K: “Community is so important. To knowing you’re not alone and then showing up for each other.

H: 100 percent.

K: even when a situation is scary and people are thinking about their own situations of course but also thinking about their loved ones and their neighbours.

H: We will only survive this with community. We will only survive this together. We will only survive this by showing up for each other. That is our only way out.

This is an exchange between sister/co-host Kerry and friend and returning guest Professor H Mayhem May on this week’s show.

We’re continuing the celebrating of PRIDE on Outlook this week, as we did almost exactly to the day (three years ago) when May was on with us that first time to share about their short film, “Finding Tiresias”, an inclusively designed experimental piece about identity and diversity and change.

Ozzy Osbourne, legendary rock performer died since having H May on this time. In his band’s song “Changes” he sings: “I’m going through changes”.

This is the theme of our second discussion, live in studio, with H from just across the border in The Finger Lakes region of New York State.

Canada and the States both celebrate birthdays during the month of July along with Pride and Disability Pride, just within a few days of one another, as we’re right next to each other. We’re illustrating the need to recognise that closeness and connection and that need to keep connections between us strong in the face of so much chaos and adversity, both as neighbouring countries and in overlapping communities.

So we’re talking interconnection, intersectionality, and interdependence along with examples of loss and grief and accepting of changes as H considers a guide dog for continued outdoor adventures, keeping up blindness skills in an ocularcentric world since being in community with us and others at a Drama Club Camp week in Maine, and in the expanding possibilities developing the ideas from last year’s Maine gathering into a future inclusive and representative theatrical statement with Dr. May’s growing lived experience and directing stage knowledge and expertise at its heart.

For more on our friend and ally Professor H May, visit their website and learn more about “Finding Tiresias” and other projects and perspectives:

https://www.drheathermay.com

Check out last summer’s Maine experience on the two-parter episode we put together featuring our week in community with H and others:

https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/outlook-2024-10-14-our-week-in-maine-well-figure-it-out-pt-1/id1527876739?i=1000673780980

https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/outlook-2024-10-21-our-week-in-maine-well-figure-it-out-pt-2/id1527876739?i=1000675516532

And go back 3 years to hear H’s first appearance on the show:

https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/outlook-2022-07-11-awaiting-tiresias-with-professor/id1527876739?i=1000569782476