reverse threading

the path back is the path forward

Tag Archives: two artists at home


by 1 Comment

quaking aspen dreams. [two artists tuesday]

we have our own personally-funded go-fund-me for this dream. it buys time for the bigger dream.

the tiny stand of quaking aspen trees beckoned to us. it was instant love. at first sight, no less. tall, willowy, silvery-white bark, the stand transported us to high mountain forests, to trails in breckenridge, to the first ahhh moments coming over the pass.

we took a breath and asked the price.

the nursery is an oasis. in the middle of our town, we sank into it for a few hours, just strolling about and imagining. these trees brought us to center.

our real landscaping need, right now, is for tall grasses along our new fence. we studied each variety and its characteristics – upright and erect or billowing and rounded, low to the ground or reaching to the sky with plumes, feathery in the light. i visited again during the week, asking questions and spending an inordinate amount of time staring at the aspen trees, photographing from different angles and surprised, soaking, by a full-on sprinkler. we’ll go back and purchase a few grasses.

we’ve run the numbers and the stand of aspen must wait. our tiny aspen tree, delicately brought home from the high mountains, aptly named “breck”, is in our backyard and would love the mentoring of a taller, more established stand. with us five years now, we don’t want breck to feel lonely. but, numbers don’t lie and a stand of aspen, along with planting it, is a little bit expensive. the immediate-gratification toddlers in us want it now, but the adults know it needs to wait. there are other priorities. sigh.

we’ll visit the aspen again. and i’ll visit it while david is working, again. and we’ll save up and keep on designing what we want the next phase of our backyard, our sanctuary, to look like.

in future days, our – still-imagined – tiniest “pando” (latin: i spread) of aspen in our yard will grow and remind us of the interconnectivity of all. the canopy-to-come will bring us to places we cherish, dreams beyond the dreams. we will keep saving, a deliberate stand-fund.

we are aspen-dreaming.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY


by 1 Comment

kismet. [merely-a-thought monday]

kismet. clearly. for two rock lovers, two expressers, two artists, it is self-actualization.

we have decided to go off-grid…the two of us, our dogdog, a gigantic collection of rocks and paint pens. we will travel the country by littlebabyscion, seeking spaces in which to paint – preferably ones without mosquitoes – and we will fully-immerse in our new art form, certain that, though there are about a billion books out there with templates and patterns and directions and almost a paint-by-number approach to rock-painting, our rocks – as newly self-actualized igneous artists – will stand out. and we will create riches and mountains of gratitudes, fans jostling to get our next-released-rocks.

we can see it.

our sedimentary souls, with layers and layers of artistic experimentation and experience, loss and success, opening nights and closing shows, will fly in the bliss of stroking-paint-pens-on-rock. our artistry opened and whimsy blowing off the doors of the amazingly realistic work of roberto rizzo. yup, yup, dare to dream….

and then we will return from our extended journey, changed forever, kismet having delivered us back to our back door.

we laugh at our overnight dreamy success. or – wait – is it our dream overnight? hmmm…

we wipe the sleep from our eyes.

*****

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


by 1 Comment

a watchful eye. [k.s. friday]

should it get to the point that the vine is obscuring the metal sunflower, we will cut it back. right now the vine is in its glory, billowing on top of the wooden fence, weaving in and out of the decorative wrought iron, and tumbling down our side. it has reached out and is starting to creep over this sunflower, ever so slowly and then, suddenly, the sunflower is wrapped in vine.

we keep a watchful eye.

for the vines of the neighbors, though lovely, are somewhat aggressive and we wish to protect the plants we have beneath their spilling. they are quietly growing, growing beneath these explosive vines and it has taken us years to cultivate even this small garden.

it used to be that the snow-on-the-mountain took over…it was everywhere. it choked out the lavendar garden and its long-branching rhizomes were spreading, spreading, giving our newly planted grasses a run for their life. it was overrunning everything else and its root system sent out feelers all over the yard, even under the driveway, looking for vulnerable plants it could overtake.

now the ground elder, on the other side of the potting bench, is rampant. because it is on-the-other-side and we mostly keep it from the stone patio in our potting garden, we are not as worried. but we watch it anyway.

we’ve discovered that vigilance is key. not so shockingly, we see the vines will win.

so we keep a watchful eye. and we protect the more fragile plants. we are sure to water them and check for the invasives trying to squeeze them out.

because they are beautiful, diligent silent growers, not insistently loud snowballing vegetation, and they each deserve their own space in the sun, their own dirt, air to breathe and our appreciation.

*****

SILENT DAYS from BLUEPRINT FOR MY SOUL ©️ 1996 kerri sherwood

download music on my little corner of iTUNES

stream on PANDORA

read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY


by 1 Comment

walking sunsets. [two artists tuesday]

there are days that go by that we don’t notice. we hear the waves crashing or the wail of the foghorn, we feel the wind shift over the cool water surface, we listen to seagulls over our house or boats racing the shore. and, though those are all familiar to us, we don’t notice.

we walk the sunset along the lake, night dropping in around us. it’s quiet but we hear faint strains of music from the harbor and the festival on the channel. the lights to our left balance out the ever-diminishing clarity of view to our right. it is pretty exquisite. we are lucky, we repeat.

we live in an old house with an old garage and an old yard in an old neighborhood. we are steps from lake michigan and its glorious power, its ferocity, its smooth-as-glass silk, its wide spectrum of personality. and, sometimes, we don’t notice.

because sometimes, like you, we get caught up in the stuff of life, the challenges of life, the confusing relationships of life, the weariness.

those are the days we should walk the sunset.

for there is not much that reminds you of time passing like watching the giant eastern sky answer the western setting sun. there is not much that reminds you of your absolute tiny-ness in the overall scheme of things. just shy of eight billion people on this good earth and everyone shares this one sun, able to watch colors over lakes, deserts, meadows, cityscapes, neighborhoods, ballfields, cornfields, highways, bayous, mountains.

to sometimes notice, sometimes pay attention, gives us petite pause, like the air you feel staring at a richard diebenkorn ocean park painting, the all-over softened loll of arvo pärt’s music unwinding you, slower-than-slow-dancing on the patio, the hush of a hammock.

“we think we have about twenty good summers now,” the wander women talk about choosing their adventures. we are the same age, so it’s a little bit bracing.

but a good reminder. even from the very start. if we only have about 70 or 80 good summers in all, if we are fortunate, it would seem each one really, truly counts. and, if the height of summer is – in most parts – about three months long, then that’s about ninety days. that means somewhere between 6300 and 7200 good summer sunsets in all, possibly more, possibly less.

it makes me wonder how much i noticed in the first 5670 summer nights to date.

i’ve got some work to do.

i’ve got some walking sunsets to pay attention to.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY


by 1 Comment

those dang cupcakes. [merely-a-thought monday]

8:40pm: hostess cupcakes become the topic of discussion outside at the table on our deck in the dark of falling dusk.

8:42pm: despite the fact that they are not gluten-free or dairy-free and, frankly, we aren’t really sure what they are made of, we mutually yearn for a hostess cupcake.

8:44pm: we look at each other, the flame of the tabletop miniature citronella tiki torch dancing on our wide-eyed laughter.

8:45pm: we put on sandals and grab a set of keys and the southport-pantry-now-morelli’s-deli-change-purse.

8:46pm: we are high-tailing it to ann’s corner store, walking fast to get there before its 9pm close.

8:53pm: we arrive and scurry down the snack-food aisle, in our singlemindedness missing the large hostess rack of goodies in the middle of the front aisle of the store. slight panic ensues. and then…

8:54pm: we find the rack. he leans forward to grab the box of eight cupcakes, but i point to the two-pack.

8:55pm: we purchase the two-pack, gleeful, an aura radiating around us as we leave the store and walk more sedately home.

9:08pm: we are home. we sit out back, open the cellophane and clink cupcakes.

9:12pm: we decide they are not what they used to be. or, we are not what we used to be.

9:14pm: we acknowledge the melancholy, the poignancy of the moment, wiping chocolate from the corners of our mouths.

as the evening wore down: we talk about the new eating patterns we are starting the very day you are reading this, eliminating from our diet all things not-clean so as to re-set. we – on this night on our deck – plan out what to eat in the remaining days – before today – our pantry and fridge will be reflective of our whole, unprocessed food choices, eliminating refined sugars and additives. it’s just a 30-day thing – and there is a plant-based version – but, having immersed in it before, we know we will notice a direct correlation of the food and beverage choices we make and the difference in how we feel. yada yada. so we make the decision and the new airpods i’ve purchased will help keep my two nieces close at hand as we are walking into this together.

10:12pm: we turn out the light and, in the dark, giggle about our frantic dash-for-delicacies adventure. and, in deference to the power of the hostess-cupcake, we nod and agree that there is still something about those fudgy-frosting-covered moist-chocolate-cupcakes filled with a light-marshmallowy-filling and flourished with a swirl-of-vanilla-icing. though simply sugar, high-fructose corn syrup and white flour, all of which are “basically free of any naturally occurring nutrients”, those cupcakes are a bank of memories and a touchback to the anticipation of the first joyous bite.

today: we admit to all of you, even though they are not likely to reappear any time soon, we will continue to hold hostess cupcakes gently and lovingly in our hearts.

*****

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


by 1 Comment

like loons. [two artists tuesday]

i wonder if they wondered.

we had stopped right in front of their front steps. like came to a dead stop. and just gazed.

but their blue eryngo had called to us, their seafoam green step risers, the perfect backdrop. a dead stop. full immersion. color – like the sound of loons on a quiet lake. so beautiful.

i took just a few pictures, knowing we should keep going on our sidewalk-amble, breezes off the shore beckoning us to walk through the park.

saturday we spent the day in our front garden beds. we transplanted the sedum being overrun by the tall ornamental grasses marching toward the old brick wall. we cleaned up the daylilies, proudly wearing their glorious orange blossoms, high above the green leaves. we – well, he – dug out a line all the way across the front, so that we can place a stone wall of sorts. nothing fancy and certainly nothing measured or pristine, a wall that will mark where the lily garden and the growing-grass meet.

ornamental grasses love this yard and the beachy feel suits this house. we know there are many fancy-plants out there, but we have learned, through experience – finally – to not fight with what works. ornamental grasses it is.

as we walk the ‘hood we try to get some ideas. our neighbors own a garden business and are gifted gardeners, so their yard is precise and, elegant and, well, pretty perfect. we are not making an effort to achieve perfect. we’re artists. we know there’s no getting there from here and we kinda like it that way. our yard is less magazine-like and more a folksy invitation to hang out, kick off your shoes, tell a story, laugh, sing, dance.

but it’s a treat to wander in this neighborhood, every house different than the next. there is no sameness here and there is no real garden or lawn-olympics. there are gorgeous ideas and there are misses. there are old hedges and new wildflowers. there are yew and big stately oaks and pines and delicate daisies and coneflowers, and there are hosta and ferns and container gardens and raised beds we can see peeking down driveways and around the sides of houses.

i suppose that there is an hoa somewhere that would cite the homeowner with the seafoam green step risers. they’d get a note that would give them a certain amount of time to re-paint those risers, wearing from weather and the front of many shoes climbing to go inside and be home or go inside and visit.

i’m glad we don’t live where this would be cited. because the day i took this photo all i could think about was what an eye – an aesthetic – the owners must have who put blue eryngo next to their seafoam-green-weathered steps. and what a gift it was to those of us wandering by who noticed.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY


by Leave a comment

i’m from new york. [not-so-flawed wednesday]

towering cloud. monochromatic tones. i took this photograph. i may not have taken a second look but for the wire cutting diagonally across it. it was the interruption that made it – a gorgeous cloud – even more interesting.

i’m not from here.

i am proudly from new york and sunday night out on our deck i reveled in feeling new york. i haven’t felt as new york as i felt that evening in a long time. we were playing records outside and painting rocks. i had selected a few albums – dan fogelberg, john denver, michael murphey, survivor, fleetwood mac – and i was playing dj, picking and choosing the songs to play. we sang along, somehow remembering lyrics of songs we hadn’t heard in ages, a mondegreen or two slipping in.

then i went inside to find a certain album, leaving david to pour a little wine and wonder what i was searching for.

i came back out with the double-album-set of saturday night fever. there is nothing that quite defines 1977 like that album and the bee gees. instantly transported back to the discos and beach bars of long island, i got up and, in the new privacy of our backyard, danced. the more i danced, the more i danced.

i texted a few friends, asking them if they remembered the steps to the hustle. crunch wrote back that he didn’t remember all the steps, but he remembered the spins and sent a picture from a beach bar on the island he was at as he typed his message. marc reminded me he didn’t dance – which i, of course, remembered – and told me – if i was indeed sending him snippets of “stayin’ alive” simply to annoy him – not to be such an “assassination” (which, back in the day, i would say for the word “ass” so as not to cuss. friends would tell you i have come around from those days.)

interrupting our 70s mostly-mellow flow, saturday night fever disco drew a line through the soft wash of memory in which we sat. it invigorated us. it made us dance and it made us laugh. it made a perfect night even more perfect. and it woke up the new york in me, never too far away but always a little at-bay, a little tempered.

new york is a little noisy for wisconsin. new york is a little demonstrative for wisconsin. new york is a little talkative for wisconsin. new york is a little emotional, a little animated for wisconsin. new york is a little exuberant for wisconsin. new york is a little brash for wisconsin. it’s a little center-stage, a little aggressive, a little assertive, a little interruptive.

i’m not from here.

i’m from new york.

and i’m damn proud of it.

*****

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


by Leave a comment

one shadow. [two artists tuesday]

in the perfect moment of sun, the perfect angle of ray, the perfect covering of cloud, the perfect surface of shadow, two became one.

i took a second look before i pointed it out to him. i wanted to be sure i didn’t miss the bird, maybe tucked into the shadow of fern. it wasn’t there. it had immersed itself into the shadow of the other.

i knew, upon gazing at this, i would not likely witness this again. it was that kind of moment.

when david proposed on knee at gate F8 at o’hare airport, he presented – from inside a tiny box inside a tiny satin bag – two silver rings, almost identical, like the almost-identical-wrought-iron-green-eyed birds. after a magically vehement and funny proposal, he explained he saw us as two individuals, coming together, yet, with great love and respect, remaining individual, bringing to each other all in each our circles. one ring was etched and one was smooth.

we spend pretty much 24/7 with each other. it’s been that way since the beginning. he has supported me in any work i am doing and, likewise, i have supported him. with rare exception, we have traveled, always, together. we chore together and explore together. we cook meals and scheme happy hours and pop-up dinners together. we love on the dog and pine for our babycat together. we cry listening to lowen and navarro’s last concert together and laugh at the same lines over-and-over while watching my big fat greek wedding together. we walk and hike and exercise and spat together. we lift each other up. we grow older together. david’s office is upstairs so during work hours he is merely a flight of steps away. we, as artists, create together, writing every morning, daydreaming aloud about studios on the side of a mountain. saturday we spent hours – with new ridiculously-liberating paint pens – painting rocks together and walking in the dusky edges of day along the lake.

both rings are almost all smooth now. i imagine one of these days they will be the same.

and, though there will always be two – two silver rings, two iron birds – the sun will shine down on us, day after day, shadows of two green-eyed artists on the sidewalk, in the leaves on the trail, on the sand of the shore, on our new fence.

and then, one day, maybe – with all perfects (and imperfects) aligned – that sun may cast a miraculous shadow of one. we might miss it, but we already know it’s there. mingling with the ferns.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this TWO ARTISTS TUESDAY


by Leave a comment

some fun. [d.r. thursday]

we cleaned the garage. now, this is not my favorite chore. there are spiders in the garage. lots of them. and they peer out at me, lurking, waiting for me to walk by, so that they can drop down a line and swing right in front of my face. their decibel-tolerance for closed-mouthed-screams must be vast, for they elicit many of these from me as they plot and scheme, surprising me.

regardless, we cleaned the garage.

david went in first, broom held in front of him, sweeping as he stepped. in a gallant move, he tried to clear the way for me. his heroics helped; there were fewer surprises as we worked.

our garage is old – like our house – and nails are pounded into the exposed 2x4s to hold bagchairs and hoses and the bike pump and various gardening tools. in one of my best organizing-learnings about a decade back, there is an old tall plastic garbage can in the corner which holds things like shovels and rakes and a fence-post-hole-digger and a metal thing i can’t identify but which seems important. there are two bikes hanging from the ceiling. and up above on wood laying across the rafters, like a mini attic, there is a red tricycle (pause for an “awww”), an old red wagon (repeat), a few old doors and a rooftop turtle that has a big dent in it from when – a few decades ago – we drove into a parking garage late at night forgetting it was up there on top of the bronco. oopsies.

like anything else i do, it was a time of revisiting stories.

the best thing in the garage is the volkswagen. our 1971 super beetle is tucked in, while littlebabyscion and big red suffer the elements. tenure counts here.

we finished cleaning, triumphantly and without any horror, and sat on the deck with a gorgeous saturday afternoon stretching out in front of us. i poured two glasses of white wine and brought out a snack, some brown paper bags, scissors, a few rocks and some paint. time to have some fun.

because we have been the grateful recipients of gift-rocks-on-the-trail we decided to leave some of our own. story of our lives, come to find out there are better tools for this than the ones we had. we had dollar store paint and brushes. those didn’t work. we moved on to david’s good acrylic paints from his studio and the dollar store brushes. these worked better, but didn’t yield precise lines. we found out later that there are real live paint pens – ones you can paint rocks with. they draw precise lines and tiny little scenes. (well, you draw them, they just make it all a possibility.) we’re going to get us some of those, i say.

in the meanwhile, our rough-hewn works of rock-art will have to do.

the next day, we hid the first round of rocks the first time we walked the loop on our trail. by the second time around, some of them were gone. i guess rough-hewn was acceptable.

i can’t wait to see what we do with paint pens.

my first rockwork

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY

CHASING BUBBLES 33″x48″: this painting of glee is available.
©️ 2019 david robinson


by Leave a comment

older-agers. [not-so-flawed wednesday]

in junior high i wrote a piece which i titled “old age is not a disease”. i was the child of older parents; most of my friends’ parents were at least ten years younger than mine, some fifteen. many of my parent’s friends were also their age and my grandparents were significantly older, so i was surrounded by elders.

i’m not quite sure what compelled me to write this piece, but it was written with fervor and i was passionate about my assertion. though i’m certain it’s somewhere in a bin downstairs, i’ll rely on my tenuous memory when i say i backed it up with facts and a great deal of emotion. always thready and emotional. from the beginning, i suspect.

so i guess it should come as no surprise that i am drawn to things waning. i find the flower on trail past its prime, bowing to the forest floor, petals wrinkling. i find the fallen tree, nurselog to a little community of new trees, striving. i find the dried grasses, glowing in late autumn. my photo library is full of these older-agers.

i keep the daisies until it no longer makes sense. but it seems that is way past when others would keep them. their curling petals no longer crisply open, instead shrinking and closing. they are beautiful. all stages.

daisies are kind of important to us. i was holding a daisy when i met david in baggage claim nine years ago. the second time i met him with a whole armful of daisies. and then, daisies walked with us down the aisle. i suspect they will be with us all along.

so, like us, i recognize their allure in every stage. even in waning.

this past weekend the father of my beloved children, my first husband, turned 65. i wished him a happy birthday and texted that i was astonished that we are the ages we are.

the time between back then and now has flown by and, were i to be defined as a daisy, i am grateful the petals and that yellow center of joy are still present, though a little crumply and a spectrum of many flaxen shades.

i know i don’t look like the daisy of yore. but every stage of a daisy counts.

“may the light of your soul mind you,

may all your worry and anxiousness about becoming old be transfigured,

may you be given a wisdom with the eye of your soul, to see this beautiful time of harvesting.

may you have the commitment to harvest your life, to heal what has hurt you, to allow it to come closer to you and become one with you.

may you have great dignity, may you have a sense of how free you are,

and above all may you be given the wonderful gift of meeting the eternal light and beauty that is within you.

may you be blessed, and may you find a wonderful love in yourself for yourself.”

(john o’donohue – “a blessing for old age” from anam cara)

*****

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