When I tell you you’re a sweetie pie, you say that I’m the sweetest pie, and I can’t help but think of a Shoo Fly, made with brown sugar and vinegar, me who is so darting yet somehow insubstantial, sweet, sad, sour—
But for you, I think of a Moon, because of the spoon of your backside, also just because I like the name.
But a Moon Pie’s made with marshmallow, and there’s not much of the marshmallow in you— a soft heart, but what really comes to mind is a tree branch, because of the way the muscles line your shoulders, sides, the lean strength that bends, the way a branch is surprisingly green beneath the bark.
But what kind of pie is made with branches? The closest is a nest—
I think then of how you hold me at your chest, me, who is so mercurial, and how you would never even think of Shoo Fly— no, you’d never call that my pie.
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No offense meant to Shoofly Pie, or those who like it! Have a great day. (All rights reserved, as always.)
I am worried about the upcoming election. Women’s rights are on the line. Frankly, in many states, women have already lost the line.
But it could get worse (and will if the GOP takes over congress.)
Voting rights are on the line. Frankly, in many states, voters have already lost the ability to vote easily and to have their votes counted.
But it could get worse (and will if the GOP takes over congress.)
Yes, we are already despoiling the planet.
But it could get worse (and will if the GOP takes over congress.)
Yes, Putin has already acted on delusions of grandeur, and his soldiers have raped, tortured, and are currently bombing civilians. But his actions, and those of other dictators, could get much much worse.
And the GOP noticeably does not care about crimes against humanity, not if it raises the price of gas. Sadly, it seems as if many GOP politicians do not care much about crimes against humanity even they didn’t raise gas prices. (They seem to have a not-very-secret affection for dictators.)
What I have been doing—which has become almost mystical for me—is making small donations nearly every day (sometimes randomly repeated through the weeks) to Democratic candidates around the country. Each is a very small donation. Yet, I try always to carry through the thought, to bother.
If I think of someone in a pivotal race—Val Demmings against Marco Rubio; John Fetterman against Dr. Oz; Tim Ryan against J.D. Vance; Mark Kelly against Blake Masters—Beto O’Rourke, Stacy Abrams, Catharine Cortez Masto, Mandela Barnes, Evan McMullin—-the Democratic candidates here are all interesting and worthwhile–I try to make that little donation. I feel like even my small donations will generate a random positivity in their direction, while if I have the thought, but don’t follow through, I might contribute to the negative. (It might somehow contribute to the idea of other people not bothering–not even bothering to vote.)
I guess I am trying to work the “butterfly effect.” It’s the idea in chaos theory that one small change, one small action (the movement of the wings of a butterfly), can generate a big result.
My thought—that even my small efforts (the little donations, the carefully worded, if hopeless, emails to family members in red states)–could populate a tide.
Anyway—I put it out there. To think about politics right now is sickening, disheartening, but important. Do what you can.
***************** ps–Raphael Warnock is another to support!
Drawing above is mine–was supposed to start as a moth, but I drew a butterfly of sorts–again in Peter Hristoff’s wonderful “Inventory Drawing” class at SVA.
Another work week. These are definitely connected to a sense of dread and isolation these days! (Especially if, like me, you are working remotely. Remote work is a wonder, but when you are stuck in the dread of Monday, you realize that even a commute, much less the camaraderie or a workplace, can sometimes jog your cog-self into a more convivial slot.)
The shortening, cooling, daylight adds to the sense that time is way too short, yet also hanging heavy. It’s an odd combination of time pressure and time endlessness. Worry over the current election cycle, Russian brutality in the Ukraine, and so much else in the world doesn’t help, of course–nor endless Trump.)
What does help: for me, anyway–thinking of the delight that children bring to many many moments, both for themselves and others. Getting outside. Music. Art of all kinds–both enjoying and making.
The pic is one of the drawings done very very quickly in Inventory Drawing, taught by Peter Hristoff at SVA. It was not actually done for this subject matter, but fits the bill in some ways.
In the midst of all these sands of time—have a good week!
I woke in the canyon of my mother and her bedroom wall. I would sleep there as a child, from the middle of the night, when I would wake and call my father, who would shepherd me across the hall to their dim room, and into my mother’s slim twin bed.
The twin beds were a gift from my grandmother (my dad’s mother). My mother sometimes laughed about that, though, a child, I did not get the joke. I saw my parents as a couple, yoked, but not physical, and was shocked one Saturday morning early charging their closed door.
She slept with her back to me; she slumbered rather than slept, while I, who always slithered to the inside, danced my feet along the wall.
It was an exterior wall, with a big picture window and two smaller, a mix of cold and warmth, what with her pajamaed back, the baseboard heat, the chill of plaster.
So safe, and yet also an adventure. I seemed to feel the bricks on the other side. I lost myself too in the snowy roads of the Grandma Moses drapes, sleighs pulled over the rough damask by belled horses to a honeycomb of the same yellow-windowed house, repeated through the fabric, red-bricked but so different from our own.
Maybe part of the adventure was whether my feet would leave marks, my mother a maniac about smudges—she didn’t ever punish anyone, but to be in the same house with her when she was scrubbing was its own kind of torture.
Oh, but I missed my mother this morning. I missed her more than I would ever have believed, I, who knew how I loved her, missed her even more than that.
I missed her for who she was and also just because she was my mother.
I missed being a child, me who will always be a child.
I missed being a child with a mother beside her.
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Kind of a draft poem. The pic, not drawn for the poem, is one from Peter Hristoff’s Inventory Drawing (at SVA.) Thank you all and have a great weekend!
I am okay but have been loaded up with tasks of late, both job and personal, and a fair amount of worry and concern, and haven’t been able to post. I’ve missed it.
Sometimes one’s mind is too jumbled to send any clear messages. (Maybe the only word the brain conveys is “agh!”)
Lately, enmeshed in this jumble, I’ve channeled my determined creative energies into putting together a children’s book. (More on this when it’s ready.) One great thing about doing a children’s book (for me) is that I don’t worry too much about messages—of course, I can’t help but include something a little bit preachy, but I have to focus mainly on making the book entertaining enough to lure a child through it. And getting the illustrations to work takes me a huge amount of time. So, in the last couple of months, when I have had breaks, I’ve focused mainly on a new little children’s book.
But a couple of weeks ago, I was lucky enough to start taking a drawing class, Inventory Drawing, with Peter Hristoff of SVA. Peter, a wonderful artist himself, is also a gifted teacher. Inventory Drawing is a class in which one is forced to draw not only on paper, but from inner resources. But Peter keeps the pace (and inspiration) moving fast enough that one can’t get too caught up in inner tangles.
What I like about the quick drawing (which often involves a layering of themes) is that you have to let meaning arise as it will—you don’t have enough time to be too purposeful (or too much in a rut). Of course, because we are human, some kind of meaning tends to come to our minds whenever we look at something we or another human has made.
In the case of these fast drawings though, the meaning is not always so easy to encapsulate. It can go in a lot of different directions, which allows for a kind of breadth. And breath.
Anyway, here’s one from a class a couple of weeks ago. I hope to put some up regularly.
The sleeping face of the child knows no right angle; it twists straight, skews acutely, so cutely.
You want to protect that child, you want to keep them from ever being hurt, you want all lessons learned to be steps on some friendly ladder, a ladder with good hand rails that also bestows wings.
Their eyelids look as velveted as wings, the skin softened to sky.
But what kind of sky could ever be as soft as that skin?
The kind you wish for them.
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A bit of a draft poem for today. The pic doesn’t really go with the poem! But it is a sleeping face, in this case of a snail, and was drawn for children as part of my newly-published children’s book, Snail Taxi. Available on Amazon.
Finally—to all those who, among all the trouble in the world, remember 9/11 in NYC today, I send love.
I made a to-do list last week, my job life feeling as scattered as dried leaves: “check bank statements” — these, of a client (I’d be too scared to check my own), “follow up,” “do time.”
But there are other lists I should make— if you can ever “should” these things, different to-do lists:
1. Sit down in the sun. Close eyes and look up slightly—feel the warmth through your eyelids; even for just a second; it should not be a searing sun in these mountains’ September.
2. Watch deer at dusk. Do not hanker after some screen. And If there are no deer, watch the apple trees that the deer like to wander beneath. See how they too bear bend; see how they too find food in the softening light.
3. Hold his hand. Catch it as you walk, warm as the sun, in your palm. And, like the sun, you will be able to see it, simply in its feel, without looking. . You will be able to see the hand in its warmth, even as you, multi-tasker, are also watching deer, or trees, or walking towards a grocery store at the top of a parking lot, a different list in your head—milk, crackers—hold his hand, the fingers rooting you, even as, together, you walk ahead.
A little poem for a Saturday morning. Have a good one!
The illustration doesn’t completely go with it, although it’s supposed to be a dawn picture. It is from one of my children’s books called Snail Taxi. I love the book actually, and I did it a couple of years ago, but only recently got it on Amazon. Available here.
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