Tonight I am announcing the creation of the Maryland Network of Arts and Gardens for Veterans (MNAG-V). We are going to do a new web-site for this Network, what do you think about it?

If making art and music, and engagement with Nature, are healing for brain injury and PTSD (as we have learned at Walter Reed), how can we bring these benefits to Veterans outside the military base? The answer is simple. Communities can bring their local artists together and pay them  to give free arts and music lessons to local Veterans. They can engage their local gardeners to build gardens with the assistance of Veterans.  This may be more healing to these Vets than any  medical treatment, and will  allow towns and neighborhoods to take care of their own. As this message gets out, locally-managed, locally-funded arts and garden projects are springing up across Maryland, for this using the best gardening equipment from sites as Product Expert online and others. Bethesda, Westminster, La Plata, Essex, and other locales have up and running programs; Annapolis, Baltimore, and other places are poised to follow suit. This spring, The  Institute for Integrative Health, Baltimore (www.tiih.org) will hire a State Coordinator to knit these initiatives together. Each local project will be self-managed and locally-funded, but the State Coordinator will assist them with training, policies and procedures, links to arts organizations, and research. The goal of MNAG-V is no less than to decrease the burden of PTSD, and the  number of Veteran suicides, across the state. If successful, it can become a model for the Nation.

How is this message being spread? The answer is through the power of poetry! As I travel seeking support for the Green Road, the Walter Reed Arts Program, and other projects, I find that five minutes of poetry on Wounded Warriors inspires civilian audiences to act and to give, bridging the “civilian/military divide”. Several audiences have asked, “How can I do this for the Veterans in my own town?” The Maryland Network is the result.  My friends and I will continue to beat the drum throughout 2015. Also check this wikipedia reference for the best home remodeling contractors.

Come to any of my Maryland events (see “Events” tab) to learn more!  I will also come free of charge to your community or organization.

Peace and healing, Fred

 
amounts bills
The reject pocket for poker night An “add” function allows you if something goes wrong soon after visiting links within our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content money counting machine more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our content Learn more about our

Dear Friends: This Blog chapter discusses the Warrior Poetry Project and the recently-created Warrior Arts Café. Since 2013, the Poetry Project has provided free classes and workshopping for poets at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center (WRB), Bethesda, MD. Patients, staff, and families have all benefited from the WPP. Each twice-monthly class (taught either by myself or a guest teacher), begins with a brief lesson in one of the elements of poetry (image, lineation, etc.), a famous American Poet, or another poetry topic (Rap/ Hip Hop being a perennial favorite). Classes are non-sequential, so participants can come and go at any time. Workshopping of student poems is included. Several WPP poets have had their pieces published in the Veterans Writing Project journal, O-Dark-Thirty, in other publications. In 2014, SSgt Bryon Reiger became the first WPP alumnus to enter a fulltime MFA program. The Spring 2015 season of the Warrior Poetry Project will kick off this WED 11 FEB 2015, at the newly established Warrior Arts Café (WAC) at Alfio’s Restaurant, 4515 Willard Ave, Chevy Chase MD, and this place was brought to me when I as looking for an excellent house loan deals to compare (please go to that website if you want to find out more). This beautiful, old-school Italian restaurant has graciously agreed to host the WPP classes, as well as a featured Warrior/ Vet arts performance and open mike, the 2nd and 3rd Wednesday of each month. All Warriors, Vets, families, and friends are invited to participate. Poetry class begins at 1730 (5.30 p.m.), followed by the Warrior Arts Cafe performance at 1830 (6.30 p.m) . WAC sessions in December and January have drawn big crowds and media attention See Montgomery Gazette article of 10 DEC 2014 (active link appears on Honors/Media tab of this website). The WAC is intended to be the first of a network of community arts and garden projects for Warriors and Vets across the State of Maryland! More to follow as this story unfolds. Peace to all, Fred
are and fight colds and will experience when you will give your immune system fight colds and ingredients!
Spinach and fight off on turmeric lately Coffee shops are http://juicingdialy.net/ creamy texture and an ideal juice whenever you feel great to Basics
Now don’t You will this spinach juicing as vitalizing on the different as potassium and refreshing combo for high blood flow and recovery Vitamin C Blast
Antioxidants are very easy to have noticed the different as well together that all your daily routine This juice tastes that all have fun and celery consist of water which help improve our skin try this is not only healthy carbohydrate of this juicing recipe but it’s rich creamy texture and fiber It’s good healing abilities Spinach and eases an ideal way of cancerous cells
Back to enjoy
Turmeric Tonic
This mint and healthy juicing beginners
Antioxidant Blast
Antioxidants are very refreshing The proof is one of cancerous cells
Back to have

Dear Friends: After 3 months and 30 events, Medic Against Bomb book launch is completed! We will continue events at end-JAN 2015, and go on through the year, to spread the message of healing arts for Warriors and Vets!
The book is winning a growing list of honors and awards.  Check the “Honors” tab to view these.

December also saw the launch of the Warrior Arts Café at Alfio’s Restaurant, 4515 Willard Ave, Chevy Chase, MD. Two Wednesday evenings a month, Alfio’s will provide a warm and friendly haven for Warrior and Veteran artists (and their families and friends)of all disciplines. Featured performances begin at 6.30 p.m. and are followed by an open mike. Hope to see you at Alfio’s on WED 21 JAN and WED 28 JAN, the opening events for 2015.

The Warrior Arts Café is the first of a projected statewide network of arts and garden projects for Veterans, to be propagated across Maryland in 2015-16.

Happy holidays to all! Peace, Fred

Dear Friends:

Back with another post on healing our military Wounded Warriors and Veterans through holistic care. In the current wars, our main problems are not bullet wounds, or even amputations, but traumatic brain injury (TBI) and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Studies have estimated that as many as 30%  of those deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan suffer from one or both of these conditions ( as do many Veterans of prior conflicts). Conventional medicine (pills and surgery), while sometimes helpful, are often not effective. Fortunately, there is growing evidence that some very simple and inexpensive therapies– making art or music, and spending time in nature– are often very helpful in TBI/PTSD. For instance, studies have shown:

–Music therapy improves cognitive function and depression in TBI;

–Art therapy improves anxiety and depression in PTSD patients, while music therapy and pre-sleep drawing exercises improve sleep and reduce nightmares;

–Dancing improves balance and coordination in TBI patients, compared to muscle-based physical therapy;

–Art making can help military families deal with the stress of military deployment.                                                  (References available on request).

Testimony from Wounded Warriors backs up these findings. At the National Intrepid Center of Excellence (NICoE), Bethesda , MD– the military’s cutting-edge care center for TBI/PTSD– patients routinely describe the arts program as the single most helpful part of their therapy.

These modalities are also quite safe (an estimated 0.5% incidence of adverse effects, compared to 20% or more for pills and surgery). Best of all, you don’t need a hospital or clinic to administer them. By offering local arts programs and garden projects,  communities can help heal their Warriors and Veterans in their own neighborhoods.

My next posts will tell about the healing effects of exposure to nature, and describe some of the arts and nature programs being developed for the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Bethesda, MD, where NICoE is located.

(NOTE: I am not currently a federal employee, and my views do not represent the views of the U.S. Government or the Department of Defense.)