reverse threading

the path back is the path forward

Tag Archives: slowly


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in the questions. [k.s. friday]

i cleaned my studio.

finally.

took everything off every surface. dusted everything. put some things away. moved things around. got rid of excess. hung a favorite print. and – with great care – gently vacuumed the inside of my really beautiful piano, for full-stick is an invitation to dust.

i stood back, stood in the doorway, looking in.

the room was breathing. deep breaths.

i was breathing. immersed.

there is still more to go through. there is more to file away. there is former work-trauma to discard and there are calendars of choir music and ukulele band books and handbell arrangements and contemporary solos to box up. the first pass didn’t get all those and now, two years later, i am still a little paralyzed by all of it. that’s why it all needs to go. this process is taking longer than i would have anticipated. “mind, body, spirit,” she said. “it’s not likely others will understand all the layers. they will expect you to just move on, to get over it. they will not grok the wounds; it is all fraught.”

but there were staff lines in the sky. and the universe prompt is haunting me a little.

it’s always had a purpose – my studio – a direct line from standing or sitting in there to actual work. i’ve not just noodled or played because i was just playing. i’ve stood in there to write – to flesh out an album, to practice, to plan – the arc of music for a concert or for a church calendar, to teach – so many students through the years. it hasn’t been a place i go to without purpose, without an end-product, without a result i could see. as an adult, my studio has represented the potential for income; it has been a professional place. now there are questions. many of them. like living in a blank staff, i live – lost – in the questions.

i played my piano. a few carols.

there is one more day this year. and then 2023.

and i won’t carry carols into the new year. it will be time for something else, something less dusty.

there’s some way to go. it’s not as simple as it sounds.

the staff lines in the sky hold no clues, have no notes.

maybe – instead of reading that as tacet – silent – i might – and “might” is the operative word here – read that as a composition without designated key, without predetermined time signature, without definitive expression markings, sans any direction or boundary.

vacuumed and breathing.

an empty notebook on the stand. pencils.

full-stick.

we’ll see.

*****

lost. in the questions. – kerri sherwood

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read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY


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slowly. [not-so-flawed wednesday]

we almost did it. almost. almost ordered thai food for pick-up.

but we didn’t.

we’d been hiking and were cold and tired. and we didn’t reeeeally want to make dinner.

but we did.

eventually.

we got around to it.

slowly.

we pulled our adirondack chairs into the last vestiges of sun in the yard, sipped wine, had a happy snack. when the sun disappeared, we brought our glasses inside and painted rocks – from the sand near the beachhouse – at the kitchen table, for we had hidden all the ones we previously painted. time stretched out in front of us, slow, a glorious saturday night.

instead of pad thai, we made tacos with homemade seasoning, had one of the last two avocados from my sister, watched a hallmark – yes, hallmark – movie under a big sherpa blanket, had two squares of chocolate.

hiking – tough elevation climbs – on this last trip to north carolina reminded me to go slow. it was the lesson i brought home from vacation. set a slower pace, don’t set too high a bar, mosey a bit, let living happen.

so i planted the painted rock on our sunroom table on top of sandstone from those smoky mountain trails. the other side of the rock reads, “no. slower.” you know…take a backroad, linger in the setting sun, sink under a blanket, climb a little slower.

my snapchat alerted me to a flashback. two years ago. on a balcony in aspen. the caption: “i don’t want to leave.” i remember slowly packing up, slowly loading the truck, slowly driving away. it was hard to go – as always – but slower made it a little easier.

i leave summer slowly and i step into autumn – my favorite – slowly. i wasn’t really ready for flannel. i pulled off the summer sheets for the last time in the season, thinking about how it feels on a hot night to place your face on a cool spot of the pillow. flannel isn’t like that.

but at the end of the night, after hiking and tacos and wine, chocolate and blanketed-movie-watching, in a house chilled by blustery northwest winds, the flannel was warm and i found myself snugged in soft stripes, slowly drifting off.

*****

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


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“the pace of nature.” [merely-a-thought monday]

“…adopt the pace of Nature. Her secret is patience.” (ralph waldo emerson)

no matter how hard we try, there is not one thing we can do to make the sun appear or the day warmer or the moon to rise or the snow to fall. we accept that time will come, time will pass, time will form and time will destroy. we give over to nature, anticipating that which we know, expecting the unexpected. we baby-step through this very time in the universe, our footprints barely visible on the timeline that is forever. we learn that no matter our stride, we are simply tiny beings. eventually, we learn, after giving over to patience, that that is enough.

the john denver sanctuary in aspen is a treasure trove. we have been there three times now. a garden of trails and large river boulders etched with lyrics and quotes, perennial daisies and aspen trees, it is a gentle sinking into peaceful. the city sounds of aspen fall away and the river and streams are lulling.

we wandered for hours, reading, sitting, pondering, the sun on our faces, the sound of quaking leaves slowing us down. i stood on a giant rock, like a stage under my feet, and bowed deeply to no one and to the brilliance of a man who knew how to tenderly shape melody and weave lyric into a fabric like a soft blanket.

we were immersed in poetry, in words, delicious to read aloud. we were quietly taking it all in, i in all my john-denver-glory, reliving the cassettes i wore out, rewinding, rewinding, listening again and again. this exquisite place, tempting all-day-hooky-playing, wielding a magic defined by thought, encouraging reflection, softly begging you to tumble in your own thoughts. this place slowing you down, reminding you that it is not stuff that defines you, it is not the stuff-of-you that will remain with others.

we wrestle with timing, with suspense, with expectation and disappointment. we measure against ladders of success and hold ourselves to higher higher higher standards of accomplishment.

nature quietly treks on, luminescent and glorious, patiently acknowledging every babystep moment of its impact, surrendering judgement and secretly, from the heart of the universe, signing its autograph on all of us, whispering to us to slow our pace.

*****

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