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Showing posts from 2016

Traveling in France by Bicycle

I traveled from Calais to Pont L'Eveque on my own twice. The second time around I brought my bike. I bought a rack for the back, so I could strap my things to it. I'd brought my sleeping bag to England, and so I strapped it to the back of the bicycle. I know I brought my bag because the wild farm kitten I later acquired developed a dependence on that sleeping bag, and when I lost it nine years later she died within the year. Anyhow, the bike rack didn't fit. It rubbed at the bike frame, stripping off bits of fancy iridescent paint, exposing metal that would later rust. I used a too thin bolt and nut so I could cobble it together. This made a rattle the whole trip. I also bought a yellow poncho. It didn't occur to me until it was later pointed out by local youths (on a moped, always with those mopeds), outside a French MacDonald's that, along with my curly red hair and my wine colored Danskos, I bore an unflattering resemblance to someone who is not one

No right to complain: Artist dissing

According to Psychology Today, this is the definition of a  micro aggression :  everyday verbal, nonverbal, and environmental slights, snubs, or insults, whether intentional or unintentional, which communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative messages to target persons based solely upon their marginalized group membership. As a woman, redheaded and bisexual at that, I have certainly experienced microaggressions. But one of the small and common put downs that hurts me the most has nothing to do with being female or queer, and therefore probably doesn't qualify for the definition, although it still fits the frame. Yep, poor, privileged me: I'm tired of being put down for being an artist. Artist friends and I talk about the discomfort of self identifying as an artist. Maybe the push back from the world that we feel is because of lack of financial success. I have heard many variations on the theme of “What a luxury that you get to spend all your time on this fun hob

Lost Mountain Blues at Squam Lake

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I just spent a weekend at Squam Lake, as part of the SCBWI retreat, at the site where On Golden Pond was filmed.  The swimming was wonderful, the loons lonesome sounding, and the Milky Way visible. Got to make some lovely, engaging friends.  Also, I had the great pleasure of getting a one on one session with one of the editor/mentors, the very kind Arianne Lewin, of Penguin Random House. To which I arrived sixteen minutes late, nearly in tears, because first I got lost on West Rattlesnake Mountain for two hours. Intending to do a loop, I went up the steep side. At the top, sweating, I enjoyed the view, but didn't linger, because I'd wanted to catch a quick shower before my meeting. So, then I went down the wrong side of the mountain, and didn't notice.  When I got down to the road, no clue that it wasn't even the right road, I alternated sprinting and fast walking. I was sure that the camp was just around the corner. At the

PTSD versus Resilience

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What allows a reported 45 % (according to the article on PTSD in the New England Journal of Medicine – written by Rachel Yehuda, Ph. D.) of rape victims not to experience PTSD? (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) I am fascinated, especially in light of the moving letter  from the young woman in the Stanford rape case, that any woman would be able to move on with her life without crushing psychomedical reverb. I imagine, aside from the 55 percent who experience PTSD, that a significant portion still experience long term debilitating consequences. Depression, nightmares, and health complications aren't restricted to PTSD diagnoses. I'm reading the Yehuda article as closely as I can. It's dense stuff.  “Patients with chronic PTSD have increased circulating levels of norepinephrine and increased reactivity of a2-adrenergic receptors. These alterations, in tandem with the finding that thyroid hormone levels are increased in patients with PTSD, may help explain

Copyright confessions

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Copyright is tricky. I deal with it all the time. Who would have thought being an artist would lead to such a concern for the law? Spirit of it, at least. Will my own images be used without my consent? Am I taking advantage of any photographers by using their work? I try, very hard, to be respectful of photographers. They work to get the subject, the perfect shot, and they work to make it better, and then they put it online for all the world to see, hoping, just like I do, that no one will steal their work. Usually, I get my images from sites where photographers post their photos for free use. Sites like morguefile.com, or, when usage has no conditions, Wikipedia. Occasionally, I remember to cite their names, even when the sites doesn't ask for that. Seems like the least I can do, and, all too often, more than I do. Some photos on Wikipedia have a share and share alike term of usage, meaning that, if I paint one of the animals from one of their gorgeous photos, I woul

Showing at Grasmere in Bristol

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I'm busily completing the animal alphabet again - the giraffe, hyena, deer, skunk, turtle, and fox all found homes since last time. I've replaced them with a goat, a hedgehog a dingo, and another fox. And I'm working on a squid and, maybe, a three-toed sloth for T, as per my daughter's suggestion. I'm so excited to go and visit Beth and Peter's shop, Grasmere !

The Still Silent Bisexual

For me, coming out as bisexual is either ridiculous, or feels like an unnecessary reveal about something that is no one else's business but my own. So why do it? Well, largely, I don't come out. In spite of the blogging, I'm a pretty private  person. But the world needs more voices admitting that we're bisexual. There's a visibility problem. In middle school I had my first boy crush, in high school my first girl crush, and I've had as many serious girlfriends as boyfriends (though most definitely not at the same time). I joined BAGLY (Boston Alliance of Gay and Lesbian Bisexual Trasngender Youth – note the order? And the absence in the actual acronym? Oh well. They were still hugely helpful for me) while in high school. Just before college, I had an accidental pregnancy. At the same time that I had mononucleosis, was going to a women's college, and had an identity crisis. I thought I was a  lesbian, instead of being bisexual. In spite of

Zoetrope!

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My kids and I went to the Robot Block Party , hosted by the Rhode Island Students of the Future at Brown University, this past Saturday. They found Legos and robots and go carts they could build from the wheels up, and I found a ZOETROPE! Two of them. They were built for the Rhode Island Museum of Science and Art (currently without walls) by David Kunitz. Totally smooth, quiet, and perfect. So I had to make a frog jumping for the occasion. RIMOSA on Facebook , twitter , and their home site

Time to write

The latest thing I've learned about writing is something I really didn't want to know. It's this: I write best in the morning, before I've even stood up to make my morning tea. I am so not a morning person. I hide for the first hour after I wake up, if I think it'll help me avoid talking to anyone. My husband gives me a hug, and then beats a careful retreat, because I am a grizzly bear if I've been awake for less than that required hour. Mornings are for tea, toast, and dark chocolate. But then, in some freakish lack of judgement, I put the computer where I could reach it in the morning, and actually started writing as soon as I was awake. You know this is nonsense, right? I really love it that I've discovered the way to circumvent my  brain's endless chatter, endless need to “check” something on the internet. When I'm still waking up, strangely, I care little about the outside world. It's the perfect time to write. Even a

Slowly moving back in to Etsy

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A friend told me it would take five years to start feeling normal again after cancer. Yep. I'm finishing ( still! ) the daughter-demanded sequel to a middle grade book I wrote for her a couple of years ago, and slowly getting my feet back under me on Etsy . Yay, Etsy! Thank goodness for an easy, online vendor! Uploaded sea turtle below. Happy to be online.

Are you a writer?

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Are you a writer? I'm not, apparently. I recently failed an “Are you a writer?” online quiz. Yeah. I know. Lame to take it, lame to care... But it caused havoc with my writing this morning. I want to rephrase what I hear some Buddhists say: you can only call yourself a Buddhist if you meditate (if you Bhud? Bouder means pout in French...) and you are a writer if you write, a painter if you paint, etc. But those statements aren't always true. Sometimes awareness of yourself not meditating is what's happening, a story is hibernating for the winter, or a new way of seeing a landscape is hatching. Anyway, how are we not setting ourselves up as jerks if we start declaring that what is or isn't happening in the moment defines a person's entire identity? Which leads me to think that identity is the problem. I clearly care way too much about what I call myself, and what others call me. Every time I show a painting, it feels like I'm exposing

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