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the little alleluias. [merely-a-thought monday]

texting with our son, who was about to attend a music festival out west, he wrote that i would probably like the artist. he sent a link to the teaser of above and beyond’s song “gratitude“. i followed the link, loved it, jaunted over to the full-length, and loved that.

the everest youtube paused, we followed the soundtrack song to find that new favorite i wrote about in may, “you and me“.

it is not likely we would have just stumbled upon either. there had to be a tiny opening, a tiny window, a door to something new.

explorations don’t have to be gigantic. they can be mini adventures, pocket-sized, teeny-weeny, a moseying into something unknown, a reminder that there-is-just-so-much-out-there. exploring creates a yearning to explore, a synergy of sorts, to keep-on-ing.

mary oliver, in her book, “long life”, writes of “what she calls ‘the little alleluias’ in her days and in her doings.” (frederic and mary ann brussat) those tiny noticings. micro adventures. “nature, animals, the soul, place, and literature.” and sound. and music. and touch. and color. and laughter. and cooking. and creating.

in these days we don’t get far. our roadtrip juju has been poking at us for months now; our last roam was in december. that’s a long time ago for two people who love roadtrips. but work and an intentional budget and, yes, covid, have kept us closer to home. “soon”, we say to each other, “soon.” and then we sigh. the mountains are calling, the coast and points north, family down south, family out west.

in the meanwhile, we scout out other exploring. we paint rocks and hide them. we dance on the deck. we listen to music we don’t know. we pay attention to the girl, the boy, friends tell us about things we might like. we use two tortillas instead of one.

last night we had the best pancakes for dinner. gluten-free. and real-live maple syrup. my niece sent me the link to them. breakfast for dinner. it’s not a trip to the mountains, but it gets us to the foothills of adventure. something different.

exploring is like snickers minibites. sometimes five grams of delicious feeds us.

it’s the little alleluias.

*****

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


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the void. [saturday morning smack-dab.]

it’s like an ongoing game-mix of charades and taboo or catch-phrase over here.

we can’t think of a word…we act it out…we “sounds-like” it…we describe the word without using the word…we gesture wildly and stare blankly at each other. we don’t start panicking right away, but there comes a moment when the void is a little too voidish and we wonder if we will ever come up with the word at all.

since we are writers, this is a tad bit relevant. one of us invariably needs a word – we know the word – we are intimately familiar with the word – the word is like second skin – but it has gone missing.

we try to come up with the letter it starts with – say, r, for example. one-of-us insists it starts with an r and that-same-one-of-us launches a verbose description about TheWord, attempting to get the other to ThinkOfTheWord.

“r!” i repeat, “it starts with an r!!”

“and it’s pasta? something we’d have with sauce?? rigatoni?? rotini?? ravioli??”

“no! no! no!” “think!!” “we have it all the time! r!!! come ON!!” beginning to act out what it looks like, hands drawing in the air…

“ribbon??”

“ribbon?? have we EVER had ribbon pasta?? dang!! come ON!!”

“are you sure it’s not a t? like tortellini? or trofie?? or maybe a c? like cavatappi? or cavatelli??”

“geeez. no! it’s an r!!”

“well, i can’t think of another r-pasta. is it penne?”

“penne!! that’s it!!! yes!! penne!! a p!!”

the void is a moat, equipped with word magnets, it seems.

every day another word is butterfly-netted and held at bay, even if only for a few minutes, just to torture us.

*****

read DAVID’s thoughts this SATURDAY MORNING

SMACK-DAB. ©️ 2022 kerrianddavid.com


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not unimportant. [k.s. friday]

just like when i take a photograph of a person i try to avoid having extraneous people in the picture, when i take photographs outside i try to avoid any messy unnecessities.

this time i did it on purpose.

on july 29th i will have lived in this house for 33 years. i have sat out back watching the sky turn orange over the garage for 33 years. i have watched the trees grow up over the rooftops in my view. i have watched squirrels on their highways-of-highwire for 33 years.

it suddenly occurred to me that there might come a day when i can’t simply walk out the old screen door onto the deck, stepping onto the patio to watch the sky in the west. there might come a day when i live somewhere else and i won’t have access to this view.

and so the messiness of wires sectioning off the sky became important. important enough to photograph. important enough to remember.

we’re surrounded by things – and views – we have taken for granted. we see them every day – though we don’t really see them.

they seem unimportant.

yet, these familiar sights are the very things that help ground us. in a world that is politically volatile, climate that is destroying mother earth, bombastic leaders itching to reduce freedoms, disrespect and aggression out of control, it would seem that we need grab onto that which grounds us, centers us, slows down our breathing.

because i’m thready, i notice – and try to memorize – things like how the old wood floor creaks in the hallway, what it sounds like when the glass doorknob falls off, the feel of the small chain on the basement door and the decades-rubbed indent it has made, the sound of a double-hung window with ropes and weights opening, the deck cracking in cold weather, the cool painted-cement floor under bare feet in the basement, the places where the plaster has cracked. they all spell home.

and, with a world in turmoil, everything in flux, so much anxiety and grief and worry, things that are solidly familiar help.

*****

THE WAY HOME from THIS PART OF THE JOURNEY ©️ 1997, 2000 kerri sherwood

download from my little corner of iTUNES, please

or stream on PANDORA

read DAVID’S thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY


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right now and love. [d.r. thursday]

barney had an anniversary. seven years in our backyard. seven years of sun and rain and snow and ice. seven years of chipmunks and squirrels and robins and cardinals. seven years of wild geranium and day lilies and peonies and potted plants and candles. seven years of intense love. some things are unexpected. i still remember the beginning.

but barney’s influence on us has been significant. as he has aged, grayed, wrinkled, as his layers have peeled back and as his many-wooden-layered sedimentary life has undergone a metamorphosis, so have ours. we have gone the road with barney.

there are moments we glance over, in early morning light or the dim of dusk, and are taken aback at the beauty of this old piano in our yard. i can’t imagine it not being there, even as it gently lists a little left, into the ground.

same as those moments, in early morning light or the dim of dusk, that we glance over at each other. a little bowled over by the sheer presence of the other. the moment-ness, the what-else-is-there-ness, startling us into awareness. time keeps marching on and little counts but the chipmunks scurrying, the birds landing, the sun on our faces.

i got a single text from our girl. i read a post from our boy. they are in their own skins; they are making their way too, upright pianos in the backyard, living their best lives.

it’s a hot night. we sit on the cushions we bought last year – after long, measured research and budgeting – and light our column firepit.

the flame dances in the breeze. and it frames barney.

and reminds us – simply – that right now and love are what count.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this D.R. THURSDAY


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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


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opening day. again. [merely-a-thought monday]

we wake up early anyway. there’s no alarm clock on saturday morning. yet, before the sun is barely above the horizon we are awake. we both lay and listen quietly to the quiet. birds, chipmunks, the pond out back, maybe the waves on the lakeshore if it’s windy. for just a little while, before the lawnmowers start or cars drive by or people empty their recyclables into the new big blue waste containers, if we close our eyes we can picture being wherever we want to be.

my big brother has now been on a different plane of existence for thirty years. 30. as of yesterday. it is shocking that so much time has passed by. for the longest time i had a hard time understanding how the world could go on, when he could no longer feel it. and yet, it did. those of us left behind had broken hearts and missed the sound of his laughter, the details of his stories, his giant bowls of coffee ice cream. we are left wondering how he is present with us, what he can see, what, if anything, he feels. it was a friday.

“this life is not a dress rehearsal.”

the magic of friday night seems ubiquitous. for those in a traditional workweek, the weekend stretches out in front of you, friday night’s yawns delicious and lingered in. there are two glorious days to follow, days of errands or adventures or catch-up or sleep or just simply nothing. two of them. days to declutter your brain a little and sink into a little less routine.

and then, suddenly, sunday.

and, too fast, monday.

and we find ourselves wishing for friday.

yet, there is something about mondays that we should probably lean into. another day. here.

i stand here, in the kitchen in the world in all its complexities and all its flaws, and the dog gives me a kiss before he starts his breakfast and i bring david freshly-brewed coffee in a favorite mug. he smiles as i approach his pillow and the dog pounces on the bed. the sounds of early-early monday morning are like the sounds of saturday, like the sounds of friday. the certainty of monday is no less or more certain than the certainty of saturday or friday.

i imagine my brother took with him the sounds of morning, the sounds of his beloveds, the sweet taste of first java and ice cream in a late-night bowl. i don’t imagine he reached out to grab things as he floated; there were certainly no trappings as dear as the party he had on thursday-the-day-before just being near those he loved. his hologram remains with each of us, his humor and brilliant mind within our grasp as we speak of him. he made – and makes – a difference in this world for us.

we can choose to shut down the party on sunday. last call before midnight, enough time to sleep for the new week. or i guess we can recognize it can keep going. to be standing here, now, in this spot – with all its chaos and all its bounty – is party enough.

the day starts in quiet. the sun is barely over the horizon. the birds are singing, chipmunks chirp. i can smell the coffee brewing. i am here. i don’t know how the world goes on once i can’t feel it anymore. but for now, i can.

and it’s opening day. again.

*****

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

in honor of my big brother, listen to ANGEL YOU ARE

(from AS SURE AS THE SUN ©️ 2002 kerri sherwood)

sip coffee, listen to the birds, love on your loved ones, kiss your dog. repeat.


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those gizmos. [saturday morning smack-dab.]

it happens. yep. iykyk.

we have all done something like this. did we lock the door? did we close the windows? did we leave the iron on? (who irons these days, anyway?)

my sweet momma’s sign on her mirror – “old age is not for wimps” – was prophetic. it’s not just the aches and pains that seem to grab your hand one day and skip along with you, all jolly-like. it’s the yiiiikes moments. those moments when you wrack your brain to try and remember if you did something. and your silly ole brain won’t let you get there. i mean, what IS that?

these are the moments that we can talk about while sitting around with the up-north gang or at friday potluck dinner. these are not moments you wanna mention to the kids. as it is, our stories are less than captivating to them now. add to it a level of aging-hazard and we’ll soon be the proud owners of whatever gizmo will help us be less feeble.

goodness! my momma was right to put that sign on her mirror. it’s not for wimps, these, err, challenges. good thing we are all doin’ it together.

*****

read DAVID’S thoughts this SATURDAY MORNING

SMACK-DAB. ©️ 2022 kerrianddavid.com


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not as they appear. [k.s. friday]

described as “too vigorous”, creeping bellflower, gorgeous purple flowers and all, is considered noxious and invasive. i know people like that.

as a matter of fact, the other day while we were strolling along the lakefront, we passed someone i know who is quite bellflowerish. without hesitation, i immediately began an animated conversation with david, complete with hand gestures and enthusiastic arm movements, my face intent on his as i told him the non-story and he stared at me, knowingly.

there are just some people who are best avoided.

had we stopped, even to exchange pleasantries, the conversation would have shifted to mining. this person mines for details, details, details, for gossip, for information. too vigorous, noxious and invasive, masked by curiosity and feigned intense interest, this person has always been a miner. avoidance is best, just like creeping bellflower. it looks lovely and inviting, beautiful purple flowers standing tall, but it will reseed – your newsy news – and spread it all out in gardens near and far, your personal story strewn all over, regardless of soil, aggressively spread like a weed.

the most robust plant can produce up to 15,000 seeds annually and self-sow in the wind. bellflower can overwhelm other, less aggressive, plants as they strive to co-exist. they are tough to eradicate in a gentle garden.

beware. creeping bellflowers will run over you and your garden.

sometimes, flowers are not as they appear.

*****

PULLING WEEDS from RIGHT NOW ©️ 2010 kerri sherwood

download from my little corner of iTUNES, please

stream on PANDORA, please

read DAVID’s thoughts this K.S. FRIDAY


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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


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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