identity | The Direction of Intention

Now We Must Ask [David’s blog on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on November 5, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“The more you know yourself, the more clarity there is. Self-knowledge has no end – you don’t achieve, you don’t come to a conclusion. It is an endless river.” ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

In these times it is difficult not to write about the ubiquitous inanity and daily horror show produced by the current administration. We are writing a few days ahead, so it has become our practice to acknowledge that we might have to dump our initial posts if the latest outrage, the intentional starving of citizens, the kidnapping of people off the streets, the dissolution of congress to protect pedophiles…is too much to ignore. In truth, it’s all too much to ignore and it’s too toxic to focus on all of the time. We look away to remind ourselves that the goodness in people far outweighs the malicious spirit that currently claims the national narrative.

To that end I have this paradoxical reflection to offer: to all of you out there who voted for this but now daily proclaim that this is not what you voted for, I want to 1) roll my eyes and shout, “While you were cheering and waving Mass Deportation signs, did you not read your sign?” Did you think this was a sitcom? Project 2025 explicitly articulated this horror show in minute detail; you have no excuse – other than laziness – to now claim that this is not what you voted for. Yet, 2) it is never too late to wake up. It is never too late to realize that you’ve been duped. Saying, “I made a mistake,” is a step on the path of self-knowledge.

In waking up ever so slightly, there are two questions to ask: 1) “How was I so easily duped?” And, 2) “What will I do with my new awareness?” Knowing that this is not what you voted for does not absolve you from responsibility. You opened the cage and let loose the monster. It is not enough to divest yourself of culpability. People in fishing boats are being murdered, people with brown skin are being beaten and disappeared, millions are losing their healthcare and it is estimated that 50,000 people will die each year because of this loss…Saying, “It’s not my fault,” is akin to sticking your head back into the sand. Saying, “I made a mistake,” needs to be followed with a second step: corrective action. Self-knowledge is a bit of a misnomer; self-knowledge is inert until activated when it becomes dynamic: responsibility.

This ugly white supremacy has been a part of our national identity since our inception. A few days ago I told Kerri that it is my belief that our national mask is slipping. This terror-face is not new, it is merely revealing itself (again). We are seeing this part of our national identity with renewed clarity. Past generations, having seen this part of our national face, have been successful at restoring the mask, suppressing but not eliminating the ugliness.

Now we see it. And the two questions to ask ourselves are akin to those who claim that this is not what they voted for. We see it. What will we do with our new awareness? We claim to be a democracy yet we are currently witness to our rabid inability to reconcile ourselves with our history of slavery, of the genocide of native peoples…We continue to entertain a political party that actively – and perpetually – suppresses the vote of people of color and of women. It is unmasked. It is in full view. It is fascism and has no place in a multi-cultural democracy. It is no longer enough to say, “We see it.” If we stop there the cycle will once again repeat itself. The ugly face will be driven underground until if pops up as the reincarnation of The Confederacy or Jim Crow or MAGA.

We see it. Now we must ask ourselves how we translate our seeing, our self-knowledge, into responsible action. We claim to be a democracy: how do we close the gap between our rhetoric – who we claim to be – and our lived actions as translated into policy and daily practice – and into history?

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE RIVER

likesharesupportthankyou

Filed under: Awakening, Flawed Wednesday, Identity | Tagged: artistry, awareness, Congress, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, identity, jiddu Krishnamurti, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, mass deportation, narrative, responsibility, self knowledge, story, studio melange, the melange, white supremacy | 1 Comment »

The Welcome Stone [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on August 11, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“There is no greater remedy for helplessness than helping someone else, no greater salve for sorrow than according gladness to another.” ~ Maria Popova, The Marginalian, August 3, 2025

“We are due for a win,” I said.

She said, “You can stack up the losses and focus on that or you can recognize that we are winning all the time.” She began to list the many, many, many bounties that we experience each and every day. I laughed. A teacher teaching me one of my favorite lessons to teach: One of the most potent choices we enjoy is where we place our focus. The bounties comprise a mighty stack.

She climbed on the rocks to catch a photo of the waves crashing. The lake was lively and sending waves toward shore like an ocean. Her photo captured a surprise pictograph. “Hi.”

“Oh. Hello,” I said to the picture of the pictograph greeting.

“I don’t agree with spray painting the rocks,” she said, and added, “But this made me smile.” Me, too. It evoked a chuckle.

I imagined some distant future archaeologist discovering the “Hi” on the rock. A sign left by the ancients. The team of researchers will decode the marks and marvel. They will discuss the meaning of the scrawl left on the rock. Perhaps this spot was once the portal to an ancient city? Papers will be published. It will become known as The Welcome Stone. People will travel miles to see it. They will buy tickets and speculate.

It will live as a reinforcement of the message deciphered on a large statue discovered with a similar sentiment: Give us your tired, your poor…

“Who were these people?” they will ask.

It amused me to imagine that they would probably never know that, at the time of the making of The Welcome Rock, we – the people – were asking ourselves the same question.

read Kerri’s blogpost about HI

likesharesupportcommentthankyou!

Filed under: Identity, Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, focus, focus placement, generosity, identity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Maria Popova, pictograph, story, studio melange, The Marginalian, the melange | 1 Comment »

Our National ABOUT Page [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on May 2, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

This quote by Reynolds Price has been on my ABOUT page since I began blogging:

“A need to tell and hear stories is essential to us – second in necessity after nourishment and before love and shelter.”

Since I already know what I am about (mostly) I rarely visit my ABOUT page. I’d all but forgotten this quote was a constant presence on my blog. It is the flag I planted, as much for myself as for others, so I might always have a north star, a way to locate and find my way HOME. I carried it in my pocket long before I enshrined it on my site. I remember typing it into the little “about” box – it felt like a declaration.

Lately the quote has been poking at me. It wants further consideration. It has renewed relevance in our current circumstance.

The disparate bubbles that we occupy, MAGA and WOKE, are stories. Although the characters are different in the respective bubbles, the overriding story is the same: there is a threat to our way of life and the threat is the other bubble.

Although I believe the MAGA bubble is filled with dangerous fascism, they believe the WOKE bubble is socialism run amok. Occupants of both bubbles follow their news-of-the-day as if it was essential, true. Both narratives fuel the division. Both bubbles tell the tale of a heroic fight for good over an evil villain.

This is the third time in our history that these bubbles have formed; irreconcilable narratives housed under a greater umbrella-story, ironically called The United States of America. Robin Diangelo wrote the story of white supremacy requires black inferiority. Conversely, the struggle of equality-for-all is pitted against the story of white supremacy. It is nearly impossible to reconcile the combating sub-narratives: the Manifest Destiny story of god-given superiority (MAGA) with the All Men and Women Are Created Equal (WOKE) story. Our national narrative, our essential umbrella story, is of this struggle for identity: superiority for the few or equality for all. So, here we are.

A need to tell and hear stories is essential to us because stories are the glue that hold us together. Stories are essential because they define “belonging”. In a nation of immigrants, with a long history of bloody fighting over this question of belonging, what might it take for us to recognize that this fight is the greater story that defines us? It is the legacy we perpetuate in our grappling; it is the trace we leave in time. When will we see that the loss of freedom, the collapse of love and shelter is the cost of our shared narrative of seeming irreconcilable difference?

We’ve built our house on a volatile fault line.

However, there is a greater narrative available. It has been on our national ABOUT page since the beginning of our nation. It is our motto, our north star that will guide us HOME. It is printed on our currency. What might it take for us to rise above the bubbles and embrace the story at the center of our rhetorical ideal? What might we need to reconcile to live fully the nourishing story of e pluribus unum?

[this may be my favorite piece by Kerri. If you’re feeling angst or overwhelmed, do yourself a favor: take a short life-break, close your eyes and listen]

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

read Kerri’s blogpost about TRACES IN THE SKY

The Storyteller emerges from the forest.
Lucy & The Waterfox
http://www.kerrianddavid.com

likesharecommentsupportsubscribetellabetterstory…thankyou.

Filed under: Identity, KS Friday, Story | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, e pluribus unum, equality, fascism, freedom, identity, info bubbles, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, MAGA, Manifest Destiny, Robin DiAngelo, story, studio melange, the melange, white fragility, white supremacy, woke | 1 Comment »

Scratches On The Wall [David’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on October 15, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Scratches on the wall. Petroglyphs, the only evidence that remains of a people who once lived in these canyons, who lived by the river we’ve named Fremont. We do not know if they had a name for the river. We do not know if they had a name for themselves. We call them the Fremont, after the river. A location name.

The Fremont River is named for an American explorer, John Charles Fremont, so the people who scratched pictures into the rock over 1,000 years ago also carry his name. As is the nature of history, we locate them from our point of view. We build an identity-structure and civilization-story about them based upon our story of them. We’ve placed them in our narrative timeline, 1 – 1300 CE. We have no idea how they thought of or marked their time.

We have no idea what became of them. They disappeared into time. We have no idea what the petroglyphs mean or why they scratched them into the canyon walls. We wonder at the semiotics, the inner symbolic life that produced such strange (to us) images that remain on the red rock walls.

This morning, through my COVID aches and chills, I watched the news. I would like to say that I am mystified by the civilization-story currently being spun and supported by half of my nation but I am not. I would like to say that the hatred and fear-mongering of the red hat tribe is as much a mystery to me as the way of the Fremont, but it is not. The concurrent xenophobia and wild-eyed-creation of an internal enemy (anyone not in a red hat) has roots that are all too easy to see. It’s a fascist popcorn trail, a page from Hitler’s handbook. The language is identical. The images, scratched into the red-fox-walls of our time are all too easy to interpret. A frightened and misinformed populace is easily manipulated. Fooled.

What is a mystery to me is the inner symbolic life of my nation’s conservatives that seem so ready to trade our sacred democracy for a populist authoritarian. What scratches on the walls of their minds are so easily storied into hatred. What has so hardened their hearts that they embrace with cheers the repulsive bile spewed by their candidate? It is as incomprehensible to me as the petroglyphs of the Fremont.

All societies disappear into time. Ours, relative to the Fremont, is still in its infancy. We can only hope that an explorer in some distant future finds our petroglyphs – and although a mystery to them, we will have known that we transcended the authoritarian threat and overcame the fox-fear-fantasy, manufactured hatred and dark lies. And, over the next thousand years, our scratches on the wall tell the tale of how we matured to fulfill the promise of our sacred ideals. Out of many, one.

read Kerri’s blogpost about PETROGLYPHS

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

Filed under: Language, Metaphor, Perspective, Two Artists Tuesday | Tagged: artistry, authoritarian, Capitol Reef, civilization, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, Fremont, hatred, ideals, identity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, language, lies, narrative, one, out of many, petroglyph, petroglyphs, possibility, promise, Sacred, semiotics, society, story, studio melange, the melange, vote | 3 Comments »

Strive To Be One [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on September 16, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Love takes off the masks we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.” ~ James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time.

Sometimes I pause and reread the previous few weeks of my blogposts. My first thought after my latest read was, “Good God! I’m bipolar!” I’ve learned not to listen to my first thoughts. They are not nearly as considered or considerate as the thoughts that follow. I am lately writing about love.

Love. This is the rest of James Baldwin’s quote: “I use the word “love” here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace – not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth.”

Love takes off the masks. The masks we fear we cannot live without. The masks we can no longer live within. It is a tug-of-war. It is vulnerable to be seen. Yet, to grow, old identities, like suits of armor, must be discarded. To grow up it is necessary to show up, to step-out-there.

Jonathan once told us that a tree must split its bark in order to grow. Snakes shed their skin. And people open their hearts and learn what it is to love.

“Love does not begin and end the way we seem to think it does. Love is a battle, love is a war; love is a growing up.” ~ James Baldwin

I found some measure of comfort about my nation (and my latest writing) in James Baldwin’s guiding words. Perhaps we are in a struggle to remove an old and ugly mask, still in place. Racial division. Misogyny. We fear what we will see if we drop this patriarchal mask. Yet, our love of country is requiring us to grow. To take a hard look at who we are and where we’ve come from. To shed the mask we can no longer live within. We are bigger in heart and spirit than our original colonial notion. The mask of divide-and-conquer is suffocating to the world’s greatest democracy, a nation of immigrants come together under the banner e pluribus unum, out of many, one.

Love makes us dare to grow up. Love makes us strive to be one.

read Kerri’s blogpost about HEARTS

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

Filed under: Love, Merely A Thought Monday, Metaphor | Tagged: artistry, daring, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, division, e pluribus unum, grow up, heart, identity, James Baldwin, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, love, masks, mature, misogyny, quest, spirit, story, studio melange, The Fire Next Time, the melange, unity, USA, vulnerability | 5 Comments »

On The Morning Breeze [David’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on September 3, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

The first hint of fall was in the air this morning. Is it a scent or something I feel riding on the breeze? I’m not sure. Maybe both. I stood at the door and breathed it in. It is like the return of a favorite friend.

I’ve been waiting for this moment. The plumes on the grasses changed color a few weeks ago – a sure sign of autumn approaching. The vine coiling around the rocks by the pond has already passed through crimson and yellow to brittle brown, a transformation that usually happens later in September. Breck-the-aspen-tree, stressed by all the rain we’ve recently experienced, is not yet changing. She must wonder if she’s been transplanted to a rainforest. I imagine she refuses to put on her fall color until she’s had a chance to wear her finest summer wardrobe. The bees are out in force and a little aggressive, a sign of summer’s end.

I’ve been meditating on my conversation with Judy. We talked about life’s changes. The hot fire that tests us and transforms us when we finally understand that we must let go of who we think we are. “Either I die or this dies and I’m not going to die!” she said, laughing the laugh of someone who has been forged in fire, someone who has let go of seasons past and moved with nature into the surprising new.

Standing at the backdoor, feeling autumn to my bones, I felt the ash of the fire all the way to my core.

Beyond the dictionary definition, I am learning about resilience. Resilience is not a rigid bulwark. It is an open hand. Breck-the-aspen-tree bending with the wind. New sprouts arising through the ashes after the forest fire. It is autumn announcing its arrival on the morning breeze.

read Kerri’s blogpost about PLUMES

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

Filed under: Edges, Emergence, Identity, Two Artists Tuesday | Tagged: artistry, autumn, change, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, death, fall, fire, flexibility, identity, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrisherwood.com, life changes, nature, resilience, seasons, seasons change, seasons of life, story, studio melange, the melange, transformation | Leave a comment »

Near Hiatus [David’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab]

Posted on August 17, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Until today, I’ve never been compared to a good english muffin. For that matter, I’ve never been compared to a bad english muffin. In the end, whether a good english muffin or bad, I am a festival of nooks and crannies and plan on celebrating each new addition. When you’re falling, dive!

You may have noticed an appearance change in this addition of smack-dab. Unlike me, it’s not new nooks and crannies. We are having technical difficulties at Smack-Dab International. Namely, Kerri’s computer died mid-Smack and took this week’s cartoon with it. While I was readying a post of apology for our smack-dab-hiatus, she produced this strip in record time on her ancient iPad mini! Moral of the story: while I look more and more like breakfast food, she is rapidly becoming the queen of the work-around. She never ceases to amaze me.

read Kerri’s blog post about ENGLISH MUFFINS

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

Filed under: smack-dab | Tagged: aarp, aging, artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, english muffin, identity, image, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, middle age, middle age cartoon, middle age romance, mirror, nooks and crannies, saturday morning smack-dab, smack-dab, story, studio melange, technical difficulties, the melange, wrinkles | 4 Comments »

For A Moment [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on August 5, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

“The distinctive human problem from time immemorial has been the need to spiritualize human life, to lift it onto a special immortal plane, beyond the cycles of life and death that characterize all other organisms.” ~ Ernest Becker, The Denial of Death

We waited until the oppressive heat of the day passed to take our walk. The air was thick and still but it felt good to be outside, moving. Because the humidity teases forward every former injury, we talked about our ubiquitous aches and pains. My back. Her wrists and fingers.

Kerri stopped and said, “I get it now.” We laughed at the memory:

One day, years ago, Beaky looked in the mirror and declared, “I look like an old woman!”

Kerri said, “Momma, you’re 93! You are old.”

Beaky stared at herself in the mirror and added, “But I don’t feel old!”

“I get it now.”

As we walked we talked about feeling young in a body that hurts when it’s humid. A new experience on our path through life, a growing dissonance between body and spirit. The spirit steps a few feet away and looks back at the body, declaring, “What the heck! That’s not what I look like!” It is certainly not what I feel like.

There’s a surprising gift in the dissonance. Perhaps, like all good paradoxes, within the discord, the first real harmony of life becomes available. The “supposed-to-be” drops off. The social face is less useful and set aside. The striving to be somewhere-else-in-some-imagined-future-achievement ceases, becomes so much dust. Suddenly, the miracle of life is not somewhere else. It is found in the here-and-now. Flexing achy fingers. The evening sky made pastel by humidity.

The growing realization that this ride is limited makes it all the more precious. Grounded.

Life – spirituality – becomes uncomplicated. Unapologetic. Authentic. Spirituality that requires no cathedral or book of rules. No incense or intermediary. No searching or appealing prayer. Spirituality that is borne of the simple appreciation of the moment. Feet firmly planted on the ground. In the Buddhist tradition: joyful participation in the sorrows of the world. Here and now.

In joyful participation, holding hands with achy bodies on a humid evening, for a moment at least, we get it. We arrive at uncomplicated, unapologetic, and authentic.*

(*thanks to the Heggies Pizza truck for the post inspiration!)

read Kerri’s blogpost about UNCOMPLICATED, UNAPOLOGETIC, AND AUTHENTIC

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

Filed under: Gratitude, Identity, Merely A Thought Monday | Tagged: aging, appreciation, artistry, authentic, consciousness, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Ernest Becker, Heggies Pizza, humidity, identity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, miracle of life, paradox, paradoxes, presence, spirituality, story, studio melange, The Denial of Death, the melange, Unapologetic, Uncomplicated | 1 Comment »

All But One [David’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on July 9, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

Is it about the subject, the seagull feather, or the overall composition? It’s a more relevant question than you might imagine.

Of note: another word for ‘composition’ is ‘constitution’. Framework. Anatomy.

Begin here: the Supreme Court just ruled on a question of presidential immunity. Was their ruling about the subject (presidential immunity) or the constitution (the framework that fundamentally defines our national identity)?

Hint: In school we learned to speak The Pledge of Allegiance. “…with liberty and justice for all.” With this ruling, with hands over hearts, the words spoken daily by children and adults alike must now be, “…with liberty and justice for all, but one.“

In taking up the question of presidential immunity -a puzzling choice on their part at the outset since the answer to the question of immunity is already deeply imbedded in something sacred that every American school child recites by rote at the beginning of each school day – the Supremes altered the composition of our picture. The very constitution of our democracy. All, but one.

In his weekly newsletter, artist Nicholas Wilton writes that we must see our work as telling our story. With this ruling, the work of the Supremes, on our behalf, set course for a much different story. A fundamentally different composition.

When was the last time that you read and considered the power and import of the Preamble to The Constitution? “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

We the People (the composition). All, but one (the subject). The Supremes reversed the subject and the composition: All but one is now the composition. Where does that leave we the people? It’s a more relevant question than you might imagine.

Hold your nose and say it with me: I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all but one?

read Kerri’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday

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

Filed under: Perspective, Seeing, Two Artists Tuesday | Tagged: artistry, composition, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Framework, identity, immunity booster, justice, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, liberty, presidential immunity, story, studio melange, subject, the melange, The Pledge of Allegiance, The Preamble, The Supreme Court | Leave a comment »

Edge Of Time [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on March 29, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

It was here for a moment. The snow on the wall. The tall grasses bowing beneath the weight. Today the grass is standing. Time moves on. Circumstances flow and change.

Yesterday we sat at a counter in the Public Market and ate gumbo. Kerri and the server, a young woman, talked about the oddities of aging. It was Kerri’s 65th birthday so the topic was vital and current. Both women laughed at how out-of-sync they feel relative to the number of their spins around the sun. “What is this supposed to feel like?” they asked in unison. The old man sitting next to us almost spit out his salmon.

We arrived at the art museum an hour before closing. She said, for her birthday, she wanted to visit her boys: Richard Diebenkorn. Ellsworth Kelly, and Mark Rothko. We sat in front of the Rothko for several minutes and I swear, like a good wine, the painting opened. The longer we sat with it the more it beckoned. The richer the color became. “I wish there was a bench in front of Richard,” she said. She loves her other boys but Diebenkorn is her favorite.

On our way out we stopped by the enormous Anselm Kiefer painting, Midgard. The mythical serpent doing battle at the end of the world. It’s a metaphor in darkness: cycles of renewal amidst constant destruction. A crucible. I always visit Anselm as he is a favorite of my friend David. I sent him a photo of the painting and realized that it has been almost eight years since I have seen him.

Catching a glimpse of my image in the window and not fully recognizing the man that looked back, I said, “This time thing is crazy.” She squeezed my hand.

“Tell me about it,” she said. And then asked, “So, what’s the next part of our adventure?”