from where i sit...

is it just me or is there a faulty planetary alignment going on this week? something's just off. i'm not sleeping well. and i just feel, well...blah. i'm reading a book that i hate and yet i persevere. what's strange is that i have surrounded myself with inspiration all week and actually feel very inspired on an intellectual level. my inspiration notebook is filled with notes and scribblings, and i'm constantly running to scribble another sketch or thought in it, but when it comes to sitting down and actually DOING any of them, it falls down for me. i can't really get up off the couch or out from in front of the computer. i'm all input and no output. what is it about this week? i can't put my finger on it.

in a way i'm in a holding pattern. i signed a contract for a new job last week and it starts next week. so this week has been the in between week. i should have been eager to get all kinds of things done (like all those half-finished sewing projects i've got going) , but strangely, i just feel i'm waiting. and it's not that good liminal space kind of waiting that i love and have waxed philosophical about on numerous occasions. it's just a really non-productive kind of waiting wherein i have retreated into giant sloth mode:

and i was feeling rather badly about it until i read this. it seems that leonardo davinci was a great procrastinator. he filled tons of notebooks with ideas, but executed very few of them in actuality. it's really only an ingrained weberian protestant capitalist thing that makes us think that procrastination is bad. in fact, procrastination gives you time to work things out in your mind. perhaps all this thinking about the artworks that i've sketched out will make them better in the long run. i mean, who wants to be mediocre? and there are times when productivity breeds mediocrity. as the article says, davinci understood the fleeting nature of the imagination...it's important to get your ideas down while they're there. working them out comes later. to quote the article, "if there is one conclusion to be drawn from the life of leonardo, it is that procrastination reveals the things at which we are most gifted--the things we truly want to do."

therefore, i procrastinate in order to get in touch with my innermost creative self. so there.

procrastination with a capital "P"

why oh why oh why do i procrastinate? what is it that i think i get out of it? not much, truth be told. self-recrimination. panic (in the end). feelings of guilt for lack of productivity? but somehow, i am not able to work myself out of the procrastination rut i'm in this week. it doesn't make me feel the least bit good, so why do it?

i pondered this as i made gocco prints this morning for my latest swap. it seems that what i'm procrastinating is finishing several articles (all of which are open on my screen), not things like this, tho' the last time i participated in a swap, i also procrastinated it. so who knows what will trigger my tendency to procrastinate?

there's something so satisfying about little frosting peaks of ink in yummy colors.

(hmm, wonder if it's time for lunch.)

these are my most favorite colors..blues and greens. they make me feel relaxed.

sabin had doodled this design on a paper, so i snagged it.

i even made a couple of moleskine notebooks 

(perhaps one day i'll stop procrastinating that etsy shop)

this tree is one that sabin drew when she was 4.

i've long been wanting to do something fun with her drawing.

i decided that during october, we would eat a more vegetarian diet here at our house. less meat. we don't really need meat at every meal. it will be healthier and easier on the grocery bill. but now that october 1 is here, i'm already thinking, that seems like a lot of work, so maybe another time.  what is going on with me?

i have three half-finished articles open on my screen. i am now on day three of spending long stretches staring at them. what is it? why can't i wrap them up? i guess it's not so much procrastination as a block of some sort. but how do i clear it out? i thought perhaps indulging in creativity would help. the repetitive motion of printing gocco cards has given me plenty of time to think. so maybe it's time to give it another go. or perhaps i'll wait 'til tomorrow...

procrastinating

as i often do with a deadline looming, i find myself procrastinating - making detailed lists, skimming a few chapters of "podcasts for dummies," updating the trello boards (yes, they are really just more lists), going through scads of photos to choose which ones should be sent for retouching (not a priority), writing this...doing things, but not the things i should be doing as i'm careening towards that deadline. doing things only tangentially related to the task at hand. doing things to prepare for doing the task at hand but not actually doing the task itself. why do i do this? why do i need to feel the sharp blade of the axe whispering against my skin in order to get to it? alas, it's not there yet, and so the procrastination continues...

* * *

oh to be a poet of procrastination.

* * *

i've been thinking that america looked like an empire in decline for some time now.
apparently i'm not alone.

* * *

perhaps a reason to start running?

* * *

i jumped on the fire & fury bandwagon and ordered the book.
maybe i shouldn't have.

gocco goodness

in typical procrastination mode this morning, instead of tackling my growing to do list, i was suddenly inspired to make a few gocco prints with my nifty little printer. first, i drew a dandelion and made a print master of it.

then i put burgundy ink on it (it looks rather red here)

then i printed it on some gorgeous little moleskein cahiers notebooks

then i cleaned the master and put gold ink on it.

and i made a few more notebooks.

this is what i'm going to put up on etsy.

i've been promising myself to do so for months now.

somehow fear has stopped me.

but now i'm ready.

the dandelion, a cheery little flower that spreads its seeds of possibility to the winds.

#3 - the grandest inquisitor

this week i'm writing each day about a person, place or thing that has had a big effect on my life. i'm going to be leaving aside parents, sister, husband and daughter because those are a given for having had a big effect and writing about that effect would be way more typing than i should do with the angry nerve in my left hand. 

i have had a lot of fun thinking about this assignment that i've given myself this week and yesterday was quite surprised where the thinking and the writing took me.  let's see what happens today. this is installment 3.

today, i know exactly who i want to write about, but not really where to begin.

time: late 80s-early 90s

place: large university in the midwest

after following the advice of my new age russian teacher in southern california to pursue my russian studies, i went back home to the midwest and enrolled in a russian program at a large state university. having had russian 101-2 as a night course, it wasn't long before i found myself in over my head in russian 201, so thanks to the kindness of two professors, after a few weeks, i was allowed to switch to russian 102. what a relief that was! not least because of the wonderful professor teaching the course, harry weber. his kindness and patience got me through and although i'm not sure i ever fully recovered my confidence where russian as a language was concerned--it was never easy for me, i just loved it passionately--he enabled me to think it was possible to keep doggedly pursuing it.

as is often the case in language departments, the professors teach both literature and the language itself, so where prof. weber came to mean so much to me was in a 19th century russian literature course. under his guidance, we did close readings of pushkin, turgenev, gogol, dostoevsky, tolstoy--all the biggies! and i felt a whole world opening up for me. i had actually read war & peace as a kid, mostly because i wanted to tackle such an enormous book. but harry opened up the whole historical, philosophical expanse of that baggy monster and i learned to appreciate it so much more. 

aside:  actually, i never really came to love tolstoy, he's so preachy and righteous that other than sebastopol sketches, i never really became a tolstoy person. and it might be that i got that from harry as well, because last year he admitted in an email that he never really liked tolstoy much either. i had asked him to help my sister, who was disturbed by reading anna karenina, see the redeeming qualities in that book and he said that he didn't really think there were any. which, in its own way was a comfort because it validated my sister's feelings about the book.

the 19th century lit course led to a course with prof. weber on tolstoy & dostoevsky. the highlight of that course was an intense couple of weeks on the brothers karamazov. i just looked at my dog-eared copy of it as i sat down to write this and just looking at the marginalia and highlighting and underlining i did at that time takes me back. i positively devoured brothers k--even reading 120 pages of it while driving (along a straight, sparsely trafficked interstate) because i simply couldn't put it down. in wanted to BE each brother in turn, tho' ivan was my favorite with his rationality and his intellect. i could relate to the desire to careen around manically following my emotions and obsessions like mitya and some part of me wished i could be good and pious like alyosha. the discussions we had on the course were intense and masterfully led and provoked by prof. weber. which is why i called this posting the grandest inquisitor...he asked questions and pushed us to explore answers and it opened up a whole world for us. or at least it did for me.

i loved reading before that, but in his courses and under his tutelage, i learned to love books and to appreciate them so much more deeply than i had previously. it's something that remains with me to this day and could only have been emparted by a wonderful teacher. i also learned that it was ok not to like some of the books. before that i had been intimidated into thinking that you MUST love all of the classics. harry taught me that that wasn't necessary.

there are two more books which harry opened my eyes to:  mikael bulgakov's master & margarita (where there is another encounter with the inquisitor, hmm, i might have to explore the implications of that another time) and andrei bitov's pushkin house. that was later in a graduate literature course. 

i'd already read master & margarita in 20th century russian lit, so the graduate course reading was a repeat. each student on the course had to present a book in turn and i was sure i'd get stuck with something i didn't want. i sat there, crossing my fingers that i'd get m&m and couldn't believe my luck when it was still available when it came to me.

i spent weeks preparing my presentation--fear of humiliation before my fellow graduate students overruling my normal inclination towards procrastination. i researched everything i could get my hands on that had been written about it and in the end settled on a bakhtinian reading of it as menippian satire. it was my first intense research project and i learned so much from it. i went in several times for guiding discussions and always came away feeling i'd been pushed by harry to find my own answers and thoughts. socratic method used subtly on me to help me grow as a scholar. only a fantastic teacher is truly able to do that.

bitov's pushkin house was the final book of the semester and it somehow spoke to me. it fit with the postmodern theory i was reading in another graduate course that semester, so i could read it through the lens of kristeva (arguably not postmodern, i realize, but a transition figure between structuralism and postmodernism, as i read her) and derrida. but perhaps it was simply a main character who felt fragmented and unreal in the face of the world around him was just something i could relate to as a 20-something graduate student who was struggling to come into her own. i wrote an essay on the book for the final exam and received an A+ from harry. it was one of those times when the pen was simply a conduit directly to my thoughts and my brain was in the zone. the question must have been a perfect one for me (i no long remember exactly what it was), again, the perfect question posed by the grandest of inquisitors.

harry is retired now, but i always go and visit him and his wife nellie when i'm back in the US. they are the kind of people, living the kind of life that husband and i aspire to when we reach their age. they are engaged with the world, well-traveled, thoughtful, wonderful conversationalists. we play cards with them when we're there. we laugh and laugh and tell stories and laugh some more. they are a joy to be around. i feel privileged to have had harry as my teacher and mentor and most importantly as my friend. 

christmas angst

christmas angst. every year, i declare i won't have it and every year, i have it. of course, it's deserved to an extent - i still have a pile of presents for my parents sitting here on the sideboard, not sent. ditto my sister. i tell myself it makes it more exciting to get unexpected presents in january. or february. but i hope i won't wait that long. what is it with me and procrastination?

i found out this afternoon that we were expected already today at the more local family christmas to-do. i never knew that (husband made the arrangements and obviously didn't adequately communicate them). but because of cold weather and bunnies and kitties and chickens that need their water thawed twice a day, we had never planned to go already today - it's just too long to leave all the animals home alone. but i have to admit that now i'm very worried that they're thinking we're horrible not to be there. which may sound like i'm a little paranoid and over-reacting, but we are talking here about a person who didn't speak to us for a couple of years because of a misunderstanding over a handful of smoked shrimp, so you never know.

but we're as ready as we're going to be. presents and goodies are packed, as well as good humor. let's hope that's enough. and if not, it's only one day. but i do just once wish for a christmas free of anxiety.

weekend accomplishments

when the possibility of blog camp transitioned from fantasy to reality, i took at look at this little slice of hallway hell and panicked a bit:

but, thanks to the tidying frenzy which preceded my sitting down and getting to work, and an entire day of effort on the part of husband during which he put in a new floor, it now looks like this:

and i can tell you that is a big relief! and we now have our very own room in which to iron. which makes us feel strangely posh. but probably isn't really that posh as long as we're doing the ironing ourselves.  which are are.

* * *

other than that, i invented a new recipe for rhubarb-strawberry cake. it was necessitated by discovering quite a ways into a rhubarb-strawberry crumble that i didn't really have enough brown sugar. i've never invented a cake recipe before, but it turned out pretty well. this is a shot before i discovered the thing with the brown sugar.

those two mangoes in the upper right of the picture (looking suspiciously breast-like) were diced together with some red onion and served over grilled halloumi as an appetizer last evening. they were the really good kind of southeast asian mangos and are almost buttery in texture. they kick those green ones from south america right out of the kitchen. no comparison. tho' there was a twinge of guilt involved in the carbon footprint of buying either one. however, that was eased by the taste of the velvety sweetness mingled with the salty halloumi all smoky from the grill. yum. and gone too fast to get a picture of it.

* * *

after getting down to work this afternoon (thank you rain), i finished three articles and got a good start on three others. now there are only three to go (because yes, it was nine, not seven). but the night is young and there is much caffeine in the house, so i will soldier on.

but first an after-dinner walk in the evening sunshine, since the rain of the day cleared up around 4 p.m. the world was fragrant and green and so alive.  even the dandelion seeds were luminous.

thanks to all of my procrastination, the house is tidy, the laundry is done and put away, ditto the dishes and nearly half my work is done. i have that sunday evening feeling--when you feel relaxed and ready to face whatever the week brings and even have optimistic thoughts that you'll start running tomorrow. the sunday evening feeling is that good.

from where i sit...

this is the view before me.  i'm still getting acquainted with the iMac.  i miss right click.  i didn't realize how much i actually used right click until now when i don't have it.  but, i am confident that i will adjust and learn.  and in the meantime, the joy i get from sheer aesthetics of the machine is enough.

the weather is changeable and unpredictable.  it's restless.  sunshine one moment, rain showers the next, rainbows in between.  sometimes i think the weather accurately reflects my own moods, or is it that my mood reflects the weather?  i feel a bit restless as well and my to-do list is a mile long, which doesn't help.  i always end up feeling restless and have a strong tendency towards procrastination when i have a lot to do.  i have emails i need to write, a small piece for LNG World Shipping, invoices, invitations to make for our big end-of-summer party, straightening up, laundry, ironing, dishes...the list goes on and on.

so, what am i doing?  sitting here, synching my iPod with the new iTunes and generally not doing any of those things i should be doing.  but, perhaps that's what sunday afternoons are for. the work can wait 'til monday.

11 things (x3?) or riding the jagged edge...

dec. 11 - 11 things: what are 11 things your life doesn’t need in 2011? how will you go about eliminating them? how will getting rid of these 11 things change your life?

1. a job that steals my energy instead of energizing me.
2. negative thoughts.
3. fear.
4. negative people.
5. a depressing kitchen.
6. anything that stands in the way of creativity.
7. procrastination (ok, people, stop giggling, i mean this).
8. low ceilings.
9. not listening to my intuition.
10. television.
11. toddlers & tiaras

and how it will make a difference:

1. i gave way too much energy to a job that my inner voice screamed to me, from the very beginning was a bad idea. but i've learned my lesson and won't ever do that again.
2. the bad job exposed me to lots of negative thoughts and i have realized only in hindsight what that did to my creativity.
3. i took the bad job because i was afraid to trust myself and my own abilities. 
4. the bad job exposed me to loads of negative people, but i learned a big lesson about how damaging that is to my entire outlook on life and i won't ever let it happen again.
5. my kitchen is still horrible and calamine pink, but that will change in 2011. i won't get my ultimate kitchen with the aga (yet), but we will do the "curry kitchen" and it will be a BIG improvement over what we have today.
6. i'm not going to lose sight of being creative in 2011 as i did for much of 2010 - i let lots of things get in the way...moving, job, negativity...i refuse to let that happen again.
7. i'm a horrible procrastinator, so perhaps it will help to put it here. writing is the new praying, after all, so now is my chance to say i'd like to stop procrastinating.
8. our house is full of uncharming low ceilings and i feel them cramping my style. i won't be able to totally get rid of them 2011, but some of them will change.
9. i turned down the voices in my head in 2010, much to my detriment. i won't be doing that again.
10. i'd love to watch less t.v. it steals your time and your brain.
11. sabin and i have a minor addiction to discovery travel & living's toddlers & tiaras. i think, for me, watching it makes me feel like a good parent. because there are seriously no people more dysfunctional than these pageant parents. unless it's jon & kate (yes, they're still together here, tho' i realize they've long ago split where most of you are).

but to end this on a positive, rather than a negative note,  i hereby list the 11 things my life needs in 2011:

1. daring.
2. positivity.
3. writing.
4. daily creativity.
5. lots of gardening.
6. knowing much more intimately where my food comes from. (we are getting pigs and chickens as soon as spring comes.)
7. more time with friends.
8. more time spent on the back of a horse.
9. listening to  my gut.
10. music.
11. time outdoors.

what 11 things do you want in 2011?

check out more lists of 11 things at reverb10.

oh yay, a meme for blog camp day

lisa-marie at this girl... tagged me for one of those question memes where you answer all of them but the one you like least, replace that one with one of your own choosing and then pass it along. :-) it sounded like the perfect post for a saturday, when i'm hanging out with my blog campers!! (squeal! yay! happy dance of joy!)...so here are the questions (and i'll admit i chopped off more than just one--it was getting too long for me, but i added several easy ones at the end):

what is your current obsession?
thankfully, i seem to have moved on somewhat from the eyeball thing, so i'd have to say stones. rock on, man. especially if the stones also look like eyeballs. that's the best.

coffee or tea?
both - tea in the morning--with milk and 1.5 spoons of sugar, coffee the rest of the day, with plenty of milk (preferably steamed/frothed), but no sugar.

what's for dinner?
tonight, it was one of our favorite dishes--fish (we used rødspætter--one of those ugly flat fish with eyes on top, not on the sides, that i don't know the name of in english) baked in the oven with a lovely mess of grated carrots, leeks and a can of coconut milk. served over rice. it's heavenly. and there's some left over, so i'll be having it for lunch tomorrow. yum. we have a great fish guy in our town, so i try to go there at least once a week.

what would you eat for your last meal?
wagyu beef and a big plate of sushi

what was the last thing you bought?
i'd love to say it was my chucks, but it was four packages of tea, a package of fried onions (ristetløg) and a bag of crisps made of root veggies (so totally healthy). :-)

what are you listening to right now?
sadly, i'm listening to husband snoring, as i turned off the music when he went to bed. most of the day, we listened to america's greatest hits, oddly enough.

what's your favorite ice cream flavor?
i love a really good coconut ice cream and once cried in a thai restaurant in phoenix because they were out of theirs, which was heavenly. once i cried, they actually scrounged up a bowl of it for me. lesson in that: crying to get your way--very effective.

what do you think of the person who tagged you?
lisa-marie's blog is new on my blogdar (like radar, only detects blogs)...i think i've visited her one time previously. i love discovering new blogs and anyone who uses lots of ellipses is cool in my book.

if you could go anywhere in the world for the next hour, where would you go?
i'd go to the seminary co-op bookstore in hyde park, chicago. i could easily kill and hour and several hundred dollars there.

which language do you want to learn?
i'd like to learn afrikaans.

what is your favorite color?

i think this says it all: turquoisey-blue

what's your favorite piece of clothing in your own wardrobe?
my best and fave long & lean gap jeans. (and you thought i was gonna say the chucks, didn't you?)

what is your dream job?
i think i have my dream job, but would like to blog for a living.

what is your worst habit?
procrastination.

if you had £100 right now, what would you spend it on?
books.

do you admire anyone's style?
this is really bad, but i'm drawing a total blank. i love dr. gregory house's style...but that's more a state of mind than a look.

describe your personal style...
this isn't a question. i refer you to my profile description in the sidebar. :-) my style's all over the place, depending on the occasion. i love fake lashes. i have a hugo boss suit. but most of the time, i wear flannel pj bottoms, a comfy t-shirt and the striped gap sweater my sister gave me for christmas.

what are you going to do after this?
sleep (i've scheduled this post, you see). i don't sleep enough what with the fact that you all keep writing blog posts, even when i'm busy and i'll probably never catch up!

what are your favorite movies?
the abyss (afgrunden) (1910) starring asta nielsen
fargo, the princess bride, the castle, napoleon dynamite

what is your favorite smell?
this changes all the time (you know my thing for perfume), but i have to say that in spring, when the air is heavy with the scent of lilacs, that not much can beat that.

cats or dogs?
cats or cat-like dogs (e.g. pugs)

mac or PC?
mac (duh)

tolstoy or dostoevsky?
dostoevsky

moscow or st. petersburg?
moscow

how many questions do you think i added? which ones?


and if you would like to play along, consider yourself tagged. thanks again lisa-marie for giving me an assignment, sorry i kinda tapered off at the end and didn't answer quite all of the original questions...

blog crush: the fragrant muse

a glass of white wine at sunset by a beautiful, still lake

this is for you HRH TFM 

the beauty of this bloggy world is making new friends. people who very quickly feel like long lost sisters, or at least a best friend you've been missing. people who finish your sentences in an IM convo, or perhaps, due to the nature of IM, say the same thing as you at the same time. the fragrant muse is one of those people. or should i call her--her royal highness the fragrant muse. ;-)

we actually met first on flickr, when she asked me about my camera (she might have been sorry, as i issued a book to her on flickr mail, waxing philosophical about how much i adored my nikons). happily, she's got one now too. :-) and i can't wait to see what she sees with it.

she's a new blogger...she's only been blogging for about a month. but what she's done so far is very promising. like me, she had years of piano lessons and can't really play. and just today, i learned something and tomorrow, you can bet i'm going to go see if my local health food/treehugger store has some clary sage oil.  i want to see what it does to my dreams. now if she would just give me advice on the exact right oil to combat my procrastination and make me write all that stuff i need to write tomorrow...

please, go check her out, you will definitely not be sorry.

too much and more and exactly enough

sometimes it seems like there's just too much:
~ fear.
~ wanting.
~ consumption.
~ anxiety.
~ wondering.
~ worry.
~ procrastination.
~ jumping to conclusions.
~ thinking the worst. 
~ wasted energy.
~ wasted food.
~ angst.
~ impatience. 
~ negativity.
~ envy.
~ wandering.
~ t.v.
~ baby bunnies (that would be too many).
~ madness

there needs to be more:

~ believing.

~ letting go.

~ beaches.

~ running.

~ music.

~ positivity.
~ acceptance.
~ expecting the best.

~ believing (did i mention that already?)

~ acting on ideas.

~ room.

 ~ travel.
~ energy.
~ daring.
~ kindness.
~ creativity.
~ thinking.
~ disipline.

~ mascara.

~ nail polish.

~ baby chickens.

~ beauty.

~ strawberries.

~ dreaming.

~ sleep.
~ evolving.
~ transformation. 

there's precisely enough:

love.

laughter.

space.

silence.

conversation.

dreams.

plans.

wonder.

luck.

choices.

time.

weeding as a metaphor for life

tuscan kale and blue viking wellies

i haven't been weeding enough in the garden. i blame that i wasn't sure which bits were weeds and which were the actual plants i had planted. and with all of the rain lately, it's gotten a bit out of hand. on the bright side, it's a bit easier to tell the plants that should be there from the ones that shouldn't (the ones that shouldn't are WAY ahead). so we spent some time weeding late this afternoon.

there's some kind of strange peace in weeding. you can immediately see the results of your work. there is a sense of progress (as long as you don't look up or look around when your garden is as large as ours). it feels wholesome. and there's simply no way around it, you just have to do it. one weed at a time.

if i'd been able to stop talking to husband while i was weeding (i could feel that he wished i'd shut up, but still i talked), it would have been quite meditative. i'm going to try that kind of meditation in the near future. productive meditation. getting something done while meditating, that can only be good.

i found it very peaceful. and there's plenty to do tomorrow.

i've vowed that i'll spend at least an hour weeding every day. it could be that weeding in my garden will weed some of the other unwanted things from my life in general. like procrastination. and lack of focus. because when you're weeding, you have to focus - you focus on what needs to be there and what doesn't.

it might very well be that weeding is a metaphor for life.

making lists

december 28 - achieve: what’s the thing you most want to achieve next year? how do you imagine you’ll feel when you get it? free? happy? complete? blissful? write that feeling down. then, brainstorm 10 things you can do, or 10 new thoughts you can think, in order to experience that feeling today.

independent/free is the word that comes to mind. or rather words. but they're related, aren't they? because when we feel independent, we feel free. or at least i hope that's the case.

to do:

1. make lists
2. discuss them with husband
3. discuss them with jude
4. visit godaddy
5. order MOO cards
6. website
7. creative thinking
8. read the newspaper
9. send some letters - real, old-fashioned letters
10. action not procrastination

doing all of these things might not make my goal of feeling independent and free today, but they will be moving me in the right direction. best part of all, i've already done several of the items on this list. (by the way, that's the best kind of list: one that includes something you've already done, so you can cross something off immediately.)

* * *

this is part of reverb10, a month-long exercise in reflecting on 2010 and manifesting 2011.