what secret purple wisdom?

A friend of a friend took these pictures. Me being a biology major and all - I have a special spot for the way living things work. From the lub-dub of the heart to the sporulation of microbes. So many things happening that we rarely think of - and so intricate and mysterious and amazing. Following is one of my favorite poems - I hope it helps express creations beauty to you...enjoy!


What Secret Purple Wisdom

What word informs the world,
And moves the worm along in his blind tunnel?
What secret purple wisdom fells the iris edges
To unfold in frills? What juiced and emerald thrill
Urges the sap until the bud resolves
Its tight riddle? What irresistible command
Unfurls this could above this greening hill,
Or one more wave – it’s spreading foam and foil –
Across the flats of sand? What minor thrust
Of energy issues up from humus in a froth
Of ferus? Delicate as a laser, it filigrees
The snow, the stars. Listen close – What silver sound
Thaws winter into spring? Speaks clamor into singing?
Gives love for loneliness? It is this
Unterrestrial pulse, deep as heaven, that folds us
In its tingling embrace, gongs in our echo hearts.

-Luci Shaw
(from the Angels of Light, Shaw Books, 2000)

du-du.du.du...du.du.du...du-du.du...

Thus is the sound of the ice-cream truck. It comes by, every night, at about 8:45 pm. Maybe some other night I'll get a better picture of it (I'm leery of using the camera out in my 'hood, I already stand out enough!) - I could use a better pic as I was just brainstorming a magical painting including it a few moments ago...that white blare at the top of the picture is actually a big fat florescent light...kinda like the one you might use to light the driveway at home out in the country. The light, combined with the music, combined with the hum of the music...mmm. It's something else. I generally don't mind it a bit.

For the past few weeks however, it's been extra amplified. The Ice Cream Truck usually stops across the street, on the corner. But our street as been half-way shut down due to a construction project (more of this later) and so now the ice-cream truck stops smack-dab in front of my kitchen window!

And on a night such as tonight...and every other night this week...when I've been madly trying to get my statistics work done...it's been quite bothersome. In part because of the distraction it causes - but I think mostly because it reminds me of the time (it always comes about 8:45). And each evening I've been ever so aware that I'm far behinder then I should be and that normally at 8:45 I'm usually winding down for the evening and doing something enjoyable.

You know, in Thailand, out in the rural parts...I once asked a few people what they did for fun. The question kinda bewildered them. Fun?! Free time? What is that? There eventual answer was that they sometimes went fishing on Sunday. It's not that they were so busy. But they had real work to do - and when it was done, they were tired. So do they fill the rest of their evenings with "fun"...no...they sit around (on bamboo floors of their hut) and talk. They couldn't stay up late into the night and finish their statistics homework if they wanted to! So I'm both blessed and cursed!

As I've been in the flurry of the statistics this week...I feel like I haven't had a chance to breath...Go to work, come home and do stat's until I go to bed (It's an online course, and I never do begin work on it until the week before...but I'm working 5 days a week now instead of 3 1/2 so that makes a big difference and last weekend was the art show.) I tried really hard to start doing it earlier - but there's just been so much going on! It's like a day is full...and passes. Then before I know it a week. And then I look back and the whole month has passed in a jiffy! Time is funny. It can both be so slow and so fast. Slow I think because you want to see results...so you yearn for the future when you can see something changed or see the fruits of your labor. And fast because once you really get rolling with something, you forget the passage of time - or you have too much to do and never fit it in.

I think I want to be living in the present. Both aware of the future and the past...but steadily living where I presently am. There's a point when you just have to be done with your work and sit on the floor of the bamboo hut - and there's another point where you discipline yourself and persevere. In both of them though it's important to stay grounded in what you're here for. Not just to work. Not just to have fun. But to go about your life in joy - accepting the present and stepping forwards.

I think at the moment, I'll accept my present fatigue and get some sleep. An early morning breakfast will give me a good few hours to finish my statistics before the test :)

<<< art show >>>

This Sunday was the art show. It's a good thing that I don't live in the same town as my Mom - because that would have made for a difficult Mother's Day! (Latinos actually always celebrate Mother's Day on May 10th...so their official holiday was last Thursday.)

Anyhow...the art show was a success! There was a good turn out of all sorts of people. We got everything done in time. There was also a short movie showing at the opening, which went over really well.

The movie was a short documentary made by a group member, Daniel, who's attending film school. It was a piece done on his younger half-brother who never had a dad in his life and is now a new dad himself at 20-years-old. It was a really amazing, intimate look into the feelings his brother had. Afterwards Daniel answered some questions and it was amazing to hear the reconciliation and communication that was opened up in his family through making the movie.

I did end up putting in my series of paintings on displaced people...I titled them "dis(PLACED) people" I got some positive comments on them during the show. (Aunt Pam - you should recognize the animals!) I'm really looking forward to the July 1st show - we're doing it around the theme of "liberation." It should be really good!

This week is very busy - I have a statistics test which I didn't get to spend any time preparing for this past weekend because the art show took up so much preparation time!

I still need to share some info from the conference I attended too. On Monday, while I was teaching one of my 7th grade classes I added in some information on trafficking, prostitution, and trafficking - some important things about those issues that the kids need to be aware of...it was cool to be able to have that platform!

"So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus, himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built into it for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit." Ephesians 2:19-22

catching up...

Time lapses and then I feel like I have to catch up and then more time lapses and I don't blog current thoughts because I feel like I have to catch up the missed sections - but, I'm just going to start from scratch...because I keep missing the ability to add quirky little tidbits of life...such as the afternoon that I laughed at the tiny chihuahua hanging out of the window of a huge truck...or the fantastic dinosaurs that my neighbor kids drew - joys such as this that soon pass out of memory.

This weekend I've been working on painting. Next Sunday is the opening to the first art show that I've ever taken part in. It's quite exciting. It's really neat to be part of LA Street Productions, it's a really cool group of people from my neighborhood. I feel a lot of pressure about the show. It's just nervous picking something that you think is showable. In order to live up to my standards it needs to be aesthetically pleasing as well as thoughtful.
I've been working on a four painting series around the notion of displaced peoples. I'm not sure if that's what I'll end up including...we'll see.

I think that's all I'll write for now...I do need to catch up from last weekend, I attended a conference on child sexual exploitation and trafficking that I'd like to share about...but my brain doesn't have the thought capacity at the moment :)