remember when i told you that there were all those cute agreeable good-natured dogs posing happily for their people in the tulip fields and mine wasn’t one of them?

in the first two photos, atlas was attempting to rush me. in the last three, i tried to make him stop and stand still, just for a second, so he looked everywhere but at me while trying to sneak by me anyway.

can you see the spray of drool in the last photo? that’s how quickly he moved his head past me. he really is a creature of movement. i wonder if this is a weim thing.

by the way, all of this took place in less than three minutes. i need the arm strength of an amazon and the speed of a jungle cat to live with this dog. i have the first. clearly i’m still working on the second.

i was actually going to title this post the evolution of  a nickname until i saw these photos.

why? yesterday, atlas acquired a new nickname: waffles.

wondering how on earth he got that one? easy. it went from woof-y to wuffy to wuffles to ruffles (have ridges) back to wuffles to waffles.

i met a friend for coffee this morning, then treated myself and my current idea to a delicious sandwich and an iced coconut latte for lunch.

portland is warm and sunny. i wore a skirt and a short-sleeved shirt and sandals and did not freeze. it was lovely.

i am torn between feeling like i am on the right path and with wondering – yet again – what on earth i am meant to be doing with my life. i feel like my heart is three sizes too big – bursting with love for the world and for all of you – but i don’t know how to harness that energy in a way that actually makes a difference in the world.

i have almost literally no food in the house, aside from a can of chili, an apple, some pasta, and a strange assortment of cheeses. however, i feel strangely uninspired to visit the grocery store so i am drinking a diet vernors for dinner. good thing i had that sandwich! (though now that i write this, i realize i could also have an apple with cheese.)

i feel a rather conflicting mix of emotions but instead of feeling them fully, i am reading articles on the internet. they are good articles, but i think i would be better served by sitting quietly for a while. maybe i will do that now.

atlas is perfecting the art of the flop. (by which i mean, he throws himself down on the ground and wriggles around on his back.) i’m pretty sure he’s mastered it, but he continues to practice.

how are you? really?

 
{i wrote this post for my friend relyn’s blog to celebrate her month of passions. i am sharing it here today because it seems fitting. if you are not as fond of lower-case letters as i am, do thank relyn for this brief respite from them.}

When I was younger, I wrote letters to a dear friend of mine. She lived less than fifteen miles away and I saw her most every weekend. I loved writing letters – it was fun to capture funny snippets from daily life in a story – and I didn’t have many far away friends. I didn’t expect her to write back; I just wanted to write letters. Plus, my dad intervened in my one attempt to find my own penpal. (I tried to write to an inmate. There must have been an ad in the classifieds? I quietly slipped the letter in the mailbox one morning – apparently I suspected my parents wouldn’t approve – but it was discovered. That was the end of that.)

I have a stack of postcards and cards on my desk right now. They are all addressed – so I remember who they are for – and I am slowly writing on each of them. Most of them are celebrating March birthdays. I am very fond of belated birthday cards; I like to think it’s even more surprising and delightful when a card shows up well after the birthday has passed. This month, I was inspired to recycle a couple of unused Christmas cards in the spirit of fun and whimsy. As far as I’m concerned, you can say “fa la la la la” all year round, and Santa making a snow angel on the beach is the perfect sight for a snow-covered midwestern friend. (I just realized that the latter says “Enjoy the holidays”. Your birthday is a holiday, right? Maybe it should be.)

It turns out that all these years later, I still love sending mail. With a few words and a stamp, I get to show someone that I care about them, even if I don’t say so directly. I get to show someone that someone out there in the big wide world is thinking about them. I get to imagine a little dose of happiness sitting in someone’s mailbox between bills and junk mail. I get to remember that – even in moments when I feel lonely – there are people in the world that I love and adore.

I must say that I loved mail even more once I discovered the magic of postcards. They really are the perfect size! Letters are great, but sometimes my hand just doesn’t flow across the page, and it’s so easy to jot something on a postcard and pop it into the mailbox. (Like: I’m thinking about you! I had a dream about you last night – we were spies and managed to save the world! Harold and Kumar – a pair of bluebirds – are eating bird seed on my patio and I wish you were here to watch them with me! You might like this quote!)

If I really stop and think about it, sending mail is a beautiful practice. I am doing it for other people, sure, but I am also doing it for myself. It feels like I am putting a little bit of myself out into the world. It feels like I am practicing vulnerability and trust and openness. It feels like I am helping to spread joy and surprise and wonder. It feels like a way to ground myself in the moment and to really appreciate it.

I want to help fill the world with beauty. Sending mail is one of my favorite practices.

want to join me? let’s celebrate our friends and fill the world with postcards!

in a fit of inspiration, i created a set of {let’s celebrate friendship} postcards. they were inspired by my love of mail and my love of postcards and my current obsession with friendship. and yes, i actually put “you rock” on a photo with rocks. i am indeed cheesy.

the set includes 5 postcards. the cost is $12.50.

if you’re interested, click yes, please!

i used to occasionally read something – on the web or in a book – that made me feel uncomfortable.

it almost always happened when i was reading something along the lines of this-is-how-you-should-do-x or this-is-how-you-should-be where i wasn’t doing the thing or being the thing.

for a long time, i thought the feeling meant that i had to change. in response, i would try to do the thing (or be the thing). if i couldn’t (or simply just wouldn’t), i would feel guilty and ashamed of myself for not doing the thing (or being the thing). i would also make the author wrong – either because i was doing something i didn’t want to or because anger felt better than guilt or shame.

this was so uncomfortable that i started to avoid anything i thought would contain advice or suggestions.

eventually, i realized that what the feeling really meant was that i was reading something that didn’t resonate with me. it wasn’t that i was wrong or they were wrong. the feeling was my inner guidance saying, “this is not for you”.

the interesting thing is that once i realized this, nothing i read really bothered me anymore. it became easier and easier to discern what resonated with me and what didn’t – and to take what resonated with me and discard the rest.

it took a long time for me to learn that i am an expert on me.

sometimes i still feel like i don’t know very much about myself, but it is indeed true that i know more about me than anyone else does.

that is what i want for you – for you to know that you are your own expert.

i was playing around with photoshop and made us a pinterest-friendly reminder. (i decided i can’t do this very often because i love fonts and playing with them makes me want to buy all the fonts in the world so i have them at my disposal. there are so many good ones out there!)

there is magic all around you.

sometimes you just need to turn yourself upside down and sideways to see it.

and the world rejoiced, for spring had come.

tulips are definitely definitely definitely my favorite flower.

(can you see the tiny bug on the pink tulip in the last photo? i really wanted to brush it off to avoid a black speck in my photo but decided that would be rude.)

all those cute agreeable good-natured dogs posing happily for their people in the tulip fields – and this is what i get. (if you can’t tell, this is the tail end of a yawn.)

to be fair, i am only realizing now that he must have been staring into the sun. no wonder i had such a hard time getting him to look at me.

i love him anyway. and in our next life, when i am the dog and he is the photographer, i will try to make up for it and pose agreeably for him, at least once or twice.

sometimes
there are no words
for what binds you,
for the cage
that keeps you
small and silent.

even i, with all the words at my disposal, have none.

the tiger sees the bars of his cage and paces,
knowing his own strength.

we pace,
not knowing our own,
wondering why we don’t feel free,
forgetting that
sometimes
invisible bars
are the strongest of all.

i apologize.
i do not mean to leave you in despair
when the truth –
your truth –
can slice through the darkness like a clap of thunder
and dissolve
the bars around you.

this is how it starts
after all,
a scream welling up in the silence.
soon enough,
you will learn your own strength.
you will learn that you are free.

i am delighted to inform you that the secret garden is now open for 2013!

the secret garden is my patron program. it’s my way of filling your year with surprise, delight, and anticipation.

i hope you like what’s in the circles this year!

i saw this chalk drawing on the sidewalk when i was out for a walk with atlas. it was so colorful that i had to run home and get my camera.

doesn’t it make you want to sit down on the sidewalk with your own bucket of chalk? i definitely want to.