children get older; i'm getting older too

photo by AZADA ENSHA for the new york times

I grew up singing choral music. It taught me not only music theory but a number of lessons in psychology and myself. My last choral director was cruel to me - and me very much in particular; I set aside the harshness he directed at me [an insecure 15 year old] because I loved being a part of the making of music. So I was moved on seemingly hundreds of levels watching the PS22 choir perform. They even made Tori Amos cry in person, singing one of her songs to her.

Each individual expression, each twirl of a finger, each patting of the chest and expressive eye-closing is worthy of its own gallery, its own focus. And yet the meshing of all of these things is what makes this particularly beautiful. I think it shows that the idea of kids making music together isn't just an inspirational concept for cinema, but it plays out every day. I know there must be other choruses out there that are similarly passionate and expressive. Here are some of my other favourites by PS22:

embrace the moment for everything changes and all this will too

photo: rpeschetz

YOUR MISSION: Download this song [Pumpkin Soup by Patrick Wolf], find the nearest quiet cemetery, sit down and listen to the song. It will change your life.

Yesterday. I leave for a walk near dusk, stopping at the across-the-street neighbour's to help her carry grocery bags. Her husband makes art out of cutlery; in the entryway, there is a sculpture of a tree with carefully-bent forks for leaves. I smile a lot whilst walking, but I am unable to stop grinning walking past some boys playing pick-up street hockey, clouds of breath drifting upwards into the pinking sky. There is a 19th-century cemetery where I walk, where the gravestones are chalky and crumbling, where this winter a few strings of dead leaves cling to the branches, and black birds dot each branch's capillaries in place of green. I have never seen another person there. I sit on the ground and feel the cold from the earth seeping through my jeans. I appreciate the nature of life, that everything changes.

I've been out for an hour, several miles, and when I get home, I eat a bowl of homemade minestrone soup. Later, I bake oatmeal raisin biscuits and read If On A Winter's Night A Traveller barefoot, on the cold floor.

how to conduct

conduct, v.

transitive verb
1. to direct or take part in the operation
2. to cause (oneself) to act or behave in a particular and especially in a controlled manner

intransitive verb
1. of a road or passage : to show the way
2. to have the quality of transmitting light, heat, sound, or electricity


I was walking in the woods today, cheeks red and numb, but smiling, when I accidentally broke off a twig from a wintry plant. I moved to throw it to the ground, but I thought, perhaps I was meant to have this piece of wood, so I shrugged and accepted it as meant to be in my possession. Its purpose, however, became quickly apparent. Sometimes I find things in a similar way, and they sit around the house before I discover their purpose(s). But as I began humming 'The Carol of the Bells' as I set off in the harsh cold toward home, my hand knew exactly what to do with the twig: it was a conducting baton! 1, 2, 3 it counted as I hummed the melody, and my new baton performed the corresponding loops. I draw from half of my life spent singing in choruses; conductors are not simply waving their hands wildly, though it might look like it, especially when conductors get into it when the music hits a crescendo, because conducting also shows performers how small/loud and staccato (abrupt or choppy)/legato (fluid) to be. Each time signature (about time signatures) has a corresponding arm movement to keep a chorus or orchestra in the correct time and rhythm. My friend, M. used to giggle at me when we went to the symphony for absentmindedly conducting along with just a finger.

3/4 time, 4/4 time, 6/8 time

Counting out a rhythm with one's hand movements is different from counting mentally. Like meditation beads, a simple stick can be a measurement of what's being processed mentally, without overthinking it. Feeling the rhythm of music means addressing it from a different perspective. I once took a course in music theory and composition, and it startled my perspective on music. Sometimes, I pry apart chords and add things up differently. Sometimes a simple melody will do me fine. I couldn't stop smiling, strolling down the empty street with my stick-cum-baton, singing just to myself.

A MUSICAL ACTIVITY: Go somewhere where you won't be disturbed. Get comfortable, and close your eyes. Allow music to enter your thoughts, and sing or hum the first song that comes to mind. Sing it all the way through, or until you can't remember the rest, or until a new song pops up. But do sing/hum the next song you think of - don't skip any just because you aren't in the mood for that sort of music. Allow your brain to flit from song to song, creating a crazy new medley. I did this on a whim today and recalled two songs from my childhood I had nearly forgotten. You might remember a song your grandmother sang to you before you even have memories, or a song you danced to every day for a month in your teenage years that you can now pluck from the deepest memory files.

Conducting also means to transmit electricity. There is a reason mantras are sung or hummed or chanted; vibration is conductive. It loosens our face muscles and connects us to what's around us. When I got home after my walk, hands numb, I thought suddenly of the opening of a film I had seen. I have only seen the opening, and there was no audio the first time I watched it, but I have a feeling this entire film, August Rush is entirely what I'm talking about. Listening. Feeling what's around you. Conducting, in every sense of the word. I'll let you know how it goes.

wakefulness

There must be a reason that bloggers have taken to breakfast photography. To me, it is about thankfulness and appreciating the food that I am able to eat. It is about taking a moment to appreciate the imperfect beauty of a place setting, the senses involved in eating, beyond taste (the texture involved in peeling citrus fruit, the scent of cinnamon). Browsing other people's breakfast photographs gives me the satisfaction of peering into a segment of someone else's life, the equivalent of a slice of sunshine through the blinds on the carpet (is that why the cats like it so?). Dinner photography would not be as satisfying; morning is particularly sacred with its cups of tea and quiet and that careful pale light. At its core, breakfast photography symbolises the truth I seek in photography- to capture a moment, raw and simple. To help one find beauty in everything, to see life through a new lens.

Some breakfasts:
simply breakfast: the original
of mornings: breakfast photograph community
louvecienne's breakfasts on flickr: my friend jen's gorgeous breakfasts

Breakfast photography also has motivated me to make the simple change of breaking my typical breakfast habit of cinnamon wheat cereal with soymilk seven days a week. Attention to a daily vegan breakfast means eating consciously and peacefully.

inhale. exhale.

photo: clouddinner

I sat alone with my laptop and a cup of tea, determined to make a sufficient list of items for a wishlist. I struggled, more this year than past winters. I need little, I want little. Perhaps it was recalling this year's simplifying; I donated half of my possessions nearly a year ago, and I have little desire to replenish the supply. I have curbed my book-buying addiction by ordering books to borrow from the library. I do the same with films; there is no need for me to own films but a beloved few, because I embrace films as I do much of life: a brief imprint, a fleeting but deeply meaningful experiment in existing. In the end, I chose to list a few things that would enhance something I enjoy for its organic nature, attention to this moment and deepening of the senses - cooking. A high-quality chef's knife to improve my cutting skills, and a set of cast-iron skillets. A copy of Keri Smith's How to Be an Explorer of the World (her books are some of those rare essentials to own- they serve as ongoing reminders to live in the moment and make art out of everything).

I realised that by filling my life with more stuff I would only deprive myself of the exhilaration to be found in the tiniest, most unnoticed aspects of life. An ideal holiday celebration would be a solstice festival focusing on the social cooking and eating of hearty, healthy foods and creating (singing, collecting leaves, drawing, dancing) with loved ones - perhaps even crafting gifts together. All gifts would be handmade: home movies stitched together, lopsided home-sewn stuffed creatures, poems and songs and performances, baked goods to take home, plants grown from seed, scribbles on paper, scribbles on scrap wood, scribbles on the backs of hands.

“Be content with what you have, rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you.” - Lao Tzu

23

"I see 23 as being two victorian windows with very nice, wooden frames that warp in the rain." - My friend Andrés and I spent Sunday night, or nearly morning, discussing our interpretations of each number, and how each number has a personality. I like 4s and 2s most. Odd numbers are just up to no good. Except 23. The 2 makes everything ok. And so, a list of 23 nice things:

1. black tea with just a bit of cardamom and soymilk, 2. photographs with perfect lighting, 3. making polaroids with poladroid, 4. my new friend clementine, 5. reading in the bath, 6. soul music when it's cold, 7. keri smith, 8. cinnamon, 9. good cheap red wine, 10. lucy and desi crying during the filming of the we're having a baby scene, 11. making chocolate cupcakes and giving them away, 12. 'hopelandic' or vonlenska on sigur rós's () album, 13. minimalism, 14. note-taking in moleskine cahier notebooks (the brown ones), 15. brackets in general as they are rather useful, 16. getting caught in perilously high winds, 17. getting lost in a book late in the afternoon and not noticing that the sun has set and there is but a tiny a bit of light by which to read, 18. agave nectar in tea, 19. bears, 20. food photography but more specifically breakfast photography, 21. km (my cat stepped on the keyboard, and that is what he was eager to add, apparently, and I'm keeping it), 22. yoga in a warm room on a snowy day, 23. this photo.