reverse threading

the path back is the path forward

Category Archives: home


by 1 Comment

the fat seagull. [k.s. friday]

“you must begin by knowing you have already arrived. your true nature lives as perfect as an unwritten number, everywhere at once across space and time.” (richard bach – jonathan livingston seagull)

i followed the seagulls on my ten-speed. to the beach, always the beach. later, i followed them in my little blue volkswagen, their screeches out my open window, their soaring showing me the way. and i felt kin to richard bach, his writings about freedom and passion and dreaming and the meaning of life. we met at the beach – crab meadow – and talked telepathically. well, i talked. i don’t know if he was listening. he was on the west coast and i was on the east, though i suppose jonathan livingston may have been able to deliver any message of gratitude i had.

and so we arrived at the fat seagull. it is beyond me why we had never discovered this bar and grill tucked into the downtown of manitowoc. it’s a cheers! kind of place, people who know each other gathered at the bar and around tables, eating, drinking pints, playing games, talking. in the way of wisconsin pubs, there is a vast menu and we order a thursday special to split. the bartender tells us that the two wine glasses they had were broken so he gives us diminutive stemware and charges us less. we choose the bottle still corked, wondering who last drank out of the open bottle and how long ago that might have been. we are kind of strangers in a strange land…17 draft beers and traditional old-fashioneds surround us and our tiny wines.

we listen to live music and gaze around – at people, at the bar, the old wood floor, the ceiling. it is a study in perfection. we feel alive – out and about – a two hour drive each way – food we didn’t prepare – wine we didn’t pour. we talk about how it feels. we laugh and dance. we don’t realize it’s raining out; it had been a beautifully sunny day. we are glad to be there.

we end this week in uncertainty. we reach backwards, examining all we have done – so far – in life and work, what we have accomplished, what we have not. sixty-something is not youth, nor is it aged. it is somewhere in-between, located wherever we are. we bring all we know – and all we do not know – with us. we try to trust that we have arrived, that we are on the tarmac – or – in the terminal, that we – too – despite our lack of certainty – have flown, screeching and soaring.

“instead of being enfeebled by age, the elder had been empowered by it; he could outfly any gull in the flock, and he had learned skills that the others were only gradually coming to know.”

*****

TAKE FLIGHT ©️ 1997, 2000 kerri sherwood

download music on my little corner of iTUNES

stream on PANDORA

read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY


by 1 Comment

fluff and pine and raynor winn. [d.r. thursday]

and we will give thanks over costco rotisserie chicken and homemade mashed potatoes.

and we will play favorite cds in the happy-lit sunroom as we set a table, thoughtfully choosing cloth napkins, deciding which place, which memories we want to evoke.

and we will speak of others gathered around tables and tv trays, spilling into family rooms from dining rooms and kitchens filled with light and food and conversation.

and we will call and have chit-chat, maybe even a facetime visit.

and, if the rain holds off, we will take a hike in the woods. it will be slightly warmer and there are few dishes to wash.

and, maybe, we will read poetry or the new raynor winn book, if our copy arrives soon enough.

and it’s possible we will watch a movie or two, with a duraflame log burning but not stressing the fireplace and chimney.

and we will dessert on brownie bites, perhaps a dollop of whipped cream, perhaps a few raspberries. or ice cream from our yonana, still a dollop, still a few berries.

and we will miss those not here…those gathered with others, those too far away, those on other planes. we will speak of them in our gratitudes and hold them all close.

and we will sit – and stand – and maybe even dance – in the day, even in its liminal space.

and we will begin to decorate with fluff and pine to welcome the season, earlier than usual.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY


by 1 Comment

crinkles and shoestrings. [two artists tuesday]

they aren’t even my favorite. shoestrings are my favorite. but it didn’t matter. we pulled into the culvers drive-thru, rolled down the window and ordered “the biggest french fry order you have”. sometimes you feel like a nut. so…crinkles.

in really-more-news-than-you-need-to-know, we ate them all. the entire contents of the family-size-fries-in-the-heavy-plastic-hinged-take-out-container. all of it. well, except for like ten fries. we left those to be all virtuous.

i could instantly feel a zit forming on my chin, somehow lurking there since early teenagehood, waiting for me to indulge in toomanyfries. i vowed not to go out anywhere until it was gone. all-the-way-gone. errgggh. you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t. we neeeeeded those fries. but they were not without peril.

you might think that was a bit of an extravagance for two artists onastricterbudgetagain. but receipt 186 for “kari” reveals it was merely $5.55 and we ultimately figured that “1 fry fam” was a lower level vice than other things might be. we think about these things way more than you might think.

the fries helped, actually. well, like vices, at least for the moment. we devoured them, along with dogdog, who was in littlebabyscion with us.

and then we went to the rv dealer for continued escapism. astounded by the interior of both you-drive-them-rvs and you-pull-them-campers, we moseyed for a few hours, in the gigantic domed building, out onto the multiple parking lots full of options and back inside.

the fact that one of the lowest-priced campers had a kitchen nicer than our own was disconcerting. i mean, it had an island and a dreamy butler pantry with a wine fridge. and an oven. it had an oven.

good thing. something in which to make those ore-ida shoestrings.

i’m guessing we’ll need them. and you can’t find a culvers everywhere.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY


by 1 Comment

we know. [saturday morning smack-dab.]

“and their eyes get all wet.”

yes, they do.

because babycat, well, he rescued me. this black and white hulking tuxedo cat was not merely a cat. he was always an angel in disguise, just like all our pets are intended.

we – truly – miss him every day. and so does dogga. the alpha-in-the-house, babycat’s presence was part of the most basic of maslow’s hierarchy. he was as necessary to a sense of rightness-in-the-world as any of the physiological and safety needs.

i suppose as time continues to go on, the lump in our throats will ease a bit.

but as the hierarchy presses, rears its pointy head and pokes at us in these times, we gather dogdog and that babycat-angel around us and tuck in.

we do know, b-cat.

*****

read DAVID’s thought this SATURDAY MORNING

SMACK-DAB. ©️ 2022 kerrianddavid.com


by 1 Comment

a mixed bag. [d.r. thursday]

$6.99. for ten. that’s not cheap. and i have often wondered why they are not included as a perk for city taxes or the utilities and waste pickup. i always – really always – print out the coupon for $2.00 off and have them in my purse every fall. but even then, $4.99 is still not inexpensive.

the other day we stood in the grocery store in front of the biobag display and had a few terse words. i didn’t have any printed coupons in my purse and he-who-shall-remain-nameless-in-this-story wanted to buy a couple boxes. everything inside me railed against buying them without the coupons. i even said that i would go back – after i downloaded the coupon page and then went to the officemax to print them (since our printer was on the fritz). he said my time was worth more than that. i wondered – again – why, if kenosha is providing a link for the coupons on their city site for anyone and everyone, the stores don’t just discount them at point of purchase. it seems like a ridiculous exercise in wasted paper, a little bit of irony – especially when the reason to purchase them is to be environmentally mindful. seems a little plastic if you ask me. to let you off the waiting-with-bated-breath hook, we bought the biobags – two boxes – and i tried to forget that we paid full price.

while i recognize the absolute need for biobags – and the ability for them to disintegrate – i wonder how all people can afford them. they simply cannot purchase boxes and boxes of biodegradable biobags in lieu of food or in lieu of paying the mortgage or rent or gas for the car to get to their job or the WE energies bill. there has to be a way for everyone to have access without breaking the bank. i can tell you that there were many times we stood in the store and had to think about whether or not to purchase them. and now, we are back there…thinking again about the cost.

the trees around us haven’t lost all their leaves yet. we will finish out the boxes of bags we have and then, i suspect, we will use those big black plastic bags and take them to the compost site out by the airport and dump the contents into huge piles. we can reuse the black bags for the next runs and the next runs. as we fall into winter we will definitely mulch some on the yard as well and rake some into the gardens for critters to take refuge and find warmth.

leaf-raking time is a funny time. it brings back a zillion memories of my poppo out front raking leaves and leaf-raking parties with hot cocoa and cookies (we had a zillion trees at my growing-up house) and, later down the road in a different time, a different state, my kiddos loving jumping in the leaves and despising raking. we love to swoosh our feet through the leaves as we walk and the scent of fallen autumn leaves is divine. we drive around the ‘hood, astounded at the sheer number of bags at the curb and try to remember how many weeks the city will pick them up. we can smell leaves burning as we drive to our favorite trail and we watch as people use those big blower devices to blow leaves into the street, passing on leaf-responsibility and encouraging their leaves to blow into their neighbors’ yards.

leaf mulchers. leaf blowers. leaf burns. leaf piles. leaf bins. leaf parties. leaf them alone.

it’s a mixed bag. yes. pun intended.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY


by 1 Comment

the view from my pillows. [two artists tuesday]

every morning.

every morning this is the view from my pillows.

after coffee, after breakfast, after hugging on dogga snuffling in our faces, after the weather app, after a littabittanews…my sturdy old laptop and our quilt.

i know that not everyone wants to read all these words. i know that many will do much to avoid it. i know that – in the grand scheme of things – my blahblah doesn’t really matter much. sometimes there are responses, comments from people, questions, validations, pushbacks. sometimes people ask if we have a patreon account or a way to donate a cup of coffee. that there is someone out there who takes time to write a few words back at all is pretty gigantic. because in today’s world, there are an inordinate number of things – out there – one could choose to read, to watch, to listen to.

but i guess it all doesn’t matter.

because i have found – now – that i write for me.

writing each morning – this practice – makes me think and ponder and rehash and sort. it is a caffeinated burst in the day, a jump-start to everything that will follow.

sometimes it is a walk into a bank of memories, complete with tears or laughter.

sometimes it is a wondering for the future, attempting to connect the dots of constellations i have yet to see.

sometimes it is a rant about the world, the country, the community, things i perceive as wrongdoings.

sometimes it lifts others up, those who levitate our spirits and souls with generosity.

sometimes it is with amazement for what we see and hear and taste and smell – out there – in nature and on this good earth.

always it is with a sense of impermanence.

these words will stay on the page, so to speak, for as long as wordpress allows them to. they will eventually fade as more words will enter the big melting pot of written thoughts.

our writings will lift off someday into the atmosphere. they will float around, bouncing off stars and planets – like the silver balls in a pinball machine. maybe they will leave a little something behind, a touch of evanescent dust that someone will see and remember.

the other night – around 2:30am – we heard the owl. outside our window, the great horned owl spoke into the night. it didn’t know if anyone was listening. but we did. we listened. we heard it call. and for its unspoken spoken words, we were grateful. we will remember.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY


by 3 Comments

weird moments et al. [saturday morning smack-dab.]

so there WAS this time…i was walking around the house on hold with some representative – i don’t remember that part…whether it was insurance or healthcare or a store… – and i wanted to send a text. so i started looking for my cellphone. i looked high. i looked low. i looked in my purse, by the bed, in the kitchen, on the sink in the bathroom, in my studio. i looked downstairs in the basement by the washer and dryer. i went up to the office. i ran out – still on hold – and looked in littlebabyscion. i was starting to get worried. somehow i had left my cellphone s.o.m.e.w.h.e.r.e. but where?

in the final moments before i panicked, i pulled my hand away from my ear to see how long i had already been on hold. voila! my cellphone. yes, indeedy, i was ON my cellphone all along.

it goes up there in the list of weird moments.

oddly, those seem to happen more and more these days.

i wonder why….

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this SATURDAY MORNING

SMACK-DAB. ©️ 2022 kerrianddavid.com


by 1 Comment

caaa-rits! [d.r. thursday]

stri-ped. two syllables. not one.

i moved to wisconsin and found out that there was a whole ‘nother way of tawwwking here.

acrosst. add the t.

turn-ament. no tour here.

rowwwt. not root (route).

the i. not the interstate.

highway. not freeway. not even expressway. or parkway. just highway.

brahts. not bratwurst.

slowww cooker. not crockpot.

carrots. not caaa-rits.

and the list goes on…

i did not adhere to these right away. some of these are things i still don’t utter, pronunciations that don’t make it into the air.

i really have no idea how this state (or state of mind) has changed my patterns of speech. i know that i can easily – way easily – slip back into my long island roots. and that, if i am talking to the right person, i will instantly have a drawl. my voice and vocal patterns tend to be impressionable.

when heidi and i worked together all the time in performances, i picked up the vernacular of hers that emphasized the THANK of “thank you!”. the “thannng” was forward and “kwew” was in the back. i think of her probably every time i say “thank you” for just that reason. i think of carol when i say “turnament” and 20 when i talk about the slowww cooker.

so it stands to reason that we have fallen in love with jim and sipandfeast. ohmygawwwwwsh!!!! delightful in every way, sipandfeast is a youtube channel (and an IG and a website and whatever else). jim and tara, their son and daughter live on – wait for it – long island. it makes me instantly adore them. he cooks. with the greatest of simplicity and in the gentlest way, he demonstrates amazing italian (and other) recipes, many of which were passed down by his grandmother. his accent, his delivery, the way he just tawks to the audience, the fam are all the sweetest and we find ourselves searching for the right dutch oven to start making these meals. but have i mentioned the way he tawwwwks? caaa-rits!!! i feel like just because i am FROM there we should hang out. (preferably at their dinner table post-cooking show.)

i really have no idea what this image is. i somehow shot this photograph without knowing. it could be my neighbor’s fence…we were taking a walk and i was putting my phone in my back pocket when i guess it snapped a pic. it looks a little like a flag, but it’s not. trust me on that. i’m not a big flag person these days.

i have to say, though, that as i looked at it, studying and wondering, i could hear someone in my head say, “it’s stri-ped!”.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY


by 1 Comment

an old quilt. [not-so-flawed wednesday]

in some ways, it felt like coming home. this trail – its bends and hills and forks – was a mainstay for us for a long time. it was the old quilt before we added another to our collection. we used to wrap this trail around us often in the week, most especially on sunday afternoons, replacing the sunday-drives of my growing-up.

the nature megaphone always called to us. we’d crawl in and sit with our backs against the curved wall, our boots propped up on the other side. we’d take out whatever snack we brought along and munch and talk. and, if we were lucky, the sun was coming in on the greater-than side and it would bathe our faces and we’d close our eyes and just listen to the forest.

but we hadn’t been there in a few years. the county, in a money-over-preserve-conscious moment, approved the building of an aerial adventure course – with high ropes and ziplines and such. and then the woods were screaming-noisy, the parking lot fuller than we had ever seen it. we wondered why all those people in all those cars didn’t see the value of the woods before the treetop park.

one day last week we went back. there were few cars in the lot so we pulled on our boots and set out.

it was instantly like coming home. leaves gently raining down on us, we could feel the trail saying, “hey. where’ve ya been?” and we decided right away to do all the loops, see it all, visit the megaphone.

sitting inside, our backs to the curved wall and our dusty boots propped up on the other side we wished we had brought a snack. the sun was streaming in, warming our faces. we closed our eyes and listened.

all the old quilts in your life count. even the ones you don’t wrap in very often.

“to outer senses there is peace,

a dreamy peace on either hand,

deep silence in the shadowy land,

deep silence where the shadows cease.”

(oscar wilde – impressions II)

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this NOT-SO-FLAWED WEDNESDAY


by 1 Comment

drive it or pull it? [saturday morning smack-dab]

we can’t decide between the kind you drive and the kind you pull.

i mean, if you drive it, then you have to drive it everywhere, unless we tow littlebabyscion behind it, in which case it would be a really-really-big rv and neither of us can picture driving that kind of lumbering size down the highway. but if it’s the kind you pull, you have a vehicle. but then you have to pull it. and back it up. and fit it into parking lots. and juggle it around to get it into camping spots. that brings me back to the kind you drive. the small kind you drive.

the imperative?

a bathroom. and, preferably, a shower.

with a tiny kitchen, a bathroom, a shower and wifi we can go anywhere; we can rule the world. every other day i talk about this. because who doesn’t think about this, i wonder…

the wander women have figured it out. of course, they planned with great intention and are retired, so access to wifi on all workdays is not a sink-or-swim. for us, right now, we need to just-keep-swimming and wifi is the life preserver as we continue to work on our own plan.

i keep transferring visiting the rv place from one weekend to the next. probably because my rent-it-now signature pen is itching, the brochures are stacking up. ahhh. plan….

but really. it’s just delicious to think about all those backroads, all those mountains and canyonlands and seashore beaches at our disposal, dogdog hanging out with us, a tiny fridge filled with good food to make on our tiny stove, grilled on our tiny grill. music and art and wordswordswords created on an adventure Out There on-the-road-again.

i’m totally game.

d and me and dogga and willie nelson.

*****

read DAVID’s SATURDAY MORNING SMACK-DAB thoughts

SMACK-DAB. ©️ 2022 kerrianddavid.com