charley star photo

INSPIRATIONS

My latest inspiration is simplicity.... 
small objects -- natural objects...
quiet, simple spaces... things with a story... 

like this mobile my sister made from small objects found on a visit to Marfa, Texas....
like this iron headboard given by an elderly lady to a friend, and then to my sister -- it still has the elderly lady's prayer card tied to it from when she was a small girl moving from italy to america...
like the simplicity of cut flowers from the yard, good light, a kid’s doll, and old wooden crates from a barn.

    
(click pic to enlarge)

this inspiration is in large part due to my sister and my recent trip to her and T's country house in upstate new york.  ever the design aesthete, she and hubby t have created a haven of a weekend house up there.  the house was full of charm and super-cute.

living in LA (and especially the almost nature-less area i live in), i had been craving THE EARTH. dirt. creeks. space.  Natural sounds.....  we spent the weekend strolling slow country roads, dense with trees and smell of rain in the air... watching (with dog tugging and satine squealing) the rush of water churning over the dam after the dump of rain, the rise and fall of the creek... reading, gardening, inspecting leaves and plants and new rosebushes (i've now mastered the identification of poison ivy)... cooking... (and well, ok, lots of dishwashing).

in some small crevice of the day, my breath dropped in a little lower, a little deeper, a little fuller.  my spirit felt a little freer and my mind had the pleasure (on its long walk or meadow-gazing or cat petting session) of wandering for wandering's sake -- not to solve problems or pre-multitask my next move. and somewhere, i realized, i had "found" a "missing" piece of myself that i had been too busy to even realize was missing.

maybe it was the verdant landscape. perhaps it was the rain. or waking up to the chirp of birds instead of the grate of an alarm. or the perfect cornflower blue out my window being the first thing i saw in the morning, or the simple wooden floors and "barn-modern" design aesthetic... whatever it was, i realize as i settle back into life in LA, where my surrounding 'nature' includes skunk instead of deer, how much my environs-- even my home interior -- influence my mood.  and i find myself cleaning and de-cluttering the house, aiming for simplicity and wishing for a big dump of rain to cleanse the air, and a rocking chair on a porch from which to watch it. 

xxo

     

Morning, Saugerties, NY, 2007

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MOURNING PRAYER

A friend's mother passed away this week.

I have caught myself at many moments connecting to that sympathetic space, but at a loss of how to comfort what surely must be a perspective-changing, heart-wrenching loss.  What is comfort? How do we offer it? So often, we perceive comfort as the ability to "fix," and when we can't fix it, are at a loss as to what to do.  Perhaps comfort in this case is merely entering that space of loss (and celebration of a life) with my friend.  To deeply connect.  Perhaps it is allowing one to share their story, or simply, clearing space to allow the breathing into the experience, so that we don't feel suffocated by the sorrow of it.

For Tima, I offer you this poem as a small bit of comfort.  I wrote it when a friend of mine passed away, and I found myself nearly overwhelmed by emotion and looking for a way through...

Let My Heart Be a Prayer
(Mourning Prayer)

Let my heart be a Prayer
that I might learn more to love, and not
shut down, even in the face
of Sorrow.

Let my heart be a tear,
that I might shed the rivers
rolling inside me, and not drown
in their rage.

Let me not ask 'why,' but 'how',
how to connect to something greater
than myself, and to those aching with loss
greater than I?

Let my suffering have space,
and be supported by friends
so that it does not
suffocate me.

Let my heart open wide, across vast
fields, over mountains and plains, so the weight
of this loss will feel light,
as a blade of grass, or a flake
of snow.

Let my heart be the seasons,
so it may return from Winter
to the regeneration
of Spring,

And let my Beloved
be now like a Song!
that on release of my breath,
she may find her Home.

SHUCKING THE HUSK

nobody told me how difficult it was to leave your child, your baby, for the first time.  no one said big chunks of my heart would be ripped out with each passing mile between us, that i would arrive at my final destination with a large, gaping hole in my soul, that volts of worry and images of my daughter's curdled face would haunt me thousands of miles away.  i was taking it on faith that the challenge of leaving satine would be "good for both of us"-- and certainly this was no trivial event for which to leave her:  a dear friend's wedding-- but despite that, there i was in mexico, praying for satine's comfort and sense of security. i knew she was in the best of hands -- grandparents, aunts, uncles -- but i couldn't help but wonder if i had selfishly abondoned my child for my own "good times" as i rode, sleep-deprived, from cancun airport in the shuttle van to tulum. 

i'd been travelling solo all day --not good for the sleep deprived and emotionally raw mom to spend too much time alone, pondering one's choice to leave their baby--up since early morn, and had yet to connect with any of my friends / the bridal party, all of whom by now were already in tulum. i knew without a doubt that i wanted to be at this wedding, to actively participate, witness, support, and celebrate this transformational event in my friends' lives.... but that desire did not negate my own emotional demands and motherly instincts.  as we drove, my heart grew heavy; i knew the "letting go" had begun; this was just one of thousands of small steps of "letting go" i must endure as a mother as my daughter grows into her independence.

when i finally saw  my friends, their hug-filled greetings were enough to release the barrier to my emotions, and my tears released into holly's (the bride's) embrace.  not that it was a super-dramatic moment, but i leaned into her in that moment, borrowing from her strength.  i was reminded of something writer mark nepo says: "it is a quiet and inexorable law that when i can't hold my head up, it always falls in the lap of one who has just opened; and when i finally free myself of burden, there is always someone's heavy head landing in my arms."

in that moment (and several more throughout the weekend) i was being held by the fabric of my family back in ny taking such good care of my daughter, and the tangible embrace and encouraging words of all my friends there in tulum.  simultaneously, my presence there (hopefully) was a support to my friends getting married-- that they would know how much they meant to me-- to all of us who had come-- by the very act of us being there.

and that is the dance, this interplay of relationship, of falling and rising.  it is the process of growth, of partnership, of friendship, of marraige, of motherhood.  it is true, this inter-connectedness of us all, how i can not do it alone, how the support of my friends in that moment validated for me the very importance of why i was there:  to be present, with and for each other, in these moments of our lives... to know this grinding of experience, of living, that shucks away our husk, exposing the sweeter kernels of connection beneath.

and sweet it was... after a phone call confirmed that satine had survived that first night and was smiling and happy and had probably forgotton all about me, i was able to relax and enjoy myself.  it was a beautiful ceremony/reception, and a perfect expression of the couple.  as holly walked into the arms of her future husband, happy tears swimming in my eyes, my heart told me i was exactly where i was supposed to be. 

(big thanks and toooooooons of gratitutde to my mom, dad, sister, big T, and hubby for making it possible.  i love you all.)

xxo,
charley