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Category Archives: not-so-flawed wednesday


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do winter. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

dogga stands on the frozen pond out back. it is covered with snow and this is the first time – the first winter – he has not still avoided it. he’s not a water-dog so – as an aussie that circumvents it when it is an actual pond, it is surprising that he is choosing to traverse it, dig in its snow, stand on it.

winter is his favorite. it is his beach-weather. it’s his bliss.

now, i’ve heard many people lately complaining about this winter. “sick of” cold, snow, grey skies, biting winds, they crankily bemoan winter – like it’s a monster dedicated to making them miserable.

i don’t feel that way.

it’s winter, i think to myself, and winter is supposed to be like, well, winter.

the last few wisconsin winters have been easy on us, moderate temperatures, little snow, no real winterish hardships or challenges. maybe that’s made some of us less tolerant of what winter really is. but this winter feels about right, as far as i’m concerned. i think you are supposed to want to linger inside, nest, cocoon a bit. i think you are supposed to rest and maybe clean out a bit, readying yourself for spring and new growth. i think you’re supposed to take stock of it all and appreciate the change in seasons as the spinning earth revolves around the sun. i mean, maybe that’s just me.

i find great beauty in the almost-monochromatic that is winter. i find a storehouse of rejuvenation in its fallow. i find anticipation in the slowly-lengthening days, the slight uptick of temperatures. i find a little bit of hope – even in the midst of the darkness that is this country right now.

when spring comes – after the temperatures level out a little bit – we will cut these grasses down so that new growth will have room to burst through the soil. in the meanwhile the tracks around the grasses show that there are tiny creatures taking shelter in them, warmed by the fronds into which they are nestled. the snow is gorgeous – so bright out back i cannot comfortably look out the window.

it’s february. i don’t know how long winter will last. i suppose it could stretch well into april, maybe a bit into may. whatever. i am just here – me, d, dogga, our new gutters and warming cables – riding the coaster. studying the milder weather where family and friends live, i wouldn’t mind a few days in the 60s, but i kind of need the seasons to be what they are.

we watched the birds in the birdbath yesterday. there were at least seven birds splashing and drinking out there. i guess the sun was strong enough to melt the snow that had accumulated. they seem elated. they’d fly away and then return, waiting their turn on the edge of the bath together. they know where the birdfeeder is and they frequent it. their chirping and birdsong in the morning reassures me that – yes – it’s just winter and this is what winter is like.

i don’t want to race through. i don’t want to wish for months from now. I don’t want time to go by without my acknowledgement of some sort, my appreciation.

i just want to do winter – because it IS winter.

i’ll get to spring when it’s spring.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this not-so-flawed wednesday

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the river. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

and the river runs…

i’d say that each time we see it, it looks different.

the des plaines is not a raging river. it is not a major water thoroughfare. it bubbles out of the ground a little north and west of here and flows south, through the rest of southeastern wisconsin and into illinois where it eventually – through joining with the kankakee and the illinois – becomes a tributary for the mississippi. its origin is from glaciers long ago, a heritage it carries in its current, in each bend.

it is a treasure, this relatively unknown river. we have hiked many of its miles, getting to know it in all its different seasons, its river-ness unflailing even in drought.

a place of solace, the trails that have developed around this river must be wrapped in the magic of the flow – for it is there we go (as we have written time and again) to sort, to ponder, to laugh with abandon and to cry.

and even in the moments when it is frozen, when all appears still and fallow is on the calendar, it is still moving. it is a living and breathing river – a body of water that continues.

i suppose that could make me feel the slightest bit less panicked about this country. this is a living and breathing democracy. though it appears frozen and at inordinate peril, i suppose there are tiny streams of constitutional law that are still bubbling up, pushing their way to the surface from aquifers deep in the earth. i suppose that the river’s origin 14,000 years ago should speak to me about tenacity through challenge – both natural and manmade. i suppose that the import of this simple river on the places through which it flows should remind me that every single impact counts, every effort to eradicate invasive species makes a difference.

and so, with no small measure of hope, i honor the uprisings of those who protest against the cruelty being dealt to the people of this country. i applaud the efforts of those who push back against the authoritarian rule that has surfaced in plain sight. i acknowledge that under it all – flowing underneath the vileness of this administration – are steady, solid, compassionate, reasonable voices. the people who stand firm on the principles upon which this country’s democracy was built – not silent, not still.

and the river runs…

*****

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

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hats for 200, please. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

i used to wear hats. not baseball caps – i don’t have the right face shape for those. millinery hats. it was the 90s and i had straight-across bangs, which works best for hats – particularly when you have a high forehead – which i do as i inherited this from somewhere deep into and repeated on related faces time and again in my ancestry. nevertheless, i didn’t have a lot of these fancy hats – actually, only two: this green wool felt bowler-type hat and a black flat rim wool felt hat. i had a suede cowboy hat, and a couple of straw cowboy hats, but i wore the felt hats pretty consistently. i don’t wear them anymore and have decided to move them on. but not before telling d some stories about them, not before modeling them, grimacing at how they now look on me. sigh.

the black hat – a wide brim boater/gaucho – was my favorite. i told him about when i took part in the american cancer society jail ‘n bail fundraiser – a faux ‘arrest’ when you are taken to a place i now can’t remember and – in order to ‘get out of jail’ – you must raise enough donations to equal your ‘bail’. it was a fun event and i was really happy to help this cause having lost my big brother to cancer. i wore my hat that day. and, because i knew about the ‘arrest’ ahead of time, chose a chic outfit to go with it. i wasn’t going to be photographed in just anything.

i’m holding back the black hat, but, as i write this, think i might be able to move it on as well. i’m not a hat-person anymore and someone else needs to sport these stylin’ hats. i’m pretty sure that the outfit – a suit maybe? or something else a tad bit fancy – has moved on long ago. most fancy stuff has moved on long ago. we aren’t fancy-stuff-wearing people these days.

in an effort to not talk about current events, we talked about that on the trail one day. we have simplified our wardrobes. i still have some work to do on that – more ruthless culling – but our first mutual impulse is not to keep things that suggest fancy gatherings or anything highfalutin (as my sweet poppo would say).

i confessed to d – as we slogged through the mud on the hiking path – that i am way more interested in the gear one needs for a thru-hike on the PCT than what i might wear to a derby party or a sophisticated tea. we avoid gold-gilded places and steer away from people who find identity with all that. ick. that all feels like a waste of life. i talked about how i could pretty much get by with a couple pairs of favorite jeans, my ever-present scoop-neck long-sleeves, a thermal shirt or two and my favorite black flannel shirt. oh. and boots. and flipflops. and my hiking sandals. boom, done. what is it they call those minimal wardrobes?…..a capsule wardrobe. (in reading an aarp article about this, i realize i need a few more items to be in on this movement – though those items are likely already in my closet….a consideration for how to effect the pare-down.)

if all this sounds like avoidance, you are likely right. for there are moments right now when one is in peril of being overwhelmed by every single thing going on, one is in peril of succumbing to the angst. and, in those moments, well, let’s go with ‘hats for 200, please’.

anyway, anything i could wish to wear now – at this age – is anything that is actually me. there isn’t a dinner party, a stage, a trail, an adventure we would consider going to, performing on, hiking on, partaking in that would require anything fancy-schmancy. it’s simply not us.

and i’m actually certain of that.

because now – at this point in our lives – there is nothing to prove. we realize there was nothing to prove all along. there is just gratitude for being here – on this planet – and acknowledging that there is a fleeting moment – a.fleeting.moment. – between being here and not.

which i why i will never understand what is happening right now in current events – why there is so much cruelty, so much aggression, so much hatred, so much extremism, so much vile superiority. we all breathe in and out the same way. dominance over others is a waste of this life.

and which is why – on the trail – we talked about the hats i unearthed from hat boxes perched on the top shelf in the closet of my studio.

*****

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

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making the cut. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

before she had her ears pierced, my sweet momma had a collection of beautiful old-fashioned screw-back earrings dangling on this display on her dresser. i don’t know if i have any of those earrings but somehow i have this chrome and acrylic display that i think she and my poppo used back-in-the-day when they owned a small jewelry store.

i don’t have a specific use for this. it sits empty on my dresser. every time i look at it i think of my mom, so maybe that’s its use (though thoughts of my momma are prompted by many things and moments in my days.)

in this time, in the going-through of the stored stuff – things in boxes and bins and closets – there have been a few treasures. the crèche from a well-loved christmas house in a little town in florida that i passed on to a dear friend who has significant connections to that town. the painting we sent to the family of the painter. the hand-painted collector plates – painted by ancestors – i’m sending to family members so that they, too, might have a piece of this history.

other things? well, not so much.

it will be a slow process and last night – before we went to sleep – we were talking about how we might have missed so much had we just quickly given everything away. i’m grateful we are taking our time. the gifts are in the time-taking.

now, i would be remiss if i didn’t mention how hard some of these things are to part with. despite no real driving imperative for banana curls, i am reticent to part with the pink sponge curlers. despite no current (or impending) babies in the family, it is a tiny bit difficult to give up the sesame street baby play gym. despite a lack of counter space for it, the 1970s roll top breadbox is a tough giveaway. despite never having used it – and frankly, not even knowing i had it – finding the Betty Crocker plug-in warming tray seems a splendid idea for entertaining. despite not wearing them for – like – ever, the sweatshirt collection – and yes, it is a collection – has a zillion memories, each one its own reason for purchase. how can i give up montauk or galena or northwestern university or long island or nyc or seattle or lawrence or the university of minnesota or the high school tennis team? despite zero talent for woodworking, my brother’s scrollsaw templates…were my brother’s. despite, despite, despite. despite no real need for them, i will struggle as i photograph and ponder the fate of these things…remembering always that they are simply things and that any memory is still a memory, cued up and ready for my heart to wander through or linger in.

it’s gonna take a while. likely, a long while. but each day something is given away or sold or sent to someone or – in some cases, when appropriate, thrown out. little by little we are making headway. and, now, david – who used to be much more ruthless about culling possessions – is finding himself also relishing the process. well, relishing might be a tiny exaggeration. but definitely appreciating the process.

i’m not sure about this vintage earring holder piece. it has no function on my dresser, but it doesn’t take up a lot of room. there is a gingham stuffed heart hanging on it right now.

maybe that’s all it needs.

when the play gym and the warming tray and the sweatshirts and the scrollsaw templates and all the other things i will unearth and unbox and unbin and photograph and ponder actually move on, maybe it’s the small seemingly meaningless that will remain. to someone else, those things might look extraneous. but my heart connects the dots. and this time through, well, the chrome and acrylic stand might make the cut.

*****

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

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this is the stuff. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

(about this week: there is a peril, it seems, to writing ahead these days. we had decided that this week – the first full week of a new year – we wished to use images of light as our prompts, we wished to linger on the possibility of light, of hope, of goodness. though our blogposts might stray from that as we pen them, it was without constant nod to the constant updating of current events – a mass of indefensible, unconscionable acts. we pondered what to do about these blogposts we had written and decided to keep them. we hope that – whether or not any absence of the happenings of the day, whether or not the chance these written words seem somewhat inane at this moment – you might know that those events – of corruption, illegality, immorality – do not distill or distort our intention – to bring light and hope to this new year – the first days of which bring more insanity and unnerving instability. we are still holding space for light.)

and so…

and what does the ceiling fan see, looking down at the centerpiece on the dining room table? what is the bird’s-eye view of this bit of old peeling-paint chairwood, this tiny dollar store tree, these glass votives, the glittery ornament tucked in? acknowledging that everything is clearly a bit easier if you are a ceiling fan, i wonder – is it thinking, “now, THIS is the stuff of christmas!”?

the piece of wood comes from an old chair that used to sit at the kitchen table. it’s part of the seat and there are two other gorgeous pieces that we can use for some other purpose. how many times i have sat on that chair, how many times a beloved child or family member or friend sat on that chair. i revel in having a slice to carry forward, a slice of those times, an artifact of meals and conversations, a touchable piece of history.

we’ve been talking about our dining room table lately. we have this great teak table – with giant leaves – that i got from a dear friend about twenty years ago. it was her dining room table but it became the perfect work/conference table in my recording label offices on the lake. when i moved from those offices back home, the table came along and became my dining room table. it’s been the gathering place for so, so many dinners and parties – i would be hard-pressed to even venture a guess how many. it has served us well.

there is definitely evidence of all that life. there are the stains: the rings from water glasses, the lighter blob from a pumpkin that was secretly aging, the scratches from babycat or a multitude of projects created on this surface.

and so now it needs some refinishing. the chairs need to be reupholstered. it needs some work.

and we have begun to think about this.

downstairs, in the storage room that houses the boiler and the hot water heater, there are doors. many doors. six-panel doors with some heft. doors from old closets. screen doors. cabinet doors. a bunch of doors.

one of these doors is a french door with windows, the glass still intact, the white paint just weathered enough. it’s not as wide as the dining room table – which has been a great workspace, a terrific staging ground – a place where one can put a plethora of serving bowls and accoutrements for a big dinner.

but it’s – this door – it’s got some charisma. there is a certain charm to the possibility of having a dining room table that is actually a door from this very house. with a good piece of glass – or plexiglass – or whatever the good folks at town and country glass recommend – this could become our new gathering table. food for thought, we consider it.

but then we’d need chairs, for the chairs at the teak table are also teak and would need to be given away with the table.

so. chairs.

i suppose we’d be off and running on a fantastic chairquest – odds and ends of vintage (read: old) and repurposed chairs with personality to circle the perimeter of the new doortable.

and thus would begin a whole new set of relationships and stories and memories – between us and the dining room table and the chairs and all the people who would sit there, with us.

and the ceiling fan would then look down – with its bird’s eye view and its ceilingfanlife perspective – and giggle – once again, as ever – at the thought of just how many times it has taken a screenshot in its mind’s eye (assuming the ceiling fan has a mind’s eye), how many times it has wanted to memorize the moments below it, how many times it has thought about how lucky it is to be hung over a gathering space, how many times it has thought “now THIS is the stuff. of life”.

*****

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

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kintsugi-ing. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

we had a list of possibilities. it was a list of things to do, places to go before or during christmas. since our adult children and their partners would not be here, we knew we needed to keep busy, to create more hustle and bustle. missing your grown-up kids is ever-present, even when you are happy for them.

so we started a list: the botanic garden lightscape display, the garden domes, splitting a burger at a favorite bistro in a little town square across from the gazebo lit with christmas tree and menorah, a park festive with big illuminated balls of color. we included luminaria, a bonfire on christmas eve, singing carols around the piano in my studio.

as it turned out, we lit three luminaria and, on a rainy christmas eve, placed them inside, in front of our fireplace.

and we hiked on christmas day. bundled up, we took to our loop – this place where – for years now – we have sorted through life.

yesterday (which isn’t really yesterday now but is last week) we had a hard day. i wonder how many of us had a hard day. it was the day after christmas, the day when you realize all the hoopla is over, all the preparations done, the anticipation breathing a sigh. it is the day that sort of places you back into the calendar, a place that had – temporarily – been suspended in celebration, big or little.

it was on that day i realized we had not stood at the piano and sang carols.

this is the fifth year we – or even i – have not stood at the piano – any piano, any where – and sang carols.

i thought i was ready.

because five years is a long time for someone who spent most of her adult life – at christmas – creating experiences through music – for christmas.

i thought that carols would be the way back in, the easiest path back.

but somehow it got lost in whatever else we did on those two days of christmasing.

and, when it dawned on me we hadn’t, it didn’t fall gently.

in some self-indulgent raw disclosure to you, i can say this fiveyears has taken a toll. i can see now that being fired broke my spirit, that being fired triggered unmentionable earlier pain that further entrenched the breaking.

and i wonder now if it wasn’t so much about stopping my music. i wonder if breaking my spirit was actually their intention.

wow.

healing takes a long time.

and now this is the last day left to this year and we will cross into the year when i will turn 67. and i shake my head – vehemently, to unstick the clinging tarry goo – and throw a rope to my spirit that is trying to tread the water of eh-it’s-ok.

it’s done. it’s enough.

i have decided to decide.

i’m not positive that is possible; i’m not even sure that is possible.

but this piano-less existence is hard and i wonder if it is harder than what it will actually feel like AT the piano.

it won’t be carols.

but it will be something. something gut-worthy of answering the tug, something that makes me show up, that makes the walls of my studio vibrate with fortissimo and neck-crane to hear breath in the rests.

in the new year, little by little. kintsugi-ing.

and – even now – even in the middle of deciding to decide – part of me wants to add: maybe.

*****

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

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now more than ever. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

it’s a week ahead of christmas as i write this.

in earlier years – for decades – i would have been consumed with shaping advent and christmas services, designing music that lifts the story of this holiday, that spreads the message of love, of light, of the season.

it’s been a bunch of years now that I haven’t been a minister of music and i trust that each church i’ve served before will again have ringing of handbells, choirs in harmony, cantatas with wonderful narrative, pipe organ music reflective of this time of light…perhaps even a ukulele band strumming some favorite carols. i hope that the music programs i started in churches in new york, florida, wisconsin all have grown and that they carry on in the same spirit of joy i brought. it is different to not direct, but the space allows for introspection and reflection.

several years ago – as a piece for one of the cantatas i composed or arranged – i wrote the song “you’re here”. as i listen to my own song – recorded as i sang it at a piano into my phone – these lyrics: and now, you’re here, in a world of hypocrisy and your love can heal us all…”

and it occurs to me that we are all mary – holding space for love, for light, for hope. even outside a tradition that celebrates christmas or hanukkah or any other specifically religious holiday – it is love – period – that can heal us. OUR love. love for one another, love for equality, love for goodwill, love for kindness. it is holding up compassion, concern, tenderness, empathy. it is recognizing brokenness and despair. it is valuing humanity itself and leading with heart and generosity.

in this season, i have found myself humming another of my own personal favorites: hope was born this night.

i hope so.

in each of us.

we need it now more than ever.

merry christmas.

alleluia.

*****

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

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wiper wisdom. [kerri’s blog on not-so-thawed wednesday]

it is most definitely a wisconsin thing.

never before – in all my years of winter in New York – did i see anyone ever stand their windshield wipers up.

now, i suppose it could be a contemporary thing – which would explain why i didn’t see it in my growing-up years. perhaps someone somewhere decided that rather than ripping frozen rubber wipers off their windshield – necessitating new wipers – they would attempt to avoid the freezing-onto-the-windshield by standing their wipers up. however it came about, having spent long periods of time freezing and trying to de-ice my wipers, i have to admit that it’s a good idea.

so we have joined whatever masses out there do this thing and, because we don’t garage littlebabyscion or big red, they are outside – anytime we are not driving them -with their wipers at attention.

already this winter we have had two significant snowstorms and extended frigid temperatures. it is only the beginning of december. though this does not bode well for people sans snowblowers – like us – it is opportunity ripe for successful wiper-freezing-avoidance.

back in the days of selling cds at retail show after retail show after retail show i stumbled upon a vendor selling round cone-shaped ice scrapers. i watched the video demonstrating this handy device. once again, this time in utter scraper-ignorance, i had never seen such a thing but it turned out to be pretty remarkable and i bought several and gave them to family and friends. we still have one and i just looked them up online – they are readily available.

my sweet dad always had tips for me – things he (strongly) suggested i do as i travel around, words of wisdom. “Keep kitty litter in your car,” “buy a telescoping shovel for the car,” “put blankets in the car,” “make sure you have a working flashlight since it gets dark early”. i am unable to start winter without – still – following his advice. living his retirement in florida, he was just happy to relinquish all his winter-knowledge to the sun gods and me. and he bought one of those folding dashboard sunshades, some kind of unwritten law in the baking-sun sunshine state.

so I don’t know if you do the standing-up-windshield-wiper thing. if you live in wisconsin and your vehicle is outside i suppose there’s a pretty good chance you do. these regional trends are powerful.

besides, you don’t want to be caught out there with your magical cone-scraper trying to get your soon-to-be-de-rubbered wipers unfrozen off your windshield. i mean, one can only handle so much failure dealing with winter. and the town snowplow coming down the snow-filled road right after you cleared the apron of the driveway is more than enough stress.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this NOT-SO-FLAWED – THAWED – WEDNESDAY

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if we were featherdusters. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

and what if we, like the sweet autumn clematis, were each merely one featherduster, one long, wispy tendril birthed from a maroon-brown pod joined with other maroon-brown pods on a single branch of a single vine.

what is it we would do with our wispiness, our soft fluffy plumes, tiny jet engines to propel us near and far? what seeds would we disperse, what knowledge would we dispense, what silvery sheen would we spread?

what would we choose to do with our one, wild featherduster life, our one journey through air, aided by wind, abetted by the twirling of our feathertail? where would we go, what jet stream would we join? what earth song would we sing? what would we touch – ever so lightly – brushing past, barely felt, a tickle of plume?

what if that were all we had? would we join with all the other featherdusters, an intertwined community seeding community? or would we spend our time engaged in disjointed competitive infighting with the others? would we choose a path on which we might twirl through together or would we choose to shoot off, like that one plane in a memorial fly-by, forging a new trail in air, bushwhacking through underbrush? what would our desire path be?

what if that had been our passage in this place? what if our featherduster existence had been it? would we have been all in? would we have given our best? would we have embraced seeding more clematis – like seeding more shimmery goodness? or would we have held back, continually waiting for something glorious to happen, for better weather, or for whatever later might be?

*****

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

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the babycat chair. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

this is called ‘the babycat chair’. though many would have disposed of it years ago, we held onto it…homage to our babycat.

for some reason, he chose this chair – and really, no others – well, to be accurate, he did have a bit of a relationship with the red gingham wingchair recliner in our bedroom. this was his to do with as he pleased, i guess.

babycat would just arbitrarily start scratching the back of this wicker chair. maybe it was when i hadn’t recently cut his dagger-nails, counting as i clipped – 1, 2, 3… – each paw a new 5-count, with his patience on the edge and his teeth locked around my hand holding him. treacherous stuff, but i knew i was in no peril. (though, in retrospect, as i look at this chair-destruction, i can see he was pretty capable of much peril, after all.)

when he’d start clawing the back of this chair, dogga would become instantly nervous, knowing instinctively that b-cat was ‘gonna get in trouble’. dogga would run over and push b-cat aside or pull him by the neck away from the chair entirely. the first time we saw him pulling the cat around the wood floor by his neck, we were totally scared and stopped him. but babycat would go back for more and the dog-pulling-the-cat-around-by-his-neck game would go on and on – for years and years – these two best friends playing and teasing each other.

we put a throw blanket on the chair – and a few pillows – to try and hide the missing wicker, hoping no one would fall through entirely if they chose to sit in the chair. it was really the back of the chair that was the worst – well, and the one side – but babycat had not clawed through the bottom, so this guest-ending-up-on-the-floor thing wasn’t really a big worry.

babycat died unexpectedly in march 2021 and took parts of our hearts with him. he had been with me (and then us) for about twelve years and was a true saving grace for me in his years. i’m not sure how i would have survived many of those years without his lumbering, hulking tuxedo-cat self keeping close to me. we still miss him. both of us. and, for dogga, it’s exponential. babycat was his bestest friend.

in these days of cleaning out, we (or i) have to keep making decisions about things that have threadiness written all over them. this chair has been one of them. do we keep it or do we move on?

knowing that many people are capable of fixing things or repurposing things or utilizing the materials of things, we placed the chair – after i did a photo shoot of it – at the curb. it is never more than a couple hours before someone picks up the things at the curb.

but no one picked up the chair. we talked about breaking it down and placing it in the trash. for perhaps, there was nothing really reusable about it.

in the end, we brought it back up the driveway. it is now at the top of the driveway, adjacent to the garage and the fence, next to the birdfeeder. we haven’t really talked about what’s next for it. but as we pass by on the way from the back door to littlebabyscion or big red, it always makes me smile.

the babycat chair lives on.

*****

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

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