reverse threading

the path back is the path forward

Tag Archives: living life


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season-of-the-adirondack-chair. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

and the-season-of-the-adirondack-chair begins.

i cannot tell you how excited we are about this. for, as in most things, the beginning of something is almost always glorious, full of anticipation and expectation. and the-season-of-the-adirondack-chair is no different.

even with thermals and down vests, even with warm and fuzzy boots, there is no distracting us from the advent of this time, there is no disconcert about temperature or our sedimentary layers of clothing. the possibility just seems limitless.

we easily turn our perfectly lightweight chairs to the sun. we look at each other and smile. and deep inside, we hear bob marley singing, “every little thing is gonna be alright”.

we have waltzed on this patio, sipped wine on this patio, eaten delicious dinners on this patio, played ukuleles on this patio, had band rehearsal on this patio, entertained family and friends and scores of people who are or had been a part of our community on this patio, planned our wedding on this patio, watched our dogga on this patio, had hard and hopeful and healing conversations on this patio, planted tiny farms on this patio, laughed till our bellies hurt on this patio, cried till our bellies hurt on this patio, wished on the moon and the stars on this patio, watched the flame of our firepit dance with abandon on this patio, contemplated on this patio, grieved on this patio, napped on this patio and felt finally-awake on this patio.

and now, a new time will start, overlapping all the other times, weaving in and out of all the rest, a foliated-metamorphic-conglomerate-sedimentary rock life.

and the patio greets the adirondack chairs with glee. they all face the sun. and they smile.

*****

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

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asphalt illusions. [kerri’s blog on not-so-flawed wednesday]

“i’ve looked at life from both sides now
from win and lose and still somehow
it’s life’s illusions I recall
i really don’t know life at all

i’ve looked at life from both sides now
from up and down and still somehow
it’s life’s illusions I recall
i really don’t know life at all”

(joni mitchell – both sides now)

puddletrees. they were right there, waiting. trees out a window. trees in a snowstorm. trees in front of us. illusion. reminding me – in the taking of the photograph – that things are not always what they seem.

it’s like story. things are not always what they seem.

“but in this song there are only two sides to things… there’s reality and i guess what you might call fantasy. there’s enchantment and dis-enchantment, what we’re taught to believe things are and what they really are.” (joni mitchell – at a performance 1967)

two sides. we’ve been taught to remember that there are two sides to every story. we learn though – somewhere along the way – that there are often many more sides than two. story is a multi-faceted creature, amorphous enough – and pliable enough – to take on the shape of whatever the storyteller – or the listener – wishes. this is not just dependent on details or fact; this is not simply dependent on reality. this is dependent on intention. even with the truth-telling of true story – with ample substantiation – there are others who will warp story into their agenda. reality and the flipside. brutal.

and so sometimes the don’t-know-clouds, don’t-know-love, don’t-know life takes on monumental proportion.

but there are puddletree moments. pared down. and these are not win or lose, up or down moments. they are simply suspensions of time – when we marvel at the reflection of trees in puddles or a single snowflake on a leaf or the survivors in scorched earth of a controlled burn, when we linger in the harmonic of a ninth or the color of the peony, when we pause in the middle of mayhem to look around us, when we know that just a little beyond reality is dream. and we can see it from here.

life’s illusions in an asphalt puddle. we really don’t know life. what it really is. at all.

“well, something’s lost, but something’s gained
in living every day.”

*****

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

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buymeacoffee is a tip-jar website where you may help to support the continuing creating of artists whose work you value. xoxo


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orange sherbet and milkweed. [kerri’s blog on two artists tuesday]

the orange sherbet sky is a stunning backdrop to most anything but the milkweed’s wisp is anything but most-anything.

we pass by and notice. we pay attention. texture and color and movement from the gentlest breeze – it is a photograph before it was a photograph. my job was simply to snap it.

our days are slower. we linger in not-knowing. we acknowledge time as it sneaks by. and the next week comes before any of us are ready, before it seems possible. even the milkweed is surprised.

we are learning lesson after lesson. that this is life: the things our fingertips touch, the scent on the wind, the view before us, the call of the black-capped chickadee, the ground under our feet. we are caught up by the impermanence of it all. we are realizing the folly in the gathering of stuff. we immerse in the river where there is no stratum. we feel the moment, without knowing the edges of next.

the orange sherbet sky doesn’t dawdle. color has another place to be. and as the sun drops below the horizon, the shadow-gaps fill in.

we stand with the milkweed in dusk, close, loitering in early night and, with gratitude and rest, ready for next.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY

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blurry from here. [d.r. thursday]

it’s all blurry, isn’t it?

we are mutually reading a book – the measure – in which every person in the world over 22 years old is gifted a box. in that box is a string which represents the length of one’s life. we are about a third of the way through so making our way along the trail of this story. we can’t help but wonder if we would open the box.

it’s all blurry from here – the future. no matter what, we do not have any idea what’s out there, what is to come, what will or will not happen. even with the best of planning, the field of vision is not crystal clear.

our video of choice on-pillows was a pct hike. no surprise there. but the youtube we watched was extraordinary. an “older” couple – 61 and 60 – backpacking this thru-hike, exquisite photography, even more exquisite narration. more than a few times we wished we had jotted down his words, wisdoms from the trail, wisdoms from blurry life. they called their hike “a pacific crest trail coddiwomple documentary” and he explained that “coddiwomple” means “to travel in a purposeful manner towards a vague destination, ” to “keep moving forward even when you’re not quite sure where you’re going”.

blurry. life.

we could seriously relate. even without being on trail, we pay attention to just how blurry things really are. the rearview mirror can give you hints, but never quite enough information and, besides, it’s not the direction any of us are headed in our timelines. they keep going and going. focused, unfocused.

i have found myself peering at the future…as if through those tiny opera glass binoculars…trying to see what is out there in front of us. the aperture is narrow in diameter, the focus is not all-consuming. anything outside of the zone is out of focus. blurry from here.

i went through photographs the other day. i take hundreds each week. the unintentional rothko showed up in my camera feed. studying what came before and what came after gave me clues as to what it was a picture of. i now know what it is. but it doesn’t change the feeling the photograph evoked. the painting of color fields, blurry and without clear lines of distinction. a rothko created by accident.

life is kind of like that, i guess. you are out there, coddiwompling around, living life, breathing in and out, never really sure of the destination, always surprised along the way. you paint what you think will be the future. and then, in any given moment, it all gets blurry. blurry, but nevertheless – surprisingly – beautiful.

i’m not sure i’d open the box.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY


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astonished. [d.r. thursday]

nostalgia hits fast.

how many times i have stood in front of the gazebo in northport harbor…how many times i have sat on the steps, lost in thought or listening to the clinking of metal sails in the docks next to the park…how many times i’ve wandered in the harbor surrounded by the dreamy lights of the gazebo and old-fashioned sidewalk lampposts on the paths.

lake bluff brought it all back.

an absolutely beautiful display in the square drew us to it and we parked, even in freezing cold, to walk around a bit, take pictures and soak it all in. it wasn’t northport, but it was stunning and magical.

the wordpress prompt today reads: is your life today what you pictured a year ago?

are any of our lives today what we pictured a year ago?

the element of surprise … both ways.

at a time of year that always-always makes me miss my childhood home, both of my parents, our big stone fireplace, the luminaria lighting our neighborhood streets and groups of friends caroling around the blocks, hot cocoa and marshmallows, tinsel and krumkake, rum cake and eggnog, the delicious anticipation of opening gifts and the northport harbor gazebo radiant, its lights shimmering in the harbor, we find the little square in the middle of lake bluff. astonishing.

“instructions for living a life: pay attention. be astonished. tell about it.” (mary oliver)

*****

UNFETTERED 48″ X 48″

read DAVID’s thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY


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spirograph on deck. [saturday morning smack-dab.]

we are surrounded by people with grandchildren. there are tiny babies, toddlers, pre-teens, teenagers. we are ‘of the age’. it would seem that each and every day there is yet another announcement on social media of a new grandbaby-to-be, a gender reveal party, a baby shower, a birth of a tiny being into this great big world. my biological grandma clock is pokin’ at me, but, alas, this is not within my control. at all. these are important and very personal decisions; each of us has to decide what is individually right for us. and so, we’ll see. no matter our age, we celebrate our children living their lives.

and so, we watch others as they enter the glee-filled world of grandparenthood. they amass toys and sleeping provisions and high chair options and read books about the newfangled ways small babies learn to eat food and they post adorable videos of all the extraordinarily ordinary moments we – as parents – didn’t have time to notice. they go to the closet in the hallway or in the family room and gaze up at the tinkertoys and legos and trouble game and candyland and the saved baby dolls and barbie dolls and matchbox cars and crayons and stickers and markers and coloring books and they get dreamy looks on their faces as they ponder all these – once again – in their lives. ahh. what perfection.

we have all that stuff too. it’s mostly in the hall closet, where we’ve always kept it. games and puzzles and crafty things and bebop and a jumprope and jacks and egg coloring kits and pumpkin carving tools and those squishy balls you get all soaky wet to throw and frisbees. all the crayons and colored pencils and markers and glue are upstairs in the cabinet in the office. and stickers. lots of stickers.

there is really no reason we can’t just revisit all that stuff now anyway. i mean, if we are going to practice snack-time, we can spirograph first.

he is such a boy. SUCH a boy. any – and i mean ANY – time i ask him if he’s hungry, he always replies with an emphatic “yes!” like he’s been starving for days and days. snack-time is a driving force, a dominant priority, something he has already perfected. but, hmmm….yes, a carrot easily dangle-able.

i’m guessing spirograph is in our future.

happy mother’s day.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this SATURDAY MORNING

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