Category Archives: writing

On Luck, Gratitude, and Wild Turkeys

13 Monday Aug 2012

Posted by in adult children, environment, friendship, inspiration, pets, travel, writing

≈ 10 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , , , ,

Last week I joined 5000 other women at the 2012 BlogHer conference in New York City. To make the event more affordable, and to have a little family time, Paul and I drove down together and stayed with our son in Brooklyn.

The thought of rubbing elbows with people I’d only known through online exchanges was pretty thrilling. And I was looking forward to making some new connections and taking home some helpful tips and inspiration from the sessions.

But I was also nervous. There’s nothing to make me feel more like a country bumpkin than a trip to the Big Apple.

Because I generally travel with my extremely competent male entourage, finding my way from Brooklyn to the conference on my own would be a new experience. In fact, when my son heard my plans, he joked about making me the kind of placard that kindergartners wear while on a field trip. “My name is Judith, if lost, please call….”

Jokes aside, his excellent directions enabled me to arrive at the conference without a hitch.

Well almost.

Sadly, he didn’t give me any fashion advice that would enable me to survive a 45- minute subway ride without looking like I’d slept in my clothes.

I’d agonized for days over what to wear. And I chose my two favorite summer dresses, both with fabulous belts. The problem was that one was cotton, the other linen, and no matter how well they traveled when carefully folded in a suitcase, they both became a wrinkled mess after I’d sat in them for any length of time.

But my dress worries vaporized when Paul and I came back to Brooklyn after meeting for dinner in the city. Our car was not where we left it. It had been towed — a front wheel was allegedly outside of the legal space. When we got it back, it was making an ominous new noise.

Which leads me to the string of bad luck we’ve had over the past couple of weeks. A few days before our New York trip, Paul was driving his van home from a job. It was raining hard and his windshield wipers suddenly went dead. He had to pull over and wait for the storm to pass.

After our trip and the second car fiasco, my prescription sunglasses and then my swim goggles disappeared in quick succession. Like the car, they were suddenly gone from where I surely had left them. Apparently there’s a black hole for eyewear.

Then, when it seemed like we’d lost or broken everything we could in one week, I saw a family of turkeys crossing our yard. “Get the camera!” I whispered to Paul. He brought it over, turned it on, and announced, “It’s dead.”

Luckily, my iPhone was handy and still working (for now at least).

I was transfixed by this momma and her five babies as they made their stately way across our yard and into the garden.

Karina was transfixed too.

So here’s the current tally: two broken cars with one very expensive repair, two pairs of lost eyewear, and a deceased camera (did I mention that the electric toothbrush is also on its way out?).

So yes, we’ve had a run of bad luck. But the fact that it’s the everyday, garden variety kind of bad luck and not real trouble makes me enormously grateful.

Grateful that my husband can fix a lot of things.

Grateful that my friends are willing to step up and provide help and advice. (Thank you Jane and Heather for the camera recommendations. And huge hugs to Kathleen who made sure I attended the conference with nice-looking business cards.)

Grateful that lost items, unlike people and friendships, are easily replaced.

And grateful that we arrived home safely and can sit on our deck and enjoy Mother Nature’s daily parade.

Vase by Elizabeth Cohen (http://elizabethcohenpottery.com/)

Inspired by Older Women

02 Monday Jul 2012

Posted by in aging, art, health, inspiration, mid-life transition, music, writing

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , ,

Women who are in their sixties and older have been on my mind lately. While I have a few years before my own 60th birthday, I’m noticing that late middle-age/ early old age can be one of the most powerful and vibrant times in a woman’s life.

It started at a Patty Larkin concert that took place right here in Concord. I’ve listened to her music for years, but I’d never seen her in person.

If you’d asked me to describe her voice, I’d have told you that it has a smile in it. And after seeing her play, I can now say that, in fact, she does smile when she sings.

From where I sat, Larkin looked and sounded like a woman in her early forties. Her body is toned, and her smooth, youthful voice reveals none of the wear and tear that often comes with time. And the inventive way she noodled around on her electric guitar reminded me of my 29-year-old son, who plays and composes experimental music.

“How old do you think she is?” I asked my husband during intermission. He pulled out his smartphone and looked her up. “Sixty-one,” he told me. Really? Wow.

Close up she may not look quite as young as she does from afar, but the vibrancy and joy she exudes while performing is that of an artist at the height of her powers.

A few weeks later, another powerful, older woman came across my radar. I reviewed Lilly Ledbetter’s memoir, Grace and Grit: My Fight for Equal Pay and Fairness at Goodyear and Beyond.

After 19 years as a supervisor, Ledbetter learned that Goodyear was paying her significantly less than her male counterparts. She took her battle for fair pay all the way to the Supreme Court.

The court decided against her, ruling that the statute of limitations had run out on her claim. She lost her personal battle, but she had the guts (and grit) to persevere so that the rest of us wouldn’t be treated in the same way.

In one of his first official actions as President, Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act, which provides a more reasonable time limit for such claims. Now in her early 70s, Ledbetter went from the factory floor, to testify before Congress.

While reading Ledbetter’s memoir — which I could barely put down—I was reminded of how filthy factory work is (I welded electronic bug zappers during college), and of the gauntlet many women must run when they work with men who are unable to check their sexual urges at the workplace door.

Ledbetter isn’t an artist, nor is she a glamorous celebrity (though she’s both eloquent and elegant in words and appearance), but a regular person who grew up in poverty, worked grueling hours to help support her family,  and then became a spokeswoman for us all. She is forever on my list of inspirational women.

Then last week, at another event in town, I heard historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, 69, and photographer Annie Leibovitz, 62, discuss Leibovitz’s latest project, “Pilgrimage,” which is currently on exhibit at the Concord Museum.

These two smart, articulate women shared personal stories filled with self-deprecating humor. And while Goodwin awakened my somewhat dormant interest in history, my focus was on Leibovitz.

“Pilgrimage” is a photographic study of places and the personal effects, work, and surroundings of several historical figures. Some of them, Thoreau, Emerson, and Louisa May Alcott once lived here in Concord.

Leibovitz began the project during a difficult time in her own life. She needed to do something that wasn’t an editor’s assignment, but that was instead self-driven and that satisfied her own interests and curiousity. In healing herself, she did what many of us do —what I do when I’m overwhelmed, sad, or in a rut — she shifted gears and focused on the minutiae.

While I might weed the garden, detail the house, or start a cooking project, Leibovitz focused her camera on the light outside Emerson’s window, the beat-up surface of Virginia Woolf’s desk, and Georgia O’Keefe’s box of handmade pastels.

Both Leibovitz and Goodwin agreed that it is these kinds of details that make the person come alive. Later, as I walked through the exhibit past photographs of Annie Oakley’s riding boots, Marion Anderson’s concert gown, and the top edge of Eleanor Roosevelt’s desk drawer, etched with her signature, they came alive for me too.

Rather than becoming diminished as they age, these women are only getting stronger. I have heard women my own age complain that they feel invisible. With no regular job and an empty nest, I occasionally feel this way too.

Women like these show us that we don’t have to fade away.  If we keep working, doing, and learning, we can be better, we can do more.

I leave you with another video of Patty Larkin. Check out the way she works that electric guitar with her bow.

Where Do Ideas Come From?

25 Monday Jun 2012

Posted by in art, inspiration, writing

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , , ,

My fascination with creativity started at our kitchen table, where I’d sit across from my grandfather, both of us drawing. One day, while I worked with my pencil and crayons, he painted a landscape on the back of an old shirt box. I don’t know what happened to it, but I still have this one that he painted on canvas.

Painting by Jacob Scheinfein

Back then all I cared about was my inability to make “realistic” drawings. Too bad he didn’t tell me (or maybe he did and I don’t remember) that making art is much more about perseverance and hard work than it is about innate talent and inspiration.

As artist Chuck Close says, “ Inspiration is for amateurs; the rest of us just show up and get to work.”

Practice may not always make perfect, but it does put you on the road to creation. It helps you figure out what you like to do and helps you develop skills and goals. If my grandfather were alive today, I’d ask him, Why that house, those mountains, that tree? Does the scene on canvas match the one in your head? Was there a message behind it? What were you thinking about when you took out your paints and got to work? What was your intention?

A few weeks ago, this video of designer Karin Eriksson at work in her pottery studio, captured my attention. In it, Eriksson seems both deliberate and intentional as she measures out her lump of clay, places it on her wheel, and goes to work. She knows what form she wants that lump of clay to take and how to get it there.

In this case, I’m guessing, the form is already designed — we don’t see if any “rejects” or “seconds” come out of her kiln — and so this video is about process and control, not about what went on in her head when she made the prototype for these pieces. Perhaps this work was executed exactly as planned, but it also may be the result of trial and error or happy accident.

For photographer Sally Mann, accidents are part of the plan. She captures her images using old cameras, faulty lenses, and prints them using the wet-plate collodion process. The resulting photographs have streaks, dust spots, and other “imperfections.” She likes the element of the unexpected that her process engenders. As she says in this clip, “I feel I’m at the whim of the angel of chance because all these wonderful things happen on the plates.”

Last year, when I interviewed artist Sophia Ainslie, she said that in some of her work, “… accident was an important part of the process.” But even when your goal is specificity and deliberation, you have to work with mistakes, “If the mark happens to be in the wrong place—whatever that may mean—,” Ainslie told me, “then you’ve got to run with it and make it right.”

When putting my own ideas down on paper — as opposed to writing up an interview, for example — I may have a broad sense of what I want to say, a tiny kernel of an idea, or even just a feeling to build on, and the bulk of the piece comes while I’m writing  and rewriting it. As Chuck Close suggests, I often don’t discover where I’m going until I get to work.

Sometimes I’m hit by that hyperbolic “bolt of lightening” that puts me in “the zone,” and the words seem to flow of their own accord. But that rarely happens.

The other morning my friend Kathleen told me that she has so many ideas that she is having a hard time settling on a direction for an upcoming show. Then the next day she reported that she’d just spent a whole day working on a new piece only to be disappointed with the outcome.

I tried to remind her that this always happens when she’s starting a project. And then I joked that as a writer, when I’m not satisfied, I can just hit the “delete” button. She didn’t laugh. For artists, the cost of rebooting is much more than frustration and dejection — the materials they use are expensive.

Here is some of her work-in- progress.

Photo and artwork by Kathleen Volp

In their tiny gem of a book, Art & Fear: Observations on the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking David Bayles & Ted Orland caution that, “The function of the overwhelming majority of your artwork is simply to teach you how to make the small fraction of your artwork that soars. One of the basic and difficult lessons every artist must learn is that even the failed pieces are essential.”

Frustrating but true for all of us, whether we express ourselves through music, words, or images. As Kathleen says, “It’s all about bringing your own voice to your work. You have to be clear and be true to that voice.”

Doing so is hard work. It is painful, messy, and frustrating. But it is also satisfying, affirming, and just plain wonderful.

So, artists, photographers, writers, musicians and bloggers, 

  • Where do your ideas come from?
  • How much of your creation is about controlling your medium and how much is about overcoming obstacles and setting yourself free?

Discuss!

Karina’s Walk

17 Sunday Jun 2012

Posted by in environment, friendship, pets, writing

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

, , , , , ,

When I wasn’t working at the store this week, I was writing a book review and a piece on air pollution.

And then there was that password-protected Father’s Day tribute. Sorry, but I didn’t want to  a.) gross you out with my sentimentality or b.) bore you with cute pictures of my kids, who most of you don’t even know. But husband loved it and that’s what counts.

Just so you don’t think I’m lying about all the busyness, here I am at my retail job. See? Busy, busy, busy.

Anyway, because I didn’t have time to write a post this week, Karina has graciously agreed to give you a tour of “her” woods.

Click on the arrow and she’ll lead you in.

Contemplating a Mid-Life Migration

04 Monday Jun 2012

Posted by in adult children, aging, environment, friendship, mid-life transition, travel, writing

≈ 18 Comments

Tags

, , , , , , , ,

Last weekend we shared homemade pizza with friends on our back deck while a great blue heron sailed overhead. Throughout the course of the meal, we heard orioles singing and saw flashes of orange as they flitted across the yard between their nest in the willow tree and the fruit trees in our garden. A grosbeak, hummingbirds, and various other winged residents also made appearances as they went about their evening business.

When you aren’t confronted by the ticks, poison ivy, and mosquitoes, and don’t have to cut the grass, weed the garden, or shovel the driveway when you’d rather be doing something else, this place can feel like paradise.

We moved to Concord almost 20 years ago, and Paul and I still remember a day that first spring when we looked out a window to see our 10-year-old son trailing a pheasant across the back lawn, nearly stepping on the end of its long, sweeping tail.

Our pheasant-follower and his younger brother grew up here. They went to school here. And now they have both moved on to make their own homes and create their own exciting adventures. And as hard it will be to leave this house and yard behind, Paul and I are ready to move on too.

At least we think we are.

In an ideal world, we could create an oasis like this one in the middle of some city. A city that has sidewalks, public transportation, and a rich cultural life —all things that are missing and are sorely missed in our current location.

I want diverse neighbors, a corner store, a local cafe, and a bit of nightlife. I’d love to attend a movie or a concert and then walk home afterward while discussing what we’ve just seen or heard.

In his recent op-ed piece for The New York Times about New York City’s new bike-share program, David Byrne captured my idealized version of city living as he described the different routes he takes on his bike to pick up groceries, commute to work, or visit friends. And he talked about making his home in the big city.

“I just turned 60 and have no plans to retire to the suburbs,” he writes. “I love it here.”

“That’s what I want,” I thought. “A place I can fall in love with, a place that stimulates my intellect and fosters my creativity.”

But then, just below his paean to urban life was another op-ed by his daughter, Malu, who described the optimal environments of young artists like herself who have left the city because of its high cost and many distractions.

“I might have to escape New York to keep my artistic spirit alive,” she writes.

Somewhere between Byrne’s viewpoint and that of his daughter lies the crux of my dilemma. I want the bustle and excitement of the city but not the noise. I want to be able to move around freely even when—especially when — I am too old to drive, but worry that the constant press of people will grate on my introvert soul.

While any place that Paul and I are together will feel like home, I also want to find  my own niche. I want to write in my office and then meet friends for coffee at a neighborhood cafe, or spend the afternoon wandering around a nearby museum.

I know that there is no ideal place, there are only places that you make idyllic. Paul and I will take a few trips, and maybe someplace will click for both of us. Maybe no place will, and we’ll decide that this is the only home we want.

In the meantime, it’s fun to weigh our options and examine the possibilities. That’s the joy of being middle aged. Even with financial restrictions, we are as free as we’ll ever be to do what we want.

I will be sad when/if we leave this house and town that has become so familiar and where we have lived so much life. And I’ll miss those birds. But I’m also ready to follow their example. Yes, they return every spring, but in the fall they leave that empty nest without hesitation. They move forward.

Armchair Traveler

21 Monday May 2012

Posted by in aging, inspiration, meditation, mid-life transition, travel, writing

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

, , , , , ,


Yep, it’s a pretty slow day here at the homestead. We’re just sitting around and thinking, cogitating, mulling things over, chewing the fat with ourselves. You get the picture

When I find myself stuck in the mental doldrums where there is both everything and nothing to write about, I look for inspiration elsewhere.

I didn’t have to look far: This morning two beautiful pieces about traveling crossed my screen almost simultaneously.

The first is by my long-time friend Martha Nichols. In her piece, “Why Travel?” she describes what travel does to her “inner landscape.”

“When you go to a new place, you’re more vulnerable,” she writes. “It’s as if a crack of light opens in the clouds, illuminating your inner landscape as well as what’s passing outside.”

This piece reminds me that no matter how far I roam, I can never escape myself. Martha explains why the hard parts of travel are also the most valuable.

Then, over at Lost in Arles, my new friend Heather Robinson tells the story of how she came to live in Arles. She says it’s a story that bears repeating and I say it’s a story worth sharing.

“Inside an abandoned church, we looked at the work of Harry Gruyaert’s ‘Rivages,’ ” she recalls. “We turned ourselves towards beauty and that stirring surged up into tears. We knew. This was where we were ready to be.”

Indeed, Heather’s entire blog is a celebration of the beauty she finds in the landscape, villages, and food around her. Every one of her posts is un petit cadeau dropped into my inbox.

And then, because I also needed a bit of bucking up, I reread a favorite piece by Dominique Browning. “Go where the love is,” she advises.

“That means not only doing what you love, but being where people love you–where they understand what you do, and, more important, where they have an affinity for who you are. Where the wellspring of creativity can be nurtured.”

And that’s what I’ve been doing these past couple of years as I search for new ways of working. Her post reminds me that if I keep planting the right kind of seeds, something satisfying and meaningful will eventually take root.

And finally, I leave you with this video of fearless young women cruising down la Sierra de Madrid. I may have a middle-aged body, but my spirit still soars like a twenty-something’s and I can feel the wind in my face and the road vibrating under my wheels as I watch them sail down the mountain on their longboards.

Winning Connections

13 Monday Feb 2012

Posted by in inspiration, writing

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

, , , , ,

Once upon a time, when writers like me were well paid for their work, an editor I wrote for joked that just for fun, he’d like to print the next issue of the business research newsletter we were working on in Wingdings font. “Just to see if anyone will notice.”

Back then, writers didn’t interact with readers so much. This particular editor always enclosed a short thank you note when he mailed me my print copies, acknowledging a job well done, and any particular challenges we’d faced in completing the article. I miss him.

And while those checks and thank you notes are no longer rolling in, I have found that writing online comes with its own set of perks. For one thing, I am connected to my readers. They respond to my ideas and we have an online conversation. I also can reach out to other like-minded souls by commenting on their posts. Holed up in my little home office, I value those connections more than I can say.

Even better is that these connections are not limited by geography. One of my favorite online friends is Heather Robinson, whose blog, Lost in Arles provides a guided tour of Provence. And this tour doesn’t take you to the usual tourist spots. Mais non! When you tag along with Heather and her faithful dog, Ben, you are traveling with a local, eating as a local, and experiencing the region as a local.

Velvet eyes © Heather Robinson

Antiques Market © Heather Robinson

As a fellow redhead, lover of dogs, nature, and all things beautiful, I often wonder if Heather and I were separated at birth. So I was surprised, flattered, and delighted when Heather announced that she was awarding me and four others BOTH the Blog on Fire Award and the Liebster Blog Award. Thank you Heather, and bisous to you and Ben.

As part of accepting the Blog on Fire Award, I am asked  to share five things about myself that you may not know.

  1. I recently accepted a part-time job at a wonderful little store in Concord Center. What do I like most about this job? The fact that I can channel my inner fashionista and dress up two days a week.
  2. My 16-month old puppy Karina and I are taking a class in “household manners.” Here’s the question, Who is being trained: her or me?
  3. I secretly, desperately wish I could speak fluent French, how else will I ever move to France and have a regular coffee date with Heather?
  4. I swim 3/4 of a mile 3 times a week. After two years of consistent effort, I am still waiting for the chiseled upper arms to emerge.
  5. I don’t cook as much as my foodie friends might think. Without my husband to shop and cook, I’d probably exist on tofu, eggs, toast, and the occasional vegetable.

As a winner, I also get to pass these awards along to my own favorite five. As Heather noted in her post, “Something wonderful that both of these awards have in common is that they are in recognition of blogs with under 200 followers.” A couple of my own favorite five may have exceeded the 200-follower mark. However, they all meet my criteria:

  • I  faithfully “follow” each of them, rarely missing a post
  • They post regularly
  • Their topic makes my heart sing, challenges my brain, and/or whets my appetite
  • We are “connected” (see paragraph 3 above)

*For the winners, please see the “rules” at the bottom of this post. 

And the winners are:

Kathleen Volp artblog —Fine artist Kathleen Volp brings you into her exploration of language and image as she shares the process and thinking behind her artwork. Here’s your chance to learn what makes an extraordinary artist tick.

A Coastal Point of View — For those who know her, Cheryl Fuller Sparks exemplifies what it means to navigate life’s joys and sorrows with patience and grace.  Join her behind the camera as she explores life through her lens.

Food and Fiction — First and foremost, Jane A. Ward is a writer — but she also happens to be an amazing cook. Her blog is a delicious combination of engrossing writing, photographs, and recipes that make your stomach growl.

Econesting — Ronnie Citron-Fink shares her expertise of environmental issues ( the “eco” part of the equation) and her love of all things we use and do in our “nest.” Her posts help me understand the science and politics of air pollution, inspire me to become reacquainted with my knitting needles, and help me relax.

Martha’s Singapore Column — Follow writer and editor extraordinaire Martha Nichols as she explores Singapore alongside her intrepid 10-year-old son, Nick. Martha’s musings cover the food, culture, and daily challenges she encounters as an American abroad.

The Rules for the Winners

To keep these awards going (and I realize the slightly chain-mailedness of that phrase), please recognize blogs with under 200 followers and…

1. Thank the person who gave you the award and link back to their blog

2. Choose five blogs to nominate and let them know by leaving a comment

3. Request that the chosen blogs pass the Award on to their favorite five

4. Copy and paste the award on your blog post

5. List five things about yourself……

Number 5 is just for the Blog on Fire Award, so if you don’t want to divulge (it really isn’t that painful), there is always the Liebster Award…

Heather and Ben

Judith and Karina