The great and powerful longing

Longing

I awoke this morning thinking about–and feeling–longing.

The longing, like a swirling snake of energy, which has lived with me since I was a wee putter-snapper.  

Do you live with longing?

Oh, she can be a challenging guest, that one, with her slanted green eyes and endless desires which circle round and around and around.  

She lives at the center sometimes, an ache which can’t be filled.  Oh, how I’ve tried to appease her all these many years!  How did I try to appease her?  Let me count the ways.

A non-apologetic manifesto about being weird.

Weird? Not weird?

First, let’s get the definition straight.  If a person is weird, what the heck does that mean?

A Google search revealed these synonyms:  strange – odd – peculiar – quaint – uncanny – bizarre.

Now that we *almost* know the definition of weird, let’s explore this phenomenon further.

May I suggest that those who are not labeled weird by society do the following thing very well:  they fit in.  They eat the same as their peers, dress in the same clothes, act in appropriate ways, speak without being *too* strange or offensive, are friendly, polite and well-behaved, or at least act acceptably bitchy, raunchy and amusing.  They act “normal”.

Thank you for four wonderful years of blogging here.

The very first photo I published. Our house creatively shining in the woods.

Yep, my friends, it’s been four years of blogging on WordPress come Winter Solstice.

Will you forgive me a post down Memory’s Lane?

My first WordPress blog started after lighting a grand solstice fire on a snowy night out in the woods on December 21, 2008.  A daily blog called Opening the door, walking outside followed for an entire year.  After less than a ten-day break, Lake Superior Spirit opened its blogging doors on January 1, 2010.

Fare thee well, fallow fields and yet another blogging break

Time to leaf you…

And now…it’s time for this one to take another blogging break.

Yes, you knew this would happen, didn’t you?

You recognize the pattern, don’t you, even though I’ve tried to deny it?

Some of us create, create, create, create…and then our fields must lie fallow as we renew, as we build up the soil of our creativity.

As the chill of November deepens, as the winds whip to a frenzy on Lake Superior, as the snowflakes scurry and spin…some of us heed the call to turn inward, to dream, to listen to the deepest inner voice whispering between pine needles, between scurrying autumn leaves scuttling on the frozen earth.

Last time I took one of these regular breaks a couple of you expressed concern, worry.  No, my friends!  Never worry about me while on retreat.  I am happy, somehow, at these times.  When the computer mostly turns off, when the emphasis turns inward, something in my soul sings like a cheerful chickadee.

(It sings in outward creativity and sharing, too, but it’s a different kind of song.)

As we turn toward the Thanksgiving holidays, I give thanks for all of you.

For your steadfast presence in my life.

For all the gifts you share with others.

For the gift of sharing your precious self, your unique thoughts, your individual gumption, your brightness, your magnificent beauty.  Your gorgeousness…

In my absence, please feel free to peruse my New and Revised blog roll.  Finally, after months and months, I’ve added new names & faces for you to enjoy.  I’ve deleted those who’ve passed by the wayside or remained silent so long that they’re composting into new friends.

Evergreen blessings!  May our hearts open further in gratitude in this upcoming season…

Life’s patterns…

P.S. The comments are turned off, dear readers, because we’re not saying goodbye, are we? We’re saying fare thee well, ye fallow field, ye. We’re shouting *over the river and through the woods* “Until we meet again! Fare thee well! Fare thee well!”

When a legally blind man calls you “Gorgeous”

Life is really super-duper absolutely inarguably funny.

Two days ago I wrote a Farewell for a Little While post.  See ya @ Thanksgiving, readers, because creative fields must lie fallow.  (Oh how Munira and Lisa and I love the word “fallow”.  Isn’t fallow the coolest word?)

I was so happy about my upcoming blogging break.

But the Universe had other plans.

Drum roll, please!

Blinded by the light

Blinded by the light

Apparently, once I wrote a blog post called Blinded by the light.

It must have been a long, long time ago because the memory of writing this is now covered in darkness.

On Monday morning I quickly signed into WordPress before going to work, re-read the previously written blog about Dying on Facebook, and skipped over to the stats page to discover who might have visited previously.

Turns out four people had visited this ancient long-ago Blinded by the Light post.

I noted it, duly forgot, and headed to work.

A deer grazing by the side of the road caught the bright glare of the car’s headlights and stood frozen.

The art my camera liked in San Diego

Something about these little Mexican ladies–I love them!

Before I quit posting photos and stories about our recent trip to San Diego for the wedding of our eldest and his bride, may I show you some pictures of art that my camera liked in the streets among farmers markets and art shows and Old Town stores?

Four in the morning

Rain

It’s four in the morning.

Blackness outside the window, peppered by lightning streaking the sky, revealing skeleton trees and lone patches of snow.

Thunder rumbles incessantly in the distance, clearing its throat, mumbling of possible rain showers.

I dreamed restlessly as lightning and thunder negotiated in the dark of night.

In dreams Creativity wrote, wrote, wrote.  In half-awake tossing and turnings, words rose like phantoms creating St. Patrick’s Day nattering, full-sprouted paragraphs arising like chattering ghosts, endless talk, talk, talk.

Pause

Last night's moon out the kitchen window

I cannot write another dashing headline.

Cannot type another amusing or clever or exciting word. (Even if it’s only amusing or clever or exciting in my own mind…)

Someone pushed the “pause” button and everything creative simply screeched to a halt.

This happens with creativity, as you all know.

It will be painting for a hundred days in a row and suddenly the artist can’t lift her paintbrush.

It will be sketching drawing after drawing and suddenly the pencil quits moving.

It will be knitting scarf after sweater after hat after mitten and suddenly the knitting needles stop clicking and sit silently in the closet.

Creativity has a mind of its own.

We must listen to its unfathomable desires.

Eggs are nothing to yolk about…and other scrambled thoughts about creativity

eggs.

Today we shall discuss the Common Egg.

(Of course we shall discuss much, much more.  But we shall start with the Common Egg.)

When you look at the above carton of Common Eggs, what do you see?

Pause for a moment. Look at the spherical white eggs.

Now.  Close your eyes.

Tell us what you saw.

Please kindly describe.