Into the woods with no existential thoughts - Nel bosco senza pensieri esistenziali.

(con versione italiana)

Saturday ritual - walk in the park with Eden, but this time no existential thoughts like the last time. Just feeling light and airy - Gemini must be in one of those places. I'm thinking about maybe going to Italy in June, how could anyone get existential over that? I guess I could, but in a very different way. I haven't been in two and a half years, since the trip on which I took 800 photos. This time I would take videos too, and I'd get a laptop. But I don't know, I'll think about it tomorrow, tomorrow is another day...
Rito del sabato - passeggiata con Eden nel parco, ma questa volta senza pensieri esistenziali come l'altra volta. Solo una sensazione di leggerezza - si vede che il segno dei Gemelli e` in uno di quegli spazi......Sto pensando di andare in Italia a giugno - come si puo` diventare esistenziali pensando a quello? Chissa`...forse potrei, ma in una maniera diversa. Sono due anni e mezzo che non ci vado, da quel viaggio in cui ho scattato 800 foto.  Questa volta farei anche dei video e mi comprerei un laptop. Ma non so, ci pensero` domani, domani e` un altro giorno....


We left the woods and went into the sun. Abbiamo lasciato il bosco per andarcene al sole.

I love these plants, and they are blooming all over San Francisco right now. I can never remember their name. I want to say Eremerus, but I don't think so. Do you know what they are called? Every time I see them I want a garden filled with them.
Mi piacciono tanto queste piante e in questo periodo la citta` ne e` piena. Non mi ricordo mai come si chiamano. Mi viene in mente Eremerus, ma non so. Voi sapete come si chiamano? Ogni volta che li vedo ne vorrei un giardino pieno. 

Who are we and what are we doing here? Chi siamo e cosa ci facciamo qui?

Sometimes, for a very brief moment, I think I know. Then I forget. Maybe it's best to forget what we think we know and start fresh.
I often wonder about the "road not taken" and the path we choose when we come to a fork in the road, and how that choice can drastically alter the course of our life. Actually I shouldn't say alter, I should say determine, because what we do is to go one way instead of another, one life instead of another. Yes, we make choices every minute of every day, but some of those choices have a way bigger impact than others. You know what I mean? Huge.
A volte, per un attimo, credo di sapere. Poi mi dimentico. Forse e` meglio dimenticarsi quello che si crede di sapere e ricominciare da capo. 
Penso spesso alla "strada non presa" e al sentiero che scegliamo quando nel nostro cammino arriviamo ad un bivio e a come quel sentiero altera il percorso della nostra vita. In effetti non dovrei dire altera, dovrei dire determina, perche` quello che facciamo e` di seguire una direzione anziche` un'altra, scegliamo una vita invece di un'altra. Si`, e` vero che facciamo delle scelte in ogni momento della giornata, ma alcune di quelle scelte hanno un grande impatto. Sai cosa intendo? Enorme.

We have no choice but to choose and most times we can't see where the path is taking us, we can only follow it. Non abbiamo altra scelta che di scegliere e il piu` delle volte non riusciamo a vedere dove ci porta la strada, possiamo solo seguirla.

This reminds of the Robert Frost's poem The Road Not Taken, even though the meaning is different and, although I have been making choices for a very long time, in some ways I haven't strayed far from my childhood: I still believe these are the caps of tiny woodland fairies. Tutto questo mi ricorda la poesia di Robert Frost, La Strada Non Presa, anche se il significato e` diverso, e penso che sebbene e` tanto ormai che faccio le mie scelte, per alcuni versi non mi sono discostata molto dalla bambina che ero: credo ancora che questi sono i cappellini di piccolissime fate del bosco. 

Trees - Gli alberi

  Trees have the power to calm me. I can be wound tight and stressed, but when I am with them I breathe a sigh of relief. They live three blocks from my home and they are the best part of the neighborhood. I visited them this morning with Eden. Gli alberi hanno il potere di calmarmi. Posso sentirmi tesa e stressata ma, quando sono in mezzo a loro, non posso fare a meno di rilassarmi e fare un sospiro di sollievo. Vivono in un parco a tre isolati da casa mia e sono la parte migliore del quartiere. Questa mattina, con Eden, sono andata a trovarli.

Do you see her? La vedi?

We are fortunate to see another Spring.............and these flowers are for you.  Abbiamo la fortuna di vedere ancora un'altra primavera...................e questi fiori sono per te. 

Thank you

(segue in italiano)
Thank you.  Thank you for the teachers, for the great spiritual masters, whom the Holy Spirit, the Divine Essence of All, periodically sends to Earth to remind us of our divinity. 

Thank you Jesus the Christ, the Nazarene, for Your teachings and Your sacrifice. Even if you do not believe in His divinity, as I do, if we were all, starting with me, to follow His radical teachings this Earth would be a Peaceable Kingdom. If only we respected and recognized each other’s divinity, as well as the divinity of nature and of the other animals, think how amazing our planet would be! It would emanate a rainbow of love and light, it would illuminate the universe and vie with the stars for brilliance. 

To follow the teachings of Jesus, or the Buddha, or Mohammed, or Krishna, or the expressions of divine love of the Persian poet and Sufi mystic, Jalal ad-Dīn Muhammad Rumi, would transform our world. 

May I be present, aware and in awe of life. This is my prayer.

"If your thought is a rose, you are a rose garden" - Rumi

Grazie. Grazie per gli insegnanti, per i grandi maestri spirituali che lo Spirito Santo, l’Essenza Divina di Tutto, manda di tanto in tanto qui sulla Terra per ricordarci della nostra natura divina. 

Grazie a Gesu il Cristo, il Nazzareno, per i Suoi insegnamenti  e il Suo sacrificio. Anche se non credi che Egli e` divino, come credo io, se dovessimo tutti, a cominciare da me, seguire i Suoi insegnamenti rivoluzionari la Terra sarebbe davvero il Regno della Pace. Se solo rispettassimo e riconoscessimo l’essenza divina di ognuno di noi, come anche l’essenza divina della natura e degli altri animali, pensa come sarebbe stupendo il nostro pianeta! Emanerebbe un arcobaleno di amore e di luce, illuminerebbe l’universo intero e farebbe a gara con le stelle per luminosita`. 

Seguire gli insegnamenti di Gesu`, o di Budda, o di Maometto, o di Krishna o le espressioni di amore per Dio del poeta persiano e sufi, Maulana Gialal al-Dīn Rumi, significherebbe trasformare il nostro mondo. 

Che io possa essere presente, consapevole e incantata dalla vita. Questa e` la mia preghiera.

"Se il tuo pensiero e` una rosa, tu sarai un roseto" - Rumi

The World Needs Love

(la versione italiana e` in fondo alla pagina)
We all need it, in one way or another. Pray for it, chant Om Namah Shivaya (listen to Krishna Das chant it here, practice the Metta meditation, do it your own way, and your heart will be filled, maybe even from unexpected sources. And when your heart is overflowing with love, send it out to the farthest reaches of the universe. It can only do good. It won't run out and it doesn't hurt, well maybe just a teensy bit, but it's a good hurt....

Il mondo ha bisogno di amore. Tutti ne abbiamo bisogno, in un modo o nell'altro.

Prega per riceverlo, canta Om Namah Shivaya (ascoltalo cantato da Krishna Das qui), fai pratica di Metta, o fallo a modo tuo, e il cuore ti si riempira`, forse anche da fonti inaspettate. E quando ti sentirai il cuore straripare, con il pensiero manda l'amore negli angoli piu` lontani dell'universo. Puo` solo fare del bene. Non si esaurira` mai e non fa male, beh forse solo un po', ma e` un male che fa bene....  

An Artful Journey

I just returned from An Artful Journey retreat at the Presentation Center in the foothills of the Santa Cruz mountains.
Reentry to planet Earth was harsh. I realized as I rode through the city streets that I was tightly clutching the fabric of my jacket lying on the seat beside me. Not a good sign.
At the retreat I took Nina (as in Carolina...) Bagley's class. I've read her blog for 4 years and thought I had an idea of who she was, but it turns out I did not really. She is the warm, poetic, sensitive, emotional person who comes across in her writing, and an excellent teacher, of course, but she is also very down to earth and very real. Someone with whom I feel I can be my quirky, not always sweet self. The words engraved into the silver portion of the bracelet of hers that I bought, "I have waited until now to walk with you amongst these towering trees", may prove to be prophetic for me, as I have come to the realization that without a doubt I am not "a city girl". I must go find some trees amongst which to live, the sooner the better. Whidbey Island comes to mind, or somewhere else around Seattle.

In addition to the Presentation Center itself and to Nina's teaching and personal skills, the experience of being in community with more than one hundred women of all ages, from all parts of the United States, as well as from other countries, and with whom I have in common a desire to create, proved to be a very healing one, something I am looking forward to repeating. I do not know about other art retreats, since this is my first, but  if you have a desire to attend one, I can highly recommend An Artful Journey. There's another one coming up in July... just so you know....

We had a lot of "lightbulb moments" during class, and that is why Nina is holding up a drawing of one.

A few more photos of the Presentation Center, where even the trees were adorned with jewels.

My unfinished pieces made with items (the butterfly and the blue heart) from my father's "stash" from the seventies, when he made jewelry as a hobby, a pendant I made years ago, and the word "ricordi" scanned from a page in my mother's handwriting and embedded in resin. I really enjoyed making those resin charms and intend to make more. And now, back to earth... 

From wistful to light-hearted

Wistful: 1. characterized by melancholy; longing; yearning.
2. pensive, especially in a melancholy way. 3. musingly sad.


When someone you were in love with as a teenager in another country finds you forty years later on Facebook, and you communicate, and check out each other's pages, photos and friends, it is strange and slightly absurd. It feels as if there are four of you, the two you once were and the two you now are, and yet it somehow plucks at your heart strings in a sad and tender way.


This was the mood I was in as I left work, under skies that were getting ominously grey, to go to a "talk-experience" by John Friend, the founder of Anusara yoga and a sort of yoga superstar. I had just heard of him recently and since he was in town I was curious to see what he was about. The bus did not show so I walked on streets I do not normally use, and the farther I went the more everything seemed alien. I got in my stranger in a strange land mood. By the time I arrived at the location of the event I was deep in conversation with my inner bitch. It was early so I had to wait around and everything started to irritate me, including snippets of conversation I overheard. I almost felt like walking out, but I am very happy I didn't.

It turns out that John Friend, who seems to be a yoga teacher, spiritual seeker, poet, performer, inspirational speaker, and a totally natural and unassuming human being as well, decided about a week ago that since this was the night of the waning moon, as well as Mahashivaratri, the annual celebration of the wedding of Lord Shiva and Parvati/Shakti,  he would add a performance to the talk-experience. And that he did. As he and a scholar of tantric studies? Sanskrit? from U.C. Berkeley took turns narrating (the scholar also sang portions of the narration in Hindi), dancers, three of them beautiful women with illuminated hoops, reenacted the story of Shiva and Parvati/Shakti, while we the audience sat under dimmed lights, bathed in a shower of pin pricks of green sparkles covering us, the ceiling and walls, all to the music of a guitar, tablas and a flute. Shakti, sinous and sensual in a red harem girl dress, danced wildly around Shiva, a muscular 6'4"god, with dreadlocks to his rear, his leopard-print-loin-cloth-clad body tinged in blue. There was also Cupid, a shorter, body builder type, dressed in red shorts, white moon boots and large pink wings. It sounds insane, maybe tacky, but it wasn't. It was perfect. 
Then we chanted OM Namah Shivaya (I bow to the goodness in everything or Om and salutations to that which I am capable of becoming) first silently holding loved ones, ourselves and the entire universe in our hearts, then for three minutes out loud, but softly and everyone in his or her own time, so that the resulting effect in the darkened auditorium was like the sound of hundreds of butterfly wings flapping at once.


At the end bags were passed around and we each pulled out a little gift.

Inside, a mirror, where we could see our own divine reflection. 

And just like that the wistful, grey, alienated stranger in a strange land felt as light as a butterfly. 

Thank you John Friend.