Day 0 (minus a few hours)

Hello Everyone,

It's been a long day but both Dale and his DBD (Dear Bodhisattva Donor) are safely tucked in bed in the hospital.

No one will give us a definitive answer about the time of the surgeries in the morning, except that they begin with the donor and then start Dale's surgery about 1 1/2 hours later.

I'll do my best to check in again later tomorrow.  In the meantime, do whatever feels right to bring them all the healing energies they might need to call on.

love and blessings to all,
laura

Ah, blogging.........

Today is about packing.  Tomorrow we drive to UCSF.  Thursday's the transplant.

I'll put a post up and let everyone know how Dale's doing (and how I'm doing also) maybe Wednesday night.  Or Thursday night. 

Dale's doctors are the best.  And the support from all of you is strong.  Thanks, hugs, and deep bows to all.

a test of sorts

Maybe I will try to use this blog as a way to communicate with those that want to know what it's like to be the wife of a man undergoing a liver transplant.  We'll see.  Dale and I are pretty private but I realize this might be the best way to keep those who are interested up to date.  I'll talk to Dale and see how he feels about this.  I've still got 10 days to figure it out.

Collage Pictures

First, there is the Goddess Collage in full view and glory

and here are 2 other "woman" based collages

and one I call "Dreaming"

I'll try to get back here later or tomorrow to add some more pictures.  Right now it's back to the studio....

collage

Do I have to apologize once again for the time between posts?  Or has everyone just gotten used to my lack of social media skills?

Anyway, one of the most talented book artists I know of, Susan Kapuchinski Gaylord, whose Spirit Books are fantastic just honored me by including a card I sent to her with my Goddess Collage on the cover in her Studio Sunday-Desk Corner.

Susan does an emailing to her list several times a week where she tells about what she's doing, gives ideas about books to make, things that inspire her.  You can go to susangaylord.com to learn more.

The irony is that I just started an online Self Guided Course in collage through MoMA in NYC a few days ago.  I wanted to refresh/hone/upgrade my own collage skills.  I've used collage over the years and find it a wonderful freeing way to create art because you can do it even if you think you can't draw -- you just have to remember to collect images from magazines and keep them in a box to start.

I'll post my Goddess Collage and some other collage pieces I've done over the years tomorrow.  Right now I'm headed back into my studio.

Remedios Varo's painting Harmony and a few words about Ekphrasis

Ekphrasis is defined in the dictionary as

: a literary description of or commentary on a visual work of art

Greek ekphrasis, literally, description, from ekphrazein to recount, describe, from ex- out + phrazein to point out, explain

Honestly it’s a great workshop exercise.  My first experience with ekphrasis was receiving a postcard of a Max Ernst painting in a workshop I was taking with Donna Masini back in NYC in the 90s.  I was so inspired that I continued to use paintings, particularly surrealistic paintings, as a jumping off point for my writing.  I found they quite literally transported me into a different vision of everything around me.

I  discovered Remedios Varo’s paintings when I read an article about her on the Science Tuesday pages of the NY Times.  Since then I’ve written a series of poems based on her paintings.

My poem, Music, soon to be published in Crack The Spine, is based on Varo’s painting Harmony.

If you’d like to read the article in the NY Times, here’s the link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2000/04/11/science/scientific-epiphanies-celebrated-on-canvas.html

My poem "Music" soon to be up on Crack The Spine Issue 72

Good news!

My poem "Music" (based on the Remedios Varo painting Harmony) will appear in Crack The Spine Issue 72.  The folks over at Crack The Spine have just released a Contributors page for that issue:

http://www.crackthespine.com/2013/07/issue-seventy-two-contributors.html

Looks like I'm in some good company!

I'll see if I can figure out how to make a copy of the painting the poem is based on and post it.