You know it is Spring when...

• The dust you clean off the window sill is yellow. Can we say pollen?
• When you go outside in the city and it smells like cow shit - oh I mean mulch.
• When the sun is out and the sky is blue
• When it is 70 degrees by 3 pm but started out at 32 degrees when you left the house. Layers, Layers are your friend!
• the tulips are out and surrounded by dandelions
  
• When the stores are fully stocked with winter clothing and the summer stuff is on clearance
• You see limos everywhere - it is time for the Prom you know
  

Creativity like wine, gets better with age...

Last night we went to the Smuggler's Cafe located in the Big Dog Motorcycle showroom. The band playing was Paradox -a great cover band. The guys in the band seemed to be around our age and they were all really talented. The played well, sang well and the songs were tight. A great rocking experience!

H and I were discussing creativity last night and I told him I think we grow into our creative expression - at least I have. In my twenties I was so busy with the rat race and trying to be who I thought others wanted me to be - trying to be a grown up - that I forgot just how important my creative spirit was to me.

As children, I think we use creativity daily, to solve problems, to express ourselves. Children use art and the creative process to find what appeals to them most. They draw, paint, mold, build and design.

As adults I think some of that quest for knowledge, that desire to create and the process gets lost in the day in and day out struggles.

It is no big surprise then, that as we get older - in my case - entering my mid 30s, that we try to rebuild that process. Many moms I know make note cards with stamps or scrapbook. Take cake decorating classes or learn to sew. Knitting and other needle work are also popular choice. The hobbies are a way to tap that inner creative child. Creativity feeds the soul.

For me, I went back to something I had done since high school. I journaled, then I decided to do the public journal - my blog. Then I moved into stories and poetry. Now I am freelancing and pursuing my fiction.

H is talking about picking up with piano lessons or maybe guitar lessons - something he has not done since a child.

Being creative is soulful, enjoyable and challenging. Ultimately, I think it keeps us young.

An extra 100 plus pounds is alot already...

Today L, E and I took our first bike ride of the season. I say we, but in reality, they ride in the trailer or as my German friends call it, the caboose and I ride, dragging them along behind me.

Now I am not complaining because I love the rides. It is so much fun and very freeing to be able to get around town on the trails, there are so many great little hidden parks and paths. I cross trained and well honestly trained for the 1/2 marathon dragging them all over town. At the beginning of last spring I could barely make it to the library with them in tow and by the end of last summer I was coasting all over town, for miles and miles.

So while it is all good - I must say that over the winter - some little people have put on some pounds because the extra 100 pounds - well it seems a bit heavier and we are just getting into the beginning of bike season. Wow, I think I am going to have to add an extra workout to feed my biking habit. Or wait - maybe I can get the city commissioners to regrade a few of the steeper hills around town - I mean really it is a small thing to ask, right?

I wonder...

Today E and I went to the park that is very near our house. Our neighborhood is very close to a river and next to the park is a small wooded area and I guess you could call it a valley, but there is a steep incline going down to the river. This wooded area is the nesting area for vultures and some hawks. We have a hawk who lives in our back yard at certain times of the year. She is beautiful to watch and very regal.

So today as E played on the slides, I was sitting in the swing and watching the vultures and hawks fly around. The sky was a crystal blue, so clear and there were no clouds. The birds looked as if they were floating in the sky, their black wings shiny in the sunlight. Now I can tell which are vultures and which are hawks based on size. The vultures are larger birds and rather bald.

I think when we think of hawks, we think of them being strong and powerful birds of prey. They are regal, in fact I think kings have kept hawks for display and sport for centuries. Many sports teams have a hawk as a mascot. As does my alma mater.

Now vultures on the other hand, they get a bad wrap. They feed on dead animals and sometimes prey on dying animals. In common speech we say things like - the vultures are circling or so and so is a vulture.

But to watch them fly today - the vultures were just as graceful, just as powerful and just as beautiful as the hawks. They flew in perfect circles on the wind currents. It was lovely to watch. So peaceful and yet so powerful.

I imagine we associate vultures with death and that is what makes them seem less majestic and powerful, but is it really more majestic to stalk and slaughter a little mouse or other small mammal as a hawk does or is it better to eat that which is going to go to waste anyway and spread bacteria in the process? Vultures serve the communities in which they live by eating what is left to waste. I read online that in India and Pakistan, when animals die the farmers and herders leave them in the fields for the vultures and because of over use of a particular drug in the live stock, which is deadly to vultures, much of the vulture population has died and the rate of illness among the farmers, due to decaying dead flesh is on the rise. Diseases such as botulism are kept in check by vultures and without them it is spreading through the towns and villages.

Both birds serve a purpose, the hawks keep us from being over run by rabbits and field mice and the vultures keep our wooded areas and fields free from dead animals, which spread disease. In flight they are both majestic and graceful, full of power and beauty.

So I wonder, why do we value one above the other...

Balance

I think it goes without saying that most of us have a fair number of balls in the air most days. I have often struggled with balance, in various forms and shapes and sizes. My mind is always busy. Always. I am a thinking machine. I almost never dream, at least not that I remember and my theory is my mind is so busy with thinking and dreaming while I am awake - that when I am asleep, I am asleep and my mind is recharging for another big day of all manner of thoughts.

I am working a fair amount now on free lance projects and I will admit that my fiction writing has taken a back seat, which is ok. There is the creative ebb and flow to my life, which is important. I am working to establish a plan, to work in writing fiction. I have a story which I started along time ago and I have decided to finish it this summer. It is the right time and I want to finish it. So that is my creative writing goal for the summer.

I have alot going on with my freelancing. I am setting up my website and I am networking slowly and I am commitment to making this happen. This time last year I was flirting with calling myself a writer. Now today - I AM A WRITER. I am making money writing. I am developing my craft. I am learning. I am taking it to another level. I write because it is my passion, I have always written, now I am sharing the fruits of my labor with people, in very public ways and I am growing and I am a creative being and for the first time in a long time, the little voice in my head is happy and occupied and feed and not angry at me for ignoring it or telling it we cannot do thing.

So on one hand I have added balls to the juggling routine but on the other hand I am so much more at peace and the voice within me is happy and finding an outlet. That is true balance I think. The schedule and the laundry and the calender, will eventually work itself out. The mental peace is vital to all of that. I have - I think for the moment - found the mental peace I was craving. I have a focus, the voice in my mind is focused because I am attentive to it. It no longer needs to throw ideas at me, I have its attention and it has mine and we are one.