DR Thursday | The Direction of Intention

A Happy Spirit [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on December 12, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“I would rather walk with a friend in the dark, than alone in the light.” ~ Helen Keller

We bought the chandelier a few years ago. It was meant to hang over Barney, our disintegrating backyard piano, but it wasn’t the right fit. For a single summer it lived just outside our backdoor. It’s a solar chandelier so it jumped to life for a few hours after the sunset. It never held a charge for very long.

It migrated into our sunroom, suspended just beneath the plant table. It tickled us that we had a low chandelier that nearly touched the floor. It didn’t get a ton of sunlight from its place beneath the table so it sprang to life for only a few minutes each night after we turned out the lights.

As part of the recent whirling-dervish-clean-fest, the chandelier has been elevated to a new position. Now, instead of dangling beneath the plant table, it proudly hangs above it in a prime position receiving plenty of light. Now, when the lights go out and the chandelier springs into life, it casts glorious shadows across the ceiling.

As part of my evening ritual of closing up the house, I move room-to-room pulling the plug on our many happy lights, saving the sunroom for the last. I like watching the chandelier illuminate, fulfill its purpose and cast its shadow. It both amuses me and I find it oddly comforting.

Last night, knowing that it had only a few minutes of charge since the day had been dark and cloudy, I stood and watched the shadow change as the little chandelier waxed and then slowly waned. A lifespan of a few moments, a complete arc, as the vibrant jeweled octopus stretched across the ceiling and then almost immediately faded into nothingness. The quick visit of a happy spirit. It sent me to bed with a smile and the promise of another visit in the morrow.

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE CHANDELIER SHADOW

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Filed under: DR Thursday, Navel Gazing, Seeing | Tagged: artistry, chandelier, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, illuminate, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, purpose, shadow, spirit, story, studio melange, the melange, visitor | 3 Comments »

My Constellations [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on December 5, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Like stars in the sky, there are moments in life that form constellations. Actually, the stars do not form the constellations, we do. We are pattern seekers in our incessant meaning-making. I constellate my memories, sense-make my path, generate my revelations.

In our dedicated cleaning and rearranging of the house, the restoration project of my studio after the flood, we bought new shelves. My art and work books were piled high on an old computer desk, made mostly inaccessible. Gathering dust. With the new shelves, the ease of access to my books, comes new energy.

I sorted through my books before placing them on the shelves. Many of the work books, the resources I used for my past life, didn’t make the cut. In fact, none of them did. It was a revelation, placing them in sacks and moving them out of the house. With open space comes new energy.

Carrying a particularly loathsome sack of books to the recycle bin, I realized that every major change in my life has come with a book purge. When I left Los Angeles, I gave my library of 1000 plays to a friend. When I left central California for Seattle, I took a truckload of books to the used book store. I left a pile of favorites in the building that housed the school and theatre programs I’d created.

My books about Picasso, Matisse, Renoir, Leonardo, Michelangelo…they’ve always made the cut. They are space openers. Life-givers. The connective tissue in the constellation called “My Life”. This is not a revelation. I wondered why I so often turn away from it, stack my books and my life in difficult-to-reach ways.

Another gift Horatio gave to me in our call last week: as I was dumping on him my truckload of excuses and justifications for not painting, he stopped me, saying, “I think it’s much more elementary than you are making it. Decide what you want to do and do it. Your challenge is that you don’t know what you like.” He added, “You have the germs of what you like…”

Cleaning and placing my books on my shelf was like coming home. When I stood back and could see all that I’ve carried through my many, many moves, there was no doubt what I like, there is no doubt about what connects the many stars in my constellation.

read Kerri’s blogpost on THE DISH

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Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Energy | Tagged: art, art books, artistry, cleaning out, constellations, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, enegy, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, meaning, meaning making, memory, new energy, sense making, story, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

The Great Gift Of Purpose [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on November 28, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“In oneself lies the whole world and if you know how to look and learn, the door is there and the key is in your hand. Nobody on earth can give you either the key or the door to open, except yourself.” ~ Krishnamurti

In the United States of America, today is the day we give thanks. Imagine it! 364 days dedicated to dog-eat-dog grousing with one day set aside for thanks-giving. Envision for a moment a flip of our dedication: a single day devoted to complaining-and-selfish-taking with the entire rest of the year committed to gratefulness and appreciation.

Is it possible for gratitude and cherishing-others to be the norm?

Tom Mck’s grandfather told the story of two Civil War veterans who owned adjacent ranches. One vet fought for the north and the other fought for the south. They shot at each other every day creating a dangerous situation for the whole community since their ranches were on the road to town. Finally, no longer willing to dodge bullets just to go to the market, the community brought the two men together and negotiated an accord with them: the vets agreed to shoot at each other only one day a year, the same day each year. Their fellow citizens knew not to go to market on the auspicious day.

I thought about those two men this morning. Their entire reason-for-being was to hate each other. They gave to each other the great gift of purpose. An unspoken detail of the story, perhaps the most important aspect of the whole story, is this: none of the bullets they fired over many years ever hit the mark; they were either terrible shots or they didn’t really want to eliminate their reason-for-being. They intentionally missed. They loved to hate their neighbor.

It’s a complex game we play, is it not? The tale of the two Civil War vets is a story for our times.

Is the great-gift-of-purpose as easily given to loving, uplifting and supporting our neighbors? Is our capacity for generosity and consideration really so limited? Is there only enough for a single 24 hour period?

Is aggression and hate really more magnetic and satisfying than kindness and love?

Our nation chooses this day as Thanksgiving. Kerri’s and my wish for this troubled land on this day of laying down our weapons: a genuine flip of our dedication.

read Kerri’s blogpost about THANKSGIVING

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Filed under: DR Thursday, Gratitude, Identity, Possibility | Tagged: appreciation, artistry, community, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, hate, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, kindness, krishnamurti, love, purpose, story, studio melange, support, thankgiving, the melange | 1 Comment »

Simply Arriving [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on November 21, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Each one of us is the custodian of an inner world that we carry around with us.”
~ John O’Donohue, Walking in Wonder: Eternal Wisdom for a Modern World

In my early artist-life, showing my paintings threw me into conflict: I really wanted my paintings to be seen but I feared what they might reveal about me – namely, that I believed that I had no idea what I was doing. I was the poster child for imposter syndrome, a boiling bucket of self-doubt. I used to describe myself as having one foot on the gas and one foot on the brakes.

Even though I was surrounded by wise elders and insightful mentors who assured me that no one really knows what they are doing, my fear of exposure shielded me from their sound advice. I huddled behind a fortress of my own making.

We came upon the vibrant yellow leaves still clinging to their branches, seated next to a field of brilliant ochre and orange grasses. The shock of color was enough to drop me into the present which – as always happens when I become fully present – made the colors that-much-more vivid. Then, the yellow sent me through a time tunnel, a visceral memory of that younger version of myself working in a studio, nearly dancing, smearing yellow paint on an enormous canvas. He was completely in the moment, fully alive.

I wished that this older version of myself could have tapped him on the shoulder and said, “This is what makes you whole, authentic.” I would add, “Someday you will understand. Someday you will leave the fortress behind.”

There is a thread, a consistent truth, that binds us, the young artist and this much older version: this beautiful world has always had a way of shocking me into presence; I have always understood the capacity to be shocked-into-presence as a gift. It has has opened my eyes. It helps me see.

And, when I see, I disappear into “something bigger” than myself. The dance beyond striving. I am lucky: not everyone understands the power of not-knowing, the pleasure of simply arriving, fully alive.

Self Portrait on the Oregon Coast (circa 1988?)

read Kerri’s blog about YELLOW

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Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday | Tagged: artistry, authentic, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, imposter syndrome, inner world, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, presence, story, studio melange, the melange | 7 Comments »

Voices Of Clarity [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on November 14, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“A society must assume that it is stable, but the artist must know, and he must let us know, that there is nothing stable under heaven.” ~ James Baldwin (via The Marginalian)

We picked our window of time perfectly. We needed to walk, to get out of the house and breathe yet it had rained much of the morning. Antsy, we took a chance when there was a small break in the weather and headed for the trail.

We walked slowly. We kept an eye on the sky. We watched the next band of storm clouds roll in. It was beautiful. It was ominous. The rain came a few moments after we completed our loop, just as we were getting into the car. We laughed at our good fortune.

Some people take photographs to record events. Kerri, like all artists, takes photographs to feed her spirit. She sees beauty and the photo is way to connect or harmonize with the beauty. It is akin to a hummingbird drinking nectar. I watched her take photos of the coming storm. There was a fierceness in her posture. There was joy in the face of the tumultuous clouds. As I watched I remembered a conversation I had with Brad about the reason artists create. There is a precise moment for the child-artist that a spark lights a soul-fire. In my moment I desperately wanted to see clearly what was happening behind peoples’ eyes; behind my own eyes.

“Tyrants always fear art because tyrants want to mystify while art tends to clarify.”~ Iris Murdoch (via The Marginalia)

Later I looked at her photograph of the rolling storm and thought it a perfect image for our times. The storm is coming. Lydia wrote a comment musing about the surprise rise in prices the maga-faithful (and the rest of us) will experience when the people who pick our crops are deported. I responded darkly that the artists and intellectuals will pick the crops from their place at the corporate farm detention camp. Despots always have to eliminate voices of reason, voices of criticism and opposition. Voices of clarity.

Today, now, more than ever, I want to understand what-on-earth is happening behind peoples’ eyes. As I understand it, this is exactly the time, when chaos and deception rule the day, that artists get-crackin’ to clarify.

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE COMING STORM

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Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Edges, Perspective | Tagged: art, artistry, balance, chaos, clarify, clarity, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, instability, Iris Murdoch, James Baldwin, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, stability, story, studio melange, The Marginalian, the melange, tyrants | 1 Comment »

The Shallow Truth [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on November 7, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

We had a quiet yet lively debate last night. The question was, “Did they know what they were voting for when they chose the candidate who vowed to end Democracy?” They certainly know that their candidate lacks all decency; he made no effort to hide his depravity. Kerri is of the opinion that they know. Only rage, fear and hatred could vote for a party that so explicitly promises violence. I am not so sure. Or, perhaps, I do not want to believe it.

The scholar of fascism (I didn’t catch his name) referenced Plato: Democracy inevitably leads to tyranny. “The people have always some champion whom they set over them and nurse into greatness. . . . This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears above ground he is a protector. . . . having a mob entirely at his disposal, he is not restrained from shedding the blood of kinsmen; . . . After a while he is driven out, but comes back, in spite of his enemies, a tyrant full grown.” (Plato, Republic) The scholar said it was fascinating to watch his life’s study, the rise of fascism, happen in real time. I would choose a different adjective. Horrifying, maybe. Unimaginable. Certainly it is sad.

Tyrants lack reason. Tyrants rise from emotion untethered from rationality, logic…intelligence. Emotion untethered from intelligence is a great definition of Fox News, hate-tv, the megaphone of the tyrant.

Last night Nick Fuentes, a white nationalist and dinner guest of the tyrant-elect, tweeted, “Your body, my choice. Forever” It is a sentiment not unlike the famous Access Hollywood tape, the tyrant-elect bragging of his fondness of and predilection for sexual assault. “When you are a star they let you do it.” Of course, now we must seriously consider the ramifications of the word, “Forever.”

If they truly didn’t know or understand, with the coming of the promised nationwide abortion ban, their daughters, sisters, nieces, mothers, wives will soon fully grok the reality, living as they will, without any agency over their bodies. They will come to understand. Certainly they will come to understand when the women in our nation – as is happening now in Texas, are maimed and/or die when life saving treatment is available but illegal.

I don’t want to believe that they know what they voted for. I don’t want to believe so many of my fellow citizens are so ugly. I prefer to believe that they are titanically ignorant rather than malicious.

I decided during our late night quiet debate that, at this early moment in the shock of coming tyranny, it is a pointless conversation. A few years into the tyrant’s reign, we will discover whether or not they really understood what they voted for. When the greatest economy in the world tanks, when – as happened last time – family farms are driven into bankruptcy from needless tariffs, when we join the world’s autocrats rather than resist them, when the new class of oligarchs hold the reigns of power, when we are fully feeling the “promised pain,”… then the answer to our question will come out. Will the voters for tyranny ask, “What happened?”

I hope so.

I’m writing these words today so that two years from now I will not have to say what I suspect is the shallow truth of our present moment:

He was a star so you voted to let him do it.

(to be continued)

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE VOTE

Filed under: DR Thursday, Identity, Perspective | Tagged: Access Hollywood, artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, fear, hatred, ignorant, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, malice, Nick Fuentes, order, plato, Rage, reason, story, studio melange, the melange, truth, tyranny, tyrant, white nationalism | 3 Comments »

The Guardrail [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on October 31, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

It’s a windy day and the chimes are singing to us. The wind is from the west so the temperatures are rising. We opened the windows. It feels as if the house is breathing, taking in the fresh air before the temperatures drop and the doors and windows are sealed against the cold.

I know that we are breathing. Kerri said that there’s nothing like a ride in an ambulance to give you perspective. She thought of our children. She thought of me. “Nothing else mattered,” she said. Each breath we take includes a sigh of relief.

Life can change in an instant.

We walked the rim trail. We sat on the edge of the Grand Canyon. It’s an awesome thing – especially for someone who is afraid of heights as I am – to sit on the edge without any guardrails. Full exposure. To me, it feels as if the canyon is pulling me over the edge. It’s disorienting. Of course, it is not pulling me, I know. The feeling, the fear, comes from inside of me.

I heard a powerful statement this week. With the supreme court’s jaw-dropping ruling on presidential immunity, with the Project 2025 plan ready to replace civil servants with those who will swear an oath of loyalty to the dictator-wanna-be, with a cabinet of sycophants and loyalists, there is only one guardrail left between our democracy and our nation being pulled into the abyss of fascism. The maga-clan isn’t even trying to mask their hatred, their authoritarian intention; it was on full display in Madison Square Garden.

The GOP has dissolved into a puddle of cowardice. Fearing it will lose a dollar, the business community and much of the media have tucked their tail, dropped their collective spine and are playing hear-no-evil-see-no-evil.

We are in the ambulance, now. What world will we leave our children?

The guardrail is us. You and me. Our vote. I suppose that is as it should be. A “Government of the people. by the people, for the people…” – a democracy in crisis – should necessarily depend upon the people to deliver it from the hands of an autocrat.

We are and should be the guardrail against tyranny.

It only takes a minute to read the full text of The Gettysburg Address. Lincoln’s final thought in his very concise address are as relevant today as they were the day he dedicated The Soldier’s National Cemetery, November 19, 1863:

“—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. ~ Abraham Lincoln

It is our turn. We are the guardrail. We are the generation that will determine whether or not our nation, “…conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal…can long endure.”

Vote as if our democracy depends on it – because it does.

Earth Interrupted I, 48″x53″ mixed media on canvas

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE GUARDRAIL

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Filed under: DR Thursday, Identity, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: Abraham Lincoln, artistry, autocrat, courage, cowardice, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, equality, freedom, GOP, Grand Canyon, guardrail, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, liberty, MAGA, story, studio melange, The Gettysburg Address, the melange, tyranny, vote | Leave a comment »

A Perspective Giver [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on October 24, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

I could have sat all day on the porch and stared at the sculpted landscape, the fingers of Lake Powell reaching into the canyon. My artist’s soul rejuvenates in the southwest. It excites my imagination while quieting my mind. Just as the high desert sun warms me to the core of my being, the geography invigorates the core of my artistry.

It’s been two weeks since I sat on that porch and looked with awe at the horizon and watched the colors transform from hot orange to dusty purple as the sun progressed across the sky. It was akin to looking at the ocean surf, a rolling touch of the eternal. A perspective-giver.

While sitting on the porch I pondered our nation’s inability to fully reconcile with its past. It’s impossible to drive through tribal lands and not consider the full history of our nation. It’s been much on my mind recently since it is a central theme of my latest play, Diorama.

Think about it: just this week the maga-candidate-for-president suggested he would stop funding schools that taught about slavery. Nikki Haley, while running for the Republican nomination for president, said that there’d never been racism in the United States of America.

I sometimes wonder in these divisive times if the USA is like an alcoholic that refuses to admit that it has a problem. Why so much denial? Why so many blatant lies? In fact, it’s not new. Take a gander at the Lost Cause narrative propagated throughout the south (and the nation) following the civil war, a tale of happy slaves and benevolent slave owners. You might recognize it as it has resurged as the official curriculum in the state of Florida (and other states) in 2024. Twelve generations of brutality white washed and to what end?

Of course, it is the white-washed America that the reds aspire to inhabit – and to achieve their fantasy they necessarily need to ignore the full scope of our history. There’s no responsibility in a white washed history. In cowboy brain there are only good guys and bad guys so the good guys need never question their actions or confront their shadows. It’s an infantile narrative, not only unworthy of a maturing nation, but crippling to its growth.

The fourth step in the AA twelve step program suggests that, in order to restore our sanity – in order to grow up – we must be willing to make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves. We must not be afraid to admit when we are wrong or recognize when we have strayed from our ideals.

A fearless moral inventory. An honest look at our complete history, the good, the bad and everything in between. As Aldous Huxley wrote, we are in a race between education and destruction. An educated populace would never tolerate the lies of the would-be-autocrat and would easily see through the crazy revisionist history that he manufactures and spews. Perhaps that is why he vows to dismantle the Department of Education.

The question before us in November is whether or not our democracy will prevail and mature or will the white nationalist monster, in a celebration of ignorance, eat our collective freedoms and send us swirling into the immoral (and infantile) fascist nightmare outlined in Project 2025? A fearless moral inventory or the path of the Lost Cause cowards?

The choice is ours to make. The story is ours to tell.

read Kerri’s blog about PERSPECTIVE

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Filed under: DR Thursday, Education, Perspective | Tagged: AA, Aldous Huxley, artistry, autocrat, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, education, fearless, history, ideals, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Lake Powell, Lost Cause narrative, morality, narrative, perspective, racism, responsibility, story, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Nine [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on October 10, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Just as no photo can adequately capture the scope and grandeur of Bryce Canyon, no words can adequately capture the story of these past years. Nine years ago today, 10.10.2015 at 11:11am, we stood before our community, we told the tale of Erle meeting Earl, we said, “I do”. We skipped out of the church just as we skipped out of the airport on the day we met.

10.10. at 11:11. Significant numbers. We are more numerologists than I realized.

I Googled the numerology of the number 9. A longer view. It represents completion – though not as finality – rather, the end of one chapter and the initiation of something new. It represents growth; a journey of learning. I read that 9 is a powerful, positive and significant number.

We are certainly on a journey of learning. Powerful and positive. And so, we celebrate the number nine. Completion and the initiation of something new. Appropriately, the portal to our initiation was the canyonlands, vast in scope and grandeur, impossible to capture.

read Kerri’s blogpost about BRYCE CANYON

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Filed under: DR Thursday, Gratitude, Love | Tagged: anniversary, artistry, Bryce Canyon, completion, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, hiking, initiation, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, learning, national-parks, new chapter, nine, number nine, numerology, story, studio melange, the melange, travel, utah, wedding | Leave a comment »

Two Moons [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on October 3, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.” ~ Edgar Allan Poe, Eleonora

Looking back it makes me laugh. I advocated – more than once – with skeptical school board members that daydreaming was not only useful but a necessary activity. The inception of every worthwhile invention, every startling work of art, every passionate pursuit, begins with a daydream. An idea somewhere out-there. A student staring out the window is rarely wasting time. I wonder how much life Shakespeare or Einstein or Marie Curie spent gazing into imagination-space?

And what about the light of the moon? More than once we’ve chased the moon and stood at the shore in awe. Moonlight evokes a silent reflection. It pulls me into a different kind of imagination-space: not “out-there” but inside. “When to the sessions of sweet silent thought I summon up remembrance of things past…” (Sonnet 30, William Shakespeare) Things past. Memories.

Many years ago, deep into the night, I stood beside a backyard pool and gazed at the full moon. I knew my life was about to change radically. A leap. I was scared. I whispered, “I don’t know where you will lead me but I will follow you.” Recently, standing on the shore of Lake Michigan, watching Kerri snap photos of the brilliant full moon, for some reason I vividly remembered that long ago poolside moment. I smiled and whispered, “So this is where you led me!”

I couldn’t be more grateful.