Red-shouldered Hawk Territory--V

I am having to shift creative focus, from wildlife viewing and sketching, to sending out submission letters for my novel. Why spend all that time writing it, if I don't pursue publication, right? I've always planned to do that. I simply needed to hold it for a while, the way you hold an infant close to you when its newly born. I am a writer as well as an artist. And though every publisher will tell you that more than one focus scatters your interest, it can't be helped. There is truth in this. Dividing your time is a challenge. But now that I have discovered who I am, I refuse to go forward leaving either behind. And so there is this dance, this back and forth journey, both creative endeavors, both requiring deep commitment, both rewarding in and of themselves. The hawks. Yes, I visited them yesterday. Neither of the adults were around and as I ventured into the nest yard, I felt its emptiness, as though no one were home. But knowing this was probably my last opportunity to see the juvenile, I stayed the duration of four hours and visited the gardens and sketched while waiting. In time, a juvenile began calling in the nest area. I saw him in flight several times, though when he perched, I could never locate him through the leaves. He returned to the nest area, flying within it from perch to perch, then exceeded its boundaries to cross the road and travel to neighboring areas, noted both visually and by the distance and direction of his solicitous calls. Though he is seen from time to time by the residents, it has become less and less likely that I will see the hawk family. And so, I will now devote my hawk watching time to using the inspiration they've given me to finish my sketchbook and select some favorite images to paint, all of which I will share with you as they are completed.In the meantime, I want to introduce you to several other Red-shouldered hawk lovers and observers that I have met along the way. This has been another amazing part of the journey, the connection that blogging has given me to others who have enjoyed similar experiences and captured these in their own unique ways.

Leonard is a professor and journalist in Marietta, GA. You must visit his video and though the outcome of his story is uncertain at this time, mobbing is a turnabout reality for hawks, one in which nature provides for the predated as well as, the predator.

Mary Howell Cromer lives in LeGrange, KY. She launched her blog, Red-shouldered Hawks of Tingsgrove this week to display her journal and photos of the Red-shouldered hawks that she has spent hours observing the past several years. She has experienced both happy and sad endings, as well, and given aid to the parents a time or two. Don't miss her fun images of the juveniles.

And Jay at Down to Earth, created a wonderful diary post about her experiences with Red-shouldered hawks living in and around her property in eastern North Carolina. Visit her beautiful images, including a juvenile visiting the bird bath.

And last, but certainly not least, you must visit Larry Jordan's Red-shouldered hawks at Birder's Report for a northern California look at this beautiful species. To see my entire series of posts on this family of Red-shouldered hawks, click this link. The above images were taken at various times during my observations. The sketch is of the female with prey brought to her by the male. The second image is the male taking the remains of the female's meal to another perch to eat. The dragonfly is a ballerina ! a very small male Blue dasher. The perched hawk image is the male; the hawk in flight, one of the adults.

The Two-fold Inspiration of Blogging

In my first of two anniversary posts, this being the second, I wrote about the stage that blogging offers us and how its benefits resonate in our daily lives. The inspiration found in blogging works in much the same way. It comes as a natural outcrop of creating. The more we create, the more we are stimulated to create and the more easily new ideas flow.

I take photographs. I look at them on the computer and I see more than I saw before. The images bring me closer to the subject. I learn and want to share. And because I have a stage, I am inspired to do just that. Changes in awareness and confidence are a natural result of that creating. So the next time I write a blog post, send out queries for a book, tell a story to my neighbor or embark on a new endeavor, newly honed skills emerge from my creative library and add sparkle to what I do, often without me even noticing.And that brings me to the second aspect of blogging inspiration, my fellow bloggers. Creating stimulates more creating. And seeing what others have created pumps you with new ideas, encourages by example, and gets your creative juices flowing even more.So, by way of celebration, I want to name and thank three fellow bloggers who have particularly inspired me during this past year. Julie Zicklefoose, who freely uses her inner world to infuse humor and depth into stories that leap right into our hearts. Toni Kelly, whose generous sharing of sketchbook designs and studies stir the urge in each of us to get busy with our own. Debbie Kaspari, whose amazing documentation of field observations and sketching makes us all want to get out there and brave the unknown.

And to each of you, readers and fellow bloggers, a special thanks for being part of this blogging community and making this a fun first year. A parting note about shyness: Passion, determination, practice--whether experienced individually or in combination--all trump shyness.

Photos from top to bottom: A Carolina wren begging to be painted; tufted titmous; American goldfinch; pine siskins on a crooked birdbath (I think I'm celebrating my birdbath too); golden-crowned kinglet sketch.

Celebrating One Year of Blogging

It was one year ago in January that I created my blog and published my first post.
And as our calendars flip over to February, it’s clear that the date itself, January 13, wasn’t particularly remarkable for me. But knowing the anniversary was passing caused me to look back and reflect. And as I did, I was reminded of how simply it began, as a desire to display photographs and art and write about nature. And I see what it has now become, an interactive community of mutual sharing, learning, mentoring and inspiration.

And so to celebrate my first year, I want to highlight for you, in this post and the next, two aspects of blogging that have become particularly important to me and inseparable--the stage and the inspiration it provides.
The stage of course is the blogging platform, a place to "perform", to publish your writing, your photographs, your artistic endeavors, whatever they may be, to an audience that remains largely anonymous but that can span the globe. It makes the sage advice, “You make your stage. The audience is waiting”, spring vividly to life.Every stage we create has something to give us. We step forward, find our courage. We practice and make our mistakes. We change and we get stronger, not just on the blogging stage, but in every aspect of our lives. We learn as we create and we learn as we experience the stage, whether it's this stage or any other we have selected.I was recently talking with a friend who is a published author and artist, and said, “I haven’t done one thing toward publishing my novel. It just sits there along with the writer’s market books that are stacked on my buffet and I do nothing.”
“Well, why not? Why aren't you getting it out there?” he asked.
“Umm…avoidance, I think. I’m shy.”
“You’re shy? What do you mean you’re shy? I’ve never seen that in you.” We stared at each other. I finally spoke.
“I don’t look shy. It’s what we sometimes call counter-phobic in the mental health field. Everything I love requires that I be on stage. So I push myself out there until I make it look easy, but it’s really not.”
And that is one of the many ways this stage has become important to me—practice. We create, we let the world see what we have to say and then we’re stimulated to create again by the very stage we dance on. It’s an energy that feeds itself. We get some feedback and we have some control. But most of all, the more we practice the more courage we have to say what it is we have to say and to show the world who we are through our passions and creations.
Next post: The inspiration in blogging

Photos from top to bottom: Greater sandhill cranes at Bosque del Apache (more in an upcoming post); Golden-crowned kinglet in watercolor (also upcoming); possible female rufous or broad-winged hummingbird in New Mexico; a stack of writer's market books; me (right) with Natalie Goldberg (2008), who doesn't like photos, but isn't shy about her teachings; writing and hiking buddies in the Santa Fe National Forest in New Mexico (2008).

A Welcome to 2009!

Every year I create a list of experiences and accomplishments that marked the year's journey. Its my way of expressing gratitude for the year past and loading my mind with ideas and thoughts about what I want to do in the coming year.
One of my favorite motivational quotes comes from Neal Donald Walsh: "Yet here is a secret of all Masters: keep choosing the same thing....over and over until your will is made manifest in your reality." And when the going gets tough, which is sometimes the moment before reaching the finish line, I recite this encouragement in my mind..."just keep chosing the same thing". And whatever project or activity I'm struggling with seems to finish itself!

I also recently came across a fun way to think of these goals. Artist Karen Winters refers to them as "the things I'm looking forward to in 2009"on her blog The Creative Journey. And since I began both my blog and a facebook page in 2008, I will celebrate the launching of these two activities and the coming year by posting a few of the things I'm looking forward to in 2009.

--sending out query letters to find an agent for my novel

--finishing the last few pages of a whooping crane coloring book project and zipping it off to my layout partner in this endeavor

--spending a week of watercolor practice with Ann K. Lindsay and art friends in New York

--visiting Cape May and enjoying nature in a few other new places

--spending more time painting watercolor landscapes and the birds I've photographed

--developing a notecard series (or two) of backyard birds

--spending more time in the outdoors, hiking, sketching, photographing, kayaking

--creating a handmade moleskin sketchbook and filling it with a year's observations, stories and sketches

--creating new ways to display and market my art!Okay, that's enough for now. I noticed there is a lot of playing on my list. Welcome 2009!
Wishing you and your family a Happy New Year with many things to look forward to!

Photo: Greater sandhill cranes flying to roost at the Hiwassee Island, Dayton, TN.
Art: "The Return", original watercolor by Vickie Henderson.

Each of Us Creates the World

I have visited several blogs recently that have touched me deeply, both with their stories and with the passion of the authors. Visit the recent posts of Orca Watcher on Lolita, A Whale of a Purpose on the Beluga Whales and Creative Freedom Photography on the Giant Panda and you will feel touched, as well, by the dedication and enthusiasm.

Progress is created one person at a time, and the collective voice of individuals creates a momentum of awareness that is more powerful than the wind and the ocean combined.

I am reading Natalie Goldberg’s book, Wild Mind, Living the Writer’s Life. I’m reading it for several reasons, one of which is to stay connected to what I learned and felt at Rose Mountain. But I also read it to go deep. It settles my mind from the day, from whatever is bothersome and troubling on the surface, and from whatever seems insurmountable. Not that reading solves any of these problems. I’m borrowing another deep thinking mind for a while to encourage my own. These are the mentors and the teachers we find in good literature.

In her chapter, “The Dead Year” which is about hard beginnings, Natalie Goldberg writes:
I often say to myself now when writing is hard, “There is no such thing as failure.” The only failure in writing is when you stop doing it. Then you fail yourself. You affirm your resistance. Don’t do that. Let the outside world scream at you. Create an inner world of determination. When someone complained about getting up at five a.m. for sitting meditation, Katagori Roshi said, “Make positive effort for the good.” I repeat that often to myself when pushing the pen across the page feels like I, alone, have the responsibility to make the earth turn around the sun. Well, it’s true. Each of us does create the world. We’d better get to work.

She is writing about her love, writing. I read about writing and I see and hear everything that matters. I hear whales and orcas, and the gentle pandas, and I hear the whooping crane purring to its young. Despite decades of efforts to save the wild migrating population of whooping cranes that winter on the gulf coast of Texas, they are currently being threatened again by the potential development of key marshlands on their wintering grounds and by a new push for cleaner energy that seeks to erect wind turbines in the migration corridor of the most endangered crane in the world without responsibility to confer with wildlife experts on safe co-existence.

There are so many challenges ahead of us. Enough challenges for every single person to make a contribution. Every one of us “better get to work.”

Natalie Goldberg--the writing life

Every time I pick up one of Natalie Goldberg’s books and read a page or two, I’m inspired. Mexican Hat--Las Vegas NWR, Las Vegas, NM

I had the pleasure of experiencing four days of study with Natalie Goldberg and Sean Murphy, along with ten other participants. In the whole of that time we devoted ourselves to quieting our minds; and we wrote, and we read aloud, and then we wrote some more.

I had already read three of Goldberg's books prior to this experience but there are more—eleven altogether. If you are a writer or if you are interested in discovering more about who you are, her books are a dream to read, short chapters, gritty, inspiring.

I opened Wild Mind, Living the Writer’s Life this morning and read: “Writing is the act of discovery. If I knew everything ahead of time, why bother writing?”

And that's exactly it. Not knowing is so key to writing and to life. If we knew how to do everything, why bother? So go all out and make mistakes. Try something new and unfamiliar. Discover who you are and what matters. And write. There’s a whole wide world out there to be discovered --both inside and out.

The Silence

Clearly the most profound experience of my stay at Rose Mountain was our teachers, what they taught us about writing (and about living). Both Natalie Goldberg and Sean Murphy are talented and powerful mentors. I am fortunate to have experienced their wisdom and that it lives on in my mind, my practice and in their books. But I have wondered what aspect of this experience made it so difficult to re-engage when I returned home, so much so, that it took a full two weeks before I could feel my feet firmly replanted in everyday life again. I have concluded it was the silence. The silence of the mountain, the silence we observed just after meeting each other--thirteen of us inclusive of teachers, the silence of meditation, of walking, of writing and of listening. There was nothing superficial, shallow or pretentious to occupy our minds. Everything around us was real and pure, the air we breathed through our nose, the earth squarely solid beneath our feet, the whisper of the wind in the pines. There was nothing in the way of our opening up.
Without everyday distractions and demands to hold you to the surface, as your pen moves across the paper, what bubbles up is what matters. And what matters comes from a deeper place. And when you go deep you heal and become open to who you are.
As we read what we had written aloud to each other, this bubbling up was honored with silence, reverent, affirming silence. No reassurances bombarded you. There were no attempts to repair your composure or make your voice go away. No criticism or ‘fix it’ responses, no rushing in to make you feel better. There was only listening and silence. And how does this feel? Uncertain at first. It’s unfamiliar. But what follows is a very settling and strengthened certainty that you have honored who you are. You have listened deeply and heard what you had to say and in the midst of that profound silence, you know that is all that really matters.

The challenge then becomes, how do you hold on to that when you return? How do you incorporate that into your everyday life despite all the surface clamoring? The answer is, you practice.

The Blank Page

“It is in facing the unknown that we find out what we know.” Morning pages, 6-3-08
Wild Hyacinth

We are all afraid of the unknown. This is a natural survival fear. It is also a life challenge. Everyday holds small unknowns but with these we have some level of control and choice. It’s when the bottom falls out and we are on wholly unknown ground that we must take a leap.

There is unknown wisdom in each of us, unknown knowledge and unknown talents. But since unknowns make us doubt and shrink back, the Universe sometimes gives us a push forward, a reason to take that leap.

When I was finishing the novel, even after writing the final scene, I realized there was one more story thread that needed a bow. I sat down with my pen and blank paper with no idea what would come next. I had one little thought--maybe they could have pizza together.

And so I sat with my blank page and my pen and that pizza and I wrote words on the paper, starting and stopping and starting again, until finally the lines began to flow, the characters moved and the scene happened. And when I was finished, I read what I had written and was amazed. The loose threads had tied themselves together without my knowing it. This is the fun of creative work. This is the unconscious helping, a wholly magical, hard working and benevolent part of our beings.

And this is how it happens, how you write a book, paint an image, live your life. You show up, you take what you know and you go. It isn’t easy and it isn’t smooth. But in the process you discover who you are and what you’re made of and what comes next.

Healing Stories

"I am writing this story and it kicks me in the gut, it brings me to my knees and swells my eyes with tears. This is not an easy story to write. It is about who I was and who I am. It’s about trying to figure out what makes a good person good, trying to figure out how to fit in, how to give myself permission to be who I am--to let myself become without society or church or my neighbor or a husband, telling me who I am, what I should think, how I should act or where I should go.” Morning pages, May 12, 2008Columbine

Isn’t that what we're all trying to do--become our truth? We tell our stories a snippet at a time, at lunch, in emails, in letters, in conversations. We tell the funny ones mostly. And then there are the deep ones, the painful ones that we save for precious moments and precious people. Telling our stories connects us to all of human kind and stories heal. They are an act of love.

I am close--less than ten pages from finishing my novel. It is a work of fiction but no matter how much fiction one creates, truths flow out. The unconscious is an amazing part of the mind and body. It is ever busy, ever working to help and to heal.

And so soon, maybe tomorrow, you may hear me singing from the tree tops and the words to the song go something like this: “it is finished, it is finished--all of it is truly finished!”

A Tribute to Writers

"Remember life is an ongoing process of creation. You are creating your reality every minute. The decision you make today is often not the choice you make tomorrow. Yet here is a secret of all Masters: keep choosing the same thing....over and over until your will is made manifest in your reality."
--Neale Donald Walsch, Conversations with God
viburnum

My priority today and until it is complete, is finishing my novel. This commitment, that the time is now, has given me a new kind of respect and admiration for published writers. It is enough to choose this priority over and over again midst the trials that life throws your way and among other daily demands. But then there is the eye strain and the aching joints from too much stillness and the mind-numbing reading and re-reading.

I've always loved reading and writing, but this experience has given me an even deeper appreciation for those who have gone before me. And so I continue, repeating this phrase in my head over and over again--"every single day, choose the same thing, choose your novel."

Morning Pages

“Morning pages are non-negotiable. Never skip or skimp…. Morning pages will teach you your mood doesn’t really matter….[they] will teach you to stop judging and just let yourself write. So what if you’re tired, crabby, distracted, stressed?” --Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way.

I’ve been writing morning pages for ten years. You don’t have to be a writer. It’s a tool for everyone.

“Three pages of whatever crosses your mind—that’s all there is to it. If you can’t think of anything to write, then write, “I can’t think of anything to write….”

Your morning pages will stand by you through thick and thin, through joy and sorrow. They will clean out the clutter and stop the foolishness. They center your integrity and solidify what’s important. They become your best friend. And then you become your best friend.

Your Best Friend

Of writing, Natalie Goldberg says, “…it is your friend. It will never desert you, though you may desert it many times. The writing process is a constant source of life and vitality…. it offers me a chance to touch my life which always softens me and allows me to feel connected with myself again.”

I sometimes suggest writing as a way of sorting things out, gaining insights and restoring calm. Recently, a young woman brought me a page she had written. She had written it in a moment of feeling overwhelmed. She handed the page to me with embarrassment, saying, “this isn’t my best work,” and yet, I think it may have been just that, her best work. It was spontaneous, pure, open. In less than a page of words, she had expressed her fears, corrected the false assumptions that fueled them and restored calm. And that is beautiful. That is your best friend speaking to you from within.

Creative Happiness

"Happy isn’t having everything perfect. It’s feeling comfortable in your own skin and finding contentment in your own company. It’s spending more of your time doing things you love—creating and enjoying what you create. That creation can be a walk in nature, a massage, the interaction you have while working, your enjoyment of the wind or the warmth of a sweater. Creating is what we do with how we feel. Every day is filled with opportunities to create."
Nov 29, 2007, morning pages, Vickie Henderson

Practice Finding Your Voice

Natalie Goldberg’s, Writing Down the Bones, is one of my favorite books. I keep it on my bedside table so I can open it whenever I want and read a few pages. Not only is it full of two-page gems about writing practice, each lesson also speaks volumes about living life.

Last night I opened the book to the section entitled, “Make statements and Answer Questions.” In this section she brings to light a study that shows that women and minorities often use qualifiers in their statements, words that ask for reinforcement and encouragement, rather than using a clear and affirming voice. She writes: “After I read the article, I went home and looked at a poem I had just written. I made myself take out all vague, indefinite words and phrases. It felt as though I were pulling towels off my body, and I was left standing naked after a shower, exposing who I really was and how I felt. It was scary the first time, but it felt good. It made the poem much better.”

We all know what this nakedness feels like. We know it best in the form of early encounters that caused fear or humiliation and these experiences often shut down our voice at an early age. But truth is, there are no constants and opinions are as varied as the autumn leaves. We each have our own unique way of seeing the world and of creating and expressing ourselves. No one expression is any more valid or valuable than another.

Drawing and writing practice can help overcome the fear of exposure. To expose your thoughts and feelings on paper can be unnerving at first. To present them to others, even more so. But with practice, you will find your voice. You can’t help it.