Spirit in Action

The Chimpanzee Chronicles and Growing Compassion

Debra Rosenman is author of the upcoming collection, The Chimpanzee Chronicles: Spellbinding Stories from Behind the Bars, about our closest animal cousin. It's about increasing understanding & compassion, something Debra also does through her workshops on Journey into the Animal Heart Circles and by her private practice as a Certified Rubenfeld Synergist and Somatic Archaeologist.

Broadcast on:: 27 Oct 2013
Audio Format:: other

[music] Let us sing this song for the healing of the world That we may hear as one With every voice, with every song We will move this world along And our lives will feel the echo of our healing [music] Welcome to Spirit in Action. My name is Mark Helpes Me. Each week, I'll be bringing you stories of people living lives of fruitful service, of peace, community, compassion, creative action, and progressive efforts. I'll be tracing the spiritual roots that support and nourish them in their service, hoping to inspire and encourage you to sink deep roots and produce sacred food in your own life. Let us sing this song for the dreaming of the world That we may dream as one With every voice, with every song We will move this world along This is the last chance I'll have to remind you that fast approaching is the big event being sponsored by Northern Spirit Radio Something we're calling Feed Your Body, Feed Your Soul, Turn Your Radio On It's a way to bring together a lot of the parts of what Northern Spirit Radio does The music, the activism, the people, the spirit On Saturday, November 2nd We'll start with a presentation by Will Fantle of the Cornucopia Institute On organic standards, a presentation called "Foxes in the Hen House" And we'll follow that with a meal of organic and local ingredients Pizza and flaafo hummus and chicken kebabs Plus local herbal teas and apple cider And that meal is because we want to live out the values and work that we try to uphold via spirit in action We'll finish the evening with concerts by three musicians Her weapon and his famous captivating flutes Robbie Crawford and her transformational crystal bowls And Sue West and her prolific and down-home folk and gospel tunes It's all happening in Eau Claire on November 2nd So just head here from wherever you're listening to us To be a part of a rich experience of people and spirit And support for the Northern Spirit Radio community Get the full details at northernspiritradio.org But you tuned in today to sit down with our guest, Deborah Rosenman Author of the upcoming book "The Chimpanzee Chronicles" Spellbinding Stories from Behind the Bars Deborah is an animal advocate And by sharing 26 different stories and experiences with chimps She replaces statistics with individuals and theories with personalities Deborah's wide circle of work includes her private practice As a certified Rubenfield synergist and somatic archaeologist And the workshop she leads around the journey into animal circle hearts We'll get to that stuff and more But I want to start us out with a topical song It's not about chimps exactly, but it is about what we can learn from another of our primate cousins The baboon And it's by one of my long, long, long time favorite musicians, Charlie King And his partner, Karen Brando I'll let them explain about baboons can work it out And then we'll be talking to author Deborah Rosenman First, music by Charlie King and Karen Brando Are you ready for a better way to be? There's an answer swinging in our family tree Everybody lives more fully When there isn't any bully if baboons can work it out then so can we Now this is a true story Baboon troops are known for being violent, hierarchical and male-dominated So when a tragedy wiped out the most aggressive males in one baboon troop The survivors generated a new or peaceful culture That happened 20 years ago All the original members of the troop have died off But they taught this cooperative behavior to their young And to new males who migrated into the troop So they've created a new way of life And we figured that if baboons could do that Are you ready for a better way to be? Are you ready for a better way to be? There's an answer swinging in our family tree Everybody lives more fully When there isn't any bully if baboons can work it out then so can we Act 1 a culinary bungal in the wilds of Kenya A tourist camp there in the jungle serves a toxic menu They throw their garbage in a heap The alpha baboon males compete The prize they win is poison meat They die like alpha men do Are you ready? Are you ready for a better way to be? There's an answer swinging in our family tree Everybody lives more fully When there isn't any bully if baboons can work it out then so can we Act 2 the female ratio doubles in the ape assembly Surviving males who want no trouble take their places humbly Instead of dominance and subjection Mutual grooming group affection It's the natural selection for this baboon family Are you ready? Are you ready for a better way to be? There's an answer swinging in our family tree Everybody lives more fully When there isn't any bully if baboons can work it out then so can we Act 3 now 20 years have passed They're still cooperating New males arrive they're learning fast No fighting, we're all dating Stress is lower, hearts are stronger Loving more and living longer Hot their line and join the conga Time for celebrating Now a human bully is harder to defeat I mean you can't just send the White House poison meat But you can march, sign a petition Organize a coalition Hey, hey, ho, ho We say rumsfelds got to go 'Cause everybody lives more fully When there isn't any bully if baboons can work it out then so can Bush and Cheney? What a quandary Better put your trust in Gandhi Baboons can work it out and so can He should have voted for Cruz and Cheney? Baboons can work it out and so can him and her And you and me as smart as any chimpanzee Baboons can work it out and so can we Deborah, thank you so much for joining me for Spirit in Action Thank you for having me, I'm so excited to be speaking with you And you're listening audience, it's really an honor and a pleasure Again, for our listeners, the book that is going to appear by next spring The chimpanzee chronicles spellbinding stories from behind the bars How long have you been immersed in chimpanzees? Oh my goodness, for a very long time Who does love chimpanzees? I mean I've loved them since I was very very little But I've been working on the book since 2007 And it's a really interesting story of how this all came about My passion for chimpanzees You mentioned something about working as a publicist And then having a chimp show up, roller skates and all that Tell that event I ended event planning business in New York City for ten years And I hired a baby chimpanzee from one of my clients I always loved chimps and I thought, you know, this was a client that had everything So let's get a baby chimp I had no idea that I was part of a problem until many many years later But this baby chimp came in on roller skates, where's the hit of the party? It's absolutely adorable I kept pictures, I still have in mind my refrigerator of this little chimp I now know, when I found out, many many many years later, what was really going on And after the chimps couldn't perform anymore, I made a promise And I said, no more, you know, I'm going to become part of this I was part of the problem and now I'm going to become part of the solution I think that maybe that doesn't fully make clear what the problem with this is I mean, because, you know, we see baby chimps, that means people fall in love with chimps They care about chimps and therefore they maybe, you know, want to have chimps protected So that would be the upside of maybe seeing a chimp dressed up in a dress or on roller skates Could you make more clear the downside of it? I believe, on the whole, that we have really broken their bodies and their spirits By forcing these chimps to live in our world Whether it's, you know, as an entertainer, whether it's a subject in medical research Or a chimp that's kept as a pet There are wild beings, even though they're so close to us We share approximately 98.6% identical DNA So we are actually closer to the chimp than the chimp is to a gorilla It's these similarities that have caused them great suffering So, of course, they're used and they're dressed up and everybody, including myself back then But they were just absolutely adorable, but then what happened? They start growing up and this chimp that I hired Came from a very, very, very loving human mother Who was extremely protective of the baby when the baby was there for all of an hour But what happened? There are a lot of people in entertainment Quote, unquote, you know, trainers who use really abusive, terrible ways of having chimps perform Because they start to get older and then they become teenagers And they don't listen, they're wild animals, so they're forced into submission And it never, never ends well When they're about seven or eight years old, they become really too strong to handle And we've seen this in the paper and the news, you know, how chimps have attacked, killed, hurt, named, a human It's never the chimps fault, the chimps shouldn't be in that particular position to begin with Well, what is a good environment? What is a good position for them to be in If they're not meant to be as house pets or something like that? There actually should be in the wild with their families I mean, you know, in the different countries in Africa where they come from Which is a whole other problem because they're losing their lives there because of the bush meat trade and deforestation But that's where they do belong And even in zoos, there are some zoos that are better than others But they're extremely social beings like we are So the chimps in entertainment often end up when they can't work anymore When their shelf life has expired for work Then they often end up in roadside zoos or medical research or some terrible situation And they suffer, chimpanzees have feelings just as we do They laugh, they cry, they get into fights, they're jealous, they're possessive, they grieve They have every quality that we do But when they're put into tiny little cages, it's amazing that they all don't go crazy And you can learn a lot about all the feelings and the different moods And the different ways that each chimp has of being in the chimpanzee chronicles Again, the subtitle Spellbinding Stories from Behind the Bars by Deborah Rosamund I, by the way, have been a vegetarian for 37 years, I guess now I think I have probably a higher compassion ratio towards animals than most people And I see the violence that we do to animals My question still is, what's the solution? And so you mentioned the best environment is for them to be in the wild I think we find ourselves between a rock and a hard place because one of the things I've noted Is the animals that we domesticate, maybe for food or maybe as pets, you know, dogs or cows or whatever Those animals flourish, we make room for them because they're useful to us Those that aren't useful to us, wolves or whatever, they go to the edge of extermination So, what's the proper way of dealing with chimpanzees? Given that, you know, we're not in control of Africa You know, if we don't have them here, they end up as bushmeat Oh my goodness, a rock and a hard place, so how do you think about those things? Oh, it is, and you know, when I was saying that they belong in the wild, I was talking from a more global perspective If we just take what's happening here in this country, there's the chimpanzees that are in roadside zoos and in substandard zoos And in medical research, which, you know, it's walking the fine line now with them being released out of medical research With the great aid protection and car savings act bill in the Senate now, and of course, the US Fish and Wildlife Services Is sitting with the decision right now whether to put chimpanzees on the endangered list or not If they do, then the medical research part of it would be immediately outlawed So we're on the cusp now of great things happening that chimps will be released So there's going to be another problem the other round because then once all these chimpanzees are somewhere around 1,100 chimpanzees in medical research now Then out of rows, I think around 700 that are in federally funded research facilities Which those would be the ones that would get out first And then all the others that are in privately held research labs, that's more work to see how that's going to work out But then where the rubber chimps go, you know, they have to go into sanctuary It costs a lot of money for chimps to live and, again, they could live upwards of 50, 60 years in captivity It costs about a million dollars, I mean, I'm saying with the top of my head, but I think so If a chimp comes in like as a baby into a sanctuary and lives to be 60, it's about a million dollars for the whole lifetime But that would be a really happy thing to work out because these chimpanzees have suffered so much They deserve the best that we can give them now These stories that we get to read in the chimpanzee chronicles We get the idea that really the line between us is that there's not that big of a gulf between us and chimpanzees Should we be thinking of chimpanzees as different than, say, baboons or gorillas or angitangs or other primates Or dolphins and dogs, for that matter, why should chimpanzees get special compassion? Well, this is my first book, the chimpanzee chronicles Just to let you know that elephants and dolphin books and orangutan books are following So it's just that chimpanzees have been extremely special to me and my heart, so I chose to highlight them But no animal should be left out, I believe all animals have souls And I believe that all animals have a right to live as much as a right as a human being And I gathered these stories that witness to the injustice and the exploitation and heartless treatment of chimpanzees But it would be all souls, you know, I could take it to all souls Because I believe that every single being has an inalienable right to be safe, free and live with dignity So it has really taken a village of people to write this book, the chimpanzee chronicles, I have 26 authors And it's going to take an even larger village to help the chimpanzees, you know, on their journey of healing I look at this book, again, it's the first book, I send the book out that it will be published in and out by April 10 But I send it out, I look at it as a prayer, a prayer for wholeness, and a prayer for freedom You know, I have my own thoughts about why we have to care about chimps, I'm trying to get your thoughts about it One of the things that I'm aware of is anytime we increase our compassion for one being It's likely that our compassion sensitivity will grow towards other beings So maybe we'll have fewer wars because we care about chimps, right? And maybe we'll actually care about whatever the minority or the out group is that we discriminate against Because we end up opening our hearts a little bit more So I always think that that's a good thing to do That's so beautifully said, Mark, it really is I agree with that too, and you know, we all wake up when we wake up Not a second before In 2005 or 2006, can't remember now, I started projects we dream for that reason I started it before I started the book because children are the way I thought this would be really amazing to go into the local schools in Santa Fe and teach children You know, or work on projects, I should say, with children That promote a deep respect and empathy toward animals and the earth And then, you know, I of course focus it on the study at grade eight And it's through education, and I teach fundraising and community relations And it's just so darling to see, you know, little first graders and fifth graders And sixth graders, you know, involved in this process And every time I go into a school, you know, my prayer is if I can change one life Then it would have, you know, that one life of the child Would then, you know, would have reverberations along the way So that is what's in my heart to do You know, in addition to being an empathic vegetarian or being a very motivated Quaker religiously I'm also a scientist, and so I have to admit that there's some battling arguments that go on in my head One of the ways that we can see the world is as a zero-sum game That is to say, if I gain something, someone else loses something, right? There's also the possibility that some things are not zero-sum That, you know, when you share a joy, the joy is doubled It isn't halved because you've shared it with someone So some things are zero-sum and some things aren't One of the things as a scientist I look at Are there resources which are scarce, like, you know, wild lands in Africa That if we give them the chimpanzees, some people won't have them And that people will suffer from starvation Again, do you deal with that or is the prayer just the overview picture? How do you deal with those kinds of concerns that are probably have some validity at least? Yeah, well, there's so many different parts to your statement there The bushney trade is really a problem And I have two stories from Africa that go into, you know, a little bit of detail about that I don't think those are stories that you've yet read It's a very, very interesting thing because it's not the chimpanzees are in peril Not just because, you know, people who are very poor are using them as a source of protein Which is true, but more are being killed because they're being sold into large cities They're being sent into New York and London and, you know, other Saudi Arabia I mean, they're just being sent like all over the place and it's a prized meat A gorilla and chimpanzee, so it's not, you know, people trying to make a box So it's greed There are limited resources all around the world And that gets into a whole 'nother dialogue about food for surrounding people So I think that's over and above what I can talk about in this moment Okay, not everything is at our pay grade, you know We don't have to solve all of the world's problems at once But one of the things that I accept is that there are compassionate people that I disagree with That is to say that just because they disagree with me doesn't mean they're wrong and I'm right I recognize that some people are trying the best they can with whatever situation they think they have And one way that that affects me in terms of chimpanzees is, you know, are we going to spend a million dollars per chim To keep them in the United States Obviously, some places like Kenya have found better situations Because they have a large tourist trade for people going on safari People going out to see the animals in the wild Which I did when I was there in 1996 I think they found a way to be sustainable for themselves and for the animals And to have the animals killed was actually a blow to their economy But most people aren't thinking creatively in that way You know, they think the only alternative is a zoo Which is, as you say, an unfortunate environment for an animal like a chimp And you know, you can't really take a domesticated chimp and bring them back to Africa I mean, it's just not going to work It happens with one chimp that was very well recognized story many years ago But it just can't happen because they're domesticated But it can happen with some chimps that, you know, like out of the wild And, you know, they lose their mother or whatever And, you know, some chimps in some areas are, you know, they're starting to be reintroduced back into the wild Again, it's a lot of focus and a lot of money to, you know, get behind these kinds of things One of my stories of that Marian who worked in Africa in Sierra Leone, you know, she talked about You know, they did a consensus in 2009 and they found out that, you know, chimps were being forced out of their habitat Because of deforestation and bush meat and they were just running and running further toward where people live So they were going in and, you know, trying to educate people in the town, like if this happens, you know, don't kill them, call off And, you know, it was working and then they said, you know, we'll give you some other sources of food And they actually brought goats for them, so they could milk the goats and, you know, get milk and, you know, and then have more goats Maybe have babies and then sell them and other people can store it and they taught them how to plant special seals of crops That chimps wouldn't be attracted to, you know, like, stop growing pineapple and grow something else So this kind of thing is going on and it's a huge problem all over So there are many different solutions and there are many hundreds and thousands of people who are, like, working towards helping chimps You know, and in Africa as well, helping people directly If you just tuned in, I want to note that you're listening to Spirit in Action Our host, Mark, helps me for this northern spirit radio production on the web at northernspiritradio.org On that site, you'll find more than eight years of our programs for listening and download You'll find links to our guests, you'll find a place to leave comments We love two-way communication, so please do post a comment when you visit There's also a place to make donations and your donations are invaluable to us It is how we make this program possible So make a donation when you visit the site, but even more so, I want to remind you to support your local community radio station They're giving you a valuable slice of news and music that you get nowhere else And so please, with your time and with your money, please support your local community radio station Today we're speaking for Spirit in Action with Deborah Rosenmann She's the author of a book that will be coming out this coming spring The chimpanzee chronicles, spellbinding stories from behind the bars Include some 26 stories from people who are actually dealing with chimps I think in some cases in the stories, as I read, they had worked with other animals They thought that they were particularly connected to them, and then they found a particular heart connection I'd say, a real mutual understanding with chimpanzees That kind of empathy, I think we sometimes think we have it with our dogs, with our cats Although cats tend to ignore us, but dogs, in particular, we find that they care about us, we care about them Could you share a couple of the stories, a little excerpts from them, that would give people a flavor of what we're talking about here? Absolutely, I'd like to share with you three stories, I'll just redo a little excerpt The first one is from Gloria Gro, who is the founder and director of the Fauna Foundation outside of Montreal in Canada This is the opening paragraph In 1981, Merck Scharth and Delmay pharmaceuticals sent CH562, aka Jean, to the Buckshire Corporation Research Facility She was six years old, seven years later, Buckshire sent her to the laboratory for experimental medicine and surgery in primates There, Jean was subject to two years of research, including being inoculated with HIV, continual vaginal washes and cervical biopsies She was often treated for self-inflicted wounds, a sign of severe stress Following a 1995 experiment, Jean had what everyone described as a nervous breakdown She was no longer of use to research For the next two years, she was left alone, heavily medicated, and her slightly less than five foot by five foot by seven foot cage The drugs did little to prevent her from screaming continually, ripping her fingernails off, thrashing out of control, or huddling against the floor in the back of her cage This is where I met her, sitting in that dark corner, looking more terrified than anyone I had ever seen Lost in another world, Jean looked up to me with beautiful almond-shaped eyes, but seemed to be pleading Will you help? That's the beginning of Gloria's story, and it is an amazing story to read I don't want to give anything away, but besides being eye-opener, it's extremely heart-opening and touching That's one, and then we're going to go to something that's a little more happy, on a happier note It's a story I have by Aegeana Martin, who is an animal activist extraordinaire, a lawyer, and she is a primatologist And she worked with signing chimps, chimps that, you know, use sign language to speak for three years This is part of her story I recall my first day at the chimpanzee and human communication institute, where I was introduced to many humans whose naming faces all look the same None of these people look like the psychologists I knew from college, they look like anthropologists There was a difference, in my experience, psychologists were suits and lab coats, anthropologists were sandals and had long hair Immediately I was put to work gathering together in Richmond I was surprised to learn that the chimps got clothing, shoes, plastic mirrors, toys, brushes, purses, magazines on a daily basis This is normal for this group of chimps, because as part of their cross-fostering experience, they were raised with all the comforts of the human home They ate out of plates and bowls, and used spoons and toothbrushes Coming from a laboratory background, I thought that these were no-nose based on the animal welfare act because they could not be cleaned or sterilized properly And because it might cause fighting among the animals, I did not know then how heavily indoctrinated I had become in the ways of treatment of our fellow animals Wasting my concern to my trainer, she said, "We don't call them animals" Up to that point, I did not know that animal was a bad word However, I soon learned that the chimpanzees here were either called "chimp" as in "each chimp gets one bowl of soup" or by their name Tattoo did not take her vitamins today I also learned that the chimps were not fed their food, but were served That we were not caretakers, but caregivers And safety was top priority, along with, of course, the chimps well-being The motto of the facility was "chimp's come first" A line I would come to repeat countless times to others for the next three years So, a few weeks later, I got the routine down Empty the dishwasher, get clothes out, put out new enrichment, clean cages, make lunch, don't stare at the chimps, don't interact with the chimps unless you've been trained to do so Don't cross any red lines and so forth Every day, one of us would sign "what wants heat" Each chimps had a favorite food and would tell us what they wanted I'm just going to read this a little further here She talks about a chimp named Moja It was a routine to my greetings with Moja First, she wanted me to blow air on her face and indicated this desire by signing "blow" I would blow my breath and she would take it in and sign "clocking" Yes, I usually just had my clocking She then would point to my zippers on my fleece vest It was the Pacific Northwest, after all Moja wanted me to do and undo the zipper So, I would as she scared the zipper with fascination Then Moja would point to my Velcro zipper tag and then point to her ear She wanted to hear the Velcro sound I happily obliged by doing and undoing my Velcro straps She loved Velcro Finally, she would make a tick-tick-tick sound with her mouth and point to my watch Sometimes she would just listen This happened hundreds of times She would listen to my watch Always a variation of the sight, smells and sounds that she wanted from me Sometimes I would show her my teeth and my tongue And she would do the same for me If I had a scab or a cut that was visible to her She would sign "hurt there" and I would show her She always wanted to tick my scab, but I would not let her Her fingernails could get really long, and she could hurt me or infect my wound Red was one of Moja's favorite colors When it was time to pass out blankets, she'd pick up the red one and sign "red bath" If there were no red blankets at sleep time, she would sign "red" I would answer "no red, red dirty" meaning that the red blanket was in the washer She would point to the enrichment closet and sign "red" there That's pretty interesting, isn't it? I mean, just sharing how smart they are Yeah, well, how much they understand Now, we tend to think of creatures that don't speak like we I mean, we sometimes even put in a separate non-human class It was certainly done with people from Africa in terms of slavery That's how we justify how we take economic advantage of some other being So, I think living in close proximity there to chimps These stories and the chimpanzee chronicles They give us an idea of the humanity of that One of my favorite quotes, by the way, from Mother Teresa is "The problem with our world is that we draw the circles of family too small" I love that Just think about what that means I mean, some of us do it, people in my family, but not the people across the street Or not the people outside of our border Or not the people of our color or whatever, you know, of our sexual preference Or maybe the people who are of different species, like chimps So, are chimps particularly close to humans in terms of speech, other abilities? They can't really speak, they don't speak because of their tongue They can't actually form words But, I mean, when you have signing chimps, meaning they speak to us They actually speak to us in our own language I mean, that's pretty incredible, I have a story in here by Mark Bodimer Who talks about seeing a chimpanzee who was home reared Meaning, raised as a baby in a human family Then this is Bruno, and Bruno ended up in medical research And now, you know, took the time to bring somebody in who understood sign language Because they said, "Oh yeah, he's doing all these movements and no one understands what he said" The wrong story short, Mark went in and he understood And the first thing that Bruno signed to him was key out He was asking to get out of the cage Yep, I love that quote from Mother Teresa and really extending our family to the world, to everything that exists Do you want to hear a little excerpt from another story? Sure, let's do that This is not quite about a chin, but this will just give you a little idea of some practices that were used This was a practice at Yorkies, which is in Atlanta It's a story that Jen Fierstein, who is a sanctuary director at Save the Chimp Which is in Fort Pierce, Florida And it's the largest chimpanzee sanctuary in the world She has written a story about a particular chimp that this is part of her story Another practice at Yorkies that bothered me was when the baby monkeys were taken away from their moms And the day they were born for research They would stick them in light, tight, black boxes Because they'd be going to the main center where all the hardcore biomedical research was happening The babies would then be fitted with prisms, contact lenses, or goggles In order to manipulate their sight and the input of light into their eyes To see how that affected eye development The lead investigator for this study did a presentation on the project And said part of the reason this work was so important Was that there was a high incidence of nearsightedness in children in Thailand The logic of this escaped me I am nearsighted, and I have treatment for it Perhaps the money they were spending on doing this to baby monkeys Would be better spent on providing eye glasses for children in Thailand I just love it I mean, that's what it says so much And it says so much to the research that has been going on with monkeys and chins And to my knowledge, none of it has been successful That chins are really, chins are not good subjects Because of the small percentage of difference that we do have in our DNA So, you know, they're shot up with HIV And they don't develop AIDS the way that the humans do And all other kinds of hepatitis and all other kinds But they can do human colds, they can get tuberculosis And it's been a problem in some places And I don't know which places overseas that do have, you know, tourists coming in And I know that, you know, the time with tourists being spent Looking at chins or looking at chimps in the wild has been greatly cut down And sometimes, you know, people even ask to wear masks now Because chins can't pick up things So that gives just a little idea of the stories I have a story by Alison Argo who is an award-winning documentarian She's won Emmys for her animal documentaries And the one that I actually love is called an uncommon history into that chimp So she wrote an amazing narrative I mean, I just have so many stories And they're all different You know, everyone is really addressing a different aspect of a relationship with a chimp Well, you've given us these samples of the stories that are in the book, Deborah So, how can people get the book? You want to talk about that? Sure, well, the book is in the process now of being published I've decided to self-publish the book because it's important The book get out into the world as quickly as possible With all the things that are happening with chimps now It will be available in April on Amazon and many other places and my website And I'm still doing a fundraising project that's going on just for another few months And if people go to my website, you can read the website I have a seven-minute video that talks about the book And I want you to the end because the end is really fun My website is ChimpanzeeChronicles.com I appreciate anyone who is interested in even contacting me to talk about chimps You can reach me at Deborah at ChimpanzeeChronicles.com I've heard something, or read something a while back An interview with Maury Sendak who wrote Wild Hanks A classic children's adult book as well She asked him to comment on anything about his favorite readers And he said there were just so many But there was one little boy that sent him a chiming card with a little drawing Maury's absolutely loved it And he said he answers all his children's letters But I'm usually very crooked, but there was something about this little boy's card And he took his time and he sent him, Maury, sent him a purse card And he actually drew a picture of a wild thing on it And he wrote, "Dear Jim, I loved your card." And he got a letter back from his mother That said something like, "Jim loved your card." He loved it so much that he ate it To me, and Maury said that no one ever gave him a higher compliment I really think of that because I'm hoping that people can eat my brook You know, really take it in and digest what it really means If anybody sends a donation in, then I would be very happy to email you an excerpt from a story So please make sure that I have your email address And we'll go from there, thank you And again, this book is due to be released in early spring of 2014 In the meantime, people can go to chimpanzeecronicles.com There's a link from nordinspiritradio.org if you wish But you can go to that site, make a donation, watch a video And catch up on some more of the latest news about this You know, one thing I'm not sure I 100% have understood yet, Deborah You started out, a vent planner was one of the things you were doing You hired this chimp, how did you get to be such a strong chimp advocate? Where did your consciousness shift? That's a really, really great question, and you know, I got sick I got this incredible illness called multiple chemical sensitivity environmental illness I became allergic to the world, my immune system just collapsed in a really bizarre way Where, you know, I was hypersensitive to the toxins and fragrances Perfume and soap and, I mean, in everything, and I became homeless Nothing in my middle class upbringing really prepared me to be homeless Or be going through this, but I went through this for many years And I actually became a refugee in my own body I was in, in my car, during it's no storm in New Mexico during the Christmas week I remember it like it was yesterday, and I just said I can't do this anymore This is really tough, you know, what do I do? And I just took a piece of cloth that I had and I envisioned it like a white handkerchief And I actually lifted my arm and I waved it, and I surrendered I completely surrendered Shortly after that, things started to shift I was still sick, but I started to have dreams And chimpanzees started to come to me in my dreams I know that sounds a little woo-woo, but it really is woo-woo true And they came to me in my dreams and just gave me all kinds of messages And my civil background kept showing up and, you know, sort of teaching me how to breathe And it was almost like yoga classes, and this continued over years So I became just so interested, and then I remembered that Oh my goodness, I hired a baby chimpanzee years before I started getting books and reading voraciously everything I could get my hands on About chimpanzees, and I was absolutely devastated and we stopped to read what was going on And that's when I really, I made the promise that I'm going to now be part of the solution And that's when I started projects with dreams And now I'm well, and I'm grateful, and I got to finish the book And it's been quite a journey And I wouldn't trade it for the world because it opened me up to a new way And I will say that it was July 4th, 2000 I had a dream I was told in the dream And these are the exact words to be receptive to the beauty, grace, and deep wonder Of the forest, animals, and our own human nature And that dream and my illness together And then the dreams, you know, with the chimps, have shifted my life completely I like your phrase, it's a bit woo-woo, but it's woo-woo true One thing I didn't quite understand, I mean I understand chemical sensitivities At one point, you know, twenty years ago, there was a man who ended up renting a room Living at my house because my house did not kick off his sensitivities I arranged to rent a room at another house while he was doing some classes at the university And he found out that whatever the lemon pledge or whatever they used in that house would cripple him He ended up living at my house for a semester while he finished these courses In between, before we connected up, he was living out in a tent outdoors Because he couldn't be in any building, there was no place that he felt safe Medically, how did you become homeless? It was also an economic event as well as, you know, I can't be around these chemicals? No, it was not an economic event, it was, I was so sick, I couldn't, my body couldn't tolerate being in any home at all In every place that I went into, there was something in there that absolutely set me off You know, what happens with the immune system, it's just sort of like a rain barrel effect, you know It's just, we're all the toxins that are actually in our own bodies Just keep rising and rising and rising, and then it just hits a crescendo And that's a whole mother, that's a whole mother's show on, you know, that kind of thing But I became homeless and then I was able to be in and out of different places, you know, a couple weeks at a time And someone would take my bag for six months and then I'd get a bag It was just, it was quite something, but I got well, I mean, it's been a long journey And I must say that continuing to do this work, I love Alice Walker, said activism is her rent for living on the planet So I feel like this is my rent for living on the planet, and this is why I'm here So it's a real thing, you know, the environmental illness, and people really have to work very hard at clearing all the toxins out of their body Part of your paying your rent on this earth, I mean, you've authored the chimpanzee chronicles Or you've collected the stories from the 26 people who've contributed for this book You've done that, but I also note on your website that you are a certified Rubenfeld, synergist, and a somatic archaeologist Those are a lot of syllables, is that also a part of paying the rent? It wasn't because I wasn't working for many years, I mean, I couldn't work at all But yes, and those are part of what I do now, like a small practice And there's a lot of syllables, but you know, the real lead is somatic archaeology and Rubenfeld's energy, you know, together We're looking into the body for the answers and doing generational trauma work, looking at the past and seeing, you know, what we're carrying That's not ours, that may be contributing to problems that, you know, people are having in this current day And I love to work with people who are in deep grief I mean, not only about losing animals, but, you know, the state of the world with animals in it today So, I mean, that's one of my specialties It's so close to my phone cards One of the reasons, Deborah, that I do Nord and Spirit radio programs in particular, spirit and action Is because I want inspirational examples of what's being done in the world So I want to leave us on a somewhat of a positive note There's a number of different environments for animals, for chimpanzees in the United States And some of them are plainly damaging and threatening I mean, whether it's research or whether it's being in a zoo There's some really negative experiences for chimps in those settings What are some of the best places? I think that there's some places, islands, off of Florida, where chimps get to live kind of naturally Could you talk about, you know, save the chimps and what those good refuges are like? And thank you, you know, it is that you can really get lost in all the problems that are happening But I want to say that, you know, my book is not just about that It's really important to know that because the book also is about hope and compassion and the possibility of change Where there are eight really terrific sanctuaries in the United States right now that have chimps Seven in the U.S. and one in Canada When I say sanctuary for chimps, that means that, you know, they come out of medical research, pet, life or entertainment life And they have a life now where they don't have to go back into any of those scenarios And they get to live out their lives in as best a sense of freedom as they can You know, if we can give them enrichment and choice and companionship with other chimps Then that is really great Yep, the chimps sanctuary you're referring to is called save the chimps The largest chimpanzee sanctuary in the world and they have 13 different islands And they've put their, you know, chimps in groups, maybe 20, 15, 20, 25 chimps per island Of course there's inside enclosures there where chimps come in and that's where they're fed But they're the choice that they want to freak outside, you know, whatever That's an amazing place and actually I have stories from seven out of the eight sanctuaries in my book What people are doing to help chimps is just phenomenal And you can really see how chimps have, through the stories in the book, how chimps have changed You know, with love and patience and the right kinds of food and social environment And enrichment and enrichment are things that, you know, keep their minds occupied And, you know, not just the tire hanging somewhere And where they get to actually use their mind or they get to forage for food And they get to maybe do some of the activities that they did in the wild, or would do in the wild That is beautiful to see One sanctuary called the Center for Great Apes and that's in Wachua, Florida That we used in entertainment, so most of the chimps either have bubbles, that was Michael Jackson's chimpanzee And the chimps that were used in TV ads, commercials, Super Bowl ads are now residing with her Not or else still, you know, there are still many that need to be saved But there's a lot of great stuff going on with those, and for that I'm grateful for every person That devotes their lives to helping chimps Again, we've been speaking with Deborah Rosenman, she's the author of a book that will be coming out Early spring 2014, the Chimpanzee Chronicles, spellbinding stories from behind the bars You can go to her website, ChimpanzeeChronicles.com Find the link to her there She's happy to have your donation, she's happy to talk with you People who are increasing compassion in the world are always a pleasure to have its friends And so I'm pleased to get to know you, Deborah, and I thank you so much for joining me for Spirit in Action Oh, my pleasure, thank you for all that you do, you know, bringing together people who are moving change forward in the world Including yourself, a big hug to you One last reminder, go to northernspiritradio.org And besides finding a link to Deborah Rosenman and to so many other folks doing good work in the world You'll get the detailed info on our November 2nd concert, talk, meal, community celebration, and benefit Feed your body, feed your soul, turn your radio on I'll catch you in Eau Claire on November 2nd, maybe, but certainly weekly via the radio and the net We'll see you next week for Spirit in Action The theme music for this program is Turning of the World, performed by Sarah Thompson This Spirit in Action program is an effort of Northern Spirit Radio You can listen to our programs and find links and information about us and our guests on our website northernspiritradio.org Thank you for listening I am your host, Mark Helpsmeet, and I welcome your comments and stories of those leading lives of spiritual fruit May you find deep roots to support you and grow steadily toward the light This is Spirit in Action With every voice, with every song We will know this world alone With every voice, with every song We will know this world alone And our lives will feel the echo of our healing (upbeat music)