Jeanne Hewell-Chambers

+ Her Barefoot Heart

Category: Jeanne’s Barefoot Heart (Page 93 of 99)

Jeanne’s personal creative pursuits of stories stitched, written, and spoken

untitled because i have no idea what to call this

January 30, 2010 / / 38 Comments
vines.jpg

i’ve been offline for far too long, tending to things that simply have to be done.
well, guess what: writing has to be done, too.
writing is my life raft,
my ticket to worlds beyond where i shop for groceries,
my train to discoveries and quarries and ores.

i think better when i write.

keep my fingers away from the keyboard for too long, and my thoughts become fuzzy, uncertain, timid.
let my fingers romp regularly, and i’m confident, clear, (more) courageous.
let my fingers languish too long, and i slouch.
let my fingers dance with words daily, and i smile more – inside and out – and stand taller, too.

away = small.
write here = abundance.

away = alone.
write here = connections.

away = shallow panting.
write here = slow, deep breathing.

when i’m away from writing, my to do list that grows more than it wanes.
when i’m write here, i’m actually (and strangely) more productive.

when i don’t write, my brain chases its tail, going faster and faster and faster.
when i take the time to write, my soul has time to exhale and take a look around,
turn over rocks,
and roll down hills without worrying about grass stains.

when i don’t write, 2 + 2 = 4.
when i do write, i am quick to note that i just say 2 + 2 = 4
because that’s what most people are comfortable with,
all the while rubik-cubing ways that 2 + 2 = all sorts of different answers.

when i don’t write, the world is reduced to faded primary colors.
when i do write, there are at least 64,000 different colors – and it’s not the least bit overwhelming.

i don’t write, i get cranky.
i do write, and well, okay: i sometimes still get cranky.

i don’t write, and it becomes harder to write.

i don’t write, and it becomes harder to think of something to write about.

so why don’t i write daily?

the readily available and easy answer is: there’s not enough time.
but we both know that i have the same amount of time that everybody else has,
i just choose to spend it differently.
i mean, if i had diabetes,
i’d make time to check my blood glucose levels and take insulin, right?

perhaps the common answer is fear.
afraid that my writing sucks,
that i’ll be rejected,
that i’ll just have to go eat worms.

but truth be known,
there’s something else:
a little something we like to call guilt.
for more years than i care to think about,
my adorable husband
has trekked off to a job he never wanted
and doesn’t much like.
so why should i get to do something i enjoy?
i mean, really, what makes me so damned special?
if he’s miserable, it seems only fair that i should be miserable, too, right?
isn’t that why we learned equations in high school?

so merrily we roll along.

this time writing hasn’t solved anything, but
i’ve clarified it,
sat it on the table,
and that counts.

haiti: ways to help

January 15, 2010 / / 25 Comments

people never cease to amaze me in their generosity and willingness to help those in need. what happened in haiti is beyond the scope of my imagination, and the myriad of ways people are offering assistance to haitians is near-overwhelming. small businesses, entrepreneurs, individuals, corporations, and non-profit organizations are stepping-up to help, and they need your donations. as you go through your day, pay close attention. do you wear glasses? there are people in haiti who need glasses. when you put your shoes on, think about all the people in haiti who are without shoes. when you get a drink of water, remember that haitians get thirsty, too. diabetes, heart conditions, developmentally-delayed people, children, and the elderly are segments of the population holding parts of my heart. what are the things you and those you love need to survive daily? there are people in haiti who need the same things – things they are not able to get right now. this is by no means an exhaustive list*, but if you’re looking for ways to help, here are some opportunities you might want to check out.**

there are small businesses and entrepreneurs who are giving of themselves:

  • kelly diels, the crackerjack writer of the blog called cleavage organized and motivated the twitter troops to donate what they have. read how you can join the cause and/or scroll on down to go shopping from the vast buffet of people who’ve donated their goods and services and help yourself while you help others.
  • aidan donnelly rowley is donating $2 for every comment left on her blog. (this from danielle la porte, author of the blog called whitehottruth.com. and just so you know, danielle donated the proceeds from one of her fire starter session. no small thing – the donation or her work.)
  • my friend, lindsey, is donating $2 for every comment on her blog, a design so vast left between now and monday morning, january 18.
  • update: another creative, multi-talented friend, kate is donating the proceeds from an herbal consultation.
  • update: and congratulations are in order for our alana who’s pregnant! she’s researching how to respond to the call for breast milk.
  • update: for a limited time, artist bryce widom is donating $15 from every purchase of The Return or Liberation prints.

to donate much-needed medical supplies, visit:

to provide assistance specifically for haitian children:

if basic needs (food, water, shelter, sanitation) is your thing, here are some options:

perhaps you’d like to help with shelter – transitional shelter, permanent shelter, and/or community shelter:

they need clothes in haiti:

  • shoes: everybody needs shoes, and if shoes are you think, here’s where you need to go.
  • alana reports that sports chalet is collecting shoes through january 31. they’re asking for gently-worn shoes that they’ll ferry over to soles 4 souls, but if you can’t bear to part with your shoes that are already broken-in, buy some to donate.

non-profit organizations are collecting and delivering various items of need:

other compilations of donation options:

  • on his blog, guy kawasaki lists 20 ways to help. (via my whipsmart friend, amanda at violetminded.com.) (just so you know, i was already working on this list when i learned of guy’s list. there may be overlap, but i didn’t copy off his paper.)

* i have no firsthand knowledge or experience with these organizations, so check them out and use your own good sense before contributing. i am receiving nothing in return for mentioning them here except the knowledge that i am doing what i can to help people who cannot help themselves right now.

** if you know of other outreach opportunities, let me know and i’ll add them to the list. i will be updating as needed.

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contagion

January 10, 2010 / / 42 Comments
contagiouscandles.jpg

last week, three people i hold dear (though i’ve only know them for a scant few weeks) wrote posts that opened doors in my heart that have been long closed. their conviction and courage, their honesty, their willingness to outright own vulnerability because silence is no longer an option is nothing short of inspiring. these women have enkindled conversations that are long overdue, conversations i hope will continue and spread and take on a life of their own – a full, rich life that will change the world.

though this poem was written by a man who wrote of political and social upheavals, it is the one that has kept me company the past several days, and it is the one that i am sending – in spite of the near-oppressive notion that i’ll get red ink comments from my english teachers noting my usual erroneous interpretation – as a salute to my three guests of honor, women i am proud to call friend . . .

bonnie of windshieldthinking.com

emily of pleasurenotes.com

julie of unabashedlyfemale.com

p.s. yes, i changed the two masculine pronouns to feminine, so sharpen your red pencils and deduct points at will.

Emerging

A woman says yes without knowing
how to decide even what the question is,
and is caught up, and then is carried along
and never again escapes from her own cocoon;
and that’s how we are, forever falling
into the deep well of other beings;
and one thread wraps itself around our necks,
another entwines a foot, and then it is impossible,
impossible to move except in the well –
nobody can rescue us from other people.

It seems as if we don’t know how to speak;
it seems as if there are words which escape,
which are missing, which have gone away and left us
to ourselves, tangled up in snares and threads.

And all at once, that’s it; we no longer know
what it’s all about, but we are deep inside it,
and now we will never see with the same eyes
as once we did when we were children playing.
Now these eyes are closed to us,
Now our hands emerge from different arms.

And therefore when you sleep, you are alone in your dreaming,
and running freely through the corridors
of one dream only, which belongs to you.
Oh never let them come to steal our dreams,
never let them entwine us in our bed.
Let us hold on to the shadows
to see if, from our own obscurity,
we emerge and grope along the walls,
lie in wait for the light, to capture it,
till, once and for all time,
it becomes our own, the sun of every day.

© Pablo Neruda

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snow

January 8, 2010 / / 58 Comments
snowthroughwindow.jpg

it snowed here last night.

just a dusting, really.

not enough for even one bowl of snow ice cream

but enough to cause the roads to be icy

and treacherous.

phoebeseessnow.jpg

we spent most of the morning

with our noses to the window

taking in the beauty of the freshly-articulated trees

wondering if we can make it up and down the hills

on our daily walk.

snowbluelight.jpg

i love the quiet stillness

the snow brings

and the blue air.

there are those who will explain

the hue and stillness

with great authority

using numbers and

formulas

and studies.

but they’re only theories, really.

educated guesses, really, that make some feel better about the world and themselves

but

sometimes we don’t need to know why

we just need to enjoy and revel in

what is

while it is.

woodsinthesnow.jpg

who’d’a thunk it

January 5, 2010 / / 44 Comments

creation of the collage started on shaky ground – real shaky ground – and for a while it seemed that i would go through 2010 red-faced and collageless. i left my journal at home, see, the one i wanted to shelter the collage, and to make matters worse, my only magazines themed around fiber arts and pottery (not an oprah magazine in sight) (and how can a worthy collage be created without images and words from a staff who knows me. i mean, they really know me.) (which is odd, given that i am not a subscriber.) (or a regular reader, for that matter.)

but then i put on my martyr pants and got busy ripping, and before we got to the end of the 2nd season of lost dvd’s (the television show, i mean), i’d ripped past thoughtfully weighing the pros and cons of every. single. image. i’d ripped my way past looking for words and fonts. i’d ripped my way past justification and rationalization and a whole lotta’ other stuff that i can’t quite name.

now remember: i still didn’t have my journal

so i just crammed tucked the ripped images into my bag, figuring la-te-da i could throw it all away at home just as easily as i could fill the trashcan there, and i pretty much forgot about the whole thing until last night when i couldn’t sleep and couldn’t turn on the television without waking up the dog who would, in turn, wake up the husband who has to get up early so i try not to.

wake my husband up, i mean.

i tiptoed out of the bedroom, fished the ripped bits out of my bag, found my journal, got some glue, and sat down at the dining room table where i was immediately surprised by how many images i had. now you have to understand that spatial concepts is not my strongest intelligence by anybody’s measurement system, but any fool could see that all those images were not going to fit on a 2-page spread in my journal, and i didn’t feel like going downstairs in search of one of those big sheets of paper (and besides, where would i store it) (the collage, i mean), so i just started tearing off any superfluous paper, ripping it right on down to the quick.

to the essential image, i mean.

collage2010rejects.jpg

i eventually came to the last piece, and there i was: surprised again, this time by the hugeness of the discard pile (especially compared to the keypers). coveting wanting my little ole’ collage to be as pretty as emma james‘ vision board, i stuck my tongue out the side of my mouth and started laying the pieces out on the page. but then when i bit my tongue remembered that this is not about planning, i just started squirting glue and laying ’em down, and before i knew it, i was done. finished. collaged.

well, almost.

there was this one image in the discard pile that kept jumping out on the way to the trashcan, and when it leapt out for the third time, i said okay, fine and took it back and glued it onto a page all by itself.

collage2010annex.jpg

i’m calling it the annex.

and here’s the really super trooper amazing part: by the time i crawled back into bed around 5 a.m., all the keypers – i mean, every last one of ’em – had found a home on the two-page spread in my journal.

and i even had a few spaces to boot.

collage2010.jpg

just goes to show, doesn’t it . . .

burn

January 3, 2010 / / 38 Comments
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i hate sunday nights. i love sunday nights.

sunday nights are a transition time for me. the end of the pause. the threshold of beginning.

i am ready for my husband to go back to work. i want him to call in sick tomorrow.

i want to watch another movie. i am ready to get up and move.

i do not want go to back to a life of to do lists. i long for the structure of plans and productivity.

i am a different person. i am the same person trying to be different.

i want to spill things onto the page. i don’t have a damn thing to say.

i love the way i’m beginning to drop down into some philosophical, reflective writing (except for yesterday – that piece was pretty blah). i am tired of being serious, longing to cut loose and romp.

i want to change my update on facebook. i want to drop facebook altogether.

i want to finish my collage. i want to rip up the ripped out bits and flush them.

i want to sing and dance. i want to go to bed and sleep in the fetal position.

i want to twitter. i want to tuck in.

i want to get something done tonight so i’ll be ahead of the game tomorrow. i don’t even want to think about doing anything tonight.

i want to find a book on the writing of lost. if i never see another book, it’ll be too soon.

etc.

etc.

etc.

~~~

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leap

January 3, 2010 / / 32 Comments
blackeyedpeas.jpg

today i leapt.

and i leapt with deliberation and thoughtfulness.

in the fiber arts community there’s a movement called slow cloth – just the name calms me. to live a life of calmness and space and rapt attention, that has been my dream, and today i am closer to that desired lifestyle . . .

gwen bell has developed a year’s worth of brief daily prompts intended to help cultivate a mindfulness lifestyle, and i am onboard. i am so onboard. today’s prompt: “Take time today to update your passwords. Make them bells of mindfulness, action-oriented words,” and so today finds me updating my passwords with verbs (and making sure everything is saved in 1password, the handiest software for mac users. it’s like having my own vault on the computer and on the iphone).

i also leapt into shuttersisters today. signed myself right up, committing to take and post a photo every day this year. i’m setting up a tumblr blog for the shuttersisters photos – i’ll let you know when it’s up and running, though i hasten to add that i am just a woman who enjoys photos, not a woman who would ever be confused with a photographer who knows what she’s doing.

january’s photo theme is create, and i’ve selected a photo of black-eyed peas, a southern staple – especially on new year’s day. thewordwire got me thinking about it yesterday, with her tweets about the southern delectables she was cooking up in her vegas kitchen. new years day is one of the rare days when i cook a full, resplendent meal, something my mother does frequently, and her mother did three times a day. i didn’t inherit the cooking gene – i don’t even collect cookbooks, though i’ve written a few from recipe collections of grandmothers.

my mother has an entire closet filled with plates and glasses and bowls. she sincerely enjoys entertaining, judging your love of her by how many times you go back for refills. she knows how to make people comfortable at her table. it is her native language.

her mother entered cake contests – and won a few, too. in the summer, she’d plant a huge garden, and every day would find her gathering items from the garden and cooking a big lunch (with biscuits made from scratch 3 times a day, i want you to know). the afternoons were spent shelling and shucking in the glider on the front porch then going inside for canning, freezing, and pickling.

these women that form the fabric of my matriarchal lineage created food that nourished and a table that welcomed.

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conjuring is hard work

January 1, 2010 / / 26 Comments
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though i made a valiant effort to talk myself out of doing it, if i do say so myself, i started work on my vision board, my creative collage, whatever you want to call it for 2010, and let me tell you: it’s harder than i remember. first off, the only magazines i have here are pottery magazines, fiber arts magazines, and a few catalogues. not a single oprah magazine in sight. resolved to working with what i have, i sighed audibly then began to flip through the magazines within reach. at first i would notice an attraction to something, then i’d immediately begin to explain and justify that attraction.

that’s NOT how it’s played, and i know it.

then i began to look for words and got hung up on the cliche phrases that kinda’ make my skin crawl but i figured folks would see them, like them, and find me enlightened.

or something.

that’s when i almost joined kelly in her search for a mountain. eventually, though, i pushed past all that crap and began ripping out images at will and just because.

not wanting to get up from my comfy position for reasons i can’t explain, i abruptly switched gears and began to create a list of things i want to do One Day, taking inspiration from shannon and emma (i actually stole borrowed a few from both – thank you, sweeties) because here’s the thing, folks: THIS IS HARD. ask me what i’m going to do tomorrow, and i can whip out a to do list before you finish the question mark. ask me what we need to accomplish by a week from today, and stand back because in under 5 minutes i’ll have a complete schedule complete with task analysis and shopping list. but give me a pen and a blank sheet of paper and ask me to list things i want to do just because, and i’m blank. lost. nada.

i am noticing that there aren’t so many physical adventures on the list, though i do want to run (read walk, mostly) a something-marathon with kipp – if he’ll have me, of course – and one of the items i stole borrowed from emma is dance naked in the rain (although it reads “dance nekkid in the rain” on my list).

travel seems a topic good for at least 5-10 entries, but nooooo. i can only think of a handful of places i want to go. climbing mountains? don’t think so. swimming in all the oceans? i hate sand on my body, so that kinda’ knocks that out now, doesn’t it?

maybe it’s time to switch gears here and set the vision board and list aside and just choose a single word for 2010. just one itty bitty word for 2010. and what, you might well ask, would that one word be?

finally, something easy in the conjuring of a new year. my one word for 2010? JustBecause.

resolutions, schmezolutions

December 31, 2009 / / 33 Comments
sunsetson2009.jpg

today’s Q: what resolution didn’t stick?

today’s A: n/a. not applicable because i stopped making resolutions long ago, and in doing so, i surrendered. i handed off control of my to others. here, i said, you, whoever you are, you be my rudder. you decide where i go, what i do, who i do it with. you decide my fate, my future, my now. i’ll just float along aimlessly and see what happens.

i quit with the resolutions because i felt inadequate and eroded when i didn’t stick to and complete them. i quit with the resolutions because i felt like i didn’t take up enough space in the world to be worthy of resolutions. i quit with the resolutions because i just didn’t think it was worth it. i didn’t think i was worth it.

but oh my goodness how much can change in a month’s time.

i still won’t make resolutions – but i will make something akin to plans. (not tonight, though, cause i’m watching mama mia.) (and i’ve had maybe a wee bit too much wine.) (but not enough to affect my spelling skills, just my planning skills.) (and don’t worry. i’m not leaving the house.) tomorrow, though. yes, tomorrow i will create a collage for 2010. tomorrow i become the architect of my own life.

and it may or may not involve words.

~~~

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i am holding my heart with both hands as i say thank you to gwen bell for putting this challenge together, and thank you to members of my new twitter tribe. i have, through this challenge and on twitter, found my right people – my tribe – and my life will never, ever be the same.

blogliography for this post:
acey
alana
angela
bryce
coach dian
danielle
emma
gwen bell
julie
julie
karen
kathy
kelly
lindsey
lisa sonora beam
molly
mandalove
mary
morag
mynde
nicole
rebecca
susan
thewordwire
zura
and my family: andy, alison, and kipp.
and other members of my twitter tribe who don’t have blogs.

best09
~~~
the stories are mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge. today’s post answers the question “what resolution did you not keep in 2009?”
~~~

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messages from another side

December 30, 2009 / / 16 Comments

they’re often entertaining and informative, but at a deeper level, advertising mostly illuminates the vital need for teaching, encouraging, practicing independent thinking skills . . .

this, my friends, is what can happen when you get too, er um, worked up:

literal is funny (sometimes):

best09
~~~
the stories are mine, but credit for the kindling goes to gwen bell and her best of 2009 blog challenge. today’s post answers the question “what ad made you think this year?”
~~~

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