Pernille Ipsen spent her early years in a feminist collective in Copenhagen. She recently wrote a book about the seven women who raised her, which won a major Danish literature prize. Pernille talks about the story of her seven mothers and how to write a story without breaking someone's heart.

To see photos from the book: https://www.wortfm.org/desire-lines-my-seven-mothers/

Book: Et Åbent Øjeblik: Da mine mødre gjorde noget nyt (An Open Moment: When My Mothers Did Something New) (Gyldendal, 2020) by Pernille Ipsen. Image courtesy of Pernille Ipsen.

Sometimes, a historical artifact will emerge that makes us question our past and our present. In this case, it’s a black and white video from 1962 made with hidden cameras. The film documented housing discrimination in Madison. But it was suppressed by UW before it could be shown. It sat in the university archives until this year. On this week’s Desire Lines, we learn about the role of archives. Who do they protect? How do they preserve? And what else is waiting to be rediscovered?

Produced by Carrie Ann Welsh. Music is Longing by Ketsa, used under a creative commons license.

Image: The Bureau of Audio-Visual Instruction’s film reel storage room. Courtesy of the UW Archives.

WORT link: https://www.wortfm.org/desire-lines-housing-discrimination-and-hidden-cameras-part-two-archives-as-reparations/

In 1962, a film was made to document housing discrimination in Madison. But just as the film was completed, UW suppressed it. The film was buried in the university archives for nearly 60 years. Recently, the film was rediscovered and made public. In this piece, we hear about how the film was made with hidden cameras and microphones, and why it is such important piece of history. This is the first of a two-part series.

Featuring the voices of: Cat Phan, Kacie Lucchini Butcher, George Allez, and Daphne Barbee-Wooten.

For more details on the film, check out this episode from WORT of “Madison in the Sixties" or this article from UW Libraries.

Produced by Carrie Ann Welsh.

Music is “Longing” by Ketsa.

Photo: A still image from Barbee and Hanisch’s 1962 film that was banned by UW. Courtesy of the UW Archives.

WORT link: https://www.wortfm.org/desire-lines-housing-discrimination-and-hidden-cameras-1-station-wagons-and-suppression/

I visited the local pet cemetery on a full moon.

For more information, visit the Westport Pet Memorial website: https://www.westportpetmemorial.com/

Music is “Longing” by Ketsa, used under a creative commons license.

WORT link: https://www.wortfm.org/desire-lines-pet-cemetery/

It’s morel season here in the upper Midwest. This piece takes us to the woods to go mushroom hunting with local wildcrafter and educator Day Host-Jablonski. To learn more about hunting local mushrooms: www.meetup.com/Experiential-Community-Healing/

Acknowledgements: Music is “Number 76” by Dan Welsh, used with permission; and “Longing” by Ketsa, used under a creative commons license. Image: Day Host-Jablonski photographs a false morel in the woods.

WORT link: https://www.wortfm.org/desire-lines-how-to-spot-morels-and-their-lookalikes/

Madison Parks hosts an annual Earth Day Challenge and this is the first time back since the pandemic. This year, hundreds of volunteers at almost 50 parks around the city helped with trash pickup, raking, mulching, and weeding. I went out to talk to the volunteers at James Madison and Tenney Park.

Music is “Longing” by Ketsa. Used under a creative commons license.

WORT link: https://www.wortfm.org/desire-lines-earth-day-challenge-2021/

What is the opposite of what you’re doing right now? Practicing polarity in a pandemic can be good medicine.

Special thanks to the voices of Martha McAlpine, Cynthia Burnson, Jenisha Watts, Nate Millington, Lauren Wojcik, Claudia Ramly, Eleni Schirmer, Mae Graber-Schmidt, Rachel Goldberg, Michaela Sulka, and Edmond Ramly.

Produced by Carrie Ann Welsh.

Acknowledgements: Music is “Built for Nothing,” “Longing,” and “Dandy” by Ketsa, used under a creative commons license. Sound effects from the free sounds library.

WORT link: https://www.wortfm.org/practicing-polarity-in-a-pandemic/

Up here in the upper midwest, winters sure feel long. But a recent climate change study reminds us that winter is actually shrinking. By 2100, summer is projected to last nearly half a year and winter will be less than two months. What will happen to spring, that long season of transition? It doesn’t look good. A slow spring is important for crops. And for us. There are many micro springs of Wisconsin to savor.

Produced by Carrie Ann Welsh.

Attributions: Music is “Recording 1.24.21” by Dan Welsh and “Come to Life” by Arthur Russell. Used with permission. Quote excerpted from James Still’s 1940 novel, River of Earth, read by Mattie Decker. The line “the cold keeps the emergence from happening in a blink” is from Kathleen Maier. This piece also features the voice of Malaika Baxa.

WORT link: https://www.wortfm.org/desire-lines-seven-springs-of-wisconsin/

Grandma poems. Eighty-five-year-old Barbara Lozowski (Ama) reads poems she’s written about knitted afghans, growing old, and a circle of trees in the Upper Peninsula. Recorded in Kentucky in 2018.

In 2018, I spent a few weeks with my grandparents in Kentucky. I was there taking care of my grandpa, “Pop-Pop.” He had advanced Parkinson’s and was at the end of his life. One afternoon my brother Mac came over and Ama brought out the photo albums and scrapbooks and the notebooks of poems she's written poems in for years. I was in and out of the room tending to Pop-Pop and left the recorder on the table for a few hours.

Produced by Carrie Ann Welsh.

Special thanks to Barbara Lozowski and Mac Welsh.

Music: “Which That is This” by Doctor Turtle, used under a Creative Commons license.