Anatomical Nesting Dolls by Jason Levesque

Illustrator Jason Levesque blesses us regularly with his whimsically sexual, clean-line illustrations. This time around he has jumped off the two dimensional plane and directly into the third via custom painted nesting dolls.  

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The Academy Awards and The Dog Show

I did not watch The Academy Awards but I did watch The Red Carpet lead up with the ubiquitous Ryan Seacrest. My favorite "Red Carpet Crossing" was Miss Piggy and Kermit. While watching, the thought crossed my mind that it is appropriate that The Dog Show and The Academy Awards are on in the same month.

The similarities are striking. Replace a leash and a collar with an absurdly expensive dress designed to accentuate boobs and asses and they are indistinguishable -  but at least the dogs are not obsessed with displaying what would best remain unnoticed. We see the dogs' handlers.  We do not see the stars' handlers.  Otherwise known as stylists, publicists or agents, they are off screen. In both shows it's all about beauty but I prefer The Dog Show because the dogs manage to keep their dignity intact without making complete fools of themselves.

I came across a letter written in 1992, ten years ago. Unfortunately our culture has headed south since then but the words ring true. The letter has a strong Jungian flavor, one reason why I kept it:

"Entertainment Tonight," that aired Friday, September 18, 1992, was very disgusting. I am not a parent, sometimes I can't even imagine being one. What parents must be going through with their youth in these times.  I feel for our youth, they are being pulled in so many directions, many of them self-destructive.

The television show showcased youth receiving plastic surgery to look like their idols in the entertainment business.  If they could only realize that to change anything about themselves for the sake of melting into someone else's identity is a great loss.  There is something that all of us find wrong with ourselves.  The key is to find what is right, work hard and value your individuality.

Please remember, these people in the spotlight they have chosen to emulate have already realized their uniqueness.  The commercial world of entertainment is focused on beauty for financial gain.  They have the benefit of the best make-up, fashion (costumers) and publicists in the world.  They are made to project perfection.  Projection is not realization.

I couldn't have said it better myself.



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Introducing the Candidates

Hillary - Fairness and Equality

Ron Wilson - Do Your Job

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India

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Oh, Those Housewives

I confess, one of my guilty pleasures is watching The Housewives, a reality series on Bravo. Not all of them, there are not enough hours in the day, and watching all of them could severely impair my sanity - but I find myself hopelessly drawn to those babes from Beverly Hills and New York.

For pure naked conspicuous consumption, you can't beat Beverly Hills. (I'll save New York for another day.) I am not sure how to describe the daily activities of this cluster of whack jobs. Money can't buy you class, it also doesn't guarantee any integrity or just plain common sense. Their entire existence is so over the top that the viewer doesn't know whether to be left with a sense of horror or hysterics.

Putting aside the fact that so much money could help hundreds, if not thousands of needy people, you have to marvel at the sheer audacity of their homes, clothes and jewels, not to mention their plastic surgeon's bills. One housewife, Adrienne, has her own spa upstairs, the skin rejuvenating machine alone cost $30,000. Another, Taylor, has lips the size of oars.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Not content to sit at home, they fly from one vacation spot to another, one party to another. Each stretch limo is longer than the last. While en route to the their next social engagement, they primp in front of the mirror in the limo, bracing themselves for the next cat fight.  Like a prize fighter in training, they prepare for the evening's  bloodsport . They hate each other one minute, drool over lunch together the next.

Boxing is cleaner, these housewives attack each other with innuendos, snide, cruel remarks and a viciousness the the likes of which I have never seen. What are we to make of this? Clearly these shows make money or Bravo would not continue to produce them. I watch, but the thought of these airheads ever being role models for my granddaughters is truly terrifying.

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Recycling Saturday

Everything is not what it seems . . .

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Happy President's Day

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A Tale of Two Joan's

A Tale of Two Joans

I watched two documentaries back-to-back, one on Joan Baez: How Sweet the Sound, the other on Joan Rivers: Joan Rivers, a Piece of Work. Two talented women, both now in their 70's, both enormously successful, now looking back over their lives. That's not quite true, Joan Rivers won't stop long enough to reminise, but more on that later.

Joan Baez was born in 1940 with a clear, singing voice,  coupled with a unique ability to write much of her music. Both her parents were handsome, intellectual and refined.  Her father was a professor at MIT, the family moved to Belmont, MA when she was in her teens. This close proximity to Harvard Square was the impetus she needed to launch her career by playing her guitar and singing folk songs either on the street or in the ubiquitous coffee houses in Cambridge. She often said her guitar was an extension of herself. Although She enrolled at Boston University, she only lasted about six weeks in the halls of higher learning. Music was what mattered to her.

Success both surprised and frightened her. There were times when she would glance at her audience in the middle of a song, break into a panic attack, excuse herself, go into the bathroom, "talk herself out of it," return and continue where she left off. Panic attacks notwithstanding, her career flourished, she met and became involved with Bob Dylan for several years in the 60's. Their mutual talents were a magnet for each other and the audiences they served.

The 60's were a time of great unrest and Joan Baez was an integral part of both the Cival Rights movement and later the Vietnam protests, attracting thousands to her concerts.  She sings upon  rare occasions today, but seems to be content with her status in life. I love it that she has allowed herself to age naturally without the aid of Botox or plastic surgeons.

Not so with the other Joan, Ms Rivers, who is indeed "a piece of work." Of the two Joans, I found Joan Rivers to be much more interesting, as a matter of fact, I found her to be fascinating!  She has the tenacity and the drive of a Pitt Bull. Whereas Joan Baez refused to set foot in a plastic surgeon's office, Joan Rivers supported many. That face has been lifted more times than a snow plow during a Minnesota winter. She admits it, she brags about it, although we get the sense that aging makes her very angry. (Joan is an extremely controlling woman, and aging is one thing she cannot control.)

Born in 1933, she grew up in Westchester County and graduated from Barnard College. No dummy she. Joan took a variety of whackadoodle jobs, including a stint as a tour guide at Rockefeller Center. I mention this only because I, too was once a tour guide at Rockefeller Center. That job took stamina, and whereas I have long since lost my get up and go, Joan will keep working until she drops. She is incapable of saying no. No matter where the gig, NYC, Las Vegas, or an Elks Lodge in the boonies of Wisconsin, Joan shows up and does her schtick. She is so competitive that she won on Donald Trump's Celebrity Apprentice. 

I was prepared  to dislike her intensely, I'm not all that crazy about raunchy humor and the F bomb dropped every other sentence, but I found her to be rather endearing, in spite of her intense workaholism. She calls it as she sees it, there is not a phony bone in her body, in spite of that face which seems to contradict her authenticity.

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The Rules for Being Human (Author Unknown)

1) YOU WILL RECEIVE A BODY

You may like it or you may hate it, but it will be yours for the entire period this time around.

2) YOU WILL LEARN LESSONS

You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called life.  Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons.  You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid.

3) THERE ARE NO MISTAKES, ONLY LESSONS

Growth is a process of trial and error - experimentation.  The "failed" experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiments that ultimately work.

4) A LESSON IS REPEATED UNTIL IT IS LEARNED

A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can then go on to the next lesson.

5) LEARNING LESSONS DOES NOT END

There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons.  If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned.

6) THERE IS NO BETTER THAN HERE

When your "there" has become a "here" you will simply obtain another "there" that will again look better than "here."

7) OTHERS ARE MERELY MIRRORS OF YOU

You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects to you something you love or hate about yourself.

8) WHAT YOU MAKE OF YOUR LIFE IS UP TO YOU

You have all of the tools and resources you need: What you do with them

is up to you.  The choice is yours!

9) YOUR ANSWERS LIE INSIDE OF YOU

The answers to life's questions lie inside of you.  All that you need to do is look, listen, and trust.

10) YOU WILL FORGET ALL OF THIS

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Valentines Day Dance at Puddleduckpuppet Plaza

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Puddleduckpuppets Plaza News at 5

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The Museum of One's Kitchen

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Shadow and Light Source Both by Rumi

How does a part of the world leave the world?

How does wetness leave water? Don't try to

put out a fire by throwing on more fire! Don't

wash a wound with blood.  No matter how fast

you run, your shadow keeps up.  Sometimes it's

in front!  Only full overhead sun diminishes

your shadow.  But that shadow has been serving

you.  What hurts you blesses you.  Darkness is 

                                                     

your candle.  Your boundaries are your quest.

I could explain this, but it will break the

glass cover on your heart and there's no

fixing that.  You must have shadow and light

source both.  Listen, and lay your head under

the tree of awe.  When from that tree feathers

and wings sprout on you, be quieter than

a dove.  Don't open your mouth for even a coo

Rumi

"I could explain this, but it will break the glass cover on your heart and there's no fixing that."  Isn't that a beautiful line? And then the last four lines, Don't open your mouth for even a coo. When I am feeling down I read Rumi who never fails to tell me what I need to hear.

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Doggie DNA

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God Went to Beauty School

God Went to Beauty School
by Cynthia Rylant

He went there to learn how
to give a good perm
and ended up just crazy
about nails
so He opened up His own shop.
"Nails by Jim" He called it.
He was afraid to call it
Nails by God.
He was sure people would
think He was being
disrespectful and using
His own name in vain
and nobody would tip.
He got into nails, of course,
because He'd always loved
hands--
hands were some of the best things
He'd ever done
and this way He could just
hold one in His
and admire those delicate
bones just above the knuckles,
delicate as birds' wings,
and after He'd done that
awhile,
He could paint all the nails
any color He wanted,
then say,
"Beautiful,"
and mean it.

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Synchronicity - "Godwinks"

Wikipedia says synchronicity is the experience of two or more events that are apparently causally unrelated or unlikely to occur together by chance and that are observed to occur together in a meaningful manner. It is similar to, but holds more meaning than a mere coincidence.  Some people call synchronicity “Godwinks.”

During periods of my life when I think about the concept, episodes of synchronicity seem to flow into my life on a regular basis.  Within the past week, the following happened:

1. My swimming is progressing well, but in spite of the fact that my granddaughter, Carly, has patiently demonstrated the flip turn, I am fearful of actually doing one in the water.  I was thinking about this yesterday while swimming laps when who should begin to share my lane with me but a young girl about ten years old. She repeatedly swam a few yards, turned and practiced her flip turns over and over again.  After about 15 minutes I asked her if she would teach me, and she did!  My turns were simply awful, my butt wavered above water like a beached whale, but at least I did them. 

1. Ten years ago I spent several months at a retreat center in the Sierras, owned and     operated by the followers of Paramahansa Yogananda. After returning to “my life,” the memory faded but lingered on to one degree or another.  A few weeks after moving to Waltham, a picked up a brochure blowing in the wind on the town green, and it described the BMG, The Boston Meditation Group for followers of Yogananda, and they met a block from my apartment.  I have been faithfully attending ever since.

1. My doctor ordered several tests for me at Newton Wellesley Hospital.  I was walking Oskar early this morning pondering whether I should go to Newton Wellesley or maybe go to Mass General or Beth Israel, larger better known hospitals. I ran into a fellow early morning walker who mentioned to me that he was on his way to Newton Wellesley Hospital to see a client.  I asked him what he thought of NWH, and he said it’s the best, many doctors from the larger Boston hospitals practice there.  

1. My favorite "Godwink" occurred several years ago when my son was ill and in an ICU at a hospital in Burlington, Vermont. We are not from Burlington so after spending several nights in a local hotel I asked the information desk at the hospital if there was any residence where I could stay and they said that there was a convent of retired nuns across from the hospital, and the nuns would be happy to put me up.  Those nuns were like angels, they offered me peace and a clean room and even breakfast!  I asked them what type of nuns they were and they said that they were The Sisters of Mercy.  For years, one of my favorite singers has been Leonard Cohen, and of all his songs, I love The Sisters of Mercy best.  What a sweet Godwink!

(Please note that I am having trouble with my numbering, and I cannot seem to fix it!  Oh well.)

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