we returned to san diego a week ago; feeling a certain kind of displacement i began sifting through my treasure chest of stratagems and wondering at the complexty of that word: home. our trip east was full. the fiber crafts studio is an amazing place, and wandering the campus was akin to strolling through memory; heavy air, crossing streams, the grassy weed with tiny ball-like pink blossoms were all familiar, almost forgotten hallmarks of my childhood which punctuated my days in chestnut ridge. i will share snapshots soon. the children started in their new school yesterday(i was relieved to find... Continue reading

folks have wondered at my decision to pack up kids and set off on the open road without a copilot. it is difficult to describe the peace experienced as miles drift past, gathering themselves up in the rearview mirror, how waking in a new place to a new life each morning refines the soul like nothing else. i suppose it is that a traveler has always been in me. unargueable is the magesty which anointed us along our journey: and this, the finale sunset as we rolled back into san diego... Continue reading

we are taking a respite between the busy-ness of our trip east and the busy-ness of our trip back west. it's been an amazing adventure and i, or we, are stopping once again at aunt cookie's to re-member. i don't yet know what details i'll share of the journey; it's been a long one and some real soul-work was begun. i will say that my car ate a good portion of our budget and one of my teeth lost a valiant battle with a raw food energy bar. those were the easy parts. i did promise to keep folks abreast,... Continue reading

in addition to pedagogy/anthroposophy lectures, spacial dynamics, singing(yes!), and of course handwork, we have been studying the soul of color. blue came knocking on tuesday, but really sat down with me for a visit yesterday. goodmorning blue, sit down. Continue reading

we are the diné, my child with the Earth we live with the Sky we live with the plants we live we know their ways. heed well the plants, my child.l learn the ways of each, my child. some you must ask for gently, pick the tips heat them softly and, they give. some you must demand of strongly dig through the rock pound hard the roots you will tire and, they will give. give to each as it requires it will give to you, my child, it will give to you. we are the diné, with the Earth we... Continue reading

houston. right. we found a sweet spot for a quick bite on our way out of town... then headed on to my favorite state. ahhh. or rather, aaaaiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! me gotta go, pole the pirogue down the bayou...(that was for you, ursie!) i'll tell you what; some bon temps rolled! we were headed straight for new orleans but the kids felt restless after 4 days of driving. i sent a text to ursula and mama maggie for a lafayette lunch recommendation. maggie put 2 and 2 together and suddenly our dear friend william is calling me. it's been 10 years and... Continue reading

austin and houston didn't really take hold of us. there were several missed connections in austin. an old flame, a few old friends. we even arrived for a swim at barton springs and he pool was closed for maintenance. downtown houston looks like a movie set... a movie set made of legos. the kids put out their clothes out for the next leg. next stop: nola. Continue reading

it was more than i could have ever imagined... a much needed receding from stimuli. i anticipated a bit more in-your-face approach to the art, the design. there was a touch of that, but not much. perhaps it helped that marfa is pretty much closed on wednesday. perhaps tomorrow it will be a zoo. but not today. today was spare. today was space in between breaths. there was no sense of where we were headed next or what needs to be dealt with before september. it was simply now. rainy, quiet, now. it was, perhaps, the first time in many... Continue reading

there are many more miles to go. we woke yesterday on the edge of town (in what nai called an unfriendly motel room) with the intention of jumping in the car and driving straight to cookie's. after a mile or two we found ourselves in tucson proper, and it was unexpectedly cute. despite the 111 degrees claimed by the thermometer, we wandered a bit before driving on. normally i would take the time to right these images. tonight i ask you to turn your devices on their sides or maybe just tilt you neck; it is far less than those... Continue reading

warning: this might be a hot-air-corn-popper kind of telling, as i am exhausted and the decompression that comes with road-tripping has begun. yesterday my facebook page was almost completely divided along colorlines. not that my friends were in debate, but rather the brown folks and those that have brown family were mourning, and the non-brown folks were posting beautiful pictures of vacations and yummy dinners. it was almost as if there were two entirely separate worlds out there. almost. this morning we(i) did the last of the packing and cleaning and we hit the open road, stopping first at church.... Continue reading

funny that i had a completely different post in mind for this day. it was about an experience my father had in medical school dealing with the sort of insidious racism that has in many ways changed its face over the years, but still holds a firm grip on us. then tonight my children brought me this: while cooking dinner a relatively routine sibling scuffle ensues. voices are raised and they come storming into the kitchen, daughter first followed by son with his arm raised as if to strike her. me: absolutely not! we do not hit. we never hit.... Continue reading

a custom piggy bank is your prize in my referral contest! Continue reading

hey all! it has been a loooong moment since i have posted here; the sun continues to shine in san diego, which can be a bit distracting. also, i opened a new facebook page, which is super for quickie posts! i'm stoking the blog fires today to let folks know about my first video(!), upcoming training, and a new crowd-funding campaign. so exciting! the nuts and bolts are that i will be heading east for a few weeks in summer and spring for the next few years to participate in handwork teacher training at the fiber craft studio in chestnut... Continue reading

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okay, so sometimes in is easy being green. especially in san diego. one of my very very favorite surprises has been the second-hand shopping. there is an abundance of amazing spots, and i hit several of them for the children's birthday. for amzi an extraordinary coffee table book about horses($1-she's chosen 'colt' as one of her middle names) and rainbow suspenders($1-she's wanted them for eons), for nai a book about ocean exploration($1) and 2 pair of pants($2.95 each- he'd blown through the knees in everything somehow), and for them to share a pair of badmitten rackets with 2 birdies($3.95); only... Continue reading

amzi- i don't like frack mac and cheese. *** nai- i don't like it when we shop at walmart. me- walmart? we don't shop at walmart. nai- what's the big grocery store that's so expensive? me-whole foods? nai- right. whole foods. i don't like when we shop at whole foods. *** tomorrow the twins turn nine. i can hardly believe i've known them for nine years- i feel as though i've just about missed the whole thing. every year we do something a bit over-the-top for their school celebration. in kindergarten we made an amazon cake iced with vegan coconut... Continue reading

i know. i was so diligent about posting during our cross-country drive, and since then i have been absent, to say the least. then my sister sent me this email: is sd good? well, i am not sure who could pass up palm trees, flowers blooming in december, a steady 70-ish degrees, and the best second-hand shopping for which an o.c.d. recycler could ask. certainly not me. there's an avocado tree in the back yard, a 10 foot poinsettia outside the bathroom window on which hummingbirds alight daily, and a mountain view over which the sun peaks every morning. the... Continue reading

it's been 2 weeks since my last note; so much has transpired. the days are full and we sleep so well at night. we found a house! with an avocado tree in the back, and a loquat in the front. i've never had a loquat but i will let you know how they are when they come around. we've been busy, busy, busy settling in, trying not too miss too much about new york and keeping hurricane sandy recovery in our minds' eyes. we went to the dia de los muertos celebration in old town which struck me as a... Continue reading

'the word culture is used. to you culture means taco bell and the funny mexican with the funny songs. we gave you our culture of a thousand years. what have you given us? a social system that makes us beggars and police who make us afraid. we've got the land and we are going to work it. we are going to get that park. we no longer talk about asking. we have the park'.- a san diego state student during the 1967 occupation of what would eventually become chicano park we are so fortunate to have found a home just... Continue reading

tonight marked our first community celebration since our landing, and i must admit it made me a wee bit homesick. i longed for holloween past: roaming through bed-stuy, post fulton park parade, map in hand, familiar faces on every corner. getting treats at brownstone books, bread stuy, the akwaaba. ziggy steering the s.s. shadyside while taawi rides her trusty steed. dinner after at peaches. a party for the grown folks with denise and cristoff as milli vanilli and lloyd as sho'nuff. remember the braided hair plugs on his chest? rumor has it those days are gone. the 'hood has changed... Continue reading

in between starting at the new school and searching for home space and work space, we are enjoying our new hometown. ursula! the mingei(my new favorite) ocean beach(the children's new favorite). it's a small, small, small, small world... barrio art crawl, where i had some work just 48 hours after we landed east village logan heights i wish we're holding all of the east coast in our hearts and minds today. may you be well and be safe. Continue reading

we're here. we did it. i don't have it in me to write it all down; it's all there, but it's so much that i don't know how to distill it for proper digestion. my children and i have travelled a journey that once upon a time(what words!) would have taken years- maybe generations, and we completed it two days sooner than i had expected. here we are with my best friend ursula (she would be your best friend too, if only you take the moment to know her). ursula and the children are asleep. only i stir, as the... Continue reading

it's been amazing. fun, boring, creepy, exhausting, rejuvenating, challenging, and amazing. we left amarillo wednesday and hit cadillac ranch just outside of town; a living, site-specific, interactive, public art installation consisting of 10 cadillacs planted nose-first in the ground at an angle corresponding to that of the great pyramid of giza, and the coolest thing we saw along our tour of route 66. nai and i both left our mark, amzi elected to keep her hands clean. 'my baby drove up in a brand new cadillac ranch tumbleweave' in honor of mr robert escalera next stop: the land of enchantment(and... Continue reading

goodmorning! this is a heads up as i suspect we will be in internet-free territory tonight, so have no fear if you don't hear from us for a day or two! xo Continue reading

so...yesterday we were in kansas for a hot minute. actually, it was more of a windy minute. the first two people we met asked if they could help us, and it seemed more like 'can we help you get out of town as soon as possible'. i texted my dear william and told him i understood why dorothy wanted out so much; this was clearly no place for a small band of travellers with a tad too much je ne sais quoi. we stopped for lunch and the owner of the cafe pulled up a chair after serving us, then... Continue reading