I will send a gift (Handmade or not) to the first 5 people who leave a comment on this post requesting to join this PIF exchange. I don't know what that gift will be yet, but you will receive it within 365 days. The only thing you have to do in return is "pay it forward" by making the same agreement on your blog-and do something selfless for a few ( Read more... )

"When I got to New Mexico, that was mine," Georgia O'Keeffe said in 1977. "As soon as I saw it, that was my country. I'd never seen anything like it before, but it fitted to me exactly. It's something that's in the air, it's different. The sky is different, the wind is different. I shouldn't say too much about it, because other people may be ( Read more... )

"Last night I slept in sheets the color of fire / tonight I lie alone again and curse my own desires / sentenced first to burn and then to freeze / and watch by the window / where the boys grew in the trees" -Carly Simon, "Boys in the Trees"

Hiking Tesuque Creek-hot desert summer afternoons, appreciating the way my body's sweat acts like a swamp ( Read more... )

Surprise? (Probably not.) I am having serious thoughts about going back to school for Conservation Biology/Ecology or Environmental Science. It's still entirely an idea, as I'm trying to sort out the logistics and thoughts of where to go/how the hell will I pay for this?/am I really going to subject myself to four more years of college?/a student ( Read more... )

A visit to Arizona always leaves a taste bittersweet, like lemon meringue. Memories stack up on top of each other until they're toppling over. The highway has carved its map into my bones, and the hours give me time for singing, thinking, and remembering. I see a sign for St. Johns, and I think, “Peggy was born there.” Passing Gallup, I think of ( Read more... )

Things I did this weekend: (not in chronological order)

Had a piano lesson with Peter.

Brushed horses.

Started reading a book by Craig Childs.

Finished freelance article.

Watched the weather go through all four seasons in a single day.

Had impromptu drum set lesson with Boyfriend.

Spent lots more time with Boyfriend.

Watched "The Science of Sleep" (during ( Read more... )

...there is something absolutely ambrosial about waking up to sunlight falling in golden flickers, delighting tulips shot through with red and orange, wandering down a hill to visit with sheep and little black lambs, chucking sweetly-scented hay out of the back of a rickity old Ford pickup for donkeys and horses, and then sitting down with a cup of ( Read more... )

Today as I walk I feel a "fuck you" in the curves of my hips, the look on my face, the color and shape of my eyes, and the sway of my hair. "Fuck you" in each step, in my smile-sun glinting off teeth, a grin that's almost a sneer. "Fuck you" in the grace of my neck and the straightness of my back, the long slope of my nose and pout of my lower lip.

( Read more... )

The sun rose this clear morning to cold and aggressive winds. I wriggled deeper into my clean turquoise sheets, so comfortable in my little cocoon that I didn’t want to get up. It’s so quiet in my house right now: no frisky white dog bursting into my room to nose and lick my hand as it hangs out from under the covers; no sound of my housemate ( Read more... )

Landslide, deluge, rabbit-like. A plan rehashed when Jewel said, "We should travel together sometime soon." And I said, "Well, there's always Puerto Rico this summer."

This is going to happen.

The ocean is already dancing in front my eyes, palm fronds teasing my sunburned skin. Girl whose eyes match the sea. I have so much coming up in the next few ( Read more... )