Just playing

More iPad, Zen Brush fun.

Saw Elton and Leroy together in concert on Friday night. Good fun.
Yesterday we saw Red. More good fun. Especially for the Baby Boomers amongst us.
Those of us of a certain age like this movie because it reminds us we still got game.

More art coming a bit later.

Let's be kind to each other, just for today.

Been busy..

making art. It is amazing how much better I feel if I spend a few hours mindlessly painting, cutting and pasting. Oh, and photo editing.

This will eventually support a collage
or cover a book.


This is one of those balsa wood cheese boxes. My granddaughter and I painted a couple of them one afternoon. I have cut pages, accordion style and am collaging them. Then I'll glue them so that I will have a concertina book. Never did anything like this before. Fun.



A dear lady who I admired greatly passed this last week and I spent a lot of time thinking about the card I wanted to make for her family. This is an altered photo of the angel who lives in my front garden. I also have her up as my desktop right now. My gift to you, in honor of my generous friend, if you would like her on your desktop. Just think of me when you look at her. And please don't put her on anything you will sell or mass produce.




I'll close with a quote that I am thinking about a lot this week.

...(life) is like a chick refusing to be returned to the eggshell. Yiyun Li

What a soft day

An old Irish priest used to start his sermon with this phrase on misty Sunday mornings. I thought of him today. I love this weather, it brings out the best in me.

The Ranch is so lovely. All sounds are muffled.

That bird bath has been here a very long time. The Birds of Paradise are giving it their best for a late season bloom.

This bird bath is the one we bought new for our first granddaughters christening. Over 35 people gathered on the lawn to welcome her into their lives.

Wish you were here.

More Zen Brush Painting

Once a Juggler

Once I was a juggler,
a very good one actually.
I juggled balls big and small
all day long, never dropping one.
I wanted to stop but the balls
just kept flying, my hands
and eyes too busy catching
and tossing to see the right
moment in each trajectory
to capture and hold. I asked
for help. I explained that
it just wasn’t fun anymore.
Who was I kidding, it
was never fun. It was survival.
And, while I no longer consider
myself a juggler, I still have balls in the
air. Balls that long ago, I threw so
high they don’t come down
for months, sometimes years.
But they do come down
and my heart stops with
their insistence and urgency.
I want to stop. It isn’t fun anymore.
lm 2010









On the other hand, alone can be very enjoyable.



Very soothing. Sometimes just fun and silly. Something about using this app is stretching my drawing. Somehow I feel more confident. I think it gets me past the terror of thinking of "ruining" a piece of paper.

When I look over this poem and the art, it strikes me as kind of depressed. I'm really feeling pretty good. Got a new prescription that just might work!

Lets all just feel how we feel and enjoy it, whatever it is.

Wow, it's been a long time

I have an iPad. I am totally smitten. Obviously, yesterday's experiment in blogging from said iPad was a flop. Need to work on that, but there are so many others wonders to be had. Here are some early efforts in the Brush Painting app that is great for whiling away many-stress free hours. I have sprinkled in some scribbling that came from the truly funky place I have been lately.

All of these are my originals, written this month.

Like a monkey with a banana
in each hand, I’m afraid to put
one down so that I can eat the other.
I’ll starve to death with nourishment
in my grasp.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My arms are not
nearly long enough
to reach all of
the places I itch.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I pray to you to open a new door
for me. But I wonder if you already have
and I’m here trembling on the threshold.




What is that unknown
thing out there on the horizon?
Is it the monster fed to huge
by all of the times
I chose the right thing
instead of the human thing?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A monk in a funk
afloat in a boat
has, I’m afraid
been swept out to sea.

He dropped his oars when
the noon bells rang and
the Angeles dropped
him to his devout knees.



If I could I would travel
to that kingdom
far across the Milky Way.
Back in time to the day
God was born. Then I could
watch him, listen and learn
how he came to be so benign,
so mysterious, so very far away.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I see Moses come down from
the mountain with an armful of
heavy stone laws and I’m afraid to
climb up and step into those misty
heights. Afraid I’ll come back
with even more responsibility
and crazy to boot!






This is How the Wind...

This is how the wind whistles
through a four chambered heart,
as if it were no more
than a low desert landscape.
Dreams and desires whipped
into dust devils that put
on quite a show but, in the end,
come to nothing.
Piling up regrets like the
ever shifting dunes. Driving
small bits of memories into
stinging eyes that can only
be relieved with a wash of tears.
Old loves are turned into ripples
that look like a quiet pond stirred
by a gentle breeze but are only
the trails of an unseen hand
drawn mindlessly through the sand.
lm 9/2010




I have been many places and done many things since I last blogged and I had planned to post it all. But, really, life (yours and mine) has gone on. To sum it all up, I'll quote, again, John Denver when he sang, "some days are diamonds, some days are stones." All in all, I'm happy to riding around the sun on this crazy planet.

Claremont has developed, in the midst of much controversy, an addition to the old "Village" which is quite well known in the area. If you are nearby, be sure to visit The Claremont Folk Music Center on the original side. People come from all over the world to visit the place Ben Harper hung out as a kid. It is quite charming and is totally a hands on place. They also have an extensive collection of unusual and antique instruments from all over the globe as well as concerts and open mike nights. Tell them you saw it here!

The new area is in no way an addition to the original, but we have been taking advantage of Friday nights in the common area. There are plenty of places to get a bite, great frozen yogurt and a live band until 9 or so.

My other favorite "i", my phone, is filled with camera apps that I love playing with. Here is a peek at last Friday night. I don't know the woman at the table but the scene was so perfect I have made her part of my collection.






And how about this big old moon???



I'm wishing for you the blessings of constant opportunity for the new.

First post from the iPad