Reconstruct This...

Here’s what really wags my tail: nice people. There is just nothing on this planet like being in the company of people who make it their business to make you feel good. Jena at Bullseye, Baby! is one of those people. Ms. Feral at Gone Feral is another. (Warning: If you like your language clean and your thoughts pure, don’t check out Gone Feral. Mom and Dad, that means you…) Jena and I connected a few months ago. When I found her blog in November/December, I knew I’d found a new landing pad. Jena’s blog visually reminds me of Apple’s packaging: the gorgeously minimal design, the simple instructions, the tightly constructed copy. Like Jena’s blog. I like everything she writes, but here's one that hit the mark: Letting Go of My Russian . Jena is smart, funny, wry, compassionate, genuine and creative. And check out her poetry. (Crimony! as my grandma used to say. It's that good.) I love reading Jena's posts. She’s one of my daily reads. So, I was beyond honored when she emai...

My answer to the burning house question: I would grab the kids’ art. And, maybe, a couple pair of really cute shoes. I’m not much of a collector. So I surprised myself when I bought my 2nd Lucy plate. And totally bowled myself over when I realized one day that I had seven Lucy plates. I hung them in a row above the big kitchen window. They’re not actually called Lucy plates; they’re the Julia series, more than 500 versions of the same woman painted by artist Piero Fornasetti and produced by German china-maker Rosenthal. I call them the Lucy plates, because the woman’s circular, blue eyes remind me of Lucille Ball. I took the Lucy plates down when I repainted the kitchen Adams Gold, and I let them collect dust on top of the fridge for a couple years after that. Ocho recently helped me put the plates back up. “What made you get these?” he asked me. “What do they mean to you?” I loved the question. I just love that kind of thing. I love it when someone says, “Tell me something about you ...

At least that's what Sherry at "Sage and Thyme" and "Journal of the Wandering Muse" thinks! Thank you for the "Roar for Powerful Words," Sherry! I am really honored to have gotten this from you! I'd like to pass it back to you, (especially for the recent True/False post) but I think that's against the "rules." So, I'm giving it to Jena, Hedge, Katie and Deena (Sherry already honored Bella, who's not only prolific but brilliant, and Jen at Jen's Musings has this one, too.) So, here's to Jena for writing so lucidly and artfully about life's clean and messy topics; Hedge for writing with intelligence, creativity and total fearlessness; Katie for her grace and humor; and Deena for her generosity and openness. All these women have the power! (I'll provide hyperlinks this weekend when I have a little more time.) I'd also like to mention Church, for our offline talks about life. She's the real deal. Hope you a...

My daughter Katie was reading the Roots: Part III post, when she said, “Isn’t this Ocho: Part VIII? How many posts are you going to write about him? And how come I’m not in your blog?” I hesitate to write about my kids here because it feels like an invasion of their pre-teen/teen privacy. But Katie not only has given me permission to write about her, she is bullying me into it. Actually standing here as I write… Here’s what I’d like to write about Katie: I named Kate after Katharine Hepburn. I had a gut feeling her personality would match, and that gut feeling was accurate. If you look Katharine Hepburn up on Wikipedia, the entry uses adjectives like outspoken, independent, adventurous to describe her. The word that comes to mind, for me, is audacious, defined on dictionary.com as: 1. extremely bold or daring; recklessly brave; fearless: an audacious explorer. 2. extremely original; without restriction to prior ideas; highly inventive: an audacious vision of the city's bright fut...