Turn And See [on KS Friday]

Posted on November 29, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

grateful songbox 1 copy

Gratitude is a word easily tossed about in this season. It is often a nod to something that ought to be more present. It can be momentary, skipping a stone over the water. A commandment for how we should feel. Be Grateful.

Gratitude finds roots and deep resonance the day you turn around and realize beyond the abstract that this life is limited. These moments are limited. No longer an easy sentimental phrase on a Thanksgiving card, gratitude looks at what and who is present and loses all interest in what may-or-may-not-be missing. A sunset, each sunset, becomes a unique once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Last night, late, 20 came over. We sat at the table, told stories. Drank wine. Chocolate and raspberries. Heather and Brian Facetimed with Kerri. Her laughter in the next room, the enthusiasm of their conversation, made 20 and I smile. A long lost friend tossed a cryptic note into our ocean. We puzzled it deep into the night.

There has never been another evening like it. There will never be another.

Kerri’s GRATEFUL is not a Hallmark card. It is not a commandment or a should-feel. It’s not flowers and feel-good honey bees. It flows with the urgency, the power, and the recognition of that day when you at last turn and see an end to yourself. It is a love note to being alive, a meditation on the everyday priceless moments, a call to awaken to the unparalleled now.

 

GRATEFUL on the album AS IT IS is available on iTunes & CDBaby

 

read Kerri’s blog post about GRATEFUL

 

laughing website box copy

 

grateful/as it is ©️ 2004 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Awakening, Gratitude, KS Friday, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Listen For The Splash [on DR Thursday]

Posted on November 28, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

I’ve shown this painting more than a few times and it always generates interest. More people have considered buying this painting than any other in my catalogue. Yet, it remains the bridesmaid. Angels At The Well.

What a crazy title! I can’t remember why I painted it or why I thought angels at a well was such a compelling subject. In fact, I chose it for this week’s Studio Melange because I pulled it out of the stacks and thought, “Really, what a bizarre subject! What was I thinking?”

In mythology, wells are sources of rejuvenation, places of fate, the future can be read in the waters, omens uttered, they are holy, cursed, or a place where wishes are cast. Spirits get caught in them. Stories begin or end at the well. They reach into the earth, the element of  water disappearing deep into the element of earth.

Angels are messengers (remember that the next time the postal person delivers the mail). They are liaisons between gods and people, between the vertical and the horizontal realms. They meet you at the crossroads. They stand watch. They announce. They fall.

Perhaps symbol collision is why Angels At The Well piques so much curiosity but is consistently left behind? What kind of well? What kind of angel? And, maybe that is why I found it compelling enough to paint. Or, it occurs to me that it might be this: drop a pebble into the well. Listen how long it falls. With the splash will come new knowledge, an answer to a wish, a question, or there may be no splash at all. Then what?

 

read Kerri’s blog post about ANGELS AT THE WELL

 

drc website header copy

Happy Thanksgiving (for all of you USA-based angels)

 

pumpkinfarm website box copy

angels at the well ©️ 2004 david robinson

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Random, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Ask A Simple Question [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on November 27, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

everything to lose copy

Here’s a very sexy beginning to a blog post: this morning I read that sales of durable goods in these United States are up .06%. Stoves. Washing machines. Dryers. It is a dubious statistic. The week before our wedding, our washing machine AND dryer died. The nice salesman at the appliance store, an older man, began his sales pitch with reminiscence. “I remember when we actually made good products built to last. Now we make crap built to fall apart.” The next 45 minutes was a lesson in what’s built to break in 5 years or less. He steered us away from more appliances than he tried to sell. It was eye opening.

“Durable” goods, these days, are built to be less than durable. They are built to be replaced. They are built to be thrown away. They are built to produce nice looking economic statistics. [note: Kerri and I have and still cook on a stove that is at least 40 years old. It looks like hell but works like a dream. It was built in the era before planned obsolescence was considered a consumer best-buy]. The seedy dark side of our consumer culture is 1) the mountains of refuse we leave behind and 2) how rarely we turn and look at the consequences of our consumption.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch , one of five garbage patches gyrating around our oceans, is at least twice the size of Texas and growing. When I was in graduate school I took a class about my city and the environment. Like me, none of my classmates knew what happened to our trash. None of us knew our watershed. None of us knew how our trash impacted our water.  We take our refuse to the curb. It goes away. Magic!

Where does it go? The latest National Geographic Magazine (12.2019) has an eye-opening article on our addiction to plastics and the pollution/environmental devastation it creates. One of the chief denials of the modern era is that humans are somehow separate from the environment in which we exist. We can do whatever we want to do to “it” and “it” will have no impact on “us” at all. According to the story, we are above it all. And, as is true of all denial tales, we either wake up and reorient or we hold fast to our delusion and drown as the unsinkable ship goes down.

Speaking into steadfast denial often requires a new, courageous, and unlikely voice. Enter Pattie Gonia, an environmental advocate drag queen. A modern berdache.  A powerful presence, an artist, standing in the trash, wearing the trash, asking (and answering) a very simple question: what do we have to lose?

 

 

Watch this short documentary to learn more about EVERYTHING TO LOSE and PATTIE GONIA:

 

 

 

read Kerri’s blog post about EVERYTHING TO LOSE

 

heart in island sand website box copy

Filed under: Awakening, Edges, Flawed Wednesday, Heroes, Perspective, Story, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Sip [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on November 26, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

wine copy

Unlike wine, I am not getting better with age. The cliche’ would have me growing wiser with my years but the closer I walk to my end the farther away wisdom seems. I know less and less the more I live.

Yesterday, Kerri told a young man – a budding preacher – that he’d reach and impact more people through vulnerability than through knowledge. To be vulnerable is to open to life’s experiences. Knowledge is too often a protection against experience. A younger me used knowledge as a sword – just like this young man. I am only now finding gratitude for the day my sword shattered.

Perhaps standing at the edge of the mystery and acknowledging that I know nothing useful marks the beginning of wisdom. Quinn told me that wisdom had nothing to do with the stuff that you think you know.  I am catching glimpses of what he meant. Isn’t it true that the real stuff, the stuff of deep value, always leads to silence? To quiet? To listening? To sitting comfortably in the space between and enjoying the moment just because?

These are the reasons I enjoy wine more and more. I drink it with friends. I sit on the back porch and sip it as I watch the sunset. As my agendas fall away, I find more open space for simple appreciation, utter appreciation, for this single sip of life.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about WINE

 

picnic table website box copy

 

Filed under: Gratitude, Navel Gazing, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Chase Your Tail [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on November 25, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

phooey copy

Sometimes I think I am living in an Antonin Artaud play. Surreal. Surreal. Surreal. And very funny.

I came into the bedroom last night and Kerri said, “Dog drove doughnuts in a car for half an hour.” I fell on the floor laughing. She was reading a news headline but that did not make it less absurd.

Speaking of headlines, if this was kindergarten, the entire Republican Party would be sent to the principal’s office for advanced liar-liar-pants-on-fire. An entire cadre of seeming adults claiming that the dog ate their homework. I’ll bet that dog conspired to eat their homework, too!

Suddenly, this surrealist post has a dog theme.

“God struggles.” P-Tom said in all seriousness. I looked at Kerri and said, “I have a real problem with the idea that a god, any god, struggles.” She rolled her eyes.

An eye roll inspires an explanation. “Gods are not supposed to be separate,” I said, leaning in. “Things that struggle are separate.” She scooched away from me, a signal to stop my pontificating. “I struggle with the notion that god struggles,” I said proudly in an attempt at thought-condensation. Kerri narrowed her eyes, saying, “You ARE a struggle.”

Theme’s must be honored, especially dog themes so please note that ‘god’ spelled backward is ‘dog.’ In my philosophy, dogs struggle. Gods do not. As Anton Chekhov wrote in his play, The Cherry Orchard, “My dog eats nuts, too.” Try and write that about a god!

Jen and her “little” made pretzel-monster-cookies for Halloween [Jen is one of my heroes. She and Brad are ‘bigs’ in the organization Big Brothers, Big Sisters]. Kerri chose a cookie to eat but couldn’t do it because it was too adorable. She thrust it at me, saying, “You do it.” Suddenly, I was cast in the role of cookie executioner. I made cookie screaming noises. The cookie pleaded for a pardon but I was heartless. It was over quickly. It was a very, very good cookie.

If I were a dog watching me eat the cookie [my apologies to Chester and Henry], I’d go to the garage, jump in the car, start it up, and chase my tail, doing doughnuts until either the car ran out of gas or the police showed up to take me to the principal’s office. Either way, making sense of people must be hell for a dog. It’s hard for us, too.

 

when sled dogs dream jpeg copy

 

read Kerri’s blog post about PHOOEY

 

snapchat website box copy

note: did I mention that BabyCat snores like a champion – especially when I am writing. This post was dangerously close to being cat-themed. ‘Cat’ spelled backwards is “Tac.’ Go figure!

 

 

 

Filed under: Merely A Thought Monday, Random, Rants, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Take Pause [on KS Friday]

Posted on November 22, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

grace songbox copy

Kerri’s GRACE is a poem. It is an essence.

When climbing the mountain, there is that moment when you pause the ascent, catch your breathe, and take stock of where you are. It is the moment of rest, of replenishment, of taking in the view. It is neither arrival nor departure. It is somewhere in between.

The somewhere-in-between-space is where GRACE is glimpsed. A fleeting glance, a warm touch, a slow inhale before the thought of climbing pulls your eyes and mind from GRACE and back toward a destination.

 

GRACE on the album RIGHT NOW is available on iTunes & CDBaby

 

read Kerri’s blog post about GRACE

 

ks website header copy

 

 

prayerflagsinsnow website box copy

grace/right now ©️ 2010 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Awakening, Emergence, KS Friday, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Talk To Yourself [on DR Thursday]

Posted on November 21, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative
softly she prays copy

softly she prays, mixed media, 40 x 30IN

Sometimes an image exploration does not feel finished. This painting went into the stacks a year ago. I pull it out all the time because something about it is calling me.

Each time I pull it out I sit with it. We have a long silent conversation. I am compelled to work into it again. I should have named this painting The Siren.

I’ve promised Kerri not to work into this piece – or paint over it. That used to be a common practice for me. This version will remain untouched.

It amuses me because this painting was the result of another version, a very colorful painting that hung in a public space for so long that I forgot about it. I left Seattle without it. A few years ago, an honest gallery owner sent it back to me. It inspired this chatty descendant, Softly She Prays.

If my math is correct, when I one day in the future decide that the next version is complete and toss it into the stacks, I will have had a twenty year dance with this image, a sketch from a long ago sketchbook. A thirty year conversation.

It occurs to me that I  am now talking to a much younger version of myself. The figure/image is the same. The prayer is much, much different. Maybe I’ll title the next version Reaching Back In Time. Or, perhaps a better title is Just Another Way Of Talking To Myself.

Either way, there’s so much more to discuss.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about this painting

 

 

bootsbythestage website box copy

softly she prays ©️ 2018 david robinson

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Breathe The Same Air [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on November 20, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

network connections copy

For years I had a debate with my business partner. She was a first adopter, always jumping into the latest technology. Her position in the debate: real relationships were possible through technology. My position: you need to be in the same room with someone if you want a real relationship. Technology can provide connective tissue but can never approach the visceral, tangible, sensual realities necessary in a relationship.

Over time I’ve flip-flopped my position and then flipped back again. Connectivity is not relationship. I am connected with people all over the world – and I deeply appreciate the network connection – but I am only in relationship with the people I spend time with. It is simple. Relationship takes time. Relationship needs time. It is not an achievement; it is an ongoing investment in the heart of another.

John O’Donohue writes about the “digital instant,” the expectation of arrival compressed into a nanosecond. The absence of journey. If the website doesn’t come up in a second or two, we leave in frustration. We click our angry departure for another instant arrival. If I don’t answer an email within a compressed amount of time, the originator of the email wonders why I’m ignoring them. Connectivity comes with expectations that often prohibit relationship. Or, rather, connectivity is the low-bar expectation of what now qualifies for real relationship.

Yesterday 20 and I continued a conversation that we started four years ago. We will pick it up again because our conversation has no end. It is a lifetime conversation. There is no expectation of arrival, of conclusion. The focus is entirely on the journey, the friendship, the continuance. The laughter, the deep sharing of fear and frustration, the vulnerability, the sharing-of-time-to-listen-and-give-presence. What we share is not a network connection (that phrase feels scrubbed, antiseptic, even in the writing of it). It is something with breadth and depth and texture that can only come when two people breathe the same air, sit in the same room, read body language, and feel what is beneath the words.

 

photo-1

 

read Kerri’s blog post about NETWORK CONNECTIONS

 

slow dance party cropped website box copy

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Language, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

Help Yourself See [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on November 19, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

gratitude blanks copy

In a particularly dismal period of time in my Seattle years, I decided I needed to focus on the good stuff. I made a game of writing on small bits of paper things in my life for which  I was grateful. And then I left my small gratitude notes around the city as I moved about my day. I left them at bus stops. I rolled some and tucked them in crosswalk signs. A few were tucked into menus or left on coffeehouse tables.

My gratitude notes had an interesting blow-back. They inspired me to seek things that I was grateful for so I might write a note about it. Not only that, but they made me pay attention to the infinite acts of kindness that I saw everyday. People were helping people everywhere! I was blind to it until I started paying attention; until I got out of my misery-head and opened my eyes.

I was struck by the vast difference between the story I was being told about humanity and the story I was witnessing on my daily walks across the city. I could count the acts of aggression. I lost track of the acts of kindness and generosity because there were too many to capture.

When you stop and think about it, isn’t it always the case that the the good stuff, the potential-pool-of-gratitude-possibilities is vast yet the gunk gets all the focus. What is it in us that hyper-focuses on the flaw, sorts to the wound, while the river of beauty roars by unnoticed?

Kerri designed these cards for another project and they made me remember my notes. Encouragement of gratitude. Give it a try. Download the blanks. Scribble a note or two of thanks-giving and leave them behind somewhere. Be prepared for some eye opening blow-back.

 

gratitude blanks PDF copy

 

read Kerri’s blog post about GRATITUDE

 

 

pumpkinfarm website box copy

Filed under: Gratitude, Possibility, Seeing, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Be Like Your Dog [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on November 18, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

independent dog copy

Some people look like their dogs. Some people are like their dogs. I am one of the latter.

DogDog resists all recognizable constraints. He cannot tolerate tight spaces. It’s the reason he won’t climb stairs. It’s not the stairs, it’s the tight passage way. How’s that for a metaphor! I would be more successful in this life if I had better tolerance of constraints.

He is hypersensitive to other people’s feelings. He is, to use a phrase from the Dog Whisperer, an energy-reading machine. He knows when I am sad or angry or frustrated BEFORE I know that I am sad or angry or frustrated. I have, like DogDog, always been able to walk into a room and “feel” where the energy-eddies were swirling. Sometimes I can’t tell if it is my sadness or the person I am sitting with. That takes some time to sort out. I wonder if DogDog has the same challenge in sorting which feeling belongs to which animal.

DogDog is fearful of non-threatening, seemingly ridiculous things. For instance, his food bowl is metal and it sits at the base of the oven. When the bowl makes contact with the oven, metal on metal, he flees to save his life. He hides in the other room until we convince him that the sound-monster is gone. My monsters are just like his. Seemingly ridiculous to outside eyes. Always constituted of the things I do not understand. The sounds that make no sense (what people say, what people do to each other). The future. The past. Metaphoric metal on metal.

What I would like to learn from DogDog? My monsters keep me awake at night. His fears don’t stick – or, rather, he doesn’t carry them forward. Not only is he a profoundly sound sleeper but, the next time there’s kibble, he’s back at his bowl giving it another go.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about A VERY INDEPENDENT DOG

 

 

paws website box copy

 

Filed under: Identity, Merely A Thought Monday, Metaphor, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Next Page »

  • visit the studio melange at kerrianddavid.com

  • The Seer available on Amazon.com

  • Lucy & The Waterfox is also available on Amazon.com