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shadow wisdom. [kerri’s blog on k.s. friday]

the shadow knows.

on this part of our walk in the ‘hood, our shadows precede us. we follow them east down the sidewalk, never quite catching up. and, just as suddenly as they appeared, they disappear – as we turn a corner and head for home.

i, laughing aloud, wish for the long, skinny legs of my shadow. though we clearly can’t see our expressions in our shadow photograph, we both smile as i take a picture. it reminds me of times of confusion in my life when it was difficult to sort out the emotions of the time – and i smiled anyway.

when i was in junior high we were assigned the task of choosing an old radio show, writing a new script and recording the show onto cassette tape. my group chose “the shadow”. “who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of man? the shadow knows.” i don’t remember the script we wrote or the storyline we chose, but i do remember the commercial we made. it was about a product that could clean anything – from brushing your teeth to heavy grunge cleaning – the same product.

i am aware of shadow work – the shadow – the place where unprocessed trauma is found, where pain is stored, where we somehow try to protect ourselves. the work to help recognize what has become unconsciously present in our lives. it would seem important for all of us to have an opportunity for the quiet time to step into our shadow – the place that knows. because we are human, there are always places in our heart to heal.

in the meanwhile and here in the sweet phase, we walk arm in arm around the block a few steps behind our shadows. we binge on happy moments and hoard them for trying times, sad times, confusing times, times when our shadow tilts its head and asks us to feel something else.

we carry the wisdom of time we have already spent living. there’s a knowledge we gain as we experience the blisses and the traumas of this life. and smiling – even in the shadow times – stokes the fire, keeps the pilot light on, reminds us of the here and now and the evanescence of it all.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY

listen to GOOD MOMENTS: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbiKiz1NZYs

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our promise to walter and irma. [kerri’s blog on d.r. thursday]

i want to hold onto the sound. cicadas and crickets on summer nights. it’s a locating sound, and, as i adirondack-chair-sit on the deck listening, i am immersed in it. i can feel it.

we’ve been watching the series “alone” lately. our binges have taken us through to season five, where ten people have been dropped off in desolate mongolia to survive as long as they are able. the sounds are completely different – wolves are howling, deadly snakes hissing, bears rustling through the woods – unnerving sounds. it is beyond my wildest imagination what these people are doing, how they are assimilating into and feeling a part of this environment, how they are sustaining. i would absolutely fail out there.

it does make me think that – indeed – we all have our strengths. as we hiked the other day we talked about how fascinating it is to watch other people and the random abilities they’ve been blessed with. we are simply spokes on the wheel…a giant wheel of universe proportion.

i came across this cicada in our driveway. i was immediately saddened, for it was wandering in a circle and i knew it had little time left on this earth. its beautiful coloring, its giant alien eyes, it captivated me and i gently placed it into the bushes next to the driveway, offering a few words of gratitude for its existence.

one less cicada to sing its nightly song, i know that too soon the night will be quiet and i will miss the sounds i have always associated with the white noise of summer.

i woke up this morning to the sound of walter and irma in our backyard. these are two cardinals that frequent our feeder and hang out on the wires of the garden happy lights or on the top of the fence that stretches across the yard. they are as much a touchstone as our cicadas, but i know they will stay through the fall, through the winter and hopefully will cheerily greet the spring again next year. they have a hard time with our bird feeder because the rim is not big enough for them to perch upon – and because the squirrels do gymnastics emptying it.

we have promised walter and irma a flat feeder – the kind we understand that cardinals prefer. and every time walter flails around on the edge of our current birdfeeder, we imagine that irma is reminding him that someday we will have a different feeder, to hang in there and to stop being overly-dramatic.

i think that someday has arrived.

sometimes it is the simplest of things that bring us the most reassurance. somehow the loss of one more cicada makes me want us to extend to our backyard birds something that will make their ability to sustain a tiny bit easier. they are spokes on our wheel – giving us the grand pleasure of watching them, slowing us down, grounding us.

in the days that we feel like we are in the wilds of mongolia – for we all have days like that – we find things that bolster us, we find things that give us perspective, we find things that make us feel a part of the whole, we find ways to sustain.

i know i will soon miss the cicadas and crickets. i recorded their nightsong on a video and saved it. just in case – in the middle of winter or the wilds of mongolia – i need to feel it.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

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sink or swim. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

you don’t think much about the sink until the sink no longer behaves like a sink.

and in those moments, as you stare at the rising water line in the not-draining-sink, your heart does a little flip-flop-sink and you mentally list all the solutions you hope will quickly and thoroughly address the problem.

but in a house that is anxiously awaiting its centennial birthday party in ’28 this-old-house/handyman/reddit/my-dad’s-rube-goldberg solutions are unlikely fixes. even AI has trouble adequately addressing this…the plunger, hot water, baking soda and vinegar, salt water and one of those straight 99 cent barbed-edge snakes are not the thing.

so we called mike, plumber extraordinaire, who told us to call shane, drain extraordinaire.

sparing you the details of the kitchen sink drain blockage clean-out and the bathroom sink drain blockage clean-out, i will tell you that it felt like a small miracle to run the water in the sink and watch it go down the drain – as it is supposed to. there are days we are amazed by running water. and there are days we are amazed by sinks that drain the water running in them. these last days have been both.

the simplest things – addressed by people who really know their stuff – are back to being simplest things.

those moments david plunged and plunged and plunged, the moments we shook baking soda into the drain followed by vinegar – like a cool science experiment – the moments d laid on towels under the kitchen sink cabinet, bucket at the ready, undoing the j piping…they are – thankfully – fading into oblivion. this is good, as we are not the people who know their stuff when it comes to sinksanddrains.

there’s kind of a lesson here.

despite the fact that we always try to make it up – the solution – acting like we can articulate the problem and then – using good deductive reasoning and analysis (and google and youtube) – solve the problem – does not mean we will truly solve the problem. we may stave it off for a bit. we may make a tiny, barely discernible difference which boosts our high-fiving egos but solves nada. we may truly make the problem worse. it’s a wide spectrum of possibility and so many things can happen in that unhappy expanse of disaster potential.

the lesson, you remind me….

yes, the lesson is to give over to the people who know. that’s – indeed – why they know.

so, although it may seem a tad bit like overkill, i have to say that we are ever grateful to shane this week. every single time i run water in the bathroom sink – to brush my teeth or wash my face or my hands or in the kitchen sink for any of innumerable reasons – I think about his calm and measured demeanor and the fact that he – with quiet confidence – fixed it all.

and the simple thing – the job of sink – is back to being a simple thing. it is back to not being larger than life. it is back to being almost 100 and waiting for its birthday party just a few years down the road.

it’s funny how a misbehaving sink can run your life – instantly. all other priorities fall by the wayside as the water rises, rises. nothing else gets done. i’m guessing it just plumb wanted its fifteen minutes of fame, its time in the sun.

it’s a good thing we didn’t have to sink-or-swim on our own. we’d still be sink-ing.

*****

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

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doing-do-bees. [kerri’s blog on two artists tuesday]

“i’m a romper room do-bee, a do-bee all day long.” (romper room)

oh geeez. about to write this blogpost, i looked at this image – of this stunning bumblebee happily lingering in the flowers of our coleus – and thought of the romper room do-bee song. where does this stuff come from???

my dear husband claims that i am a circular worker-bee, that i go from one thing to the next, doing a bit, then doing a bit, then doing a bit, then circling around again and getting a bit more done, a bit more done, a bit more done. i suppose that is somewhat true – though i would like to add that eventually it all truly gets done, circular or not. as i watched this bumblebee bumbling happily around the other day, i thought that maybe i am more of a bumble than a circular worker-bee. or maybe that’s the same thing…

this little bee seemed perfectly content to flit from one flower to the next, never lingering too long on any one nectar source. it reminds me of when i had toddlers, flitting from reading from a stack of books on the floor to the matchbox cars on the floor to the studio to jot down a lyric or a melody to the stove to stir the kraft macaroni and cheese or flip over the grilled cheese sandwich. in constant motion. just like the bee. eh, truth be told, it reminds me of now.

romper room was a staple back in the day. though the host never saw me (she never said my name aloud) in her magic mirror, i remained a fan through my pre-school years. the fact that i have the romper room do-bee songs 45 rpm record attests to the impact of this little show back then. it’s interesting that i still have it – in my 45rpm record case – the kind that perfectly fits 45s with a buckle on the front and the handle on the top. and it does make me wonder how mitch miller and his orchestra, along with the sandpipers recorded this side a/side b with straight faces. “i always do what’s right. i never do anything wrong. i’m a romper rom do-bee, a do-bee all day long,” the big finish has a predictably rising (and crescendoing) melody despite impossible-to-humanly-achieve lyrics.

we write blogposts six days a week, as you know. five of them are based on images of photography or quotes we have come across in our path, while saturday is the cartoon smack-dab that we produce. that you have gotten to this sentence is amazing to me and i want to thank you for reading – however often or sporadically you read. i’m never quite sure of what i will write as we open up our laptops (ok, well, not my laptop now as that is refusing to remember its role in life, so i open up my mini ipad). i’m never sure of how you might react or respond to what i have written. sometimes i feel vulnerable about what i have shared. sometimes i feel nervous about what i’ve put out there. sometimes i’m a little tiny bit proud of something i’ve written. nevertheless, i keep writing and telling you of life from my little corner of the world. it is, after all, a romper room rule:

romper stomper bomper boo, tell me, tell me, tell me, do.

i’m an artist. always i know that there will be another flower, there will be another source of nectar. the next image, the next day. and i will happily – and bumbly – share words and thoughts with whomever wishes to read them.

you and i – we are together in this moment. we are doing-do-bees, sharing time in the world.

and, from the bottom of my trying-to-be-a-do-bee-all-day-long heart, i wish you plentiful flowers filled with plentiful sweet nectar as you flit from one moment of your life to the next.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY

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good people. [kerri’s blog on merely-a-thought monday]

it’s not that complicated. BE GOOD PEOPLE.

it’s not complicated at all.

it would seem the most basic tenet – of any philosophy of life, any religion or belief system, any ideology, any world outlook, any life stance or doctrine of living.

it would seem that at the very root of all of it – this thing we do on this earth – being good people would be most important. we are – time and again – witnesses to and recipients of abundant goodness. likewise – time and again – we are capable of bestowing goodness.

but i suppose the word “good” is up for grabs these days. and i suppose each of us will define that – and what it means to be a good person – for ourselves.

as this election cycle continues to unfold until it screeches to a stop on november 5, we have some things to decide. we need to really discern what is actually happening, what candidates are really saying, what future plans they might enact, what adjectives describe them, their candidacy, their intention as president. we need be clear on what their overarching belief is of how the populace of this nation should be treated – which includes women and men, humans of all races, regardless of age, religion, gender identification, sexual orientation, economic status.

we need to be wary and aware, to check our sources, ask questions, have conversations in our communities and – even more importantly – beyond our own communities.

we need to hear the truths and pick apart the untruths, look for the kind of future we wish for, the people we aspire to look up to, the kind of country we will be able to count on for our future and the future of the other people in our homes, in our towns, our states, our nation.

for this country to move forward – to responsibly and continually evolve – is to give all equal access to vital physical needs, safety, education, health and healthcare, possibility. are we our brother’s/sister’s keeper or are we all about our individual selves – every person for himself – with no integration or inclusion of any others? what are the messages we wish this country to send to all the world?

it is my hope that our intentions as a country are ever more humanitarian, ever more generous, ever more open, ever more caring.

it is my hope that the ugly, mean-spirited, incoherent ramblings of a power-seeker are made plain to all in time for us to vote against it.

it is my hope that all people have the courage to step away from the zeal and status created by anger-mongering and popularity bandwagons to vote with true heart.

it is my hope that the gaslighting and conspiracy stories, the exaggerations, vitriol and lies, the sneakiness, the violent threats, vulgar rhetoric and promises of retribution, the misogyny, bigotry and the darkness of the shadow of authoritarianism are cast aside – for democracy, altruism, kindness, empathy, virtuous truths – for good people.

good people. it’s not complicated.

*****

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

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why on earth? [kerri’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab.]

messed-up is an understatement.

i tried to find an adjective to describe the things people are saying and doing ‘these days’. the current political climate has seemingly swung open a door to the undeniably crass, the vulgar, the rude, the shocking lie, the exaggeration, the pontificating of extremism, crudeness and base-ness beyond any description. i gave up on adjectives. because the descriptors confounding, perplexing, astonishing ….. don’t even touch it.

every single day i utter the words, “why.on.earth???!!!!” i am shocked at the things people are saying and i can’t understand why they are saying the things they are saying. i am shocked at the things people are doing and i can’t understand why – on earth – they are doing the things they are doing. so, yes, perplexed, confounded, astonished. but also stunned, disappointed, dumbfounded, bewildered, sickened.

where have manners gone? what about respect? courtesy? decorum??

propriety has fallen by the wayside.

why on earth???

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this SATURDAY MORNING

SMACK-DAB. Copyright 2024 kerrianddavid.com

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the pontoon boat. [kerri’s blog on k.s. friday]

prior to going up-north i had only been on a pontoon boat once – in the carolina mountains with a black lab who loved to swim and a tiny little life-vested girl who equally loved the water and who spent time rafting alongside. our little boy had not yet even joined us, so it was a long time ago and the memory, although faded in detail, is clearly peaceful and beautiful. gloriously great fun.

the pontoon of up-north means laughter and snacks, old-fashioneds and slow cruising around the connecting lakes. it means conversation and story-telling, the search for loons, and the art of spontaneous plan-making.

we haven’t solved all of earth’s mysteries onboard, nor have we come up with a design for world peace, but we have found solutions to less pressing problems, offered and heard advice, dreamed a bit.

there is nothing quite like a pontoon boat to remind you of the power of community. and, more than once on that pontoon boat a few weeks ago, i looked around and gave abundant thanks for the others on the boat. snugged into comfy seats, sun on our faces, a summer breeze blowing, we are in a cove of deep friendship, people who can count on us and upon whom we can depend.

moments like these lend themselves to carrying a kind of a pontoon boat philosophy of life everywhere…a place of inclusion, of generosity, of comfort, a place of openness and caring. a place to share some time, to float ideas, to listen, to feel heard, to have raucous fun, to be quiet. a gentler ride through life, with people around you who will be there when the seas are rougher, when you need a little help with forward momentum, when their support is like oars in a rowboat.

we are fortunate – when we can give over to the pontoon boat. we are fortunate – life presents us with people with whom we can ride along together. we are fortunate – we are reminded of the sheer gift of community. we are fortunate – and we take time to be grateful.

the loons watched us and then, after a few seconds of study, they determined we were simply co-existing with them. they paddled away, riding our rippling wake.

*****

TIME TOGETHER: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orq9Q6Wd5O4

read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY

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an upside. [kerri’s blog on d.r. thursday]

i scoured the streets of san francisco looking for it. i had somehow lost the peace pendant my daughter gifted me – it fell off from around my neck and, as we moseyed away from the san fran moma and shopped, i suddenly realized it was gone. i immediately backtracked my steps, even knowing it was not likely i would find it. we all walked with our eyes peeled to the city streets.

as i stepped up onto a curb while crossing a busy street, i saw it. there, in the gutter of the road, lay the pewter peace sign and its chain. i felt a surge of relief finding it, for I truly do treasure the gifts my children have given me and, of course, you know how thready i am.

years ago, the kiddos made a shopping trip to target. together they picked out a tall bamboo vessel with golden and deep red-dyed dried reeds and gave it to me – a gift. it has – since then – continued to have a place in our home. now it stands in the bedroom, between the red and white gingham-checked recliner wing-chair and the jewelry armoire i purchased on marketplace, right in front of the window. in the morning, the sun streams in and sets the reeds aglow. and i think of my beloved children every single time.

i suppose i could be less thready, a tad bit less sentimental. it’s not likely, though.

i could take you on a walk through our house and yard. the stories would not be about the value of objects we have displayed or the name-brand of things we own. the stories would be narratives, tales of experiences we’ve had, of times with others, of things we’ve been gifted, of workarounds, of love delivered in a plant, a candle, a wine holder, hearts, peace signs, a rag-rugged love sculpture, a quilt, of history in a branch, an old table, a window frame, vintage suitcases.

when littlebabyscion had trouble last week – and we had a conversation – me and littlebabyscion – i asked it to hang around longer. and i fully expected it to listen, because i have basically personified that little vehicle since i purchased it. friends from all over wrote to ask how littlebabyscion was, because, well, they know. yeah, less thready is not likely.

this morning was intensely beautiful. with the sun starting to pour in the open windows and all the fans off for the moment – so no white noise – we could hear the birds, the gurgling pond, the airplane flying above. we sipped coffee and dogdog laid on the foot of the bed. there was nothing you could have done to have made it any better. feet tucked under the blankets – for it was still a little cool in the early morning – we were silent.

i memorized it and tucked it away.

that way, another day – when it’s cloudy outside or inside – i could pull it all back and remember, i could let that moment wrap around me once again.

thready has an upside.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

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getting ready. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

fall has cracked the door open. and, though it may tiptoe around a bit in this teeter-totter season, it will not backtrack. it is on its way.

and nature – in its wisdom – is doing the work, prepping for cold to arrive, stoking up, storing up, guarding its ability to survive, seed heads readying to spread far and wide.

she asked me if i would be recording again. I wasn’t sure how to answer. i don’t know. it has been some time since my last project. recording is expensive and – because of today’s world of streaming – not particularly financially rewarded, making it a kind of skewed investment…heavy on the cost, extraordinarily light on the payoff.

yet, every independent artist knows recording is not solely about the financial reward. it is the expression of what’s inside, just waiting to hit air. it’s doing the work, prepping, stoking, storing, guarding – all for the seed heads to fly.

she asked me other questions as well – how i compose, if i hear music inside. her questions cracked open the door to a conversation I haven’t had in a long time, a real conversation about my music. i felt grateful – not only for her inquisitiveness, but for her obvious support of what i have already produced. it was a sort of balm on a wound that was just lingering, lingering.

I don’t know when – or if – i will produce another album. i’ve teetered-tottered just like the waning of summer and the rising of fall, just like daisies struggling to stay vibrant, open, to stave off utter fallow. i’ve wondered through these last few years if, after fifteen albums, i was “done”, wondered if, at 65, i was no longer relevant, wondered if i still had the necessary chutzpah.

i miss the stage, a piano and a boom vocal mic, a wood apron beneath my boots. i’ve missed telling the stories of songs and the gestures of instrumental piano. i’ve missed eye contact with an audience, finding resonant bits, making people laugh or reminisce, the moment you know they are right there with you.

the daisy seed heads are getting ready. it’s pretty certain they will proliferate gardens again in the spring after their fallow through fall and winter.

maybe – somewhere in here – i am getting ready too. i guess we’ll see.

*****

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

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golden light rising. [kerri’s blog on two artists tuesday]

the glow of the setting sun teased through the grasses out front. autumn is rising.

my old hiking boots are waiting by the back door. soon – and very soon – it will be time to change out of our hiking sandals and back to these boots, worn from many, many miles of trails. we need to replace them. the podiatrist informed us we should purchase new ones every six months or so if we are wearing our boots regularly. since we are artists, this is not quite possible. and so, these circa 2016 boots have graced our feet for the last eight years of hikes. every bit of worn leather, every creak, has a story to tell. someday it will be a tad bit hard to retire them. they have served us well.

today is the first day of school here. i am completely out of sync with these touchstones of time. the trip to target – with school supplies galore – helped place me in time. but with grown children and no direct connection to the school system, we had to look up the district calendar.

a certain wistfulness comes on the breeze with the return of the fall sun. it happens every year. it’s hard to identify, but it is palpable.

i wonder if it is a kind of homesickness – for growing-up times back on long island and for my own days with a backpack – stuffed with textbooks, spirals and new pencils – slung over my shoulder.

i wonder if it is a kind of nostalgia – a yearning – for the times when my children were little, when they picked out new backpacks and pencil cases, gathered their wide-ruled notebooks and glue sticks, colored highlighters and crayons, those days when packing lunches and snacks and waiting for the bus were the defining times of the day.

i wonder if it is the bank of memories i carry – taking my children to college, unpacking into dorm rooms, apartments, toting stuff back and forth, my heart holding dearly to the threads of their childhood while, at the same time, supporting their gossamer winging wings, watching their contrails.

i wonder if it is a kind of longing – a pining for things undone to be done, for things not accomplished to be accomplished, for summer dreams to extend beyond the setting summer sun.

autumn rises and i feel invigorated. these are new times. there is new possibility. i have no idea what is coming but this rising autumnal sun is full of golden light.

golden. light. and my old boots are waiting by the back door.

“the sun shines not on us, but in us.” (john muir)

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY

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