reverse threading

the path back is the path forward

Tag Archives: create


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squeaking. [not-so-flawed wednesday]

“squeaking with joy, ” cousin kate wrote – all in caps – “the turtles are back!”.

at the exact time she sent that, we were on our trail, on the bridge over the river, gazing down at the turtles. we had seen a couple earlier in the spring, but then it got cold and they disappeared. now, they are back – seemingly for good – and we, too, are squeaking with joy.

earlier in the winter, i had written:

“i think about the turtles. they are there in the warmer months, sunning on logs and rocks that jut out of the river. but, when it dips below fifty degrees or so – and stays there – they disappear. apparently, they dive down to the muddy bottom, their metabolism slows down, they require less oxygen. their mucky homes keep them safe as they bide time, these wise, long-lived creatures of the water and the land.

we know they are there – somewhere – in hidden spots, places they feel sheltered and secure. i think about what they might be doing. they are silent and the fallow is long. i trust they are sorting what is next, kind of like us.

time keeps moving, though, and i keep hope that when it warms up and the turtles have a more secure sense of themselves in the world they will reappear, out of the suspension of presence. i’m hoping for an early spring.

and waiting. and the river freezes. and then it thaws.“

and then i had this idea walking down the hall the other day. it was a the-turtles-are-back idea.

in my mind i named it “out of fallow” or “out of the mud” or even “the relevant challenge” or “on the fly” but the name is fluid. the idea floated around and landed tiny feet on my brain, so i eventually told david about it.

it’s relatively simple. we choose ten destinations – in wisconsin, in the midwest, on the northeast coast, in the high mountains, on quiet southern beaches, in the canyonlands, in the grand national parks – all different projects. taking a yamaha portable battery-operated keyboard (with recording/disc drive capability), ten canvases and paint, both laptops, and a couple spiral notebooks – we go to each destination for a pre-determined amount of time (say, three hours). while there, i compose on the fly – what that place feels like – and he paints on the fly – what that place feels like. on the fly – spontaneous creation – is not for the meek at heart. it requires focus, has a terminal product necessary at the end – a short time after beginning – and necessitates a degree of letting go. it pushes us back into the active-art-place and pushes us past edges. it gets us out of the muddy bottom. it produces the raw pieces of an album to be orchestrated and a collection of paintings to be framed. it needs some support to get off the ground. it has me pondering, swimming to the surface with the turtles.

our snouts will pop out of the river and we’ll look around some, trying to figure it out. we would definitely need some encouragement, some warm sun, some help.

and, if we move forward, out of the suspension, we – turtles, too – will definitely be squeaking.

*****

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

turtles love coffee.


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we are all in our underwear. [not-so-flawed wednesday]

with great fervor, he said, “we are all desperate to make sense out of this life.”

“play the fool,” ethan hawke’s words of wisdom.

every day of this mysteriously unknown-unrevealed-unmapped extended journey of life we have been granted – we are seeking to make sense.

and – in the moment of moments – the ones when the abyss is evident or the peak is present, the ones when confusion reigns supreme, the ones when you cannot imagine any more bliss or any more dread or any more ardor or any more devastation, the ones when complexity is the starting gate, the ones on the roller coaster you wish someone would stretch out flat – in those moments none of this – any form of art – any medium, any life-giving expression of creativity – is a luxury. it surely does sustain, heal, breathe life into the motionless heart of fear or sadness. it is the music, the paintings, the photographs, the lyrics, the poetry, the clay pot in your hand, the dance. it is what the pads of your fingers touch just simply by seeing, hearing, reading, smelling, tasting, watching. necessary. of the essence. crucial. fundamental.

“give your heart to everybody you meet. the rest is pretense.” (e.h.)

and – the creators – each of us – stand by, fools all of us. humankind. finding who we are, what we love, expressing, connecting.

“showcasing a piece is allowing it to come to full bloom, to let it breathe in the world, to share it. but showcasing a piece is not for the meek at heart.

in the way you would likely feel standing in your underwear in a town square, introducing the world to some new piece of your heart is raw. on old wooden stages with a piano and a mic, centered on a wall with a tiny price tag placed nearby, during poetry-reading night in the corner of the general store, sharing with the novel-writing club every first thursday, skating the first performance on ice, tapping “publish” on a blog each day … pieces of your heart float shakily about as you try to hold onto sisu and stay grounded. it matters not how many times you have done this. your heart has been unbridled and you are allowing others in. each and every time.” (the underwear moments* – kerri sherwood)

“but then i thought about beauty. i thought about how artists dive below the surface, try to find the depth of meaning, try to hear and see that which others might pass by, not noticing. i thought about stages and boom mics and connection and standing in front of a diebenkorn – or a robinson – deep inside, marveling. i thought about arvo pärt and his absolute tug on my heart. i thought about john denver and simplicity. i thought about recording studios and soaring string sections, cello lines that make clouds rearrange to allow in light. the weaving of intricate relationship between people and nature, between people and art in any form.

there have been moments – and i can actually remember them – when i have been driving and listening to a song and i weep or hiking and seeing something so stunning i stop and cannot move. these moments when i know, without a doubt, that it was right to turn down the business-school-accounting-program acceptance. these moments when i know, without a doubt, that i will not have the same security as the person-i-would-have-been following that route. moments when i feel a sense of pride to be a tiny part of the tapestry of what people turn to in time of rejuvenation, of rest, of crisis, of pure bliss. these moments when i know, without a doubt, that somewhere along the way what i have done with my time has touched someone, has opened them, has taken them diving with me. below the surface of this great big world – to beauty.” (the gig economy tapestry – kerri sherwood)

“…boldness. the uninhibited freedom of expression – artistry come to fruition in the moment of utter sharing. terrifying and liberating. raw and real. the underwear moments.”(*)

this great big planet earth. sedimentary layers of beauty. we are all in our underwear.

*****

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

www.buymeacoffee – a link or this QR code – if you wish


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the pony. [k.s. friday]

and – up close – if you choose – you will see the foreleg of a winter-dressed pony, the extra cold-weather-coat trapping hair next to the skin of the horse, keeping him warmer. he is stopped, gazing at the distant field, ready to canter into it, the exploding of freedom of movement.

and you blink and it is a cattail. one of many in the field, waiting in the marsh through autumn and winter for early spring. as many as 250,000 seeds, white fluff sailing and transported by birds and breezes. and the life cycle continues.

it is winter in my studio. the rhizomes are gathering underground, together with the cattails. maybe around the spring equinox, maybe a bit later, the shoots will rise out of the ground – like a phoenix out of ashes – and new sprouts will grow and grow. the cycle germinates and pollinates and seeds will fly again. the birds and the wind and i will play for you – seeds and notes flying.

in the meanwhile, i wear my winter coat. it is keeping the heat in. it protects me. insulation for shelter in this long and cold winter, to shield in the storms, to brace in this fallow.

but soon, soon, with the sun and fresh air, the pony will run free.

*****

UNTITLED INTERLUDE ©️ 1995 kerri sherwood

download music from my little corner of iTUNES

stream on PANDORA

read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY


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beyond the edge. [d.r. thursday]

this installation was beautiful. stunning. olafur eliasson’s rainbow bridge was in a room full of light and the spectrum of color was immediately striking. and then, we walked into the room further and all the color disappeared, instead spheres of glass reflected the windows and the water outside the museum. “the appearance of the spheres is unstable, slipping between clarity, colour, and blackness in response to the slightest movement of the viewer.” (olafur) if you stand right in front of one of the twelve spheres, you can see your reflection upside down, teasing you to make faces and play. we could have visited with this piece all day – moving around the room, standing still, watching the light waltz and dip as the hours wore on.

“its [the extraordinary] concern is the edge, and the making of a form out of the formlessness that is beyond the edge.” (mary oliver- upstream)

and so, when we finally moved on, past the sunlit rainbow, i’m quite sure we were both in that dreamy place – the place where you linger in all the vast possibilities that are out there – combinations of color and sound, notes joining together, brushes brushing, harmonics floating above you and bass notes stabilizing your foothold. it is a place of creation, where you feel the tendrils of ideas, of paintings, of songs, of melodies of piano, of sweeping strings and mournful french horns, of spattered acrylic, of photographs with intense depth of field. it is the place we visit on the trail, on the mountains, on the seashore, in our studios. it is beyond the edges of billpaying folders and mortgages, student loans and job searches. it flies past all the details of everyday mundane. it is nebulous and it is visceral.

we moved out of the room – newly equipped with dream – refreshed because someone else had “put it out there”. someone else – also – had vision and the impulse to express it. someone else – also – had stood for long hours, sat for long hours, pondered for long hours in front of canvas or a piano or on a wooden dance floor or waiting for the perfect snapshot. someone else had composed – the extraordinary – from out beyond the edge. and its whisperings fell on our ears, encouraging our response to it and reminding us to jump.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

earth interrupted VI

visit the ongoing construction on david’s website


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a chicken and a cow in autumn. [two artists tuesday]

my nephew called. i guess technically he isn’t my nephew now but neither one of us cares about the technicality of it. we talked a couple years ago but not since. no matter. he was ironing and he thought of me. he described how ironing makes you just kind of slow down and lets your mind wander. and so he followed his instinct and dialed. i told him i was glad he wasn’t thinking of me as he was washing the floor. he agreed and said that a washing-the-floor conversation wouldn’t be as whimsical.

whimsical.

i loved how he used that word. we slowed down our hiking, shuffling our feet through the leaves on the trail, david encouraging me to chat. my nephew and i laughed and told stories, asked questions, laughed some more. later, in some text-reminiscing, he asked me if i still had the beer cap earrings he had bought me when we were together up-north many years back. he said, “you’re one of my favorites.” i walked slowly into flashes of another time of life. it was a gift.

from the deck it looks like a chicken. suddenly a chicken leaf fell from the maple tree and landed squarely on our little curlicue-fence. i stopped at the top of the steps and drew d’s attention to it. “look at the chicken back there!” i insisted. we laughed at the chicken on our fence. ok, not exactly. but imagination is a funny thing. we make castles out of refrigerator boxes and gazelles out of cumulus puffs. we create out of thin air.

“have you noticed that autumn is like a yellow cow?” (pablo neruda) “have they counted the gold in the cornfields?”

we are not alone in our imaginings. pondering leaves, clouds, swirls in the lake’s surface, rocks on the trail, i wonder what it would be to not ponder these things. i feel like i might laugh a little less, like there would be a little less whimsy.

i’m not sure how autumn is like a yellow cow, though i am sure that is valid for pablo. it’s all good. it makes the world go round with a little more pizzazz. there is gold everywhere.

right now i’m just wondering where exactly my beer cap earrings are.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY


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the stock pot. [two artists tuesday]

i have kind of a wild-harebrained-dream.

in my wild-harebrained-dream we own a food truck called “and sauce.” and we drive around the country in big red pulling our food truck and selling sauce on pretty-much-anything.

i blame the whole30. or credit the whole30. i suppose there’s a difference between blaming and crediting.

the whole30 is a diet for 30 days (clever, eh?) during which you only eat whole foods and do not eat any: grains, legumes, dairy, added sugars, alcohol. you pare down your menus to fresh vegetables and meats and seafood and, after 30 days, deliberately add things back in to see how your body and digestive system react to various ingredients. it was back in early 2018 and it truly helped me get a tummy that was having a rebellion under control.

in many ways, it kind of stuck.

one of our staples was my homemade tomato meat sauce. but, at the time, we could not have it over pasta – regular or gluten-free. so we had it over spaghetti squash, which was, surprisingly, amazing. then we had it over oven-roasted chopped sweet potatoes. then we had it over roasted brussels sprouts. and over a hamburger. and over a baked potato. when we could add gluten-free products back in, we had sauce over penne, over rotini, wrapped in corn tortillas. sauce, we had discovered, is good on pretty much anything.

and the ideas were born. “and sauce”, the cafe, the food truck, the home delivery service. with the entrance of the pandemic, the food truck seemed like an apt adventure. i mean, who needs to even think about pianos and stages when you can travel around with stock pots and a food truck?

perhaps i am romanticizing this a tad bit, but, since this is my dream and not my reality, i am giving myself grace to daydream.

in those moments where comfort is sought and food that soothes the soul is paramount, we turn to the stock pot, to sauce or soup. the biggest pot comes out, the apron goes on (i adore over-the-head aprons), the cutting boards sit on the counter and life instantly slows down.

chopping and measuring (sort of) and sauteing and stirring with the giant wooden spoon from finland and sampling…it’s all heaven. there is not much that smells better than onions and garlic being sauted in olive oil. (though i recently read how you could re-create the williams sonoma store scent, which is very popular, by simply simmering vanilla extract, rosemary, lemon and peppercorns.)

just walking into the kitchen and seeing the stock pot on the stove is a reassurance. whether there is sauce in that stock pot or veggie soup or – drumroll – my sweet momma’s chicken soup (with the addition of spinach leaves and shredded parmesan, of course), it brings everything back into focus.

and as we ladle out sauce or soup into bowls or onto baked potatoes or penne, we, in turn, put worries and concerns and out-of-sorts-ness into the big pot. cause that’s actually the job of big stock pots. balancing out life.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY

to find TRUCKMEISTER – a really fabulous milwaukee-based food truck we had at our wedding, please click here. i might have used a photo of their truck for my rough-hewn AND SAUCE food truck pic. lol.

TAKING STOCK from RIGHT NOW ©️ 2010 kerri sherwood


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i’m with vince. [k.s. friday]

it pains me to even write this, but there’s actually more than one. fart-noise-apps, that is. “tap and fart” and “fartworld” are two examples. i could be considered mirthless – and i don’t care if i am – for not wanting to jump on these and install them on my iphone. what kind of person wants a fart app, anyway?

“the devaluation of music and what it’s now deemed to be worth is laughable to me. my single costs 99 cents. that’s what a single cost in 1960. on my phone, i can get an app for 99 cents that makes fart noises – the same price as the thing i create and speak to the world with. some would say that the fart app is more important. it’s an awkward time. creative brains are being sorely mistreated.” (vince gill)

i am on the devaluation-pushback-wagon with vince. we’ve never met, and we are in different stratospheres from a making-bank-standpoint, but there are some basic tenets on which we clearly agree.

i have beat this drum again and again. as an independent musician, composer and recording artist, it is likely i will continue to beat it and beat it and beat it, and each thump of the djembe will float into the atmosphere, unresolved. because times have changed. and apple music and spotify and pandora and tidal and amazon music have it down to a science. point-zero-zero-zero-something of a penny for a stream. i wrote about it seven years ago and it hasn’t changed. 99 cents seems like a gold mine!

yet, doesn’t the thought of feeling like it is striking gold – at 99 cents – take your breath away?

and how would YOUR life be without music?

the imperative for an artist to create – a composer to compose, a musician to play, a painter to paint, a writer to write, a dancer to dance, a potter to throw – is undeniable. it is how we speak to the world. it is a creation, an invention of the heart and soul.

vince gill has had multiple number one hits. he is extraordinarily successful. yet, he is apparently just as disgruntled with the industry’s standard of payment to artists as little-ole-me. though i doubt it’s quite the same for him, it raises questions for me of the great whether-or-not.

whether-or-not to ever record new material, an expensive venture always.

whether-or-not i can ever squeeze more royalties out of my fifteen albums in the world streaming freely in rivers of computers and iphones and tablets and androids.

whether-or-not to pursue stage-performing ever again.

whether-or-not to keep writing.

whether-or-not there is relevancy.

or, since the world seems to value other noises above music – and i am incredulous and saddened about this – whether-or-not to point my imperative to creating some obnoxious noise app.

because farts make up to $10,000 a day.

sigh.

*****

download music from my little corner of iTUNES

listen on PANDORA radio

read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY

WATERSHED from AS IT IS ©️ 2004 kerri sherwood


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the easel in our sunroom. [d.r. thursday]

we have sat at this table countless times now. it’s the table at which duke and eileen sat for decades of their marriage, sipping coffee, listening to the radio, reading the paper. there have been infinite conversations at this table, much laughter, maybe even an argument or two. this table, clothed in worn, yet sturdy, has seen many meals and some good life.

two days ago i spent some significant time at this table with 20, duke and eileen’s son. we helped him when it was time to clean out their house; duke had moved on to a different dimension and eileen was moving into assisted living. he asked us to put the old table into big red and take it as a donation to one of the resale shops in town. we brought it to st. vincent de paul and they refused it. the guy at the furniture donation door said that it showed wear on the top and that it wasn’t acceptable under their guidelines. we didn’t have time to take it elsewhere so we left it in the back of big red, for a very long time, waiting for another day to donate it somewhere.

looking out onto our deck and backyard, our sunroom is one of our favorite rooms. we stood in the sunroom one day in the early pandemic and did some re-imagining. an old door horizontal on a couple horses spanned the length on the east side of the room and an antique drafting table was smack in the center looking out back. we moved the drafting table upstairs to the office. and stood there, pondering. we thought it might be nice to have a table in front of the window, perhaps one we could sit at with coffee or lunch. we went downstairs into the storage room looking for perhaps another old door, a surface we could use. we couldn’t find just what we wanted, so we thought that we might go look for a table somewhere. it was one of those forehead-smacking-moments when we remembered we had such a table in the back of big red. we unloaded it and the duke-and-eileen table had itself a new home.

we have written at this table. david has drawn cartoons and sketched sketches at this table. i have laid out, added font, finessed, colorized, photoshopped at this table. we have created at this table. it is the easel in our sunroom, a room we adore. amid happy lights, succulents and plants with names like KC, snakeinthegrass, leticia, ralph surround us. the gentle sound of a tiny fountain is soothing and the whir of the small wine-fridge-from-the-boy reminds us not to forget snack-time-happy-hour. we can see the birds at the feeder and know that magic is sunning on a rock in the pond. this table is happy and we are happy the secondhand store turned it away.

so on tuesday, 20 and i sat working on some things he needed to get done. a couple of times he said, “wow. we are sitting at the table duke and eileen sat at all those years…” yes. that’s how we feel each day.

the specific history of this table is a mystery, for we will never know the love expressed at this table, never know the decisions made at this table, never know the tears shed at this table. we just know that it has comforted us through this whole time of pandemic.

like duke and eileen, we have sipped coffee at it, listened to music, read news apps. we have had conversations and much laughter and have argued at this table. this table continues to wear, continues to age, continues to be a place of many meals, and continues to see some good life.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

a place of creations


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no timely manner. [d.r. thursday]

now i understand. at least, i am beginning to understand.

my sweet momma and poppo would linger…watching birds, gazing at flowers, studying the horizon – be it shorefront or mountainside, cityscape or tiny town or rural farmland, slowly taking it in. in the hurry-hurry of my younger years, i would scurry past, noticing but maybe not really.

i am moving slower now. not because i can’t scurry, but because i am choosing to list to the linger side. though we still watch re-runs after re-runs of joey hiking and climbing and backpacking and pitching tents any and everywhere, imagining ourselves in those canyonlands keeping up, imagining ourselves on the pct or the john muir or the colorado trail, i know that our pace would not match the pace of joey or the exuberant younguns on heading somewhere or walking with purpose or the meticulous norwegian xplorer. we would be slower, lingering, lingering. i’m not sure that would get us from point a to point b successfully or in a timely manner, but i’m thinking that our definition of ‘timely manner’ may have to just be different. because now – in the middle of this grand middle age – is different.

for now i want to watch the birds and gaze at flowers up-close. i want to stop and stare, drop to sit on a nearby log and take it in. i want to notice the intricasies of all of it, the undertones, the overtones.

as i look at the close-up of this milkweed trailside i am struck by the layers of detail. it somehow makes me recall decisions between the major chord and the relative minor, a continuum of impact. it makes me think of melodic gestures, a spectrum of color and of grace. a horsehair brush extended from the heights of the universe, painting perfection in the woods. artists’ hands waving paint on canvas, cupping clay on a wheel, flying over the white and black on a piano, coaxing lines that make you weep from a cello. all the same. creation in all its iterations.

on the call pat told me that the music – my music – had harmonics, tuned with the universe, that made her travel. humbling.

for i see that is what my momma and poppo were doing. traveling. they allowed the beauty around them to touch them, to slow them down, convincing them – in all the infinite glory that beauty -and art- can muster – that ‘a timely manner’ was relative, that time was relative. that time spent in a slow linger was precious.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

linger on DAVID’s online gallery