some favorite things

And *here* is the jewel of the day -- a perfectly ripe O'Henry peach. I think it was more than ten years ago now that I tasted another out-of-this-world peach -- the Angelus peach -- and as the name suggests, it was truly heavenly. I've searched for this variety of peach ever since but with no luck. I think I may have found a good rival, though, with this one. I could have sworn with the first bite that it had been marinating in vanilla sugar..


As I was enjoying my tastes-like-vanilla-sugar-peach breakfast, I was treated to some front row entertainment from this guy, a big 'ol pileated woodpecker. Though the Great Blue Heron rates #1 in my book for "majestic", this guy is a close second --

A windy overcast day today. Fall has started, and each breeze and gust of wind is nature's way of helping the trees to cast off this year's growth in preparation for winter. The leaves haven't quite started turning yet, but the seedpods on the Big Leaf Maples *have*. Right now they're mostly clustered on the branches, but they're brown and dried and ready to launch.
That's got to be one of my favorite "gestures" of nature -- watching the maple seedpods fall through the air like little helicopters. The show is just beginning... only the most-ready and mature of them are heading to the ground right now, but in another few weeks these fall breezes will have hundreds of them fluttering down from the sky.

Mary Oliver poem

Landscape

Isn't it plain the sheets of moss, except that
they have no tongues, could lecture
all day if they wanted about

spiritual patience? Isn't it clear
the black oaks along the path are standing
as though they were the most fragile of flowers?

Every morning I walk like this around
the pond, thinking: if the doors of my heart
ever close, I am as good as dead.

Every morning, so far, I'm alive. And now
the crows break off from the rest of the darkness
and burst up into the sky---as though

all night they had thought of what they would like
their lives to be, and imagined
their strong, thick wings.


***
That poem just floors me, with awe. How that woman could pour so much meaning and imagery and 'moment-ness' into so few words... One of the amazing things about it is that it builds with each stanza, starting with the simplicity and almost childlike innocence of the first observation of moss. From there each verse draws more insight until finally landing on Consciousness, itself, in the image of the crows bursting into the sky. Masterful.

on the reading shelf

Always, always there seems to be a dozen strangely diverse topics at the front of my attention at any one time. I was reading last night about some descriptions and advice for INFP types (me to a "t"). And the phrase of the day (for me) is?

"Pick one thing and do it well"

Yes, yes, yes... but it's SUCH a difficult thing for me to do! Still, I've long been aware of this and am working on it (believe it or not!). In the meantime, here's what's on my reading shelf currently:

Christopher Alexander, "A Pattern Language" -- It strikes even me as odd that I'd be reading a book on city planning, architecture and building, but this book is fascinating and highly readable despite it's 1171 pages of text. I've heard it referred to as a sort of mystic's approach to buildings and space-planning, though he uses very little spiritual language. It's just all very honoring of human beings' natural tendancies toward shared aesthetic and a "felt sense" of home.

Leif Peterson, "Normal Like Us" -- I've always had a certain awe for anyone who's a writer, so to be reading a book by someone I've known personally is a real treat. This is a collection of short stories injected with both a good deal of humor and a lot of wisdom and insight. Truly, my idea of a very enjoyable and worthwhile read. Highly recommended!

David Bohm, "Wholeness and the Impicate Order" and "On Dialogue" -- I just picked up these two titles over the weekend after learning about a philosophy called Process Theory. I was big into philosophy in college but haven't read much since then other than Integral Theory stuff. But learning recently about Process Theory has got all those philosophy-love sparks flying around in my head again. Can't wait to dive into these...

Bonnitta Roy, "A Process Model of Integral Theory" -- THIS is the article that catalyzed my interest in Process Theory. I discovered it online last week as I was researching a psychotherapeutic technique called "Focusing". This brought to my attention the work of philosopher, Gene Gendlin, which then had me googling him for more info. When I saw Roy's article linking Gendlin's (and other's, like Bohm's) work to theories that expand on Integral Theory... well, I read it and it got me all excited to read more. I love this sort of deep inquiry into the nature of reality and consciousness.

I should probably also note what's been playing non-stop on my iPod lately. When I go into the studio to work I like to listen to audiobooks. My favorite right now (and which I keep listening to over and over and can't get enough of) is Joseph Campbell's "Mythology and the Individual".

and it was all yellow...

Back in the studio today. It's been a busy week, but more on that later :) Today was "yellow day" for the color swatches --


But I didn't want to just do boring old color swatches (though really -- these colors are not boring! I love what this wax does). So I grabbed a scrap piece of plexi and did some playing around. I had no plans for this piece other than to play and experiment, so I very consciously did NOT judge as I created. I wanted only to explore tactically, visually --

While the wax was melting I busied myself with general studio clean-up and organization. A long, long time ago I used to love playing with beads. I still have my collection (I don't think I'll ever be able to get rid of all those beautiful sparkly beads!), and maybe someday will find a way to use them again. As I was cleaning and organizing I found some of my old projects - some that I did on my own, and others I did for some classes I used to teach about beading --
This was a fun project, as I recall. Tedious and time-consuming, but I've always loved that sort of work. Truly meditative for me --

Mary Oliver quote

Let me keep my mind on what matters, which is my work, which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished.

-- Mary Oliver

got the blues

Playtime in the studio. This week's project has been an expansion on something I started earlier this year, when I made up separate batches of encaustic medium in every single oil and powdered pigment color I own. Now I'm taking those colors and painting them onto little squares of plexiglass.


Plexi is the perfect ground for exploiting the translucent quality of the wax. It allows light to enter from behind as well as in front.

LAKE AND MAPLE, by Jane Hirshfield

I want to give myself
utterly
as this maple
that burned and burned
for three days without stinting
and then in two more
dropped off every leaf;
as this lake that,
no matter what comes
to its green-blue depths,
both takes and returns it.
In the still heart,
that refuses nothing,
the world is twice-born --
two earths wheeling,
two heavens,
two egrets reaching
down into subraction;
even the fish
for an instant doubled,
before it is gone.
I want the fish.
I want the losing it all
when it rains and I want
the returning transparence.
I want the place
by the edge-flowers where
the shallow sand is deceptive,
where whatever
steps in must plunge,
and I want that plunging.
I want the ones
who come in secret to drink
only in early darkness,
and I want the ones
who are swallowed.
I want the way
the water sees without eyes,
hears without ears,
shivers without will or fear
at the gentlest touch.
I want the way it
accepts the cold moonlight
and lets it pass,
the way it lets
all of it pass
without judgment or comment.
There is a lake,
Lalla Ded sang, no larger
than one seed of mustard,
that all things return to.
O heart, if you
will not, cannot, give me the lake,
then give me the song.

a view from the studio door

Back in the studio today. The weather's still gorgeous out, but I both need and want to get some work done. At this point, most of my work involves getting the studio set up. Can't do much work without an easel set up, or my paints organized and available, or a workbench ready and waiting with tools in easy reach.

I do love this new space. The largest, by far, that I've ever been in. It almost feels luxurious! Except that I have plenty to fill it with, with all the many mediums I've dipped into over the years. I've always fantasized about having a space where I could set up separate work stations... one for painting, one for drawing, one for encaustic, one for metalworking. Then there's the pottery, the enameling, the glasswork, the dry pigments/tempera/paint-making station... I could go on. Does it sound like I suffer from too many distractions and no focus? PRECISELY. But... I trust... Somehow I know this is what I'm supposed to be doing, and how I'm supposed to be doing it, meandering though it may be...

So here it is. All full of boxes and very little in the way of order... *yet*. I'm working on it. Bit by bit. Letting the space grow out from the first central "core" that I set up at the end of summer -- the desk area, which isn't really visible here (just left to the very center of the picture, behind the table with the meditation cushions sitting on top):


And the view? Truly amazing, considering this is a low-rent artist's studio. Views like this are why people tack on an extra hundred grand or so to the price of a house. I am *very* lucky to have this:

And this is Hubert, cheering me on with a paintbrush in his mouth. I found him over the summer in Republic, WA, looking all forlorn at a garage sale.