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 »

Embrace Orbisculate [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 8, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative
A family is trying to get ‘orbisculate‘ into the dictionary to honor their dad who died of Covid-19

Compromise. Accuse. Jaded. Dishearten. Tranquil. Swagger. Mimic. These are just a few of the over 1,700 words that William Shakespeare invented or adapted. Making up words, playing with sounds and meanings and clever twists of usage was appreciated in his lifetime. Audiences went to hear plays like we go to hear concerts. The sound of the word was more important than the visual on the stage.

During Shakespeare’s lifetime, Robert Cawdrey toyed with a thing that would someday be called The Dictionary though it wasn’t something Will had to consider. Spelling was phonetic. Teachers did not think to circle his words with red pencil. That bit of standardization was still a few centuries away. Spend time within the unedited-for-our-eyes First Folio and you’ll find yourself sounding out words just as the poet did. Tasting the sounds. Shaping meaning in your mouth en route to making meaning in the world.

Language is fluid. Each year new words come into being and others drop from sight. For instance, our word “google” is a “creative spelling of the word googol, which implies an unfathomable number. It was coined in the 1930’s. Our version is in the dictionary as a verb: to search for information. And, you’ve probably already heard that it’s also a company that facilitates the search for information. Which came first, the verb or the company? Some words, over time, come to mean the opposite of what they originally meant. The archaic meaning of the word “egregious” is “remarkably good.” From remarkably good to outstandingly bad is quite a journey!

Definitions are discoveries and agreements made according to how we use the tasty sounds we call “words.” Each word comes into being from necessity.

Orbisculate is a tasty word that William Shakespeare might have created and enjoyed. But, he didn’t. Neil Krieger did. It is a word for juice squirting in your eye. Neil died of COVID and, to honor this good man and his good life, his family is attempting to get Neil’s good word into common parlance and, ultimately, to the dictionary. They are appealing to poets and pedestrians alike to embrace their necessity and use Neil’s word. If you visit their site, check out their 50 Goals. Never was a single word so lovingly brought into the lexicon. Help them if you will. Will would have. He’d have used orbisculate in one of his comedies. Or many of his comedies.

I have a sneaking suspicion, if they are successful in their quest, that, over time, orbisculate will come to have another meaning: an act of familial love.

The Orbisculate haiku challenge! Here’s mine:

Now, it’s your turn. Make sure you let the family know.

read Kerri’s blog post about ORBISCULATE

Filed under: Language, Love, Merely A Thought Monday | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Look To The Hand [on KS Friday]

Posted on March 5, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

This is the year of the hand. Not ox or rat or snake or dragon. Hand. Not merely as a symbol but as an overriding metaphor for our latest circle around the sun. And, like all good metaphors, “hand” is complex and signals more than one level of meaning.

You’d be amazed what you cannot do when both your hands are immobilized, when both your wrists are broken, when your thumbs are bound in plaster. So, the first level of meaning in our metaphor of “hand” points to all the things we take for granted. Try and wash your hair without your wrists. Try and cut a piece of bread without the use of your hands. Try to open a door without your thumbs. The failure of proper appreciation for simple function. There’s nothing like a good hard tumble, complete with casts, to revivify genuine indebtedness to the temple of the hand.

I’ve read that an opposable thumb is a physical adaptation that helped humans survive – and thrive – in our many habitats. In addition to all the things we take for granted (and now fully appreciate), our “hand” metaphor-of-the-year also reaches into the wonders of adaptation. I watched with utter amazement, two weeks after her fall and with no time off extended to her, my wife played the piano. Standing across the room you’d never know that she was in casts. This woman, who could not button a shirt, somehow, managed to play. To make music. To open hearts. Standing behind her, I was slack-jawed at the contortions required, the adaptations necessary, to reach the keys. Spread a thick layer of pandemic on top of lost jobs and injury, and the year of the hand is a miracle of rolling adaptation. An affirmation of the possible.

And, while considering miracles, I would be remiss if I did not mention the mittens. Gloves are not made for hands-in-casts. To keep hands warm while walking-through-winter we tried a succession of thick socks, borrowed mittens, and other inventions that included sacks, wraps and duct tape (I’ll leave it up to your imagination to fill in the gory details) – none of which did the simple job of keeping fingers warm. We visited multiple sporting good and camping supply stores and found possible solutions but they were not in the budget. Not even close. The year of the hand is, above all, a year of tenacity. One step at a time. Keep walking. Keep looking. Keep trying. And then, one day, an after Christmas sale brought to us, as Kerri likes to call them, her miracle mittens. They are easy to slide onto injured hands and over splints. On sale they were within our reach. “My hands are warm,” Kerri purrs as we crunch through the snow. “It’s a miracle.”

The year of the hand. Filled with appreciation for all that what was once taken for granted. Adaptation in circumstances that we might once have called impossible. Tenacity. There’s always a way. And, if we forget that we can do almost anything regardless of the fury that surrounds us – and we sometimes forget – all we need do is take a breath and look at our hands.

read Kerri’s blog post about MIRACLE MITTENS

find Kerri’s albums here

Filed under: Edges, Gratitude, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Listen To The Painting [on DR Thursday]

Posted on March 4, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative
Surrender Now, 24 x 24IN, mixed media. 2016

This painting is called Surrender Now. In this moment. in my life, I can think of no more appropriate sentiment. Surrender. Now.

The playwright John Guare wrote that it is necessary to write ten bad pages to write one good one. I am the visual artist proof of his thought. In my life I have painted a lot of crap and will continue to do so. This painting is one of my good pages, one of my good paintings. I’m doubt if my ratio is as good as ten-for-one but, mostly the ratio doesn’t matter. As Tom McK said, “A writer writes, a painter paints.” The rest is not really that important.

The great gift of being a painter is that your paintings talk back to you. Sometimes they are sassy. Sometimes they are sage. This one is the latter. It reminds me in times of contention to open my hand rather than make a fist. It reminds me to let go. Palms to the sky.

So much these days is out of my control. I suppose that is always true but currently it is in my face. The castle crumbles. So, I look to the painting for solace. The advice is abundantly clear.

read Kerri’s blog post about SURRENDER NOW

surrender now ©️ 2016 david robinson

Filed under: Art, DR Thursday, Edges | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Stroll The Esoteric Garden [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on March 3, 2021 by davidrobinsoncreative

Lately, I am strolling the esoteric gardens and have picked for you these wild blossoms.

First, my favorite quotes of the week:

  1. “Life is mysterious and transcends logic, so the living thing can never be fully analysed, taught or learned…The doctor may explain why the patient is dead, but never why the patient is alive.” [Declan Donnellan].

2. “Samuel Beckett is a wonderful writer who has meditated deeply on the mystery of death…All of Beckett’s works, especially Waiting For Godot, are about death. In other words, because death exists, time is radically relativized. All we do here is invent games to pass the time.” [John O’Donohue]

DogDog and BabyCat are food-driven. The levels of excitement in our house escalate when the food bowls are filled. DogDog performs his vertical-jump-and-counter-clockwise-spin dance. BabyCat uncorks an excited verbal symphony that sounds a lot like “now, now, now, now, now…” The anticipation of the bowl, it seems, is far more satisfying than eating of the food from the bowl. The anticipation lasts longer and I am certain that, in the gobbling, neither DogDog or BabyCat actually taste their food.

3. “After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical, but it is often true.” ~ Mr. Spock. I laughed the first time I heard this in an episode of Star Trek. Capitalism reduced to a simple, single phrase. The economics of desire, wanting and having en route to wanting.

I have crossed paths with many a seeker. Mostly, they talk of presence or mindfulness or being as a noun. A thing to achieve or possess or gobble. Food in a bowl. The anticipation of unity in a path devoted to separation, thus, we are seekers. The Buddhist’s remedy to the dedication of separation is to chop wood and carry water. In other words, being is a verb.

With the notable exception of how-to-go-on-a-walk-without-pulling-our arms-out-of-the-socket, using the promise of a treat, Kerri can teach DogDog anything. There is no end to the tricks he will perform, the indignities he will suffer, en route to a treat. He sneezes on cue. He counts, high-fives, sits, jumps up, jumps down, wears paper plates on his head…his little Aussie body quakes with excitement, his eyes firmly locked on the promised treat.

We wrinkle our brows daily and ask, “How can they possibly believe that?” Horatio would respond, “It’s game theory. What are the incentives, the promised pay off?” Anticipation. Treat. We might as well ask, “How did hate, division and lie become food in the human bowl?’ There is no end to the tricks people will perform, the lies they will embrace, the funny hats they will wear, the indignities they will suffer or inflict, eyes firmly locked on a promised treat. Superiority. Or mattering?

I have crossed paths with many a power player. Mostly, they talk of winning, and owning, and being-on-the-top. There is never enough food for the bowl. The anticipation of achieving abundance through eyes that only perceive a pie with limited pieces. Owning this piece and then the next and the next and the next…

“Life is mysterious and transcends logic.”

Yearning meets obstacle.* The strange alchemy necessary to invent a story.

Dogs and cats living together, oh my!

“All we do here is invent games to pass the time.” I wonder, as I wander through my esoteric garden, what might it take for us to invent more inclusive, life-giving games, a more generous story?

*this definition of story courtesy of Robert Olen Butler

read Kerri’s less esoteric blog post on ANTICIPATION

Filed under: Awakening, Emergence, Flawed Wednesday, Identity, Metaphor, Perspective, Play, Possibility, Story | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

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