A São Paulo Notebook

I love the concept:

Artist Fernanda Guedes draws strangers who catch her eye and then invents identities for them.

Going The Distance

Here
Source: The Gladdest Thing

Here I am in the garden laughing
an old woman with heavy breasts
and a nicely mapped face

how did this happen
well that’s who I wanted to be

at last a woman
in the old style sitting
stout thighs apart under
a big skirt grandchild sliding
on off my lap a pleasant
summer perspiration

that’s my old man across the yard
he’s talking to the meter reader
he’s telling him the world’s sad story
how electricity is oil or uranium
and so forth I tell my grandson
run over to your grandpa ask him
to sit beside me for a minute I
am suddenly exhausted by my desire
to kiss his sweet explaining lips

by Grace Paley

Colored Pencils

The vibrancy of David Poppie's art inspires me as I sift through paint chips and attempt to make my peace with the color yellow.

Russian Sex Appeal

Ulyana's striking take on matryoshki.

A Dirge Without Music

Elegy For A Plum

She cannot be so dead.

She cannot be so dead

when she flickers with such glorious motion

here on the broad plains

of my heart.

by The Noisy Plume

Thoughts On The Death Of Thomas Plotkin

Each of us is a blend of dust and divinity. We each have the capacity to be heroic, and we are, each and every one of us, mortal. In a time when we are reminded of that, it’s not the answers to questions that will heal; it is community and family.

by Tori Murden McClure

Bring In The Clowns...

There should always room for the circus in life.


Feats of strength and madcap antics.

Heart Tremors

I woke up at 3am unable to sleep so I curled up under a comforter on El Coucho and watched the rest of Jane Eyre, having started the movie while in a rose oil and epsom salt bath before going to bed.



The heroines of Brontë and Austen have been compelling creatures for me since I was a child. Why am I so moved by their stories? These women with their guarded, unrecognized, passionate and imaginative interior worlds are set free by a romantic love that persistently and patiently works to break down all obstacles, including those of their own making.



Seeing these tales told well nourishes me on a deep level-- the ultimate comfort food. Although Evan and Mike continue to be utterly mystified by my taste for them, I keep returning to my favorites to bulwark the easily shaken faith I have that love does in fact conquer all.



(The perfect version if you recast Jane and Mr. Bingley, but not equal to the Greer Garson and Lawrence Olivier telling I grew up with or the epically long loveliness that is the BBC miniseries. Just saying.)

Welcome To The World!

Livia Grace Paar
arrived at 4:10 pm
weighing in at 8 lbs 8 ounces
to the great joy of many

To think that Skype allowed Evan to meet his new niece hours after she was born! Miraculous times we live in...

Devolution

(click on pic for music)

Please note: this post was created under the influence of an ER-sanctioned Vistaril overdose that reduced me from human to animal to vegetable to mineral. Slow-blinking mineral.

Argh...

Anaphylactic shock: also less than ideal.

A Family Tree

Today is Eliza Belle Scott's second birthday. She's one of my favorite kids of all time and space.


If I had my druthers, I would give Eliza her family tree rendered in a print by Patricia Curtan of Chez Panisse fame to celebrate the day. Seems to me a dreamy gift for the walls of a child's room!