Category Archives: Nature

Just Breathe

No one can find the rewind button, child. So, just breathe.

Just Breathe

Two AM and she calls me ’cause I’m still awake,
Can you help me unravel my latest mistake,
I don’t love him, winter just wasn’t my season
Yeah we walk through the doors, so accusing their eyes
Like they have any right at all to criticize, hypocrites,
You’re all here for the very same reason
‘Cause you can’t jump the track, we’re like cars on a cable
And life’s like an hourglass, glued to the table
No one can find the rewind button girl,
So cradle your head in you hands
And breathe, just breathe,
Whoa breathe, just breathe
May he turn twenty one on the base at Fort Bliss
Just today he sat down to the flask in his fist,
Ain’t been sober, since maybe October of last year.
Here in town you can tell he’s been down for a while,
But my God it’s so beautiful when the boy smiles,
Wanna hold him, maybe I’ll just sing about it.
‘Cause you can’t jump the track, we’re like cars on a cable,
And life’s like an hourglass, glued to the table.
No one can find the rewind button boys,
So cradle your head in your hands,
And breathe, just breathe,
Whoa breathe, just breathe
There’s a light at each end of this tunnel, you shout
But you’re just as far in as you’ll ever be out
These mistakes you’ve made, you’ll just make them again
If you only try turning around.
Two AM and I’m still awake, writing a song
If I get it all down on paper, its no longer
Inside of me, threatening the life it belongs to
And I feel like I’m naked in front of the crowd
‘Cause these words are my diary, screaming out loud
And I know that you’ll use them, however you want to
‘Cause you can’t jump the track, we’re like cars on a cable,
And life’s like an hourglass, glued to the table
No one can find the rewind button now
Sing it if you understand.
And breathe, just breathe
Whoa breathe, just breathe…

Anna Nalick

The Blue Hour

Leaving Target tonight, I was entranced by the evening sky. It was a rich Indigo blue, almost verging on navy. It was the shade of the not quite ripe night sky. Usually I see light blue skies, gray skies, or vivid optimistic blue skies. And when I looked later night had fallen. Usually when I think to look, the sky has transformed into black velvet. What I saw was the in between color. Funny how I’d never noticed it before. Or maybe I just don’t remember noticing it quite as vividly in an ordinary location. I know that I am often aware of beauty when I’m camping, but I miss the beauty of my mundane life.

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Joshua Tree National Park

Look

I was driving to an appointment just now, carefully navigating rush hour chaos. I happened to look at the sky and saw big puffy clouds, the sun brilliantly reflecting light and shadow. It was so sharp, so detailed, to SEE this gift of beauty in the middle of an ordinary moment. I felt small and elated, and it brought tears to my eyes. Go and look at your world. It’s incredible.

two medicine after noon

Bleeding Heart

bleeding heart

Bleeding Heart

My heart is bleeding. It bleeds upward and fills
my mouth up with salt. It bleeds because of a city in ruins,
the chair still warm from sister’s body,
because it will all be irreproducible. My heart
bleeds because of baby bear not finding mama bear and it bleeds
to the tips of my fingers like I painted my nails Crimson.
Sometimes my heart bleeds so much I am a raisin.
It bleeds until I am a quivering ragged clot, bleeds at the ending
with the heroine and her sunken cancer eyes, at the ending
with the plaintive flute over smoke-choked killing fields. I’m bleeding
a river of blood right now and it’s wearing a culvert in me for the blood. My heart
rises up in me, becomes the cork of me and I choke on it. I am bleeding
for you and for me and for the tiny babies and the IED-blown
leg. It bleeds because I’m made that way, all filled up with blood,
my sloppy heart a sponge filled with blood to squeeze onto
any circumstance. Because it is mine, it will always bleed.
My heart bled today. It bled onto the streets
and the steps of city hall. It bled in the pizza parlor with the useless jukebox.
I’ve got so much blood to give inside and outside of any milieu.
Even for a bad zoning decision, I’ll bleed so much you’ll be bleeding,
all of us bleeding in and out like it’s breathing,
or kissing, and because it is righteous and terrible and red.

Carmen Giménez Smith

A Living Continuation

“The day my mother died I wrote in my journal, “A serious misfortune of my life has arrived.” I suffered for more than one year after the passing away of my mother. But one night, in the highlands of Vietnam, I was sleeping in the hut in my hermitage.

I dreamed of my mother. I saw myself sitting with her, and we were having a wonderful talk. She looked young and beautiful, her hair flowing down. It was so pleasant to sit there and talk to her as if she had never died.

When I woke up it was about two in the morning, and I felt very strongly that I had never lost my mother. The impression that my mother was still with me was very clear. I understood then that the idea of having lost my mother was just an idea. It was obvious in that moment that my mother is always alive in me.

I opened the door and went outside. The entire hillside was bathed in moonlight. It was a hill covered with tea plants, and my hut was set behind the temple halfway up. Walking slowly in the moonlight through the rows of tea plants, I noticed my mother was still with me. She was the moonlight caressing me as she had done so often, very tender, very sweet… wonderful! Each time my feet touched the earth I knew my mother was there with me.

I knew this body was not mine but a living continuation of my mother and my father and my grandparents and great-grandparents. Of all my ancestors. Those feet that I saw as “my” feet were actually “our” feet. Together my mother and I were leaving footprints in the damp soil.

From that moment on, the idea that I had lost my mother no longer existed. All I had to do was look at the palm of my hand, feel the breeze on my face or the earth under my feet to remember that my mother is always with me, available at any time.”

–Thích Nhat Hanh, No Death, No Fear

We Are Not the Designers

“But we do neither: we never fail, and we never succeed. We are not the designers of our lives. Life is the designer of us. Life is vast and grand, intelligent, clever, and completely unknowable. It always has the last word. It is the last word. Life interrupts us when we are at our most self-assured. Life diverts us when we are hellbent on going elsewhere. Life arrives in a precise and yet unplanned sequence to deliver exactly what we need in order to realize our greatest potential. The delivery is not often what we would choose, and almost never how we intend to satisfy ourselves, because our potential is well beyond our limited, ego-bound choices and self serving intentions.”

–Karen Maezen Miller, Hand Wash Cold: Care Instructions for an Ordinary Life

Gratitude

Despite the fatigue and pain in my body, despite the washing machine and the dishwasher being broken, despite the state of our country and the earth, I felt flooded with gratitude this morning as I took Bean to art camp for the day. I’m grateful for:

  • coffee, brewed strong and black
  • friends with kids who are willing to help fetch each other’s kids and take them places (it takes a village)
  • my husband’s reliability and humor
  • my daughter, who works so hard to find her way these days
  • the means to afford the repair bills, the art camp, the groceries
  • the spirit of animals, a chance to connect with pure consciousness
  • political resistance and the freedom to act
  • a chance to cherish life and death, creation, destruction, and renewal
  • all the mysteries of existence, the unanswered questions, and the chance to sit with not knowing
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The Months Blaze

So many summer trips, summer camps, heatwaves, gardening; then school began, and here we are. I took the summer off painting. I recently returned to a few begun last spring and finished them. And I’ve made a couple new ones, as I experiment.

sentries / 12" x 36" acrylic on stretched canvas

Sentries / 12″ x 36″ acrylic on stretched canvas

hazy city / 10" x 20" acrylic on stretched canvas

Hazy City / 10″ x 20″ acrylic on stretched canvas

Windfall / 4" x 4" acrylic on canvas panel

Windfall / 4″ x 4″ acrylic on canvas panel

Rock Face / 4" x 4" acrylic on canvas panel

Rock Face / 8″ x 8″ acrylic on stretched canvas

The Leaf Beneath / 5" x 7" acrylic on canvas panel

The Leaf Beneath / 4″ x 6″ acrylic on canvas panel

The Wind Confides Secrets / 5" x 7" acrylic on canvas panel

The Wind Confides Secrets / 4″ x 6″ acrylic on canvas panel

secret garden / 6" x 6" acrylic on wood panel

Secret Garden / 6″ x 6″ acrylic on wood panel

Recognition

Last night, I stretched before bed, a routine which helps bring sleep when I make the effort. At the end I lay on my back in what is called “corpse pose” in yoga.

As I lay quietly, I imagined my heart stopping suddenly. My breath ceasing. My brain shutting down, and with that, all awareness evaporating. The “me” that existed just gone. No more Kathryn. No afterlife awareness as Kathryn.

What arose for me: we are expressions of the Life force. The creations Life makes are temporary. They change, disintegrate, and the constituent parts are reabsorbed. The matter and energy become the source again. There is no soul identified as Kathryn. There is no awareness of others. In this way we are eternal and infinite, because our parts merge again with Life. But the death of the body is the death of the personality.

And for whatever reason, for the first time, that felt all right. True. Not scary. Not sad.

Work Backlog

I’ve been busy creating but not posting. Here goes.

under the ocean / 4" x 4" canvas panel with acrylic

“Under the Ocean” / 4″ x 4″ canvas panel with acrylic

santa cruz harbor lighthouse / 5" x 7" canvas panel with acrylic

“Santa Cruz Harbor Lighthouse” / 5″ x 7″ canvas panel with acrylic

beehive / 6" x 6" wood panel with acrylic

“Beehive” / 6″ x 6″ wood panel with acrylic –SOLD

botanical treasures / 10" x 20" stretched canvas with acrylic

“Botanical Treasures” / 10″ x 20″ stretched canvas with acrylic

untitled / 6" x 6" wood panel with acrylic

Untitled / 6″ x 6″ wood panel with acrylic

pollinators / 8" x 10" wood panel with acrylic

“Pollinators” / 8″ x 10″ wood panel with acrylic

Little Pieces

While I work on a larger canvas, sometimes I take time off from it to let my creative intuition develop. Yet there remains an urge to create. I bought some new paints and media to play with (Golden Clear Tar Gel, pouring medium, glaze, fluid acrylics). Here are three little pieces from recent days.

This first work is based on a photograph my cousin took. The light in the photo was so ephemeral, and I knew I wouldn’t capture that essence. So I went for a bolder look. My father grew up in Plattsburgh, NY, where the lake is. I sent this to him as a gift.

sunset on lake champlain/ 5" x 7" canvas board with acrylic

“Sunset on Lake Champlain” / 5″ x 7″ canvas panel with acrylic

My daughter often suggests names for my pieces, and sometimes I take them! This one is called Autumn Splat. This one is sold.

autumn splat / 5" x 7" canvas panel with acrylic - SOLD

“Autumn Splat” / 5″ x 7″ canvas panel with acrylic

Lastly, this piece! I’m always amazed what a few colors can do: two shades of green, yellow, burnt sienna, black, and white. This work is also sold.

little creek / 5" x 7" canvas panel with acrylic

“Little Creek” / 5″ x 7″ canvas panel with acrylic

February Winter Break

Some years, our family will “go to snow.” Last year there was none, so I took Bean to Los Angeles to look at dinosaurs. This year, despite there being plenty of snow, we didn’t get coordinated enough to go. We don’t ski, and there is only so much sledding one kid and two parents can enjoy. This has made for a quieter, somewhat duller break. Yesterday, Bean and I took a three mile walk in our neighborhood. She was very resistant at first, but after awhile and my gentle insistence, we discovered the joy of being outside. Her eye caught leaf impressions in a concrete sidewalk. We visited a small pond near our house. We played a game where she ran around and my task was to try to get a picture of her. We talked about friendships, and spiritual beliefs, and how to handle frustration. And we got silly. It was good medicine.

turtle pond in winter
sidewalk impressions
Bean february 2017
Bean february 2017

Latest Work

For the last few weeks I have been working on a painting using a new type of canvas (to me) made of Belgian linen. It is incredibly smooth, and the paint glides on and blends beautifully. So I chose a palette and began to see what emerged. Two nights ago, I dreamt that I was pregnant. Most of the time I don’t recall dreams, so when I do, it has import. This dream felt so real. When I awoke, I was holding my stomach the way I did when I carried my daughter, feeling it taut and firm with life.

I finished the painting today. Sometimes when I paint I have an idea. Other times, as with this one, I start without an idea and work intuitively, without thinking and analyzing. Then I step back and see what I see.

This painting reflects a deep, intuitive exploration of the divine feminine within me and the earth. It makes me think of molten earth, the core of our existence. I also see a womb with an embryo, and an ovary, and the blood that makes the ground from which we arise.

I have gone through menopause in the past year, and now I am a crone. But while my physical body cannot create a human life anymore, I have graduated to creating life on a larger scale.

I want to thank my father for his recent gift that enabled me to purchase larger canvases!

praise her from whom all being flows / 24" x 36" acrylic on linen canvas

Praise Her From Whom All Being Flows / 24″ x 36″ acrylic paint on linen canvas

The Kind of Mystery

“This old Chippewa I know – he’s about seventy-five years old – said to me, “Did you know that there are people who don’t know that every tree is different from every other tree?” This amazed him. Or don’t know that a nation has a soul as well as a history, or that the ground has ghosts that stay in one area. All this is true, but why are people incapable of ascribing to the natural world the kind of mystery that they think they are somehow deserving of but have never reached?”

– Jim Harrison
the hammock papers

via WhiskeyRiver