choose your own adventure

music follows me. it repeats itself on car stereos and in stores. the piano keys, the drums beat themselves into my head until i succumb to fully listening. forcing me to tune out the droninig mundane chatter of the grocery store or the full inbox or the empty packing boxes or the traffic signals and idling engines running hot. it hits me mid-week. with key in ignition, it blasts in my eardrums.

i am lost in my mind.

music follows me and insists i slow down. giving me a chance to do my own processing, my own regurgitating, my own creating with flowers and sunflare and self in the backyard of texas.

“momma once told me, you’re already home where you feel love.”

i am moving. literally and figuratively. i’m moving to the east coast today. today?! moving towards something unknown and something else completely familiar. there is so much newness happening it’s hard to keep up with it all. so i want to provide this opportunity for you, dear reader, to listen to some tunes and welcome you to sign up for my newsletter. a newsletter?! it’s the most efficient way i’ve found to share all the news on where to find me: gallery shows, teaching gigs, new shop updates, and general life yumminess. if you read this blog you know i am a slacker at heart… so sharing a quote or bit of news once a month is about all to expect. nothing big, but life is sometimes noteworthy. i promise not to inundate you with tedium, but you can expect to see a bit of changes with my online presence. things i’m pretty excited about!

if you are so inclined to stay in touch with me as i venture into this new life of mine, i’d love to keep that connection going. i want you to know our relationship is reciprocal, and as terrible i am with following up with your generous comments, i carry you all with me as i write and create. and i’d love to share bits of my future adventures with you. something tells me that life is going to be pretty sweet.

so, you can sign up for my newsletter here. {i’m expecting it to launch sometime in september.}

i wish you all safe travels into august, my friends!
i’ll see you on the east coast.
love, meredith

disappearing

“The day he first told me he was starting to disappear I didn’t believe him & so he stopped & held his hand up to the sun & it was like thin paper in the light & finally I said you seem very calm for a man who is disappearing & he said it was a relief after all those years of trying to keep the pieces of his life in one place.

Later on, I went to see him again & as I was leaving, he put a package in my hand. This is the last piece of my life, he said, take good care of it & then he smiled & was gone & the room filled with the sound of the wind & when I opened the package there was nothing there

& I thought there must be some mistake or maybe I dropped it & I got down on my hands & knees & looked until the light began to fade & then slowly I felt the pieces of my life fall away gently & suddenly I understood what he meant & I lay there for a long time crying & laughing at the same time.”

~ “Disappearing” by Brian Andreas {storypeople}

a year ago to the date, i wrote today’s fortune. mostly now i stumble across dates accidentally. they trip me up in the most surprising way. dates and times and places and dreams become memories attached to me in my sometimes detachment. drifting like balloons tied to a child’s wrist.

it’s amazing to me how through time everything changes and everything stays the same.
and that’s all i have to say about that.

i choose love

…and then there’s the elephant. the one in the middle of the room.  the one that we step around careful of its stink and swatting tail…

“you don’t have to sugar coat things,” he says.
“i won’t always know what to say,” he says.

and that makes it better, because neither will i and i find myself apologizing for my use of expletives but this is just so fucked up. and sometimes the only thing that helps is throwing sailor curses at this stinking fucking elephant taking up precious fucking brain space.

i am thankful for friends.  new friends who feel familiar. light and joy and lilting sing-song voices. i am thankful for this.

no one says anything. because no one knows anything, other than she will die.  but we don’t know when.  other than she will continue to fall and break bones and remain feeble and agitated. this woman who never hurt a fly is slamming doors and bitch slapping neighbors.

she’s fighting for her life.
and i’m not ready to lose her.
nor am i ready to face her reality.

so, we’re left drifting.  bobbing in the hot sun as waves go up and down, making us queasy. there are no more words other than sad. heartwrenching. i’m sorry. and love.

and so i choose love.

all that you dream

“do you know what happens, when a dream comes true and you feel your joy bubbling over into wide grins, happy dances, and shrieks of “Holy @#$%!!” and the like?

your energy actually spills over into the oceans of time and reaches into the past where it laps upon the shores of a former here and now, infusing a former unsuspecting self (who is still merrily living their life due to time’s “simultaneousity”) with a  flash of inspiration or a burst of intuition; a hope for what the future might hold.

and that, my friend, is the truth about where dreams come from.”
{all that you dream of already exists}

~ Notes from The Universe

home

he’s home.

print me

I think all of us, in some form or fashion, grew up with the instant gratification of photography. Sometimes it was the polaroid that jumped out of the sx-70 to be developed. Most of the time, it was waiting a few days to save up babysitting money in order to pick up prints at the drugstore. And often, it was life revealing itself in the slow motion stir that came from behind the closed door of the darkroom.

Photography is meant to be held.  Join in the conversation over at shutter sisters today!

flotsam

“a collection of things that the tide brought in”

i had no idea what i’d find out there, on the coast of oregon.  i’m endlessly amazed at the things you can find on the coast. sand dollars, seaglass, friends, experiences. i fill my pockets. i fill my memory cards. i fill my journals. and still my heart overflows. there is simply not enough space to hold all the goodness. all the stories. all the connections and laughter.

life is at its best when it is most surprising.

images from a photowalk i led at Your Story Retreat
Gearhart, Oregon June 2011

this girl

this girl, she is reflections in windows.
getting lost then being found.
the galaxies between us, the days shortening in distance
as we come closer to ecstacy.
what is normal is awkwardness, the sometimes bitterness.
the habit that returns in love.
this girl, she is holding hands on the coast of maine.
nuzzling beards, undressing insecurity, devouring artistry.
sometimes ragged. sometimes hollow-eyed.
she is acceptance of ordinary.
this girl, she is climbing trees.
she is laughter believing in love again
after years of being nowhere.
this girl, she is
returning
awakening
quickening.
this girl, she is groovy music.
barefoot in prose.
forever cultivating grace.
this girl, she is simply returning to who she always was
but once forgotten,
relieved to be awake
if for nothing else but the fluttering of heartbeats.

these words were born from a “this girl” writing prompt
Your Story Retreat. Gearhart, Oregon
6.16.11

welcome to my happiness project

somethings fall into your lap. paths cross. people meet. careers bloom.
somethings fall apart. death looms. silence deafens. muck sticks.

this is life. how we handle it, how we view it, how we shift in our seats to change our perspective all plays a part in our experience. yes, life is in fast forward as we zip through our day. always counterbalancing the good and the bad. it’s the only way, right? look for the light … even while fumbling in the dark. find your truth by using your heart and mind and art.

stumbling is a common occurrence for me, i could look at this as something negative or something positive. stumbles lead me down roads i otherwise would not have taken. wrong turns can lead to new sight. (as was the case the day i circled the block not once but twice to get a better view of this love bug.) i parked. i clicked. i drove away feeling lighter… and somehow inspired.

the next day i realize what this is, exactly. what has started. how my view has shifted. how my iphone can turn into a tool to help me focus and see, and how the process will carry me through the next chapter of journeys i’m beginning.

what you see here is the start of my happiness project.
(and it’s working because it makes me ridiculously happy)

your story :: my story

who are we before we become who we are? we’re still in there somewhere… hiding, playing with shadows until someone comes along who makes us want to dig in and share our story.

go ahead and begin. where? teaching at the Your Story retreat in oregon shifted something inside me for the better. is that where i start… with profoundness? that seems rather brave. so, do i start with the sunrise flight over earth that lay stretched out like a well-loved quilt? the train from the airport, the lushness of trees and green and all things oregon? the intermittently rainy and sunshiny afternoon spent in portland watching umbrellas and bike messengers smile as they travel the city? how about the women i met? the first conversations, the recognition, the hugs, the laughter? what about the ocean air, the writing, the breathing, the photography?

there will be time for all that.

right now i want to start with this orange shag carpet beneath me, and the childhood it conjures up. the backyard decks, with holes in fences perfect for spying. the birds sing in compliment to this space here. this circle of gathering women.

where do we begin? we begin where we left off. we jump right in unafraid even in our being afraid. embracing that vulnerable place stepping into the discomfort that is what it is.  honor the changes as they come, big or little. words scritch and scratch across the page in release, never knowing what i want to say. never knowing what i need to say until it is said. i go through life much like this. not knowing exactly what i’m doing, what i’m supposed to be doing until it is done.

hold this space for words. honor them as the release.  i hear my own voice and the words that tumble out in stutters and stammers and shyness. honor them as something separate and still the same as the alter ego, the more confident version of myself looking through the glass and back into my own eyes.

here, just outside this luscious carpeted room, the safety of the camera draws me into it.  it’s my experience of the moment combined with the birdsong and the cool morning air.  my story, this story, this retreat, this workshop is tied together with paper hearts sewn and strung in picture windows. it is the comfort of the wood around us.  the strong beams, the bones of this house will keep us together. this gathering of women sit protected, like a bird nest tucked into the strong branches of the tree.  letting it come.  letting the wind blow through, letting it rustle us, but not disturb us.

these are the thoughts that arise.  these are the visitors to the head space.  they are welcome here. i greet them and call them by name.  hello insecurity.  hello realness. hello little girl looking for the reminder of strength. i greet them and sit with them awhile before they leave.  out through the open window, back into the air we breathe.  back into the trees they go.  acknowledging their presence is important. labeling them is not necessary and yet i feel the need to call these pieces of myself by name.

this is how i begin my story.