Posted in Body, Bones, Culture, Death, Haiku, Holding My Breath, Obituaries & Epitaphs, Photography, Place, Poetry, Practice, Seasons, Spirituality, Wake Up, tagged Babyland, cemeteries, changing seasons, Chinese Community Memorial, gateways, history of Minneapolis, Lakewood Cemetery, Minneapolis, promise of Spring, the practice of haiku on May 9, 2008 | 4 Comments »
Gateways, Lakewood Cemetery near Lake Calhoun, Minneapolis, Minnesota, May 2008. Spring blooms in Babyland, near the Chinese Community Memorial. Photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
white-belled bleeding hearts
spring sweeps through silent gateways
cemetery pause
-posted on red Ravine, Friday, May 9th, 2008
-related to post, haiku (one-a-day)
Read Full Post »
Posted in Haiku, Holding My Breath, Life, On the Road, Photography, Practice, Skies, Things That Fly, Travel, tagged airplane shots, the practice of haiku on March 31, 2008 | 6 Comments »
Somewhere over Arizona, the flight home from California, photo (not taken with my cell phone camera) © 2008 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.
how come the return
is shorter than departure?
finally, exhaling
-related to post: haiku (one-a-day)
Read Full Post »
Posted in Haiku, Holding My Breath, Nature, Photography, Place, Poetry, Practice, Seasons, Silence, Skies, tagged holding space, the practice of haiku, the sun, winter in Minnesota on March 26, 2008 | 3 Comments »
Holding Space, Minneapolis, Minnesota, February 2008, photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
lake frozen in place
yellow sun sinking behind
holding silent space
-posted on red Ravine, Wednesday, March 26th, 2008
-related to post: haiku (one-a-day)
Read Full Post »
Posted in Animals & Critters, Haiku, Holding My Breath, Nature, Photography, Poetry, Practice, tagged creepy crawlers, home remedies, spiders, the practice of haiku on March 21, 2008 | 37 Comments »
big spider, Rock Creek Regional Park, Maryland,
photo © 2008 by R3. All rights reserved.
bugs, bugs everywhere
why do we invade their world
swirling stick circles
4 or 5 inch legs
webmaster spins silken tales
spider sense prevails
-posted on red Ravine, Friday, March 21st, 2008
-related to posts: haiku (one-a-day), WRITING TOPIC - INSECTS & SPIDERS & BUGS, OH MY!, and My Totem [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Art, Haiku, Holding My Breath, Nature, Photography, Place, Poetry, Practice, Seasons, Secrets, Things That Fly, Wake Up, tagged Audio Art, Nature's secrets, recording nature, sound technology, the practice of haiku, the sound of snow and ice, winter in Minnesota on February 24, 2008 | 10 Comments »
Snow Flying On Ice, Minneapolis, Minnesota, February 2008, photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
thick lumbering lake
bristles at the crackling sound
snow flying on ice
Lake Ice Booming - 1min
Recorded by Audio Producer/Editor/Mixer, Curt Olson at Track Seventeen
More sounds of Winter at: The Sound of Snow and Ice - Various Artists at Gruenrekorder
-posted on red Ravine, [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Bones, Haiku, Holding My Breath, Nature, Photography, Poetry, Practice, Seasons, tagged cattails, the practice of haiku, winter in Minnesota on February 13, 2008 | 11 Comments »
Cattail Sun, -25 wind chilled February day, Minneapolis, Minnesota, photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
ears red from the wind
snow flies off frozen boot tips
cattail fluffs her hair
-posted on red Ravine, Wednesday, February 13th, 2008
-related to post, haiku (one-a-day)
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Bones, Haiku, Holding My Breath, Nature, Photography, Place, Poetry, Practice, Seasons, Skies, Wake Up, tagged moonrise, the practice of haiku, winter in Minnesota on February 10, 2008 | 13 Comments »
Quarter Oak Sky, -25 wind chilled February day, Minneapolis, Minnesota, photo © 2008 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
quarter oak moonrise
behind a sliver of sky
holds bonechilling peace
-posted on red Ravine, Sunday, February 10th, 2008
-related to post, haiku (one-a-day)
Read Full Post »
After The Storm, Holding My Breath Series, Minneapolis, Minnesota, March 2007, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
snow on the blue porch
quiet, listening to silence
in a pregnant pause
-posted on red Ravine, Monday, February 4th, 2008
-related to post, haiku (one-a-day)
Read Full Post »
Posted in Animals & Critters, Body, Bones, Books, Death, Growing Older, Holding My Breath, Home, Life, Love, Photography, Place, Poetry, Practice, Quotes, Relationships, Silence, Structure, Writers, Writing, tagged December (Christmas Box), Fitzgerald Theater, Galway Kinnell, Josephine Dickinson, MPR Talking Volumes, Silence Fell, Strong Is Your Hold, Where Were You When I Came In From The Evening Milking, Writers Hands, Writers reading their work, writing through grief on January 9, 2008 | 28 Comments »
Writers Hands VI, Josephine Dickinson, Fitzgerald Theater, St. Paul, Minnesota, April 2007, all photos © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Josephine Dickinson read her poetry at the Fitzgerald Theater last April, sharing the stage with her mentor, Galway Kinnell. She met Galway at a poetry reading at Morden Tower in Northumberland. She was drawn to [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Bones, Culture, Death, Dreams, Gratitude, Holding My Breath, Holidays, Nature, Personal, Practice, Seasons, Silence, Things That Fly, Vision, Wake Up, tagged celebrating the seasons, fire, letting go, making light of the dark, Solstice & Equinox time chart, winter, Winter Solstice on December 23, 2007 | 6 Comments »
Solstice Fire In Winter, December 22, 2007, Winter Solstice in Minnesota, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
We celebrated with friends outside by the pond. It was frosty cold, hovering around 5 degrees. Frozen hands. Sparks fly. A light wind blew from the West. The brilliant sunset was undone only by a circle wreath [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Dreams, Gratitude, Holding My Breath, Laughing, Photography, Random, tagged begging, digital cameras, open letter to camera makers, plea, product giveaways, technology on November 1, 2007 | 37 Comments »
Dear Makers of Exceptionally Good Digital Cameras,
I write with a proposition I think you’ll find too good to pass up.
Send me one of your top-of-the-line digital cameras, and I will post on this blog unimaginable images of giant bull snakes, wild feral turkeys, and other natural phenomena.
No, I am not a photographer by training nor a [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Culture, Food, Holding My Breath, Holidays, Laughing, Life, On the Road, Personal, Photography, Place, Seasons, Structure, Things That Fly, tagged All Hallow's Eve, Family, friends, Grantsburg, Halloween, Holidays, Home, minerals, pumpkins, rocks, Siren, The Great Pumpkin Catapult, The Midwest, Wisconsin on October 14, 2007 | 24 Comments »
The Great Pumpkin Catapult, The Lee Roberts Farm, Grantsburg, Wisconsin, October 2007, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Yesterday Liz and I traveled out to Siren, Wisconsin with friends to check out Verne Peterson’s lifelong rock and mineral collection. It was a beautiful Fall day and the almost two hour drive flew by like [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in 25 Things, Body, Bones, Culture, Death, Dreams, Film / TV / Video, Holding My Breath, Jugular, Life, Love, Photography, Random, Relationships, tagged film, Jodie Foster, movies, Simplex, Terrence Howard, The Brave One, vintage on September 29, 2007 | 32 Comments »
Yesterday, 35mm Movie Projector detail, inside the recently refurbished Parkway Theater, Minneapolis, Minnesota, September 2007, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
After dinner at the Tea House last night, Liz and I went to see The Brave One. I’ve always been a big Jodie Foster fan. She’s got charisma, isn’t afraid to tackle psychologically [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Bones, Family, Holding My Breath, Home, Life, Love, Personal, Practice, Seasons, Topic Writing, Writing Practices, tagged fall, fish, tea roses, water, writing practice on September 26, 2007 | 14 Comments »
The 7 tea roses sitting on the deck, roots untangled and exposed, tilted in their makeshift pots, looked like fish out of water. I stared at them through the picture window. The wind whipped the mustard ash leaves across the peeling gray paint. We called a handyman to help shore the deck for winter. He [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Bones, Culture, Death, Family, Gratitude, Holding My Breath, Home, Life, Money, Personal, Photography, Place, Practice, Writing on August 20, 2007 | 10 Comments »
Memorial, By Night, Gold Medal Park, Minneapolis, Minnesota, August 5th, 2007, shot through the grove of trees at center circle, facing the I-35 Bridge, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
I heard on the 9p.m. news that they found the final and 13th person from the I-35 Bridge collapse. The final person as far [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Culture, Holding My Breath, Home, Personal, Photography, Place, Seasons, Skies, Wake Up, Weather, Writing, tagged Brookview Park Ice Cream Social, calm before the storm, disco ball effect, disconnection, losing power, summer storms, sunsets, the Jolly Czechs on August 15, 2007 | 21 Comments »
-Calm Before The Storm, sunset at the Brookview Park Ice Cream Social, August 2007, Minneapolis, Minnesota, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
The power went out at 11p.m. Monday night. A ferocious storm raged through the Twin Cities, the second in three days. Cloud to ground lightning flashed continuously every few seconds. Thunder rolled, [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Bones, Holding My Breath, Jugular, Personal, Practice, Recall, Recovery, Structure, Topic Writing, Work, Writing, Writing Practices, tagged dharma, Elizabeth Statmore, motivation, Recovery, red Ravine Guests, the power of intention, the practice of writing, the process of writing on August 13, 2007 | 22 Comments »
by Elizabeth Statmore
Writing this book is the loneliest journey I have ever been on.
Nothing even compares — not divorce, not mental illness, not
abandonment, not the murder of my best friend from high school. Not
therapy. Not meditation.
The other day I told Natalie how hard I am finding this last stretch.
She agreed sympathetically and compared it to [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Authors, Bones, Books, Death, Essay, Holding My Breath, Jugular, Life, Personal, Place, Reading, Wake Up, Writers, tagged bridges, English teachers, funerals, how literature enriches life, Minneapolis bridge collapse, Mr. Schminda's Book List, Our Town, red Ravine Guests, Teri Blair, The Bridge Of San Luis Rey, Thornton Wilder on August 8, 2007 | 45 Comments »
by Teri Blair
Years ago, I was given a reading list by my 11th grade English teacher. I was in the college prep class, and the list of 100 or so books were ones he wanted us to read before we graduated from high school. It wasn’t just his idea. He told us a committee of [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Architecture, Gratitude, Holding My Breath, Photography, Place, Skies, Structure, Wake Up, tagged First Bank building, Minneapolis at night, Minneapolis Skyline on August 4, 2007 | 5 Comments »
-Minneapolis At Night, shot Friday night, August 3rd, 2007, before a walk to Gold Medal Park to see the I-35 Bridge, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
-Minneapolis At Night, posted on red Ravine, Saturday, August 4th, 2007
UPDATE, 8/11/7: Here’s a link to all the buildings on the Minneapolis Skyline: Buildings of Minneapolis. If [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Death, Family, Fotoblog, Holding My Breath, On the Road, Personal, Photography, Place, Structure, Taos, tagged fear of bridges, fear of heights, Minneapolis bridge collapse, New Mexico, Rio Grande Gorge Bridge on August 2, 2007 | 38 Comments »
Approaching the Rio Grande Gorge, photo © 2007 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.
I’ve always been afraid of bridges. I remember last year Natalie Goldberg took us slow-walking the length of the Rio Grande Gorge bridge outside Taos. I had to walk as close to the road and as far from the railing as possible. Each [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Bones, Great Places To Write, Haiku, Holding My Breath, Nature, On the Road, Place, Poetry, Practice, Taos, Travel, Wake Up, tagged Ghost Ranch, Haiku, New Mexico, Practice, Taos, Writers, writing retreats on July 6, 2007 | 7 Comments »
I found these haiku in the pages of a notebook I was rereading from August of 2006. Has it really been almost a year? They were written at Ghost Ranch when I got separated from the writing group after lingering too long at the pond. I sat on the prickly ground, alone and silent, chewing [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Authors, Bones, Culture, Holding My Breath, Life, Maps, Money, Nature, Personal, Place, Poetry, Practice, Relationships, Seasons, Silence, Spirituality, Structure, Travel, Vision, Wake Up, Work on June 30, 2007 | 3 Comments »
It’s the end of June. ybonesy and I will be traveling over the next two weeks. Different times and separate destinations. Expect slight delays, possible blasts of summer rain, seeds of a sunset poppy, the beat of a gyrfalcon.
Tonight I feel like poetry. Away from home, there is ground in the simple. A blinding light [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Art, Authors, Bones, Books, Dreams, Holding My Breath, Jugular, Memoir, Personal, Photography, Practice, Quotes, Structure, Vision, Wake Up, Writers, Writing, tagged Anne Lamott, Bird By Bird, Letters to a Young Poet, Rainer Maria Rilke, truth, Writers, Writing on June 29, 2007 | 14 Comments »
-Just Sitting, Mabel Dodge Luhan House, Taos New Mexico, February 2007, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
I’ve been in a daze since I got back from the trip. Tired, unfocused, full. Obsessed with flashes of detail, and snippets of conversation. I’m getting closer to laying down my stories.
I want to write memoir. And [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Authors, Body, Bones, Culture, Family, Holding My Breath, Home, Photography, Place, Practice, Random, Silence, Skies, Spirituality, Structure, Taos, Wake Up, Work, Writing on June 25, 2007 | 5 Comments »
-Got Your Back, Taos, New Mexico, April 2007, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Monday, June 25th, 2007
Read Full Post »
Posted in Culture, Holding My Breath, Laughing, Random, Structure, Word Of The Day, Writers, Writing, tagged bated breath, language, Mark Twain, Shakespeare, Word Detective, words on June 23, 2007 | 2 Comments »
I noticed that one of the last comments in The Devil Came Down To Austin contained the phrase waiting with bated breath. It struck me as poetic Old English and I wanted to find out more.
The Word Detective has this to say about bated breath:
The word “bated” is an aphetic, or clipped, form of the [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in 25 Things, Body, Dreams, Holding My Breath, Jugular, Life, Maps, Memoir, Nature, Personal, Photography, Place, Politics, Practice, Relationships, Topic Writing, Travel, Wake Up, Work, Writing, Writing Practices, tagged Boquillas Canyon, Death Valley, desert, Gila River, memories of water, Mimbres River, mimbresman, New Mexico, Pouder River, Puget Sound, red Ravine Guests, writing about water on June 15, 2007 | 12 Comments »
By mimbresman
Kayak Beach, photo © 2007 by mimbresman. All rights reserved.
Winter 1977/78 – Mimbres River, NM:
I wanted to explore the Cook’s Range with my Jeep CJ-5. I get to the lower Mimbres River which was flooding due to warm rain melting snow in the mountains. On the far bank of the river was a sign [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Authors, Body, Bones, Books, Creative Nonfiction, Culture, Dreams, Holding My Breath, Home, Life, Memoir, Personal, Place, Random, Structure, Writers, Writing, tagged Beginner's Mind, Monkey Mind, Natalie Goldberg, running through rain, Zen on June 14, 2007 | 29 Comments »
I feel like I’m starting over. I feel like I don’t know anything about anything. The journey to Pennsylvania and Georgia for research and writing walked the thin line between past and present. I didn’t know what I was doing or what I would discover. It was sometimes disorienting. Each day I had to open [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in 25 Things, Bones, Books, Culture, Doodling, Dreams, Family, Gratitude, Growing Older, Holding My Breath, Home, Laughing, Life, Love, Money, Personal, Place, Practice, Secrets, Topic Writing, Wake Up, blogroll on June 8, 2007 | 16 Comments »
-Holding My Breath, watercolor and ink painting, © 2007 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.
Holding my breath when I drive by a cemetery, else spirits of the dead will invade my lungs. (Present. Given to me by my husband. Something he did as a child. Now it belongs to our family.)
Checking all the locks on doors [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Holding My Breath, I Don't Remember, Life, Memoir, Nature, Personal, Photography, Place, Relationships, Secrets, Travel, Writing, Writing Topics, tagged Clarks Hill Dam, memory, Niagara Falls, Practice, the practice of writing, water, writing about water, Writing Topics on June 7, 2007 | 11 Comments »
Island of Pine and Clay, Clarks Hill Dam, June 3, 2007, photo © 2007 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.
Have you ever made love under a rustic waterfall or on the sand at Cannon Beach, Oregon (it doesn’t feel as romantic as it looks in the movies). Have you soaked in a natural hot springs in [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Bones, Culture, Family, Film / TV / Video, Growing Older, Holding My Breath, I Don't Remember, Jugular, Life, Memoir, On the Road, Personal, Place, Politics, Random, Secrets, Structure, Things That Fly, Wake Up, tagged ancestors, Bert the Turtle, bomb shelters, Conelrad, Duck & Cover, history, Politics, video on June 2, 2007 | 31 Comments »
-Duck & Cover, posted on YouTube by maesterjay, May 16th, 2006
In a quest for memoir details and memories, I spent the afternoon driving through Southern childhood neighborhoods with my mother and step-father. When we had finished walking through tall blooming magnolias in Georgia’s historic Magnolia Cemetery, we drove by my grandfather’s ranch home from the [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Bones, Culture, Death, Dreams, Family, Gratitude, Growing Older, Holding My Breath, Holidays, Life, Love, Memoir, Personal, Place, Practice, Quotes, Relationships, Writers, Writing, Writing Practices, tagged Bones, history, James Baldwin, Memoir, pilgrimage, Practice, Travel, Writers, Writing, writing practice on May 28, 2007 | 3 Comments »
It’s the day before I leave on a two week trip to Georgia and Pennsylvania to do some research for my book. A memoir. I talked to my mother this morning, a short check in before I fly out tomorrow. I told her I am keeping my heart and mind open and looking forward to [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Culture, Dreams, Film / TV / Video, Growing Older, Holding My Breath, I Don't Remember, Life, Memoir, Money, Personal, Secrets, Structure, Vision, Wake Up on May 22, 2007 | 26 Comments »
-Can’t Sleep, April 7th, 2007, all photos © 2007 by QuoinMonkey, all rights reserved
I stayed up writing until 4am last night. I recognize the state of mind as one of my creative zones. It’s also a lonesome place where I live in the heart of darkness and pulpy gray brain matter. Thoughts, feeling, and ruminations move [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Bones, Doodling, Dreams, Gratitude, Great Places To Write, Holding My Breath, Laughing, Personal, Practice, Random, Structure, Vision, Writers, Writing, tagged doodles, Gratitude, red Ravine, ten thousand hits, Writers, Writing on May 20, 2007 | 14 Comments »
This weekend red Ravine passed the 10,000-views mark and, well, we wanted to shout out to all you readers: Thanks for clicking! We went live on April 7, and we’re having a blast.
What all this has to do with Back of the Napkin? Nothing, except I happened to doodle on one. But that’s the beauty [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in Body, Culture, Film / TV / Video, Holding My Breath, Jugular, Random, Wake Up, tagged controversy about smoking, CSI Miami, No Smoking signs, quit smoking ideas, smoking bans on May 20, 2007 | 7 Comments »
-No Smoking Clock from QuitSmoking.com
At an art opening last night, I overheard a conversation by a woman who used to do research for a stop smoking campaign in Minnesota. County by county, people are electing to vote for legislature that bans smoking in public places.
This is no surprise. It’s going on all over the country, [...]
Read Full Post »
Posted in 25 Things, Doodling, Dreams, Family, Great Places To Write, Holding My Breath, Laughing, Life, Personal, Politics, Practice, Random, Wake Up, Work, Writing, blogroll on May 15, 2007 | 16 Comments »
My 15-minute practice on Place; that topic post is due today
Walk through the house next door and sit in each room; we close on it today, and tomorrow it will belong to someone else
Draw the hummingbird that’s been buzzing around in my head
Go for a walk on the ditch behind my house just so my [...]
Read Full Post »
