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Good morning, sunshine!

March 6, 2018March 6, 2018Balance, Life, UncategorizedLeave a Comment

It’s been a while! I keep waiting for something to want to be written, but feel that one month after returning from India and one week before returning to work, I might need to force the issue.

I have been a hermit. Not a depressed hermit, nor a sad or lonely one. Just one who is totally content to rearrange the furniture before decluttering the bookshelf and then cooking dinner or taking a walk and happily crawling into bed at 9 o’clock. The past couple of weeks have been chilly in LA and I am happy to blame the dampness, the need to wear a sweater, and the desire to drink tea all day for my lack of blogging, but really that all adds up to perfect writing weather. So, what’s up?

I returned from India just in time to celebrate the Lunar New Year of the Earth Dog in Downtown LA’s Chinatown, something which, as a March born Aries, always sets me up for my own personal, fast approaching new year. With the first part of 2018 under my belt, where are things flowing and where do adjustments need to be made?

Something clicked in India and I have had a hard time writing about it and summing it up into words. Hence the lack of blogging? It wasn’t conscious or literally related to India and no experience there was directly responsible, but I returned to my life feeling and seeing clearer than I can remember ever feeling or seeing.

Midlife; when the Universe grabs your shoulders and tells you “I’m not f-ing around, use the gifts you were given.”

-Brené Brown

This clarity led to a couple of weeks of real physical and mental discomfort as patterns, habits, relationships, and ideas that no longer served me were illuminated and then removed. I can only describe it as feeling like the birth canal we all must go through to get to the light. Within this period, which came between the eclipses of January 31 and February 15, I was woken in the middle of the night by a literal earthquake centered in Silver Lake, (only 2.9, but that is strong enough when it’s under your house!), a necklace I haven’t taken off for over two years literally detached itself from my neck and fell off while I was standing still (I’ve always heard that when you break a necklace or a mirror it is the end and beginning of a seven year cycle of karma), I broke a pitcher and my tea kettle on the same day, and the list goes on and on.

And then I woke up one morning and it was all clear. Things I have been working on or trying to “figure out” (ha, when has that ever happened?!) suddenly became clear. Puzzle pieces clicked into place. Words I’d said or thoughts I’d thought suddenly had the power of knowing in my gut to back them up.

Was it India with its ingrained spirituality which, even if that’s not why you go there or what you are seeking, permeates the air, water, and people and gets into your bones? Was it being away from everything familiar and therefore seeing that which can so easily be overlooked? Was it just time? Was it grace? Or the eclipses? Who knows?! Some combination of all of the above. All I know is that it’s all good and that there is no escaping your wake up call when the Universe deems you ready. So, get ready!

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Home Sweet Home

October 22, 2014October 22, 2014Food, Life, UncategorizedLeave a Comment

There is no lovelier time than October in New Mexico. Really, October anywhere is pretty great, but it seems especially beautiful in the high desert.
As I put gluten free, pumpkin almond brownies in the oven, the doors are open, and the World Series is about to come on. It’s good to be home.

GF Pumpkin Almond Brownies
Ingredients:
1C Almond butter, chunky
11/4 C pumpkin purée
2 eggs plus one yolk
1/3 C date syrup ( I sub agave nectar)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 Tablespoon cinnamon
1 C chocolate chips
Directions:
Mix almond butter and pumpkin until smooth. Add rest of ingredients and mix. Pour into greased 8×8 or 9×9 baking pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 -30 minutes or until toothpick inserted into center, comes out clean. Cool all the way or even refrigerate.
Credited to McKenna Barlow

Burque

June 1, 2014blah blah blah, Life, UncategorizedLeave a Comment

I’ve been diggin’ my town lately. Albuquerque. From the outside, it could easily be mistaken for a brown, desert city, full of strip malls. A city notorious for being at the top of lots of bad lists and at the bottom of most good ones. A city that periodically has ‘dust’ as the forecast in the weather app on my phone. A city that many know only because of its connection to “Breaking Bad.”

But, it’s a city that has a true identity as well, one that I take for granted and then miss when I’m away. Around the Bosque, along the Rio Grande, there is a connection to the land I don’t find in many cities. I wake to a rooster crowing, even though I live downtown. On the weekend, I have my pick of either the farmer’s market at 8th and Central on Saturdays, or at the Railyard, in the Barelas neighborhood, on Sundays. There is vibrant music and arts scene, in part made possible because of the low cost of living.

Having grown up in Santa Fe, Albuquerque’s more precious neighbor to the north, I’m relieved by the realness found in Burque. I live in the old Victorian neighborhood which butts up against Old Town, Downtown, and in which contemporary lofts are constantly popping up. There is a mishmash here that I find appealing.

There are times that Albuquerque’s inherent funkiness drives me slightly bonkers and I just want things to function smoothly, safely, and properly; but, without a doubt, I know that the reason I live here, and in New Mexico, is because anything too obvious or normal bores me immediately.

February 4, 2014February 6, 2014Balance, Life, Travel, Uncategorized, Work, WritingLeave a Comment

There was a book I loved as a child, about a gypsy caravan. Though I have forgotten most of it, including the title, I still remember the line “gypsies only come to go away”.

I was enamored with the idea of traveling with ones tribe and house, always waking at “home”. It was the beginning of my love of Airstreams, Volkswagon campers, and it apparently led me straight into wardrobe trailers. But, after spending the better part of a decade living out of suitcases and hotel rooms, the allure of the road began to wane.

Instead of feeling that I always woke at “home”, I found the opposite was true. Even when I was there geographically, my routines and habits were a confused jumble. I took this as normal until last year when, after taking several months off to try to develop a routine, I realized that jumble was a choice I was making.

I’ve spent the past six months slowly unraveling the knot and am just now able to see the progress I’ve made. Maybe it took heading on the road recently, staying on couches, and in friend’s apartments, to become more certain of my need to create a grounded and stable life that doesn’t depend on that excitement to keep it afloat.

Over the past few months I’ve worked to develop not only daily routines, but closer relationships with people who live near and far, and a stronger reliance on my own inner compass to keep me grounded. For years, I used being on the road as an excuse to not do the work all of this entailed until, one day, I looked around and realized my laziness was helping to create a life I didn’t enjoy.

I know that there is some type of adventuring free-spirit inside of me that certain parts of my career and lifestyle benefit and I know that I am not cut out for a 9-5 existence. But, I also know that gypsy needs to take a backseat for a while, look for an Airstream to park in the driveway as a guesthouse instead, and unpack the suitcase.

As I sit in LA, I dream of the snow falling at home, of the first smells of spring when that snow begins to melt, and of the routines I’ve developed well enough in the last few months to miss.