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“How will we know when it’s time to leave?” he asked. “There’s no clock. I don’t have a watch.”
As only a four-year-old could, she gave him a look that was half-frown, half-patient, and said, “Sand and magic.”
“You’re right,” he said, wondering when he’d stopped understanding gravity was magic.
I got this free downloadable coloring page from Easy Drawing SA. The hourglass came from a YouTube drawing tutorial.
From this wee book, I’ve found an opportunity to elaborate on my week’s theme: Time. Or rather, I’m letting a couple of poets do it for me. Right now, I seem to be letting others do the heavy lifting on most of my other social media. I’ll elaborate on that some other day so that I can revel in the delight today’s post provides me. I hope it adds something good to your day, as well.
I’ve never been better prepared by my past interests and my theme for this page. I LITERALLY followed directions.
poem
what time is it? it is by every star
a different time, and each most falsely true;
or so subhuman superminds declare
— not all their times encompass me and you:
when we are never, but forever now
(hosts of eternity; not guests of seem)
believe me, dear, clocks have enough to do
without confusing timelessness and time.
Time cannot children, poets, lovers tell —
Measure imagine, mystery, a kiss
— not though mankind would rather know than feel:
mistrusting utterly that timelessness
whose absence would make your whole life and my
(and infinite our) merely to undie
And this beautiful one, for which I’ll provide the lyrics, but also a moving rendition you might have seen in the film Four Weddings and a Funeral. Interestingly, the original version of this poem was written to be performed on stage in a play.
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.
He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.
The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.
A “mindful clock” reminds us to be in the moment.
Our sense of time is fluid because of our memories (e.g., either something happened that we’re remembering, or something happened that we fear could happen again). The moment it enters our thoughts, a memory turns us into time travelers. Sometimes that can be joyful, other times painful; sometimes comforting, other times agonizing. Mindfulness is not about forgetting or ignoring your memories or even your hopes and fears. Mindfulness simply provides the opportunity to be present in the current moment in a way that can refocus the brain from regret (about the past) or anxiety (about the future), for example.
Here’s a small excerpt using a life event from one of the characters in the Neverending Saga.
[He’d] never worn a watch. Even as a little kid, he’d had an adversarial relationship with watches, clocks, and possibly time in general. He was willing to adhere to most of the rules: bedtime; time to get up; be in your desk on time when the school bell rings; don’t keep parents, other family, and [teachers] waiting by being late.
[After the tragic loss of his parent,] he began to understand how distorted his perception of time could be. Some good things seemed to have happened long ago; bad things not only felt recent, but had such sharpness, rawness, that they seemed to happen again each time he thought of them, with the same impact.
Time, time, time
See what’s become of me
While I looked around for my possibilities
I was so hard to please
Look around
Leaves are brown
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter…
Just so you know, none of these watches work, and that’s fine. I’m sure most of the ones on the left have a story, but I either don’t know or remember those stories. From left to right on the rolling pin, they are my mother’s Mickey Mouse watch, and four of her “old lady” watches, at least a couple of which likely came from my father. Number six with the blue face has no numbers or hands and is more of a cuff bracelet, so I don’t know if it was ever really a watch.
The next five are my wristwatches. The first is one I bought in NYC at Macy’s when the one to its right (a gift from Tom) stopped working. Why buy a replacement battery when I could get a watch at a famous department store? Timmy went with me and picked it out. Those were my last two new watches before cell phones made them obsolete. The two to the right were my “old lady” watches, I guess, when I taught or worked in the corporate world. And that’s my Mickey Mouse graduate school watch finishing the row.
There’s a symmetry/balance in that row of Mother’s watches and mine.
The three in the shadowbox hang in the writing sanctuary now: the Spiro Agnew watch I got when he was still Nixon’s vice president; my bicentennial watch I received as a gift in 1976 from the woman and her husband who would later become my first mother-in-law (and stepfather-in-law); and my Red Ribbon watch I got in the first half of the 1990s when I was an AIDS caregiver and activist.
On the table, on the right, is a musical-themed brooch that also contains a once-functional watch, and to its left, a pendant watch on a chain (possibly a gift from my first husband? Or maybe Tom? I don’t know!). I once had another beautiful pendant watch given to me by a sweet boyfriend circa the eighth grade. A couple of years later, I had to change clothes before band practice in the women’s restroom at a different school. I set the watch on a sink and forgot it. It was probably less than ten minutes later when I raced back to the restroom, but it had been taken, and no one ever turned it in.
Over the next few days, we’ll see how I address this week’s theme: Time. Maybe I’ll tease you with some excerpts from the Neverending Saga.
I’ve heard it’s not “cool” to like Coldplay, but I always have, so I leave you with their song “Clocks,” the lyrics of which could easily have been written by one of my characters to his muse, his love, his obsession.
The lights go out and I can’t be saved
Tides that I tried to swim against
Have brought me down upon my knees
Oh, I beg, I beg and plead
Singin’ come out of things unsaid
Shoot an apple off my head
And a trouble that can’t be named
A tiger’s waiting to be tamed, singin’
You are…You are
Confusion that never stops
Closing walls and ticking clocks
Gonna come back and take you home
I could not stop that you now know
Singin’ come out upon my seas
Cursed missed opportunities
Am I a part of the cure
Or am I part of the disease? Singin’
You are…You are…You are
You are…You are…You are
And nothing else compares
Oh, no, nothing else compares
And nothing else compares
You are…You are
Home, home, where I wanted to go
Home, home, where I wanted to go
Home, home, where I wanted to go
Home, home, where I wanted to go
I’m glad I chose inspirations as this week’s theme on my most recent Sunday Sundries post because I feel like doing so has reminded me all week of people I know personally, along with so much music and other art, that have inspired me throughout my life. There’s a lot in the world I’m shutting out right now, or trying to, but I never want to be closed off from what inspires me.
Yesterday, while running a multitude of errands, I needed to go to Michael’s to look for something jewelry-related. They didn’t have it, but I did find something else that made me happy. Pictured are inexpensive, plastic steampunk-style buttons. I don’t need them as buttons and can probably clip off the backs of those that have them. I want them to use in art collages on canvas. This has been an idea that’s percolated for a couple of years after I found a Southwestern artist on Instagram whose work I admired. I shared her stuff with Lynne, and at that point, the two of us began talking about and gathering little items and objects for possible multimedia future projects.
Here, for example, are some smaller charms that I began buying as I found them.
Let me tell you, these things were relatively expensive compared to the buttons. The cost alone made me hesitate to get started without a clear vision. I wanted the chance to experiment without feeling like I’d wasted money.
After I bought the buttons, I came home with steampunk on my mind, set the buttons in front of me, and opened this coloring book. I’m not sure what it is about steampunk design, costume, and art that intrigues me. I don’t believe I’ve ever watched any of the movies or TV shows that I think it’s been used in (with the exception of one episode of “Gilmore Girls”).
Here’s what I colored.
Below are containers with more of the items I’ve accumulated through the years with an eye toward this project, some from Lynne and some from my mother-in-law from her craft supplies.***
These are reproduction vintage papers Debby gave me either for a birthday or Christmas one year. I’d like to find a way to use them, too, in this project.
***An entire section of this post vanished when it was published. I mentioned how Lynne and I have through the years gone antiquing and thrifting, sometimes together, sometimes solo. I used the fun of those times not between two friends in the Neverending Saga, but with a couple doing that as they’re falling in love. Their shared enthusiasm leads them to new people, to gifts they give to each other, as part of the stories they imagine, and on spontaneous adventures.
Current Photo Friday theme: Branches.
Mockingbird, March 2013.
On Instagram, I follow this guy I used to work with because he always has interesting photos and writing excerpts that he finds across the Internet and shares in his stories. There was one the other day that I REALLY liked, but trying to identify its origin or creator became problematic. I decided not to share it here because I can’t be sure of its correct attribution. Though I can’t show you what inspired me, it’s the reason I began to imagine what would happen if my characters left their pages to give me guidance and encouragement. Here’s how that looked for me (this is only the second page I’ve added to my coloring pages collection book in January, because the magical unicorns remain in their original book).
The background book drawing that I colored was a free download from Super Coloring. The male silhouette group was a free download from Frepik. The female silhouette group was a free download from Vecteezy. I’m grateful for creators who are generous with this kind of content and ask only for credit.
I copied and pasted actual text excerpts from several of the Saga novels to apply to the silhouettes. I don’t know which characters they’re supposed to be–well, maybe one of them, but the story that matches him hasn’t even been written yet–maybe it’ll show up in the eighth or ninth book. All the words are mine, so I only have to credit myself.
This became a good diversion today after I did a bunch of household stuff and dog stuff, ate a decent midday meal, had a shower, etc. (In another Instagram account I follow, periodically the content creator asks in her reels, Have you eaten today? Drunk your water? Taken your medications? It’s actually quite helpful sometimes to keep me on track!)
This post is my method of asking my characters to work their particular brand of magic and get me back to writing, please.
I can’t believe it’s been almost three years since I went to the fantastic Houston indie bookstore Kaboom Books. It may have been where I picked up this Joni Mitchell book.
Long before I lost a ton of albums in the Harvey flood, I had other albums that were water damaged from a leaking pipe in one of my graduate school-era houses. I’m not sure if I lost my Joni Mitchell albums then, or if I gave them away during one of several purges (I moved a LOT as a grad student, and purges were helpful). I had roommates over different times who were Joni fans, and very often, if I met someone who was passionate about an artist, I’d give them my vinyl.
Sidebar: My friend Ed was a huge fan of the band Chicago, and I had almost all of their albums on vinyl collected over many years. It was a pleasure to give him those albums, and it was even before he once let me drag him from church to help my brother move an insanely heavy sofa bed up some stairs and inside my new apartment, thereby giving me something to sleep on. A couple of years later, both Ed and his brother Joe were two of Tom’s groomsmen in our wedding (where my brother walked me down the aisle–I wonder if David and Ed remembered that damn sofa bed, which was so heavy that I left it in the apartment when I moved out!). The same year Tom and I married, Joe married my friend Susan, who I’d met when we both worked at the same horrible law firm during one of my grad school breaks (I introduced Susan and Joe, and they’re still going strong!). I wonder if Ed still has those Chicago albums. =)
Back to the subject of Joni. I don’t own any of her music now, but I stream her whenever I’m in the mood. The above two pages from the book got me into a deep dive of her relationship with James Taylor (the song “Blue,” lyrics shown here, is allegedly about him, and the sketch is also–allegedly!–of him).
All the relationships among the musicians of Laurel Canyon in the ’60s and ’70s are a frequent research topic because they include many of my favorite artists (and several of Joni Mitchell’s lovers). If I could get my head out of the terrible places current news takes me and write, I’m stalled in the middle of a chapter set in 1975, wherein a couple of good friends are trying to keep another friend away from that Laurel Canyon scene. It amuses me to write against my fascination with that time and those artists to keep myself from throwing my character to the wolves… or coyotes… “Coyote” is one of my personal favorite Joni Mitchell songs, one that’s allegedly about her relationship with the late playwright/actor/director/ screenwriter/author Sam Shepard.
Author Paul Lisicky, a writer whose work I always enjoy, and a contributor to our (as in Timothy J. Lambert and my) January 2014 anthology (11 years!) Foolish Hearts: New Gay Fiction, has a new book coming out, Song So Wild and Blue: A Life with the Music of Joni Mitchell (on sale February 25, 2025). I’m looking forward to reading this. As Harper Collins describes it, A guide to life that is part memoir, part biography, and part homage, Song So Wild and Blue is a joy for devoted Joni enthusiasts, budding writers, and artists of all stripes.
Musicians and writers and artists–they inspire me, and I’m still hopeful they’re the best antidote to the things that are currently overwhelming my voice and state of mind.
I’d have sworn I’ve used this book more than once on this site, but I could find only one instance back in September of 2019, which was of course before the world went into lockdown. I didn’t realize in those months of 2020, when my life altered so much (as did most people’s, worldwide), how an old companion of mine, Anxiety, came to stay. Even now, though I don’t navigate through the world quite the way I used to, I grapple with anxiety every day and do at least one thing that scares me.
I like the concept of “shrinking the wolf.” On this site, when I share a personal story and photos, or a bit of fiction, or lines of poetry, or a painting, even a coloring page, or post a photo on the Photo Friday site, or express a political opinion, I’m shrinking the wolf.
When I’m out of my comfort zone and out in the world (grocery store, drug store, bank, doctor’s office, retailer–it’s a small world!), I look for and try to extend only kindness (caveat: you would not believe this if you’re a passenger in my car, but none of my muttering is heard by its deserving recipients, so I give myself a pass).
It’s always reassuring how much kindness I’m given when I’m out and about. Kindness inspires me.
Whatever your fear is, today or any day, I hope you can shrink that wolf.
ETA: I got this book/journal in February of 2015, so this is officially the THIRD time I’ve posted it. I need to use it more often.
“Take care of this moment.” –Mahatma Gandhi
What inspires me:
The sight of blank canvases and paint.
Visualize what you’d put on your blank canvas in this moment.
