AROHO Presents the 5th Gift of Freedom Finalists
Bridget Birdsall is a healer, writer, poet, teacher and a visual artist. She has a degree in Marketing Management from Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska, and an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont College in Montpelier, Vermont. She currently teaches classes in Creative Writing, Poetry, World Literature, and Marketing at Edgewood College and Madison Area Technical School. This summer Bridget will be...
Fund Your Creative Projects
About five years ago I was visiting Portland, Oregon, when my cell phone rang. I was getting ready to attend my son’s college graduation, and almost didn’t answer. I’m glad I did. On the other end of the line was Mary Johnson, calling to tell me I’d been selected to receive the 4th Gift of Freedom, a $50,000 award from A Room of Her Own Foundation. Imagine my surprise! I’d spent a lot of care and effort on the application, but I knew...
“Those Ugly Voices:” An AROHO Feature with Eliot Sloan, Gift of Freedom Finalist
I teach creative writing at a girls’ high school. Needless to say, I was nervous when I got the job: how does one really TEACH creative writing? What if I failed, what if they didn’t produce anything? I was consumed by my own fears. Here I was three years ago, my first day, trying to talk to these amazing girls–these girls who were all going to college in a few months, who had won national science awards and...
“Like Eating Butterbeans,” by Barbara Presnell
When I was growing up in North Carolina, summers were hot and busy with work of all kinds. Mid-July meant somebody from a nearby farm would bring us a bushel or more of butterbeans, and we’d shell until our fingers were yellow, filling large pans then putting up pints and quarts for winter. Butterbeans were beautiful to look at, in their waxy light green delicate skins, but when cooked, they were dull, mushy, pulpy things that tasted...
“Take Up your Bed and Walk:” An AROHO Feature with Bridget Birdsall, Gift of Freedom Finalist
Dear Gift of Freedom Applicant: After years of plugging away at my writing, attending countless workshops and earning an MFA, I had filled hundreds of pages, with hundreds of words, that never managed to journey any farther than the filing cabinet in my closet. So, when a friend told me about the Gift of Freedom Award, which of course sounded too good to be true, I decided to take a chance and put my words out into the world. This was...
This month’s edition of WAVES is dedicated to our creative sisters whose spirits burn for their art while they are in the fight of their lives.
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How is artistic expansion the antidote to our worldly challenges?
Submit Your Art & Writing to WAVES
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We meet each other in waves of light, waves of vision, waves of sound–a studio beyond boundaries.
Creative sisters, shoulder to shoulder, shore to shore.
This time, there is no setting our art aside. This time, there is no setting our art asunder. This is our time.
December 6-7 | oneness | noon to noon EST | dip in and out throughout this twenty-four hour wave
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the antidote Oct 31, 2025
