KS Friday | The Direction of Intention

Learn Mu [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on March 22, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“The heavier the burden, the closer our lives come to the earth, the more real and truthful they become. Conversely, the absolute absence of burden causes man to be lighter than air, to soar into heights, take leave of the earth and his earthly being, and become only half real, his movements as free as they are insignificant. What then shall we choose? Weight or lightness?” ~ MIlan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being

It’s too easy to boil life’s weighty decisions down into two easy choices. Go left or go right. Say it or don’t say it. Stop or go. It’s to imagine a kind of clarity that doesn’t really exist. Sink or swim.

I’ve been rolling the Japanese word, Mu, around in my head these past several months. Mu is a useful third choice, an escape from the imagined duality. It means, “Nothing.” Make no choice. When I berate myself, demanding an absolute answer to the question, “What do I do now?” I know to whisper, “Mu.” Decide not to decide. Stand still. Mu is a third way. The constant nest.

In Mu I’ve learned that frustration is a choice. And anger. When fear takes me by the throat, rather than choose to wrestle with it or attempt to control it (that which I cannot control), I ask myself to make a choice other than fight or flight. “Mu,” I whisper. Choose anything else.

I’ve learned that the weight of the burden is only a small part of what keeps a person’s feet on the ground. The greater part is how the burden is held – rather – when it is held. Future fear or past regret? Ah, there it is – another too easy choice, both crushingly heavy.

Mu. There is lightness in standing still, in choosing nothing. In nothing there is presence with what might seem a heavy burden. Instead of fearing what will be or grinding against what was, I am learning Mu. There is lightness of being in the midst of swirling turmoil, not unbearable, Mu, with feet both firmly planted on the ground, holding in my hands only what is…

[this is one of my favorite of Kerri’s compositions]

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE NEST

like. share. support. subscribe. comment…thank you.

Filed under: KS Friday, Language, Possibility, Transcendence | Tagged: artistry, burden, choice, control, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, decisions, duality, future, gravity, grounded, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, lightness, Milan Kundera, motion in stillness, Mu, Nothing, past, regret, still, stillness, story, studio melange, the melange, the middle way, the third way, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, the way home, the way home kerri sherwood, weight | Leave a comment »

After All [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on March 15, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Food is the most primitive form of comfort.” ~ Sheilah Graham Westbrook

In anyone’s book, our circumstances at present are extreme. And so, we cook.

My role in the kitchen is sous chef and clean-up. Kerri is the master chef though she is generous and does not require me to address her as “Yes, Chef!” Dogga is the third member of our team. He is an enthusiastic taste-tester and also serves the role of floor clean-up. We are a good team. The simple action of cooking together is large part of our recipe for cooking-up-comfort. We love it.

The actual food that we cook is, of course, a huge part of the comfort infusion. We range from chicken soup to Kerri’s pasta sauce. Lately, we’ve been making grilled cheese sandwiches and, I’ve noticed, recipes that require mashed potatoes. Truthfully, we could probably strip everything else off the plate but the mashed potatoes are the essential. They are the epicenter of comfort. We have in the past made mashed potatoes all-by-themselves and feasted on an intentional mainline of food-cheer.

My theory of comfort food is paradoxical (and obvious). Comfort food takes you back in time. Kerri’s mom made comfort-mashed-potatoes so they are a direct connection to Beaky. Comfort food also drops you into the present moment. The delicious fulfillment of warm expectation. There’s nothing like taste and smell – a happy dance of two senses – to pull everything into the right-here-and-now. And in this moment, wrapped in a yummy warm blanket of tasty comfort, all is well. At least for now. And, in the end, it makes us realize that this bite, this moment, is all that we have. Things are not so bad after all.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about MASHED POTATOES

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Filed under: Gratitude, KS Friday | Tagged: artistry, Beaky, comfort, comfort food, composer, connection, cooking, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, expectation, feast, food, fulfillment, in the moment, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, mashed potatoes, memory, musician, now, paradox, presence, recipes, right now, Right Now by kerri sherwood, right now on itunes, senses, Sheilah Graham Westbrook, singer songwriter, story, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Take The Back Road [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on March 8, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Even in our race to Milwaukee to meet a deadline, we decided to take the back roads. We’ve learned that the time difference between the freeway and the less-stressful-backroads is often only 15 minutes. I’m finding that getting-there-faster is generally an illusion that always produces heightened stress. We have enough stress as it is so we look for ways to feed-the-calm. To reinforce presence. 15 minutes seems like a fair trade for less angst. Even in a race.

We’re regularly passed on the road by a car-in-a-hurry. We inevitably catch them at the next light. All the aggression, all of the get-out-of-my-way, achieves a car length of advantage. I try and keep that in mind in our age of more/faster, a by-product of information inundation. Aggressive drivers have become something of a metaphor. It takes time to process information. It takes time to suss out relevance. Very little is actually gained by going faster to go faster. Except more stress. It is an un-win-able race.

On our back road drive to Milwaukee we marveled at the clarity of the storm cloud’s line of demarcation. It was as if a giant X-Acto knife cut the clouds exposing a swatch of blue-blue that extended to the horizon. We literally drove under the line. In a moment we moved from shadow to sun. In a moment, the gloom and weight of the stormy day transformed to warmth and rejuvenation. In a moment.

I wondered if the angry driver swerving through traffic, speeding toward a destination, even noticed the line. I wondered if the warmth and rejuvenation we experienced was available amidst the dedicated hurry-hurry. I wonder at the ubiquitous story of needing-to-get-there-faster, getting there first. What is actually gained? What is actually lost?

It takes time to suss out relevance. It takes time to notice the warmth and welcome rejuvenation when it becomes available. It takes time to actually see – to see – another human being on the road to somewhere. It takes time – and taking time, as it turns out, is nothing more or less than a choice, something as simple as taking the back road.

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes or streaming on Pandora and iHeart Radio

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE LINE

like. share. support. comment. in any case, go slow.

buymeacoffee is a stop on the road to somewhere.

Filed under: KS Friday, Metaphor, Seeing | Tagged: angst, artistry, back roads, choice, choices, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, gain, going slow, hurry, illusion, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, loss, moment, presence, rejuvenation, slow, slow down, story, stress, studio melange, sun, the melange, warmth | 1 Comment »

Learn About Silence [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on March 1, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Sometimes an action is not what it seems. For instance: she decided to sell her cello. It sounds so simple, doesn’t it?

When she broke both of her wrists in the same fall, she worried that she’d lose the ability to play her many instruments. To bow a cello requires a flexible and strong wrist. It healed and she recovered. Bowing the cello was not a problem. And then there was the second fall. A newly mopped floor with no signage. Her first words, laying on the wet linoleum, writhing in pain, holding her right wrist: Oh God! Oh, god, I can’t believe it!”

She lost degrees of movement in the second fall. It sounds mathematical, doesn’t it? Simple math. On a good day she has half the degrees of movement that she had before she met the wet floor. Enough to open a door but far short of bowing a cello.

After three years and countless hours learning about degrees of silence, she decided to sell the cello. “It needs to be played,” she said. “It deserves to be with someone who can play it.”

A simple action. A very complicated story. A heartbreaking moment when the luthier handed her a check. She touched her cello, turned, head down so the man could not see her tears, and walked away.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE CELLO

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buymeacoffee is what you make of it.

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Identity, KS Friday | Tagged: action, artistry, cello, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, degrees of movement, grief, heart break, injury, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerri sherwood yamaha artist, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, loss, mourning, movement, musician, musicianship, pianist, recording artist, silence, simple action, solo piano, story, studio melange, the melange, two broken wrists, yamaha artist | 2 Comments »

Proof That We Were [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on February 23, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Time keeps moving,” I wanted to say. “It eventually dumps all of us back into the ocean.” I hold my tongue. In my silence I wonder about the origin of this odd idiom, hold my tongue. It invites some hysterical images. It’s better, I suppose, than biting my tongue. Same thing, less damage.

We sort through the children’s clothes – our children’s clothes – from the time that they were toddlers. Kerri coos and tells me stories. I never knew them at that age but delight in imagining the very independent adults I know stumbling around, infant drunken sailors, clad in OshKosh b’gosh overalls. We giggle at her recollections. I marvel at the tiny shoes. I am grateful that she’s filling me in on their early years.

Every so often we wonder what it would have been like to have had babies together. On the drive to our honeymoon we were visited by our first imaginary child, Chicken Marsala. He was – and is – infinitely wiser than his parents. That simple truth, an imaginary yet wise child born in the minds of two aging artists, inspired us to write a comic strip. It was a great premise! It was also great fun to write and draw and Chicken knocked hard on the door of syndication. Alas, he grew up and left us as empty nesters. There are no cute clothes as proof of his existence but there are hundreds of drawings. Seeds for Smack-Dab.

The river runs. Time keeps moving. We have so many ideas! Most pop up and then roll downstream and join the ocean of possibilities. Some leave their marks behind. Toddler clothes that we capture and develop into mature creations. Those creations are what we leave behind, proof that we were once toddling to-and-fro on this gorgeous planet. OshKosh b’gosh!

chicken marsala © 2016, 2024 kerrianddavid.com

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about OVERALLS

like it. share it. support it. comment on it.

buymeacoffee is like a footprint on the trail: evidence that you are out there and proof that we have reached you.

Filed under: Family, KS Friday, Possibility, smack-dab | Tagged: artistry, cartoon, cartoon strip, chicken marsala, children, cleaning house, cleaning out, creations, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, empty nest, ideas, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, memories, oshkosh, proof, remembrance, seeds, smack-dab, story, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Life Spilling Out [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on February 16, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

If this beautiful winter skeleton of Queen Anne’s Lace was a sculpture – my sculpture – it would be titled The Impossibility of Containment. Trying to hold on to the magic movement of life. It spills out in every direction.

I once had an espresso martini in Aspen, Colorado. It was the single best drink I’ve ever had. It was so good I did something I never do: I had two. I savored every sip. Occasionally since then, in other watering holes on earth that offer a drink by the same name, I’ve tried to replicate the past. To no avail. The bar in Aspen no longer exists so, like a good sand painting, my espresso martini revelry lives where it belongs, on the wind and in my yearning.

This week I completed another trip around the sun. I look in the mirror and am sometimes surprised by the face that stares back at me. My eyes remain consistent, yet what my eyes are capable of now seeing has changed dramatically. Although I occasionally yearn for my younger face, I would never exchange my current eyes for my former sight.

I see possibility spilling out in every direction. Simplicity. I see extraordinary friends all around. Each morning I open my eyes to the one face that fills my heart to bursting. I am, as Nietzsche suggests, loving my fate. Every pothole, every mountain-to-climb, every seeming obstacle, every frustration, a magic moment, a heart-seed leading to who-knows-where. Life spilling out in every direction.

I’m practicing the skill of opening wide my arms, welcoming the impossibility of containment.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about QA LACE

like. share. support. comment. grazie!

buymeacoffee is a possibility cast onto the winds of time.

Filed under: Art, Awakening, Gratitude, Identity, KS Friday | Tagged: abundance, artistry, compsoer, containment, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, fate, heart, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life, love, magic, movement, musician, Nietzsche, open arms, possibility, released from the heart, revelry, seeing, sight, solo piano, story, studio melange, sweet ballet, the melange, yearning | 3 Comments »

Cranky, Earnest, Docile [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on February 9, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

I can’t help it. I see animated characters in these spiky thistle-balls. Three spiny stooges who are sharp, sharp, sharp on the outside with nary a thought on the inside. Bullies all.

Look closely and you’ll see that each has a different character. There’s a leader who has no idea where he’s going. There is the faithful number 2 who follows the leader without question. This thistle has no idea that he’s lost. And then there’s the character I love the most: the butt of every joke, the low-man-on-the-totem-pole. The follower. This thistle is just happy to belong. He doesn’t care where he goes as long as he’s with the pack. A directionless devotee.

What I adore about my budding animated-thistle-story is that each character is defined by their relationship with the other two. Leaders cannot lead without willing followers. Likewise, the role of faithful servant, blind follower, the second in command, only knows himself relative to number one. Number two puffs up on hot air borrowed from of the boss. And the low man, the thistle picked last for the team, will take any bone thrown his way. The other two are careful not to throw too many bones. Status games are like that: high status leaders need grovelers on the bottom rung. Mo, Larry, Curly.

Cranky, Earnest, Docile.

Cranky, the thistle leader, is ego-driven. He can do no wrong so, being directionless, he is constantly proclaiming himself a victim. “The forest is out to get me!” Earnest works hard to validate Cranky’s reality. If Cranky says it is true, it must be true! “The forest has it in for Cranky!” Docile, in turn, will perform any task without question. Docile will march in the streets, break windows, lie, hide documents…all to be one of the gang and, by association, feel one-rung-above. Docile is dutiful. The noticeable absence of question or thought is what makes Docile such a rich character. He is a lemming in thistle-clothes.

The absence of direction or thought or moral compass is what makes these three spiky stooges so utterly comical. So utterly frightening. So utterly close to home out here in the real world. Animation. Our poor thoughtless cartoon nation.

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

read Kerri’s blog about THISTLES

comment? share? like? support? thank you.

buymeacoffee is a thumbs-up for thinking, a nod of approval for curiosity and questions.

Filed under: KS Friday, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: animation, artistry, association, cartoon, cartoon characters, character, Cranky, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Docile, dutiful, Earnest, ego, ego driven, follower, gang, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, leader, lemmings, moral compass, spiky, status, story, studio melange, the melange, thistle, three stooges, victim, victimhood | Leave a comment »

Stand In A Word [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on February 2, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Poets and philosophers have been trying to define beauty for eons. What is beautiful? It’s an impossible task since beauty is not a “thing.” It’s an experience, meaning that it is a relationship – so it is not possible to squeeze it into a fixed word definition. Like all rivers and relationships, beauty is fluid. The best we can do it recognize and appreciate being part of the relationship. We can approach it through language but will never capture it.

The English language is hard. It turns everything into a noun, a thing. I just wrote “being part of the relationship.” Even if I’d written, “being a participant in the relationship,” I’d still be stuck in the noun-trap. Participant (a thing) in another thing called “relationship”. It’s no wonder we have such difficulty wrapping our small-noun-minds around huge-global-relationships like climate change. Through language we can easily compartmentalize the most intimate of interrelationships; as a dedicated thing, climate, has nothing to do with me, also a thing. Two things rather than one relationship. Where’s a verb when you need it?

It’s always there. Our language prejudices us against our interconnectivity.

If Kerri and I have a cathedral, a place of worship, it is nature. Our trails. We go there to get quiet. To clear our busy minds. We go there when we have questions too big to merely solve. We go there when we are overwhelmed and need to ground ourselves. We go there to fill up on inspiration. We go there for the same reason we each go to our studios – to enter a conscious relationship with something bigger than our little selves. To experience that which cannot be defined. We go there to release the noun-mind, the problem-solver, and enter the relationship with beauty. To stand in another word that, like beauty, is a flowing river, impossible to contain: possibility.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about CATHEDRALS

share. like. comment. support. all are meaningful words, like “thank you”.

buymeacoffee is an action, a verb, that has positive impact on the pronoun in the phrase.

Filed under: KS Friday, Language, Metaphor, Possibility | Tagged: artistry, beauty, cathedral, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, grounding, inspiration, interconnected, interconnection, interconnectivity, interrelated, interrelationship, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, language, nature, noun, possibility, relationship, sanctuary, story, studio melange, the melange, verb | 3 Comments »

Ding! [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on January 26, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Inspiration rarely looks like we think it ought to look. It rarely comes from the direction we expect. This little bell throws Kerri into advanced fantasies about her “store.” Her imagination is unbridled; her internal space is large enough to hold more than one store. For instance, she has visions of a food truck called And Sauce. Hungry people come to the window and order her special pasta sauce on a variety of delivery options. There are many variations of craft and clothing shops, art stores, there is a series of online products that follow The Little Pillow world-wide explosion. This composer, singer-songwriter has a heart for retail. It’s why she owns her own label and mourns the onset of the age of streaming: selling CD’s was too much fun.

The little bell also makes an appearance (in her mind) each time she sells something unearthed from the basement. “Ding!” she sings with excitement, when the folding screen or the bag of books find a new home. Sometimes, as we sort through the next layer of stuff in the basement, I hear her sing, “Ding!” Another sale made in her mind.

To be clear, we do not own the bell. We saw it one day in an antique store. “I have to take a picture!” she said. “To remember.” It’s among the many lovely quirks that she developed through her life as an artist. Wanting does not necessarily mean possessing. When we first met, showing me a magazine of women’s clothing, she explained, “If I stare at the picture long enough I don’t need to have it.” The yearning is satisfied by the yearning, not the having.

And, the yearning inspires new ideas, clever combinations of what’s already in her closet. This little bell works on the same principle. Retail mania in many configurations rolls out of her yearning for the bell. You’d be amazed at all the clever combinations on the menu of And Sauce. You’d be be delighted – as I am – with the joy-feels that ripple across the house every time the sing-song imaginary bell rings. “Ding!”

Another sale.

Kerri’s music is available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora and iHeart Radio

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE BELL

like it? then do. share it, too. or a comment or two? support it, woo-hoo! we thank you.

buymeacoffee is whatever you imagine it to be.

Filed under: Creativity, KS Friday, Possibility | Tagged: And Sauce, artistry, AS IT IS, cleaning house, cleaning out, composer, counter top bell, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, ding, fantasy, Food Truck, imagination, inspiration, joy, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, online products, sales, selling, singer songwriter, story, studio melange, the melange, unfolding, unfolding on iTunes, yearning | 3 Comments »

Stand At The Fork [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on January 19, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Once in a vision
I came on some woods
And stood at a fork in the road
My choices were clear
Yet I froze with the fear
Of not knowing which way to go
One road was simple
Acceptance of life
The other road offered sweet peace
When I made my decision
My vision became my release.

Nether Lands by Dan Fogelberg

It happened again. We were making dinner and, before she said it, I knew exactly what she was going to say. “I’ve been here before,” I thought. Deja vu. I understand these moments as affirmations of being on the right path. The first day we met was a festival of deja vu.

Most of my life I was terrified to sing. A professor in graduate school challenged us to walk into and explore one of our fears so I took a class: singing for the utterly petrified. That wasn’t really the title of the course. I can’t remember the title because I was in a heightened state of panic the whole semester. We had to choose a favorite song to sing. I chose Nether Lands by Dan Fogelberg because it was the first album I ever owned and I used to play it over and over and over. I knew the title track by heart. I figured I’d have a better chance of staying conscious if the song and lyrics were already beaten into my brain. The fact that I am writing this so many years later is proof positive that I survived.

When we met I told her, a consummate musician, “I don’t sing and I don’t pray.” Better to spill the beans upfront than to torture her ears down the road. Managing expectations, yada yada.

“That’s too bad, ” she said. A few short months later I was singing in her choir, band and ukulele band. So much for conviction! She told me that my problem wasn’t singing, it was hearing. I had to learn to hear. I loved the implication: walking into fear requires learning to hear. I’m still learning. Deja vu!

It happened again. Carefully opening the small step ladder between the piano and the cello to hang the lampshade in her studio. “I’ve been here before,” I thought, positioning the legs of the ladder. I knew she was going to tell me to make sure the feather clip was in front. I knew she was going to wrinkle her nose. I had no idea what would come next.

It’s what I love about a good deja vu – you’ve both been there before and have no idea where you are going. It stops you for a moment of appreciation. Affirmation. Always at a fork in the road: simple acceptance of life and sweet peace. I have a feeling that, no matter the choice, all roads eventually lead to the same place. Hanging a funky cool lampshade. A wrinkled nose. Learning to hear. A deja vu. An affirmation of being right where I am supposed to be.