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the infinite infinite. [kerri’s blog on k.s. friday]

somewhere – in the infinite infinite – i suppose that my sweet momma and poppo might be with my big brother, nibbling on crumbcake and coffee ice cream. maybe they are having a chat about christmas eve norwegian fish pudding and rum cake. or maybe about burning your fingertips making krumkake. maybe they are reminiscing about singing carols in the living room – gathered around the organ or the piano, my brother with his guitar, my uncle with his beautiful tenor.

i suppose that the party might be bigger…with their baby daughter i never met, with my grandparents, with their siblings, with friends they treasured. they may pop open the martini & rossi asti or blend some eggnog, assuming there is electricity. maybe they are swinging on stars and peering through the clouds at us here; maybe they are missing us.

in the way that things are in this place right now, i am glad that my sweetest mom and dad are not physical witnesses to what is happening, for their hearts would be broken by the ugliness of these times. i am grateful – in an odd way – that they do not have to experience what will be in the next for this country, for our world. even with everything they saw and endured in their lives – which is plenty considering they were born in 1921 and 1920 – i know that what’s happening and what’s coming would challenge and disappoint their beliefs and values to the core.

and so, in the meanwhile – between now and the infinite infinite – i will miss them. the axis has never returned to balance since they’ve been gone and this time of year brings that home even more.

i do believe, though, that if my momma – ever the letterwriter – could write in the sky – out there by the moon – she would. she’d likely draw words with the help of clouds and contrails. and she’d spell out something like, “daddy says ‘hello brat!‘” and “don’t forget to live life, my sweet potato!”.

when i look up – or inside – i can hear them both.

merry christmas mom and dad.

*****

bonus track (god be with you till we meet again) © 1996 kerri sherwood

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indulging out, indulging in. [kerri’s blog on two artists tuesday]

we were talking about what it used to be like – out holiday shopping.

we both individually remember the out-and-about of windowshopping and browsing and pondering and findingjusttherightthing as including the time and space for stopping, for a nice cup of coffee and a treat, maybe for lunch out.

it was sheer indulgence the other day when we used a long-saved gift card for dinner out after a fun day of shopping. and yesterday, we did a thing.

we actually – mid-day-mid-shopping – stopped at a bakery to pick out a danish (yes, sacrificing the usual gluten-free-ness) and then we went next door to starbucks to get a christmas blend coffee. we shared both – jubilant at the “old-timey” tradition we were re-enacting, pretty happy with ourselves that we chose to take the time and splurge on coffee and a treat.

it’s beginning to look a lot like christmas!

i spent a-couple-years-less-than-a-decade celebrating christmas in florida. though everyone still decorates and the holiday rush is still pushing you forward, it never quite felt the same as christmas up north. i suppose if i had grown up in the south it – the traditions and rituals and things i associate with christmas – would be different, but having grown up in the northeast, i associate the holidays with being bundled up, the cold, the snow, pink cheeks and noses, mittens and scarves. there is a different sparkle to twinkle lights in snow.

we here in our neck of wisconsin may not have a white christmas this year. but it will be brisk enough for the deck to make cracking noises as we walk to our backdoor, for the radiators to clunk a little, for the wood floors to creak under our feet. ice will paint beautiful images on a couple of the north-facing windows, the stars in the bitter sky will seem brighter and dogga will be in his glory laying outside in the cold. it’ll be cozy inside, surrounded by the glimmering trappings of the holiday.

maybe – as we continue our march toward Christmas Day – in-between bits of shopping and wrapping and shipping and clearing out and giving away – we will take a few minutes here and there to celebrate the right-now of it all. maybe we’ll consider another coffee out, another pastry. maybe we’ll bundle up and go see some special lights. maybe – just maybe – i’ll play some carols in my studio. this is the time of year i especially miss creating a space – with and through music – in which other hearts might open to the spirit of the holidays, to sink into that which they feel but cannot see.

as adults – whose bars for enchantment are higher than in childhood or for whom perhaps reality has life-light-dimmed – we all sometimes struggle as these times roll around. we know it’s up to each of us to create any magic in these holidays, to recognize it, to linger in it. the tiniest bit of indulgence goes a long way. indulging out and indulging in.

*****

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a season of light. [kerri’s blog on k.s. friday]

it did my heart good to wander slowly through milaegers garden center. like the line “it’s much more than a box” from the department store gift-wrapping scene in love actually, milaegers is much more than a garden center. and day before yesterday it was a holiday wonderland.

it was just what i needed. we strolled slowly, each of us raying out to what invited our eye. everything was decorated and the displays were glowing. we were searching for just the right thing and lingered around each tree – perfectly laden with ornaments and gleaming tchotchkes.

we finished our holiday shopping for the day and happily used a gift card we had held onto for well over a year – a local bistro where we loved sitting at the bar sipping a glass of wine and sharing a most-delicious burger. it was truly a day that put spirit into our spirits.

last night we sat in our living room under a furry white throw and looked around at our decorations, satisfied that we not only paid homage to a festive season but were true to our own sensibilities, a mashup of organic and glimmer. there is a shimmery incandescence in there we can both feel – particularly full of grace at a time of seasonal and out-in-the-world darkness.

the tiny trees we’ve collected are scattered about, both happy-lit and simply green. even the very plainest of these have their place.

the big branch in our living room – from the old tree out front – has now stood there for four holiday seasons. though it is wrapped in year-round white lights, each christmastime we have added something. two years ago it was silver bulbs. last year it was vintage shiny brites of my mom and dad’s. this year we added crystal prism ornaments. there is a lone metal star. it is – to us – really beautiful.

eileen’s tree – “e.e.” as it will always be known – has the place of honor, standing sweetly in the doorway from the living room to the dining room. a nod to the traditional, it has become, now, one of our own traditions. it all feels peaceful, which is our intention.

in the day the crystals on the branches in the living room throw beams of sunlight across the floor. with the room lights off, the happy lights of the trees on, the crystals on the branches in the living room glitter, anticipating the season of the return of light.

it is not milaegers but it is home and, in a world of frenetic and fraught, this luminous place is truly our sanctuary.

*****

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a chandelier life. [kerri’s blog on d.r. thursday]

it is likely that we are captured by the minuscule much more than most. it truly doesn’t take much for us to be in wonder – or, at the very least, to spend a moment or two noticing something that maybe others might not notice.

our entertainment budget is pretty much non-existent. we love to cook together, hike together, write together, read together, on occasion argue together. occasionally, we will have the good fortune of going out for a meal or to a movie or maybe a concert. but most of the time we entertain ourselves in ways that don’t cost a lot and that’s all good.

a few years ago we decided that barney – the smith-barnes piano aging in our backyard – needed a chandelier over its brow. you might remember we found one online that works as a solar light and so we ordered it. it wasn’t expensive – i mean, for a chandelier! – and we were surprised when we got it in a small amazon bag. taking it out revealed a collapsed plastic “chandelier” that had to be shaped and would then hang in all its glory. it was not quite all-that nor what we had expected. we knew immediately it would not serve barney well and, in the process of deciding whether or not to return it, hung it on our awning outside for a bit.

that night the little chandelier glowed – like any good solar-powered ithinkican chandelier – and we fell into like. and we decided to keep it.

we recently hung it in our sunroom right in front of the east window where the sun streams in each morning. littlechandelier apparently loves this spot because each night – if it has been a sunny day – when all the lights are out in the sunroom, it has a tiny glow.

its shadow is intriguing. both of us have stood staring at the shadow, completely enjoying littlechandelier’s effort to do its little chandelier job.

even in the middle of challenge – whatever that challenge may be – i must say that i truly appreciate appreciating the littlest things. i appreciate that WE appreciate the littlest things.

we are not living a posh polished-glass-ornate-crystal-chandelier kind of life. but we are living a chandelier life nonetheless. it’s all around us.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

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dried flowers. [kerri‘s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

“may this house shelter your life. when you come in home here, may all the weight of the world fall from your shoulders. may your heart be tranquil here, blessed by peace the world cannot give.” (john o’donohue – for a new home – benedictus, a book of blessings)

back in the day – referencing the 80s and 90s or so – i used to have lots of dried flowers – everywhere. dried flowers and herbs and red peppers were definitely a thing then, part of the homey, country look – hung on any hook, any trellis, any door jamb you could access. it all felt comforting, smidges of beautiful, tiny respites from busy-ness.

there’s a moment in the movie my big fat greek wedding when ian miller tells toula portokalos that he remembers seeing her a previous time. she, who has had a bit of a self-makeover, says, i was going through a phase then. i was frump girl. in one of the best he’s-a-sweet-guy moments, ian responds kindly, i don’t remember frump girl, but i remember you. and you cannot help your heart from going pitter-patter and you just know what might happen….

well, i have gotten over the dried-flower-phase. though i loved it then – and completely embraced it – there are no dried flowers hanging around now. though, truth be told, i do have a few dried daisies from our wedding tied with jute and a little garden lavender posey gathered with string. oh…and the first rose d gave me. and i think there is some hydrangea drying (long-term) in the basement and maybe a few wildfield thistles in the sitting room sharing a vessel with a bit of pussywillow. oopsies. i might have been a bit off on the word “no” in “no dried flowers“…

perhaps I should yield on using absolutes.

moving on.

i am most definitely a fierce appreciator of dried flowers and wild weeds in the fields and meadows of our hikes and adore the textures and morphing shapes of them through the seasons. it is likely that we have already shared a thistle or two as our blog images, but – – – this one, this one counts too, i argue for its inclusion.

because of my propensity for hangingontothings – emotionally and in real life – it is quite amazing that all those -older- dried flowers made their way out of the house from the latest 80s and through the 90s. when you have lived in a house this long – 35 years – you know it will iterate through time. and you cannot hang on to all the vestiges of the last phase, no matter how splendid they are.

so now, here i am, not even sure what this post is about. this stunning in-fallow-stoking-up-energy thistle made me think of the dried-flower-phase, of things that – at some given time – made our home feel like our sanctuary. i suppose i might let you just try to connect the dots.

or you can just nod your head, roll your eyes and quietly support my stream of consciousness today.

*****

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one caesura after another. [kerri’s blog on k.s. friday]

the big chalkboard wall was in the basement for decades. and for decades it was signed and scribbled on by my children and their friends-through-the-years. there have been moments – in more recent years – the empty nest years – when i would hit the cement floor at the bottom of the steps, flip on the spotlights and stare at the colored-chalk names scrawled on the wall. lots of history there.

before i took the eraser to this wall, before i washed it off, before i realized the colored chalk didn’t really erase or wash off nomatterwhat, before i prepped it for paint, i took many photographs. once again, my thready heart is challenged – but photographs help.

my girl chalked this design in one of the corners – during the skateboard/dickies/vans era. the memory flood is fast and furious and i stood – touching the chalkboard and its names and illustrations – for some time before wiping it and readying it for a fresh coat. in the end, we put together new shelving for that spot adjacent to david’s studio and now it houses inspiring books of artists and musings…easy access for him, for both of us.

as i’ve written, there are many more of these woven threads in our home to unravel, to gently place aside, to memorize. but – inasmuch as it is a challenge, it is also a gift. because so many things are things we no longer notice, things to which we pay little attention. and right now…right now, we are paying rapt attention to each detail.

we are each telling stories of thethingsinthebox or ontheshelf or tuckedaway or rightthereinfrontofus. some of it makes me a little bit sad – no, i guess it’s more wistful than sad. some of it makes me try to think backbackback to the days backbackback. some of it makes me wish i could revisit those days, live them again, relish them in real time, or maybe live them a little slower or a little differently. and some of it just gives me a little standstill, like a tiny caesura – all part of the diapause, i suppose – one caesura after another.

we keep going. my curiosity is piqued as we open closets and bins, page through children’s books finding scraps of crayoned notes or pictures. i store it all inside, knowing that – even though i will likely forget some of it – it is all there – layers of memories and moments.

and the chalked diamonds will forever remain on the wall of the basement. because they were there, they are there. and they are part of it.

*****

IT’S A LONG STORY © 1997, 2000 kerri sherwood

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sunny starry snowflake seeds. [kerri’s blog on d.r. thursday]

“…you can trust the promise of this opening. … for your soul senses the world that awaits you.” (john o’donohue – for a new beginning – from benedictus, a book of blessings)

i was keeping it, even though it was broken. my sweet momma used to use it as a fruit bowl – on our kitchen table or counter when i was growing up. i feel like i remember bananas in this starry snowflake basket bowl – which hasn’t had its curved glass handle for many, many years now.

as we moved about our home, choosing to be more minimalist in approach, i came upon this glass basket bowl. the broken edges were rough and, though it was sitting out, it was not something i would wish someone to touch for fear of the possibility of getting hurt. i considered this bowl for some time, placing it on the dining room table, gently dusting it out, cleaning its starry edges. and then i realized that it was time for this basket bowl to be disposed of. i took plenty of photographs before gently letting it go, for my threadiness needs – sometimes – to be handled with care.

and then we moved on to the next. and each thing that we moved about or stored or repurposed or disposed of made room – room for our old house to breathe in a bit more light, for us to discover something new that might transform the space.

we can both feel it. the sun’s rays are now reaching further into the living room – way under the old two-person glider that came in from the deck. we’ve sat there many times now already – visiting with our boys on thanksgiving, sipping coffee and watching out the front window, sipping wine and watching the crystals on the big tree branch dance in happy lights. there is change. there is opening.

i have a list – the spots in our home that need our attention, stuff-wise. it is not a short list. we have plenty to do.

but the rewards are great and give us incentive to keep going. we are in no rush. we’ll just take on a little at a time.

and one of these days it will be my studio. i’ll finish what i started there quite a while ago. stopping wasn’t because i didn’t want to complete the going-through-cleaning-out-reorganizing. at the time, stopping was because it was just too much right then. but now…now, some time has passed and maybe i am soon ready to file, to store, to pass on, and – in likely cathartic moments – to throw out that which is no longer relevant, that which served me well until it didn’t, that which is broken in little or big ways.

and, in the process of all this, hopefully i will see the promise of the opening – the sunny starry snowflake seeds – just as we have seen it in the other beloved parts of our home.

all the world awaits each of us each day. we just need to clear the stuff – real or imagined – out of the way to see it.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

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not going back. [kerri’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab.]

it all started with a print hanging in our bedroom. it needed to move somewhere else and it needed to be replaced with something different or nothing, blank wall space.

and so I took the print off the wall and brought in the vintage piece i thought might work. we held it up and hung it up. a little bit of change.

i went into my studio and pulled out an old full-of-personality metal tripod work light we had found at an antiques flea market this summer. it was five dollars and it actually worked. i brought it into the living room, wanting to find a spot for it.

i think it was the five-dollar-metal-dome that started the avalanche. still in our buffalo plaids, we set to work.

now, usually when people decorate they go to furniture stores and home good type places looking for pieces, new items to incorporate into their decor. but that’s not budgeted at this time, so we tried using different eyes as we looked at what was in place, what was in the basement stored, how we could change things up, refresh our home.

in the end, we spent the entire day rearranging. many spaces were treated to a littlebittachange – the living room, the dining room, the sunroom, the foyer. we imagined all kinds of things – maybe in the future some of those will happen.

and we laughed to find ourselves at 7pm – still in red buffalo plaid – ready for some leftover homemade soup.

the best part of the day, though, was a realization. at 7, sipping a friday night glass of wine with our tomato soup, we realized that neither of us had thought about or talked about the current political turmoil. it was a relief to be lost in something positive, something productive, something personally gratifying.

i know that as i go into the rooms of our home today it will strike me somewhat differently today than during yesterday’s flurry. i – sometimes – don’t do change well and my threadiness includes my surroundings.

but this time may be different. this time i think i will walk around our home and imagine all the potential of our future here. this time i will again feel the comfort of this old house, no matter what the decor. this time i will be decidedly more open-minded about not changing it all back.

because going forward – in all its shapes and forms – and not going back – holding to hope and possibility needs to override the exorbitant negativity – the absolute control-mongering insanity – so prevalent in our country right now.

we sat in the old wooden glider – moved – surprisingly – from the deck into the living room – and talked about the new perspective it gave us on the room.

“furry pillows will offset the rough-hewn-ness,” i coaxed him. we glanced around the room – at the peeling-paint-chunk-of-concrete in the role of coffee-wine-perch next to the leather recliner, at the portion of desk – with the sawed-off-side next to the radiator – in the role of end-table, at the huge tree branch from the beloved tree out front happy-lit in the middle of the front window and we laughed.

getting lost in our own home – our sanctuary – was just the thing we needed.

and to remember that little bit about control: “let there be an opening into the quiet that lies beneath the chaos, where you find the peace you did not think possible and see what shimmers within the storm.” (john o’donohue)

*****

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the unthinkable black and white. [kerri’s blog on two artists tuesday]

if we had looked only at the sky, it would have reinforced the black-and-white-photograph world we felt we were in. the sky was so november. but the photo was in color and, despite feeling differently to our core, the world was in technicolor.

the trail was mostly empty, which was a good thing. we needed to be there – our lack of hiking through interminable covid was taking a toll. exhausted from covid, exhausted from doing nothing, exhausted after doing anything.

and so the sky heightened our feeling – of walking in the black and white of this past week.

by now you know i am horrified by the election, by its results, by the actual people voting for these results. it cannot be clearer to me that there is a dividing line between me and those people who voted against my own family. it is black and white…that clear.

i’d like to go all maya/mlk jr./gandhi, heck, i’d like to go all jesus christ (“love one another; as i have loved you.” john 13:34). i suspect they would be just as horrified. quoting any of them as any kind of justification in or support of this horror story is hypocrisy.

because you have knowingly undermined the safety, security, the rights of my family, of people dear to me – and that’s pretty black and white to me. and i realize i can maybe love you, but not respect you, not want to be around you, not trust you or feel safe with you. your heart is different than i thought i knew. and i can’t pretend i don’t know or that it doesn’t matter. this – this – is becoming black and white to me.

love is a two-way street. turning your back on humanity is not love. the cruelty and immense intentional hardship you intentionally voted in for other people – yes PEOPLE – no better or lesser than you – is not love. hate, misogyny, racism, xenophobia, homophobia, transphobia are not love. fascism is not based on love – you have fallen prey to cultish, narrow, extreme, bullying, propaganda-laden thinking that is not – despite the whipped-up and warped misinformed disdain you express at the price of eggs, individual gender identification, compassionate social programs – definitely not – based on love.

i’m pretty sure that many are struggling with this right now. we are all out here, internally trying to figure out the unthinkable – how our families or friends have betrayed basic rights – values – upon which we thought we agreed. it’s unimaginably brutal and painful and hard to wrap our heads around. it is so very, very sad. but it is pretty black and white.

it’s november. i drag my eyes from the november sky – where i was beseeching the universe for answers. and i look beside the trail, where leaves are still turning and the deer wait as we approach.

*****

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yeah. now what? [kerri’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab.]

the monday-morning-armchair-quarterbacking is over the top. there is no one excuse for these election results. to be real, there cannot be enough reasons for the despicable – what the majority of voters voted for.

in the aftermath – afforded from even little to no doom-scrolling that highlights the absolute tsunami of finger-pointing, blaming, history-touting, policy-pummeling, we now see that the maga-voters voting for all the maga-sh*t did not quite understand what the maga-candidate’s maga-agenda really meant.

many of them had tuned into fox news where they learned – and clearly believed – things like people were eating other people’s dogs and cats and you could send your child to school and they would arrive home the opposite sex.

despite all the information to the contrary, they didn’t understand tariffs nor did they understand what “authoritarian” meant. they didn’t realize mass deportation meant their relatives.

and, worst of all, they poo-pooed any talk of the abject cruelties of project 2025, jumping on the he-doesn’t-really-mean-that-he-wouldn’t-really-do-that bandwagon.

weren’t they surprised when – post-election – all the maga-cronies paused very few milliseconds and posted what would amount to a naa-naa-nah-naa-naa, stating that it was the actual agenda all along.

adding fuel to the what-the-hell fire, “…catherine rampell and youyou zhou (washington post) showed before the election that voters overwhelmingly preferred harris’s policies to trump’s if they didn’t know which candidate proposed them.” (heather cox richardson – american historian, professor of history – boston college, previously MIT, university of massachusetts amherst )

if you don’t fact-check, if you don’t ask questions, if you don’t care about any potential work in the aisle or if the country’s democracy could be decimated, if you don’t worry your little head about character or details of a candidate’s experience or qualifications or with whom they choose to surround themselves, you have chosen to be a voter voting on whatever your rage is, you have voted to follow the lemmings off the cliff.

amanda marcotte (senior politics writer – salon) opined, “a lot of voters are profoundly ignorant. more so than in the past.” ya think??

so, yeah. now what?

i’m going to clean out my closet, take a hike, hydrate and try to breathe.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this SATURDAY MORNING