Swirly Girl

Joy

"We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think.  When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves."  ~Buddha

Reaching

"One must exhaust reality, transcend it, in order to reach, to try to reach, that absolute which is made of the atoms of the relative."  ~Carlos Fuentes

Leaving

[Plumeria in Kauai, Hawaii :: Taken in 2005]

I am headed off to watch two beautiful, creative souls join their lives together on a beach across the Pacific.  The last time I was in Kauai I went swimming with a group of giant turtles in crystal clear water.  I hope they're in the mood for some company again this week.

Five Things

1.  Isn't this the greatest interpretation of Klimt's The Kiss?  Kate Gabrielle's work is clever and quirky.

2.  There's a new blog in town!  If you were at the June Squam Art Workshops you saw her skipping around with a video camera - visit Marlene White's new blog!

3.  ...and if you're going to the September Squam Art Workshops, you just might run into this lovely soul over at blissful * thinking.

4.  Sophie Jacobson Photography, recently spotted at The Rose Cafe in Venice.

5.  Perfect Day Surf Camp looks like a blast.

Digging

[Taken in New Zealand :: March 2009]

Yesterday evening I experienced one of those flashes of inspiration that reminded me the creative process is something I will never fully control or understand (thank goodness).  It is true that sitting down to do the work - whether I am in a creative mood or not - is the method I use most to lure my muses into my studio, but every so often I have moments where a sudden burst of energy, words and ideas flashes into my mind and I have to go immediately to work.  I have to stop doing the dishes and run to m keyboard; I have to get up out of bed, find the nearest scrap of paper, and write down my thoughts.  If my "normal" studio days nourish me like milk and oatmeal - giving me what I need to keep going at a steady, sustained pace - the unexpected bursts of inspiration feed me like spinach in a Popeye cartoon.  If I can give in to these moments, and let the ideas pour out of me - even if all I can manage are messy scribbles - I continue to float on that high for days. 

I had one of those moments last night, when I was hungry and worn out, having just spent two hours in our yard digging up thick, hard soil, planting a dozen plants, laying down bark and hauling all the empty compost bags and plastic pots to the recycling bin.  My day should have been done, and I should have been on my way to a shower.  But instead, I came inside and immediately went to my keyboard.  I simply had to get certain thoughts out of my head for fear that if I didn't release them they would be lost forever, and all the insights that had just come to me as I held fat, squirmy worms - taking me back to childhood when my favorite morning activity was to dig deep in the ground to hold these curious creatures - would fade like mist as the sun makes its way through the clouds.  So there I was.  Dirty.  Sore.  Writing.

I began my morning with a declaration that I was ready for a day of writing.  Ready to dive in!  Dig deep!  Push my limits!  Fast forward to 1:30pm, when I typed my first word of the day, and I only managed to edit a small portion of the piece I'm currently working on.  By 3:30pm, I was out the door, headed to the nursery to fill my car with treasures for our garden.  I felt rather deflated, like I had let myself down by allowing myself to get distracted by all kinds of other work instead of taking advantage of an empty day on my calendar to write.  I said I would write all day, didn't get started until after lunch, couldn't get in the flow, and gave up.  I headed to the nursery thinking my Day of Writing had been a total bust.

Not only did my writing day become productive around 6:30pm, but when I initially started writing I started here, on Typepad, thinking it would be a great blog entry.  So I got it all out, saved it to post today, and headed upstairs to take a shower.  In the shower, my mind kept churning, and as soon as I was done, I wrapped a towel around me and went back to my keyboard without drying off, having to get out even more, and before too long I realized these thoughts were too much for a blog entry.  The piece kept growing, expanding and evolving, and it then went from being a potential blog entry to being a more substantial essay, and I am now thinking it could be one of the chapters I submit with my book proposal.  After brainstorming chapter ideas for three months and starting dozens of drafts, here I am, on the cusp of my self-imposed deadline with an idea that had not yet occurred to me, that could not have occurred to me until yesterday.  These thoughts came to me at a particular time and place, and I was able to make important connections between certain experiences only then, and not a moment sooner.  Perfect timing.  On a day when I thought I had let my writer muse down.

It just so happened that yesterday my lovely and wise friend Elizabeth reminded me that my writing is happening all the time, even when I'm not writing.  Mere hours after she said this to me, this truth played itself out as I worked on our garden and felt a jolt of inspiration from the heavens.  My creative energy isn't turned on and off like a light switch - it is always burning, always giving off light.  When a surge flows through it, creating sparks and pops, my job is to honor it, and let the light flow through me, where it can feed all the other currents moving across the world, perhaps creating new sparks in India, in New Zealand, in a house down the street.

More Squam Art Workshops Goodness

[Book In A Day will be taught at Squam Art Workshops this September!]

I am thrilled - thrilled, I tell you - to announce that I will be teaching at Squam Art Workshops this September with the lovely and talented Marisa Haedike.  Marisa and I have built a powerful friendship ever since we first met more than three years ago, and after saying things to each other like, "We should really think about teaching a class together," - hello! - the opportunity fell squarely in our laps.  Although I know better than to think this is simply some kind of fluke - that this is the inevitable result of a shared commitment to our creative ideals - I am still in a state of giddy disbelief.

I have thought about teaching for a long time now, and over the past 18 months have taught workshops, led book discussions and spoken at events, each time asking myself if this might be something I want to pursue on a larger scale.  What I find so interesting is that any events I've had this year have been opportunities that came to me unsolicited.  Like a trail of bread crumps in a quiet forest, I have been following this trail with complete trust, knowing that I am being led to my most meaningful work.

The opportunity to teach at what I consider one of the most beautiful, powerful gatherings on the planet feels more like a giant leap than one small step, and I can't wait to meet all of you - whoever you are - who decide to join Marisa and I in our class this September.  All the details are right here and here.

Five Things

1.  To see more of these beautiful, sparkly photographs, visit y.Beth Retro Photography

2.  The Urban Craft Center looks like my kind of playground...right here in Santa Monica.

3.  Lovers, Dreamers and Me is a divine, inspiring haven of all things beautiful and creative.

4.  Hands at Work:  Portraits & Profiles of People Who Work With Their Hands. 

5.  Shop & make a difference over at Global Mamas.

100 Books Project :: Virginia Tech

[Book #19 left at Squires Student Center, Virginia Tech, June 1, 2009]

I couldn't resist leaving a couple of books on the campus of my alma mater, Virginia Tech, when I was there earlier this month.  I was there speaking at an alumni event and conducting an Ordinary Sparkling Moments book discussion, so was a perfect fit for many reasons.

[Book #20 left at at a bus stop at Virginia Tech, June 1, 2009.  Doesn't Melissa have a cute bum?]

I know I've jumped ahead in the book numbers here, but there are still quite a few books that are in the hands of my lovely Book Fairies, so they'll all get accounted for soon!  I've also updated my 100 Books Project Flickr Page so you can see the progress all in one place.

Where will the next books be left?  Stay tuned...

Grace

[Meet Grace:  She's super cool.]

This is kind of how I'm feeling - reigning in a little bit (OK, a lot) of excitement, looking ahead to all that is possible.  Strangely, there are also inklings of shyness and smallness swimming around in my heart right now.  Perhaps that is because I just finished writing an essay about an experience I had when I was around Grace's age, a story that inspired me to pull out old photos of the year that story played itself out.  The photos show me in red sneakers, the same haircut as Grace, a missing tooth, and a slightly shy smile.  Lately it has been hard not to look at these photos of myself as a little girl without getting weepy, wishing so desperately I could go back to her, hug her and tell her how brave and strong and wonderful she is.  At that age, when the first day of school was still a monumental event, I had already begun developing a certain stoicism, a certain guardedness.  I was not an unhappy or brooding child, but I was cautious when it came to my emotions.  I learned early on how to keep them in check, and how to unleash my energy through my imagination.

Now here I am, all these years later, and all these years ahead of Grace, yet still feeling the same kind of excited, sparkly energy that shines through this photo of her.  And I can't help but stop and think about all the ways I have managed to bring astounding love and beauty in my life despite having had to learn how to protect my tiny beating heart at such a young age.  Grace and I have a peculiar, sad story in common, and I can't help but want the same twinkling twists of fate to carry her to the kind of joy I now know in my own life (due in no small part to my friendship with her mom).  I can't help but look at the way she smiles in all the photos I've taken of her and have tremendous hope that she, too, will learn that the choices of certain people in her life are no reflection on her and take nothing away from the fact that she is an extraordinary little girl.  She smiles bigger than I did, laughs more for the camera than I did, and in this I see so much hope, so much promise that certain cards she was dealt will not prevent her from recognizing all that is good and beautiful inside of her.

I have exciting news that has to be kept quiet for a little bit longer, but I am savoring the goodness of today, the strange way things come to life, and all the ways the universe lets me know that my life is unfolding with perfect grace, balance and beauty.

Staying True to the Essence

[Taken in New Zealand earlier this year.]

"...as time goes on we not only remember specific things in relation to the people we have loved; their lives get built into our lives and finally the transference is complete.  We are what we are because of them.  When I am getting very dogmatic, I sometimes hear Jean-Do's amused voice saying very gently, 'Pourquoi avoir raison?'  'Why have to be right?'  I am more aware now than I was during his life of how much Quig's friendship, his very existence even apart from our own relationship, did to help me forge out the position of these last years about my work.  It is good for a professional to be reminded that her professionalism is only a husk, that the real person must remain an amateur, a lover of the work.  Whatever we do well is done spontaneously for its own sake, in just the way Quig suddenly decided that he had to get up to the schoolhouse room and paint, or, equally spontaneously, had to make muffins!  I am, I think, more of a poet than I was before I knew him, if to be a poet means allowing life to flow through one another rather than forcing it to a mold the will has shaped; if it means learning to let the day shape the work, not the work, the day, and so live toward essence as naturally as a bird or a flower."

~May Sarton, Plant Dreaming Deep