critic or creator?

Today I keep having these moments where my own hypocrisy slaps me in the face, a figurative kick in the stomach that knocks the wind straight out of me. As a man I deeply respect says often, "It seems I want mercy for myself, but justice for my enemies." I want to be forgiven when I screw everything up, but I want everyone else to get their act together. I want to be loved the way I am, but expect my friends and family to be moral superheroes. What's with me sometimes?


It's much easier to be the critic than the creator. One sits back and judges the works of men, the other actually holds the stuff of life in his hands. He shapes and forms and directs, animating words on a page or colors on a canvas to become a powerful medium of human truth and emotion. There is no risk for the critic, no one threatening his eagle-eye view. He's not making anything, after all, and at the end of the day no one will hold him accountable for his opinions. For the creator, however, a great deal is at stake - career, reputation, integrity, and probably most vulnerable of all, his sense of worth of an artist. Yet for the same reason that the creator has much to lose, he also has everything to gain.


Most of us are skilled critics, full of scathing reviews and unforgiving evaluations, longing all the while to make a great masterpiece of our own. And as it turns out, when we try our hand at being the creator, taking the "stuff of life" in our hands, we become kinder to those doing the same. And at night, that time of day when our heads used to swirl with words of judgment, they now sink like anchors to our pillows. We sleep, and we smile, because today we have made something. We have risked it all, and tomorrow we will do it all again.

gravestones roll to the rhythm and the sound of you

why don't I live here?

Manarola, Italy

bon anniversaire

I like birthdays. A lot. I triple love love love them.  And why shouldn't I?  It's an occasion to celebrate!  It's one day out of the year when we think a little less about what we should do and more about what we really want.  Maybe it's selfish of me, but on my birthday I'm a little more likely to answer a phone call from an old friend, take the long way to work, accept a compliment, and linger over a nice dinner. Something in a birthday makes me feel as if each moment were a penny in my pocket.  I like to feel the weight of them all in my hands, hear the sound they make as they rub together.  These moments are waiting to be lived like my pennies are waiting to be tossed into fountains, each with a wish on my lips.  What if we grabbed on to every day this way - as if it were my birthday, and yours?  Would we celebrate each other with kind words and thoughtful gifts?  Would we splurge on dessert?  Would we wake up to realize that living, and truly living, is the best present we could have ever asked for - the opportunity to enjoy our beautiful world, to genuinely love all who dwell in it, to adventure into unknown territories, and to become the people we've always wanted to be?

i dare you to sing as loud as you can

This day is one for the books.  I'm staying this weekend at my dear friends' house, who have entrusted me with their home and two lovely dogs.  Even though it's just down the road, I decided I'd let myself do nearly all of my favorite things and write it off as a summer va-ca.

1. Woke up early to coffee and the New York Times (I had my pick, too.  These guys have more printed pages than the Library of Congress)
2. Jogged through the park to an early class at Villa Sartain.  I hate to sound so new agey but yoga is seriously changing my life.
3. Walked Churchill to the NB Farmer's Market where I filled my tote with portabellas, sweet blackberries, and a summer favorite- peaches.  It's easy to 'bite off more than I can chew' at the FM...good thing I only had a twenty.
4. Enjoyed a lunch and iced tea in the kitchen as the afternoon light danced across the table.
5. The alone time gave me the rare opportunity to play my guitar and sing my favorite songs at an unreasonable volume. Have you ever sung something as loud as you possibly can?  Recommended.
6. Afternoon siesta. No alarms, no problem.
7. Now I'm blogging, which is a newer joy...who knew this would become a place I'd love to visit?

Soon I'll pick up some hamburger buns and head to my parents' up the street.  Tonight we're grilling burgers (and of course the portabellas!)  I'm glad for this kind of finale.  Even on a perfect day, when I get to do all my favorites, it's good to hear the sound of other people, with their own lives, and their own favorite things.  I like how we mix together in this wonderful Cobb salad kinda way, tossed around until you couldn't imagine the ingredients in any other combination. I think I'll make them play Scrabble.

I'll have the wisdom for lunch, with a side of urgency

Chewing on this today:

"Nothing that you have not given away will ever be really yours." 

C.S. Lewis

“Do not think that love in order to be genuine has to be extraordinary. What we need is to love without getting tired. Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies.”

Mother Teresa

Bon appetit.

wake up, oh sleeper

I believe that beauty can wake up a sleeping soul.  Art can move the waters of a still spirit.  Our physical senses are magically connected to our hearts within us, so that the reversed image of a sunset on our retinas brings peace to the mind.  The smell of onions cooking in a pan reminds us we have a family.  And when we lean in and listen to the stories of others, it awakens the enduring Story, the one that started long before we began to breathe and will continue long after we've stopped.

The three videos I've posted below help me find the place where I'm most alive.  They are life-giving, inspiring, beautiful, and sometimes sad.  I hope you'll "lean in and listen" to the stories they tell.

road trip!

Headed to Phoenix for a week.  Triple-digit highs.  Controversial immigration reform.  A recently defeated top scoring NBA team.  What's not to love?  This will be my first time to Arizona, and it will take quite some willpower not to roll all the windows down and crank "Take it Easy" down I-10.

See ya later, alligator.

un morceau de nostalgie (piece of nostalgia)

One year ago I awoke in Paris-
The city of lights.
I can still smell nutella crepes
And roasted lamb rising
From tired street vendors.

I still hear the metro's bells and
The excited chatter of
Schoolchildren with a summer before them.

I am still lost in winding alleys and magnificent avenues.
Still standing on stone bridges
To see if perhaps,
I dropped my heart in the Seine.

of tin roofs and thunderstorms

Tonight, the sky fills my eyes with the brightest flashes of lightning.  With every deep, deliberate roll of thunder it seems to be clearing its throat, begging for attention.  A tin roof has always been the perfect stage for raindrops to play, and I find myself somehow lying in bed with an orchestra seat.  Yielding to the great storm's majesty, I shut my book and switch off the lamp.  Its soft glow flees slowly from my room.  The evening takes over.

The night, already mysterious, becomes almost magical in a summer thunderstorm, as if somewhere in the hills a young magician had stumbled upon his father's workshop.  I always enjoy the results of his fortunate discovery, the blinding cracks of lightning, the thunder's earth-trembling response.  Each exchange instills in me both fear and wonder, and I am a little girl again.  Tonight, the gentle rain is my mother.  She sings me a lullaby that only the two of us know, and at once we are dancing - she on the rooftop and I in half-dreaming.  She is a far better dancer than I but applauds with every twirl and leap I attempt.  She takes a final bow and her hand covers my face to coax my stubborn eyes to close.  Somewhere in the hills, the little magician must have heard her song and drifted off.  Perhaps later, his father came in and found him there sleeping, his little fingers still clutching his toys.  As he walked to his workshop that night he had imagined how he would scold the boy, how he would punish his childish rebellion.  Now he only looked down at his little son and wondered of his dreams, scooping him up in his arms to carry him back to his safe, warm room.

The night settles in, the earth becomes still.  In the morning, sunlight will dry the traces of the evening's masterpiece.  I will rise to receive the gift of another living day, and somewhere in the hills, the little magician will plan his next performance.

skin deep

I never judge a book by its cover, but almost always a wine by its label.  Saw these two very cool bottles today at the Huisache when I picked up my spinach salad to-go.

a borrowed vessel

There is no frigate like a book 

To take us lands away,

Nor any coursers like a page 

Of prancing poetry.

-Emily Dickinson-

One of life's simple pleasures is a visit to the public library - the smell of yellowing books, the quiet whisper of pages turning, old and young alike absorbed in the Great Story, their bodies sinking into chairs in an act of surrender.  Today I am looking for one work in particular, that being F. Scott Fitzgerald's renown tale of love and the American Dream.  Today I will stand in line waiting for the beep of the librarian scanning my membership card.  I will tell her thank you as she gives me fourteen days to get lost in the Roaring Twenties, the era of The Great Gatsby.  Flapper skirts and economic prosperity - this will be my world until I return my treasure or extend the vacation another two weeks.  As I let my heart and mind set sail on a borrowed vessel, I know I am bound for deeper waters.