Posted on January 20, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative
Cleaning out, for Kerri, has been like an archeological-story-dig of her life. I am a relative newcomer to the house and came with a truckload of paintings and not much else, so we are mostly excavating her life before me. Sometimes there is a gasp. Sometimes hysterical laughter. Sometimes I know she has found something important because of the profound silence. Sometimes there are tears.
Always there are stories. Treasured stories. Memories stirred by the simplest of finds, a shirt, a cassette tape, a teething ring.
I am the lucky recipient of her story-archeology and delight every time I hear her say, “Come look at this.”
Posted on January 13, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative
Words have become like socks in a dryer. With no reasonable explanation they simply disappear into space. Two socks go in. One sock comes out.
We’ve turned our word loss into a game. “ARGH! I CAN’T THINK OF THE WORD!” she says. “IT BEGINS WITH A THE LETTER C.” And so we commence a hearty round of word-hide-and-seek. And, inevitably, invariably, the lost word does not begin with C but is hiding behind any other of the 25 available letters in the alphabet. We know the game is over when the word jumps out of hiding and we declare, “YES! THAT’S IT!” followed by, “Wait. That doesn’t begin with C…”
The good news? I can’t remember it. But I know it’s here somewhere and begins with the letter “G”.
Posted on January 6, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative
There is a stack of books by her bedside. Strategies for cleaning out the house without doing psychological damage. Strategies for transcending deep emotional attachment to things so the cleaning out process can commence. As a dedicated minimalist, someone who’s spent the majority of life accumulating no more possessions than could fit in my car, I can only watch her go through the heart-grind of the her necessary preparation.
I learned my lesson early in our life together. She left for the afternoon and I thought it might be a good idea to clean the basement. She still has not recovered from the damage I did to her organizational system. I have not recovered from the searing look she gave me when I proudly showed her the newly cleaned basement.
And so, the necessary purge preparation has begun. I remain at-the-ready, afraid to move until…
Posted on December 30, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
As someone who’s never had to navigate the horrors of an underwire bra, I find myself distinctly unqualified to make a comment. And, as someone male, who’s never had to navigate the horrors of an underwire bra, I find silence-on-the-subject is by far the wisest choice.
I can, however, completely understand the resolution to live each day with less pain. The less pain and discomfort the better! I’ll join Kerri in that resolution! Literally or metaphorically, go wireless or go home!
Posted on December 23, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
We sit squarely in the center of a community of generosity. At night, when we turn out all the lights except those wrapped around our many holiday trees, we close our eyes and breathe it in. We feel it. The quiet grace. The kindness. The support. The friendship.
Earlier this year, traveling through our metaphoric miles of very rough road. Kerri said, “We should lean into the light more.” That’s why we sit in the twinkling light of the trees, eyes closed. We feel the light.
Posted on December 16, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
As I’ve written before, we are a scintillating couple riding high on the cutting edge of fashion. Not. Black t-shirts. Black thermals. Jeans. That’s about it. Though (make sure you are seated for this next shocking bit-o-information): I have a few new flannel shirts. Two are green. One is black. Stand back! There’s some green in the house!
In other regions of flannel interest, there are sheets (it’s winter and cotton is an ice-cold-night-time-plunge that I avoid) and, at holiday time, the buffalo-plaid-flannel pjs make an appearance. I’d strut-my-flannel on the way to the coffeemaker in the morning but tis the season to be humble so fa-la-la-la-lah, la-la-la-la!
Truth? I couldn’t strut in the morning no matter what I was wearing. Buffalo-plaid helps hide the shuffle.
Posted on December 9, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
It’s a simple math equation relative to years-on-the-planet. The numbers go up so the choices go down. Or, perhaps, the choices become more refined. We are, after all, high performance machines (a metaphor a-la la Mettrie) and, over time, require a finer food-tuning. A raised consciousness of how interrelated I am, we are, to all things – like the food we eat: what’s in it, where it came from, and what happened to it before it was packaged, transported and plated.
Mostly, in the midst of raising my consciousness relative to my/our numbers-on-the-chart, it’s really really good to have another day of life. It’s really really good to have another day of life with Kerri. I’ll start there.
Posted on December 2, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
Kerri and I walk arm-in-arm. We have since the moment we met, held hands, and skipped out of the airport. While walking in our neighborhood people regularly stop us to say how much they enjoy seeing us walk by. We appreciate their kindness. We do not take for granted the great gift of our second chance in life.
Appreciation takes time. We rarely fast-walk a trail. As a rule, we slow walk so we can see and appreciate what is all around us. Arm-in-arm, we take it in. The color. The smells. The feel. The sounds.The critters. The movement. The changes. We often walk the same trails yet they are never the same.
Filled with so much appreciation for the trees, we can only imagine that the trees feel the same way about us. We believe life is like that. As MoonJuice Hikes likes to say, “What goes around, comes around.”
Posted on November 25, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative
We’re in agreement about “the news”. Nightmarish. We are in disagreement about the temperature. I go through the winter months adding layers of clothing and piling on the blankets. Kerri is constantly peeling off layers, tossing off blankets. I like the cool night air but draw the line at frostbite. She likes the cool night air but is willing to go all the way to icicles-on-eyelashes. At night we live in an episode of Life Below Zero.
On the bright side, eyes-frozen-shut eliminates any possibility of accidentally glimpsing the nightmarish news. Silver linings sometimes come in surprisingly cold packages.
The Direction of Intention 