Navigating the In-Between: A Journey of Grace

  • Admission Free
  • Sponsored by Christ College

Schwehn for brochureHow do we navigate the space between who we are and who we would like to become, between the world as it is and world as we imagine it could be? In August of 2001, Kaethe Schwehn needed her own, personal Eden. She was a twenty-two-year-old trying to come to terms with a failed romance, the dissolution of her parents’ marriage, and her own floundering faith. At first, Holden Village, a Lutheran retreat center nestled in the Cascade Mountains, seemed like a utopian locale: communal meals, consensus decision-making, and eco-friendly practices. But as the months wore on, the idyll faded and Kaethe was left with 354 inches of snow, one prowling cougar, sixty-five disgruntled villagers, and a pile of copper mine tailings 150 feet high. Her Eden was a toxic Superfund site.
In this Symposium Schwehn will read from Tailings: A Memoir, winner of the 2015 Minnesota Book Award, and will share her passionate and awkward journey about embracing the “in-between’’ times of our lives with grace and hope.
Schwehn’s poetry and prose have appeared in journals such as jubilat, Crazyhorse, New Orleans Review, Women’s Studies Quarterly, and Word for /Word. Schwehn has been the recipient of a Minnesota Arts Board grant, a Loft Mentor Series Award, and the Donald Justice Poetry Award. Tanka & Me: Poems (Mineral Point Poetry Series) appeared in December, 2015. She teaches creative writing at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota.