The July Love List
The hottest month on human record comes to a close today.
As the climate crisis presses on, Tracy and I have been directing our energy toward our garden. This month, we’ve had numerous bees, as well as hummingbird and butterfly visitors, including a monarch. I made a sculpture for the birds, and they seem to like it. This heat wave has been rough, but the birds are bathing in their fountains, peppers and herbs are thriving, and the cosmos are just spectacular.
It’s our intention to completely eliminate our “lawn” and rewind our space, planting mostly natives for the pollinators. We’re replacing invasive plants with keystone plants, we’re going to be building more raised beds, and we are planning some environmental art projects.
Every evening, we walk outside and talk to the plants. This practice is reshaping us from the inside out.
In other news this month, our niece, who goes to school in California, came home for a visit and it was so good to see her. So, so good. My family got together for a porch dinner.
I have been working on some small paintings on cardboard, posting video and doing readings.
Links I Loved This Month
We watched this documentary about Rock Hudson.
We’ve also been watching a lot of herb, plant magic, gardening, eco content. Some of our favorites:
I want to live here.
And speaking of living, this is incredible.
We’re Mostly Trying to Escape This Moment
Siouxsie Shows Off Her Silver Hair
This is an interesting collaboration.
Greta Gerwig’s Barbie Sets Record for Biggest Opening Weekend Ever for a Female Director
I’m on this episode of the Campfire! 🔥
This whole podcast is so good, particularly this episode.
I don’t really have the words for Sinead O’Connor’s death. It hit me hard. Her music was a huge part of my life and remains so. I remember the first time I heard her voice. It was the song Mandinka and it shook through my body. I immediately bought The Lion and the Cobra, which was released when I was a senior in high school. I’ve listened to all of her music since - more than just “listened to” - it has sustained me.
Sinead showed young GenX women the power of anger and truth-telling and love. She was a brilliant musician, a guiding force and a gentle, luminous soul.
As an artist, she was brave. She told the truth and stood up for what was right and the system never stopped trying to punish her. They system attempted to punish her for refusing to fit into its idea of who she should be, for refusing to comply. It never stopped, even in her death has not stopped, telling her she was too much. For those of us who were in our twenties during the nineties, who had learned over and over again that we were too much, who burned with desire of non-compliance, Sinead was more important than I know how to express.
The grief we we feel when the artists important to us die is a real grief because art is a real connection.
The women of my generation loved Sinead. I hope she knows that. I hope she feels that now.
“Sometimes an artists job is to create the difficult conversations that need to be had. And it’s not my business what anyone thinks of me when I do that” -Sinead O’Connor
As we lean into a new month and a full moon, I am taking my journal out to the trees as often as possible where I can listen to the birds and my heart.
Goodbye July. Hello August.
xoxo