before & after

jaxon sent me four pictures of his car; before and after shots. the woman in the third photo is his wife, tiara.

little wings & baba birdman

i'm in love with everyone and everything they've ever done — kyle field

currently i'm listening to song clips of little wings, the birth child of kyle field, a friend and former co-op mate. kyle is the type of artist we all day dream of being: wandering, creating, believing and living the life. he turned me on to uncle tupelo years ago over breakfast at big sky. i'll never forget it. they quickly became one of my favorite bands. he also encouraged me to write songs and play my guitar. one of my favorite nights ever was a bunch of us gathered around a big fire in the backyard -- for dan's birthday -- and kyle playing guitar and his friend playing fiddle and the rest of us crooning where we could.

kyle is a gifted wordsmith... a true poet. take a listen to sand canyon.

kyle and matt ward (another former co-op mate) used to have a band called rodriguez; the type of local band that people continue to talk about long after the band broke up and the members moved outta town (mostly to portland). matt's latest cd was featured on npr last fall.

tonight kyle is playing with rob, yes another old co-op mate. somehow rob's moniker has morphed (devolved?) from bobby birdman to baba birdman. i've never heard him perform, but once greatly offended him (and others at the table) when i mentioned that organs do not belong in rock bands. ahem. i stand corrected [insert grin here].

tonight i'll venture to two dogs cafe to catch both little wings and baba birdman in morro bay. they play san luis tomorrow, rumored to be a strolling and singing show. once i saw kyle perform an entire gig with a mexican blanket covering his head (the alt-folky miles davis approach?) and another time kyle stood still in the middle of farmer's market holding a makeshift handmade sign that urged people to "settle down." so strolling and singing sounds good and interesting. if you are sloward on friday, definitely check it out.

overheard

jaxon's back after a few days off recovering from a pretty serious car accident. car is totalled, which would be a hard thing for most of us to deal with. but you don't understand. jaxon is all about his car. and it was a pretty cool car, coming from a person who's not really a hot-rod girl or anything. but jaxon's car was the baddest of the bad. if a cartoonist was going to draw a picture of what a bad-ass car would look like, they mighta drawn jaxy's super cool firebird all tricked out with airvents on top and that doesn't even begin to do justice to jaxon's car, who's custom license plates read "raaptor."

jaxon (working on a new web page): santa fe girls film school... says they're helping girls get to hollywood.
--pause--
jaxon: i can help girls go hollywood.
marya: yer sick.
jaxon: hey, i was in an accident.

jaxon brought in the R.I.P. pictures of raaptor. the front end is totally ripped right off. the t-tops are crushed and sunken in and of course the glass is all gone. not one part of the car isn't touched. except where jaxon was sitting. the car spun and spun and flipped and flipped and finally went down an embankment. and jaxon walked out with not one scratch on his pretty face.

it wasn't his time. and we're all glad.

meanwhile, people are trying to buy houses

ben and luke took jaxon out to lunch to welcome him back and hear all the gory details. on the way back from the restaurant, ben tells the other two about how hard it is to find a house for sale, much less one in a good neighborhood.

luke: but what if the house wasn't nice?
ben: i'd take a dump in a nice neighborhood!
--pause--
peals of laughter.

and that folks is the end of the no-potty-humor on emdot. oh, what is the world coming to?

today's link: alternate flags

what's been on my mind lately...

that blogging is ridiculous and i should take my web site down. i'm not sure i understand the point, and yet i've been doing this for over two years.

that "opinions" and the american obsession with being opinionated is just a great guise at keeping us from the important things: loving one another and realizing that we are much more similar than different. imagine if we put all of our "opinion" energy into "getting along with one another" energy or in just 'being quiet" energy... i think you would see a peaceful revolution happen.

that we (americans) need to get back in touch with nature. this goes most heavily to christians and anyone living in orange county. (wait...was that an opinion?).

that for me, personally, meditation is a strange magical painreliever that seems to simplify my whole life. i don't understand how it works, but it is nothing short of extraordinary.

"There was none of this separation of the sacred and the secular: both spiritual and physical well-being were granted at the same time, because — and this is most important — the physical and the spiritual are two dimensions of the same coin."
– Thomas Berry, American Catholic monk
from The Sun Magazine

my two favorite magazines have similar names: the sun magazine and the shambhala sun. both worth a look, a read, a subscription.

overheard words of wisdom

rem: that's okay, i'll recover. that's what happens; you recover.

maybe you had to be there, but i thought rem basically summed things up quite nicely.

overheards

wyeth walks into gigi's and his exgf sees him and beelines towards him.

w's xgf: you cut your hair
wyeth takes off hat: yep
w's xgf: now you look canadian.
wyeth looks at her.
w's xgf: i bet you're wondering if that is good or bad... (walks away)

found: pictures of live oak (and they're good)

stu just sent me a site full of pictures from live oak. you can see his picture as well. stu's band performed sunday morning.

les yeux noirs plays klezmer which means gypsy+jewish+cute french accents to you and me. they shook their hips and chachacha'd their shoulders and the girls were swooning. highlights: the two fiddlers playing on one fiddle. and my housemate going backstage for a couple of bisou's and autographs for the cd she purchased.

michelle shocked and the perverse allstars. i'm pretty sure the guitarist is looking right at me in this picture. he's thinking, damn if only i wasn't a famous rock and roll god so i could ask that woman out. she should be my wife. screw ireland, i'm moving to america.

the live oak camp is big and most people come every year, so they've got their camping situation all worked out. some of the groups bid on their own private outhouse, that gets cleaned several times a day. my friends brenda and bruce and their fellow campmates won the bid this year and celebrated by decorating their john with gusto.

live oak is a family affair, that is for sure. in fact, you'll see grandparents, parents and young 'uns running around. there are things for the kids, things for the parents, and everyone in between. there are great expanses of shade to loll the weekend away watching your favorite acts or you can sit right out in the sun. i laugh, thinking, conservatives only think they have the stranglehold on family values. sponsored by kcbx, our local public radio station and a bastion of the liberal front, live oak proves we've got the family values and a bit more fun than a republican pep rally.

foxfire, lost love and marcus livius drusus

tonight i spent some time reading the compleat iconoclast, new blog of old online and fellow dw-er, mld. i'm bookmarking this one because there is so much to read and it is all interesting. don't get me wrong, marcus and i disagree on many things. but he's a good storyteller and the best historian i've never met. plus, his life is well enough outside the norm that you will be interested in just reading how another half lives.

meanwhile, tonight i read his blog on the foxfire books and it brought back memories. back in 1991 i lived in santa cruz and had this sweet boyfriend. three years younger than me and just... young and innocent and very very sincere. all this added up to a short-term relationship as i was much more interested in boys who didn't really know i existed and were completely self-centered. or was it that i was completely self-centered?

but this guy also had all the foxfire books and he really read them and used them. build a fire? he was your man. build a log cabin? call him up. dead racoon on the side of the road? he was there to skin and cure the hide. (yuck). he could do anything, fix anything, loved his family, was upbeat, positive and had a few other qualities that are always pleasant to have in an intimate relationship (oh my blog's no fun. i leave out all the good stuff). (sigh. what was i thinking, tossing that relationship away??).

on the flip side, i think it's safe to say that i will never have any racoon hides curing in my garage rafters.

marcus's rafters, however, once he gets through the compleat set, is a whole nother ball o' wax. i should warn his girlfriend.

marya gets her groove back

i wish i were more of a bounce-back person. instead i'm a slowly-meandering back person. i love little adventures and weekend get aways, but it always seems to take me a week or so to get back in my groove. i've been a lost lamb the last few days, back from live oak and missing a beat or two here and there.

this morning in the shower, the great revival hall that it is, i felt the groove resurface. the grin was back and the remembering of purpose and fun. thank god.

other little tidbits of goodness
a spunkyfunkylittlemonkey letter from the one and only sweet bean pea pod, raelene. mizz bean is like a jolt of summer day in the midst of a cloudy, cement-laden concrete jungle. raelene is the girl who will remind you that it is good to doodle during meetings. she's the giggle in the church choir.

music in the plaza starts tomorrow night. a thousand people will gather to drink wine, meet friends, and boogie down at the steps of the mission. i'm going to all of them, except the two i'll miss cuz i'll be at a nine-day meditation retreat. i'm not losing my summer this year. as shane says, "mar, you gotta fit your work into your life, not your life into your work." amen mr. green.

last night i took a fabulous detour home. this is my favorite detour that takes me almost to lopez lake, through the rolling hills and valleys of the edna valley. past wineries and farm houses. an hour or two before sunset and this drive will fill your heart. i must get a digital camera to show you all.

i just got in my little paws "songs from the rain," the hothouse flowers cd that i had lent out years ago and never got back. i special ordered it. my coworker took an early lunch break and was picking up cds. he heard the girl at the counter leave a message on my answering machine. he said, "did you just call marya?" long story short, i am sitting at my desk, feeling a little frustrated from a frustrating meeting. and christopher hands me songs from the rain.

"let the light inside shine from the inside out."

liam o'maonlai deserves a collective hug. i'd forgotten how much i love this band.

for years i had this on my door:

Rejoice in the sunrise
Dance to the moonlight
Dance to the storm

also from hothouse flowers. and i'd forgotten about that too, til i pulled out my old issue of "home."

hey -- my mom is here. we're going to lunch. ciao and chow.

write a michelle shocked post and find many closeted michelle shocked fans. good! we can help her out by buying her new cd. grassroots, baby. grassroots.

live oak update

as always, live oak festival was incredible. another year of soulful music (and by soulful i mean music that gets you in the bones, in your feet, in your heart and that makes your booty shake a beat). but truly the act that blew me away and that i can't shake from my mind is michelle shocked.

i've been a pretty big michelle shocked fan for a long time (over ten years, my god.). not fan-atical. i don't know any of her personal facts or what she eats (please). but have learned at least seven songs on the guitar. and i don't think i went on a road trip in the nineties without my trusty copy of short sharp shocked. arkansas traveler also became a trusted travel companion (and you know i lent that cd out, never got it back and now you can't get copies in the stores).

i was really looking forward to the show. i tried not to get my hopes too up, after the super-disappointing lucinda show. but, got up at 5:30 in the morning to guarantee excellent seats. third-row center. not bad. and although you could get up and dance to many of the songs, i could not pry myself from my seat. instead just transfixed watching michelle and her amazing band the perverse allstars. twice i found tears streaming down my cheeks (you've gotta listen to "isn't it amazing" and i'm sure you'll at least get choked up yourself).

that was two days ago. and now i'm listening to deep natural (in my walkman specifically so i can hear every note and each word). all of the words i want to type would just sound ridiculous ("awesome," "amazing," "incredible" ... all of your typically overused adjectives).

so let me tell you this instead. this is an album i want to buy for everyone. that is how much i like it. now, i can't afford that. but there are two or three of you that might be getting this in the mail. and because michelle publishes on her own label (assembled and shrink wrapped each and every one of the cds, in fact) i could never burn and pass this on.

besides the "amazing" songs and the "awesome" sound... the live performance was practically a spiritual experience. and i am not just saying that. again... words can't do it justice. but she (and her "incredibly" tight, talented, and [ahem] handsome band) came out bursting with joy and love. this sounds corny in print. i know that. so just trust me. and the audience -- every one at the main stage -- just gave it right back to her. which supercharged michelle and band and a circle of energy was created. people at times had tears during songs (not crazy crying, but tears in the eyes or wiped from cheeks). other times people were dancing like wildcats, full-blown participating in choruses...

i'll go out on a limb and say that was the best show i've ever seen. (well, i know for sure this is in my top five. top three. vying for the grand prize).

just a great show.

and a treat was her guitarist, fiachna o'braonain, who also plays for hothouse flowers. funny because at the same time that i was getting turned on to michelled shocked i was getting turned on to hothouse flowers. and i remember the way their songs used to stick to my heart as well and at times make tears stream down my face. and i don't mean that in a tearful, mournful, sorrowful way. but the tears of... shared human experience? i don't know what. so let's just chalk it up to really good art. i also lent out one of my hothouse flowers cds and never got it back (though fairly i must tell you that my friend lent me two billy braggs for a listen to the hhf and i've still got the billy bragg).

after the show there was a "barn" dance -- that was salsa band salson mixing it up with the latin grooves. michelle's trumpet player, rich armstrong got up on stage with them while michelle and fiachna danced on the dance floor. i stood next to fiachna for a moment or two and i just feel compelled to (ridiculously) state right here that he is a delightfully tall man [insert wink].

go go go and buy deep natural. there is no physical way you could be disappointed with it.

not to state the corny or the overtly obvious, but...

life is truly precious.

my grandmother has been in the hospital since Tuesday. she's a real sweety. which sounds ridiculous in print, but is the right thing to say out loud. she's just a kick in the pants and has the best intentions. she loves to laugh and constantly cracks jokes. she is pretty damn funny. what i like about her sense of humor is that she often is the brunt of her own jokes in a very light-handed, never malicious way.

and i don't know if she is going to be okay or not. i just don't know.

but we never know. you could be the healthiest galoot on your block and just happen to step out into the crosswalk at the most inopportune moment.

shit. but i want her to be okay. for her. for me. because i hate loss. because she seems so full of life. so full of life, that it seems odd to see her in the hospital bed, cracking jokes, being gracious. and because, you never really spend the amount of time you should with your grandparents.

and i think of my other grandparents, living in arizona who are two of the most incredible people i have ever met. and i am about 4000 times worse about keeping in contact with them. and life is precious. and tender. and can step out into the sidewalk at the most inopportune moments.

if you are a buddhist, please keep my grandmother LaVonne in your tonglen practice.
if you are christian please please please pray for her.

overheards

bret: i'm seven-eighths irish.
bryon: you don't look irish. you look hippy.
bret: i didn't realize that hippy was a race of people.

jaxon: (talking to himself, while building new apple page) plump, juicy and full of flavor...
marya: is that your pull quote?
jaxon: (hesitates)
jaxon: you know i like that phrase almost as much as "all-girl's school."

overheards

jaxon is the biggest sports fan i know. he listens to rome and was talking about what big sniveling babies some players can be (in any sport). "i'll take the job," he says, raising his hand, pertaining to if/when baseball or the wnba strikes.

jaxon: if it weren't for my shaq and kobe, i might not even watch basketball
marya: but what about bibby?
jaxon: i might watch bibby. to watch someone kick him while he was down.
marya: but he is all heart!
jaxon: (nodding) and forehead.

overheards

yesterday was spent in the e.r. at french hospital. without going into details besides to say my gram has had heart problems, i feel compelled to share an overheard.

gram: what can i do so that this doesn't happen again?
dr: well, as you get older...
gram: i'm only 80!

the eclipse. we watched it. it was great. all of the shadows coming through the trees and hitting our shed were crescents as well. i loved the darkened, muted sky. it reminded me of fire weather. it reminded diana of the sun trying to get in after a big rain. the birds stopped chirping for a bit and then started up when the sun began to come back (it's still just coming back here).

dan also burned his eyes. he can't see the burned parts of his tofu meant for his thai dinner. he burned it bc he was outside too long with the eclipse.

jim is trying to tell me that our mockingbirds are not really mockingbirds, but starlings that mock. that pisses me off until i realize that maybe what we have are mock mockingbirds. mock-squared.

wizard the cat found and conquered the catnip bush. it started out innocent enough. shane pulled a little twig off of it and let wizard roll around and eat and pounce and generally rule the little sprig. but this housemate did not know what a crack kitty wizard was.

we found him yesterday morning quite literally wrapped up in the rest of the bush. at that time the bush was still attached to the ground. (just a little bush someone planted a week or so ago). wizard wore the branches like catnip boas.. and he sprawled on his back, this way and that like a true porn kitty.

today he has a hangover. and he is a little grumpy and sad. the cat nip bush (the whole thing) is gone. i think he ate it.

from the sun magazine: interview with paul hawken

Lertzman: I think having hope is particularly salient for young people today. How can we educate young people about what is happening in the world and not rob them of hope?

Hawken: You can't rob people of hope if they've never had it. Many young people were immersed in an environmental cold shower when they were little and had no context for the troubling information they received. They were told about dying whales, global warming, polluted rivers, and clear-cut forests. The last place to start to educate a child aboutt he environment is with the problems. You want to start with the mystery. You want them to know and love nature even though they lack rudimentary knowledge of ecology. They'll learn about the problems soon enough, but in early schooling, they should play, have fun, and honor nature.

Children feel loss keenly, and they can see how absurd the present system is. Kevin Danaher of Global Exchange told an audience in Seattle during the WTO meetings that if they were confused about their priorities, ask a nine-year-old whether corporations should maximize profits or save the environment; increase CEO stock options or stop child starvation.

Children need a sense of wonder as a basis for understanding what is happening in the world. Such children will not be hopeless, because they will never relent, never give up, never stop working at what may appear to be the impossible task of restoring the earth.

overheards

mar: but he is british, ancestrally.
rem: oh, come on. he is british incestrally. his line has never been crossed non-anglically.

(overread? this is from email)

mar: can you make a rule in your LookOut that puts his email in a
separate folder?
steve: sure! my rule will just search for the keywords "Die", "Go to Hell", etc...

just a couple random thoughts

current favorite songs to play on my guitar: "a minor incident" by badly drawn boy and "making pies" by patty griffin. i can figure out the chords. i can sing the melodies. i just wish i knew how to make the songs actually sound like the songs. i asked my friends dave and geert (sp?) about this and they said, "just listen to the song." mmmm. i need a little more help than that. some things require helpful hints.

last night, sitting on the deck smoking a cigarette (??) with heather and reb and jeff and diana and a host of others, heather said, "what i wanted to say didn't quite come out right," referring to her toast. i said i thought her toast was great (about how excited she was for them and their adventure and that we'd all meet up again). she said, "what i meant though, is that maybe the house doesn't exist."

this is a probably "you had to be there moment," but i found this to be very profound and i understood it from my heart. we are all connected. with or without house.

lately a lot of people have been commenting on how beautiful my mother is. i have to agree. here's a sweet picture, tho a few years old now, of my mom and sister.

reb's looking up. jeff's looking forward.



last night was the official family going away dinner for jeff and rebecca. i've never seen such a wet house dinner. tears everywhere, perpetuated more by the men who kept trying to stand up to give toasts only to be overcome with emotion.

we always have "neat" people in the house. architects, musicians, painters, botonists, teachers, adventurers. we always have people who touch us, or who we realize (never too late) are part of our extended family. but then there are the exceptional who live here. who mark our lives. who change our lives. who somehow without even trying, make our lives and living situation better.

and that was jeff and rebecca.

there was the good bye dinner last wednesday for friends. and then there was the dinner last night, house only. and maybe it was that -- knowing that we were surrounded by only those who belonged to the hallowed establishment walls. or maybe it was the wine flowing freely. but probably it was the acknowledgment of two extraordinary people who have touched us all so deeply. and sweetly.

jeff and reb are off for an adventure. first a month traveling across the country to "catch a keely" (jeff's too-be neice who's due to debut in a week or two) and then to reb's family in mass. and then they are off to australia for a minimum of three months, but with hopes of down-under landscape architecture positions.

shane said, the world is small. even in australia you will only be a day away.

did you ever wonder where the term "sig alert" came from? i've always wondered this. and found out today it is unique to southern california (which surprised me.). this research was inspired by macker's site, saying "where technology and .... mmm... something else jacknife." and i thought, sig alert is more like it.