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Recently, I’ve been thinking about sound. I’m not 100% sure why. Perhaps it’s due to the class I’m teaching or the way my kids like to test the limits of my ability to hear but either way, I love sound.

I love the sound of rain dancing upon air conditioners, leaves and pavement, leaves giggling when the wind tells a joke, my children when they experience a bout of aching belly laughter, waterfalls in moonlight, autumn leaves tumbling along city streets, a baby’s first cry, “i love you” said in a whisper, the silence during a snowfall, the crackle of a fire on winter’s night, the sound of a wave as it embraces the shore, a dolphin’s cheer, a whale’s opera, the angels bowling, the crack of a ball against a wooden bat, a crowd singing together, a song that melts my heart, both Jeremy Irons and Sean Connery’s voices (they could read the labels off a cereal box and I’d be in heaven), the Australian accent, some NYC borough accents, birds sitting on a limb conversing on a Spring morning, and the folks featured above….pipes and drums just make me happy.

What sounds do you love?

I was having one of those days where I felt like an old, crusty leaf blowing along a NYC street destined for the sewer. In other words, life sucked. I kept asking myself, “What does it mean to be alive?”

There were no answers for me. At the very least, I knew that being alive had nothing to do with material things but that was all I knew. What did it mean? This question had been plaguing me for days. My lack of clear answers led me to another more disturbing question. If I couldn’t pinpoint exactly what it meant to be alive, was I really living?

As we crawled along in bumper to bumper traffic on this gray and rainy day, I was lost in thought when my daughter suddenly exclaimed, ‘Oh my gosh!” Instantly, I was jolted from my thoughts.

“What?? What is it?” I asked, spinning around in my seat.

Her small hand was reaching out of her locked window and up toward the sky.

“The rain, Mom,” she said, without removing her eyes from the raindrops. ‘The drops are so cold. Touch them. Touch them.”

I happen to think the rain is beautiful. When it falls, it always seems to suit my mood. But I realized as she spoke that I hadn’t recently let myself experience the full effect of the rain in a long time.

I stuck my hand out the window and let the raindrops fall down upon my skin. They were cold but felt so good. As my skin glistened with droplets, I closed my eyes and let the each drop sink into my skin, float through my bloodstream and change my entire mood. Suddenly, I knew what it meant to me to be alive.

Being alive is about experience. It’s about opening to the world around me – to the point of being vulnerable – and letting each sense deeply experience all there is in each moment. It’s basking in the way a person tells a story with their entire being, not just their words. It’s about listening to music with your entire body, not just your ears. It’s about making love with your heart and soul, not just your body. It’s about savoring the food you eat with your sense of smell and touch, not just your mouth.

For me, being fully alive means sinking into the beauty of my experiences, good, bad, and ugly because in the end, that’s all I will be taking with me anyway and when I allow myself that gift, I’m truly living.

What does it mean to you to be alive? Are you really living??

All over the United States – as we speak – people are being bitten by The Love Bug! Once bitten you will have no choice but to share a little love or at least some positive vibes with everyone around you.  Feeling a little confused? Let me explain.

Recently, I was given the honor of being asked to be a part of the Love Bug experiment started by a fabulously crafty, super talented artist named Kelsey. She is the creator of the ultra- adorable Caffeinated Frenzy. Her work is exquisite when you see it online but in person it is even more sensational.

Kelsey started a project that invites people to leave her cute little Love Bugs with a note in public spaces for others to find – why? To brighten their day and make them smile. How awesome is that?? She has even decided to share her Love Bug pattern with everyone so you can make your own leave around. Feeling crafty? Want to teach the kids how to share the beauty of art and make someone’s day??

What I found most incredible about doing this project aside from knowing that someone would stumble across the best surpise, was doing it with my daughter. When she first saw the Love Bugs she proclaimed that she wanted them. However, after talking to her about what we were going to do and how it would make someone else happy she got excited about doing it. She even started to explain to family members how we were going to give them away to make people smile. How amazing is that?? She’s just a kid and yet the joy she exhibits at the idea of leaving someone a surprise they will love is way beyond her years! I love the power of art.

Please visit her blog for the pattern, grab your kiddos or some friends and start spreading the love! Or look around NYC as this crafty Mama and her wee one will be leaving some treats along their path.

I am writing in the hopes that you will help support a fabulous artist, Lorrie, in her efforts to collect 250 pieces of postcard sized original artwork to be raffled at the September 24th benefit for The Creative Center for Cancer (www.thecreativecenter.org).

Lorrie has been charged with soliciting unframed original 4 x 6 art in any medium-from acrylics to photography, collage to pen and ink and everything in between. This art will be on display and viewed by several hundred supporters which will include some gallery owners, art collectors and celebrities. Fine art by very well known artists will be auctioned off live, as well as celebrity art by actors such as Liam Neeson and Mia Farrow.

Currently, Lorrie is behind on her goal to collect the postcard art so she desperately needs our help!

Donating a postcard sized piece of your original art is a great way to honor someone who has been touched by cancer. The Creative Center for Cancer works very hard to bring art to people who have been touched by this disease. Please consider sending Lorrie something before September 20th. The address is:

Lorrie Veasey
c/o OUR NAME IS MUD
224 West 29th Street
Floor 5
NYC NY 10001

The value of your donation is tax deductable. Please include all your contact info on the back of the piece so that the person who wins your piece can contact you.

If you know any other artists who might participate in this event, please let them know.

You need not be an artist to participate, you simply need to have a desire to have create and have fun! I’m definitely creating a piece …will you join me??

Paula Radliffe moments before winning the NYC Marathon

Lately, there have been many things that have inspired me. Although running the NYC marathon is not one of my dreams, I admire the courage and determination in takes to do so. The fact that people of all ages, races, religions, come together to push their personal limits is incredible to me. The folks that are currently participating in NaNoWriMo or National Novel Writing Month (writing a novel in one month) are stepping out of their comfort zones and striving to achieve a dream is fabulous. The historic Presidential election has proven that if you fight tooth and nail for what you believe in, anything is possible. These things have fed the fire in my belly to make my dreams come true.

With all that has gone wrong in the world, it is nice to look around and see positive things. There are people around us doing inspiring things all the time. In fact, we may be an inspiration to someone else without even realizing it. The important thing is that we acknowledge that which inspires us and we allow it to motivate us. I’m off to work.

What is one thing that has recently inspired you?

Recently, I had a crap day. I woke as a foul, bad ass, super crank monster. There was a part of me that wanted to throw in the towel and go back to bed till the next day in the hopes that it’d be better. There was another part that wanted to face the day, not because I thought it would get better but rather because I thought I might be able to find a way to let go of all the tension inside. My shoulders were practically up to my earlobes. I couldn’t remember my dreams – clearly someone or something had pissed me off in them. In the middle of the day when I had grown just as sick and tired of myself as I am sure everyone who’d come into contact with me had, I thought to myself, “I’d really like to smash something. Just fire it against a wall.” Well, guess what?  There’s a place you can go to do just that.

Sarah Lavely and Ed King, founders of Sarah’s Smash Shack in downtown San Diego, CA, created a place where you can smash all the crap you want whenever you want. Starting at around $25 (a price which includes gear and use of a Break Room) you can hurl dishes or flowers, among many other things, at walls or bring stuff you don’t want and fire away. You can write names of people and things that are really pissing you off on the objects and send them sailing across the room. Is someone or something REALLY getting to you? You can make a poster and use it as a target! Genius! Now, if they’d only open one of those fabulous places in NYC.

Would you visit Sarah’s Smash Shack if you lived in Cali?

What do you do to let off steam when you just want to fire things against walls and scream?

As I don’t have a Break Shack to call my own, here’s some of what I do:

-Shower: I let the warm water beat the tension out of my shoulders and sing loudly and quite badly to 80’s tunes.

-Write it out: Write down all the stuff that’s annoying me in the foulest language I can and then dump it.

-Grieve: I cry and cry and cry it all out till I feel like all the stupid, nonsensical bullshit that I’m upset about is gone.

-Give myself a reality check: Read stories on the Internet or in magazines about people who really have it bad and hope that lights a fire under my ass to get it together

-Eat chocolate: Sometimes the savage beast needs nothing more than something sweet to soothe her.

Sometimes all I need is to forgive – others and myself – for being human and move on. 

But every now and again, smashing things would be fun…good mood or bad….

What say you?

Columbus Day always makes me think about discovery. So I asked myself, “Natasha, what have you discovered recently?” And one thing came to mind. Reason number 567 (yes, I know I haven’t shared the 566 others. Maybe that will be another blog) why I love where I live.

Recently, I was strolling along with my husband, daughter and brother when I stopped in front of a building I’d walked past a few days before. All along the front of the building were these gorgeous flowers; there was one in particular that I’d never seen before. The flower seemed to be composed of all these little red and orange flowers. It was so cheerful; I was captivated.

“Hey you guys aren’t these flowers great? I love them.”

We all stopped to gaze and share a few thoughts about them.

“I’m going to have to stop back and ask the doorman or someone what they’re called,” I said, preparing to move on.

My husband picked one of the flowers and gave it to our daughter. She was thrilled and we moved along hoping no one noticed that we’d taken a little souvenir.

As we began to walk, we heard a loud voice yelling something. We thought for sure we’d been caught. So, keeping our eyes forward we pretended we could not hear the voice however it grew louder and I realized that whoever it was that was speaking was not saying, “Stop thief.” So, I took a risk and looked around. There, four floors up was a man in a red shirt wearing John Lennon glasses and green dish washing gloves with a bright yellow sponge in his hand.

My brother and husband kept going for a moment before noticing my daughter and I had stopped. The man was telling me the name of the flower which I have now forgotten because I was so astounded that this random person sitting inside his apartment four stories up from the street had heard our conversation and decided to join it.

“Thank you,” I shouted and he gave me a salute with his sponge before disappearing.

As I walked away I could not help but think that NYC is just a microcosm of the much larger Universe, where if you ask for something, if you put that intention out there, you will often receive an answer. It may not arrive the way you imagined it would but it will arrive.

I love this damn town.

What recent discovery have you made about your neighborhood or any area of your life?

I wish you a wonderful Columbus Day and to our Canadian neighbors, Happy Thanksgiving! 
 

Our scene opens with a pregnant woman and her husband walking down a NYC street at the speed of a turtle. Every so often, she grabs a parking meter and appears to pray to it. No, she is not channeling the parking spirits; she is riding the waves of contractions which are not as painful as they are uncomfortable. They render her unable to walk for a moment or two. With this in mind, we might expect to hear her exclaim the following words and yet strangely, we find it is husband speaking…

Husband
Oh my God!

Wife
(Looks down worried that the “water” everyone always talks about has broken but it’s been awhile since she was able to see her feet. ‘What if it broke and I can’t see it and I didn’t feel it and I look like I pissed my pants,’ she thinks to herself)
Oh God, what? What’s wrong?

Husband
(His gaze is focused on a point across the street.)
Is that…?

Wife
(She follows his gaze while tightening her grip on the parking meter.)
Who? What?

Husband
That’s Sean Connery!

Wife
(She searches and finally spots him. He is a vision with his full head of silver hair, his brown leather jacket draped over his broad shoulders and a red scarf tied smartly around his neck. He is James Bond. He is the thief in Entrapment. He is one man who can wear a pair of slacks or a kilt and still manage to look distinguished.)
What should we do? Let’s go after him.

Although this couple lives in a city where celebrity sightings can be common, they are not celebrity hounds. They are not “wowed” by people but there are a few folks who seem…well, cool. Those are the kinds of folks this couple would like to drink a pint with and share funny stories. Those are folks like Mr. Connery.

Husband
Yeh, come on.

In all the excitement, our couple forgets that they are pregnant and that their child is working on coming into the world. Perhaps the kid has ESP, knew that Mr. Connery would be happening by and wants meet him too.
They turn and begin to make their way to the end of the block where they will cross in the hopes of meeting Mr. Bond…ummm, Mr. Connery. Perhaps they will invite him up to the hospital room to shoot the breeze. The wife thinks he’d be a nice distraction as well as focal point during labor. They are moving slightly faster than turtles when suddenly she is gripped by another contraction and comes to a halt. The husband looks at her. She looks at him.

Wife
Go.
(She says as though on a sinking ship. The unspoken words, “Save yourself” hang mid- air.)

Husband
I can’t leave you
(The unspoken words “…though I want to so can I?” hover above them.)

Wife
No, go after him
(He is her only hope. Only her husband can stop James Bond.)

Husband
Are you sure?

Wife
Are you mad? Of course I’m sure.
(She’s suddenly English using expressions like “Are you mad?” despite the fact that Mr. Connery is Scottish.)

A moment later she is gripped by a stronger contraction. She leans on a metal box containing free weekly magazines.

Husband
I’m not leaving you.

The wife looks at him. He’s noble – he’s crazy, but noble. She loves him for not leaving her on a crowded NYC street gripping random objects and looking like she is having pains associated with eating too much chili or bowls of beans.

They watch until Mr. Connery disappears into the crowd. One day, they hope to meet him and share this tale and she’ll ask him about the only comment he’s ever made that she didn’t like about women and smacks. One day, she’ll tell her daughter this story.

Till then, my husband and I will occasionally turn to one another and say, “Hey, remember when…” and laugh.

Have you ever really wanted to hang out with a celebrity, have a pint and shoot the crap for a spell? Have you ever been close to meeting them?

Thanks to Kate for making me remember this story!

I have an Exciting Nacho Update!

Bridget Murphy who was featured in the CreativeNachos article, One Woman Helps Children While Chasing Her Dream, made her dream come true on Sunday, July 27th, 2008 when she completed the NYC Half Marathon in 2 hours and 28 minutes! Not only did she accomplish her personal goal, she also raised money for an incredible cause, Team for Kids.

Congratulations Bridget! Way to bring it home! Creativenachos celebrates you and your fabulous achievement!

Bridget’s feat makes me want to celebrate and celebration for me comes in the form of dancing which made me think of this guy. Have you heard about Matt? Matt is this dude who had a friend record him doing a dance while on a trip. Then a couple of years later someone found the video online and passed it along to someone who passed it along -- you know how this Internet thing works -- and soon he became a bit of a sensation. Finally, Stride Gum asked him if he wanted to take another trip around the world, so he did. In fact, he danced his way around the globe several times and the last time he invited the folks who’d written to him to join him. Here is his video - it’s awesome. So, in celebration of Bridget, achieving dreams, Matt, and the fun folks around the world who run, dance and live this life fully, I invite you to start off your Monday by celebrating and chair dancing or simply dancing around.

Before you go to watch the video, I have to ask….

What is the one place in the world you would want to dance? I would want to dance on top of a mountain peak in New Zealand.

If you were invited to travel the globe doing one thing, what would it be? I would want to laugh with as many people as possible in as many places as possible around the world.

Photo by Rebecca Schavulski

When my friends, Faith and Dan got married, Faith knew that she wanted one of her wedding photos to include a picture that was filled the spirit of NYC because, after her wedding, she was moving to Canada. The result was this magnificent photo taken of two of the most magnificent people I know. It not only captured the happiness of these newlyweds but it captured the energy of the city in the heart of Grand Central Station and the beauty of our nation with the flag. Sometimes, we grab hold of the very moments we dreamed of capturing, perfectly.

 Photo by Brian Moynihan

My husband and I were driving along a road in Hawaii when we spotted the sun on the water. It was incredible. He stopped the car for just a moment, rolled down the window and snapped this photo. It is one of our favorite pictures. We never dreamed it would turn out to be so beautiful.

Whether it’s a planned photo or one that happened spontaneously, I invite you to partake in a community photo project called, “The One That Didn’t Get Away.” This project is open to everyone from professional photographers and those who enjoy snapping a photo every now and again to people who never take pictures but once took a fabulous picture by accident. Please feel free to extend this invitation to others.

If you don’t have a photo that you would like to share, I encourage you to think about a picture you hope to take one day and tell us about it. Maybe you’d like a self-portrait or a photo standing before a Wonder of the World. Whatever it is, I’d love to hear about it.
As for me, I have a couple of photos I’d like to take in the future including one taken while lying on the ground looking up at the swarms of butterflies I have heard you can find in Mexico in the Spring. And I’d love a photo of me when I go surfing for the first time.

Let’s see if we can create an incredible gallery of those images that exceeded our expectations. The ones that didn’t get away.
 
HOW TO SUBMIT A PHOTO:  Please go to the Contact Me page on this blog by simply clicking on “Contact Me” at the very top of this page. You will find my email address. Send your photos along and I will create a Flickr page that will link to my blog for this art project.