waiting rooms, awaited results, scheduled further appointments. My art at the time reflected my feelings of being poked, prodded, and reduced to a numbered specimen. I’d never before faced surgery, and the night before the procedure, I laid awake, contemplating my mortality.

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A Conversation With “Ginger Pie,” A Feral Cat
A Conversation With “Ginger Pie,” A Feral Cat

Recently I went to the PTO Thrift Shop on South Industrial in Ann Arbor, and parked way in the back next to the railroad tracks. Returning to my car, I spotted a feral, long-haired orange cat perched on a piece of discarded concrete. We were only eight feet apart, but there was so much brush and junk between us that she felt safe enough to stay where she was.

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Mothering
Mothering

The first person who called me “Mom,” was born over half a century before me.

His name was Raymond. Deemed unable to make his own decisions, he became an adult ward of the state after his parents and close relatives passed. Unlike a child who learns whom to call mother, Ray asked my permission. When I paused, he explained with choppy speech and teary eyes that he missed his mom and knew it was pretend.

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Parable of the Sweet Pea
Parable of the Sweet Pea

Then came the day when I got home from work and found just a few shreds of mangled stems and leaves. One of the groundskeepers had managed to find the only healthy green plant in sight on that early spring day, and he decided it must be a weed. (Even though it was inside my patio fence at the base of a trellis for the vines to climb on!)

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Rituals of Care
Rituals of Care

One type of activity I’ve been thinking a lot about lately is something I’ve decided to start calling “Rituals of Care”—those activities we do that include a certain care component—that is some aspect of the labor that feeds into something greater than what it does, in a practical, applied sense, for you.

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Renewal
Renewal

As I turned back to my book, I heard a tap on the window. I stiffened, imagining an ominous creature lurking outside, knocking on the pane. Just as I relaxed, assuring myself the wind was blowing rain against the glass, there was another tap. With caution, I approached the window and peered out into the storm. Lightning flashed, illuminating the face of my friend. Smiling, I opened it to let him in. Instead, he encouraged me to follow him out, into the storm.

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Grace
Grace

While delicate and beautiful, ice is powerful and merciless. Trees bent under the increasing weight, resembling our own huddled bodies as we snuggled under quilts. We gasped at the sound of wood groaning and splitting, and we watched a large branch fall to the frozen ground below. Tiny twigs snapped and tumbled toward the arms of their mother branch, scattering ice across the yard. Raising our gaze to the top of a giant cherry, we studied the space where the large branch let go, looking for other branches that might follow.

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Features from our Winter 2020 Issue

Featured
Three Season of Grief: A Personal Essay on Losing a Sibling
Three Season of Grief: A Personal Essay on Losing a Sibling

I was surprised to see Jane sitting up when I arrived. I hadn’t seen her out of a hospital bed in the four years since she’d moved into the nursing home in Sutton’s Bay. Though her health was generally good, she could no longer walk. At well over 500 pounds, she’d developed neuropathy and recurrent infections in her legs.

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Green Living: A River Runs Through Us: The Huron River
Green Living: A River Runs Through Us: The Huron River

Giwitatigweiasibi. Nottawaseppi. Huron. There are many names for this river birthed in a swamp, meandering south through the center of Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti and onward to Lake Erie. Cos-scut-e-nong, sebee,“burnt oak river,” connecting upstream and down, invites us to a wider sense of self, neighborhood, and community. I spoke with Rebecca Esselman, Executive Director, and Jason Frenzel, Director of Community Engagement, both of the Huron River Watershed Council, about our local river.

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Advertisers Highlight, August 2026, Week #2
Advertisers Highlight, August 2026, Week #2

We are so appreciative for our advertisers in each issue, and you should be too! They help keep The Crazy Wisdom Community Journal FREE in print and online. Please support them by clicking on their ad below to find out more about their services.

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Book Review: Life on a Little Known Planet ~ by Elizabeth Kolbert
Book Review: Life on a Little Known Planet ~ by Elizabeth Kolbert

Elizabeth Kolbert has spent decades reporting from the fault lines of our planet—melting glaciers, vanishing species, rising seas, shifting microbial worlds. In Life on a Little-Known Planet: Dispatches from a Changing World, she gathers essays that feel at once intimate and planetary, investigative and philosophical. The title itself is telling. For all our satellite imagery and data modeling, Kolbert suggests we are still strangers here.

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Cooking With Lisa: Roasted Shallot and Garlic Hummus and Easy Grilled Asparagus and shallots with Maple Balsamic Sauce
Cooking With Lisa: Roasted Shallot and Garlic Hummus and Easy Grilled Asparagus and shallots with Maple Balsamic Sauce

Roasted Shallot and Garlic Hummus is a creamy, savory spread made by blending chickpeas with caramelized shallots and sweet roasted garlic. Easy Grilled Asparagus and Shallots with Maple Balsamic Sauce is a quick, vibrantly colored side dish that epitomizes spring and warmer weather

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The Keys to Awareness: The Wholeness Work
The Keys to Awareness: The Wholeness Work

Across many traditions, spiritual teachers have taught that the “ego” is not an entity, but an activity. What we call ego is ongoing psychological activity—memory, comparison, fear, desire—generated moment by moment. It is something that we are doing and not something we fundamentally are. Ego/self is a pattern of self-attention and linguistic framing—a contraction created through self-referencing.

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Astrologically Speaking--Far-Out! The One and Only Uranus, a True Original
Astrologically Speaking--Far-Out! The One and Only Uranus, a True Original

Uranus! It’s a funny-sounding name to go along with a quirky planet. It’s preferable to pronounce it with the stress on the first syllable. As you’ll see, this planet’s physical nature and astrological significations all go together.

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When Awakening Becomes Avoidance
When Awakening Becomes Avoidance

There seems to be this point on the spiritual path when we realize that the very practices meant to free us can quietly become ways of hiding. It often begins with sincere devotion, the desire to grow, to heal, to remember. Yet somewhere along the way, the quest for awakening starts to take the place of living.

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Spirit Seeds: Spring 2026
Spirit Seeds: Spring 2026

Using Reiki to heal trauma, advanced visulaization techniques for astral travel, integrating plant medicine into spiritual journeys for deep healing

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Book Review: ~Unfiltered & Unapologetic~ Judy McCutcheon's Powerful Call for Women to Reclaim Their Voice and Lead Fearlessly
Book Review: ~Unfiltered & Unapologetic~ Judy McCutcheon's Powerful Call for Women to Reclaim Their Voice and Lead Fearlessly

In Unfiltered and Unapologetic, Judy McCutcheon writes with the urgency of someone who has spent years watching women shrink themselves to fit expectations that were never designed for them in the first place. The book positions itself as both a guide and a challenge: an invitation for women to examine the habits, beliefs, and social pressures that encourage quiet compliance instead of confident leadership.

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