today.

intoxicating.

enchanted.

color.

daydreamy.

architecture.

mid-point.

industrious.

delicious.

inter/face(book)

i am swamped. two jobs. a kidlet on summer vacation. looking for a new house. not to mention the pile(s) of things i want to do but can’t find time to do, like, um, my work as a painter, the three children’s books i have yet to send out, the furniture that needs refinishing, the yoga classes i am not attending. the list goes on and on. oh, and did i mention that i have a business? oh yes, that.

plus that other mentionable, fortydeluxe, The Blog. there is so much going on i can’t seem to articulate any of it. maybe when the new dust settles, i will have some minutes to figure out what All Of This That Is Happening is about. but for now i am simply hanging on with my two full hands to this ride that is, so far, summer 2009.

So in lieu of any new marvels or fabulous insights, i am stealing a page from the (face)book, and posting a list of factoids two friends demanded i do. for those of you who have seen it, sorry for the redundancy. for those of you who haven’t, try not to fall asleep.

1. i have avoided doing this task since chere ruthie en rouen sent it to me last fall. the only reason i am doing it now is because danny said i have to. but i still think this exercise in narcissism is so very moi moi moi blah blah blah. that being said,

2. my favorite smells are coffee brewing in the morning, fresh lavender, early grey tea steeping, and the nape of maya’s neck. for that matter, the nape of anyone’s neck whom i love.

3. my second language is dutch.

4. i am a very good mom. i tell maya that all the time. mostly she laughs that water-over-pebbles laugh, but sometimes she glares at me and says ‘well i am a very good kid’. right now that isn’t really true, but i love her with my deepest heart and soul.

5. if money were no object, and i therefore had unlimited time and resource, i would open a city-block-big shelter for dogs to be rescued and rehabilitated. and i would smooch repeatedly on the heads of each and every one of them.

6. if i could have dinner and a bottle of wine with anyone, it would be ee cummings. his poetry pulls the breath out of my body and then blows it back in, with sparkles.

7. a moment of decadence for me involves my couch, the perfect book, and french press coffee + hot milk. if chocolate needs to be involved that is okay, too.

8. i hold more women in high regard than i do men. the loveliest thing about that is that these are the women in my life. that being said, i would very much liked to have been friends with imogen cunningham and audrey hepburn.

9. i think i am very horsey. i begged my parents when i was in eighth grade to let me go to a private high school so i could have horse-back riding for phys ed. they said no, so i lived in holland for a year instead. i didn’t get to ride any horses there either.

10. i have an affinity for many things ‘c’. chairs, cups, and coats. my friend stephen and i had an epiphany several years ago on a long distance call that these things involve wrapping, much like the shape of the letter c itself. we wrap our hands around cups; we sit in a chair and it embraces us, we pull coats around our bodies to warm us. our second epiphany that day was that this probably wouldn’t make sense to anyone but us.

11. back to the horse thing. my fantasy life is that of a cowgirl. on a ranch.

12. more fantasy: if i could live any contemporary novel, it would be the time traveler’s wife. if i were terribly brave, i would sing back up in a band.

13. the person who makes me feel safest in the world is my sister loreen.

14. i move through this world trying to see everyone. the person bagging my groceries, the old man crossing the street in front of my car, the nanny taking care of someone else’s kids. every single positive action that every single person does is beautiful and significant. i love that waiters in france have deep pride in their work.

15. i overheard my grandpa in iowa tell my father when i was ten years old that i was beautiful, and it changed my life. this after getting notes in my desk in fourth grade that said ALBINO! at a time when marsha brady was the It Girl.

16. one of the sweetest things is when someone comes to my house and a) is comfortable enough to dig around in my fridge and b) doesn’t want to leave.

17. i rearrange my furniture constantly. the best time is on saturdays when there is still some coffee in the pot and an old movie on tv. once i do it – and it can take hours of critical thinking and measuring in this little house – everything feels fresh and cozy. i love cozy.

18. i have three websites and a blog site. and i dare to despise narcissism! how ridiculous of me. but really it has more to do with being a type-a workaholic.

19. i think one of the loveliest parts of a woman’s body is the ankle, and the most beautiful part of a man is where the forearm meets the wrist. that and his sense of humor.

20. i have a thing for vintage jewelry and old cars. i’ve had a little bit of both.

21. i get lost when i paint, when i write, and when i dig around and garden in the yard. there is something about using my hands, especially when in soil, that takes me to a quiet, beautifully absent place. it’s meditative, church-like.

22. i am not drawn to money as a means of status. people and their trophies bore me. i am unbearably drawn to people with money who do something good and kind and humane with their resources. benevolence is sexy.

23. i like small houses. would never want a big one. i believe big spaces belong in nature.

24. if i could do one thing besides speak fluent italian, it would be to play the violin. i really, really want to fiddle like they do in the irish bands.

25. most of you definitely know this one, but it is worth repeating. i am a really good dancer.

the company we keep

i have lost friends this year. actually, for the last few years, they have been moving out of my life in rapid succession. there is lisa, now in maryland; sophia, in san diego; tracy, on her way back from two years in austria, but to colorado, not california. more recently, june and her boys abandoned us for mexico and then, fittingly, northern california. my mainstay and pillar of strength susan up and hit the road with family in tow back to the east coast last summer. and after that crushing blow (i thought she would stay here, away from everyone and everything she grew up with, knows, and loves, just for me), it was with both selfless glee and selfish despair that i celebrated ruthie’s wedding, then said goodbye days before she left for france.

such a swirl of departures left me breathless and more than a little filled with longing for the women i call my dearest and most inspiring friends. but the carrot that dangled before them, that titillated their thoughts as they weighed options, saw possibilities, and made life- and location-changing decisions, was, for them, an opening in to growth, and evolution, and the next healthier place to be. and with that knowledge in me, and my own enormous wanderlust mostly satisfied in my teens and twenties, i wrapped them in my simple love with wishes of grace and safety, and said goodbye.

this year, these months, have been different. i have said goodbye, literally and sometimes silently, from within the space of my own heart, to another handful of women. women whom i love, and some who continue even from a vast distance to inspire me, women that i miss. but shifts occur. we shift, we change, we move toward and move away from. and what once fit so seamlessly suddenly, just doesn’t anymore.

when something or someone moves away from me, there is a space there, an opening – at least that is my experience as i have looked back upon the movement that has occurred within my life. the years and history laid out behind me show me that as something ebbs away, there may certainly be something already flowing toward. is it balance? i can’t imagine what else it would be. of course balance is the last thing i felt as loss hit, or i moved to yet another place by myself, or i lost the fight for someone or something i didn’t want to let go of. but in retrospect, if i let everything go for a moment and really look, there it is. balance. funny that i strive for it so earnestly and constantly with the feeling that it is just out of reach, that i achieve it only in the tiniest, fleeting moments. then i look back and see it there, calmly, in its almost mathematic perfection.

which brings me to the balance, however fragile and precarious and barely-there, of now. the last twelve months have kicked my ass in ways i never thought i could handle. the financial stress has woken me, and then kept me awake, more nights than not. watching my business crumble at the same time i have been job-searching in an economic slump has humbled and exhausted me. i’ve brainstormed tirelessly to figure out how, as a forty-four year old artist and single parent to my now six year old daughter, i can weave a beautiful life for myself and for her, and keep my creative soul intact. i have experienced the deepest loneliness. i have asked for help from people – my friends, my family – after twenty-five years of never needing help. never. i’ve been paving and paying my own way, and supporting my own decisions, since i was fourteen.

but shifts happen – as i mentioned before – and gratefully it seems i have been able to leap off the last year’s hamster wheel, at last. my family has scrambled to keep me afloat, my sister has given countless pep talks, a few amazing friends have listened and love-bombed, and i placed one of the toughest phone calls i’ve made to ask a friend for help. but in what felt like a single moment, the wind which has been blowing against me for what seems a very long time, changed course suddenly, and i find it now at my back, a lovelier breeze, easing me along.

why did the wind shift course? a shift in energy, that’s what i believe. a singular, specific shift. suffice it to say that a friend, one of a few that have shown me extraordinary faith, pulled me in to her environment and gave me a place to sit for a time. and other people there, the ones that also sit for a time and do what they do, welcomed me and made me fall in love with them and showered me with gifts, the kind you feel but never see. and once that person’s gesture opened a space for me, another person’s gesture showed up – gloriously and without actual cause! – and then another. and the little shift became a larger shift, and i watched incredulously as i experienced the domino effect of someone saying, hi, i see you, and yes, i can give you a little help. and thanks to her, and the others who have shown up recently, and the ones that have been there all along, i think now i will be okay, maybe even better than okay. and as sad as i have been to say goodbye to so much and so many this year, there is balance and love in the company i keep. my gratitude is endless.