nature

Get a house in the suburbs they said. An ivy-covered cottage with mature trees just north of the hills.
That way you’ll get to experience all of the flora and fauna the area has to offer, they said. So much better than the concrete jungle of mid-city, they said.

So, we did.
We listened to “them”.

And for almost twenty years it’s been exactly as advertised—idyllic—except for that July a few years back when the coyotes ate my two Siamese cats. I can honestly say that put quite a damper on my summer. Still, we have managed to co-exist with nature in a very cordial and symbiotic way.

I leave past-its-prime fruit out for the squirrels so they’ll leave my bird feeder alone; we tolerate the enormous spider webs that are mysteriously woven overnight in high traffic areas and happen to always be at face level. There’s nothing like walking outside in the early dawn hours with a cup of coffee and becoming entangled in a giant, sticky, web that entraps you like a mummy and leaves you batting at your hair like a crazy person—all the while wondering where the damn spider went.

But like I said— we agree to co-exist.

Well, except for the crows. My husband wants to shoot them because they’re colossal pains-in-the-asses whose poops are ruining the paint on our cars. I fight, like a cheap defense attorney, for their right to occupy our giant tree in the front even though the evidence is overwhelming AND it pisses me off too. The sheer volume and size of their shit attacks are hard to fathom. I had one last week, the size of a serving platter, that blotted out the entire driver’s side of my windshield. And it was purple. Wtf?

Nevertheless, I won’t allow him to kill them although I’m pretty sure he’s already had target practice with a few.

But only the ones that laugh at him. Crows laugh you know.
At you.
At your dog.
At your poor choices in cargo shorts.
But you wouldn’t know that unless you live in the suburbs.

Aside from that; things have been quiet. That is, until this year, or as we like to call it: The Year That Wild Kingdom Took Over Studio City.

Lest you label me a complainer—I will first tell you some things I love about living amongst nature.

I love the squirrels, they’re chatty and cute and they hide peanuts in my flower pots… Yipppeeee.

I love the birds. They sing and crap joyfully while building their nests in the drawers of the outside potting table where I keep the clippers and the tiny garden spade—so I can’t get to them until the babies are hatched and raised and go off to college.

I love all the spiders and their cobwebs (which I learned recently are abandoned spider webs that have dust bunnies stuck to them) but I already said that.

I love the hummingbirds who actually come up to my face and make their cute little brrrrrrrrrr sound while I’m watering.

Ok. I’m done.

This year has been the year of the skunk and now, as of late, the year of the raccoon—and I don’t mean I’ve gone schizophrenic on the Chinese calendar.

We have captured and released three skunks after our beautiful but stupid boxer, Ruby, got skunked four times.
It has cost us the equivalent of a monthly car payment for an exterminator to wait them out and once caught, have them relocated to a more hospitable zip code.

But who needs money anyway?

Once those little rascals went bye-bye we mistakenly let down our guard thinking that the worst was over.

Until last week when twice, Ruby and I were woken up by the smell of skunk. Again.

One of my friends joked that the skunks are hitchhiking back to our house because they miss us. I had her killed.

This week there hasn’t been any skunk stench. Nope. Just the terrifying screaming that accompanies Raccoon Fight Club which starts promptly at 2 am—two shows a night—two mornings in a row. The sound is SO loud and horrific I’m certain that if a skunk were anywhere in the vicinity the smell would be scared right off.

“It’s just a cat”, my husband mumbled in his sleep the first night. “Yeah, if a cat was as big as a dog and screamed like a child whose foot was caught in a bear trap,” I replied. To add to the racket, Racoon Fight Club had a cheering section like it was a championship prize fight in Las Vegas. The rats who inhabit the Bougainvillea covered fence like it’s rent controlled apartments, were squealing their little hearts out. Favorites were picked. Bets were placed. Peanuts exchanged hands.

Oh, the rats? Haven’t I mentioned them yet? Oh, pardon me. Yeah. Our house is a veritable torture museum obstacle course of mouse traps that are set…everywhere. Apparently, all of Studio City is infested with rats.

They say it’s all the ivy and mature trees. Fucking “they”!

Anyway…After fifteen minutes of cowering in the corner with Ruby, it finally stopped. All of it. The screaming, the squealing, and our whimpering.

Last night it started again only this time it was so deafening and ferocious I could have sworn they were inside the house. Ruby and I jumped into each other’s arms, shaking like two pitiful Chihuahuas. It even woke up my husband and forced him to put on pants.

You don’t want to do that in the middle of the night.

You don’t want to make my husband put on his pants because then he means business—and somebody’s gonna pay.

I heard him grab the giant industrial flashlight that occupies valuable real estate on his nightstand. I hate that thing. It’s ugly AF, weighs a ton, doubles as a weapon, and is so bright I’m sure they can see the light from space.

Husband opened the door to the backyard and yelled “Hey!” because wild animals respond to bald guys holding klieg lights yelling at them. In reality, the screaming didn’t even miss a beat. I wondered how any of our neighbors could sleep through this horror movie nightmare, I’m sure I’ll read about it in the neighborhood blog: Neighbors hold middle-of-the-night, illegal racoon fight club on their rat infested fence.

After another ten minutes of relentless screaming from the raccoons with the rats cheering loudly in the background —I’d had enough. Someone had to do something! I left the safe embrace of my cowardly dog and barefooted my way out the door to the deck on the far side of the yard. I could see the glaring beam of light shining from the flashlight on the other side of the lawn where my husband was hiding standing.

It seems he had bestowed stadium lighting upon Raccoon Fight Club which caused the rats to cheer even louder!

“It’s two raccoons”, he whisper-yelled over in my direction. I could barely hear him over the commotion. But I know they heard us, those two raccoons, yet, whatever they were fighting about overrode their fear of two humans.
And a dog.
As an aside: Were’s the memo that goes out to the wildlife in the neighborhood that lets them know that our house is probably not a good idea for staging Fight Club because —it has a DOG. A little brown dog that will…right.

Anyway, this next section sums up our marital partnership in five or six sentences. Maybe it will sound familiar to you?

“I’m hosing ‘um!”, I yelled over to my hero who was shining his beam of light right on them like it was the Super Bowl half-time show. Meanwhile, the raccoons gave not one shit. They just kept on with the scream fighting. So I turned the hose on full strength and blasted them with everything I had.

I think for a minute they thought it was part of the show. But Lord have mercy it shut them the hell up.

Blessed silence.

“They’re gone”, he informed me. “Good idea”, he added as he powered down the klieg light they can see from space.

”Uh, ya think?”, I muttered under my breath as I wound the hose back up—stood for a moment like Wonder Woman—and went back to bed.

Being the woo-woo, California knucklehead that I am, I saged the entire yard this morning concentrating on that corner, which I’m convinced is a portal to the mouth of hell.

Hmmmmm…I wonder… how much is it going to cost us to trap and relocate two raccoons? They are definitely meaner than the skunks. Hear that? I’m starting to miss the damn skunks!

I think I’ll start a Go Fund Me Page.

Carry on,
xox

“A bambiraptor is a savage baby deer.”
~ Alan Davies

I was randomly thinking about deer the other day. Don’t ask me why. I think it was prompted by a deer siting at the top of Beverly Glen a month or so ago but I can’t be sure.

Anyway, as we slowly wove our way up the canyon in a single file line (otherwise known as rush hour), I spied a deer casually teetering (if that’s even possible), on an impossibly vertical slope to my right.

Chewing lazily, she seemed to be sizing things up.

Should she stay and enjoy her snack until those things with wheels and bumpers and angry people inside that could kill her were gone? Or should she take her chances and make a run for it?

I could see her thinking about it and that made me mad.

Deer and cars don’t mix. Cars should be viewed with the same trepidation as any natural predator. Think wolf or coyote or Elmer Fudd. But they aren’t and you can just see it in their dark little Bambi eyes.

They are not the least bit afraid of cars.

They either have such an inflated sense of their own speed and agility that they’re convinced they can dash across a street without being hit OR they are in dire need of a Deer Newsletter that informs them of the dangers that living in the city can present.

Either way, evolution has failed them.

Cars are not a novelty. Cars have been around for tens of deer generations. They should run in the other direction the moment they smell traffic instead of eyeballing the wildflowers that grow on the other side of the street. When they see poor Bob laying there, yet another unfortunate victim of roadkill, they should have a family meeting where they yell and smoke too many Marlboro as they instill fear into the hearts of their baby does and sassy teenage bucks.

Maybe they do and nobody cares.

Every deer thinks that it won’t happen to them. Famous last words, right Bob?

I’m like a deer. We all are. You can tell me stuff is dangerous and I’ll just shrug and figure I’ll take my chances.
Sound familiar?

But maybe the deer have it right? Maybe we should ignore the stupid newsletter with page after page of what will kill us. Maybe we should just live our lives with curiosity about those flowers that grow on the other side of the street.

I don’t know. I can’t be sure any of it makes sense.

All I know is that some things aren’t worth dying for…and deer need to learn to read traffic better.

Carry on,
xox

I rest my case!

“Nature is efficient, it doesn’t waste time.”

As I huffed and puffed my way up the hill, hoodie up protecting my ears from the freezing (58 degrees) winds, shoes caked with mud from the recent rains, all I could do was question my sanity—demonstrated by the fact that I’d decided to “switch things up” and go the opposite way that I usually do—which is markedly harder—and freakishly longer—and that I don’t have time for this shit, I’ve got things to do!

Don’t argue with me. I understand when you tell me that it shouldn’t be harder OR longer, that it is physically impossible for that to be true, blah, blah, blah…

HEY, GO TO HELL! I have one of those step counting thingies which said I climbed 31 flights of steps today as opposed to 17 flights on a regular day, and we all know those things don’t lie.

Feeling every. single. extra. step. I was called to sit on a bench at the apex of one of the hills. I have to mention that the view of the San Fernando Valley from that bench is spectacular.

Yet, in the fifteen plus years that I’ve hiked that hill, I have NEVER been called to cop a squat on that bench.
Not when the ninety plus degree weather was making me nauseous.
Not when I’ve been caught in the rain.
Not when my plantar fasciitis had me limping like Quasimodo in yoga pants up the entire hill.
Not even when it was the best seat in the house for some of our recent brush fires.

Nope. I blast past that bench as I silently judge anyone who sits there.

Must be nice to just be able to sit and waste time, I think in that judgy tone of voice that inhabits your head when you see someone doing something which never occurred to you to do, or you feel unworthy of attempting.

So when the bench called me I was surprised. Taken aback.

Wha…what? I stammered back. Are you talking to me?
My face laughed a little. My head turned right as I looked in its direction but the rest of my body continued full steam ahead straight up the hill.

Why don’t you come sit for a while? It said again.

Listen, I have a heart-rate to maintain…

That’s when I observed my body in full speed-walking mode, make a very impressive u-turn in one sweeping motion and end up planting my ass on that bench.

Huh.

I sat there self-consciously for a minute or two staring straight ahead, catching my breath.

That’s when I saw him enter. Like a highly choreographed actor, he came gliding into view from stage left, out above the trees, but right at eye level. A stunning red-tailed hawk hovering in one place, artfully surfing the wind currents.

I sat mesmerized. So enthralled I neglected to take his picture. It was that wonderful and I would have missed his graceful dance had I not heeded The Calling of the Bench.
Or was it the hawk calling me from the wings to sit and witness his perfectly timed entrance and beautiful dance?

Huh.

He seemed to be having a ball; maintaining his altitude, wings majestically out stretched, big smile on his face (I’m just assuming that last one). He didn’t seem worried about the rest of his day, about how the hunting would be and catching his dinner. He seemed unaware of the occasional smaller birds that tried to join him and couldn’t.

He was having fun wasting time. Actually, he seemed unaware of time at all.

Huh.

I was reminded of that quote I once heard, “We have twenty-four hours in a day. Eight hours to work, eight hours to sleep, and eight hours to do whatever else makes us happy.”

I sat there and watched him for about ten minutes which is a really long time to sit on a random bench—on the top of a hill—in the middle of a hike. It felt suspiciously like time-wasting but it made me happy so I put it in that eight-hour category.

Hey, leave it to nature to school me. If that gorgeous hawk who must hunt and catch his prey if he wants to eat, has the wherewithal to just enjoy life and waste a little time, then me with my refrigerator full of food (and some trail mix in my car), can follow his example.

So…who do you think called me to sit? The bench or the hawk?

Carry on,
xox

This is a recent essay by Liz Gilbert and it’s just so damn good I had to share it with you guys.
xox

Take it away, Liz!

Dear Ones –
The other day, I was talking with someone on this page about how to walk through the world with “an undefended heart”.
This person was saying that she wants so much to live with an open and undefended heart, but then it always happens that people hurt her and attack her when they see that she is open. She doesn’t want to leave herself vulnerable to that sort of pain. So she shuts down. Understandably.

So what is to be done?

How do we live open-hearted lives without being victims of constant attack?

Allow me to introduce you to the Alpha Mare.
This is an idea that came to me through my beloved friend Martha Beck, who explained to me how the psychology of a herd of horses works. At the top of the hierarchy of a herd of horses, there is an alpha mare. She is the leader. (Stallions come and go, but the mare is in charge of the herd forever.) All the other horses look to her, in order to know what to do and how to feel. As long as she remains calm, the rest of the herd feels calm. And the alpha mare is always calm, because her boundaries are AIRTIGHT. She knows exactly who she is, and nobody messes with it. Nobody approaches the alpha mare without her invitation. Nobody imposes themselves upon the alpha mare against her will. The alpha mare never lets herself be influenced by another horse’s fears or anxieties or aggression. She knows what the right thing to do is, and she does it. Everyone else follows. She doesn’t need anyone’s approval for anything. She doesn’t need anyone’s permission. She lives and breathes from a place of integrity and certainty, because of her strong and appropriate boundaries. And as a result, SHE IS ALWAYS RELAXED.

And because she is relaxed, everyone around her is RELAXED.
Thus the whole herd can live safely and peacefully around her, with undefended hearts, and the alpha mare’s heart is undefended, too.
It is fear that makes you defend your heart, but once you have discovered appropriate boundaries, you do not need to live in constant fear.

Until you learn how to hold appropriate boundaries, and stand in integrity, and speak your truth, you will never have a relaxed moment in your life. You will live like a fugitive, always on the run, always hiding, always afraid of being exposed.

A heart without healthy and appropriate boundaries can only suffer in a constant state of anxiety and defense — vigilant against the next attack,helpless against other people’s will.

To live with an undefended heart does NOT mean that you walk out in the world like a helpless child, wide-open and boundary-less, and you just let anyone do anything to you that they please. That is not openness; that is weakness.

No. You can only live with an undefended heart once you know the difference between “This is OK for me,” and “This is not OK for me” — so you never need to worry or stress about what’s going to happen to you next, or somebody will say next, or who will harm you.

Once you know the difference between “This is OK”, and “This is not OK”, you can walk anywhere in this world safely — your guard down, your eyes filled with curiosity, your soul filled with simple wonder.

That is the alpha mare, and she’s hiding inside you somewhere, waiting to come out.

I know she is.

ONWARD,
LG

I love giving things away.
It makes me feel good.

But…has someone ever given something to someone you know—and they don’t want it—and they try to give it to you—but you’re too polite to say no?
Yeah, me neither.
OR, have you ever given someone something and they were completely ungrateful?

I could say I’m not attached to the reaction of the recipient because we all know that’s a trap and we don’t give only to receive—but if I said that I’d be lying.

Case in point.
I cleaned out my refrigerator the other day. And “cleaned out” might not be exactly the right term. I reached for a bag of apple slices (I buy them already sliced in a convenient reusable bag because I CANNOT be bothered to cut my own apples), and when they looked less than appetizing, kind of brown and mushy, instead of putting them back in the drawer and looking for some other snack, I took them out to throw them away.

I think we can all agree, “cleaned out” does work here.

Anyhow, as I made my way to the trash I had an idea.
This was not a fresh, shiny, new idea. It was actually the same reoccurring idea I get when I have fruit that has turned unfit for human consumption. I will put it out front for the squirrels!
Just two weeks ago I gave them a couple of apricots that had turned to jam all by themselves in the bottom of the fruit bowl—and they loved ‘em! Gone in five minutes!

I love that! It’s such win, win situation. They eat my perfectly squirrel-edible fruit and I don’t have to feel guilty about the fact that eighty-five percent of the fruit I buy spoils before I can eat it.

So…let me just tell you about these squirrels.

We have an entire community of extremely boisterous, horney and hungry squirrels that came part and parcel with the house, which came part and parcel with the giant Ash tree out front.

Someone in the neighborhood feeds them peanuts, the shells which I find in all of my planters…and my dogs’ poop. They have also been key players in The Mystery of The Steak Bones From Nowhere.
A reoccurring drama where we find beef and steak bones (is that redundant?), randomly on our property more than I’m guessing you do.

They appear out of nowhere and find their way into our house, I suspect via my dog’s mouth. I have felt suspicious of their appearance from the start but that’s just me. I have a suspicious nature.

On the other hand, my delightful husband with not a suspicious bone in his body, suggested that the squirrels were bringing them over. This is exactly what he said, “I think someone is giving the bones to the squirrels and they’re bringing them to the dog”.

Of course, I immediately balked at the idea of that.

Most of the bones are bigger than a squirrel’s head, some larger than their entire body I just couldn’t wrap my brain around the aerodynamics of it. Still, they kept showing up. Then the other day, when I was pruning the Bougainvillea, a perfectly round beef bone the size of my fist, fell out of the air and onto my head. It must have fallen into the boug from the canopy of the Ash tree that covers our patio. Otherwise known as the squirrel Trump Tower.

My husband was as vindicated as you can be without saying “I told you so”, the dog was as grateful as a dog can possibly be without exploding. Me—I was neither.

All this to say, our squirrels pretty much accept any and all hand-outs.

Except apparently, brown apple slices. They lay there for three days covered with snail slime until the ants finally unionized enough to carry them away.

Oh sure, bones the size of a grapefruit are fine, but apples that have oxidized a little are unacceptable?! What happened to gratitude?

Which reminds me. They also hate grapefruit. But only the white ones. Pink they love.

Carry on,
xox

P.S. Once, when I was leaving a cafe in Venice, I offered a homeless man sitting nearby the rest of my perfectly yummy, warm and untouched dinner. He accepted and I felt terrific. As we drove away my heart swelled as I watched him open the container…and throw the contents against a wall.
I’m not sure which felt worse. That or the squirrel snub.

Two very rare tree bones

What I know for sure besides the fact that salted caramel anything has become my Kryptonite and that those shoes with toes creep me out—is that those who have crossed-over use technology to reach us.

They do this because technology is a frequency, think Wi-Fi, and well, now so are they.
It’s easy for them. So much easier than moving furniture or materializing at the foot of your bed. That stuff takes work and our dearly departed ones tend to be lazy. They are always looking for the path of least resistance and since if you’re like me, your phone or computer are always within arms reach, this makes getting our attention a cake walk.

Please don’t argue with me on this.
I didn’t believe it at first either. And I’m not saying I’m one thousand percent sold on the concept, but…being that I’m not as gullible as you might think, I stubbornly ask for proof—which has been provided to this professional skeptic repeatedly. Over and Over and OVER again!

It has become irrefutable. Ask my tribe. I send them example after example which has made believers out of (most) of them.

The past few days I decided to have some fun with this recent discovery of mine. The one about technology.

Almost every morning, unless I’m not feeling it or a gooey cinnamon bun has my name on it (I believe there is an unwritten law that states that it is immoral to hike with white icing on your face), I take a 3.5-mile hike in the hills above my home. Unless I’m distracted, talking my head off with a friend, the only thing that gets this ass up those hills is live streaming NPR, a juicy podcast or something inspirational on YouTube straight into my ears via my phone and some comfy ear buds.

The last quarter-mile is all uphill. A slow vertical ascent that takes my breath away, pisses me off, and makes me want to cry and vomit—all at the same time. At the end is the parking lot where I hug my car and wait for my heart rate return to something life sustainable.

Unfortunately, right at the base of this climb—at the same red brick mailbox—the WiFi cuts out—and I’m left to listen to the voices in my head. Two which are cheering me on and the other 1,065 which scream at me in no uncertain terms—that I am an idiot and this hill is certain to kill me.

For months, I have suffered the same shattering disappointment at exactly the same spot at the base of that fucking hill.
Silence.
Until Wednesday. That day I asked my disembodied friend to extend the WiFi signal past the familiar brick mailbox to the top of the first hill. The “killer” as I like to call it.

‘Just let me continue listening to Abraham to the top of the killer’ I asked playfully. Then I laughed at the absurdity of asking for an internet connection from someone marinating in Pure Positive Energy—not lottery numbers or stock tips—and the fact that this has become my new normal.

Sure enough, the signal remained strong, cutting out at the very top of the killer hill just as I had requested. I was jubilant! Not only for the audio distraction on my way up the hill but for the sign I received from my friend.

“All you have to do is ask, and then not care”, I heard her say, so I decided to try again the next morning.

Thursday, as I approached the killer, I decided to ask for something more audacious.
If this was a game—then why the hell not?

‘I’d love to listen to Morning Becomes Eclectic all the way up to the parking lot’ I requested. Then I waited with a huge smile on my face as I chugged slowly up the killer hill. I lost the music briefly at the mailbox…but only for a second.
Sike!!

As I crested the top of killer hill and continued on to the dirt path I couldn’t believe my ears! WiFi! On the most remote part of the hike!
I can’t tell you how I got to the parking lot. I’m pretty sure I skipped or floated. It was everything I could do not to yodel my joy at this technological miracle.

Once at the parking lot, I did a sweaty slob-kebob dance to celebrate the music that was still going strong in my ears!

How was that possible? Was it a sign? An answer to my asking?
Someone I told yesterday, I can’t remember who, surmised that the neighborhood had probably just gotten tired of shitty internet and boosted the signal. I thought the timing was interesting, but I’m not gonna lie, it burst my miracle believing bubble a little bit.

This morning, Friday, I just assumed that the boosted signal would continue all the way up to the parking lot …and beyond, but alas, right at the brick mailbox…silence.
What?

I tried to get it to work as I slogged along but it was behaving badly just as it had for months.
Suddenly, about fifty yards from the end, the music came back on, strong as ever. It actually startled me in the middle of an argument with my disembodied friend who insisted that MY WiFi connection had nothing at all to do with a boosted signal.

‘It was the answer to an asking, a sign, a game’, she insisted, ‘and as long as you remember that, the music will play uninterrupted.’

Man, I love not taking life so seriously! Treating it like a game. You guys have to try it! It beats the alternative.
I’m starting with the small stuff until I get the hang of it. Come with me!

Carry on
xox

After reading my post the other day about our majestic ash tree,
http://www.theobserversvoice.com/2016/05/earthquakes-rings-and-singing-ash-trees/
many of you asked me to reprise this essay about that very same tree—and his pal JAWT—who we murdered.
And just so you know, a year later finds Ash thriving as is our garden with all of the newly available sunshine (my bougainvillea has never looked more beautiful).
Yet…RIP, ‘Just A Weed Tree’, know that you are missed.
Carry on,
xox

We are all connected.
And not just by the proximity and outreach that is available to us via our devices.

It goes way beyond that.

I believe that everything is alive and has a spirit.

There is another web active in our lives besides that World Wide one. It is a web of life, of energy that connects everything and everyone on this earth.

We are all interconnected and anything that suggests the belief that we are separate is an illusion.

Nature is the supreme example of this web of interconnection. The bees need the flowers. The flowers need the bees to bloom.

And I fucked up and cut down a tree in our front yard, apparently upsetting the delicate balance of nature throughout the world, or at least Los Angeles, California.

We are the custodians of a one hundred and fifty-year-old ash tree. And he is our giant, grounded guardian.

Of that I am sure.

I remember a psychic predicting that I would live in a tree house one day, (which at the time seemed absurd), but when I purchased this house a few years later my friends all remarked “I see you got a little house with your tree.”

It is massive, one of the largest trees in Studio City and we are so blessed to live under its majestic canopy, feeling its energy, enjoying its shade.

On the curb, just adjacent to Ash (we’ll call him Ash) was a nondescript tree-thingy.
The arborist that came to the house ten years ago during our remodel educated us, telling us all about Ash, and when asked he informed me that the other tree wasn’t any species that he was familiar with.

“It’s just a weed that someone let grow into a tree a long time ago” he told us.

Just A Weed Tree was a lot of trouble.
His canopy was dense and…ugly, even after the annual haircut we gave him, not light and airy like Ash’s.
He cast too much shade for anything to flourish and the birds loved to congregate inside that dense, dark green foliage and shit all over our cars.

He had the bad attitude of an overgrown weed. He was pushy. And greedy, lifting the sidewalk, and getting into our pipes on a regular basis.

Just A Weed Tree always appeared to be crowding Ash, vying for light; and in the severe drought that we’ve found ourselves under, I feared he was chugalugging at the water table—and I knew Ash was too polite to say anything.

I LOVE trees, I do, ask anyone. I absolutely adore Ash, but I was not fond of JAWT.
He wasn’t a tree. He was a garden variety pest.

So this past Saturday our gardener cut him down. It took two guys and they were fast and thorough, even grinding the stump.

We both forgot that it was happening that day so when we got home the whole look and energy of the front yard had changed dramatically.

There was no sign that Just A Weed Tree had ever been there. But you could feel a HUGE void.
That weed had a presence.

FUCK.

We both stood at the curb, “Wow” was all we could say.

Now you could really see the front our house, there was the added sunlight in our yard that I had craved (for the plants) and with JAWT gone you could fully grasp the wonder of Ash.

“It looks like they trimmed the big tree too,” my husband remarked as I went around picking up leaves still on their branches.
It appeared as if they had been cleanly cut and they were EVERYWHERE.

Except they hadn’t been cut. They had been dropped.
I’d never seen anything like it. They covered the entire front yard, the driveway and even parts of the roof. In the fall, Ash drops single, dead, brown leaves, never bright green leaves still on their small branches.
What was up?

My arms were full, carrying the leaves to piles I had made on the driveway
And it suddenly occurred to me: Ash was showing his shock and disapproval at the death of his friend Just A Weed Tree.

I walked over to him, closed my eyes and rested my hand on the rough bark of his truck—and I could feel his stress and despair.

Oh Fuck.

First of all, I had always felt Ash was a female. Wrong. He has a very pronounced masculine energy.
And he was pissed. And under extreme stress.
Apparently the high pitched whine of a chainsaw has the same visceral effect on trees as a dental drill has on humans (yeah, okay, got it) plus he had known JAWT for over sixty years since he was just a tiny little weed that had somehow been spared. They were buddies.

I could feel his despair and it felt awful. I should have known better. Trees do have feelings and I had callously overlooked that fact.

We had basically murdered his friend right in front of him.

FUCK.

We are all interconnected, residents of this web of life and I needed Ash to know that I could feel his anguish, so I stood with both hands and my forehead on his trunk, apologizing and conveying our sincerest condolences for the loss of JAWT. I also explained the water situation and the fact that his health and stability were of the utmost importance to us. Then I played to his vanity telling him over and over how gorgeous (handsome) we think he is.
“You Mister, are the star of this neighborhood.” I think he was flattered.

Raphael watched from a distance, he could sense what was going on, and he added his sympathies from there. “I hope he’ll be okay,” he said with genuine concern, gazing at the piles of leaves.

“Now that he understands and knows how sorry we are—he’ll be fine.” I replied.

And he is. After our little talk…he never dropped another leaf.

Carry on,
xox

“It is easier to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission”

This quote is attributed to Grace Hopper, a crusty old broad who, if given the choice, I’d want to sit next to at most dinner parties. Except she’s dead.

It should be attributed to my husband since he swears by it, lives it and quotes it almost daily.

He’s also pretty crusty and he breaks the rules. Rules are just suggestions to him. Gentle recommendations that are made to be broken. I find that quality sexy in a person. In men in particular. Really sexy. (I’m going to see if he’s still at his desk and tell him so. I’ll be back in…thirty…)

So sorry about that. Please forgive me.
Anyhow…

When you see a No Trespassing sign do you turn around or do you keep going? I keep going. I can’t help it.

I trespassed the shit out of my hikes around the hills of Soquel this week and it unleashed my inspiration.

My pup and I explored all sorts of forbidden paths, trails and otherwise off-limits parts of this gorgeous backcountry. Several Ted Kaczynski’s unleashed their hounds on us (no biggie, my dog is a one-woman welcoming committee, like the head of the local PTA, and the hounds all loved her. They’ve organized a bake sale and are coming over for tea at three.)

We happened upon a babbling brook, found someone’s abandoned Airstream trailer, stopped, kept from making eye contact, and turned around when we came across a guy, in the middle of nowhere, sitting in his junk heap of a pick-up truck, staring at us while he listened to a banjo strum slowly on the radio.
I’m not kidding.

Undeterred, we kept on walking the road less traveled (in the other direction), and two things came to mind.

In LA I powerwalk. I try to notice my surroundings but most days I’m focused on completing my 10,000 steps and getting my day started. These hikes among the pines, oaks, and lush green hills are food for my soul. I walk slowly, inhaling the scent of the moist, dark earth, moss, wet grass and the occasional field of wildflowers.

One road we trespassed on became so steep in the middle that I had to practice my yoga breathing in order to keep my heart INSIDE of my chest where it belongs when I noticed all of the delicious smells I’d been enjoying were gone. That’s just one of the things I hate about cardio (there are at least 500 more. I have a list.), it robs you of your senses.

My mouth was open so wide, gasping for air like a naked astronaut on the surface of Mars—that I couldn’t smell a thing.

So, number one: You must walk at a leisurely pace in order to smell the roses, so to speak. A full sensory experience cannot be had at 135 beats per minute.

Number two: Nothing interesting or noteworthy happens on the beaten path. It’s the safe route. Well traveled. Crowded actually. Every rock has been turned, every idea hatched.

I am convinced that in order to reach inspiration you must NEVER ask permission because more than likely—the answer will be NO.

Nope. You must trespass in life—then beg for forgiveness…then bring pie.

Carry on
xox

You’re gonna love this essay by Danielle La Porte. I did. Keep reading and you’ll see why.
Then, Carry on,
xox

Just don’t expect crazy people to be sane (cause that’s crazy).
People are going to be who they are most of the time. In character, not out of character.

Guys with anger issues can complain about kittens and unicorns.

Folks who run a lot of anxiety will worry about the days of the week coming on time.

Positive thinkers figure that the train derailment saved them from disaster down the tracks.

Punctual people are punctual.
Sweet people are sweet.
Takers, take.
Givers, give.

People change and evolve. Breakthroughs happen. But hey…

Don’t expect crazy people to be sane (cause that’s crazy), or super emo girls to behave like stoics (did you think she wasn’t going to cry just this one time? Of course she’s going to cry. That’s how she is.) The guy who’s kinda wimpy? Well, he’s probably going to wimp out. That girlfriend of yours who runs on chaos like a truck runs on diesel? Ya, she’ll probably keep making choices that make chaos — she likes it that way. The overly generous soul, she’s probably going to be illogically generous and it’ll get her into some trouble — but most of the time it works. The friend who’s always late? Chances are they’re going to be…late.

People are — for better or for worse — generally predictable. An old gentleman friend used to say to me, “Well what do you expect from a pig, but a grunt?” Oink. Point taken. And, Eagles soar. And, you can rely on reliable people.

It’s useful to analyze the stuff of people’s character. Hunh. So why IS he such an asshole? Judgement is inevitable, it’s part of conscious discernment — but sometimes, it makes us a judgmental asshole.

There’s so much sanity to just flowing with someone’s predictability — their norm, their nature. Accept it. Forgive it. Just tolerate it; or peace out if you don’t want it in your life. But don’t waste too much time trying to change it.

All for Love,

Danielle

It’s always about the sparkles, isn’t it?

Love you, Carry on,
xox