listening in

now i am falling behind to listen more closely. to give myself a little bit more time to catch up and gain lost momentum. i started painting again, every night since the new year began. the brush caught up with a little hint of transparent yellow{christmas gift via matt}, the excuse is a cover-up.

i will ready myself, to tarnish my own name for the sake of my friends, throw the first wave of attack and bank myself on the shore of fantastic {may i be bold and say superior} art making-anti gallery-anit fest participating in chattanooga. there should be a call for boycott, a call to the fringe, a better competent exclaimation of why and how. you may ask, where is my respect? my sincerity? awh but it is a blur. there are no official rejections!!! there are holy causes, mysteries pursuits, talent beyond reason, let your hearts not be broken let them rise up and rejoice! for we are, united we stand rejected. it is not all asham but a creepy pasture of questions that shouldn't be asked until you aren't painting anymore. yes and more yes. there is room enough for us all to grow and learn and i don't doubt the meaning of it all, but i for one will not stand to let my friends be discouraged in a city where there isn't any urban, "where's the graffiti?", and no sight of pushing the envelope and the lack of respect for collage as fine art. the end. the answer is in us not in the monopoly, the who's who in art in chattanooga. my goodness she's gotten funding:winner! doesn't that count for something? in my book it does so very much.

i will stop. besides kate and jen are probably already sick of my rantings...

bsides: i finished my first book of the year. even though i started it in 2006, i'm going to count it and eventually put it up on my sidebar, so that i might be reminded of my reading accomplishments and commitment to more. now it's on to this one> book number two for 2007. here i come.

i didn't break down and have a cigarette until 5pm yesterday.

fight to hold

while the intensity of revival, blossom, rebirth and red are on the tip of my tongue. i'd bargain a chance meeting with rest, comfort, thankfulness and peace. the little greenthumb i have has never cared for an orchid before. it is indeed a new subject line inwhich to write. an out of focus rehearsal of capture the flag of fight. fight for holding on to the spirit. fight for growth. fight for the lights attention, for dry winter warmth. to live with ambition and rest contented with the fight. as the very new year with very new days approach i think i've got to raise the white flag and surrender to resolution. there is a common bitter feeling making it's presense known and the eager wishes to succeed. a few things to work toward, goals to score, maps to quest, and trips to travel.

i will fail to mention: i must quit. smoking. when is it my time? does it have to be january? i will be losing. twenty. i will have digital images of all my works on slides made. i will have books made to sell and buttons too. i will have a laptop by the summer of 2007:before the a annual uoha beachtrip. i will help my friends get jobs, move, and celebrate. i will spend more time with my mom, i will read more and review more and share more. i will paint more and sew more paint chips together...there will be more correspondence, more diligent work and more meaningful vacation. there will be new nephews=a total of three! there will be more love and more endurance. and i will ask for help. i will need your help to fight.

the very best candle from thymes. and life as experimentation. i was at my friends house the night before last watching blue planet. i couldn't help but think how huge our world is and how we are so blessed to be surrounded by the smallest bits of beauty. my mother and i concluded that if we happened to be exposed to too much beauty, we'd die. i think it hurts sometimes...so beautiful it hurts. isn't that what two thousand seven should be about?

presently reading: sheldon vanauken's little lost marion.

over and out

christmas happened so quickly, in a blink, over and done with, 50% off sales, and the onslaught of valentine's day. i am still savoring the quiet moments, alone in my apartment, watching the snowy drizzle fall, gazing upon all of the perfect little gifts, my dear sweet family and friends thought to give me.

one pleasantry has been my introduction to the decemberists via kate, 'my crane wife' has been the perfect addition to my holiday music soundtrack. along with gnarls barkley and sufjan stevens, seems a fair variety. i have received some of the most lovely birthday and christmas cards ever, they seem to still be trickling in, along with another beautiful ornament. i think i'm still waiting to get another one or two more ornaments and a couple christmas postcards too. it is completely alright. i have plenty of other things to focus on now.

i never have gotten around to making granola! i never put my christmas tree up and i never decorated. i have the first two days of the new year off. i should pull my easel out and start painting again...nothing is holding me back now. i also should write my thank-yous and research the printing and button making companies...there's a host of things i ought to do.

several months ago hannah sent me this beautiful paper and i finally put it to good use. i thought kate would appreciate the non traditional wrap. she's also so good at recycling the tidbits leftover. i also wanted to make a note of whipup. i noticed this post on paint chips and so wish people knew how easy and wonderful these little colorful pieces are to work with, create, recycle and most of all inexpensively share beauty. after all there is recycled air.

munch-kins

i finally got around to making these little guys, my favorite christmas cookies of all time. they've only been apart of my little tradition for a couple of years, not many of them were eaten this year. wonder why? noticed a plate of them at the wards/knutson family home on christmas eve. not too sweet and just enough spicey, yummy crunch, sort of like a spice shortbread.

i have had an incredible holiday, i'm not ready for it to be over quite yet only having to come back to work makes it all vanish so quickly. i have received an enormous amount of love over the last few days, i'd so like to feel that all year long. more so i'd like to carry out and boldly have the christmas spirit all year long, the giving patient spirit. i'll probably take more break time. i have load the majority of my fav christmas photos though.

woodland whispers

only one more day of this medical and pharmacy business and i'm off to celebrate with family and friends, good eats, good times, listening, talking, wishing really really hard for snow, tasting the greatest joy, giving until my pocketbook hurts. or my fingertips become raw from wrapping. this year is closing up so quickly, i think eventually i will get around to a recap of the greatest moments of my life this year. i have never actually listed these sorts of things out before, i'm thinking many of you reading may not want to pack and take a two year trip through my archives. so it might be a funny journey. i don't feel older, hesitantly younger with more energy and insight screw the physical signs of maturation, wrinkles are for elephants.

i am so lucky, in the last couple of days i've gotten some really unexpected emails from my grandparents and my aunt and an old friend. so special, so very interesting here at the end of my year. are you listening? i so love martha stewart's woodland specs this year. couldn't ignore or resist the temptation at the old kmart at the foot of the mountain.

um...i must say. infradig's clinical indifference rocks! so very clean. so nice to hear this band push the envelope and surrender some of it's "jam band" qualities. i appreciate the precision and knock on wood quaility, magic or superstition, i'm not so sure which but it's barely important. the album is split both in it's willing able body participants but also in it's music-al divisions i'm still hearing some of the old echoed sounds but with new rhythms-beats as in slick flashy breaks. and what about those keys. i'm glad to hear a stable melody in lower tones, maybe that was the electric guitar from before that made it sound a little twangy. i don't mind that they've been influenced i feel like we who love(d) radiohead, aphex twin, squarepusher and others were all influenced as if on a musical high. the sounds are fairly original and gosh so far better than what you'd hear if you were listening to 98.1 or 91.5 the WAWL! thanks guys for working so hard on this album, i for one appreciate seeing that production is still apart of your thoughts and goals, also very nice to see my brother's name in there. hi-five!!! chris a. did a phenom job on the art direction, geez! people should be knocking your doors down!

i'm outta here.