Thought's Dominion: March 2005

Two Bush Valley...

So I took my teenaged daughter to the One Tree Hill Tour concert at Avalon last night. What an event. Aside from the fact that we were literally packed in like cattle, standing room only, a billion of us, I was the only one over 20 I could see, anywhere...all night. Oh. My. Gawd.

Actually, the music was really quite decent. Bethany Joy Lenz was delightful in a yummy sort of way, and The Wreckers (yeah for MIchelle Branch) were fair despite the fact that she looked like she wanted to throw up the whole time. (I shall cut her some slack, though, for going out on the road as pregnant as she is)

Well, Tyler Hilton surely has at least 1,000 young things willing to bear his child. Sheesh.

Parking was $10 bux.

3 12oz waters were $12 bux.

Best tasting water I have EVER HAD.

Maybe it was just the thought of all that spit coming out of Tyler's face onto the crowd. Ew. What's with that?

All in all not a terrifying experience. And, well, Tyler's backup guitarist is Weewy Weewy HOT.

Oh, and he can play, too.

Heh.

Kitties!

The new kitties should be here in a week or so. The neighbor cat momma is looking rather round. Like a wine bottle with legs. She sleeps a great deal. She is nesting, too. We are going to have two new kitties in our home soon. My older daughter wants to name the Abercrombie and Fitch. I. don't. think. so.

Love and Books: Sometimes you read a book and it captures you. You swim in the words and stroke your hands through their waters, amazed at the phosphoresscence. Or you are entranced by the characters and the fireflies of their lives as they wander through the plot. Other times you get lost, or you find yourself having read the same page over and over and over, not once having really "gotten" what was intended to be gotten. Sometmies there is little going on to keep your attention. Some plotline is there, but pulsing like a tiny vein just under the surface. Hard to find, but carrying life-force nonetheless. Love is like that sometimes. The quiet of it can be disconcerting, seemingly boring, but crucial to the forward motion of life anyway. Even little breezes make feathers float and bubbles gambol. Remember, when it is still therein is something simple. The mere binding of words and the pleasure of turning pages in the morning, the weight of the binding, the crisp edges of substance are enough. Love is like that. Sometimes.

I love the cermony of tea. The feel of the tea in my fingers as I pinch it from the tin. The steeping, the straining, the sipping. This is my favorite tea, a hearty and very smoky lapsang souchong. It brings me fond memories of my childhood sitting by a fire eating popcorn and playing Scrabble with my father.

I drink a lot of tea. This little silver tea strainer was given to me by my mother. It is part of a set that I have been collecting over the years. Mostly small pieces, I have a comb, a small mirror, this tea strainer...On all of the pieces is depicted a scene of some men and a woman sitting outside what looks to be a pub of some sort. It is Dutch, I think. I keep finding little pieces at flea markets and yardsales, sometimes antique stores.

Ancient: Illustration Friday

When I feel lost and not-so-comfy about where things seem to be going I tend to turn inward, and to oracles like Runes to take look at what I find there. It almost always shows me something in a new light, er, maybe an old light.

The time of transformation is 'nigh, and despite the blowing winter winds, and hurling snow out my window, I know, as sure as I see the daffodils on my bookshelf, that Spring is going to have her way and be ushered forth in the weeks to come.

And with her New Growth.

And lots of mud.

Metaphorically speaking, ya know...

Trusting the Process...

At first I tell myself that I should just have faith that this edge is there, this place were I come to, this knowing that I have something special inside that sees things. Some call it talent. I oft times doubt that very word. It feels like self agrandisement to me.

When I find myself without the impetus of faith in my "talent" I creep to the edge and do something different, just testing, see. And, ninety-nine percent of the time I am met with my own magic. Square in the face. If I had not the doubt, perhaps the magic would not feel so, well, magical. I might take it for granted.

Yesterday, someone I admire told me my work was "stunning". I about fell off my chair. *I* see my work as fulfilling to me, and sometimes I sense it is darned good.

But, yesterday was a kick in the pants. Not only did I acurately portray (and that *is* what a portrait can do) the inner and outer beauty of someone I think is heart-flutteringly gorgeous, but someone who knows "Good" when they see it, someone who is well-published and talented in his own right, told me I was talented.

It just does not get much better than that, for an artist, for a child learning to ride a bike, for a lonely elderly woman who is learning to cook something new.

Self-esteem is the best drug on the planet.

Go get yourself some.