KS Friday | The Direction of Intention

Responsible Opposition [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on August 9, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Among the many things our city does well is the design and maintenance of the gardens in the parks. Colorful and well-tended, carefully planned beds of flowers. My favorite plots juxtapose vibrant, tender petals that surround sturdy broad red banana trees. The beauty found in opposition. Contrast.

Horatio said that he was worried for the democrats. “They have no responsible opposition,” he said. The operative word in his sentiment is “responsible.” As we all know, there is no lack of opposition yet the former GOP has lapsed into a low-bar, name-calling, opposition-for-opposition-sake; it stunts the growth for all involved. It’s the Achilles Heel of the red-hat-cult. When opposition is the end-goal there is no need for ideas or solutions, no service to a greater good, no vision for the future. There is no ethic. There is no lie-too-far to resurrect some made-up-past-glory-fantasy. Opposition-for-opposition sake has only one aim: to attain and keep power.

And then what?

Maintaining power-for-the-sake-of-power is a well-known path worn into history by the likes of Stalin and Hitler. Pol Pot. Mussolini. Putin. Kim Jung Un. The path ultimately – and always – leads to the killing fields. Absolute power is never a worthy or sustainable reason-for-governing and always, in the end, eats its own people. Opposition-for-the-sake-of-opposition, once in power, eliminates by any means all other points-of-view. It silences any voice of responsible opposition. Read Project 2025 for a step-by-step blueprint on how to reduce a two-party democratic republic into a single party authoritarian state.

A healthy two-party system – democracy – is designed to bring opposing ideas to the table for debate and discussion. The point is not opposition. The point is agreement. Compromise in service to the greater good. Checks and balances. The point, at its best, is like the gardens I so appreciate, vibrant juxtaposition, carefully planned and respectfully maintained.

Democracy is made beautiful through responsible opposition. It’s a two-party system. Democracy disappears without it.

Our garden needs tending, a task for which we are all responsible. Our garden already has a great plan. It’s called The Constitution. Opposition-for-the-sake-of-opposition is like an invasive weed. This red-hat-weed will not just go away. It’s our job – all of us – to act, to call it out, to vote, to make certain the weed is pulled for good (pulled for the public good) and that the two party system, with an ethical GOP, dedicated to the rigorous and worthy task of finding agreement through responsible opposition, is restored to the service of our greater garden.

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

read Kerri’s blog about RED BANANA TREES

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Filed under: KS Friday, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, authoritarian, contrast, contrast principle, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, democrats, garden, GOP, Hitler, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Kim Jung Un, MAGA, Mussolini, Opposition, personal responsibility, Pol Pot, power, Project 2025, Putin, responsibility, Stalin, story, studio melange, the melange, vote | 1 Comment »

Walk In Joy [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on August 2, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Imagine our surprise when we saw the street was wearing a name tag. Grace. I wondered if the street chose her name or was it given? Was she tired of being referred to as a number? Third Ave. Did she want the world to know her name?

I found the street’s choice of name to be hopeful, an aspiration for how she wished to be in the world. She intended to be courteous. Elegant. Or perhaps her chosen/given name is a desire for those who travel along her way. Polite. Moving with ease through life. Hers is a wish for humanity.

Imagine if the road we choose to walk each day could infuse us with the attributes of its name! I would stroll on a road named Grace every single day! I would make time to take a walk on Hope. I’ll bet Peace would get a lot of traffic.

Imagine if we, like Grace, brought to the street the attributes we desired to infuse into the world. Light heart. Good humor. Civility. Imagine putting it on a name tag for all to see. “Thoughtfulness.” Or, “Generosity.” “Courtesy.” Imagine walking in this world with name-tag-intention. A declaration of goodness. An exercise in actively creating the world we desire to inhabit. “Today I am empathy.”

In my children’s book mentality, what we bring to the road is what the road gifts back to us. Hope. Grace. Peace. Generosity. Kindness. Is it so far-fetched?

Joy is right in front of us… if we choose it…if we choose to vote for it…vote for her.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost on GRACE

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Filed under: Identity, KS Friday, Metaphor | Tagged: artistry, attributes, civility, courtesy, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, empathy, generosity, grace, hope, humanity, humor, intention, joy, Kamala Harris, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, kindness, light hearted, love, peace, story, studio melange, the melange, vote | 1 Comment »

Pioneers [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on July 26, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Never in my wildest dreams did the younger version of me imagine that I would someday research fun facts about wildflowers. But, because Kerri has a camera attached to her right hand and because we walk trails surrounded by meadows and because we use many of Kerri’s photos as prompts for our Melange, wildflowers and not-so-wild flowers have caught my attention.

Inevitably, one tidbit of information captures my imagination and today’s tidbit about Daisy Fleabane is this: it’s considered a pioneer species which means it is among the first plants to move into an area that has been disturbed – by natural disasters like fire or man-made like plowing or construction. They improve the ecosystem by accumulating nutrients and breaking up compacted soil, opening the way for other less hardy species to follow. Sub tidbit: because they are the first, some people treat pioneer species as weeds, invaders.

It is never easy to be the first. Ask Rosa Parks or Jackie Robinson.

Ask Barack. Ask Kamala.

People who know what they are doing, people attempting to restore health to devastated ecosystems, purposefully introduce pioneer species into a devastated landscape. They know the value of the pioneer in preparing the foundation for healing, breaking up hard-packed-minds and closed-angry-hearts. They know the necessity of the first, of the pioneer, to rehabilitate and nurture a healthy, unified ecosystem.

Ask Joe.

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

Bonus and fitting for new beginnings. This is the song Kerri wrote and performed for our wedding. It makes me cry every time I hear it:

read Kerri’s blogpost about DAISY FLEABANE

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Filed under: KS Friday, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, Barack Obama, daisy, Daisy Fleabane, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, ecosystem, health, healthy ecosystem, Jackie Robinson, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, pioneer, pioneers, President Joe Biden, restoration, Rosa Parks, story, studio melange, the melange, vote | Leave a comment »

Check Your Stems [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on July 19, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Wild Carrot. Queen Anne’s Lace. Throughout every season we find ourselves marveling at the aesthetic structure of the plant. The graceful curves and shapes. They inspire movement and floral symbols in my paintings.

Summoning the Oracle, Google, I learned that a common question asked is how to discern Queen Anne’s Lace from poisonous Hemlock. They are surprisingly similar in appearance. “Poison hemlock stems are smooth, while Queen Anne’s Lace stems are covered with tiny hairs…” The moral of the story? Check your stems.

Check your stems.

The verb form of the word ‘stem’ concerns origins. Comes from. Arises from. For instance, the stem of the word ‘democracy’ arises from ancient Greece. The word literally means the people (demos) rule (kratos). “Democratic government is commonly juxtaposed with oligarchic and monarchic systems, which are ruled by a minority and a sole monarch respectively.” Healthy disagreement, opposing points of view expressed without fear en route to compromise, is the beating heart – the stem – of a democracy.

The stem of the word ‘fascism’ comes from Latin and means, “bundle of sticks,” – the visual symbol evolved to include an axe at the center of the bundle, representing “a way of organizing a society in which a government ruled by a dictator controls the lives of the people and in which people are not allowed to disagree with the government.” Elimination of opposing points of view is the stem of fascism.

“Fascism’s origins are…ultimately centered on a mythos of national rebirth from decadence.” You could find no better or clearer tag line for a fascist intention than Make America Great Again. You could not pen a better blueprint for the fascist overthrow of democracy than Project 2025. The forcible suppression of opposition. Political violence as a necessary means of national rejuvenation, the demonization of the “other”.

As demonstrated in their gathering in Milwaukee, the reds are now a perfect expression of their symbol: a bundle of tightly bound sticks in lock-step – with an axe hanging over their heads ready to eliminate any voice of opposition. It turns out, like their sycophantic VP pick, many of these men and women, who once called their supreme red leader “America’s Hitler” and “a wannabe dictator”, were right. Sadly, they lack the courage of their convictions. They fear the axe. They lack a basic grasp of the necessity in a healthy democracy for genuine voices of opposition.

Is it rule by-the-people-and-for-the-people or a fascist autocracy?

How can we discern democracy from poisonous fascism? Check the stems.

Open your eyes and look, really look. The red hats have wrapped themselves in the flag so they might appear like the Grand Old Party. They are not. To anyone undecided or confused or jaded, I can only offer this advice: it’s important to check your stems before you ingest too much fascist hemlock believing you’re dining on democracy.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about WILD CARROT

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Filed under: KS Friday, Language, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, authoritarian, autocracy, composer, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, dictator, fascism, GOP, hemlock, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, MAGA, mythos, origin, poisonous rhetoric, political violence, Queen Anne's Lace, singer song writer, stems, story, studio melange, the melange, this part of the journey, Wild Carrot | 1 Comment »

Get Out Of The Way [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on July 12, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Our mind is like a cloudy sky: in essence clear and pure, but overcast by clouds of delusions. Just as the thickest clouds can disperse, so, too, even the heaviest delusions can be removed from our mind.” ~ Kelsang Gyatso

I’ve heard for years that energy follows thought. It seems an obvious truism to me and though I have practices meant to dissipate my cloudy thoughts, I confess that I too easily bite my thought-hooks. Imagine my pleasant surprise, when poking around to find some fodder to write about, I found Energy Follows Thought, a song by Willie Nelson:

Imagine what you want
Then get out of the way
Remember energy follows thought
So be careful what you say…

Imagining what I want is the easy part. Getting out of the way is the challenge.

I once read that our thoughts are the motherlode of comedy. I suspect that it is true though there’s a catch. Few of us are aware that our thoughts are funny. If others heard our thoughts they’d howl with laughter. We have the unfortunate delusion to be the only audience to our thoughts and so, thinking we are more important than we actually are, we take ourselves seriously. We don’t get the joke.

Don Miguel Ruiz wrote as his 5th Agreement that we should doubt everything that we think. Doubting your thoughts is a strategy for dissipating them, for not biting the thought-hook. For getting out of the way. I try to remember his 5th Agreement when I am too adamant or somehow come to think that my thoughts represent truth.

Poor Kerri. She is often subjected to hearing my oh-so-serious-thoughts and has to work hard to suppress gales of laughter. She doesn’t want to hurt my feelings. 20 regularly asks her, “Did you know about this before you married him?” She shakes her head in mock-despair.

“You really had her fooled,” he says to me.

“I only had to keep my mouth closed until she said, ‘I do,” I smile. “Now, who wants to hear what I’m thinking?”

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about CLOUDS

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Filed under: Energy, KS Friday | Tagged: Angel You Are, artistry, comedy, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, delusion, don miguel ruiz, doubt, Energy Follows Thought, Kelsang Gyatso, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, meditation, mind, mindfulness, monkey mind, room, spirituality, story, studio melange, the melange, thought, Willie Nelson, yoga | Leave a comment »

Ever And Anon [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on July 5, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Our moments of inspiration are not lost though we have no particular poem to show for them; for those experiences have left an indelible impression, and we are ever and anon reminded of them.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

This morning, like a leaf in the stream, a painting by Richard Diebenkorn flowed across my screen. I was completely taken by it. It stirred a possibility about the painting that is currently on my easel. I felt as if I was jogging beside the stream so I might study it before it disappeared into the media-confluence.

And then it was gone and I was left filled-to-the-brim with giddy inspiration.

I used to worry my muse might disappear when the circumstances of life kept me from the studio for extended periods. Over time, I’ve learned what Horatio expressed so purely: artists have “pilot lights.” The flame may reduce to a flicker but it never goes out.

“I don’t have enough colors in my paintbox,” Jim said the first time he performed King Lear. He is a world-class actor and I wonder what he might do with Lear now that life has put more colors in his paintbox. His words inspired me. I am working on a play that I started twenty years ago and put in a drawer. I had not yet lived long enough to know what I was attempting to write about. I was stumbling around in the fog and hoped that I might someday revisit it, when I had lived into a greater perspective.

The fog is still with me but I’m no longer stumbling. Instead of chasing I’m letting the play come to me. Greater perspective has taught me that inspiration is a wild thing. It will emerge like Michelangelo’s David in full form when it – or I – or both – are ready to step into the light.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE FOG

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Filed under: Art, Creativity, KS Friday, Possibility | Tagged: artistry, circumstance, creative spirit, creativity, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, fog, Henry David Thoreau, inner light, inspiration, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life giving, light, Michelangelo, muse, perspective, richard diebenkorn, story, studio melange, the melange | 4 Comments »

How Utterly Good [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on June 28, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

I’ve been pondering something Horatio said during our call yesterday. “Circumstances change but that doesn’t change how you have to live.” he added, “You still have to live a good life.”

It is not a new concept. How many times have I said to groups, as if I knew what I was talking about, “You are not your circumstance.” In the school of hysterical irony, I am constantly catching myself teaching what I most need to learn. I heard in Horatio’s comment something often spoken but discerned for the first time: You still have to live a good life.

What does it mean to live a good life? What does it mean to me? To you?

In a broad sense we were discussing the many changes we’ve experienced over the past decade. Decades. Aging. Climate. Loss of loved ones. Pandemic. The politics/division of our times. Technology. A flurry of fast moving circumstance. What seemed so important a decade ago is now barely a shadow memory. Aptly, an illusion.

You still have to live a good life.

Horatio spoke of going into his studio. “Immersing in the tangible,” he said. Painty fingers. Music. Charcoal dust. The smell of coffee and conté crayons. Exiting the noise and inhabiting the now. That’s a good life. I recognize that place.

Inhabiting the now. Kerri and I walk the trail arm in arm until she spots the next photo-op. “Lookit!” she chimes, showing me her new image-capture. “Green on green,” spoken with the enthusiasm of a five year old. Our walks are immersions in the tangible. We’ve had so much rain lately, there is an explosion of green in our world. We walk slowly so we might see it. Sense it. The shapes are as extraordinary as the many shades of green.

Horatio’s comment struck an ancient chord in me.

Sitting in our stream in the mountains of Colorado, Kerri and I talked about the next phase of our lives. A intentional creation. “The Sweet Phase,” she called it. It is inaccurate to suggest that we will create The Sweet Phase as much as we will inhabit it. The tangible. The now. Just like entering the studio. We’ve already started. Our practice is to not get swept into the swirling drama of circumstance. “…that doesn’t change how you have to live.”

It’s a question of recognizing it. Regardless of the circumstance, how utterly good living life really is.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about GREEN ON GREEN

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Filed under: Art, Creativity, Gratitude, KS Friday, Seeing | Tagged: a good life, artistry, awareness, change, circumstance, conscious, consciousness, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, drama, enthusiasm, illusion, immersing in the tangible, irony, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, meditation, presence, story, studio melange, tangible, the melange, the sweet phase | 1 Comment »

Beautiful And Prickly [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on June 21, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Thriving in an unlikely and inhospitable place, this thistle served as a sign, a testimony to possibility, the rugged beauty available only through dogged perseverance. Stretching up through a tiny crack in a busy sidewalk outside aging buildings in a bustling city, these thistles stood nearly five feet tall. Their colorful flowering heads brought us to a full stop. We set down our knitted-brows and absorbed their vibrant pink and purple stick-to-it-ed-ness. “Gorgeous,” she said, reaching for her camera.

More than beauty-through-resilience, these hardy thistles spoke to me with the veracity of an oracle. As I watched Kerri take photographs, the oracle whispered in my ear “Both beautiful and prickly,” she said, “Her prickles protect her against herbivores and others.”

“Ahhh,” I sighed. A well-rounded plant, indeed. No shrinking violet could possibly survive in this environment, let alone thrive. Bloom.

For a moment I stood watching the passers-by. Few took notice of the gorgeous thistles. Some scurry-ers glanced sideways at Kerri cooing and snapping photos of what, I imagine, they thought of as weeds for someone else to pull. No time for beauty. No time for responsibility. On-to-the-next.

“I’ll bet those people think I’m crazy,” she said, tucking her camera inside her purse.

“Yep,” I agreed. “You are definitely more like the thistle than you are to the people passing-by.” She gave me a sideways glance but decided to accept the compliment.

I winked and whispered to the thistle-oracle. “All the time in the world for beauty. All the time in the world for responsibility. Nowhere else more important to be.” Beautiful and prickly. Resilient to the core.

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about THISTLES

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Filed under: Gratitude, KS Friday, Metaphor | Tagged: artistry, beauty, composer, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, divine intervention, hardy, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, oracle, released from the heart, resilience, responsibility, singer songwriter, story, studio melange, the melange, thistle, thistles, time, truth, veracity, weeds | 1 Comment »

A Dream Itself [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on June 14, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

I awoke this morning with a line from Hamlet running through my mind: “There are more things on heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” What dream, what night-wander was I following that made me bob to the surface with a line from Hamlet as my first thought of the day?

Sometimes I use Google like I use the i-Ching. A divining tool. I called up the phrase from the mighty Google and read two opposing opinions of the meaning of the line. Of course. Divining tools generally cast a broad net. The first writer interpreted the line to mean that the human imagination has limits; there is so much that we don’t know and cannot yet imagined. The second interpretation was stated with absolute authority. This is what Shakespeare meant! “One must believe what he or she sees. Even if they previously did not think so, the real evidence should change their mind.”

Evidence or the limits of imagination? Evidence as the limiter of imagination? I was no closer to answering my dreamtime question but I was affirmed in the dynamic nature of perception and interpretation. What a great play!

Living as we now are, in the advent of A-I, one must not believe what he or she sees. I have no idea what Shakespeare meant – we never discussed it – but I am certain that what one sees is no longer evidence of anything. What one hears requires vetting. There are more things on heaven and earth than Shakespeare could have possibly imagined. Our world is beyond his dreaming or he might have suggested to Horatio that he must question everything he hears and challenge everything he sees.

And, about my dreamtime question? I’ll leave that, too, to Hamlet: “A dream itself is but a shadow.”

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE NIGHT

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Filed under: KS Friday, Language, Random | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, divining tool, dreams, dreamtime, Hamlet, I-Ching, imagination, interpretation, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, night, night wander, shadows, shakespeare, story, studio melange, the melange, William Shakespeare | 1 Comment »

Sing A Love Song [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on June 7, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Watch for all that beauty reflecting from you and sing a love song to your existence.” ~ Rumi

Deep in the night the thunder rumbled and shook the house. The rain came in buckets and reached through the open window. She leapt out of slumber to close it and then retreated beneath the blankets. She was almost as quickly fast asleep. A leap both ways. I counted the space between the flash and the boom. One-one-thousand, two-one-thousand…Sky’s grumble.

Needless to say, I was awake and on a mind-wander. I remembered students who were invested in the belief that something was wrong with them. Young artists and visionaries desiring to fit in. When young, it’s hard not being one-of-the-crowd. My job at the time, I now believe, was to help them recognize that they were unique in all the world. To flip their perspective. To love in themselves that which made them stand out, that which they feared and rejected.

I understood them because I had walked their path. At this age, I continue to walk the path.

In my mind-wander I reviewed my day. Once, I thought a love song to my existence was somehow a product of achievement. I’m no longer confused about that. Twice today, the dogga came to find me and I was moved to tears. Kerri and I sat on the deck watching the cardinals and she took my hand and I knew to my core that I was the luckiest man alive. She showed me the photo of a daisy drinking in the sun. I am surrounded by generosity and friendship. Rob sends a daily pun in an attempt to keep our spirits high. Dan brought a plastic bin with all the fixings for Southern Comfort Old-Fashioneds – and seed for our lawn because he had extra.

Watch for the beauty.

The lightning flashed. The sky rumbled. I reveled in the sounds of my love song, marveled at my existence.