Welcome. I am so glad you are here.
I’m Sonia Marie - a mother, maker and relationship builder. This, as you may have gathered, is my website, a place for me to mostly share my professional experience and work portfolio. More important than what I do for work, I have learned, is how I bring my whole self to things I am doing and who I am doing those things with. I hope that when you explore this site, you learn more about who I am and what I stand for. I have found when I bring my entire self to work, I am a more grounded, creative and compassionate co-worker, friend and community member. This is a small glimpse of who I am.
I have committed to fostering relationships with others outside my community and with the Earth itself, grounding myself in the principles of peace (shalom-שלום), friendship (chaverut-חברות) and respect (kavod-כבוד).
The land that I dwell on is the traditional territory and sacred land of many nations. The Multnomah, Wasco, Cowlitz, Kathlamet, Clackamas, Bands of Chinook, Tualatin, Kalapuya, Molalla, and many other tribes, have made their homes and created communities here. Today, this diverse community is made up of people whose journeys have brought them to Portland by ways of stolen land, genocide, forced displacement, or seeking more opportunities.
I acknowledge the unpaid labor and forced servitude of enslaved Africans and their descendants, whose unremitted labor and exploitation were pivotal to the rapid economic growth of this nation and face ongoing oppression, racism, and violence.
Though we as Jews have also suffered from land displacement, genocide, enslavement and cultural displacement, I acknowledge the ways in which I, with the skin I am in, have benefited from colonialism, former and ongoing.
To love Hashem is to recognize His image in a human face, especially one whose creed, colour or culture is different from ours.
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks