Art and Life Now and Then and We.

My eye caught a glimmer of white in the field as I sat at my window. It was on a mound of dirt scooped out from one of the many ditches that drain Willow Grove. I watched and then saw a marsh hawk lift up a few feet and drop down again. Must have a mouse I thought. A crow sat on a nearby mound and then flew and circled and made a deep dive at the marsh hawk, which ducked and fluttered it's wings.

The crow took a dive at the hawk. This time the hawk put up more of a fuss and rose into the air and flew at the crow. How interesting I thought to be watching this action of the wild. Now they are both up in the sky diving at one another and there is no competition because the hawk out manuvers the crow ten to one. And I realize while watching this swooping and diving why some World War 11 planes were named after hawks; they're such amazing fliers!

After no more than two minutes it was settled that the hawk would keep what it had and the crow went back to his own mound of dredged soil.

I'm let to see the nature of these birds and I like that. It's a refreshing sight because there's not all this... oh, I hope I'm looking good while I'm flying and, oh, I hope this is how I'm supposed to be doing this.

There is no doubt about their actions. This might sound like a rather obvious observation but I am refreshened by it.

This 'dance' in the sky was not a performance; it was poetry with purpose. Art and life together. I believe we tend to separte art from life. I know I'm being drawn back to uniting the art and life by my longing for what I once had. And I wonder where it was along the way that I separted life from art.

The picture I am sharing of myself, my dad and my sister in this post was taken in 1965 in California. I'm twelve and wearing a dress sewn by my mother. I have on a white cardigan with the top buttoned. I wearing pale blue socks to match my dress and am standing with my feet neatly together (red sandels) with my hands rather gracefully clasped.

What I'm seeing in this image of me is a girl who is comfortable in her body, is wearing what she likes and has a self-possessed air about her. I can tell you when I became separted from her...it was when my legs grew longer and my waist narrower.

I got looks of approval from guys. It was no longer about feeling content and comfortable in myself; the stakes had changed, now it was about looking good for 'them'. I exchanged how I felt about myself for they felt about me. Bad trade.

How could I have given up that which had the most value. I became a slender young teen who knew she drew admiring gazes and she loved acting as though she were not conscious of them. The delight of being admired and acting as though it didn't matter.

I began turing all my attention outward and my inner world became a room boarded off. I stopped being friends with her, my inner self. I saw her as not being quite with it. She could embarras me. She was too honest. She could say the wrong thing! I mean, I don't think she even shaved her legs! But with all those inbetween years behind us now, we are closer friends now, her and I. I love seeing her straight unshaven legs in pictures and her hair that hangs to her shoulders and slips forward, which has never been to a salon. She's smiling in the picture and I imagine she is smiling at me that even then she I would be coming back for her.