centering | reverse threading

April 10, 2025
by kerrisherwood11 5 Comments

in an insane world. [kerri’s blog on d.r. thursday]

in an insane world, barney is sane.

barney has been stalwart, steadfast, unwaveringly standing in the garden through every infamous weather challenge – the rain, the sleet, the snow, the ice and the wind, the extreme heat, the drought.

it is one of the most gorgeous things in our backyard. we have watched it age, its wrinkles, its furrows, its jowls. we have watched it struggle to stay young, fresh, shellacked. we have watched it give in – to time and the elements. and, in that giving-in-ness, we have watched grace in real life.

in this insane world, i have thanked our old house and its painted-wood countertops, its old floors, its cracked plaster, its doorknob-less six panel doors. i have admired the tile floor in the bathroom and the way light streams in through the double-hungs. i have relished the paintings on our walls and the fabulous chunks of concrete that serve our living room. i have whispered to our house and i have thanked its familiarity and its comfort. i have taken refuge in its security. i have reveled in our comforter, our dogga at our feet, coffee by our side, happy lights. i have simplified need and put want to the side.

in this insane world, i have patted littlebabyscion as i get in and out, stroked big red as i have walked past it in the driveway. i have noted with great appreciation the wild geranium and the day lilies pushing up through cold dirt, the buds on breck. i have sat on adirondack chairs on the deck – still a bit bundled up – watching birds and squirrels, sipping wine and eating maybe too many chips. i have been grateful.

and i have gazed at barney-the-piano, over there, in the garden. i have felt it steadying me.

in this insane world, i have thanked barney.

“pardon my sanity in a world insane.” (emily dickinson – and barney)

*****

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December 1, 2023
by kerrisherwood11 1 Comment

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

lake michigan – and its looming presence – it’s always there, though sometimes we don’t notice.

i’ve been around water my whole life: long island and florida and here. i’m not sure if i have thought about what that means to me. i’ve lived most of life at or around sea level. i have always been able to – via a short walk, short bike hike, short drive – get to a large body of water. and, regardless of whether or not i am on the shore of that immensity, i can feel it.

the last few days have pulled me out of center – whatever center i have mustered in recent times. in the middle of the middle i can’t feel the grounding gravity that usually helps – perspective that keeps the rest at bay. i know the flailing time is limited and that we are not trapped there. adrift in the onslaught of emotion, i tune in to the things that balance me. i listen for the windchimes outside, i stand in the living room and look at the lit trees, i sit at the kitchen table opposite d, we take hikes in cold air, we light a candle.

i fend off the pining for the high mountains, knowing i can’t get there right now. in guided imagery i sit at the side of the brook – on a log – in the lodgepole pine forest – high on the mountain. i – curiously – am never on the shore – of rock or of sand.

have i always taken the water for granted? do i take this presence – merely a block away – for granted? is it human to pine for the things we don’t have, things that are harder to access?

yet, if i imagine being away from the water – any water – i have a visceral reaction. for it’s always been there and i hardly know what it would feel like without it.

the days i have sat on the coast – sandy beach beneath me – i can feel the deep breath that powerful surf affords.

the days we have hiked streamside up the mountain, the days we have sat on its bank or on rocks in the middle of rushing water – i can feel the the deep breath that the flow affords.

the days we hike along our favorite local trail – river at our side – i can feel the deep breath that its familiarity in all seasons affords.

the days we choose to walk by the lake – on its bouldered shoreline or on its beaches – i can feel the deep breath that an unbroken horizon affords.

and the water – the innate healer – is always there. grounding.

“take a course in good water and air; and in the eternal youth of nature you may renew your own. go quietly, alone; no harm will befall you.” (john muir)

*****

ADRIFT from BLUEPRINT FOR MY SOUL ©️ 1996 kerri sherwood

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July 22, 2022
by kerrisherwood11 Leave a comment

not unimportant. [k.s. friday]

just like when i take a photograph of a person i try to avoid having extraneous people in the picture, when i take photographs outside i try to avoid any messy unnecessities.

this time i did it on purpose.

on july 29th i will have lived in this house for 33 years. i have sat out back watching the sky turn orange over the garage for 33 years. i have watched the trees grow up over the rooftops in my view. i have watched squirrels on their highways-of-highwire for 33 years.

it suddenly occurred to me that there might come a day when i can’t simply walk out the old screen door onto the deck, stepping onto the patio to watch the sky in the west. there might come a day when i live somewhere else and i won’t have access to this view.

and so the messiness of wires sectioning off the sky became important. important enough to photograph. important enough to remember.

we’re surrounded by things – and views – we have taken for granted. we see them every day – though we don’t really see them.

they seem unimportant.

yet, these familiar sights are the very things that help ground us. in a world that is politically volatile, climate that is destroying mother earth, bombastic leaders itching to reduce freedoms, disrespect and aggression out of control, it would seem that we need grab onto that which grounds us, centers us, slows down our breathing.

because i’m thready, i notice – and try to memorize – things like how the old wood floor creaks in the hallway, what it sounds like when the glass doorknob falls off, the feel of the small chain on the basement door and the decades-rubbed indent it has made, the sound of a double-hung window with ropes and weights opening, the deck cracking in cold weather, the cool painted-cement floor under bare feet in the basement, the places where the plaster has cracked. they all spell home.

and, with a world in turmoil, everything in flux, so much anxiety and grief and worry, things that are solidly familiar help.

*****

THE WAY HOME from THIS PART OF THE JOURNEY ©️ 1997, 2000 kerri sherwood

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January 11, 2021
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soundtrack on repeat. a balm. [merely-a-thought monday]

were i to have their addresses, i would write thank you notes to ben folds, jon boden, sam sweeney, ben coleman, nick laird-clowes, paul buchanan, ron sexsmith et al….you get the picture. this soundtrack is our go-to right now. not only does it elicit thoughts of this most-marvelous-movie, but the music just speaks to us. on repeat. over and over we listen to it, never wearying of it.

there are just certain pieces that center you, that give you pause, that lift you. there are really too many to count for me. some of them are as simple as the text sound my phone makes when either of my children write to me. some of them are unembellished and sound like my husband humming along. some of them are as complex as layered music can get. some of them are silent, floating rumi’s words on their wings: “listen to silence. it has so much to say.”

these words of wisdom from this film, brilliance written and directed by richard curtis: “i just try to live every day as if i’ve deliberately come back to this one day, to enjoy it, as if it was the full final day of my extraordinary, ordinary life.” and these words on re-living days that have passed: “live every day again almost exactly the same. the first time with all the tensions and worries that stop us noticing how sweet the world can be, but the second time noticing.” i am reminded again and again as we listen.

this movie stays with you. it’s right there, beckoning you to remember. in the recesses behind the lists and tasks and daily troubles, in profound je ne sais quoi it quietly sits and waits for you. it’s a well to dip into even on the darker days and its music evokes each thoughtful scene.

we sit in many layers of complexity right now. it’s a symphony of great proportion, filled with questions, with challenges, with things begging for our angst-filled attention.

this album, on repeat, is a balm.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this MERELY-A-THOUGHT MONDAY

April 3, 2018
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two artists tuesday

two people get credit for this “just shrug”: 20 (aka john) and justine. it was in the “old days” when i was at the graphic design studio what felt like all the time when i learned this mantra.

20 designed the first ten or so of my album jackets (and traycards, if you want to get specific.) i would spend time with him and justine (the person who made things happen at the office) idea-brainstorming or watching layout. i can’t tell you how many times deadlines would rapidly approach or the print shop would goof on a run or the computer would glitch or…. i would inwardly be freaking out (and maybe outwardly), but 20 and just would be even and relaxed (at least on the outside.) one or the other would look at me and say, “just shrug.” after about a zillion times, it stuck.

shrugging off the stuff that stresses us out is not a science. it’s most definitely an art form – approached and accomplished differently by each person who attempts it. everyone chooses different crayons out of the box, everyone paints with different size brushes, everyone chooses a different key on the piano, everyone sings a different song, everyone relaxes a different way, everyone re-centers differently. but people are able -and if they weren’t, we would all be a paralyzed-with-stress community of people- to slough it off, to let it roll off their shoulders, to move on, to shrug.

i once heard an interview with a woman who was about 95. she was happy, happy, happy and spoke of her life. the interviewer asked her, “to what do you attribute your happiness, your ease in the world?” she answered, “i don’t take anything personally.”

ahhh. she just shrugged.

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March 5, 2018
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chicken marsala monday

late yesterday afternoon, after a day spent working on computers and designs, with technology sluggishness taking over our souls, we headed to the woods to take a hike. any time we feel tired or ‘stuck’ we walk. around the ‘hood, along the lake, or to the starbucks about 2 and a half miles away. any time we feel exuberant or elated we walk. sometimes in the mountains (ahh!!) or in chicago or the third ward in milwaukee. any time we need a ‘business meeting’ we walk. mostly in the woods, in a county or state park. walking and breathing in fresh air brings us back to the moment. it re-centers us.

we hiked up the small rise in the woods, the light was waning and behind us the sky was deep deep orange. in the clearing beyond the stand of trees stood, very still, a deer. it was clearly the ‘lookout’ as way back in the field were six more deer, easy to count in the almost-dark as their white tails bobbed when the lookout gave the alert. we stood perfectly still watching this beauty, a magic moment in the woods. neither of us wanted to leave the spot. i took a picture, not because you can see the deer in it, but because it preserved the moment for me. i didn’t want to forget. because, as you already know, i am thready like that.

around me, every rock or feather or piece of wood or ticket stub or scrap of notepaper carries with it a specific moment – preserved in time. i could not necessarily tell the story of each of those moments – there are far too many for my synapse-challenged-brain to remember. but i know that each one had meaning for me. each one defined yet another piece of me, my relationship with someone i love, a time i shared with another being, a learning, a moment of sheer bliss, a moment of deep sadness. each moment renewed me and brought me to my next moment of living.

as i have moved through life one thing has become certain. that everything changes. nothing stays the same. life is in flux, always fluid. what more do we have than each moment as it arrives for us? i ask myself, “how do i want to spend this moment? what do i want to feel about this moment?” for i can never get it back. i can never re-do it. time has moved on. and so i must keep moving. i write about moments, i compose about moments, i tell stories about moments. for me, those details count. attempting to put succinctly (ha!) into words my philosophy-of-what-moments-mean is impossible; it is the umbrella that skies over everything else i believe, everything else i think.

when The Boy was little, he called the rearview mirror in cars the “review” mirror. particularly poignant i think. i have seen it written “don’t stare into the rearview mirror. that’s not the direction you are going.” instead i try (read: TRY) to review the past moments, learn from them, find grace in them, save the memory threads. and wholeheartedly embrace the ones to come. the moments. unique. in every way. i love this chicken marsala image.

THIS MOMENT…UNIQUE…IN EVERY WAY MERCHANDISE