It’s almost done ─ 365 days stitched together by the miracle of morning and the relief of evening. Days like knitting, nights like purling, some stitches ragged, some stitches even and, in the end, the irrevocable creation of a year.
I cooked Christmas dinner last night and it was very good! The house still smells like a feast, and the dishwasher hums and gurgles. The linen tablecloth was left on the table, its starched, smooth complexion blotched and splotched with food spills and candle wax. Leading up to last night, I slept with cookbooks and piles of ancient Gourmet magazines, one side of my bed indented by the sleeping form of 50 pounds of recipes. My inspiration for dinner came to me in my dreams.
There was a soundtrack to all of this! Wow, if there ever was a season with a soundtrack, it is the winter holidays.
It starts with my double CD, “Soulful Christmas,” that I found at the thrift store. Otis Redding singing “Merry Christmas Baby” makes me dance all by myself around the living room with energy that’s great for cookie baking and vacuuming. Then, there’s Nat King Cole singing, “The Christmas Song”, this seasonal favorite is forever connected by a promise to an old boyfriend that we would always stop and dance together when we heard it.
That song gets played a lot this time of year.
Finally, it’s Gian Carlo Menotti’s “Amahl and the Night Visitors.” This opera was the first opera to be commissioned for television in the early 1950s. It was featured on a debut Hallmark Hall of Fame program in December of 1952. “Amahl and the Night Visitors” is the big gun in my holiday arsenal; a fixture from my childhood that it is nothing short of Dickensian, holding all of Christmases past, present … but perhaps not the future.
I learned the music on Wednesday nights when I was 11, sitting around the periphery of the Seattle Oddfellows Hall on the backside of Capitol Hill. There my Mom had her weekly rehearsal with the Thalia Symphony. My sisters and I, driven in the family station wagon to music lessons at Cornish and a rushed dinner at Dicks Drive-in, would sit at the edge of the big ballroom on wooden benches among piles of music cases and coats, and do our homework. One season we listened to the orchestra rehearsals for Menotti’s opera.
If you have ever listened to a beautiful piece of music being deconstructed you will never get it out of your head. I remember looking up from a page of homework and listening to something that went well, and being interrupted by the conductor’s loud rap on his desk when something didn’t go well. I know every note of that work.
Later, my parents bought the original recording, and my grandma bought the piano score (devilishly difficult to play, but she was a fabulous pianist), and every Christmas Day we would sing it.
Or try to.
I can see my dad, uncle and grandfather with bath towels wrapped around their heads standing behind the piano bench, and singing the parts of the three wise men. My many sisters and I would simultaneously sing the part of Amahl, the poor shepherd boy, who sees the “star as large as a window” that is leading the three wise men to his door somewhere in the deserts of the Middle East.
My mother or grandmother would sing the beautiful solo that Amahl’s mother sings, about her jealous longing for the riches that the wise men bring to a child they haven’t yet met, when her own child stands before them so horribly in need. The local shepherds bring what they have, which is nothing, and honor the guests with their humor and a beautiful dance. It is all there ─ the message, the music, the meaning.
“The Adoration of the Magi,” oil painting on wood panel by Netherlandish artist Hieronymus Bosch, executed around 1499. It is housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
My twin sent me an online link to the original TV show. There is a short prologue with the composer in the video that I had never seen before. Menotti tells how, lacking inspiration for the commissioned piece, he took a stroll through the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and stopped in front of a painting by Hieronymous Bosch ─ “The Adoration of the Magi,” with the Madonna and child, and the three wise men. He was reminded of his childhood Christmases in Italy, and the role that the three wise men played in his memories. And so he created his perfect story. I have included the link; it’s well worth a watch.
Now Christmas 2013 has passed. What will the soundtrack to the New Year be?
First, I will put away my party dress. I am as tired of excess as the tablecloth out in the dining room. I, too, am in need of a good washing with bleach and spot remover to reveal a clean slate. The tablecloth will be folded and put away un-ironed to hibernate in the old pillowcase on the low shelf of the linen closet. But I will be awake to the New Year.
How about you? I hope we remain open to the inspiration necessary to write the music for our 2014 soundtrack. Drawing on our personal memories and our collective experiences, I hope we each find the new spark necessary to re-configure it all, and forge something new and different and uniquely ours.
It is literally the darkest hour before the dawn. It is Solstice, that fulcrum of the year when the sand has finally run out of the hourglass and the days are so short, it’s hardly worth getting out of pyjamas since we’ve barely had our morning tea and toast before it’s bedtime with milk and cookies.
This year’s run up to the darkness at its deepest is somewhat altered by the fact that we’ve had a full moon waxing which, with its big, bright, beaming face provides a perfectly poetic foreshadowing of the returning light. For those of us who suffer from chronic Vitamin D deficiency, this is good news. The sun will rise again and stay a little bit longer every day, once we just get past this one hard part — the longest night.
Thank you, Moon, for reminding me of that simple fact — the light will return, you can count on it. As she waxes and wanes, the moon mirrors this bigger picture in her monthly, twirling circle dance between light and dark phases. I am grateful that she is here now, silvering the water on Honeymoon Bay with her shape-shifting countenance, illuminating the sky like a silk lantern held high.
“Long Night Moon” taken from Whidbey Island on Dec. 17, 2013. / Lorinda Kay photo
In plain words, the moon at Solstice reminds us of hope that lives within us, even when the heart is broken, the body is trampled, the walls are falling down around us — something in a human being wants to hold a spark of hope inside, like the moon shining bright on the darkest night. When you can hold hope like the face of the moon in your mind, hold it in the stillness of being right here, right now, you can remember the light on the other side of the darkness and you can get through what we are all up against this time of year.
You know what I’m talking about — the noisy barrage of information flooding the psyche’s field of awareness with that holly-jolly stuff regarding where to buy what at what price, who’s got the best deal on big screen TV’s, and how many days are left to run up your credit card, according to your led-lit advent calendar. We don’t have to say much more than that, except to say — as Douglas Adams once did in that hilarious piece of genius, “AHitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy — “Don’t Panic!”
There is another way to approach this dark hour besides succumbing to another dumb chia pet gift idea.
Don’t buy this!
First of all, stop everything you are doing, including reading this sentence, and breathe seven breaths now. Come on, everyone together — in and out — seven, deep, big cleansing breaths:
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
That makes a difference, doesn’t it?
Now get a piece of paper — in fact get a whole pad — and write down things/persons/places/experiences you are grateful for in your life, right now, this minute. No excuses. Think of these thoughts as metaphorically lighting candles for your inner hope chest. Don’t be stingy with these imaginary votives — light big ones, little ones, all sizes of gratitude are welcome here. When you are comfortable with your list, put it in a place where you can easily find it and refer to it as often as possible during this seasonal stress test of nature vs. nurture vs. the American Habit of buying-out the store to obliterate the pain. If you get sucked into that outer turmoil and start to feel bad because you’re not buying more — read your list of gratitude and be kinder to yourself. Sit down and have a cup of cocoa.
My table of chaos.
Next, make a list of the people you feel compelled to give a gift to by virtue of love, need, guilt, birthright, debenture, sales and marketing, or any other reason not listed here. Be specific. Explain why, if only to yourself, in detail.
Instead of rushing to the Internet, the mall, or Walmart to do that last-minute dart towards insolvency, start drawing lines between the people whose names made the gift list and the candles of gratitude you are truly grateful for. Is there a correlation there you can observe and note?
Yes?
Good! That means you’re thinking of giving to the right folks, whose names rise to the surface and who connect you to a plenitude of gratitude, who nurture your heart, and strengthen your courage. Circle them on your list with a pleasingly bright-colored pen. The rest — cross out, give up, or send a New Year’s card. Don’t stress about it now in any case — if you miss New Year’s, there’s always Chinese New Year’s, Valentine’s Day, or April Fool’s to catch up accordingly. As for the gift you might give those persons who made the cut, there’s all kinds of ways to go on that.
My wall of jam.
I am grateful that I have answered that problem for myself with all the jam I made last summer and fall — jars and jars of it I’ve already mentioned, in a previous sky-minding moment. No one ever complained about getting that jam at Christmas, Easter or the fourth of July. It’s always timely. Something that is homemade with love, and lovingly given, can’t help but please the recipient. If you have no jam from the summer, make marmalade instead. It is never too late to bake cookies for your loved ones or knit a neck warmer. Use big needles and thick yarn — you’ll be done by Christmas day.
Jam to go!
Some people need things like new soccer cleats, in order to keep playing soccer, stay healthy, and connected to friends. It’s a good gift to give at Christmas — something that somebody needs, and is grateful to get. Other people could really use a chicken, a goat, or a cow to help their family and/or village eat and survive in a sustainable way.
It is all relative, isn’t it?
As you hurtle toward the end of the year with intermittent stops on the “Give-Way,” whether Hanukah-past, Solstice-present, Christmas-and-Kwanza-future, some gifts give more than others. Ordering something up on Heifer.orgto give to persons you do not know in a place you’ve never been, and doing it as a family, a couple, a classroom, a team, or office pool offers the wonderful pleasure of shared generosity which adds a mighty fuel to the fire of your inner lantern.
As for your gratitude list — are there organizations on it which have given you heart, laughs, joy, fun, entertainment, and/or a sense of purpose? If so, I’ll bet 99.9 percent of them are non-profits of one kind or another. When you give to them, you give to yourself. I know that’s what they tout on public radio fund drives all the time — but actually, it’s true. Giving to a non-profit is tax deductible and often generates additional funding through challenge grants. I’m a Freeland resident on South Whidbey, and I’m grateful for so much. I know that even a small contribution to an organization like Whidbey Island Nourishes or Friends of Friends Medical Support Fund , or our beloved Good Cheer Food Bank, can make a BIG difference in many lives in the immediate community.
When you consider how narrow the margins are for how many people in our local area — as demonstrated by the increased number of patrons at the island food banks — you realize how fortunate we all are to live in a place that has these important grass roots support networks in place. Giving gifts locally reinforces that network, which keeps us all, as a community, safe.
And… need I say it? SHOPPING locally does that, too. The sales taxes we pay here, go back into the pot , making it possible for us to have an EMT, a school system, a hospital, a playground in the park, a transit system, and other benefits you would definitely notice if they went missing. When our merchants are successful, they are better able to make substantive contributions to the greater welfare of the community, as well. And believe me, we can do it right here — on any kind of budget, large or small. On the South End, check Good Cheer Thrift Store for hidden treasures, check Webb’s Department Store for sensible things, check Ace Hardware in Freeland andSebo´s Do-it Centerand Jim’s Hardware in Bayview for all things useful, hit up Big Sister women’s clothing storein Langleyfor magical accoutrements and pretty fancies — they have it all for us the rest of the year, why not shop with them now, when everyone needs the cash flow?
Much of what I am personally grateful for relates to where I live, the people in my greater community, and the love I feel for and with them, which is why I had great fun the other day driving around with visiting writer Dani Shapiro, and showing her the riches of our island life and also, where to shop! She was at Hedgebrookteaching a master class. On her time off, we enjoyed trolling the racks at Good Cheer together. She found a fabulous fancy black, hand-beaded, silk-lined, fine wool sweater for $9! She was ecstatic.
We tasted wine at Ott and Murphy Winery Tasting Room in Langley — all four of their beautiful reds — and she bought a case to take home to Connecticut to share with friends and family. We took in gorgeous drinking glasses at Callahan McVay’s Firehouse Glass Studio, and we ogled the women’s haute couture at Roberta on First Street in Langley. Earlier in the day, we’d been over to Eddy’s Repurposed, a cool holiday pop-up in Freeland, where Dani got several excellent, artist-designed T-shirts for her husband and son. Later, we ambled through fun apparel and classy housewares at The Star StoreMercantile in Langley. I found I could purchase a rubber chicken there at a reasonable price, should I wish to give that as a stocking stuffer to someone special on my list!
There was so much great stuff to see, we didn’t have time to do it all, but I was proud and happy to show her as much as I could the wonderfulness we have to share around here. When your friends and family come visit from off island, showthem! what we’ve got here that they can’t find at the mall or on the Internet (even with that special promo code). Show them the beautiful artwork, silks and objects of beauty at the Rob Schouten Gallery at Greenbank Farm. While you’re there, take them for the BEST pie in the world at the Whidbey Pies Café; or head to Langley and show them the gorgeous stuff at the Brackenwood and Museo galleries, and the always tempting selection of cool stuff at Soleil. And don’t forget to show them the view of Saratoga Passage from Village Pizzeria’s new bar and dining room, or, for that matter, don’t forget Freeland and the view of Holmes Harbor from Gordon’s on Blueberry Hill.
Be proud, people, and GRATEFUL for what we’ve got here together; what we’ve made here together, in the way of an interconnected network of friends holding friends up and through the darkest night before the dawn. Hold my hand out there dancing in the moonlight or watching the dawn crack open the sky — hold my hand and we’ll make it through the dark hours together!
When the seasonal noise and the mental clutter settles — in that quiet, still moment of the turning — I wish you love, joy, kindness, equanimity and compassion; all immeasurable gifts you can never get or give enough of.
Dawn on Honeymoon Bay.
P.S. On my personal gratitude list this year is this very publication, Whidbey Life Magazine. Because it exists, I can write you these messages that fall from the sky, while I am minding it. If you haven’t already, there still is time, JUST go to the Indiegogo site for the support of this publication’s expansion and continuation. The campaign to reach a modest goal ends tomorrow, Saturday, Dec. 21 — just in time for the darkest night to turn towards the light. Find out more at “Roll the Presses for WLM.”
Judith Walcutt is a writer living, shopping, breathing, and being still on Whidbey Island, with her husband David Ossman, their cat, Catkin Coal, and their seasonally returning, sunny sons, Orson and Preston.
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Oh tra la la! It’s the holiday season and everyone’s got their hand out for a little cash to help keep the lights on for another year. In the latest in a string of “asks” for community support, Whidbey Life Magazine expects me to put my hard earned dollars toward a print version? They got some nerve! Get in line WLM, right behind more worthy causes like “Beet Greens for Llamas” and “Save the Termite Foundation.”
Call me old fashioned, but I like my reading content to be relegated to the glowing of a digital screen. I’ve grown accustomed to reading hunched over my desk, my spine curved and contorted as I sift through pages of useless information on the Internet. Besides, I owe it to my massage therapist to keep my muscular system at a certain level of crap condition so that he can put me back together every month. What if I were to go renegade and read a highly-glossed version of Whidbey Life Magazine in my easy chair, the one with the automatic massage settings? My therapist would go nuts!
Who needs a fancy schmancy magazine cluttering their house anyway? Whidbeyites need the real estate on their coffee tables for more useful items like aromatherapy candles or freshly made sheep cheese and gluten free crackers.
Okay, so maybe some of you would like to flip through the pages of a magazine and see slick pictures of artists at work and read clever articles about the “culture” on Whidbey. But really, isn’t all just a racket? If you’ve seen one rustic ceramic dish haven’t you seen them all? And if its culture you’re after, you should be at local events instead of reading about them.
WLM has employed their best bloggers to go to bat for their cause, even writing clever campaign jargon to help inspire giving. The most recent piece of silliness featuring a cast of crazy characters who would have you believe that the very peace on Whidbey will be threatened if this magazine were not produced. I say if Whidbey is to be cut off from civilization – all the better! Let’s join together to turn away the throngs of ‘townies” clogging the streets of Langley, Coupeville and Oak Harbor.
They say this is the season for giving. And at the rate this “Roll the Presses for WLM” Indiegogo campaign is going, I am going to get just what I want for Christmas! So, keep sitting on your hands Whidbey and do nothing. With your sublime inactivity, we’ll squash another feeble attempt at keeping Arts and Culture alive.
Eric Mulholland is an actor and writer living on Whidbey Island and he really wants to write for a WLM print version. So help a fella out and give a little love to the WLM Indiegogo campaign!
INTERIOR, WHIDBEY LIFE MAGAZINE HEADQUARTERS – SOMEWHERE ON EARTH
The “Life Cave” is stacked from floor to ceiling with photos, articles, art stories, supplies and anything a goat can produce.
At the desk under a pile of old island periodicals, SUPERHERO SUE is slumped, head down, mumbling to herself.
An alarm is triggered.
INTENSE RINGING SOUNDS AND FLASHING LIGHTS
PASSIONATE PATRICIA, a cute, cocky broad with great legs, dashes into the office with a tablet featuring the mock-up for a glossy print edition of Whidbey life Magazine. She drops it gingerly on the desk.
PASSIONATE PATRICIA It’s bad isn’t it?
Sue still slumped, doesn’t look up.
SUPERHERO SUE The worst. We are not going to make it; we are nowhere near.
PASSIONATE PATRICIA What! No, that’s impossible. What are we going to do?
Sue pulls her head from the desk and slams her hand down on a button that instantly cuts the ringing alarms.
SUPERHERO SUE We are going to have to go to the extreme. Call in the Superbloggers!
PASSIONATE PATRICIA Really? It’s that desperate?
SUPERHERO SUE I’m afraid so!
One hour later, the Life Cave is full of an odd assortment of superheroes with uncanny blogging powers.
BENEVOLENT BOB, a highly skilled cartoonist, who also happens to be… a panda.
VIVACIOUS VICKY, skilled in mixing dangerously sweet concoctions of food with funky names, who also speaks goat.
JUBILANT JUDITH, just back from sweeping the sky — which she minds.
And lastly, we believe there may be ELUSIVE ERIC, but as he is also a master of disguise… one can never really be quite sure.
PASSIONATE PATRICIA These are all the Superbloggers we could get on such short notice.
SUPERHERO SUE I’m afraid it’s worse than we thought.
VIVACIOUS VICKY What! You mean worse than trying to lug defrosted water to 30 goats on a November morning and then… trying to milk them?
PASSIONATE PATRICIA Yes.
JUBILANT JUDITH Worse then trying to board a 4 p.m. ferry at 3:30 p.m. on July 3?
PASSIONATE PATRICIA Yes.
BENEVOLENT BOB Worse then trying to find an adequate supply of bamboo shoots to feed a 300 pound Panda on an island in the Northwest in January?
PASSIONATE PATRICIA Yes. Much worse.
A DOG (Sounding decidedly like Elusive Eric) Worse than trying to get a ticket to the last night of “The Full Monty” at WICA?
SUPERHERO SUE Well, maybe not that bad, but nearly.
ELUSIVE ERIC (Now disguised as a chicken) I think we need to tell Whidbey Island the truth.
SUPERHERO SUE The truth! The truth! WHIDBEY CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH!
Benevolent Bob jumps to his paws.
BENEVOLENT BOB What truth? I thought this was just a campaign to get the Whidbey Life Magazine into a printed format?
All the other Superbloggers look sheepishly from one to the other.
All that can be heard in the room are… crickets.
A fern walks up to Bob and puts a frond on his shoulder… [It might be Elusive Eric.]
FERN We didn’t want to worry you, Bob, because we know how difficult it is for you just to draw without having opposable thumbs.
PASSIONATE PATRICIA But the problem is much bigger then just the printing of a magazine.
BENEVOLENT BOB How can it be bigger than having a whole island of artists with no periodical to call their own? Do you know how many artists we have on this island?
Suddenly the door bursts open and in rushes JOYOUS JAN with her hands full of charts, graphs and a piece of bread spread with what looks decidedly like an illegal substance or, as it’s known for F.D.A. purposes, “Dulce de leche.”
JOYOUS JAN I have them all; the final numbers. Unfortunately, it’s as bad as we thought!
With one sweep she clears the cluttered table, throws down the charts and pulls out her whiteboard and scribbles hurried equations.
VIVACIOUS VICKY Can the ferry be saved?
JOYOUS JAN I don’t think so.
BENEVOLENT BOB What? What’s wrong with the ferry?
PASSIONATE PATRICIA What about the sinkholes? The landslides?
SUPERHERO SUE The whales?
Jan looks down… then shakes her head.
JUBILANT JUDITH This is terrible! It will make my job minding the sky so much harder. I won’t know what weather to prepare for!
BENEVOLENT BOB What? Will someone please tell me what is going on? I was under the impression that we were just doing an Indiegogo called “Roll the Presses for WLM” to create a print addition of the magazine for tourists and off-line folks, to help them find out about the island’s artists and what’s happening on Whidbey.
The armchair get’s up and speaks; the voice is once again… strangely familiar.
ARMCHAIR We are going to have to tell him.
All the Superbloggers look from one to the other; there is a long hard silence. Superhero Sue steps forward.
SUPERHERO SUE A few months ago, through the list of the Drew-ids, we obtained a cunning, second-hand device (which we of course paid 10 percent to the list for) that measures solar flares, biomass, volcanic activity, and the amount of Mr. Mobley’s sauce consumed.
Joyous Jan approaches the white board and writes down more figures.
JOYOUS JAN We have figured out that because of global warming and rapid climate change and the interminable amount of sauce consumed, that Puget Sound is going to be knocked off kilter by precisely .3758942789 degrees West on Dec. 22.
BENEVOLENT BOB Well, that doesn’t sound serious. What’s going to happen to the whales?
JOYOUS JAN We have calculated that if we don’t weigh down the ferry with the precise gigawatts to change up the catalytic convertor, reverse the warp core emissions, and reboot the laser cannons, the sound will reset to 10 minus pie (apple) on Dec. 22.
SUPERHERO SUE At that point, the ferry will list in such a way as to be naked to the untrained eye, but catastrophic to the Island of Whidbey!
JOYOUS JAN That figure equals the exact weight that can be produced with 1,000 copies of a printed edition of Whidbey Life Magazine.
PASSIONATE PATRICIA Without the printed magazine on the ferry, an unprecedented chain reaction will occur on our shores, resulting in tidal waves, sinkholes, and huge landslides that will dam the Sound, preventing the whales from ever visiting Langley again!
BENEVOLENT BOB I don’t believe you. That sounds ridiculous.
JOYOUS JAN Exactly! That’s what people on Whidbey will say if we tell them the truth.
PASSIONATE PATRICIA So we have had to go undercover with this campaign.
JUBILANT JUDITH Oh. What are we going to do?
A TALKING HAT STAND Why don’t we ask SMASHING SUE to write a blog piece? Maybe, just maybe, if all three of her readers contributed to the campaign… ?
JOYOUS JAN It’s a long-shot, but, yes, yes, it might just work!
PASSIONATE PATRICIA Averting disaster?
JOYOUS JAN ONLY if we get all three.
WILL THE THREE READERS OF SUE THE SCREENWRITER PLEASE CONTRIBUTE TO THE INDIEGOGO CAMPAIGN?
WILL WHIDBEY BE SAVED FROM DISAPPEARING INTO A SINKHOLE?
WILL THE WHALES HAVE TO MOVE TO LYNNWOOD?
ONLY YOU KNOW THE ANSWER TO THESE QUESTIONS.
TUNE IN NEXT WEEK ─ SAME BAT TIME, SAME BAT CHANNEL ─ TO SEE IF WHIDBEY ISLAND IS SAVED BY WHIDBEY LIFE MAGAZINE!
Screenwriter Suzanne Kelman will teach a new, six-week screenwriting basics class from 10 a.m. to noon on Saturday mornings starting on Jan 18. There will be an open house on Saturday, Jan. 11 for anyone interested in more details about the class. For info about the class or the open house email Suzanne at suzkelman@gmail.com.
Whidbey Life Magazine stands on a crucial precipice.
As a journalist, I have been covering the arts on Whidbey Island for more than seven years, and from the feedback I’ve received from many of you about WLM’s arts and culture coverage, it’s plain that you love what we are doing at this magazine.
I’m also pretty sure that if WLM was suddenly not available it would be missed. (There’s the precipice.) Will it continue to grow and become the stalwart source of arts coverage for the island, or will it leave only an echo?
What would it be like without WLM? Well, there would be no more scrolling that smart phone, iPad or PC to find out what’s happening on the island; no more “WLM Handy Lists.” No more funny blogs on everything from music, visual art, design, screenwriting, acting, poetry and the meaning of a creative life. No more succinct features on the luminous lights of this community, many of whom I’ve come to know well, and who excel in the visual, literary, performance, culinary and winemaking arts on this island. No more giving this extraordinarily creative island the spotlight it deserves.
For the past 18 months, the WLM team has been working hard to give Whidbey Island what it sorely needs, information on everything that happens artistically from Clinton to Oak Harbor. Your response has been enthusiastic. Since Whidbey Life Magazine began publishing its online editions in July 2012, it has grown to more than 10,000 page views per month. WLM also sends a “Flash” email to more than 1,450 avid readers each week, and also has a strong following on Facebook and Twitter. Also, thanks to your dedicated wave of support, WLM took second place in KING5 Best of Western Washington’s “Best Neighborhood Blog” catagory, beating out 78 other sites.
The message is clear, you like what we’re doing. We want to keep doing it for you.
But, we can’t make it without ad sales, sponsorships and donations. We think a bi-annual print edition of the magazine — glossy and beautiful — might serve not only as a wonderful, tangible, printed reflection of what we do online, but will help us to support the online edition.
Take a look at the “Roll the Presses for WLM” campaign on Indiegogo to watch the video and read about the print project.
I hate to ask, but it’s one of those necessary evils of growing a startup business.
If you can envision Whidbey Life Magazine as a publication that will continue to grow and be the heart and soul of arts coverage for Whidbey Island, help us out. Make a donation of whatever amount you can (or buy an ad). We promise to continue the excellent coverage you all deserve and need.
Please donate. Donations are tax-deductible because of the magazine’s verified non-profit status of our fiscal sponsor, Fractured Atlas. Make that end-of-year donation today!
Please share the “Roll the Presses for WLM”campaign link in email, on Facebook and Twitter; tell your friends, neighbors and business associates about WLM.
Thanks so much for your continued interest in the cultural and artistic life of Whidbey Island. We hope to be able to keep the stories and information coming!
Yes, It’s that time of year when I like to haul out some of my favorite holiday movies (none of which seem to have pandas in them, but never mind…) and my all time favorite is“It’s a Wonderful Life,” directed by Frank Capra and starring Jimmy Stewart.
This movie jumped to the front of my mind the other day, when I started thinking about what life would be like here on Whidbey Island without Whidbey Life Magazine. Well, for one thing, there would be one less place for me to pontificate, and tell you what I think.
But it’s more than that.
If you remember the movie, you will recall that Stewart’s character, in a grand funk about how he thinks his life has turned out, gets the chance to see how things would have been if he had never been born. (For those of you who haven’t seen the movie, long story short: IT WAS NOT A GOOD IDEA.)
Now, I’m not saying that island life without WLM would be a complete disaster, but I am saying, as an artist in this community of so many artists, musicians, chefs, dancers, actors and writers, WLM has done more to raise the profile of all of us creative types than any one organization has done since I moved here 24 years ago.
I was astounded earlier this year by an infographic put out by WhidbeyCamanoIslands.com about the amount of money that is generated by art sales annually, both in individual studios and art galleries. Go ahead and guess how much.
Did you guess $13,000,000? If you did, you are right.
So, in a nutshell, what artists (and I’m using the term inclusively here, rather than give you the laundry list again) are doing for Island County by selling their work is to put money back into the local economy. We buy food, we buy gas, we buy stuff, we pay taxes and, mostly, we buy it right here. We ARE part of the local economy.
And what Whidbey Life Magazine is doing is letting people, both here and far beyond our shores, know about the wealth of cultural experiences that await anyone who lives here or visits. We have only existed in our current form for just over a year, and the magazine and the organization are still evolving, trying to find more and better ways to bring you stories and news of the creative goings on here.
To that end, there is currently an Indiegogo crowd-funding project that is live and in play even as I type. Our plan is to create a twice-yearly print edition of the magazine, to supplement the online magazine. I won’t tell you all the details in this post, but you can read all about it here. We have just over a week to make our goal, and with crowd-funding, it’s not the size of each donation. It’s the size of the crowd. There are also some great rewards offered by the arts community, as well as an unlimited amounts of good karma that you will receive for donating to the project.
Do we really want to see what Whidbey Island is like without such a vibrant, sustainable arts community?
“Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.” (Martin Mull)
OK, I agree. Mr. Mull’s comment is a little tongue-in-cheek, a little smarmy, but I get it. You really can’t capture what music is all about by writing about it.
I’ve spent a lot of time playing music — privately, in a garage, or sitting on the edge of my bed; also in front of an audience in bars, coffeehouses, and at church services.
I’ve spent even more time listening — through headphones in a dark room, in a car with the windows down, in stadiums and concert halls. Smarter people than me have tried to capture the essence of music on the mind, body and spirit.
So why try? There was recently a local PBS special on Seattle music and the grunge era — and believe me, I had a front row seat. So, I tuned in hopefully expecting a trip down memory lane, wanting to relive nights spent with friends at Seattle music venues like the Tractor Tavern or The Off-Ramp. My wife walked through the room during the show and asked, “Is this any good?”
“Not really,” I replied. “Mostly it’s people talking about how cool the Seattle rock and rap communities are. I don’t think they’ve actually played any music yet.”
So.
When it’s done poorly, exposition about music is really disappointing and frustrating. When it’s done well, speaking and discussing music can be just as insightful and thrilling as the thing itself. You knew this next part was coming, didn’t you? Well, here it is:
My All-Time, Top Five Favorites Quotes about Music —
Number five: This summer, I took a poetry class from local legend and University of Washington professor emeritus David Wagoner. When discussing the impulse to write and create, he said:
If all the poetry and all of the music in the world disappeared overnight, in six months it would all be back.
He felt there would be hundreds, thousands of new creations very quickly. It’s such a primal need to make sounds and words and rhythms, there is simply no denying it, and no life without it.
Number four: Tom Waits, bard of the Bowery, hobo-hipster-genius, is full of insight and wit when it comes to talking about music. He was interviewed back in the ‘80s on the beloved and much-missed MTV show “The Cutting Edge.” (Remember when MTV actually played music? Ah, kids, gather ’round… that’s another story, and probably another blog topic.) In this instance, Waits was talking about listening to music, and the technology of the then-brand new CDs with their crystal clear, pristine, separated new sound. Seated at a dive bar (naturally) in West Los Angeles, he tipped his hat back and said:
I prefer music when it’s part of everything else — all mixed together. Y’know, something you overhear down a hallway, or outside from across the street.
Tom Waits / Kevin Mazure photo
Context. Mixed in with the surroundings. Part of the atmosphere. All around us.
In the same interview, he also expounded on the joys of mis-hearing things—how lyric and melody can be misconstrued or given layers of meaning by the listener; something new is created that the artist probably didn’t even intend. Beautiful.
Number three: What would a Top Five list be without a gratuitous Simpsons reference? In one of the timeless “Treehouse of Horror” Halloween episodes, Lisa needs a theme song, a “jingle” in the Tin Pan Alley parlance. The professional songwriter for hire, an elderly gent with a lisp and a bad suit, plays some cheesy piano chords and sings a few trite phrases. Lisa, clearly disappointed, waits for an explanation. The man, an old-fashioned pro of many years on Broadway, looks down and says:
Well, it’ll sound a lot better coming out of Paul Anka.
Truer words were never spoken. Any song would sound better if sung by Paul Anka. When I’m writing, I have actually asked myself that magical question — how would this sound coming out of Paul Anka? The answer is usually, “It would sound more melodic and have a tighter rhyme scheme. Get back to work.”
Number two: This gem comes from that sage, the ancient and wise Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones. What better person to blow a hole in the notion of the pretentious songwriter? Preach it, Keith:
Personally, I don’t consider that you create or write anything. The best way to think about it, for me, anyway, is that you’re an antenna. I sit down at an instrument-guitar, piano, bass or whatever-and play somebody else’s songs. And usually within 20 minutes, more or less, suddenly something’s coming. And that’s when the antenna goes up. (Wets his finger and raises it in the air.) Incoming! So you get this sort of gift. You work it up a bit and then transmit it. The idea that “I wrote that,” or “I created that” is an overblown artistic sort of thing that people love to put on writing songs. It can screw you up. If you think that it’s all down to you, you’ve got another thing coming.
Keith Richards performs on a Les Paul guitar. / Photo by Matthew Mendelssohn
The idea of being a conduit, an “antenna,” for music is at once refreshing (“Phew, it’s not really me creating this”) and, at the same time, very scary (“Holy cow! I’m dealing with a bigger force; I’m trying to get in touch with the essence of the cosmos!”) Writing and playing music is a mystical, intimate activity, but also universal and moving around us all the time. No wonder it’s so pervasive and travels across cultures.
And, continuing on that thought, talking about music, but really something much greater, here’s my Favorite, All-Time, Number One Quote about music from the artist Neville Garrick, talking about his friend, the reggae genius Bob Marley:
‘Cause, Bob never struggled to write a song yet. As him say, him say, is Jah write all them songs anyway.
It’s not me. Or you.
It’s not even Bob Marley.
It’s just God writing all those songs anyway. Writing about music may be a fool’s errand, as Martin Mull said, like dancing about architecture, but it can come close. That feeling, that spark as music washes over you… it’s a connection to something much bigger, something we all strive to feel.
Erik Christensen teaches at Oak Harbor High School, writes songs and poetry, and his favorite Bob Marley song is “Stir It Up.”
Erik Christensen Band plays the Front Street Grill in Coupeville from 6 to 8 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 11 and Bloom’s Winery in Bayview Corner from 3 to 5 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 9; Christensen plays with the Jacobs Road Band at the Oak Harbor Tavern at 9 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 14.
While I was a student at Everett community college, I took a job as the front desk receptionist at a local art gallery. I thought it was a natural fit for me since I already had an insatiable appetite for art. It might have been my child-like sense of wonder; or the manic enthusiasm that I displayed that quickly endeared me to the gallery director, because it did not take long before I landed the position as the “unofficial” gallery assistant. Believe me when I say there was some serious talent that walked through those gallery doors.
Ironically, I found myself surrounded by all this fantastic artwork, but I could not afford a single piece. The truth of the matter was, I had developed the taste for champagne, but I subsisted on a Budweiser budget. Life can be cruel at times.
Meanwhile, I had met an art student in my social studies class that talked non-stop about how fabulous her art professor was. It was mid-way through the semester when I finally broke down and promised her a studio visit, if she would just SHUT UP.
Ten minutes with professor Sandra Lepper was all it took, before I had signed myself up in every class she had to offer (with the exception of oils, because I could not afford to buy them!!).
Not only was she fabulous, but she turned out to be one of the best teachers that I ever had. One class in particular was to become the catalyst in my experience as a young artist. She told us one day in class that art is for everyone. It was not just for the wealthy, but for anyone interested in collecting it. Then she went on to say that “no matter how bad it is, one should try to have artwork made by an artist, instead of settling for prints.” As if by cue, one student asked how to go about it, when even mid-range art was out of their reach? Professor Lepper smiled and, with the fluid motion of a “Price is Right” TV model, she gestured toward the walls of her class and said, “You can start by making your own!” It took several nano seconds before it all started to sink in. I looked around the classroom and saw something truly amazing … only weeks before, she had us reproduce any artist of our choice using any medium, and the results were no less then stunning.
On the walls, were respectable replicas of da Vinci, Van Gogh, Cornell, Cassatt and Leger, to name a few. Every single piece had been done by her students, and most (including me) had never taken a drawing class before.
Inevitably, one student suggested that going to the thrift store was a good place to start. Believe it or not, their comment raised a few eyebrows and a few students even laughed. As for me, well, I had already “left” the classroom … I was busy thinking of the ways that I could steal away from the gallery where I worked, to run across the street to the thrift store! I suddenly realized that I had worked at the gallery for months, and had not made a single visit to that store.
Sometimes the most obvious thing can be the most overlooked.
The next day, I arrived a half hour early before I started work so that I could make a quick trip to the thrift store. If I had not lifted my head up in the last second, I would have collided into the wall of bodies that were lined up shoulder by shoulder to serve as an effective barrier to the front entrance of the store.
No one was getting out and there certainly was no chance in hell that anyone was getting in either.
If it weren’t for the copy of “ The Art of War” that I kept as a reliable fallback, when nothing else was interesting to read in my bathroom, I would have waved the white flag a long time ago.
One can enter “the ultimate impenetrable fortress if you do not fight your opponent, but instead infiltrate them.”
In other words, if you can’t fight ‘em, JOIN them!
The next day, I returned with a renewed sense determination, arriving an hour early and wheeling a walker onto the front lines.
It worked, at least for a little while. Sadly, it was only a matter time before the veteran shoppers had figured out that I was a total fraud. The next time I pulled this stunt, they responded by forming a defensive formation, which drove me directly into the circular clothes racks, where I somehow managed to flip over and land on my back. It was there among the scarves and purses where my mangled body lay motionless like a helpless sea-turtle only to get finished off by a hungry seagull.
Eventually, I figured it out and after a few months or so, I earned myself a position somewhere in the back of the line.
Oh, I did manage to find a few good pieces of artwork. Over the next couple of years, my collection of art quickly grew. In addition, to buying REAL art, I started to make my own by adopting my step-father’s technique of using pressed-board prints with the frame still intact and gessoing over it. I’ve been doing this continually for more than 17 years.
Just for the record, I am aware that this technique has existed for a while now. How long? Who knows? Who cares? Moreover, this style is often referred to as “outsider” art or faux art. The term I prefer to use and the most popular way to describe this method is to call it “altered art.”
Occasionally, I’ll find a nice piece, but for obvious reasons those days are (mostly) a thing of the past. Now, I spend my time in the dusty corridors of the aisles somewhere between forgotten items and dust bunnies the size of small children. I am looking for spectacular frames with horrific images of “’things” conjured up by whomever was responsible for creating it in the first place. If by chance it’s a painting, I’ve been known to conduct thorough research BEFORE altering the piece. Most of the time, out of respect for the artist, I won’t alter it.
My most recent acquisition is a rather unusual find, because the frame has an odd combination of Art Deco and geometric motif that was popular in the 1960’s. The print (33×26) is of a young woman gazing upward, while her transparent gown floats around her body in a ghostly wisp-like apparition. No doubt the artist painstakingly performed this amazing procedure so that the viewer’s eyes would go directly to her breasts. In short, most people would find this perfectly grotesque, myself included.
The Art Deco and geometric motif that was popular in the 1960’s is one thrift-store print find of the author’s.
I haven’t made any plans at the moment for this find. However, I just found out a week ago that my husband’s parents are coming up for the holidays. I suddenly feel compelled to allocate a space for this picture by the front door.
With regards to collecting artwork, whether it’s good or not is purely subjective. I happen have both “real” art and “reproduced” art in my home. In my opinion, when we mix both the “high and low” this increases the potential for a discourse between the subject matter and the viewer.
I also happen to believe that this is an essential ingredient to any great design and story.
Here are a few examples:
Here is a mid-century print by unknown artist (36×13) turned into a Fernando Leger inspired altered-art piece (20×16) with acrylic and paper.
Here’s where I placed a piece using the inside sleeves of vinyl records. (Collage and acrylic by Julie Cunha.)
Julie Cunha Interiors, specializes in expertly edited restyled vintage and modern interiors. She lives and works on Whidbey island. To inquire, or make an appointment contact by cell (360) 969-9921or by emailing at JulieCunha5@gmail.com.
Painting yourself into a corner is typical for an amateur ─ strictly speaking from a writer’s perspective ─ when sharing memories from your childhood. How does a writer make a seamless transition from the past into the present? The answer? Only a good one does.
I wrote myself into this “corner” knowing that I would have one hell of a time finding my way out of it. Believe me, I agonized over this dilemma for weeks. I even had a series of reoccurring dreams, where I found myself frantically rummaging through a row of filthy old cardboard boxes on top of a rickety card table with fluorescent lighting buzzing overhead. What was I looking for? The solution to my dilemma, of course. Funny, how the answer almost always comes from the most unexpected places.
This one came from a broken plate.
Julian Schnabel’s “Patients and the Doctors,” 1978, oil, plates, bondo on wood. / Photo courtesy of artmatters.ca
Several weeks ago, while washing the dishes after dinner one evening, my husband broke my favorite plate. I only had four of these plates to begin with, because I bought them at the thrift store. So, with regards to this situation, I knew what I was getting myself into when I bought them: No accidents and limit my dinner guests to just two at a time. What can I say? Love is blind. I love those plates.
Then it happened. A plate broke. I was a bit irritated. OK, I was livid! Especially when the perpetrator casually shrugged his shoulders and said, “Oops. Sorry.”
Obviously, my husband was not aware of the pact that I had made with myself when I purchased those plates.
Moments after impact, although I was perfectly composed on the outside, I was boiling on the inside. I even tried a half-hearted attempt at playing it off. But the ugly truth was that I was a raging maniac! What I really wanted to do was jump on the counter and scream a royal stream of obscenities (complete with a two-foot strand of spittle dangling at the corner of my mouth for the complete effect).
This plate, which I adored, represented something much more than a platform on which to put food. It was a symbol of my childhood.
There was only one way to respond to that kind of grief.
Write a poem!
After I finished writing the poem, I made my husband drop what he was doing in order to become my CAPTIVE audience. What better way to torment your abuser then to force them to listen to a poem that YOU wrote about them?
“Husband will wash the dishes”
My dish was broken last night.
In his vain attempt to wash the dishes,
Stumbling, fumbling, like a drunken toddler, the plate falls
and then the body of a not-quite-formed person follows suit.
In a heap on the floor are the remnants of my long-forgotten youth. I weep.
Not for the broken PLATE, but for the person who took my heart
and shattered it into a million tiny fragments.
The tips of my fingers still tingle at the moment all was lost, wishing
they could have been there to catch the fallen artifact.
This is one of life’s many lessons: Never believe the heart is indestructible,
for its precarious existence hangs in the balance of a single breath;
one that often lingers between life and death.
For once the heart is broken; it cannot be replaced.
It is not that easy.
And if it was, everything would be made with the intention of being immediately disposed of. My precious plate, I will miss you.
His reaction? Like someone who had just received a dose of Novocain.
Some people will never understand. Or so I thought.
Then one day, several weeks after the incident, my dear husband comes home with a box. Guess what was inside? Not one but TWO plates.
It was love at first sight, revisited.
And he had the package mailed to his office instead of his home address so that he could give me the box and see the look on my face when I opened it. This is why I’ve been with the same clumsy dishwasher since 1987.
The yellow-ochre Denby stoneware plate was replaced by the errant, but loving, husband.
It really was just a plate. Or was it? This entire incident got me thinking about the reasons why we attach value to things. I love this plate, because it reminds me of my strange yet happy (most of the time) childhood. That yellow-ochre Denby stoneware plate symbolizes all that is familiar and safe to me.
I’m sure no one else can relate.
I grew up with mid-century furnishings, when it was the kiss of death to own any of it in the 1980s. Everyone around me wanted either Laura Ashley or Miami Vice-inspired interiors. Not my family! We had the crap that no one else wanted. Imagine a home filled with half-Danish modern and Drexel mahogany.
So what if I have painted myself into a corner? For whatever reason I feel that my best work comes out when I acknowledge the present, while giving a nod to my past. As for the seamless transition?
I’m working on it.
Julie Cunha Interiors, specializes in expertly edited restyled vintage and modern interiors. She lives and works on Whidbey Island. To inquire, or make an appointment: Juliecunha5@gmail.com or cell (360) 969-9921.
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I received an email from a friend of mine which brought me to a full stop. Its message was so true and so truly moving, I feel I must share it with you, all of you out there reading this, those I know and those I don’t know, friends near and far, folks down the street I’ve never met — here are some considerations which may remind you of the real and exquisite beauty hidden in the ordinary details of life.
I love to iron. No – really – I do love to iron. Ironing has seen me through fear, loss, anxiety, anticipation, expectation, sleeplessness. I’ve dampened as many clothes with tears as I have with spray starch or Mrs. Meyers Ironing Water.
And then sometimes I iron just out of pure joy – just for the delight of seeing something finished, feeling that I’ve started and finished one thing – sometimes for myself – sometimes for someone I love.
Everything about it delights me – the heft of the iron that someone actually invented and manufactured. Where did that start – hot stones pressing hides maybe? When did dewrinkling begin to matter?
I like the capacity for transition. First it’s wrinkled – then it’s flat. And it’s the same piece of cloth – the same object transformed.
I like the steam – wind made manifest – how magic is that?
I like the ever-changing scene I observe out of the second-story window where my ironing board sits. Today – trees hung with flame – busy squirrels leaping from ground to tree to . . . A few dogs and their walkers bundled for the first time this year in hats and gloves as well as newly uncovered long-moth-balled coats. Cycles – cycles. At these transition times in nature I am newly reminded that change is hard and glorious and inevitable.
“Woman Ironing” 1869 oil on canvas by Edgar Degas.
And the smell of ironing – the moist warmth – like walking into the dark room of a sleeping child. It is fragrant and real and peaceful and so filled with promise.
And then there’s the moment when I stop ironing. Finishing for the day – a job well done (usually) and I think now for a moment of the things that don’t need ironing – shar-peis and elephant’s knees and our faces as we age.
─ From the ironing board of Candace Barrett Birk
Candace Barrett Birk who wrote this beautiful iteration outlining the hidden poetry in our daily lives, has been a friend and mentor to me for over 30 years. We met in San Francisco at a place called Western Public Radio which existed for the sole purpose of giving birth to creative work in the radio medium. It was a fellowship program funded by the John and Mary R. Markle Foundation and brought together top talent in the production of radio documentaries, theatre, recorded comedy, and experimental audio art.
Fellows and mentors worked intensely for a week in small rooms with buzzing machines, encouraging new talent coming up in the field to have wild ideas and then make them real. It was a great time in the development of the art forms in public radio and many of the voices known and loved on NPR today had their humble beginnings in those studios at Fort Mason Center. That was where WPR was then located, headed up by Leo C. Lee, an archetypal curmudgeon of the Front Page “newsman” ilk who ran the joint with barking commands and twinkling eyes. A lot of good work was done there and then the empowered producers went forth, as the diaspora of a new generation of creative thinkers in the medium.
Candace was my mentor then and there and, as a leading producer of children’s theatre and media in the SF Bay area, she encouraged me to pursue my dream of making quality programming for young people. She showed me what that might look like, sound like, and be like to do. She also suggested, before we had even met, that I should marry David Ossman, whom she had met and approved of as good husband material for me which, after I met him, turned out to be true!
Candace and I continued to work together periodically over the years — including on an all-star centennial celebration for radio of the book, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz,”which we produced at her behest for the Children’s Museum of Los Angeles. The end result is to this day one of my favorite pieces to have done ever and the Parent’s Choice Gold Medal we received for the four-hour CD release of the program is one of my proudest achievements.
So you see, Candace has had a subtly huge influence on the entire direction of my life and she has helped me iron out so many wrinkles in so many challenging situations, I can’t begin to recount them all. The important thing to me is that she took me on, the good, the bad, and the ugly, and mentored me into finding my way into the adult world I was alternately sinking or swimming in at the time. And she has continued to show me how to get through some of the toughest moments of it ever since.
The tool.
Before I was a Buddhist, it was Candace who demonstrated that since change is inevitable, better to embrace it, take it on as a creative challenge, rather than cling to what must vanish. In the course of our friendship, I have seen Candace go from running a children’s theatre, to running a children’s museum, to designing several more museums, to, in recent years, going to medical school in order to design a creative arts program within the hospital system. More lately, she has gone back to her roots as an actress and appears on the stages of the Gutherie Theatre in Minneapolis in a variety of perfectly wonderful, eccentric roles. I admire her joyous perseverance at an age when many people are happy to stop their frenzied dance of DOING things and happily sit down with a box of bonbons and a channel changer. Candace will never do that. At the very least, she will iron her shirts to perfection and write prose poems about it to her friends. In this regard, Candace has remained my mentor and my role model. Whether minding the sky or ironing the sheets, life-long learning happens moment by moment.
Coming up on Thanksgiving, I want to express my thanks to my mentor — Thank you, Candace, for showing me how to grow and grow. And to all mentors who take on the young and inexperienced, thank you for sharing your wisdom and precious time in order to encourage learning and development in others.
Here on Whidbey Island, we have ample opportunities to give and receive the mentoring blessing in our lives, everything from the 4-H Club, to the Boys and Girls Clubs, to the HOPE Therapeutic Riding Center, and more. One of my personal favorites locally is the Mother Mentors of Whidbey program. With the holidays coming up and stress levels rising, it’s a great moment for the experienced mothers and grandmothers among us to help those younger ones who are just now beginning to stare down Santa and his gang of reindeer in the waning winter light.
Judith Walcutt is a writer who has been living and learning on Whidbey Island for over a quarter century with her only husband, David Ossman. Her essay “Can a Buddhist Revise a Sexy Novel? Writer as Chodpa” will be published in the Winter 2013 issue of Talking Writing. She remains a grateful alumna of Hedgebrook Women Writers’ Retreat.
