KS Friday | The Direction of Intention

Peri Winkle Rabbit [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on November 15, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

The birds on a wire brought my Periwinkle book to mind. Context is everything. It is now as relevant as the day I wrote it:

Peri Winkle Rabbit was lost.

All the other animals were lost, too!

There had been a fire. Peri Winkle was asleep when grandpa Harry Winkle Rabbit shook her awake and said, “RUN!”

Peri ran. At first, Peri ran with her mom and dad, her sisters and brothers and grandpa Harry Winkle, too.

All the other animals were running, too, the deer and the bears and the foxes and the squirrels. Some were running in circles but most just ran away from the fire.

It was confusing. There were so many legs and paws running this way and that. Peri could no longer see her parents. She couldn’t see her brothers or sisters. Even grandpa Harry Winkle Rabbit was nowhere to be found.

Peri stopped and got knocked down. She hopped back up and called out for her mother. She called for her father. She couldn’t see them anywhere.

A great paw scooped her up and she was suddenly eye to eye with a bear!

“This is no time for still standing, little ears!” said the bear.

“I can’t find my family,” squeaked Peri Winkle Rabbit. The bear was holding her very tight.

“We’ll find your family, little ears,” puffed the running bear, “But first we have to find a place safe and beyond the fire.”

The bear held Peri Winkle Rabbit close to his chest. Peri could hear the boom-Boom of the bear’s big heart as he ran swiftly away from the flames. Peri Winkle Rabbit felt so sad and so tired, she couldn’t help it when she fell fast asleep.

“Good morning, little ears!” The bear smiled as Peri blinked open her eyes.

“Where am I?” asked Peri.

“I don’t rightly know, “ said the bear, “but we’re now safe and far from the fire.”

That’s how Peri Winkle Rabbit came to be lost. She looked around and saw that the forest was gone! The other animals looked and they saw it too. All the green was now black and the mighty trees were charcoal twigs twisted in ruins on the ground.

The animals started to cry. Even the big bear cried. Peri cried, too. Together, they made lots of loud crying sounds and it felt good to wail the loss of their forest home.

And then, they each told their stories of escape from the fire. They told of their lost homes and missing family and friends. They told the stories of their cuts and their bruises, their fears and their worries. They told of how they came to be together, in that place at that time. Peri Winkle Rabbit told her story, too.

“What do we do now?” a red fox asked, which was exactly the question that Peri Winkle Rabbit was thinking!

No one said a word for a very long time. They looked at each other, all covered in soot, dirty and singed and ruffled and tired.

“Well,” a great ram began, “I am sure footed, I can help carry what’s needed.”

A hawk landed on the ram and said, “I can see far away and can help find your missing families and friends.”

The great bear said, “Yes, and I have a nose that can smell good smells for many miles, I will help supply all of my new friends with food!”

“I can gather nuts!” cried the squirrel, rubbing his nose with his hands.

“I have great ears!” cried Peri Winkle Rabbit! “I can hear what is needed and help find who can do it!”

And all the animals offered their great gifts in service to their new friends. They slowly began to do what was needed with whatever they could find. They found water and food. They found shelter from the rain. They looked for their families. They made new friends.

“Remember, a forest must grow back slowly, one day at a time,” said the bear when Peri felt impatient.” Our job is to help it grow.”

“It is all different than before,” said Peri, suddenly missing her old home.

“Yes,” said the bear. “We are all different now, little ears. The fire has changed us forever.”

Peri Winkle Rabbit wrinkled her nose.

The great bear smiled and hugged her close, saying, “Now might be the time for still standing, little ears, we don’t want to miss the lessons of the fire.”

So together Peri Winkle rabbit and the great bear sat very still, listening to the forest and thinking about all that had happened. And though she didn’t quite know where she was, Peri Winkle Rabbit wasn’t lost anymore.

A one-copy book made for a child who lost their family during Hurricane Katrina. I’ve never published the full text but thought it was time. I included photos of a few of the pages.

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora

read Kerri’s blog about BIRDS ON A WIRE

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Filed under: Gratitude, Identity, KS Friday, Metaphor, Power, Story, The Direction of Intention | Tagged: artistry, change, children's book, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, disaster, forest fire, found, friendship, grief, help, helpers, helpful, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, lessons, listening, lost, service, story, studio melange, support, survival, the melange, togetherness, trauma | 5 Comments »

For The Truth Will [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on November 8, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

In the past three days I’ve seen this quote by H.G. Wells cross my screen more than once: “Civilization is in a race between education and catastrophe. Let us learn the truth and spread it as far and wide as our circumstances allow. For the truth is the greatest weapon we have.”

I would say, given the outcome of our most recent election, education just lost the race. It was not an accident that H.G. Wells wrote that we must “learn the truth”. Truth, like democracy, is a question, not an answer. Learning is a pursuit of questions, not an indoctrination of answers. It doesn’t take a prophet to see the coming elimination of questioners, the (continued) banning of books, the suppression of ideas. As we have just witnessed, truth has no relevance in a society fortressed against learning – especially about itself.

In my personal cosmos, Wednesday morning I officially elevated Neil Postman to the status of prophet. There was no ceremony. I’ve included both of these Postman quotes in previous posts but they are startlingly relevant and revealing of our current catastrophe. He published them in 1985:

“When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience, and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility.” ~ Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death

Historians will certainly write extensively about what we just experienced: a serious public servant lost an election to a vaudeville act. A nation finds itself at risk.

I am in a news blackout. I couldn’t bear to hear the pundits debate all-the-reasons-why without actually taking a good hard look at themselves, without actually recognizing that they, too, are part of “the perpetual round of entertainment” squeezed in-between commercials.

“For in the end, he [Aldous Huxley] was telling us that what afflicted the people in Brave New World was not that they were laughing instead of thinking, but that they did not know what they were laughing about and why they had stopped thinking.” ~ Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death

The maga-madcap-clan is doing a victory lap and posing for pictures. Their Project 2025 plan will sooner or later drive the faithful – and the rest of us – out of the vaudeville tent. Serious chaos has a way of slapping even the most entranced audiences into consciousness. Catastrophe, if survived, is a great clarifier. The maga-madcaps will look and sound much differently outside the distractions of the tent in the full light of reality.

Maybe then – just maybe – we will be capable of coming together, looking at ourselves, newly unafraid of the rigors of learning and where it leads us, and rekindle an honest pursuit of the truth. We may, once again, start thinking. As is always true in the harsh light of day, when the circus leaves town, serious questions will be all that is left, all that we have to hold onto.

read Kerri’s blog about TRUTH

Filed under: Education, KS Friday, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, education, H.G. Wells, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Neil Postman, story, studio melange, the melange, truth | 1 Comment »

I Wonder [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on October 25, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist.” ~ James Baldwin

Our Melange posts generally begin with a visual prompt, usually one of Kerri’s recent photographs. Today, for the first time in our Melange history, she offered me a quote. The photograph, the stone heart, came second.

My dad used to tell me that I’d educated myself into stupidity. He was, of course, regurgitating the sentiments of his fox-news source; those were not his words or his thoughts. He was an educated man, early in his life a schoolteacher, yet his entire life he yearned to return to the simple life he remembered, growing up in a small town in Iowa. His yearning was sincere and pervasive. He was kind to his core and generous to everyone he met. He had no idea what to do with the complexity of the contemporary world and so he found solace in rejecting it.

One of my cherished memories of my dad was the day we spent in the cemetery of his small town. He was far down the road of dementia and wanted to visit his beloved small town one last time. I was taken aback that he had no desire to wander the streets but wanted, instead, to wander through the graves – so that is what we did. He’d point to a headstone and tell me the story of the person buried there. To him it wasn’t a graveyard, it was a reunion. He could not remember what he ate for breakfast but he remembered in vivid detail the people that populated his young life, the names on the headstones.

My dad worked most of his life as a foreman of a concrete construction company. His crews were mostly illegal immigrants. For a few summers I worked on his crew and I have never been more proud of him – or learned more from him – than I did watching his dedication to the men who worked for him. He understood their plight, he valued their hard thankless work, and they were as loyal to him as he was to them.

I can only imagine what he would think of the rhetoric of mass deportation, the radical dehumanization of the men he spent his life working with, the racist lies. I wonder if his yearning for simplicity would cloud his perspective or would he recognize the ugly authoritarianism masked in the maga mass-deception.

He was, at his core, kind. Generous. I cannot imagine he would sign on to the oppression and denial of basic humanity that runs rampant through the maga rhetoric. And, since I am “woke”, a progressive, a man dedicated to learning and asking questions, a believer in open minds and hearts, I am now one of the vermin populating the fox-maga-storyline. I doubt he would sign on to that.

I wonder, if we were sitting on the patio drinking a beer, if he’d question, as I do, how his rural America, his imagined simplicity, became so ugly, so lost in the rantings of a fascist. So un-American.

I wonder if he, from his resting place in the graveyard, wishes now for a better story for his small town, for all small towns – the story of generosity and kindness he remembered as hallmarks of the people who populated his early years, the people and narrative who shaped him, his goodness, his life.

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora

read Kerri’s blogpost about OPPRESSION

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Filed under: Identity, KS Friday, Story | Tagged: artistry, authoritarian, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, deception, generosity, goodness, humanity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, kindness, learning, loyalty, MAGA, narrative, open heart, open mind, progressive, simplicity, small town, story, studio melange, the melange, woke | 2 Comments »

Commune With The Sun [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on October 18, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

I confess. For several days I’ve dreaded the sunset. My COVID symptoms seem to escalate in lock step with the march of the setting sun. Sundown; pain up. I’ve read that I am not making it up; apparently my circadian rhythms signal my immune system to be more active at night. That makes for some increased inflammation, fever spikes, and my favorite cough more active.

In the previous era, prior to the virus-that-seems-eternal, I was treated to some extraordinary sunrises and sunsets over the desert. I adore the wind that rises just before the sun breaks the horizon and the heat washes over me. I’m in awe the sense of peace I experience each time the sun dips beneath the sculpted red cliffs and how quickly the temperature drops. My rhythms are indistinct from the circadian rhythms of the earth. I suspect that recognition is the source of peace I feel. Adoration and awe. No separation.

Yesterday, for the first time since we’ve been home, the sun broke through the clouds. We bundled up and set our chairs in the sun. It was better than Advil, soaking the warmth into my aching bones. We sat for a long time in the sun, so intent on drinking in the goodness and heat, neither of us was able to speak. There was the occasional moan and an “Uh-huh,” of agreement. We moved our chairs across the backyard as the sun moved. Healer in the sky.

We are without doubt tuned to the rhythm and movement of the sun. Physically, emotionally, spiritually. Yesterday, with my eyes closed and face to the warmth, I thought, “I am no more or less than this.” I thought again of Gay, standing on the edge of the canyon, saying, “And I get to be here to see it.” There is no pleasure more sensual and reassuring than this: in the midst of feeling ill, to sit in communion with the sun. Drinking it in, so grateful to feel it reach deep and give comfort to the very center of my being.

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora

read Kerri’s blogpost about SUN

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Filed under: Gratitude, KS Friday | Tagged: adoration, artistry, awe, circadian rhythm, comfort, communion, connection, covid, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, health, horizon, immune system, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, peace, reassurance, story, studio melange, sun, sunshine, the melange | Leave a comment »

Look In The Mirror [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on October 11, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“…the Impressionists took seriously what we now often fear: that when life changes outwardly, culture must change inwardly.” ~ Jason Farago, How the Impressionists Became the World’s Favorite Painters, and the Most Misunderstood

If the word zion means “a holy place”, then Zion National Park is aptly named. Even overrun with tourists crammed in shuttles, it remains sacred. Beyond us. We are, after all, a mere blip in its history.

“Imagine how long it took to sculpt these canyons!” Charlie exclaimed. Eons. I overheard a woman on the path to the Narrows say, “It invites awe.” It is good to occasionally put our lives in proper perspective, to glimpse our smallness. Invite awe. That is one of the roles of the sacred.

While the world’s first democracy was being formed in the 5th century BCE in Athens, Greece, the grand walls of Zion were already much as they are today. Both were sacred: the new idea of “rule by the people” and the impossible grandeur of the ancient canyons.

In our present day democracy we are meant to be in service to something bigger than ourselves. The people across generations. That, too, is one of the meanings and roles of the “sacred”. To give us perspective relative to the higher ideal of our constitution as it matures in the future.

The maga-clan would have us flip the equation and dismantle the sacred. The outward changes are visible everywhere. Lies replace truth, self-service erodes the constitution, the higher ideal. The red candidate claims to have all the answers, fundamentally misunderstanding and undermining rule-by-the-people. We are, after all, a democratic republic not an authoritarian cesspool.

At one time in our history, being found liable for rape would have disqualified a candidate. Multiple felony convictions would have immediately ended a presidential campaign. Outlandish and persistent lies, inflicting real harm on people in the nation, would have horrified the electorate. A campaign driven by thuggery and grift would have burst into flames and disappeared from the public stage. An insurrectionist would once have been jailed and forgotten. And yet, here we are. Outward changes.

“…when life changes outwardly, culture must change inwardly.“

Ethics, moral decency, service to a higher ideal are completely absent in the maga-canon and the Project 2025 playbook. That so many in our nation, despite all we know, are willing to vote for a rapist, a liar, a grifter, a felon, a misogynist, a racist, a fear-mongerer…gives us a mirror with which we might glimpse our inward changes. The loss of the sacred. To fifty percent of our nation (it seems by the polling) our system of governance has been reduced from a sacred ideal to a superficial transaction. There is an unholy price to pay for winning-at-all-cost.

We have a choice in November. We can continue to create and protect our Zion, our rule-by-the-people, or we can take it down, throw it away and give the reins of power, not to the people, but to an angry narcissist who threatens to seek retribution and eliminate his political rivals.

Luckily, the choice is not his. It is ours. Look in the mirror while there is still time. Take a good hard look. Help others to look in the mirror and then vote to sustain rather than scrap our sacred democracy.

read Kerri’s blogpost about ZION

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Filed under: Identity, KS Friday, Metaphor, Perspective, Power | Tagged: artistry, authoritarian, Constitution, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, democratic republic, higher ideal, holy, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, MAGA, Sacred, story, studio melange, the melange, Zion, Zion National Park | 2 Comments »

Take It Back [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on October 4, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Last evening, watching the sky transform from brilliant pink to deep purple and orange, we ate an entire bag of Lays Wavy potato chips. Kerri called it, “political angst eating”.

20 told us that he had to stop watching The Handmaid’s Tale because it was too close to the reality we currently face in the nation.

This morning two relevant-to-the-moment pieces of art rolled across our screens and collided. The first is Lighthouse, a new song by Stevie Nicks. In this mind-boggling time that women’s rights are under attack – that women are under attack – it is a call to action. “Is it a nightmare?” she asks. “It is unless you save it/ and that’s that/Unless you stand up/And take it back…”

The second, ROED, a short 10 minute documentary film by Dawn Lambing. It takes a page from Project 2025 and imagines what the nation will look like for women if the authoritarian maga get their wish. While watching it I realized that it is already the present reality for women in many red states. Watch it. This is no longer an exercise of “what if”. It’s here.

The Atlantic recently published an article, The Republican Freak Show: Like the man who leads it, the GOP is not just incidentally grotesque. It is grotesque at its core. In the article, Peter Wehner writes, “Since 2016 they have been at war with reality, delighting in their dime-store nihilism, creating “alternative facts” and tortured explanations to justify lawlessness and moral depravity and derangement of their leader…None of this is hidden…No one who supports the Republican party, who casts a vote for Trump and for his MAGA acolytes, can say they don’t know. They know.”

They know. It is the answer to the question we ask each day after our daily horror-troll of the news: “How can they not know.” It’s time to ask a better question. It’s time to stop pretending that they are ignorant or continually justifying their unwavering support of their depraved candidate with generous excuses like,” They just don’t see it”. They do see it.

They know. It is what they want for our nation. Women stripped of their fundamental rights. Mass deportations. The suspension of the Constitution. Book bans. The gutting of Medicare and Social Security. The elimination of the Department of Education. It goes on and on. Dangerous stuff worthy of a dystopian novel. Yet here we are. If you believe the polls, nearly 50% of our nation think the freak show is the way to go.

They know.

It is what makes Kerri and me eat entire bags of Lays Wavy potato chips. It’s why 20 stopped watching The Handmaid’s Tale.

“Is it a nightmare?” Stevie Nicks asks. Yes. Yes it is. “And that’s that/Unless you stand up/And take it back…”

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora

read Kerri’s blogpost about PINK

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Filed under: Art, KS Friday, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, authoritarian, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, depravity, derangement, freedom, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, lighthouse, lighthouse by stevie nicks, MAGA, Peter Wehner, reality, rights, ROED, Stevie Nicks, story, studio melange, The Atlantic, The Constitution of The United States, The Handmaid's Tale, the melange, The Republican Freak Show, truth, Women's Rights | 3 Comments »

Ponder Pure Action [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on September 27, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Raise your words, not voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.” ~ Rumi

Although now it’s ubiquitous in the social media sphere, to be an “influencer” is a relatively new term of in the canon of aspirations. To affect, to sway, to direct, to shape, to guide… Someone recently suggested that Kerri and I should attempt to become influencers and we both cringed. For us, there’s something shallow about that word that makes us recoil. We write everyday because we enjoy writing and are very aware that our love of writing does not necessarily mean that we have anything new or of value to say. We like to write together. We like to share what we write.

I recently read a Taoist tenet: cease trying to influence others or to be influenced by others. It’s a notion meant to speak to the pursuit of happiness. Essentially it recommends stopping the pursuit. Happiness is not a thing to be caught. It is not something to be attained. The tenet is a suggestion to stand still, to act purely according to what presents itself in the moment. To act without thought or desire of any imagined gain. Happiness is bubbling in the present moment, expressed through pure action. Taoists – as I understand it – call this non-action (as opposed to inaction). Wu Wei.

Pure action. Effortless.

When Kamala Harris became the Democrat nominee, we wondered what we could do to help. Previous to her entrance into the race, the ugly-red-tide seemed impossible to stop. She brought light and new energy. We read – somewhere – that in order to help her, people should do what they already do, do what they do best. And so, in this present moment, we write. I cannot claim to be pure in my action since I hold the hope of influencing a few hearts and minds out there, somewhere in the nation, to fully understand the power of their vote and the need to know what they are voting for.

Yesterday on our walk we crossed paths and had a chat with a friend and, of course, talked about politics. As a professor, he said each day, regardless of the topic or the lesson, now more than ever, he is trying to teach his students critical thinking skills. “They no longer know what is fact and what is made-up. They have to learn to question,” he said, “They have to learn to think for themselves, beyond what they are hearing in social media.”

Pure action. I told him that the imperative to teach critical thinking places him on the frontlines. A thinking person could not – would not – vote for the maga-candidate. There is plenty of desire in the red-tide to remove critical thinking from higher education – from all forms of education. To narrow rather than expand minds.

After we went on our way I realized that Kerri and I are doing in our writing exactly what our professor friend is doing in his classroom: attempting to inspire critical thinking. Pointing the direction to questions and to discernment, challenging those swallowing whole-cloth the dangerous-maga-fox-misinformation to open their eyes, to pop the info-bubble.

“I tell my students that it’s easy to find the truth,” the professor said. “You just have to want to see it.”

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE RAIN

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Filed under: Art, Education, KS Friday, Perspective, Possibility | Tagged: artistry, critical thinking, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, education, happiness, influence, influencers, Kamala Harris, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, misinformation, non action, pure action, questioning, questions, story, studio melange, tao, the melange, truth, voice, writers, wu wei | 5 Comments »

What Remains [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on September 20, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible in us be found.” ~ Pema Chödrön

The super moon called us out into the night. We ran-walked to the grounds of the Anderson Art Center so we might get an unobstructed view of the giant moon perched just above the horizon. Later, we walked the streets and paths that followed the shore so we could watch the moon shrink as it journeyed higher into the sky. An illusion.

My favorite part of our stroll was finding that we weren’t the only people called into the night. People – many people – gathered along the shore, some quiet, some giddy – all attending the march of the moon. “This is just like the old days,” Kerri said. A community joining together to share a common experience. No one cared about the politics or issues of the day. There was a common agreement as we passed others: “Isn’t it beautiful!” Strangers so moved by the enormity of the moment, so connected to this ancient traveller, that they were compelled to speak to each other.

Think about it.

The little stuff disappears in the face of the transcendent moon. I felt as if we were participating in a ritual that is as old as humanity. And, more to the point, this ancient ritual, the awe of the moon, invoked our humanity. We were, to a person, benevolent. In the timeless moon there was no space for the petty. There wasn’t a hint of righteousness or prejudice to be found. We waned in the face of the eternal light of the moon. What remained was a basic impulse to share the moment. To join. Primordial generosity. Kindness sublime.

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes or streaming on Pandora

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE KEYS

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Filed under: Awakening, Identity, KS Friday, Metaphor | Tagged: Agreement, ancient connection, ancient ritual, artistry, awe, common experience, community, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, eternal, generosity, Harvest moon, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, kindness, moon, pema chodron, reach, ritual, story, studio melange, sublime, the melange, transcend, transcendence | 2 Comments »

Shadow Singular [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on September 13, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

She began taking pictures of our feet when, early in our lives together, we traveled to The Netherlands, Belgium and France. The point was not to capture our feet, rather it was to record the variety of surfaces we walked upon. Cobblestones and ancient wood. Mosaic tile. The unusual and the seeming ordinary, though, when traveling, no surface is ordinary. For awhile we entertained assembling a collage of the many many surfaces were we found our feet standing. A quirky memory wall.

Adding to her series of traveling feet she began capturing our shadows. It’s now common for her to say, “Wait!” I know exactly what to do. No questions required. My job is to hold still until she snaps the latest edition to her shadow collection. I love them. To me, they are our version of the Balinese shadow puppets. Wayan Kulit. At best we are aware of the shadows we cast, the projections of our minds. Our lives a moving grand illusion.

Like the feet series, the shadow collection serves as markers of our life together. Trails we’ve hiked. Bridges we’ve crossed. Friends who entertain without question our odd request for a shadow portrait.

I just read a story about a man who tried to outrun his shadow. He was, as you might imagine, unsuccessful. It was a particularly poignant story for me since I spent many of my younger years trying to escape my shadow. I was, like the man in the story, unsuccessful. Though, unlike the man in the story, I stopped running. Some small grace whispered in my ear to stand still, to turn and look at it. To really look. To walk with it.

Isn’t it poetic that after all that time running, I now hold hands with a woman who regularly stops me on the trail, not only to look but to capture our shadow – singular – as it stretches out before us, leaning in, two people blending together as one?

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora

read Kerri’s blogpost about SHADOWS

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Filed under: Gratitude, Identity, KS Friday, Love | Tagged: artistry, Balinese, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, grace, Gratitude, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, markers, memory, running away, shadow, shadow puppet, stand still, stillness, story, studio melange, the melange, Wayan Kulit | 1 Comment »

Give Over [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on September 6, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

In the pontoon boat I give over. I do not drive so I make no significant decisions. I sit in a sunny spot. I laugh with good friends or am quiet. There are snacks. I open myself to whatever comes my way. I give-over.

It seems so easy on the pontoon boat. To relax. To go with the flow. To forget the all-important-lists. To drop the illusion that I am more than I am. No need to achieve, to prove, to strive, to become. On the pontoon boat I am just this. I am with friends. We move slowly. We chase nothing. We circumnavigate the lake. On the pontoon boat I am enough – and I know because I do not think about it at all. I measure nothing. No need to measure up.

I wonder why I reserve this kind of living to time on the pontoon boat.

Yesterday was an exceedingly hard day. I filled my cup with discord and self-loathing. I was a wasteland.

The boat is not magic. The peace I feel is not given to me by the boat. I give it to myself. My friends are with me whether we ride the boat or not. The reasons for my discord existed only in my mind. A very dark cloud. In my mind I did not measure up. I withheld peace and chose inner-enmity. Why?

You would think the grace I afford myself when riding in the pontoon boat would be available when riding on the earth as we circle and circle the sun. Why is my ride on this earth any different than my ride on the pontoon boat? Why would I choose anything other than grace?

When not on the pontoon boat am I not capable of opening myself to whatever comes my way? What – other than myself – prevents me from giving-over?

I measure illusions against illusions to fully achieve my misery.

The illusions and incessant measurement are what I drop when climbing onto the pontoon boat. They are what I easily-give-over when taking my seat in the sun with friends. How much more important is it to give-over the illusions with the same ease while inhabiting this seat as I circle and circle the sun?