Borrow A Cup Of Belief [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 22, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

The sun is streaming through the windows. It is an immediate spirit lift. We sip coffee and our conversation wanders in no particular direction.

We inevitably discuss of the absence of normal, our rolling wave of disruption. “I wonder what will happen this week?” We laugh, “Knock on wood!” For a moment we sit in silence. We’ve stopped asking, “What else can happen?” We keep the question to ourselves. We’ve grown superstitious.

For us, this pandemic time will always be known as the era of disruption. All recognizable patterns are shattered. New patterns have yet to find a foothold. Each day a tumbling unknown.

I often write about “not knowing.” It is the land where learning becomes possible. The first caveat: Have the experience first and make meaning second. The second caveat: Suspend your judgements and learn. Both are rooted in the intentional suspension of knowing. Open to life.

We are definitely having experiences. We are careful not to arrive too soon at meaning.

Yesterday I read that, when life tosses us the uncontrollable, we default to imaginary controls. We do the dishes, we vacuum the rug, rather than face what is out of our control. There is great comfort in the imaginary.

Sometimes belief in yourself is hard to come by. “Knowing” that you can do it. “Knowing” that you can stand firmly in the “not knowing” is never a given. Especially in times of continuous disruption. It is only after the fact that you “know” with certainty that you can do it. “One step at a time,” we chant.

It is, in these times of disruption, that we borrow belief from each other. You tell me that I can do it. I tell you that you’ve got this. Others “know” what we do not. They see our fortitude. We see theirs. It is why human beings are a herd animal; we come to know ourselves through the eyes of the other. We go next door to borrow a cup of belief.

Beaky’s note now sits on Kerri’s bed stand. A treasure newly found in a long forgotten purse. One of our imaginary controls, cleaning out the closets, produced this gem. Beaky, no stranger to disruption, reaches across time and the threshold to offer timely encouragement, “I know you can do it.”

“Momma says we got this,” Kerri says. If I’ve learned anything, it’s to never argue with Beaky.

read Kerri’s blog post about KNOWING

Filed under: Edges, Gratitude, Merely A Thought Monday, Story | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Pace The Loss [on KS Friday]

Posted on March 19, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

The loss of BabyCat will be forever linked with my father’s disappearance into dementia. I was away from home, helping my mother move my father into memory care, when Kerri called about BabyCat. One loss was sudden. The other loss is glacially slow.

The pace of loss.

I read once that we don’t lose our beloveds all at once. No matter what, sudden or slow, it happens in stages, the heartbreak comes in pieces. Missing daily rituals. Holidays. Last night, as has been my practice these many years, I peeked over the couch to see if BabyCat was going to “check into the hotel” (sleep on the couch) or spend the night with us. And then I remembered.

When I saw him in Colorado, I thought I had grown accustomed to my dad not being able to recognize me. I wasn’t. The tidal wave of loss nearly knocked me off of my feet. Empty eyes.

It’s been several weeks since Kerri chose a piece of her music for our melange. Both of us have, for reasons we cannot articulate, lately eschewed using our artistry in the melange – my paintings, her compositions. I’ve sorely missed diving into her chosen piece of music when preparing our KS Friday posts. When she decided this morning to use her piece, MISSING, I was strangely relieved. A bit of normalcy returned. As I listened, I found myself lingering in the comfort of her composition, the warm yearning of her solo piano, sun through shades, the promise of spring. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. The comforting refuge of memory evoked in Kerri’s MISSING. A sweet-bitter pathway through this forest of loss.

kerri’s albums are available on iTunes

read Kerri’s blog post about MISSING

missing/released from the heart ©️ 1995 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Family, KS Friday, Love, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Unwrap Them Carefully [on DR Thursday]

Posted on March 18, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

I give you an emptiness,/ I give you a plenitude,/ Unwrap them carefully. ~ Norman MacCraig, Presents

John O’Donohue wrote that, “Nothingness is one of the faces of death. The life of the soul is about the transfiguration of nothingness.” As we watch DogDog search and search again for his missing BabyCat, as we quietly talk each day about the empty spaces left by BabyCat’s sudden death, I am hyper-aware of the changes already happening within us.

We are gentler in the world. We spend more time sitting with DogDog, we spend more time sitting with each other. We are not afraid of the silence. In fact, we seek it. We welcome it. Sitting at the table, we watch life-at-play in the back yard. Squirrels hauling leaves for their nest. The crows on patrol. A woodpecker. Green shoots peeking through the soil. We attend the sunset.

The emptiness we inhabit has altered our relationship with time and task. We do not seek distraction or fill our minutes with news-chatter or other noises. We are moving slower with more attention, doing less and experiencing more. Washing and drying the dishes has become an act of togetherness, a generosity, like holding hands.

Tom Mck taught me that, sometimes, it is necessary to close a program or a building and let it sit empty for awhile. The emptiness will eventually attract new ideas and bring new energy. New life seeks empty spaces. Our enormous love for BabyCat has created for us a monumental emptiness. We hold it as sacred space and will, over time, unwrap it slowly, carefully, and wisely, so that the monumental soul-plenitude created by BabyCat will find its way in.

read Kerri’s blog post about AT THE DOOR

nap with dogdog & babycat, 36x48IN, 2020

at the door ©️ 2017 david robinson & kerri sherwood

nap with dogdog & babycat ©️ 2020 david robinson

Filed under: DR Thursday, Family, Gratitude, Love | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Feel The Absence [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on March 17, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

Because I was in Colorado helping my mother navigate her way through a maze-like life transition, I was somewhat detached from the reality of BabyCat’s passing. The full weight of loss smacked me when, coming through the back door late at night, returning from my travels, my ordinarily overly-effusive Australian Shepherd was not bouncing at the door to greet me. I came in, put down my bags and, out of the darkness, DogDog emerged, walked slowly to me, and pressed his head to my leg.

Kerri warned me that DogDog was hurting. She told me about his vigil at the door, waiting for BabyCat to come home. She described his looking-looking-looking around the house for his constant companion. She told me of his quiet, his disinterest in going-in-and-out-and-in-and-out during the day.

He stays close to us. His sadness is palpable. His light is dim.

Initially, when DogDog appeared in our lives, Kerri was worried that BabyCat would never accept a dog into his domain. We knew they’d crossed the bridge into friendship when, one day, to our great dismay, DogDog had BabyCat’s head in his mouth and was dragging him across the hardwood floors. We shouted for DogDog to stop. Always an obedient boy, he released BabyCat, who promptly slapped him. The cat-head-went-back-into-the-gentle-dog-mouth and the game resumed. “Boys,” Kerri looked at me and sighed, “are a mystery to me.”

This morning, as I made breakfast, rather than go out and clear the yard of marauding squirrels, his usual enthusiastic activity, DogDog stood in the sun room, sniffing the spot BabyCat always occupied when it was time to be fed. I sat on the step and ruffled his ears. We’ve explained to him that his BabyCat isn’t coming home, that his BabyCat loved him. We’ve accompanied him as he searches the house, telling him that it will be okay. Now, as is true for us, too, we’re beyond words. We sit together in the silence, in the place where no word can reach, and, together, feel the absence, that only great love, in loss, brings.

read Kerri’s blog post about CONSTANT COMPANIONS

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Say Farewell [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on March 16, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

And just like that, our BabyCat was gone.

He waited until I was traveling so I experienced his death through Kerri’s eyes. His sudden illness. The race to the vet. A dire diagnosis. He died before any decisions were made or treatments considered.

When I first met Kerri there were two approvals I needed to secure. Beaky’s [Kerri’s mother] and BabyCat’s. Beaky’s approval was easy. We took to each other right away. BabyCat’s acceptance took some time. He’d had Kerri all to himself for years and was cautious about this newcomer. It didn’t help that my entrance to his quiet world also came with a rambunctious puppy. After our honeymoon, one evening, with no warning, BabyCat jumped up into my lap and I knew I was in. “Well, look at that!” Kerri said. BabyCat purred. I beamed.

He joined me in my morning yoga. He bumped my legs to alert me of his empty bowl. He trained me to carry him up the stairs for his late night snack [his bowl was on the landing, safe from invasion, since DogDog is afraid of climbing stairs]. He crawled into bed with us each night as we watched our late night trail and made himself available for lavish pets. I willingly became his grateful servant.

Two days after his death BabyCat came to me in a dream. I was still in Colorado and felt badly that Kerri was all alone with her grief. In the dream, BabyCat came to the backdoor and yowled; he wanted to come in. He was an indoor kitty his entire life so I was surprised to find him outside. I opened the door and knelt down. He came in and crawled into my lap and we had a nice pet. He purred. I told him that I was going to miss him.

I awoke with a profound sense of peace. BabyCat was okay. I will always be grateful that he crawled into my lap. I will always be grateful that he gave me a sweet farewell.

read Kerri’s blog post about BABYCAT

Filed under: Family, Gratitude, Love, Two Artists Tuesday | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Be The Miracle [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 15, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

“The infinity in the microscope is as dazzling as that of the cosmos.” ~ John O’Donohue

After my surgery, the doctor said, “You my friend are now a modern medical miracle.” It’s true. Had I been born in another century I would not have survived. In fact, had I been born in another century, I would have met the average life expectancy of 30-40 years. Each and every one of us, walking the streets with an expectation to live beyond our thirties, are modern medical miracles and indebted to the brave explorers of the microscopic cosmos.

Early in this pandemic, before it hit the shores of these divided-united-states, we watched the movie Contagion. So much of the world painted in the film was spot on. Pandemic deniers decrying the virus as a made-up assault on their freedom. Charlatans selling miracle cures and misinformation. Conspiracy theories run amok. The initial panic emptied shelves at the grocery store. Quarantine. An economy in tatters. A weary and anxious populace awaiting a vaccine that would stop the micro-assault. A microscopic threat vanquished by a microscopic man-made-miracle.

When we pulled into the abandoned-drive-through-bank to receive our vaccines, I felt that I was in the movie. We’d placed our names on a list to receive vaccines that would otherwise need to be discarded. The call came on a Friday afternoon, “Come now!” We jumped into the truck as the sun was setting on a frigid snowy day and raced to the given address: an abandoned bank turned into public health center. We were directed to stop at cone number 1. Nurses in snow pants, knit caps and mufflers came out to the truck. It was so cold that we had to open the door to communicate, the windows were frozen and would not roll down. A bit of paperwork, coats shed and arms exposed, and the vaccines were administered. Coats and gloves and hats were quickly donned again. We were asked to wait at cone number 1 for 15 minutes. They gave us a flag to wave if we needed help.

As we waited, engine running to beat back the bitter cold, we admired those amazing women who gave us our shots. They were absolutely delightful, upbeat, and incredibly kind. Pandemic. A blisteringly frigid day. They’d been giving vaccines since early in the morning, repeatedly taking off their gloves in frostbite conditions. We were the last two of the day. And there wasn’t a hint of exhaustion or suffering or complaining from the cold. “People can be amazing,” Kerri said. “It’s good to remember that sometimes.”

It was good to remember. Dedicated people selflessly serving others in the face of a deadly virus, enduring extreme cold, extreme misinformation, tip-toeing across ice and politics to bring big-heart-comfort and a bit of modern miracle to the dazzling cosmos called my body and yours. My health is your health. Intimately linked as we pass in the grocery store or on the street or trail, across the nation and the world. The microscopic world does not know us as individuals and cares not about our investments or beliefs or freedoms, imagined or not. All that I know is that I am, once again, a modern medical miracle, and owe a deep debt of gratitude to the men and women at the microscope and those that stand for hours in the cold.

read Kerri’s blog post about VACCINES

Filed under: Body, Gratitude, Merely A Thought Monday, Seeing | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Really Look [on KS Friday]

Posted on March 12, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

20 watches the house, the dog and our very large cat when we are away. To keep us in touch with what’s going on at home, he sends us mystery photos: common things around our house made mysterious through an extreme close up or unusual angle. Our job is to solve the photo-riddle. I love the game because, no matter where we are, it instantly makes me look at the world in a different way. Or, better said, it makes me look. Really look.

I also appreciate the game because, upon returning home, I run around the house looking at the objects he transformed into enigmas. All that I have grown dull to seeing re-emerges as rich in color and shape and texture and story.

Kerri has the visual sensibility of a contemporary artist. She went down a path of music but might just as well aimed her artistry at the visual. Hers is a natural sense of design. Her camera might as well be an accessory or visual-opportunity-attachment since she moves through the day capturing photographs of passing detail. I’ve known her to be paying bills and jump up suddenly to catch the light on the wall or the texture of the door. Her eye is never passive. She and 20 are alike in that. They are visual twins with unique sensibilities and both serve to keep my eyes open and looking-beyond-what-I-think.

Yesterday, in mid-sentence, she stopped and said, “Oh! I want to show you something!” turned and ran down the hall. When I started to follow she said over her shoulder, “You can’t look! Stay there!” A minute later she returned, sheepish, and showed me the photo she’d just taken. “Do you know what this is?” she beamed. Too excited to wait for my answer she announced, “It’s the laundry chute! Isn’t it cool!” She walked away studying her photograph, muttering, “It’s so coooool.” I ran to the laundry chute to have a look. To really look as if for the very first time.

read Kerri’s blog post about THE CHUTE

find Kerri’s albums on iTunes

Filed under: Art, Creativity, KS Friday, Seeing | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Pull Down & Lift Up [on DR Thursday]

Posted on March 11, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

If you could crawl inside of Kerri’s head and make a list of her greatest fears, the dentist would surely top the list. So, it was inevitable that dentists would find their way into the annals of Flawed Cartoon.

Flipping back through the syndicate-submissions-to-no-where I see a few themes emerge. Non-expert-experts. And dreams. When ants dream. When sled dogs dream. The two, I realize with some dismay, are connected.

No one wants to be the dentist’s first patient. No one wants the magician, while sawing you in half, to tell you that the science of magic is inexact. Cobwebs collecting on patients who’ve waited an eternity to see their doctor. Doctor Frankenstein misreading the blueprint and sewing the monster’s feet on backwards. Non-expert experts. Discovering that the people we hope to be competent, are, just like you and me, people. Filled with flaws. Sometimes over-inflated. Sometimes pretending confidence on the outside while inwardly uncertain of what they are doing. Taking the might out of the mighty so that only the y(ikes!) remains.

My dreams series features the opposite end of the spectrum: the subservient dreaming of life if the tables were turned. A giant ant stepping on tiny people who are trying to get away with the picnic. A sled dog mushing the mushers. Dreams of power borne of powerlessness.

Pulling down. Lifting up. A celebration of the mistakes, of our humanness, our yearning, our projections. Pointing us all to a common center: flawed and not-taking-ourselves-so-seriously.

When I drew the dentist, Kerri said, “Eeeeewwwwwww!”

And I said, “Exactly! That’s what makes it so funny.”

read Kerri’s blog post about THE DENTIST

flawed cartoon ©️ 2016 david robinson & kerri sherwood

Filed under: Flawed Cartoon Wednesday, Navel Gazing | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Wiggle And Be Warm [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on March 10, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to witta-woo!” ~ Thomas Nashe, Spring, Sweet Spring

“It’s not possible,” we said in unison. For weeks, the temperatures were bitter cold. The mound of snow at the end of our driveway was as tall as I am. The sun finally emerged. We pulled on our snow pants, our heavy boots, and walked into the snow-shocked world. Rounding the corner by the dentist’s office, at the base of the south facing wall, through a patch of cold wet earth surrounded by mounds of ice and snow, tender shoots of green were breaking through, reaching for the warmth. Daffodils. Spring.

We stood staring as if slapped. It was as if we had rounded the corner and come face-to-face with alien hope, something we thought existed only in some distant future, a Hallmark promise of light in the darkest of winters. Yet, there it was, tenacious and tender, a harbinger of Persephone’s return to the sweet surface of the earth. “I have to take a picture,” Kerri whispered, as I broke into a spontaneous sun dance. Passing motorists stared at the lady climbing into the bushes and the wiggling crazy man.

I felt as if I suddenly held a precious secret. I did a slow 360 degree turn and saw only winter, winter, winter. Cold, frozen, frigid, freezing, ice damming, black ice, snow plow, sand and salt world with people puffed out and covered in too many layers to please-god-stay-warm. And, in the middle of it all, a tiny patch of promise. A force greater than despair or depression or pandemic fatigue. Life.

We stayed just long enough to make sure it wasn’t a mirage, linked arms and set course for home. Cold fingers but warm in our core.

As we trudged home, breaking trail in snow, I thought of a small piece by Ellsworth Kelly. He pasted a chunk of warm yellow on a postcard image, a Japanese print. He called it “Spring (Yellow curve).” A shock of yellow completely out of place yet transforming the entire world. I imagine, one day, he took a walk in the bitter cold and saw a shock of yellow blowing through the soil. So out of character yet so welcome. Spring. Yellow curve. “Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to witta-woo!”

read Kerri’s blog post about SPRING?

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Gratitude, Metaphor, Possibility, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Invite The Humor [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on March 9, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

The sun at last. We pulled on our snow boots and walked the neighborhood, arriving at a place sacred to us, the Southport Beachhouse. It’s the site of our wedding reception and candlelight anniversary dinners on the beach.

Kerri packed a snow ball and another and another. She made a tiny snowman. We scrounged the snow for sticks, small cones for eyes. “He’s so cute!” she said. And then, “Do you think he knows the world is off its axis?”

“No.”

“Lucky snowman!” she sighed.

Horatio had me laughing during our call. He told me that the story of Job was meant to be a comedy and, in his telling, it was hysterically funny. He has me convinced. Grim circumstance is fodder for good humor. It’s why the classic slip-on-the-banana-peel is so funny. I told him that Kerri and I are waiting for the whale to burp. Despite what it seems, our time in the belly of the whale is temporary. Sooner or later, every good comedy comes to a happy ending.

The trick, I suppose, is to recognize that you are living in a comedy and it is better to laugh than shake your fist at the sky.

Sand paintings, like snowmen, are temporary. They are meant to invoke healing. They are meant to provide protection. “Do you think he’ll be here tomorrow?” Kerri asked as we walked away.

“No. He’ll enjoy his day in the sun and that will be it,” I said. She looked at me sideways.

Impermanence. A day in the sun. A snowman made for fun and not forever. In making it, we found an ounce of perspective, some tiny snowman healing.

read Kerri’s blog post about THE SNOWMAN

Filed under: Metaphor, Two Artists Tuesday | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

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