we have a front seat to the meadow. each time we hike, we are witness to the lace and humbled by powerful nature, its resilience and rejuvenation.
the lace is tightly wound in the spring, fresh, straining to burst. we watch it as it then gently opens to the sun. we watch it embrace full sky. we watch it as it folds in on itself in the fall, storing energy. we watch it as it releases seeds for next.
the lace is transcendent. it does not push back against this progress. it somehow knows that moving through phases are, indeed, all part of the journey. and nature’s lessons are clear. life is not linear. there are cycles. there is next. there is much interdependence in the meadow to sustain all life there.
and through it all, the lace is empowered. to trust the process, to keep going, to stand strong, to gracefully be open, to share in the synergy of all – all the wildflowers, all the underbrush, all the weeds, all the trees, all the insects, all the wildlife – in the meadow. to survive.
not so different than a country.
*****
THIS PART OF THE JOURNEY from THIS PART OF THE JOURNEY Šī¸ 1997, 2000 kerri sherwood
“fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars…”(bart howard)
my uncle allen sang. his love of singing – through years of lessons and practice – often starred in our living room, where my brother would play guitar, i would play organ or piano and allen would sing. there is not a time i hear “fly me to the moon” without thinking about him or his devoted support of me.
it was my uncle allen who first encouraged me to record. it was my uncle allen who financially supported those early recording sessions. it was my uncle allen who celebrated the three-song cassette when it was done, ordering extra copies for everyone. it was my uncle allen who was my first go-to and my confidante when life-as-i-knew-it fell apart, when music-as-i-knew-it was shattered and when i fled new york. it was my uncle allen who built a house in florida that i could rent from him, trying to heal with no victim advocate or the assistance of any therapy. and it was my uncle allen who celebrated when i finally – sixteen years later – started recording again.
the third ward in milwaukee is one of our favorite places in which to wander about. i have a thing for paper and notebooks and pencils and all things stationery, so i find broadway paper a joyful shop. their paper airplane mobiles enchant over by the entrance door that shares the vestibule for marn art & culture hub. the exposed beams, exposed ductwork, exposed brick – ahh – d and i could live in such a space. we spent the afternoon strolling around with 20, in and out of shoppes. a tiny crazy air plant called my name and we bonded; “waukee” was the only purchase we brought home with us. we sat at the public market, had wine and gumbo and fried clams. it was all heavenly.
i searched in the hall closet – an utter melange of stuff: games, crafts, 10×10 vendor tent weights, playing cards – and found what i was looking for: the last vestiges of the origami airplane folding kit. because their dad was a pilot, this paper airplane kit was a big hit with our children. but i remembered there were a few pieces of origami paper left and – more importantly – the directions on how to fold. mayyyybe d and i will channel the mobile-making juju of groundbreaking mobile sculptor alexander calder … or, at the very least, channel broadway paper.
in the meanwhile i dove into the thickly-filled drawers of old file cabinets in my studio. and found the other thing i was looking for: the sheet music for fly me to the moon. it is pretty likely i’ll play that later and d and i will sing it – in great honor and loving memory of my uncle allen – a man for whom i am grateful, who is likely singing on the clouds, who generously encouraged soaring and playing among the stars.
“tonight while the lights are shining and the microphone is on, i’ll play for you…” (seals and crofts)
or no lights.
a piano perched among the boulders looking out toward the mountain range – in this very special place. a boom mic.
in my dreams, i can see it.
the bigrocks are seats and the program is not written. it all comes from the spirit in this place, from air, from healing. and – even more specifically in my dream – a yamaha disklavier pro minus the fancy-schmancy newfangled stuff – an instrument to record directly to disk…on-the-fly on-tape, in the vernacular.
in my dreams – in my regaining of feeling relevant – my fight to regain relevance – as a 65 year-old recording artist who broke both wrists snowboarding and then tore my scapholunate ligament (leaving me with a rh grand total of 45° forward rom) – i am sitting at C7 pros all over – in fields of boulders, in canyonlands, perched on mesas, in meadows of wildflowers, on a cool sand beach. i am playing the boulderfield, the canyonland, the mesa, the meadow, the beach. it is a conversation between us – even, maybe – through me. it is simply an offering to anyone – or any one – who wishes to listen. it’s a dream awash in unlikelihood but with maybe-just-maybe the smallest iota of possible. maybe we can make it happen.
i stood – again – on the most obvious rock from which to bow to my invisible audience. and i bowed low.
because sound or not, there is music. sheet music or not, there is composing. audience or not, there is listening. it is all happening – simultaneously. right there. in that place.
the boulders on the grassy knoll know it. and i can see it.
“i’ve practiced many years and i have come a long, long way just to play for you… my life is but a song i have written in many ways, just to say to you…”
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from a distance they are paintbrushes, sporadically appearing in the meadow, catching plumes of downy fluff that spread like thick contrails, and, catching the wind, fly off. i can imagine plucking one of these paintbrushes, dipping it in paint, touching it to canvas, light strokes of color.
i have some paintbrushes downstairs. they are wood and some kind of fiber, inexpensive brushes i purchased when i was painting the canvas for the hall and the canvases for the living room. i actually didn’t use them. instead, i used a couple of housepaint brushes and, in alignment with that, house paint. latex. in cans. there was nothing about my painting that would be called “fine” – it was big strokes, big spattering, big expression. big brushes to big canvas. i saved the wooden brushes and, even now, haven’t yet used them, though recently bought a few small 8×8 inch canvas boards. i’m not sure why yet.
on the other hand, david cherishes his paintbrushes and knows exactly why to use each of them. his careful hand applying just the right amount of paint, brush to canvas, shaping the narrative of the painting. he recently bought a big roll of canvas. cutting off a five foot square, he painted a replica of a previous painting he had done, a piece that someone wanted but that he had painted for me. it was an amazing process to witness, as he brought the same energy, the same freedom of movement, the same emotion to this emerging painting. and suddenly, a month of hours-each-day later, it was complete. unfettered II had a destination and we shipped it off, like a short-term child he carefully tended and then let go.
one of our youtube addictions is to a channel of a man named martijn doolaard, a dutchman who is restoring two stone buildings in the italian alps. slowly, deliberately, patiently – with no expectation, no judgement, no apparent worry – martijn painstakingly goes about this restoration, working from sun-up to sundown, cooking himself dinners that look as beautiful as his vista and relaxing by editing hours of video or by painting. his brushes and his oils are precise. with brush to canvas, he paints landscapes of his surroundings, the environment of peace he has created, his studio the mountainside and sky.
i wonder who will pluck these thistlebrushes. i wonder what medium they will use to paint, upon what canvas they will work. what strokes will be applied to the prickly leaves, the blossoming flowers, the unrealized buds, the underbrush dying from eradication? what colors will be mixed to mimic the rising sun, the blur of a hawk on the wing, the flat bill of the white crane, the camouflage shell of the turtle?
nature has already brought its best in this meadow, in this forest, its brushes to canvas. it has brought its best at the line of surf of the ocean, upon the summit of high mountains, in the deepest of canyonlands, in the setting sun on red rock. it has brought its best in the faces of those we love, those who love us. it has brought its best in the perfection of creatures – domestic and wild.
boomerang betsy was shot out of the bulgarian sky on the way to the ploesti oil fields in romania. it was 79 years ago today. i’m grateful for the tenacity of my sweet poppo, taken prisoner-of-war and missing-in-action to everyone back home for months. he survived and came back home to – one day – tell the harrowing story and combat the unnamed ptsd that became part of his strong fabric as a man, a husband, a father.
without our knowing it, the veterans administration named my dad #VeteranOfTheDay on july 19, 2019. i stumbled across this a couple days ago and wondered how it was we did not know this. he was – and is – our hero every day, but it was a thrill to see a day devoted to him and his dedicated service, celebrating him, seven years after he moved on from this plane.
today we arrive in iowa. david’s family is gathering to celebrate columbus/aka chuck/aka charles/aka his dad. a time put aside to inurn his ashes in his little hometown in the farmlands. we are in a farmhouse – one with a back porch, a working silo, green grass on which to play bocce ball. the family will come here for dinners, to reminisce, to play and laugh and, likely, weep a bit. i know it will be a time rich with moments.
these dads of ours were like great white trillium. somehow – despite everything – growing easily in the world, faithful, not-too-picky, gently spreading seeds of wisdom.
the chicago botanic garden says, “in the constellation of singular spring flowers, there are a few stars that shine more brightly than the rest. perhaps the fairest of them all is the great white trillium.”
they will bloom pink. hot pink. soft pink. their scent will waft across the backyard and fill the patio with sweetness. peonies are this graceful gift of spring, blooming once a year and stunning the universe with rich layers of soft petals. were there to be a time-lapse camera on the peony, what would be the soundtrack of this wondrous flower?
this peony (and a smaller one next to barney) is truly the star of the yard. without much help from us, its beauty will reign supreme over all the grasses and all the hosta and all the day lilies. it is – despite all efforts by dogga – a survivor. and every year we marvel at how much bigger it is growing and how healthy it looks.
a quick google search reveals that peonies symbolize romantic and non-romantic love, as well as friendship and happiness. ours, blooms waiting, was a gift from dear friends, transplanted from their yard, a haven of flowers. it is stoking up energy; its gorgeousness is innate.
there is a new baby coming into the family. a baby girl. the other day i had the absolute delight of seeing the ultrasound of this baby merely four months from her premiere appearance. stoking up energy, dreaming about wearing hot pink onesies and puckered vintage polly flinders dresses. yes. wondrous stuff.
i remember that feeling. thirty-three years ago yesterday my daughter was born. pink quickly became her color. i know now’days there is a movement to have babies in monochromatic tones, beiges and earthy tones, greys, muted colors, gender-neutral. but back in the day, i celebrated this beautiful beloved baby girl with the pinks of the rainbow.
and so, each year, right about the time the peonies are getting ready to burst forth, i am celebrating her birth-day, celebrating the hot pink of her zeal in life, celebrating the opportunity this universe gave to me – to be her mother. to be the mother of her little brother, whose toddler color was blue-jean-oshkosh-overalls. the fragile blooms a dominant force in our yard, their presence in the world a dominant force in my heart.
“workers might want to consider these top 10 skills, which employers say are rising in importance over the next five years: 1. creative thinking.”(jane thier – fortune magazine)
mm-hmm. yup. #2 is analytical thinking. i’m pretty certain that without creative thinking, analytical thinking would hit dead-ends every time. and self-destruct.
the other night, in the middle of the night, the wee hours of the night when one is supposed to be sleeping, i was – shockingly – wide awake. we had a long conversation, chatting about places we had lived way-earlier-on, jobs we had way-earlier-on. i talked about eating lots of kellogg’s cornflakes and he talked about mountains of pbj sandwiches. we have both had histories of piecemeal, making-it-work, scrappy artists weaving a tapestry of living with rough-hewn shreds of granola-cotton, jute, hemp, fabrics not fine or finished but with torn edges and maybe a little holey.
larkfield road in east northport made it possible. many of my jobs – early-on – were on this road. i worked at the music store, the camera store, the dive shop, one of the churches – all on this road – before i left long island. i bought my cornflakes at the king kullen and my gas at the corner citgo, splurgy pizzas down the road and sub sandwiches next to the post office. i drove all over teaching piano lessons and saved whatever i could at the bank that gave away plates for deposits on the corner of larkfield and clay pitts. none of it was fancypants. but it gave me a different expectation bar and it was all setting the stage for a creative life.
it’s funny to me that it takes a fortune magazine article to espouse the merits of creative thinking. the number 1 top skill rising in importance – as if it’s something new. ahhh. but, perhaps it is.
for we know, better i’d say than many, the difference in actually choosing a creative path. creativity, artistry – these lead you in a direction that is unrevealed, a direction that is vulnerable, a direction that has no guarantees.
an accountant, say, knows that any amount of time spent on a project will be remunerated. time spent = time paid for. it’s really a lovely equation. and both of us have had positions in our lives when this equation was in place.
but the instant we list back to the artist side, all equations dissipate into a fog and people – the same ones who turn to the arts in watershed moments of their lives – suggest we might consider exposure of our work our form of payment. i imagine writing to the wisconsin energies company – “i’ll give you ten exposures for this $326 bill.” more so, i imagine their response. yikes!
and so, here we are. the workworld – so to speak – is catching up a tiny bit. employers are beginning to recognize the value of creative thinking…maaaybe. the COO of fortune, dan shapero, is quoted, “the long-term trend is pretty undeniable that the demand for skills outpaces the supply of skills.”
perhaps he – representing employers everywhere – is not looking in the right places.
creative thinking is found in creative people, the ones exposing their work to the world, the ones who scrimp and bring to fruition projects that started in a thought bubble, the ones who don’t have the same organizational principle applied to their vitae and whose vitae, perhaps, would go the way of bot-trash, but who have a thru-hiked life (sometimes many, many years of life – decades even – making age yet another employment challenge) – with creativity their north star.
as people-with-active-resumes we note that our schooling is bachelors and masters degrees – framed and unframed- in bins in the basement somewhere. our work experience is a little bit of that tapestry i was talking about. it’s been garnered in educational settings, in corporate settings, in public service, in non-profits like theatres and churches, in software startups, on stages and on radio, in studios with canvas and studios with microphones. our creative output is found in albums, in paintings, in books, in blogs, in cartoons, in plays, in workshop projects.
we get creative thinking.
i passed green eyes down to her. he got his eye color from his dad. both of them are wildly creative. their lives have already been a tapestry of edges. i couldn’t be more proud.
“the most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.” (mary oliver)
i lived in florida. merely 14 miles from the gulf of mexico. for eight plus years. yet, i can count the number of times i went to the beach while i lived there. likely on two hands. i spent more time on the gulf before living there and after living there. just not during.
as a teenager and young adult i was at the north shore all the time. biking there, vw-ing there, boating, diving, fishing, walking, climbing the fence to take sunrise pictures – winter, spring, summer, fall. all the time.
in recent years i’ve yearned for the days on those long island beaches. and, though they are remarkably beautiful and warm and sunny and tan-producing (definitely not important anymore), i can’t really say the same for the florida beaches. i don’t find myself pining for them.
maybe it’s just my history with them. or, perhaps, the lack thereof.
the other day we went to the beach. on lake michigan. we walked and walked for a couple of hours, searching for hagstones and paintable flat rocks. then we settled down on a big log of driftwood in soft sand and sat and watched the waves. we wished we had a picnic lunch with us and a good book. it was that kind of day. the only thing that drove us out was hunger.
but we’ll go back, because the beauty of that beach was powerful.
when you live with someone who also likes to walk, you will walk anywhere. strolling in the ‘hood, hiking on the trail, trolling for stones on the beach. it’s the thing we do when all else stops – all work, all tasks. it’s the thing we do when we want all else to stop – all wistfulness, all thought, all worry, all out-and-out angst.
it’s funny to me that there was this big chunk of my life when i wasn’t walking, wasn’t hiking. just like this big chunk of my life when i wasn’t going to the beach – to stare at the waves, to watch gulls swoop and dive in the wind, to find the gifts of the air and the water – tuning into soul and energy, soothing and healing.
i’ve pondered, before, what would have happened had i walked. now i ponder what would have happened had i gone to the beach.
on the side of the willis tower – downtown chicago – is affixed the atmospheric wave wall. created by the same artist whose rainbow bridgewe loved at the milwaukee art museum, olafur eliasson’s piece is striking and imbues the colors of the lakefront – sky, clouds, water in all its moods.
in speaking about his piece, olafur – also a climate and community activist – says, “what we see depends on our point of view: understanding this is an important step toward realizing that we can change reality. it is my hope that this subtle intervention can make a positive contribution to the building and to the local community by reflecting the complex activity all around us, the invisible interactions and minute fluctuations that make up our shared public space.â
the steel catches the light of the sun. the piece seemingly shifts with the movements of everything around it, with time as time passes.
we have not yet seen it at night – lit from behind – but i imagine it is stunning – with light escaping from the intersection of the colored tiles. the places of light: in-between.
just as weird as it was to sit on the train it was equally with wonder to move freely about in the city – after all this time and so much that has happened in our country – sans innocence. it is with a bit of heightened awareness we move in the world now, though i don’t suppose heightened awareness helped any of the victims of the latest violent rages at the hands of angry out-of-control people. it is impossible to figure out why the wrong front door or the wrong driveway or the wrong ask-of-a-neighbor could elicit such unconscionably brutal responses.
we were driving to the grocery store. we took the route we usually take, a side street. two-thirds of the way down this road – before the traffic light – our attention was driven to a guy on the sidewalk, staring at us. brandishing something – we don’t know what – he flailed his arm around, pointing to the sidewalk, swinging, pointing, staring at us.
pre-whatever-phase-one-would-call-the-phase-that-this-country-is-in we probably wouldn’t have thought twice. we might have wondered what he was doing, might have wondered why he stared at us, might have pondered what he was brandishing. but we wouldn’t have been entirely creeped out and we wouldn’t have planned a different route home and, perhaps, a different route to our store for the continuing future. it felt like the place between was unsafe. and i find that devastatingly sad.
we live in a normal midwest town. only – i guess – not so much. our town is now known – in these last years of the more-unsafe-phase – for a plethora of events that have no light in-between. our small city is as broken as every other small city, as every other big city.
were there to be a wall of art to represent this phase of our world what colors would it be?
in his rush to get one of the coveted front spots at costco, the guy in the infinity cut me off in the parking lot. i parked in a different row, but watched as he got out of his car. he bent down and pulled out some kind of revolver, tucking it into the back waistband of his pants. then he walked into the store.
i must say – i haven’t ever felt a need to protect myself in costco. maybe from overspending, but never from violence. it was disturbing – almost to the point of turning around and going home – to know this guy was walking around – maybe getting a rotisserie chicken or ribs or a bottle of wine or eddie-bauer-sweats or glucosamine-in-bulk – with some big handgun in his pants. i told d about my reticence to go into the store.
we have a code word for anytime we are in a situation that suddenly feels unsafe. post-parade-massacres, post-grocery-store-shootings, post-concert-devastation, post-festival-tragedies, post-school-maulings – post-all-of-it and in the middle of all of it – we know to drop everything and get out or get away if either of us senses danger. no questions asked. no lingering. just go.
it is without light in-between that this country has come to this point. the intersections of peoples and genders and ethnicities and belief systems and economic statuses and, apparently, any differences whatsoever, seem to have no light. they are not backlit nor are they reflective of the sun streaming over this land.
“our shared public space.” shared. from sea to shining sea.
how do we create the invisible interactions and minute fluctuations of a safe shared public space? how – in a country that seems to have insidious anger and no shortage of violence – do we find the light in-between us? because “we can change reality”.
reverse threading 