More Sun Dogs!

We saw sun dogs today while walking home from the reservoir. This display had three chunks of rainbow and you could see the arc shape quite well on one of them. If you imagine the face of a clock with the sun in the center, there was one rainbow dog at the three o'clock spot, one at the twelve o'clock spot, and one at the nine o'clock spot. The twelve o'clock dog had the largest arc, reaching to connect to the others in a faint ring.

Then we saw one very deeply colored lone sun dog later in the afternoon, lighting up a fluffy cloud-top poking out among the thin high clouds.

Teaching Art

I've been hired to assist the freshman art class at the local charter school as an artist-in-residence. It's been a real trip!

I sat with one of the introverted students and encouraged her to draw her hand; she did it in class, and then that night at home. She came back the next day with doubled improvement; I was elated! This girl has a narrow thread she is clinging to in order to communicate and to develop self esteem, but I could see that she responds well to simple, well-defined goals. I looked at her sketchbook. In it she had drawn the little bathroom in her apartment with such jauntiness and affection. It was fabulous, and I told her so! So I knew she had it in her to sink in and make something she cared about. I want her to be challenged and engaged in this class.

At the moment I am most interested in the kids that are in danger of falling off the map. They are half the class. They respond well to my one-to-one visits with them. I ask them to draw. I offer to set them up with paper and pencil if they don't have it, and I look them in the eye and put my hand on their shoulder. I never draw on their pictures but I sketch when necessary to show them how to pay attention by looking, measuring with their eyes. Observation is a skill that is a life tool and is never wasted. So whether they become artists, detectives, firemen, teachers, dental hygienists, or asphalt pavers, observation is important.

I am pleased when the students are drawing and really looking. I feel that they can always doodle on their own time (or in math class!) but in this class I want them to observe from life and sharpen the skills that come with that practice. When the kids doodle or refuse to work, they yack, and the room gets very noisy and ridiculous for concentrating. This becomes destructive for the kids trying to work, and takes down the whole room. When the kids are bored, or overwhelmed by busy-work projects, the desire to escape or slack off becomes pervasive. At these times the whole room can have the feeling that art is just babysitting, that art doesn't really matter.

I am interested in seeing the students held accountable, but in a compassionate way. I try to approach them with an I-believe-in-you-I-care-about-you vibe along with an achievable goal. Small daily victories build self esteem. I have found this to be true in my work. The students all have drawing ability and I tell them improvement is rapid and will surprise them when they put in the effort each day . . . but using their eyes, not their memory!

Sun Dog, Comet, and Shooting Star

On Sunday we were driving to rehearse in Chester CT, and we saw two sun dogs in the sky. When we put on our sunglasses the colors were even more luminous; there were two slices of rainbow on either side of the sun. I wanted to signal to strangers driving on the highway to check it out. If I had been walking I would've gone up to people and shown them. After our rehearsal the sky was clear and full of stars. Bill remembered we should be able to see the comet and showed us where. We all took turns looking through binoculars and we found the comet lined up with a star directly overhead. It looked like a cotton ball surrounding the star. As we stood there straining our necks staring at the stars in the dry cold darkness I saw a shooting star leap by!

No Need to Be Alone

This morning I couldn't move my arms without pain in my shoulders. I felt like I had rusted, like the tin man in The Wizard of Oz. It was time to loosen up in the pool. In the locker room there was a woman who I chatted with. She had pale green eyes. She told me her husband had died this past February, after 62 years of marriage. I told her I was sorry. Her eyes became slightly teary. She said she had just started dating a man she knew for a long time because he was her painting teacher. I said how wonderful; good for you for circulating. She said it wasn't easy, that she had a lot of guilt. I said I bet your husband would have wanted you to be happy. She paused and said well, I know he wouldn't have stayed alone! And we both laughed.

Rings in the Pond

This time of year it is so easy to get caught in spin. I do and I am. Receive mode is about pain, anxiety, doubt, fear, but also the poignancy of vulnerability, and compassion. Sometimes my steps into the outside world reveal the little victories among people; the bits of daily drama and life that embody courage and love. Other times I am overwhelmed by the never-ending poverty, abandonment, and suffering I see at every corner! At these times I need to be reminded to participate in making my weensy piece of the world more humane and more loving and more compassionate. I want to believe that the rings in the pond formed from my tossing the stone will radiate out and touch others.

Musical Lathering

The last jam I played in was a musical healing. I arrived in a state of emotional anguish for no particular reason except that life is this way for me half the time. I had a brain washing, a true musical lathering and rinsing of the best kind. I am continually amazed by what making music can do to the emotional centers of my brain. Speaking of which I am reading the new book Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks, the neurologist, and he has amazing stories about music and the brain. I hope to lather up my gray matter for as many Thursday night jams as I can.

Out of My Head

I am feeling the agonies of the world, the pain of my neighbors' lives, and everything I lay my eyes on seems to be groaning back at me in anguish. Understandably I get spoiled rotten from three solid months of unending energy and joy. But there are two sides to the coin and I've learned to respect that. I've been reading lots of books lately and walking for miles. Today, with deadlines looming, all I want to do is stare out the window. So I am! And that isn't so bad really. A bit of that is good for all of us, but I'd hide in my house for the next three months if I could. I need to get out and laugh, get out of my head.

On Language and Healing

I think language gives us courage. Poetry gives us courage and faith to live with open wounds. Poetry gives us the means to understand pain in a meaningless age. Language gives us insight into the darkness that we all stumble into today. So, I don't know if it heals, but I do know that it provides us with what we lack. Language provides us with something that we desperately need. Not to close the wound, but not to forget it. Language makes us not forget what we went through. I've been shot. I've been stabbed. I got scars all over my body, and my face. My jaw is wired. My teeth have been kicked out by the narcos. My jaw was beaten . . . was knocked out by the police. My head is full of cracks from the guards. My stomach is all scarred up. I've been shot in the legs, and those are just the visible signs. The wounds that I carry inside of me are even deeper and graver. Language is the only thing that I can go to and drink from, and feel invigorated and feel happy about living. It carries the magic of my people's heart. It carries the magic that I'm in love with. If you took language away from me, I would immediately pick up a gun and go to the mountains and become a rebel. There would be no doubt whatsoever, no hesitation. So, I use language as something that connects me to beyond the world I live in, that connects me to a cosmic kind of destiny that helps me towards living a good life. So it heals me in that sense. It heals me in the sense that I'm able to love living and I'm able to look at the living. Language provides me with a journey I would not have otherwise had . . . a journey into myself and my people.

     - Jimmy Santiago Baca, from an interview with
       Gabriel Meléndez

Halloween

I took Honey for the big loop walk, which is the walk through the Precious Blood Cemetery and around the reservoir in Blackstone. It's a three-mile loop through mostly residential neighborhoods.
I forgot how necessary looking around and seeing signs of life is for me. I hunger for it when my energy has switched back to being internal. I spotted carved pumpkins and spider webs and lots of hand-made decorations in peoples' yards.

I saw a three-year-old dressed up as a bumble bee with gold wings on her back, and I saw a full-grown adult dressed as Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz go into the pizza parlor with pony tails and a blue-and-white checked dress over a puffy white blouse. She looked so matter-of-fact, like she forgot she was in costume. I saw an empty house for rent and I imagined people living there. I saw an empty rabbit hutch and I imagined having rabbits. I have fallen into my internal place but I don't want to dig a dark hole which is so easy to do. I want to walk and swim and read and keep working with my new head.

Anniversary

The Urban Mermaid is one year old today!! Maybe I should bake a carrot cake with turquoise frosting!

Autumn Orange

Today we're going to the orchard to get apples and look at the foliage. I have been taking every excuse in the world to walk everywhere and soak up the colorful trees. I've been taking detours three times a day to walk by the red and orange maples on Social Street. It's that little bit of green mixed into the red that kills me. I laugh when I look at my redheaded friends - as if their hair has turned orange like the leaves!

Quotes of the Day

I expect to be astonished, to hear things I haven't heard before, or haven't paid attention to before, or that I understand in a new way. . . I'm never finished with anything, nor do I think one should be. My motive forces are wonder and curiosity, and I think these are good motive forces. People want to know about the wonders of the world, whether it's white tigers or the total wonderland of being human.

     - Oliver Sacks

A tree grows up out of the ground, but it uses a lot more ground than just the ground that’s right under the tree. There’s got to be a whole lot of music that you don't play in front of people. There’s got to be something that you play when you're by yourself. It could be anything. I'll play along with Tuvan music, or I might play “Oh, Danny Boy,” or I might take a guitar in standard tuning and start playing Elmore James chops. It doesn't matter as long as you're playing with it. That’s why they call it playing guitar, they don't call it working guitar. You've got to be having some fun with it, and particularly if you're going to entertain people. If you're just hacking the stuff through, you're not going to get anywhere.

     - Maynard Silva

My City

I've been thinking a lot about literacy and languages. There are so many languages spoken in my little city. I would like to learn them. Maybe we need a language exchange program. I can picture it. I teach English while learning Spanish. A linguistic enrichment tutoring teaching exchange. At the public library. Our city is enriched by multiple languages and cultures; Spanish, English, Laotian, French, Portuguese, Polish, and many more.

There's another grant-funded job-placement program opening for kids ages 14-21 on Main Street opposite the Heritage Coffee Shop. I am going to go talk to the kids and show them my portfolio. Maybe they will be inspired to chase their artistic dreams. It always helps to meet someone doing what you'd like to do, and it's really cool to discover they are doing it in your town! I'm glad there is a lot here in our city to help young people get a good start. Many of the kids need all the help they can get.

There's a guy in my neighborhood who rides an adult tricycle with a huge black speaker in a box attached to the back of his seat. He plays Latin music while he pedals. It's run by a motorcycle battery, and my favorite part is how the sound gets warped as he pedals by.

The girl next door has her bedroom window facing the alley literally four feet from my kitchen sink. Our houses are that close together! In the warm weather all the windows are open and the sounds travel. I worry that my morning coffee grinding will wake her up. Her mother told me don't worry she sleeps like a log! At night she has her friends and cousins over and they play music and laugh and watch movies until well after midnight! I am glad to know she is having fun. It's like I have a daughter!

A World of Faces

I have met a few emaciated women who have exceptionally large and theatrical facial features. My theory is that they are trying to make their noses and eyes and mouths smaller and more conventional by losing weight. It doesn't work that way! It saddens me because it is important and wonderful to embrace what you've got. I was lucky to walk through Grand Central Station often as a kid and there were always inspiring faces from around the world. Faces in magazines or on television are never as interesting to me as faces on streets and buses and subways.

Maynard

A dear old friend of mine is a well-known blues guitarist living in Martha's Vineyard. He was interviewed about his music-making, and I'm quoting from that interview:

. . . Music is how I express my essence, express my spirit, and I share it and get closer on a real level with other human beings.

The thing is the relationship between the truth of the music and who you are. There've been nights in my life where my only friend is that guitar. Everybody’s got something they do on those nights, and me, I play music for myself . . . and I'll share that with people, because there’s a real closeness, this is who I really am, that’s who you really are.

I don't want any other cards, I just want to be able to make a better hand out of the cards I've got.

You don't have to add stuff to the music; it just accumulates. One note leads to another. If you can play one note, after a while you can fit two in there, and it just grows.

Listen to (Tuvan bands) Hu’un Hu’un Tu, or Chirgilchin. Beyond that, slide players should listen to trumpet players, and people who are playing rhythm guitars should listen to piano players. They're the chord doctors. Listen to everything. I also think you've got to listen to stuff that isn't music. A friend of mine took me for a ride last night in an ancient Volvo station wagon with this little four-cylinder engine. And they own two huge French poodles. And driving up Lambert’s Cove Road, with the wind blowing by, the sound of that motor, every once in a while the poodles barking - it was just such a great sound.

     - Maynard Silva

Crone of the Year

We are approaching the old age of the year. Autumn is in the air and winter is coming. We are all on death row. Every morning I sit and write in the last patch of sun in my yard before the shadows take it away. Honey and I sit squinting in the warmth. Our maple tree is nearly completely orange! I have been sleeping ten hours a night.

Recently I met an eleven-year-old boy at a performance. The boy is a classical pianist and he had rosy cheeks and was wearing a suit and tie. His father said he practices twice a day; pre-dawn and evening. The boy was an old man in a child's body. He told me he has three music teachers and has been playing since he was six. Maybe when he is 40 he'll get to be a kid, like what happened to me! The hostess for the event had a wild face. Her pale translucent skin was taut and smooth and her helmet of gray curled-and-sprayed hair was an eerie halo. Only later did I realize she must have had a face lift. Her 75-year-old skin was tight as a drum across her jaw bone. There was no extra skin on her neck; in fact the muscles and arteries on her neck looked like the exposed drainpipes under my kitchen sink. Her hands were arthritic and her knuckles were frozen into a slightly bent position. It scared me when I reflected on her face. Why hide your age? Wouldn't you like to set a good example for those of us who will be old soon too?

I just saw the Chagall Man walking through the parking lot of the elderly high rise. His back is so bent over he looks like a walking question mark. He walks in little clumpy steps, determined and animated, wearing a dark green baseball cap and a cobalt blue fleece pullover, white pants and white sneakers. He focuses completely on the ground while he walks. Maybe he has always been an old man. My friend's daughter just turned 21 and we celebrated with her. She went from being a kid to an elegant, elongated, graceful woman in ten years. I am now the age my mother was when I turned 21.

I am enjoying the quiet of closed windows and neighborhood children indoors at school. In one hour everyone will be out again. Our neighborhood schools start extremely early, 7 AM, and the kids walk home at 2 PM.

Quote of the Day

The fundamental aspect of bravery is being without deception.

     - Chogyam Trungpa

I Love My Town

It immediately caught my eye; a signed imitation Botero oil painting in the window of the junk store on Main Street. It was pretty good, complete with fat man in a suit, cigarettes strewn on the floor, and the artist's unique interpretation of light falling through a doorway.

More on Food

My dough had to wait two days before I had a chance to bake it. By the time I did it looked a bit odd but it had become a real tangy cheesy sourdough! Delicious!

I made mashed potatoes for supper with milk and butter, then sauteed three bunches of steamed kale with garlic and olive oil and mushroom soy sauce. Yummy mushy foods.

Someday I want to make my own wine from my own grapes and cheese from my own cow!

I love pumpkin and apple and the first cup of coffee of the day - perhaps I think about food too much!!

Quotes from Grist for the Mill

The greatest thing you can do for any other human being is provide the unconditional love which comes from making contact with that place in them which is beyond conditions, which is pure consciousness, pure essence.

There's nowhere that you have to go to work on yourself other than where you are at this moment, and everything that's happening to you is part of your work on yourself.

I have three major instructions for my life from my Guru: Love, Serve, and Remember. Love everyone, serve or feed everyone, remember God.

There are many stages on this path, many lessons; don't stop anywhere. It's all part of the process of awakening. You have all the time in the world but don't waste a moment.

As long as you are attached to your separateness, you can't help but perpetuate fear, because there is a subtle fear in you of losing your separate identity.

When you acknowledge that your life is a vehicle for your liberation it becomes clear that all of your life experiences are the optimum experience you need in order to awaken. And the minute you perceive them that way they are useful within that domain. The minute you ignore that perception, they won't work that way.

     - Ram Dass