63: Comfort & delight

This week, I'm reveling in anything that feels like cozy magic.

I'm slurping it up, like thick soup and hot, milky espresso concoctions.

I did this as a child, too. In middle school, I developed a now-embarrassing obsession with the cottage paintings of Thomas Kinkade, who calls himself "the painter of light" (complete with trademark!). I even asked for and received a book of his work for my twelfth birthday. It wasn't that I admired his technique; the artistry didn't interest me in the slightest. It was the cozy factor I was after. The glowy-er the windows of the cottage, the bumpier the cobblestone path to the front door, the drippier the wisteria off the eaves, the more enchanted I was with the image. I examined that book for hours, imagining the residents of those homes and wanting desperately to be one, myself. As a young writer, I relied on many of the paintings to be the settings for my short stories. That world was the one I wanted to inhabit, and if I couldn't be there in reality, I'd get there in fiction.

View fullsize

Here in San Antonio, it still feels like late-summer. Clouds of frizz form along my hairline upon waking, and I've found myself fantasizing about pixie-ing once again. (Did I ever tell you I finally pixie'd back in July? It became essential when we found ourselves back in Oklahoma City in the middle of summer.) I even had to fish some proper summer-wear out of the trunk of the Corolla; merino wool and moto boots are out of place here, not to mention uncomfortable.

Seasons might be differentiated technically by changes in daylight, weather, and natural ecology, but make no mistake, they're also marked by changes in spirit, creative rhythms, practice, and inspiration. Last week, I felt clueless about my season, still do a bit; my present geographical one feels somehow slow to catch up, and my spiritual season seems to be several months ahead—dead or, more likely, dormant; torpid beyond all recognition; impatient for new growth. I'm uncomfortable on all fronts.

Kortney, kindred that she is, sent me this line from T.S. Eliot's Ash Wednesday: "This is the time of tension between dying and birth." I keep thinking of the phoenix and wondering what happens between combustion and resurrection, how possibility exists in those ashes. I'm still considering the science of prescribed burns, the fact of shifting cultivation ("The period of cultivation is usually terminated when the soil shows signs of exhaustion or, more commonly, when the field is overrun by weeds"). On Instagram, I see leaves changing all over the northern hemisphere. (None here yet.) Lighting up in hues that seem almost unreal, a final hurrah, before dropping. Tomorrow, in the U.S., one kind of season will end as another begins.

View fullsize

I'm trying not to get ahead of myself, ahead of what's Right Now in my (humid) little world. But, sure as the stars, it's definitely November, so I'm allowing myself to lean in to the November vibration I believe to be true—the one I want to be inhabiting right now—and finding (or creating) comfort there. Making lots of hot tea, rejoicing in morning fog and afternoon drizzling, snuggling sachets between my clothing in hotel dresser drawers.

Where are my eyes resting these days, if not at Thomas Kinkade paintings? A few different places. These ones spring to mind first:

+ @brysonmays (especially loving her tag #celebratingdailiness)
+ @remedialeating
+ @jeaninestewart
+ @saspetherick
+ @erhondeau
+ @onedeepdrawer
+ @girlpolish

Do you seek out cozy magic, too? What are your standbys?

With love,
Helen xx

---

Fieldnotes

Bonne Maman strawberry preserves and the gorgeous glass and red gingham lid that's left over, an electric kettle, a milky white ceramic coffee cup, lined up clementines, a fancy dinner out, the taste of honey and gin and thyme, honest-to-goodness World Series excitement (despite never really caring much for sports before), edited photos and built albums, free sourdough, read Abigail Thomas, the end of Daylight Saving Time, moved hotels, a room with a view, walked along the river, explored the Alamo, remembered Madeleine Peyroux Radio and Gregorian Chant Radio on Pandora, ate a fish taco at Torchy's Tacos, sipped a Mexican vanilla latte from Local Coffee, wandered a farmers market, watched fog, a Monday morning together, a new round bar of Sappo Hill almond soap (I smell like marzipan and I love it), turned on all the lamps to make the room feel like home

---

Links

A phrase I'd like to embody: generous listening

"Life and writing are both deeply messy, and there is comfort in this parallel."

One of my former writing professors has, with her husband, created a movement: Dedicate Your No-Trump Vote. It's too good, too important, not to mention here.

This tiny tortured artist

Finding solace in others' shakiness of late: "It's OK that you don't know if the fire is on the inside, or the outside, or if it's all the same thing."

An alphabet for the nose

---

Curios

View fullsize

At the Alamo this weekend, an item that intrigued me was this flag illustration of Lady Liberty; another, a phrase on a plaque: "This victory in defeat was the means of uniting [...] in a determined effort to resist [...]." The concept of defeat serving a greater purpose fascinates me.

62: What is

Greetings from San Antonio.

We spent the better part of the last week slowly working our way down to south-central Texas for Dana's next work assignment—and now that we're here, it's both a relief and an adjustment to be settled in one place for the foreseeable future (well, at least until Thanksgiving).

A relief because, no matter how many awesome podcasts you've queued up, sitting in the car for hours on end gets old fast. Leg cramps, gas station bathrooms, the sun always managing to shine at an angle that renders the visor absolutely useless. An adjustment because a body in motion stays in motion. Or wants to stay in motion. When you're used to relocating every few days, suddenly not relocating every few days can feel a bit like...being in a rut.

It's interesting how our brains can tell us one thing about a situation while the reality is often something very different.

As Byron Katie writes, "The only time we suffer is when we believe a thought that argues with what is." And: "I am a lover of what is, not because I'm a spiritual person, but because it hurts when I ignore reality."

View fullsize

What is.

Last week's newsletter took ages to write. Today's, too. Generally speaking, I've been feeling dissatisfied lately with my ability to translate my thoughts into words. I'm not sure what's going on or what any of it means or doesn't mean, but what I'm certain of is this: I've fallen into the habit of believing that transition pretty much never feels good. And I'm not the only one: I don't know anyone who's ever described a liminal phase of her life in pleasurable terms. Obviously it's not impossible to enjoy change; it seems, though, that the act of transforming, of making any significant change or reaching for any kind of growth, is so exhausting and uncertain, demanding on a level like none other, oftentimes absolutely frightening and loaded with foreign feelings...that we're focused on getting through it, on enduring the yuck feelings for as long as we have to and not a second more. There's zero inclination to make something pleasant when you're hyper-focused on your experience of discomfort.

If I stay focused on what is, though, what I find is a simple reality—one that doesn't need me to make meaning out of it, one that's sufficient just as it is, one that actually isn't unpleasant.

W H A T  I S :

+ It's Monday;
+ I've a standing commitment to report my weekly findings.
+ Lately, writing is difficult for me.

What's the thought you're believing that's causing you to suffer in some way? Hit 'reply' and share it with me.

With love,
Helen xx

---

Fieldnotes

Ate: sandwiches & espresso at River's End Cafe

Experienced: Horseshoe Bend

States traversed: Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas

---

Links

Noticing what is: leaves

Margarita Tartakovsky, MS, interviewed me for two Psych Central pieces about self-narratives (a topic that lights me up):

“Sometimes, we’re just one small reframing away from an entirely different, entirely expansive story."

“You can’t change the past, but you can change the story you tell yourself about it, the way you talk about it to others, and how it serves you."

---

Curios

View fullsize

We spotted Twin Arrows while driving on the interstate through AZ. The next (ghost) town over is Two Guns and has a pretty grim history. We didn't stop to explore either, as we hadn't a clue about what we were passing when we were passing it. Now, of course, I'm curious.

61: Experimenting

My hands-down favorite reframing exercise is the one where I call whatever I'm attempting an experiment.

What a small, easy shift!—to give a name to some new effort I'm undertaking—and yet, it's really an enormous gift to myself: In one word, I grant myself room and time and patience to stay oriented around process, around learning, around data collection. Not around results, outcomes, successes or failures.

Experiments are easy. Fun. Low-risk. (No-risk?) Curious. They can't go wrong; there is no wrong. It's all information, every last bit.

View fullsize

An experiment is a marvelous way to fake out the ego; generally speaking, the ego wants an arena where it believes skill and ability are the be all, end all (and neither matters very much in a bonafide experiment), and it wants to show off and impress and hinge our self-worth to flimsy things like praise and perfection. The ego gets bored with inquisitiveness and relentless seeking, which means either is an ideal gateway for beginning anything.

View fullsize

In preparation for my next experiment, I'm trying to surround myself (online) with creatives who are particularly generous in sharing their processes—as a way of reinforcing the concept, but also because I'm always fascinated by practice, by the deliberate recording and fleshing out of half-formed ideas, by the frustrations and the course corrections and the pleasant surprises. The outlines, the sketches, the beginnings of collections, the collecting of thoughts—all of that is so much more interesting to me than any finished product. I want to be let in on the evolution. I want to know the story; even better if I was permitted to witness its unfolding.

One of the wonderful things about running an experiment publicly is how it opens up the experience, the process of learning and discovery, for others. It makes the thing transparent. And, perhaps not surprisingly, that transparency adds dimension.

View fullsize

I'm sensing a new creative undertaking on my horizon and I have no real idea what it is or how to approach it—except to call it an experiment and to find a way to share with you whatever it is I'm learning about it along the way.

(Wildly enough, this is exactly how I began Weekly Findings last year.)

I wonder about your current thing—if you know what it is, if you're willing to reframe it as an experiment, and how differently it looks when you think about it as a transparent process.

With love,
Helen xx

---

Fieldnotes

Ate: vegetarian tostada at Cafe Rio; taco salad & horchata at El Coyote Charro

Experienced: Bryce Canyon National Park, Zion National Park

States traversed: more Utah

Visited: Nick, who's doing a national park circuit of his own

---

Links

How Ann Wood experiments: "I have to trick myself into starting a new shape—I love the process when I’m in it but there is always anticipatory anxiety—it’s knowing I have a series of failures ahead of me. I don’t mind them as they happen—it feels like process, progress and discovery, I get immersed in it. But still, even though I know that—starting—taking the very first step—is always hard, even for stuff I’m pretty excited about."

---

Curios

View fullsize

As we returned from Riverside Walk in Zion, we spotted this shallow pool alongside the paved trail. Tiny springs pushed crisp water up through the ground, where it bubbled and created these cloudy sand flurries that I could've watched for hours. I pressed my finger into one.

60: The accidental artist

I'm feeling very thoughtful today.

Kind of quiet. Like I'd rather take it all in than output anything. But it's my sharing day, so I'll share this deceptively small piece of personal news: I made something beautiful, by accident. And I'll share last week's finding, which is embedded in it: Such a thing is possible.

Of all the gorgeous things I saw (four national parks in three days!) and tried to capture with my camera, the images I love most are the ones I shot from the passenger seat of our car as Dana drove.

View fullsize

They're mostly blurry, but they have these bizarre bands of sharp focus that run through them. If you have a minute and you're curious, click on each one and you'll see just what I mean.

At first glance, I thought they were all garbage.

But then, right before deleting them, those crystal-clear bits caught my eye. Oh, I thought. My camera did focus. Just not the way I'd planned.

View fullsize

I'm a prolific photographer—I snap away now, assess and edit later. For whatever reason, it's one of the few areas that's left untouched by the ravages of my perfectionism. I don't seem to judge my efforts and I never take the results to mean anything about my ability, or, heaven forbid, my worth as a human being.

I play. And, in playing, I create with wild abandon.

(To give you an idea of what I mean by 'wild abandon': We have wifi for the first time in three days; this morning, nearly seven hundred pictures were waiting to be backed up to Google Photos.)

View fullsize

Not only aren't these shots garbage, they're flat-out stunning to me. They preserve a feeling instead of a scene, and I wouldn't have been able to execute such an effect more perfectly if I'd tried.

I don't believe I've ever taken a picture and had the distinct impression that the image is breathing. That the clouds might still be moving. That I can hear wind through the leaves.

These photos are alive in a way that's new to me. I wasn't expecting this.

View fullsize

So, now: I'm back to thinking about the rewards of being prolific. I'm wondering where else I need to play, to create with wild abandon. I'm wanting to investigate those areas that are stifled by my perfectionism, and I'm wanting to find a way to trick myself into treating them like my photography.

It would seem a special kind of alchemy lurks in that sweet spot where quality control gives way to generative freedom.

View fullsize

What about you? Where would you like to create rapidly and ease-fully, as a result of play? Hit 'reply' and share.

With love,
Helen xx

---

Fieldnotes

Ate: Vegan Indian curry & bread pudding at Twisted Sistas' Cafe; fish tacos & a margarita at Miguel's Baja Grill

Experienced: Mesa Verde National Park, Arches National Park, Canyonlands National Park, and Capitol Reef National Park

States traversed: Colorado and Utah

---

Links

Easily accessible, always surprising

Noticing things: Lynda Barry at NASA

"But rarely does a day go by when my son doesn’t make something. I envy his setup and his habits. His mom has placed all the supplies within easy reach. He doesn’t torture himself. The goal is simple: There is a car-carrier truck that doesn’t exist that needs to exist. He sets to work with clear purpose and utter concentration. There is frustration, occasionally, but it usually passes. And when he’s done, he’s done, and it’s off to something else."

---

Curios

View fullsize

At Arches National Park, both Dana and I recognized the arch on the right as being the hand gesture for A-okay. 👌🏻 See it? 👌🏻 Not unlike cloud-watching, a visit to Arches means spotting red rock formations that resemble all manner of things. Prime exercise for the imagination.

59: Time-bending

Sand dunes are a study in synergy.

The big ones here in Colorado are moveable mountains. They're changing with every breeze; gusts reconfigure them in seconds, as do tromping feet.

By their very design, it would seem sand dunes want to be in motion. Sliding, shifting, molding, eroding. Every moment, they're creating something.

When you arrive at the base, an empty creek bed in October, you spot dark specks on peaks—some moving, some absolutely still, some decidedly four-legged—and you begin to understand that, somehow, in climbing this breathing thing, you will become a grain of sand, a modicum of existence, a crumb in comparison to the whole. But also: kinetic participant. Sculptor.

View fullsize

Walking in sand is challenging. Climbing hills of the stuff, even more so.

Frequent stops are key: to regain breath, to sip water, to dump sand from shoes, to admire a vista that looks different with every bit of height gained, to strategize and restrategize the best route to the top.

View fullsize

Some folks don't want to climb to the top. Or it's not their end goal. Young families carry rented sleds on their backs and scale the first few dunes, oftentimes breaking off from a trail of footprints that turn into dimples before being buffed out completely by the wind.

You picture computations like ticker tape behind everyone's eyes, even the littlest kids'—probably theirs especially—all trying to work out which dunes are steep enough to thrill, but not so steep that they can't be mounted a second and third time for more sledding.

View fullsize

You're not computing much of anything. Not really. Just climbing, looking back to see how small the parking lot has become, and climbing some more.

You climb far enough and reach dunes where there are fewer people, and it occurs to you that up here, probably no one's computing. The energy here is here. People are here. You get the sense that it isn't possible to think about a whole lot here but here.

View fullsize

My friend Molly says, "True presence is a time-bender," and I'd add to that: True presence and obscene quantities of sand are time-benders. Like cracking the hourglass open, spilling out its contents, and deciding to co-create with time, not to rail against it in its various forms—the clock, the encroaching night, the spinning calendar.

So, I'm slowing down on purpose.

My breath, my conversations, my next steps.

You see, there's absolutely enough sand. No shortage. Scarcity is a perspective, and from where I stood yesterday on the highest sand dune in North America, it isn't the only one. There are infinite perspectives, all of them changing with every breeze, each of them a moment's creation.

View fullsize

By the time you reach it, the next dune will have already changed; your reaching it will change it further.

Slow down.

You aren't running out of time. You're just running.

And running in sand sort of misses the point, doesn't it?

View fullsize

With love,
Helen xx

---

Fieldnotes

Experienced: Cadillac Ranch and Great Sand Dunes National Park & Preserve

States traversed: Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and Colorado

---

Links

This is the definition of happy as exhibited by a jubilant man in a wheelchair.

There's solace in picking up a receiver and talking to a dead loved one, even if you know that 'wind phone' isn't connected to anything at all. (Caution: Listening to this This American Life episode might make you cry.)

"The effect of this basic awareness is profound. What a gift it is to simply recognize our favorite kinds of indignation, even if that doesn’t give us the power to stop them from welling up. Our reactivity can only reach mood-ruining levels when we’re unaware we’re being reactive. That simple knowing—I tend to get uptight right about here—shifts the focus to your own contribution to the problem, allowing you to recognize that the outside world might not be entirely responsible for the dark turn in your current experience, removing the sense of powerlessness from it."

If you enjoy cultural oddities and curiosities, you might really like Messy Nessy Chic's weekly newsletter (shoot, you'd probably love her whole website).

---

Curios

View fullsize

We passed this perfectly ramshackle service station sometime after Amarillo, TX, and I made Dana turn the car around so I could get some pictures. The little bit of research I did uncovered this, an artist who "paints photorealistic images of small-town America," and happened to have found beauty in the exact same place as I. How cool.