April is the Cruellest Month

This year, Eliot is right about our weather in MN. I find spring in general particularly cruel since I can no longer ski, but the roads are still too gritty/icy for me to ride my bike safely. This spring is taking its sweet time to unfurl and, at least here in this northern 'burb, the birds have not yet heralded its arrival. It's a silent spring, but the squirrels are enjoying the errant bird seed, and doing what squirrels do this time of year, which is make more squirrels.

It's a hard time for the winter-lover's mind, especially for those of us who endeavor to live in the moment. I try to find things to like about this in-between season, but I can't conjure much. In a way, spring is the bookend to fall, and since I adore that season, I tried to convince myself that I could enjoy the same things about this season. Unfortunately, my mind is not easily distracted with such sleight of hand. The average temperature is about the only thing that fall and spring have in common. Fall is crisp, spring is damp. Think of those two words: crisp/damp. Which one is more appealing? And the sun, when filtered through changing leaves, or even dancing around dead leaves blowing on the ground, seems somehow more like a warm glow, as opposed to the rays of the spring sun, which blaze down in blinding white oppression.

Maybe it's a failure of my attempt at living in the moment. No matter how hard I try to enjoy the cool air and appreciate the lack of insects, I can't shake the realization that winter is going away and the days are getting longer.  Summer is inevitable. And with the long days comes the end of cozy tea-fueled nesting, reading, creating, and dreaming. These are things best done in the dark months. The summer sun invites us outdoors, which is where we should be, tending to other living, thriving things.

Everything has its season. Be here now.

NANOWRIMO

Maybe I won't exactly finish a novel this month, but I did take the opportunity to start on my next one. Due to popular demand, I am going to try to continue the story of Maggie and company. The working title of this one is Winter at the Weir Farm. It's both exciting and daunting to embark on another novel, but the time seems right and the ideas are coming, so I look forward to seeing what evolves. Thanks to everyone who read Dog Days and for the encouragement to keep going with the characters from that book. Happy NaNoWriMo, everyone!

Simplify

While perusing one of the few big box bookstores that still remains in these parts, I noticed that there seems to be a trend afoot in the magazine world (yes, magazines, those archaic paper things that are rumored to be dying) toward a rustic, reminiscent, back-to-the-land, hands-on crafty lifestyle. I find it particularly interesting that these are physical magazines and not just online products (though they all do seem to have corresponding blogs and Pinterest accounts). My theory is that as a result of becoming inundated with technology at every turn, we yearn for something simpler, more tactile, in a sense, more real. These magazines create dreamworlds that we can insert ourselves into when the beeps and pixels start to overwhelm us. Some of the notable ones I've run across are The Simple Things, a magazine which accomplishes what Real Simple probably wanted to be, before it became another medium for ad copy passed off as journalism. There is also Land Scape and the confusingly similar in title and content Land Love. It's obvious that people are seeking a connection with nature, either because of our reliance on technology or because so many of us live in cities and have physically moved so far away from what we normally associate with the natural world. So we start a backyard garden, or chicken coop, or beehive in an effort to reconnect with that essence of who we really are as a species. We are realizing that we do not and cannot exist separate from the Earth and the rest of its inhabitants. Even if we manage to exist on fake food and spend all of our time indoors, eventually our inner selves crave that natural connection to where we came from and where we are returning to.
In a way, I think that our popular culture obsessions with zombies and post-apocalyptic scenarios are also a response to the way our lives have become complicated and sped up. Even in our nightmares, we dream of a world where technology has lost its mojo and life is reduced to the simplest of needs: food, water, survival.
We live in interesting times, where it sometimes seems as if we are seeking balance on a ball that keeps moving faster than we can find equilibrium. The interesting thing about that is that we simply need to remind ourselves that we can hop off the ball at any time.

Stolen Time

 Having Mondays off still feels somehow illicit to me. I don't know if I will ever feel otherwise. I sort of hope not, because there is a delicious pleasure to be gleaned from slipping away from the city on a weekday that is not in the middle of vacation season. The roads are free of traffic. Everything seems quieter and slower.

What's even better is to have a partner with whom to enjoy these exquisite moments. I am lucky enough to have that as well.

Today we ventured East to the St. Croix river valley. It is one of those fall days where the sky is overcast, but not so much that the sun doesn't shout out once in awhile from the cozy blanket of clouds to illuminate the salmon, vermillion, tangerine, chartreuse and lemon-hued leaves. The fall colors do not appear to be daunted by this year's drought. Or if they are, then the blasts of brightness they provide is sufficient to awe me, anyway, into forgetting any other fall that may have outdone this one.

We were eager to check out a place that was new to us-- the appropriately-named Pleasant Valley Orchard. We were pleased indeed to be greeted, not by a crush of humanity looking for parking spaces, as has been my weekend experience with other local orchards, but a quiet crunch of gravel under the tires as we pulled right in front of the red barn.

A smattering of oversized squash lay on the grass, next to a charming hay wagon filled with big orange pumpkins, and a crate full of pale white pumpkins. It was the goldilocks of squash display-- neither too many to overwhelm, nor so few that it felt sparse. They looked radiant lying there in the sunlight. So I asked my sweetie to lie down next to them for a photo. Lucky for me, he's game for such spontaneity, and the picture turned out great.

I started looking through the bin of white pumpkins for something that would make a nice companion to the mums I bought last week for the front steps, when my sweetie uttered something that made my head swivel away from the pumpkins. "Goats!"

Sure enough, inside a small pen next to the little red barn were three goats. One white, one black and one brown. We made a quick beeline for the critters, as we've both become fascinated with them ever since we saw a series of you tube videos featuring talking and fainting goats. While reading a biography of Teddy Roosevelt, my sweetie even found a phrase that somehow has gone out of vogue, and that we like to resurrect whenever possible: "more fun than a goat."

We did not feed them, since a nearby sign implored us to leave them to their vet-approved diet, but they were chewing on something, so any begging they did through the fence was purely for extra snacks. We got close enough to look into those crazy goat eyes. What a creature.

After wandering around a little bit, taking some shots of the crazily photogenic apples bursting out of the trees, and watching a bird of prey soar over the river valley, we decided on some treats to take home. The turnover and caramel apple, however, were never meant to make it to the car.

Happy trails! I raise my glass of cider to illicit Monday adventures.

Restoration

Just spent a lovely weekend retreat at the Audubon Center of MN near Sandstone. It was only a few miles off the interstate, but the mental distance from the buzz of the crowds was much greater. I attended a Loft writers' conference on nature and environmental writing. It was much more informative than I could have imagined. This conference had my favorite kind of workshops, where there was no journaling, writing, practicing or otherwise empty time. The sessions I attended were packed full of useful, inspiring information by successful, experienced writers and editors. Kudos to the Loft for creating such a great gathering!

Thanks to this weekend, I have started considering the possibility of doing some magazine writing. It makes perfect sense to write the type of thing I love to read. It just took awhile for me to come around to that obvious fact. The weekend workshops demystified the whole query process for me, which was a major stumbling block. Sometimes you can't learn all you need from reading, it actually helps to talk to people!

So I'll dig out the articles I wrote for the Yoga Center magazine over the past couple years and try to cobble together some sort of portfolio to get the ball rolling.


I'm already seeing stories everywhere.

My book is now on Amazon! You can actually search for me or for the title and it comes right up! Wow. If you really put your mind and effort into something, you can achieve it. I dare you to try!

bARTer

I was down a rabbit hole on Amazon last night, which started with me looking up the book "Twelve by Twelve"- an account of a man who lived in tiny cabin in the woods. I ordered it from the library, but I'm number 22 in line, so I may not get to read it for awhile. That book led to "Possum Living" which was written in 1978 by an 18 year-old woman who lived off the grid with her father in rural PA. I spent about an hour reading what I could on Amazon. Then I ended up looking at a slew of other books about simple living, including a new John Robbins book about how to deal with living in new economic circumstances. The preview function in Amazon can be an incredible time suck, but it is a useful tool in determining whether to buy a book.

After the Amazon research, I realized I had two credits at Audible that I still needed to use. In the new releases I found the book "What's Mine is Yours" which I remember hearing about on NPR recently. It looks at the rise of social media and the explosion of sharing, bartering, co-owning and freecycling. It immediately got me to thinking: how could I work out a barter system for yoga? I know that many people love yoga, but cannot afford to spend $12-17 for each class. I was one of those people. I took community ed yoga in order to have a regular class at an affordable price, but it was taught on a carpeted floor of an elementary school hallway-- a far cry from the gleaming hardwood floors, surround sound and showers of places like Core Power. "You get what you pay for" is what came to mind.

There has to be a way to give people a satisfying yoga experience without the expense. I think barter may be a solution. Almost everyone has something they can offer, even if they aren't aware of it. I am going to ponder this a bit more and try to figure out a way to work out a system for providing yoga without emptying pocketbooks.

Namaste,
Kate

Upper Midwest Summer Vacations

The above shot is from my three-day weekend visit to Madeline Island. Look at that water! Lake Superior is surely superior to any other lake. And to add to the attraction, it was actually warm enough to swim in! At least this summer, in Chequamegon bay. I visited the North Shore (Gooseberry Falls and Grand Marais, MN) a couple weeks later, and the water temp was a little numbing. But I did manage to float for a second before escaping back to agate beach to let my legs regain sensation. On the plus side, the MN visit afforded a fabulous view of the milky way and AT THE SAME TIME, a splendid light show from a storm raging over northern WI across the lake. Nature is just filled with wondrous surprises if we just go outside once in awhile.

Dog Days at the Weir Farm has finally been unleashed upon the world. After some attempts at traditional publication methods (a.k.a. collecting rejection letters from literary agents), I thought the timing may be good to try this new e-book publishing gambit. The idea of self-publication is losing much of the stigma that used to be associated with "vanity presses" as more and more authors are publishing their work directly and cutting out the middleman.

I did some research and decided upon Lulu.com as my e-publisher. The interface was very intuitive, and the time involved to upload and get the e-book available for sale was an hour or two max. In full disclosure, I must admit that I spent many hours in Adobe Illustrator and InDesign making the book look nice, but this was all part of my graphic design education,  and I used my book design as my final projects for those classes. There is great satisfaction in having created the book entirely on my own, from conception, to typing, to editing, to layout, to cover design, to uploading and now marketing. I am at last able to breathe the big sigh of relief and say I DID IT!

Thanks much to my fabulous writing group, The Desperadoes, whose motto is: "Genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent desperation."


I can't wait to see where the future of publishing goes. We live in exciting and fast-moving times. This can be good or bad, depending on your point of view. Personally, I am looking forward to discovering a whole world of creativity that otherwise would not have been made available to the world.

Woo hoo!

Simply Living

I've been finding inspiration all over the place for my new obsession of living simply. I haven't embraced it in my own life yet, aside from combining my bedroom and office into one small room in my house, but I'm looking forward to purging stuff that I don't need and making do with much less. Maybe it was the Tumbleweed Tiny House site that first got me hooked on the idea, or visiting Thoreau's cabin several years ago.  In any case, I think that nothing but good can come of this. Do we own our stuff, or does our stuff own us?

Could you live with just 50 things? Everett Bogue of The Art of Being Minimalist has done just that. I probably have over 50 things just related to nordic skiing! Not to mention cycling, camping, kayaking, yoga...


How much is enough?


To paraphrase Thoreau: To be happy, do not add to your possessions, but subract from your desires.
I think he may have been on to something.
The Journey of a Walk Across America is a blog by a man who is walking from NY to OR and pushing his belongings in a modified jogging stroller. He carries two books with him and when he finishes one, he trades it for a new one.

If you need suggestions on how to incorporate simplicity into your daily life, a little at a time, visit
 Zen Habits

Living small doesn't mean living without style. Check out some gorgeous homes made from recycled materials at Tiny Texas Houses and find out how best to appoint your tiny abode at Apartment Therapy

A May bouquet to brighten your day!

The month of writing and guitar is going swimmingly. And I mean this literally, since it's been rainy for the majority of the first two weeks of this month. The weather has been cooperating with my intentions for indoor activities. But today the sun is back out, and it's time to get back outside for a bit. Before I do that, just wanted to share the latest update in the writing life. I have submitted my first piece for publication! It's an interview/article I wrote for the Yoga Center of Minneapolis' newspaper on Equestrian Yoga. Look for it at the downtown Mpls. and St. Louis Park locations next month.

And I'm off!

Yoga and Bike Month

I wanted to do the 30 days of biking challenge, but I also wanted to do 30 days of yoga, so I decided to do both in April. Yoga and riding the bike every day for a month. It went well. I only missed four days of cycling, mostly due to going out of town one weekend. I still made it 22 days in a row, which is way more than I would have done without the challenge, so I'm pretty happy with my results. The yoga was easy, since I count everything from five minutes of meditation to going to yoga class to practicing handstand for 10 breaths. The goal was not to obsess or beat myself up if I missed a day here or there. The goal was to see if I could commit to something every day for a whole month. I like this idea because the common belief is that it takes anywhere from 21 to 30 days to make something a habit. I want to add good habits to my life.

The month of May will be guitar and writing month. I've already done today's allotment. Only 30 days to go! Who knows, I may end up as a songwriter by June ;)

Anyone else feel a little lopsided, off-kilter, discombobulated or generally messed up lately? Ever since last weekend I haven't felt myself. Maybe it was the huge effort of the Birkie, or the blow to my tailbone (first chakra and all) when I fell at km. 48, or maybe it was the latest big earthquake which shifted the Earth's axis (Ruth Montgomery, you were prophetic after all; I wonder how much more we can expect it to move!)

In any case, I'm trying to go with the flow. Today's niyama in yoga class was Ishvara Pranidhana, which can be translated as faith in something more expansive than ourself. I trust that everything is happening according to my dharma. In the words of Jimmy Buffet: "Breathe in, breathe out, move on."

Music and meditation helps center the spirit.

Now if I could just get rid of the pain in my tailbone...

These are bulbs that were for sale on the street in Paris in November, but the photo makes me think about what may be stirring underground here soon. I don't wish for winter to end too soon, but if it must, there are worse things to replace snow than flowers.

I found this wonderful quote today:

"Everyday, think as you wake up: Today I am fortunate to have woken up. I am alive. I have a precious human life. I am not going to waste it. I am going to use all my energies to develop myself to expand my heart out to others for the benefit of all beings." Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet

Random Item:

I sent a manuscript of Dog Days to the editors at Random House as an entry in their First Young Adult Novel contest.

Wish me luck!

PARIS!

Yes, it is just that gorgeous ALL the freaking time! They really do have a way with lights, that I cannot understand or possibly replicate. In fact, most of my Parisian pleasures were things that could only be experienced and enjoyed in Paris. The food, the lights, the sounds, the wine, the champagne, the bread, the art, the architecture... none of those things could be packed up and taken along to enjoy weeks later in the bland midwest. Well, maybe the wine, but I didn't have a spare suitcase to bring it home.

I did try to export what I could-- cute outfits, ideas for personal and home styling, scarves, photos, and memories.

Now I'm going to try to track down anything that remotely recalls Paris here in the Twin Cities. So far, I've found a good herbed goat cheese, the New French Bakery that sells $1 baguettes after 5 p.m. (just in time for picking up after work), a decent Cremant (sparkling wine) from Trader Joe's, and a sweet shop that sells French style macaroons (which, if you haven't had, are not the same coconut variety we have here) and a Tibetan shop at the Midtown Global Market that sells nice silk scarves.

Oh, yes, I was that inspired.

How could I not be with scenes like that above?

I love Paris in the winter...

It's a Beautiful Day!

Ever have one of those days when everything just seems so right and perfect that you wouldn't change a thing?

This is one of those days for me.

I went for a run this morning down by the river and stopped to watch a plane fly overhead against the thin, rumbly-looking clouds and thought "that is going to be me soon."

I stood a couple feet from the Mississippi and watched the perfectly calm water swirl oak leaves downstream, and looked at the reflection of the East Bank buildings in the river.

The color of the day was just like Thanksgiving week looks in my mind.

And I thought of one word: santosha.

The book website is up!

http://www.dogdaysattheweirfarm.com

Thank you, Heather, for your gorgeous design and brilliant ideas.

Now it's time to find a publisher. Wish me luck!

I've started work on a kids' story. Its working title is "The Fabulous Adventures of Oona Oolong." Here is a bit that I've written so far...

Oona Oolong opened her front door and stepped onto the porch. She took one big inhale and looked around. A tendril of morning glories wrapped the faded wooden fence in green and sky blue. They were not there last night. Orange sunshine streaked across the lawn and alighted on tiny dewdrops on each blade of grass. A cat sashayed down the sidewalk, as if it had a very important engagement.

“I can’t possibly go to school on a day that smells like this,” Oona Oolong declared, and walked right past the bus stop and kept going until she reached an old stone staircase that led down into the river gorge.

Some kids may have stopped and looked back at the bus stop, with a fleeting sense of guilt or obligation. Some may have even turned around. Oona Oolong was not one of those kids. She forgot all about the bus stop the moment her foot hit the first worn stone.

If she had thought about school at all that morning, she may have said to herself “Oona Oolong, you will have many days, many years of sitting behind a desk, but you will only have one morning in September when the flowers are still blooming and the sumac is turning red and the air smells just like someone somewhere opened a window and let everything in.”

But, Oona Oolong was already skipping down the steps, anticipating what lie ahead and half-watching a log in the river below swirl past the sandy shore.