Canvases for Art

Isn't it a wonderful blessing how many aspects of life provide opportunities to insert your personal signature/stamp? Paradoxically, I also believe there is nothing new under the sun, but I can subscribe to limitless variations on a theme. I think we're all capable of multiple variations of 'newness' and having physical space upon which to illustrate those variations is vital. Consider:

The Physical:

• the walls of your home and their decor
• the dishes and flatware you eat with each day
• your office knickknacks

Recently, I've considered adorning a blank wall of my closet (not enough depth to hang clothes on, yet mocking me with it's bareness...hah! closet puns: bare :) with small frames of inspiring pictures. Perhaps I'd be more inclined to take a few extra steps with work attire if my closet urged me to look my best despite any daily grind.

The Virtual

• your email background and/or signature
• blogs, facebook, twitter, myspace, etc. themes
• avatars in forums/chatrooms

I recently updated my twitter page to coordinate with this blog's color scheme and imaging. Such fun for no cost! Another cool addition was when Sting decided to follow ME on twitter!! Be still my beating heart. No, I don't think this makes me special in any way other than I was one of the first to follow him and he's reciprocating in kind...but as of this posting, only 70ish folks in the world can claim that THEE STING follows their Twitter feed. Or as my dad would call it "fluttering" or "social nitwitting". Love you, Daddy!

The Epidermal

• your wardrobe
• tattoos. I love how we can use our bodies as a canvas!
• piercings

Even in the places most folks may not regularly notice or view, we can be creative in our expression (toe polish color selection, under-garments - 'holy' or otherwise, ink strategically inserted above the sleeve line...) All options for artistic assertion!

Last blog entry, I shared my Moleskine journal adornments. This falls into the last of my classifications, the lump-sum category:

The Unusual

• the inside of a high school locker - may be long forgotten, but we each had our imprint back in the day
• journals - why the heck not? I fell into this b/c my cardboard cahier looked so forlorn all empty and brown
• modes of transportation, after a certain age, become ripe for sticker placement

To the latter point, I offer two quick stories.

1) My first car was a 1974 shit brown Chevette. Manual transmission. $1000 back in 1991. I LOVED this car and called it (based on color alone) my Shitvette. B/c no one was ever going to be bidding high dollars to obtain this vehicle in the future, I slathered it with stickers, joking that they were holding the beast together. My Dad built me wood speaker boxes, and I had the backseat permanently laid down, speaker boxes close to the front blaring cassette versions of the Pixies, Husker-Du and Echo and the Bunnymen. That thing was the bomb, until it literally bombed on a night drive home from college freshman year; leaving me to stand roadside on I-4 holding the back of a car visor with the words"PLEASE GET HELP". I had to take a ride from a fortuanately kind stranger to the nearest gas station so I could call home. Two weeks later, I was given my first cell phone (the size of a boombox and for emergency purposes only as it was crazy expensive) and my mom's Corisca. That car, I did not love; but I loved the price (free to me, thank you parental units), and I was thankful to be mobile.

2) One of this past weekend's chores included "back-to-blacking" my Jeep Cherokee bumpers. I adore my 1999 purple Jeep Cherokee, but the sun has faded her hind and front ends and this product promises a color restoration. B/c she is 10 years old, I told myself it would appropriate to institute beloved-car policy and apply stickers. After reblacking her bumps, I went protesting by way of bumper stickers. The Cherokee looks great! Black backsides, political grafitti for folks to read in DC traffic. What more could a fool ask for? perhaps a camera that take clearer pictures...nevertheless I offer you these as evidence of my most recent canvassing efforts. On which medium will you share your signature statements with the world?

Fire Chronicles

I have been a journal writer since my pre-teen years. Journaling is not often an every day thing, but I do so love to go to a coffee shop and put pen to paper. Over time, the journals themselves changed along with my age and interests; from flowery hardbacks with lock and key, to simple spirals, to Mead composition books, to leather bound works of art. Regardless of what journal version I may be using at the moment, I have never been able to pass by a selection of blank books without stopping to touch and examine each one. I've been like this with school and office supplies, planners, basically anything paper-based and organizationally-purposed. It's a sickness.

For our wedding, the items I may have spent the largest total of time on were the invitation and program. HOURS were invested choosing card stock, font, swirl size, inserts, tassels and more. It was a delicious agony I dragged on as long as possible. The husband was kind and smart enough to let me have sole control of those decisions :)

Lately, I've come to a rather surprising acceptance of using just one kind of journal for both personal and professional jottings. Moleskine has been my go-to for the past three years! I still sneak over to the blank book aisle of any bookstore I frequent, but I don't buy unless it's a Moleskine. For work, I prefer the original black leather bound "ruled notebook, large". Wonderful elastic cord closure, 180 pages, pocket in back, sturdy cover, very classy looking.

For personal musings, I've been smitten with Moleskine's "set of 3 cahier -kraft-, large". These are soft brown, light brown cardboard covers with 90 pages each. What I love most is that they are so portable and customizable! That cardboard cover is just itching to be decorated. While I can't say I've ever bedazzled a cahier (or an anything), I have definitely taken cards, quotes, stickers and other ephemera from events or places I've enjoyed and slathered the covers with same. It's such fun to pull out of my bag a book whose front page speaks to where I am right now. Here is a picture of my current cahier (pronouced KAI-YAY; it's french for notebook). I've only written about 1/2 way through it, but the covers are almost fully coated in thises and thats of interest.

This Friday, September 4th, I am starting a yoga teacher training program at pure prana yoga studio. I'm very excited to learn more about this practice I've been digging into for the last several whiles. I've ordered my books, but had not yet aquired any 'supplies' until today. I made a new cahier 3-pack purchase and have adorned one as my designated teacher training journal. The end result is viola! It kai-yay takes your breath away...Calgon, don't be jealous.

National Yoga Month

National Yoga Month is almost here! I've always liked September: new school season with fresh supplies, my birthday, the start of fall and crispy air one can both feel and smell. Now there's another reason to appreciate September. Several large corporate sponsors including Lucy and YogaFit, along with hundreds of yoga studios across the country, are partnering to share the benefits of yoga with the masses.

Perhaps the best short-term benefit is the opportunity for a WEEK of FREE YOGA! Hopefully, for anyone new to this amazing mind-body activity, this open access will foster a long-term love affair with the practice. For me, I'm taking advantage of the free week to try out a new-to-me studio in my area. Click here for more information on the studios participating in your area, and to sign up for your free week of yogamazing movement.

September also purports the beginning of yoga teacher training! I've narrowed down my options to two incredible studios and will submit apps mid-August. I'm excited and a tad trepidatious. My increasing flexibility is not shielding me (completely) from my inner klutz. Tonight, after a yoga class no less, I thrust myself onto the bed for a good read. Minutes later when I went to roll over onto my back, I could not. In my eagerness to literally jump into bed, I'd pulled something along my hip and had to crawl to the loo for pain meds leftover from an earlier foot injury.

As I type, I'm loosened up on 1/2 a percocet and a fistfull of icy-hot. Better living through chemistry is what my mom always says. I trust that with a good night's sleep and a repeat of the half pill, fistfull routine, I'll be able to go back to my other routine of oh...walking upright. I haven't determined the proper script to allievate the klutz in me. But more yoga can only help, so I'll be back at it manana. Even if my tomorrow's practice begins and ends in easy pose.

Pavers on the Path to Glory

Walking the National Mall is an item on the AblazeyDaisy Do list. I didn't want to just go to the Mall and stroll by select momuments, but rather walk around its full circumference. You know, for exercise and something to do unique for this area. I did this a few weekends ago, and took several pictures along the way.

I'm sure tourists and locales alike thought I was a crazed lady or at least had a penchant for poo as I bent down to take this lovely.

I thought it so oddly (and unfortunately) appropriate that the majority of the 'road' to momuntalism was literally paved with waste. There were dozens of Canadian geese hanging out by the reflection pool. And it seemed that they, and all their molt and anal seepage had been unattended for a looooong time.

note the dried up corners up the Reflection Pool and the gathered nasty of molted feathers.

Today, I was searching the web for some professional pics of 2009 DC Yoga Week's cumulation on the Mall. I attended that event, and the MC promised pics. I've yet to uncover them. My searching did lead me to this article from South Carolina's paper The State, confirming my witness. The National Mall is in dire straights. I love that the public gets to play on and enjoy the Mall. I think it's cool that these geese have a place to rest, feed and swim.

But shouldn't some of our Parks and Recreation tax dollars be allocated to the maintenance and preservation of our Nation's Capitol? Seeing as how some of these birds have passed on due to botulism contracted by the very waters in which Forrest Gump waded (not to mention the hundreds of thousands of real people who visit the Reflecting Pool each year and no doubt dip their piggies in), I think there is probable cause for tossing a few Stimulus Package dollars DC's way.

Yes my friends, our National treasures are in need of a spruce. Or at the very least a scat squad to pick up after our Capitol's 'pets', who ironically are from Canada.

August AHA! Moment

Day 2 of the new month, and I'm actually excited about August! For me, this is a big thing. I'm not a huge warm weather person. One would think that growing up in Florida, I'd be not only used to but perhaps even immune to the heat and humidity. One would think wrong. I high tailed it out of the Florida heat as soon as life allowed me. Of course, I ended up in another swampland, the DC metro area. But this swamp comes complete with seasons, which I la la love!

Nevertheless, August here is the thick of summer heat, and I'm usually spending most of my days trying to cool my overactive sweat glands indoors. Not this month! I've got plans galore, and I'm ready to get raring on them.

Concerts: Pat Benatar/Blondie/The Donnas at the outdoor Wolf Trap venue, Kasey Chambers and Shane Nickolson at Birchmere (see #14 of link).

Vacations: Back to Florida to celebrate Dad and Grandma's birthdays (she's turning the big 9-0!), a solo vacay driving to upstate NY for the Being Yoga Conference and visiting close girlfriends in Connecticut and NYC.

More Free Time: The Husband is putting the finishing touches on his Masters thesis even while I type. Once he submits that puppy, I plan to howl at the moon. He'll be around more with less stress. YEE-HAW! I'm so proud of him. And there's so much to do around here For our upcoming August pleasures: drum circle and outdoor yoga in Malcolm X park, Screen on the Green at National Mall, author talks on climate change at Busboys & Poets, First Thursdays in Del Ray, hoop dance in Rosslyn, local, organic food fare for DC Restaurant Week...and besides the restaurant week dinner, have I mentioned that all this is FREE!

So the A-HA moment is this: I don't have to have an entire month of lovelies planned out to take advantage of right now. I happen to be really excited about the future. But even when that's not the case, all I can really count on is the now. I can make this moment its very best with my attitude and outlook. Even if I'm not in tip-top shape or absolutely adore how my bum looks in summer shorts (too often a key factor of my mind-set). This moment isn't coming back. I can either embrace it with the same adoration I'd use for a full champagne flute, or I can use it to flop prone on the futon with the a/c kicking into overdrive. Either way, soon the moment will be gone. In which state of mind would I prefer to spend this precious time?