Thursday, March 22, 2012

Wednesday, March 14, 2012


1. Hot showers

2. Grammy's sweet kisses

3. Kerby Lane's gingerbread pancakes

4. SXSW love

5. Waking up with the single thought, "That was enough sleep."

6. The Schwester (wie shoen dass du da bist!)

7. Shoe shopping with the one and only

8. Rain-soaked, perfect afternoons

9. "I don't like walking around this old and empty house, So hold my hand, I'll walk with you, my dear"

10. Lessons learned, give more, expect less

Original photo via: Dream a little dream of me.

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Smudged hues

crushculdesac:

The Art of Emma Hesse

Photo via: Beauty and Grace

Lament for a heart
Angular, beleaguered

A form amidst the blue shadows
Shapeless features, smeared, smudged hues
Does she kneel, does she weep?

Ode to hope
Gentle, cherished

A form at rest, pink morning glory
Kindle a heart, glimmer, glittering rays
For yet she twirls, yet she delights

Monday, March 12, 2012

Small smattering of thoughts


Photo via: Modern Hepburn

The weather has been perfect and I have so been enjoying my week away. Here are some thoughts from my morning spent idly dreaming without any place to go in particular . . .  

“What more can be said, what greater case could be made than this: to find God, you must look with all your heart. To remain present to God, you must remain present to your heart. To hear his voice, you must listen with your heart. To love him, you must love with all your heart. You cannot be the person God meant you to be, and you cannot live the life he meant you to live, unless you live from the heart.”

– Ransomed Heart Ministries

Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. (Deut. 6:5)

Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart. (1 Sam. 16:7)

For the eyes of the LORD range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him. (2 Chron. 16:9)

 “To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.” 

– C.S. Lewis

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Reflections series





Tom Hussey is a brilliant photographer and has been praised as so by such publications as Adweek Magazine. His Reflections series is, in my opinion, "grippingly" beautiful. The sense of untold stories and the expressions on their faces as they peer into the mirror are captivating to me. The outward appearance, the skin, may age, but one’s true self and beauty remains at the center, gazing back with eyes, honest and true. I think the wife in the last picture must see the same as he, a reflection of bravery, courage and strength. If you were to look into such a mirror, what would you see? Would your loved ones see the same? For me, there are moments when I am teaching, standing at the front of the room, and I feel as though I am just a little girl playing school with my stuffed animals lined up in an orderly row . . . 

Monday, March 5, 2012

My current read, March

showslow:

Kent Rogowski

Photo via: Modern Hepburn

This month I am reading a book I was rather hesitant to start. I was a bit wary of the content matter and nervous as to what my emotional response might be. But as I read deeper and deeper into the book, the insight of this brilliant author has touched me, and I am glad to have picked up this book, though with some trepidation.

In an series with Real Simple, the author, Anne Roiphe was asked what makes her feel beautiful. She answered by sharing the following story.

It was mid-December of 2005. I don’t know why he said it. I don’t know if a shadow had fallen across him, something appalling he saw out of the corner of his eye. I don’t know if it was just coincidence or intuition that prompted him, but about a week before my seemingly healthy 82-year-old husband suddenly died, he emerged from the kitchen ready to go to his office, his face clean-shaven, his eyes shining, smiling shyly, holding the copy of the Anthony Trollope book he was rereading, and said to me, "You have made me very happy. You know that you have made me a happy man." There I stood in my work outfit, blue jeans and a T-shirt. There I stood with my white hair and my wrinkles and the face I was born with, although now much creased by time, and I felt beautiful.

"What?" I said. I wanted him to repeat the words. "You heard me," he said and put on his coat and drew his earmuffs out of his pocket. "Say it again," I said. He said it again. "You’ve made me happy." We had been married 39 years. We had held hands waiting in hospital corridors while a desperately ill child struggled to breathe and thankfully recovered. We had made financial mistakes together. We had spent hours out in fishing boats. We had raised the children and then second-guessed our choices. We had stood shoulder to shoulder at graduations and weddings and we were well-worn, but still I had made him happy, and I was proud and flushed with the warmth of his words.

I know I looked beautiful that morning. Perhaps not to the young man holding his toddler in his arms who rode the elevator with me; perhaps not to the friend I met for lunch, a true believer in Botox; perhaps not to passersby on the street; but I knew it for a certainty. I was beautiful.

. . .

Ten days after that morning conversation, my husband and I returned from a concert and dinner with friends and walked down our windy block toward our apartment house when suddenly he stumbled and fell and died within minutes. As I waited for the ambulance, I remembered his words, a beauty potion I would take with me into the rest of my life.

To read the series in which she was featured in Real Simple, please look here.

Her book, Epilogue: A Memoir, details her journey after her husband's death. After reading her words above, I was eager to read more and learn from her story, . . . for hers is a weighty, thought-provoking, beautiful tale.