Winged Heels

Moved!

2007-03-05T09:31:00.001-08:00

New Blog!! www.wingedheels.com

Visit me? Love you!

Change comes anyway

2007-02-22T13:24:00.000-08:00

I have come to realize that I do not "do" change well. This realization is not a sudden, out-of-the-blue lightning bolt realization, but rather a puddle under the sweaty window kind of realization. And, I must say, it makes me uncomfortable to think of myself as settled. Or set in my ways. Or, I suppose, oldish.

They say with age comes wisdom (well, that is the hope) and so it is that I now know that change upsets my delicate equilibrium.

Little Changes =Big Anxieties: or why I haven't blogged a single mot in eons

I have long wanted to shift from Blogspot to Typepad. I was okay with that, excited even. But I made the mistake of asking an out of work web designer friend for his help. A month later, I sit at the pinnacle of the roller coaster at the ever so intricate and stomach churning ride of WordPress. Not the easy WordPress, the hard one. The elitest one. The one that scares the crap out me. (p.s. another thing I know - I know why my friend is out of work.)

Big Changes = Paralysis

Meeting with the school honchos to refine P's educational goals. I am up against a Dragon here folks. My hands are freezing but I am working on tongue twisters so that I can communicate with a semblance of grace tomorrow. Lately my tongue just lolls around in its closed little cave. Maybe I need to get out more.

Little Unasked for Good Changes = Surprise

I've been looking over my shoulder lately to see who is whispering gratitudes in my ear. Its funny, but unwarranted gratitudes have been springing from my heart like little spurts of blood from a disconnected IV. Little things like I'm grateful for my iPod. I'm grateful for the sunny day. I'm grateful that my legs work (well, that is a big thing.) I'm grateful for the beautiful yellow school bus that carries P across the neighborhood, her face in the window like the Lady of the Lake. I'm grateful that my Mother is still alive and that I can count on her always to be exactly who she is.

I am not trying to make these things pop into my head. The just do. I guess I should be grateful for that! :-)

Anyway, if you want to visit me in the precious place that has unbalanced me, I would be grateful.

www dot wingedheels dot com

I'll put the kettle on.

Divine Definitions

2007-02-01T10:34:00.000-08:00

Here are the treasures that I made for the Divine Definitions swap with the Creative Underground crew. My word was manumit which means to release or liberate, to set free. This swap was indeed divine and I will post some pics of the treasures I received soon.

I am in the process of switching my blog to Word Press. It is a huge learning curve for me, but luckily I have generously hearted techie monsters in my world. In the meantime, I don't know my code from a hole in the ground, so I can't even access my elderly web page...but I know that good things come to those who wait!

{xo} Love you-and keep on checking in!

Albert's floating again!

2007-01-25T09:45:00.000-08:00

Long ago, on the BART train, I heard an angel singing "Just put your feet down child!" It turned out to be nothing more than Kate Bush coming through my walkman, but those words have since run through my head every single day of my life. I am constantly in danger of floating off above the treeline, surveying life suspended upsidedown.

IF-80s

2007-01-16T12:18:00.000-08:00

The theme this week, while providing a great deal of reverie, didn't really kick my muse in the booty. So, I decided to borrow an idea from BZ's journal and post an image of a painting I made in the '80s! Thanks BeeZee!

This painting is oil on panel and was painted in art school where I was told after presenting this to look at a duck sometime. So I did. And I got wet, but I still paint ducks like this, when I do paint them, which is hardly ever.

The Tooth Fairy Cometh!

2007-01-16T11:08:00.000-08:00

The most magical Princess P proclaims: Behold, a looth tooth!

I told her all I wanted for Christmas was a loose tooth! And she gave it to me! Thank goodness the evil Dr. King will have to scrap his torture plans for this child! We are wildly dancing a pink swirly minuette!

Sunrise

2007-01-12T10:32:00.000-08:00

photo credit

If I could chose the life I please then I would be a boatman
the canals and the rivers free no hasty words are spoken
my only lure is the river breeze that takes me to the open seas
if I could chose the life I please then I would be a boatman.
-the Levellers

IF-Phoenix

2007-01-04T08:20:00.000-08:00

Phoenix of beautie, beauteous, Bird of any
To thee I do entitle all my labour,
More precious in mine eye by far then many
That feedst all earthly sences with thy savour:
Accept my home-writ praises of thy love,
And kind acceptance of thy Turtle-dove

Robert Chester, 1601

A cupful of changes

2007-01-03T11:59:00.001-08:00

This last year has left me depleted. With a houseful of company since March, and the very devestating event of becoming pregnant and losing the baby midway through the pregancy I am starting over empty this year.

I've decided that I need some changes to occur this year. I need to fill up with good things, enrichment.

How many? How much? As many as I can fit in this cup.

How about you? What are your intentions for the new year?

Happy Holidays

2006-12-23T18:23:00.000-08:00

Wishing you
peace & joy
now & always...

IF-Help

2006-12-15T14:22:00.001-08:00

For the burden of life
is love,
but we carry the weight
wearily,
and so must rest
in the arms of love
at last,
must rest in the arms
of love.

from Song, by Allen Ginsberg

Solstice Light

2006-12-11T08:46:00.000-08:00

Here are the pieces I made for the Solstice Dangly Swap hosted by the wonderful Melissa McCobb Hubbell.

What attracted me to this project was the theme of deep winter, with the blues and light catching sparkles that define the darkest days. Ice pink and blue, pure white laced with mercury silver and delicate creamy satin appease the wistful nature of my winter soul.

Solstice this year aligns with the new moon. I am looking forward to what will be the darkest of nights and the consequent miracle of the emergence of infant summer days.

S is for Secret

2006-12-02T09:56:00.000-08:00

This is the shrine I made for Sandra Muller for an Alphabetica Swap through Club Creative.

I am really into the image of the girls, who are my aunt and my mother. They seem to want to fly out into the world, so I am helping them do it!

My letter for the swap was S for Secret. On the key is a clue which leads to a secret package of heirloom morning glory seeds that I taped behind the girls.

I liked this project. It made me stretch a lot, and it was fun to send it on to Germany where these little girls father was born.

IF-Clear

2006-11-13T10:30:00.000-08:00

"Since we cannot change reality, let us change the eyes which see reality."
-Nikos Kazantakis

This is an older drawing I made for my beautiful friend Jamie, who always sends clear skies my way.

Pip Power!

2006-11-02T12:35:00.000-08:00

Boo!

2006-10-31T07:33:00.000-08:00

This Eve:
— marks the beginning of the season of going inward.
— veil between the living and the dead is very thin.
— John Edwards is very busy tonight.
— Celtic New Year
— Dia De Los Muertos
— My mother's birthday
— Sleeping Beauty wakes up

P is getting dressed in a Sleeping Beauty gown that her dad went all the way to Disney World to get. Since it is really cold, she will be doing it Minnesota Style: long underwear, fleece leggings and jacket, pink uggs and on top: The Gown. Her royal head will be swathed in a pink fleece hat with crown attached. And her frozen entourage will follow dreaming of Irish Coffee.

IF-Ghost

2006-10-21T09:37:00.000-07:00

It is under the small, dim, summer star.
I know not who these mute folk are
Who share the unlit place with me
Those stones out under the low-limbed tree
Doubtless bear names that the mosses mar.
They are tireless folk, but slow and sad,
Though two, close-keeping, are lass and lad,
With none among them that ever sings,
And yet, in view of how many things,
As sweet companions as might be had.
-Ghost House, by Robert Frost

House swap

2006-10-21T08:57:00.000-07:00

Some cards I made for a House swap with Club Creative. These are for Paula Scinto.

IF-Quiet

2006-10-03T08:31:00.000-07:00

Listen. Listen deeply.

Can you hear it?
Can you hear the silence?

Stillness.
Beauty in its entirety
It asks for nothing just
your undivided attention.

-ebele

new to me

2006-09-28T15:58:00.000-07:00

I've just finished some altered postcards for Art-e-Zine. I procrastinated like a toad on these... collage inundates me with too many choices...however, once I got into them I really got into them! I was pleased with the way they turned out!

-The girls are my mother and aunt.

IF-Phobia

2006-09-22T10:50:00.000-07:00

"Who is there?" he shouted, but the figure gave no answer, neither moving nor stirring. "Answer me or get out of here. You have no business here at night."

Brothers Grimm

IF-Change

2006-09-20T13:19:00.000-07:00

Blodeuwedd

Made of spring flowers
as if by magic,
Summer's golden Autumn hovers
and wisest owl watches over us.

Brave Cove

2006-09-08T11:39:00.000-07:00

Just returned from the beautiful North Shore of Lake Superior. This peaceful, sacred place nourishes my soul and shores my heart. I cherish the times when we are together, no phone, no TV, no computer. Just us and nature's beauty.

M & P tempting the waves.

M & P Beach Stroll

Me standing on the rocks at Brave Cove. I look so small!

IF-Match

2006-08-21T10:43:00.000-07:00

Every man who is acutely alive is acutely wrestling with his own soul.
-D.H. Lawrence

SS-Who else could I have been?

2006-08-10T15:53:00.000-07:00

When M and I lived on Crete we were part of a circle of friends with whom the "anarchist" priest, Papa Michalis sat at the Taverna. Papa paid for drinks. The men got wine. The women got coca cola. I wished I was a man on the nights that he joined us.

One night Papa asked us if we had children. We said no. This is out of the question for the Greeks. He said "why not?" Rather than explaining that we chose to wait, M replied: We cannot afford it.

The next thing we knew he was firing off orders in greek to Kostos. Kostos had that beautiful sheepish grin on his face as he related: Papa wants M come to his church tomorrow. He wants you become a priest. You can take over his church when he is gone so that you can give your woman a child."

M declined his proposition. And Papa shook his hand next to his ear. The subject was forever closed.

We often talk about, what we call, Our Decent Proposal. Especially in deep winter as we sit land locked, far from the blue sea that we so love.

More images of Papa's museum. I love the courtyard.

http://www.kreta-sun.de/umgebung/MuseumAsomatos/Museum-Asomatos.html

Love Heals

2006-08-07T20:22:00.000-07:00

My Yoga teacher and friend, Milissa,works weekly with P.

She is a great healer and P adores her. She calls her "My special friend."

Milissa is also an accomplished writer. She wrote a memoir of her time with P. It is the first time that I saw my daughter's illness and our journey through the eyes of another.

I am deeply honored that someone has taken the time to put forth in words what is too buried for me to address with that part of my brain.

Here is a painting for you sweet Milissa!

SF-Creative Roots

2006-08-04T23:11:00.000-07:00

Sam Tchakalian (1929-2004)

I've known for a long time now. Sam died. When I found out I wanted to call Paris and tell Dana. I wanted to find Gary and pull him out of his secret hiding place. I wanted to scream from the rooftops. But mostly I wanted to cry.

He was a major influence on many young artists. He badgered and pounded, he smiled and pouted. He got down on the mat and fought with people. He wasn't interested in style, or anything close to fashion. He only demanded one thing: Conviction. No one has come through Sam's teachings without that word ringing in their ears.

I was one of those lucky people. He encouraged me. He helped me believe in myself as an artist. I am forever in his debt.

IF-Capture

2006-08-04T18:41:00.000-07:00

The houses I had they took away from me. The times
happened to be unpropitious: war, destruction, exile;
sometimes the hunter hits the migratory birds,
sometimes he doesn’t hit them. Hunting
was good in my time, many felt the pellet;
the rest circle aimlessly or go mad in the shelters.

-George Seferis

Don't mess with my girl!

2006-08-03T14:28:00.000-07:00

Before the Flood

2006-08-01T14:22:00.000-07:00

A rainy day today.
Reminds me another rainy day,
far distant,
before the floods washed us away.

Synchronicity

2006-07-25T12:10:00.000-07:00

I've been contemplating happiness. It has been so elusive lately. In winter, I thought, it will come in the summer, flower along with the garden. Now it is summer and I wonder when it will bloom.

Then, quite unexpectedly, synchronicity:

I was organizing my files and came across this collage from a swap with Lisa Vollrath. And then it happened again. My Yoga Journal newsletter came. The lead article is titled: Why Wait For Happiness.

And I ask myself: who doesn't believe in divine intervention?

2006-07-17T21:54:00.000-07:00

Suddenly I knew that I didn't belong here!

IF-Sacrifice

2006-07-14T14:28:00.000-07:00

Weighted Wings

If you asked me fly with you,
strap wings of feathers and wax to my back
I would say yes.

If you asked me to fly higher and higher
until the sun burnt the flesh off my bones
until my very soul was reunited with the fire
I would say yes.

If you asked me to look at the full moon
and to think of you
to see your face so like that moon
and not to cry
I would say no.

If you asked me to float forever
never drown
I would say,
It's all the same to the buddha.

IF-Portrait

2006-06-07T07:22:00.000-07:00

Safe

Can I keep you forever
hold you up high
let you rest there
til the rivers run dry?

My father

2006-06-06T09:37:00.000-07:00

George Anastas
March 18, 1931 - June 6, 1983

We've been together before
In a different incarnation
And we loved each other then as well
And we sat down in contemplation
Many many many times you kissed my eyes
In Tir Na Nog.

- Van Morrison (No Method, No Guru)

Treasures

2006-05-22T09:12:00.000-07:00

IF-Angels & Demons

2006-05-18T07:08:00.000-07:00

When the poets dreamed of Angels
What did they see?

History lined up in a flash at their backs.

- David Sylvian

IF-Fat

2006-05-05T10:46:00.000-07:00

"Push the ball
Let it fall
Point to the wall
Walk tall"

-Bill Taylor, bowling scholar

One more day 'til 8!

2006-04-14T11:33:00.000-07:00

One more day until the Princess becomes an official "big girl"! Eight! It was only yesterday that she slept so soundly in her nest. Now she is having birthday parties with 40 kids singing and DQ ice-cream cake....the big world is more important now.

IF-Monster

2006-03-27T20:42:00.002-08:00

A man is strong, and strength makes him kind instead of tyrannical.
A man is courageous, not because he lacks fear but because he conquers fear.

-from Day of the Minotaur by Thomas Burnett Swann

IF-Insect

2006-03-07T09:10:00.000-08:00

I remembered one morning when I discovered a cocoon in the bark of a tree, just as the butterfly was making a hole in its case and preparing to come out. I waited a while, but it was too long appearing and I was impatient. I bent over it and breathed on it to warm it. I warmed it as quickly as I could and the miracle began to happen before my eyes, faster than life. The case opened, the butterfly started slowly crawling out, and I shall never forget my horror when I saw how its wings were folded back and crumpled; the wretched butterfly tried with its whole trembling body to unfold them. Bending over it, I tried to help it with my breath. In vain. It needed to be hatched out patiently and the unfolding of the wings needed to be a gradual process in the sun. Now it was too late. My breath had forced the butterfly to appear, all crumpled, before its time. It struggled desperately and, a few seconds later, died in the palm of my hand.

That little body is, I do believe, the greatest weight I have on my conscience. For I realize today that it is a mortal sin to violate the greatest laws of nature. We should not hurry, we should not be impatient, but we should confidently obey the eternal rhythm.

- Nikos Kazentzakis

IF-Tea

2006-02-27T19:29:00.000-08:00

The drifting petal came to ground.
The laughter chimed its perfect round.
The broken syllable was ended.
And I, so certain and so friended,
How could I cloud, or how distress,
The heaven of your unconsciousness?

from Dining-Room Tea by Rupert Brooke

IF-Song

2006-02-20T09:33:00.000-08:00

And I made a rural pen,
And I stained the water clear,
And I wrote my happy songs
Every child may joy to hear.

Song of Innocence - William Blake

Passing

2006-02-17T12:49:00.000-08:00

And now lightly to kiss all whom sleep
Stitched up - and wake, my darling, wake.
The impatient Boatman has been waiting
Under the house, his long oars folded up
Like wings in waiting on the darkling lake.

- From "An Unimportant Morning" by Lawrence Durrell

Sister Moon

2006-02-16T08:00:00.000-08:00

Late winter is a great teacher.
It implores us to surrender.
To love the moon so close,
to have faith in the setting sun,
and to see the beauty in everything.

Awaken Dreamers

2006-02-02T07:28:00.000-08:00

The ice is melting, fast drops drumming on the eaves.
Awaken Dreamers!
The Greening not far distant.

IF-Glamour

2006-01-31T14:30:00.000-08:00

ISP is down!

2006-01-15T08:15:00.000-08:00

Dear Ones:

My ISP has disappeared off the face of cyberspace, taking all my images with it! Virtually, I do not exist--nor do the pictures on this blog.

So, if you've ever wondered what it feels like to be a ghost...ask me. I know.

Please visit me later?

IF-The Sea

2006-01-11T14:37:00.000-08:00

Upside Down World

2006-01-06T16:45:00.000-08:00

It rained here two nights ago.

Like so many marbles, shiny round glittering balls bouncing off the roof.
Testimony to the strangeness of these days.

Whatcha Readin'? (let's play tag!)

2006-01-06T16:19:00.000-08:00

Charlotte's Web, by E.B. White

(Isn't this secretly part of why we have children? Rereading our favorite books :-)

At the moment The Oldest Sheep is making Templeton an offer he can't refuse.....)

Movement

2005-12-27T09:59:00.000-08:00

We are diamonds floating
diving? flying?
Is there any difference?
Movement is what matters.

Trusting

2005-12-24T00:13:00.000-08:00

Time. Hundreds. Sailors at the windows. But my hand letting go. Letting go. What do you feel?

Inside Out

2005-12-15T10:00:00.000-08:00

The whole world is white and cold. I am inside looking in.
The view is magical, like a candle in an egg shell.

Holding Fast

2005-12-03T11:37:00.000-08:00

Watching the snow fall. A gentle blanket protecting those who sleep.

In deep silence, so essential, the light continues to recede.
All things growing increasingly dormant.

Home to the inner stillness to gather strength for the returning.

Above and Below

2005-12-01T12:48:00.000-08:00

It has been snowing here too. Downy covering on the dirty rooftops. Stark contrast to the bony trees and flying ravens.

All That Matters

2005-11-14T10:48:00.000-08:00

She and me and he and they and the big tattered Universe.

How many days until 8?

2005-09-27T15:17:00.000-07:00

I have just come upon this beautiful little piece of code. The fairy will move closer to the birthday cake everyday until P's birthday!! All by itself!

Beautiful, eh?

My Man

2005-09-22T07:21:00.000-07:00

Makes me laugh out loud.

We are floating around on an endless sea of rolling waves. First I fall in. He pulls me back up with some unpredictable antic. Then he falls in and we laugh him back onto the raft.

Egbert always laughs--so she never falls in--except when she hears the opening chord of "I Love You." Then she is the moon crying.

And I fall in again...

Passing time

2005-09-14T08:22:00.000-07:00

Early Autumn. This is the time of ossification.

I am constantly amazed by the passage of time. All of the cycles and cycles within cycles. How equally significant they are--the microcosm and the macrocosm. How each cell's dying and rebirth heralds an entirely new being every single moment now and forever.

Even that which has seemingly ossified is transient.

If something makes me suffer

2005-02-24T10:03:00.000-08:00

Friends,

I have deleted this post, because, I have decided to devote this blog to the positive aspects of life, and because, politics make me suffer, so I shall avoid them! :)

Also, because I am allowing Wingedheels her fledgling flight--back into the world. As you know my world collapsed with my daughter Phoebe's illness. And, far from collapsing with that world, my little family pushed through, and we are seeing the other side again.

Phoebe is climbing slowly out of her imprisoning shell. She said Mom 3 days ago! I almost kissed her to death! She liked the kissing torture, so she has been coming up to me, grabbing my face in her hands, looking me in the eye (which itself is amazing) and saying: "MOM". Which is really just WOW upside down. :)

As a result of this improvement, and to regain my sanity, I am making art again. By hand, the old fashioned way. Funny how that works. I was a professional artist, who wrote for soul satisfaction. Now I am writing for cash and I am back to loving making art! Who knew? The old Henry Miller paradigm.

I love you all for hanging in there with us. And I hope my new friends will enjoy what they encounter here, and in everything they endeavor.

Thanks for visiting.
A

My first time

2005-01-20T19:11:00.000-08:00

Prelude

Been blogging ever since I became Mac literate in 1992. Of course, there was no "real" such thing as a blog back then. It was more of a daily electronic journal that could only be seen by the intrepid ones who A: inadvertently found you, and B: then had the fortitude to actually read what you wrote.

My interest in it began with my rather clandestine discovery of the discarded e-log of a certain grad student (we shall call her Ms. H) at the "all that" art school in SoCal, where I worked and studied. She had just returned from Switzerland, from the Biennale. She had a taken a lover, who was an aging curator at a huge international museum...he was married, of course.

Anyway, it made for fascinating reading, and, more pertinently, it sparked an interest in my keeping a "log" of my doings, and beings. Of course, I feared that my existence paled in comparison to the glittering emptiness featured in Ms. H's recounts. (An empty fear in retrospect.)

Oeuvre

So today, I received an email from my longtime friend, Mitchell. He is going to see Nina Hagen tonight at the DNA Lounge. WTF! Didn't we see her together in 1985 at the DNA Lounge? The night my eardrums burst? No, he is certain that my eardrums burst in his little atomic Volvo 2 seater on the way over the bridge to Art School #1.

At art school #1, I actually gained such arcane knowledge as: how to make my own stretcher bars using a miter box, a hammer and nails; How to set-type using little metal letters; how not to put my fingers in my eyes while making an aquatint (self explanatory after seeing the little drinking fountain with two half-eggshell things in which to put your eyeballs if you were stupid, or careless, or both!) I also learned that I wanted a more down and dirty art experience so I transferred to Art School #2.

Art School#2-the sun in the NoCal art solar system. A legend in its own mind kind of place. Despite their best efforts, I learned to paint there. And I learned that words had no place in art (which I have since unlearned) and I learned what a broken heart felt like, and it felt like I wanted to leave California forever and move to France with my beautiful friends Dana & Daniel.

I graduated. And I went to Paris. And I had an affair with a Belgian posing as a Frenchman-and just when things were humming-the heartbreaker's radar kicked in and he showed up on the Belgian's doormat--looking like 10 miles of bad road. He had hitchhiked from Denmark, where he had been shacking up with his teenaged Nordic girlfriend and a crew of gnarled Icelandic buskers. He had hitchhiked to Paris in November! Have you ever been in Northern Europe in November? Have you ever slept in a German Truck stop bathroom stall in November (well, I guess any month is a bad month in a German Truck stop bathroom)? It's like those dogs who get lost while on family vacation and figure out how to get home! What can you say to that? I said, come in.

And he did. And he started to serenade me. He serenaded me in the pouring rain outside the Japanese noodle place. He serenaded me on bridges, in alleys, in the metro, on the train to Lisbon, in Lisbon, back from Lisbon—until finally an old dame threw a rotten apple at him and we returned to Cali.

Which brings us back to the beginning, to Art School#3, where I learned that Painting was dead; and a gallery full of cultivated mold could secure you a coveted place in a gallery's "stable" and that the Art World was so odious that I didn't want to make Art ever again. And I almost didn't.

Oh, yes, and I learned to blog.

Finis