Photograph source unknown.
On the move again. Should be settled in and back to a normal writing schedule by the middle of next week. Am as happy as a pig-in-you-know-what, but decided on the bear picture to illustrate instead of a piglet. Just love bears, which is not to say I don’t like pigs . . . Enjoy!
Photograph of Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) Paper Mache Sugar Skull, craft and photography by Karen Fayeth at Etsy store, Nichos and Dichos.
Raised most of my life in New Mexico, I moved to Northern California in 1997. My friends don’t call me a Californian, they say I’m a New Mexican living in California. I think that’s true. For about two years after moving, I distanced myself from my home state thinking it backward and remote. Then I began to visit home more frequently and truly learned to love my home state only by gaining perspective. I’m a writer, a painter, a photographer and labor at a “real job” during the days. Karen Fayeth, “Oh Fair New Mexico”
What happens when a boy from New York meets a girl from New Mexico? Magic. It makes for one happy mom/mom-in-law . . . and isn’t that what romance is all about?
By day my daughter-in-law, Karen Fayeth, is a corporate exec. By night, when real life begins, Karen is a photographer, and she blogs, writes books and poetry, crafts, and cooks dinner for the CitySon Philosopher, TGM (“the good man”) to her.
Most recently, my beautiful, world-class daughter-in-law just re-opened her Etsy Shop, Nichos and Dichos. It’s full of fun, colorful, skillfully hand-crafted items influenced by her New Mexican background. I suspect there will be lots more crafty goodness as we draw closer to the holidays.
Karen’s book, Life Happens in Nine Innings, can be accessed here.
Photograph source unknown.
At Wilshire & Santa Monica I saw an opossum
Trying to cross the street. It was late, the street
Was brightly lit, the opossum would take
A few steps forward, then back away for the breath
Of moving traffic . . . “
“The Oldest Living Thing in L.A.” by Larry Levis in Elegy
On the move again and remembering the
House at Garden Highway, a few skips from the river
Hot days then, but a house that was cool, ripe
Honeydew in the summer and hot Mexican cocoa
During what passed there for winter
Summertime spiders were wild, willful, wandering
While the opossum seemed shy and few
Coming to the deck door to sniff out cat food
Toting long tails, dragging long nails
Winter nights the cat and I would curl in front
Of the fire, purring poetry at each other
Chloe’s flowing, punctuated with cat chirps
Stretches and sneezes, mine entirely too
Human, stuff that put the Clo to sleep
There have been seven new places since then
To each I’ve carried the detritus of aching years
On my back, like a opossum moving her children
This time I’m shaking those babies, goodbye
