a letter (to you).

let go.

how are you? really.
how. are. you?
(let it out.)

(and know that anonymously is okay too.)

notes for the journey (august 18, 2009)

cake for two . chocolate cafe, south bend, indiana . july 2009

if you were here today and we were meeting up for tea and chocolate cake for two, these are a few of the things i would tell you about as we talked the afternoon away...

jenna's post about envy. wow. this is a must read. a must. (i keep thinking about it and so want to discuss.)

dar's "on the go" project and description of said project is simply fantastic. (oh and her new hippy urban girl space makes me smile...)

maddie's ecourse, "Bones of a Poet ~ photography and the wonder of seeing" sounds so wonderful. this phrase from the class description, the course "will teach you how to encounter the world with all of your being," speaks right to the guts of me. yes. hope you will think about joining in on this beautiful experience. (and be sure to check out maddie's new internet home.)

jennifer's poetry in motion fills my heart with joy.

jonatha. saw her live again friday night. swoon. the triple door is a perfect venue. we had the best meal and then the best time listening (read singing along) to jonatha sing those songs we love. and it was such sweetness to be able to connect with her afterward. the works continues to play pretty constantly around these parts. yep. simply put: her music is part of my life soundtrack.

this movie. even if the nuances and poetry of the book were not completely captured, i can't stop thinking about this beautiful story. seeing it on the big screen yesterday was a gift in the midst of lots of doing (even if some of the doing involves procrastinating). am planning to reread the book very soon (want to join me?).

home. a beautiful new flickr group.

anything that you would share if we met for tea + cake?
do tell...

sunday, august 16.

6:30 AM foggy mind gives way to "i can't sleep" and i decide to make the long aprons i have been saying i will make for months...visualizing new pattern ideas...reversible perhaps...

6:45ish fall back asleep

8:35 wake up, must take shower first to push away foggy mind

8:52 blog reading in bed for a bit before breakfast

9:00 read maddie's sunday post. sigh with contentment and a wee bit of a wish i was there feeling

9:02 click over to this video of a vermont lake

9:02:10 decide the day's plans suddenly changed. must be in nature today

9:10 invite jonny to join me

9:40 picnic + three cameras + one blackberry + one flip + binoculars & bird book + lizzy & jonny get into the bug and head to the mountain

10:18 car dance party to michael franti begins (a must as coffee and breakfast have not yet been consumed)

10:31 starbucks drive through

11:10 enter the park and nature commences...

11:11 on was a bit like this...

6:10 PM time to head north yet again

6:18 a little donna summer concert in the car takes us home...

a perfect day really.

a mirror at 121.

my brother . me :: april, 2009

this morning, for the first time in more than forty years, it is possible that someone else woke up and padded into the bathroom first thing to find himself looking into this mirror. this person would find himself looking into this mirror that is on the wall in a bathroom in his new home.

i know that feeling that might have come up when sleepy eyes adjusted to new surroundings, that "oh my goodness we bought our first house and today we woke in our new home" feeling. it is a beautiful, embarking on a new journey that is your life, your real life, sort of feeling.

i sit here in this moment and give myself permission to sift through my own feelings that come up as my heart reaches toward another coast, toward this home and this mirror and the memories of so much time spent with my grandparents in this home that now belongs to someone else.

i sift through the ache and the sadness and the joy of the blessing that was a friendship, a real friendship, with my grandmother. i sift through the echoes of my grandfather's last words to me the day before he died. i sift through the feelings that cause me to simply sit with confusion about how a person's life just ends one day.

my brother said to me recently as he sifted through his own feelings after just learning that a friend his age had died quite suddenly...he said, "you know liz, we can just die at any moment."

this simple truth is one that we seldom think about. we rush about our lives and worry about so much. we focus on so many things that do not matter. we forget to simply be present and experience and instead worry about missing a television program or why someone hasn't emailed us back quickly enough or if people even like us.

jon and i were driving a few weeks ago and i was telling him some story about my childhood and i suddenly stopped and said something like, "if we only understood that we would want to remember every second." i wish i could tell my five-year-old self to breathe in a moment spent by lake edwin johnson learning to skip rocks. what were the sounds? the smells? how did my grandfather's hand feel when he touched my head to tell me i was doing great? i wish i could ask my five-year-old self to tell me about every second of that afternoon.

for a project i am working on, i have been spending time looking at old photos of my family. while doing this, i have been closing my eyes and trying to remember pieces of the moments captured and then writing about what i remember or what comes up as i look at the photo. such a beautiful exercise this is as i do believe so much is tucked inside this brain and heart i carry around with me. i do believe that even though we don't remember every second, we do remember so much. and these photos of our past, even before we came to be, make up pieces that make up us. i am going to share a few of these writings paired with photos every now and then (like i did here)...maybe you will want to join me with your own photos and memories...

and in this moment, as i sift through feelings and allow myself to sit in the quiet, i think about that first day of waking up in your new home feeling and i feel my face relax and my shoulders settle into my body and my heart opens just a bit. someone else's life is beginning. another couple has a story to tell and lives to live and perhaps even create. it is beautiful. it is the cycle of life.

(a little about the photos above. when we were in south carolina in april, i took a lot of photos inside and outside my grandparents' home. at some point, my brother picked up my camera and took a few. when i returned home, i found that we had both taken photos in this mirror in my grandparents' bathroom. i love this.)

senses view: one tree

{see}

{touch}

{taste}

{smell}

{hear}

{and know}

*****

who :: liz . jon

where :: maple tree at owens beach in point defiance park

when :: august 11, 2009

senses view is a collaboration series.

read more about how it began.

see all the senses view collaborations.

home.

lake michigan view (photo by jonny) . august 2009

as i settle slowly back into the routine that is my life, my heart feels somewhat heavy as i wrap my mind around being so far across the country from my family yet again. yet, this is home. here. in washington with the tall tall evergreens and the cool august air and the backyard lavender and the tender sighs of millie. this is home. and i know, in my heart, that this distance is what has invited our time to be sweeter and, perhaps, a bit more open and full of light.ness. yes, the time is indeed sweeter. time with my dad and anne was full of laughter and sunsets and good food and late night miniature golf. time with my mom was short...just a few hours...but we had a delightful brunch and did a bit of shopping, and even though she has been through a bit these last few weeks as she has been the caregiver to her significant other after his sudden heart surgery, she still seemed lighter than i have seen in her in a long time, which made my heart happy.

after we said goodbye to my dad and anne when they dropped us off where we were staying in chicago and then again the next day after we said goodbye to my mom in the middle of water tower place, i turned to jon and leaned again his chest and started crying as i found myself inside feelings that seemed like a mixing bowl full of nostalgia and missing. now, as i settle back in, i realize that what i felt toward the end of this trip that seemed like nostalgia was really love.

in this realization, i find myself standing here, in this spot, in this moment, and i take a breath and find my footing. and i see that i am twirling inside the laughter and the listening and the light and the love and the heart that is open in the midst of it all.

yes, this is me.

(moving pictures) postcard from chicago (august 9, 2009)

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