miscellaneous projects and why i am listening to heart this morning

first sweater: chunky yarn + learning to cable.

it's a men's sweater.

but i'm making one for me.

i think it will be my cosy yurt sweater

that can easily be pulled over anything,

leaving my hair a static-y mess.

yes, i'm already aching for fall and winter.

{that doesn't mean i'm going to enjoy every minute by the pool,

lots of picnics at the park and by the river,

or our biennial trip to hayden lake with cj's entire extended family}

i'm also attempting to read all of my textbooks at least once before school starts in june:

i need to do this, otherwise i will be behind. i like to read and re-read to make sure things are making sense. wish i had this habit in high school or even for the majority of my college career. oh well, i certainly have got the school bug now, and i find myself "nerdulating" more frequently these days. also, notice my truly skilled sketch...you're probably wondering where i acquired such skill and discipline. well, the honest truth is that i am a self-trained artist. i learned while in kindergarten and i've never looked ahead. i thought my style was pretty good back then, so why change it? anyway, i like to draw on big pads of papers. i draw my day-dreams. i draw with calligraphy pens or pens i don't even know what they're for: i just like the feel of them.

yes, i am listening to heart this morning. why?

because i made the break. i was honest. we're all happy. we're all relieved. it's time for dancing, like a real novice, and time for closing the eyes while singing along to the chorus. hooray for breaking! hooray for honesty! and guess what: i can do hard things. yup. i can with the help of everyone around me, and angels whispering in my ear.

"when i ask you how you did it, you just saaaaaaay, 'it was nothin at all'!!"

my dream book:

while in salt lake city,

i stopped by my favorite book store.

i browsed and browsed to my heart's content...

and i found this lovely treasure of a book.

don't you think it's the perfect book for me?

i've read the first few pages,

and i can hardly wait to consume this book

over and over again.

will be sharing excerpts with you for sure.

manifesto monday: sans TV

for our wedding (almost 6 years ago!) we received many generous gifts: kitchen appliances and accessories, soft towels, camping gear, 5 crock-pots, lots of miscellaneous crystal candy dishes, and a TV. We've used all of our wedding gifts, and still have most of them. We no longer have the TV.

from day one, we decided we would not pay for cable or the small fee just for local channels...was TV really that important to us? nope. so for 6 years, almost, we have been TV-free. congratulations to us! here's what a marriage sans TV has done for us:

01. we actually talk to each other after work, during dinner, and after dinner. we have some really intellectual, silly, and emotional conversations. i'm glad i get to talk to cj rather than stare at a screen while sitting next to him. we've needed that talking time. marriage takes work, which really means, marriage takes talking. lots of talking.

02. we read together. right now we're reading roald dahl's "the BFG" (don't tell my siblings about this one...they might tease me about it! this is our little secret!). i like hearing cj let loose and get into the characters...it helps us to not take ourselves so seriously

03. we learn a lot about each other and our selves. right now i'm learning that i am an impatient, critical monster and cj is a guileless, patient saint. that's usually how it goes around here. bless his heart for not walking out the door.

04. we get to watch a movie on the weekend thanks to our little laptop. that's a big treat for us, to just cuddle up and watch a classic, a comedy, or a documentary.

marriage sans TV has been fantastic. this i believe.

photo of us reading...well, really cj is reading his book, and i am sitting next to him to take a photo that would relate to this post. but we really do read together often.

had to share...

photo by me. summer solstice 2008.

was just reading from storming the gates of paradise: landscapes for politics. really, rebecca solnit says everything i want to say. she's oh so brilliant like that. she moves the heart effortlessly through the voice. here's a little something she writes--my heart has been feeling this for a couple years now, and she finally put it into words for me:

Ursula K. LeGuin once noted, "To light a candle is to cast a shadow." Conversely, it's in the dark that faint light shines, starlight, candlelight, fireflies, the bioluminescence of the sea. I don't want to reverse the binaries, to make darkness good and light problematic. I want a language and an imagination where they are not enemies but perhaps dance partners, whirling each other around this globe that spends half its time away from the sun in night. I want people to remember how photography works, the medium that depends on perfect darkness within the camera to capture the image, for an image of boundless light would be purely black, and exposure in perfect darkness would show just the white of unexposed paper. The visible world depends on both.

Wonderful, isn't it?

Manifesto Monday: reading & writing

photo by me. june 2009. by the window.

somewhere, somehow, as a child i lost my enjoyment for reading. i remember reading "nancy drew" books. those seemed to keep my attention. i also recall reading a book about a kid who turned into chocolate. people read to me, and that was okay. i remember nice giants going from window to window handing out dreams to sleeping children, kids who lived in box cars, and a story about a futuristic earth. i sort of liked listening...it was better than reading.
but, immediately following my entrance into middle school the tiny reading bug that had somewhat inhabited my awkward brain left. it simply abandoned me. i didn't finish one novel from 7th grade all the way until my senior year in high school.
grapes of wrath: maybe i read the first 100 pages.
heart of darkness: only got through half of this short, but dense novel.
the good earth: i think i may have read the whole thing, but i can't recall even the plot.
crime & punishment: my first attempt at an audiobook, which i also failed at completing
strange indeed. i had no appetite for books until my third year of college. i'm not sure how the love of reading left so discreetly, and came back with such loudness.
so what happened my third year of college? i learned how to read. yes, it seems a little late to be learning how to read, but that's the truth. of course i could read the words on the page, but i didn't know how to wrap my head around the bigger picture. i didn't know how to make connections. i didn't know that there was something bigger than a straight story line. it took an incredibly complex history course with an incredible kind professor who showed me how a book was to be read...and consequently, how a person should write.
reading came easier. writing is still painful, yet liberating. there's something about reading great ideas and great plots that compels you to write your own words in a way to reveal your version of the world, its people, its history.
it is interesting to me that i have hardly any memory of those years when i wasn't reading. my memory is much more alive during the years i have been voraciously reading and writing. these gifts keep me exploring, they keep my mind questioning and learning. reading and writing are gifts indeed. we should use them more often.
this i believe.

i read...lots, perhaps too much, but i don't think so!

well, i'm still reading.
can't get enough.

we'll be leaving early in the morning
to go camping!
i'll see you on Monday.

enjoy all 4 posts today!

ode to idle days...

all photos by me. may 11 2009.

yesterday was mostly spent on the lawn

reading.

i set up my blanket and made sure i had protection from the sun

it was oh so hot

so i was grateful i brought along my hat

and sunglasses

so i could read for hours

i first read through finding beauty in a broken world

by terry tempest williams

then

i read through with a measure of grace

given to me as a graduation present from

two of my favorite people: liv + cody

THANK YOU!

both of these books have inspired me,
and lifted my heart while
lighting a fire beneath me.
there is much to do
and much to love.

here's to being idle!

Reading

My dear friend, Nicole, gave me this lovely, lovely book for my birthday. I started reading it this morning. It is absolutely fascinating and ,somehow, healing to read. Some excerpts follow:

Right now it [reverence] has no place in secular discussions of ethics or political theory. Even more surprisingly, reverence is missing from modern discussions of the ancient cultures that prized it.

Reverence begins in a deep understanding of human limitations; from this grows the capacity to be in awe of whatever we believe lies outside our control--God, truth, justice, nature, even death. The capacity for awe, as it grows, brings with it the capacity for respecting fellow human beings, flaws and all.

Reverence is the virtue that keeps leaders from trying to take control of other people's lives...Reverence has more to do with politics than with religion...power without reverence--that is a catastrophe for all concerned...Politics without reverence is blind to the general good and deaf to advice from people who are powerless.

Wherever people try to act together, they hedge themselves around with some form of ceremony or good manners, and the observance of this can be an act of reverence. Reverence lies behind civility and all the graces that make life in society bearable and pleasant.

We have ceremonies in our own time too, but we try not to think about what they mean. In fact, I believe reverence gives meaning to much that we do, yet the word has almost passed out of our vocabulary. Because we do not understand reverence, we don't really know what we are doing in much of our lives, and therefore we are in no position to think about how to do it better.

Reading

Why Americans Hate Politics, by E.J. Dionne, Jr.

I started reading this book last week. I've only read the introduction, and I'm already in love. This book was written in 1991, and I wish there was a second updated edition. It talks about how both liberals and conservatives are to blame for giving the American public false choices and false issues. Below are a few excerpts that I really enjoyed.

"...for so many years our politics has been trivial and even stupid."

"Americans have begun to doubt their ability to improve the world through politics."

"Americans view politics with boredom and detachment. For most of us, politics is increasingly abstract, a spectator sport barely worth watching."

"Voters doubt that elections give them any real control over what the government does, and half of them don't bother to cast ballots."

"Social gaps...grow wider...We have less and less to do with each other, meaning that we feel few obligations to each other and are less and less inclined to vindicate each other's rights."

"On issue after issue, there is consensus on where the country should move or at least on what we should be arguing about; liberalism and conservatism make it impossible for that consensus to express itself."

"We are still trapped in the 1960s."

"By continuing to live in the 1960s, conservatives and liberals have distorted their own doctrines and refused to face up to the contradictions within their creeds. Both sides constantly invoke individual "rights" and then criticize each other for evading issues involving individual and collective responsibility. Each side claims to have a communitarian vision but backs away from community whenever its demands come into conflict with one of its cherished virtues."

"Now, insofar as voters identify with groups, it is often with abstract national groups rather than concrete local ones. An Italian machinist in a Detroit suburb may identify himself more with his fellow gun owners than with his ethnic group, his neighborhood, or his fellow workers. Since he believes that politics will do little to improve his life or that of his community, he votes defensively: If the government won't do anything for him, he damn well won't let it do anything against him, such as tax him more heavily or take away his gun. It is not an irrational response, given the current state of our politics."

Whitman & Proverbs

I've got a morning reading routine. Part of my routine has always been Whitman.

O to realize space!
The plenteousness of all, that there are no bounds,
To emerge and be of the sky, of the sun and moon and flying
clouds, as one with them

This morning I've added Proverbs to my routine. I've made it a goal to memorize more...to memorize more poetry and more proverbs. I hope to refine the words that flow from my mouth.