Tracey Jane Hall: Creating Community

I am Tracey Jane Hall. Initiated into my womanhood in October of 1992, I am a mother of four, in love with my husband, a small farmer, craftswoman, teacher, facilitator, and friend.

Recently, I have felt a renewed passion for creating community bubbling up inside me. I have chosen to step into two new roles in the Women In Circle community. I will be representing Wisconsin on the Women in Circle Council and joining a new Event Planning Team for Women In Circle.

I want to create more community in the Women In Circle region. As my awareness of this desire clarified, I asked myself, Why? What is the value for me, or for us in a more actively engaged community of women?

My best answer comes in sharing bits of my story. I have valued having a strong connection to my Woman Within Community when . . .

• I forged deep meaningful friendships

• A circle of women gathered in my home and wept with me, the day after my first husband left me.

• Attending a celebration meant dinner out with friends, a celebration of women or men, followed by an hour at a coffee bar hearing live music

• It offered me a place to create rituals for birth, for death, for coming of age, for loss, for joy

• I moved and a new circle opened to replace my old one

• A circle of elders invited us to hear their stories

• Couples gathered to support my husband and myself in growing toward one another

• I could reach out to someone in need

• Women held me as I sobbed the first time my boys spent a summer with their Dad.

• I laughed so hard I couldn’t breathe

• Women supported me in my becoming

• I extended my hand

• Others nurtured me so I could nurture my children

• I wasn’t alone
  

Since moving to Wisconsin I have been approached by a surprising number of women and men from the local Woman Within and MKP communities who have had something they wanted to say to me about Woman Within. Each person has had varying degrees of connection to the local WW community and each has expressed opinions (both positive and negative) about her or his experiences with the local community. I have not always felt certain about how to respond, particularly when concerns about lack of connection were expressed.

Those conversations and my uncertainty led me to introspection and a new sense of clarity. We, the women who have been initiated through Woman Within, we are the local community and it is through our actions that Women In Circle can become exactly what we want it to be.

I commit to taking the following actions:

• To help create the upcoming Wisconsin Woman Within Celebration.

• To announce our first Woman Within Pajama Party!! (doesn’t that sound fun!)

• To invite all of you to an afternoon of fun, frolic and connection (a potluck event) at my home in Whitewater, WI.

• To attend as many events as I can in both the WW and MKP communities.
  

Tracey Jane Hall (WWTW, October, 1992, Lake Delavan, WI) WIC Event Planner traceyjane@mindspring.com 262.495.2835