What Painting Buddha Taught Me About Writing

From the time I was old enough to color, I wanted to paint. I kept saying “When I get older, I’ll paint.”

I guess I’m older now. It’s been poking at me with more persistence than normal. When I sunk into the mental process of deciding what I wanted to paint, I found myself drawn to the East.

I’m not religious, but I am very spiritual. There’s a clear difference to me. I see religion so often as a vehicle that carries people farther from the Divine instead of closer to it. They seem to get so wrapped up in coffee and cake meetings that love, compassion, and appreciation of the diversity of creation elude them. I don’t think that’s how it’s supposed to work, but if you study world religions that’s so often what happens. Each group thinks the rules they follow are the right ones and everyone else is simply misguided. Some religions are more tolerant of different thinking than others, but arguably any structure by its nature secretly (or not so secretly) feels right.

For me, Truth strings through them all. I have always been keenly aware that there is an amazing Source greater than me and yet somehow connected to me. My goal is to strengthen my alignment with that Source (or God or Creator–all names seem insufficient and okay at the same time) daily and by doing that, to evolve the world in a loving way rather than one filled with hate, discrimination, and fear. Simple, really.

Recently, I watched a documentary called “Inner and Outer Worlds.” It showed how to keep our inner worlds balanced in an outer world that’s constantly whirling about Tasmanian-Devil style. While watching, I found myself (as I have at various times in my life) drawn to the images of Buddha. The stillness and space of the images. During this same time frame, my husband had been looking for a Buddha picture that had been given to us from his dad years ago.

The signs seemed clear. I knew the Buddha would be my first painting and it would be for my husband. For a flash I was reticent about launching my introduction to my new paint class as the “Buddha Girl.” I live in more of a “crosses” kind of town right now. I’d be way better received if I were to paint an angel or Jesus on the cross. I suspected my Zen bend would make the other people suspicious of me. Not one to live according to what people think about me, I let it go as quickly as it came. After all, if I can’t be who I am at 50, I am certainly not connecting my inner and outer worlds well at all.

So I brought my many Buddha shots to my paint class. I flipped through them with my instructor and settled on the one above. I was excited that my new paint teacher, Sandi, said I could paint this in my first class with acrylics. That meant I’d have it in time for our anniversary. I felt the reactions from other painters. Some were intrigued, others suspicious as I’d suspected. Sandi was enthusiastic and highly creative. I knew I’d found a teacher who would let me play and develop my own creative channels.

As I brushed red on the white canvas, I thought about how similar painting is to writing. You start with a blank page. Tabula Rasa. From that, you create something wholly different than white. Ideally, anyway. You pour out part of your soul. You add color and contrast in characters and places you create. Your inner world has found a visual path to the outside.

While the first layer dried, I thought about the role time plays in the creative process. If you try to rush things, it can get goopy.But my real epiphany came while watching Sandi at work. One of the other painters had asked her to help paint an “eye” on a child painting she was making of her grandson. As Sandi dabbed her fine brush around the pupil, she talked about how every painter should paint portraits because it makes a person so observant. I loved the metaphor, eyes being windows to the soul and all.

So goes writing. I especially love watching comedians who write their own material. I’m an avid follower of “Last Comic Standing” for just this reason. The way the current comics are able to create humor from their fine-tuned powers of observing the mundane causes Roseanne to say nearly every week, “I love your ability to find a new slant on the mundane.”

That’s the sweet spot of creating anything. We all have it inside us. If only we quietly observe, we have all the material we need to create a masterpiece.

True Words

Anne Lamott said something like if people didn’t want to end up being made into bad characters in her books, they should have behaved better. I always thought that was kind of funny, not that I’d ever use pen as sword.

But recently I was talking with a writer friend and realized I’d totally done it subconsciously. I’d killed off this person (and not in a very nice way, I might add) that had definitely annoyed me. I felt bad. What struck me most was that I totally missed it.

That’s just part of the fun of fiction, I guess. How often do you read a book and wonder if the author knows what she is revealing about herself by being quite possibly unaware of that. Writers are brave people that way. They know that they reveal their truest essence in ways they may not see, yet they do it anyway.

This is true even in non-fiction. I’m working on a couple non-fiction projects and am noticing that staying neutral is a challenge. I wouldn’t have thought that. Fact is fact. Yet, we all have a filter of some sort and even interpreting fact moves through it. Movie critics are probably the best example of this. Their reviews feel very much apart of their core personality to me.

There’s only one answer. Be nice to the writers.

Exposing the Shadow

Last Thursday I was scheduled for jury duty. I called after 5:00 and found out I didn’t have to go, free for another year from the summons’ police. This gave me all day Friday to work on my WIP novel. Sweet.

I woke up Thursday to my daily morning chef ritual, peanut butter pancakes and fresh squeezed orange juice for my boys. After I messed up the kitchen, then cleaned it again, I rounded up the three teen boys that I cart to school each morning and off we went. As we were driving, I started planning my writing time.

I should really do my exercise first. It’s important and it’ll get the juices flowing.

When I got back, I went out to our combo shop/music/exercise room and hopped on the elliptical for 45 minuntes. As I wrapped up my time there (and respective special on Jane Goodall I was watching) I planned my writing time.

It’s raining and I love sitting in the hot tub in the rain. Talk about creative flow. This will do it. A logical next step.

While sitting in the hot tub under the rain, I composed a Facebook status that was entirely too long. Here it is in case you missed it…

I’m not a huge fan of “read more” posts–subscribe more to the Twitter style of posting. But I feel it coming on so maybe just this once. Can I just tell you that one of my most absolute pleasures on this earth, one that makes my cheeks hurt because I smile so much when I’m doing it, is to sit out in the hot tub in the rain. Right now, the clouds are shapeshifting, white and gray faces and animals dancing together across the sky. The windchimes tingle one moment then ring out in a full orchestra in the next, moving with the wind. Towering pines sway amongst oaks as birds dive in and out of branches, chirping back-up to the chimes. The rain changes in intensity with the shifting of the clouds and when the drops get fast and fat, they look like the Bellagio fountains on the surface of the hot tub water. No, better. Because this is Nature and it is just pretty perfect as far as I see it. #Bliss

By the time I finished my hot tub time–and novella of a post–it was time to make lunch. And shower. And blow dry my hair…and my toes.Oh, and I needed to get the laundry started, unload the dishwasher, and check my email.

I looked at the clock: 2:00. In 30 minutes, it was time to go get the boys. Kind of hard to start now. Interrupt the flow and all.

I know. I’ll wait until they get settled, eat, and then I’ll knock out ten pages.

So back to school. On the way back to school, I remember my de-clutter program. I am organizing one thing per day in the house (a drawer, a cupboard, a closet) because items in the drawers have become unrecognizable.

I’ll do my pages AFTER I de-clutter the spice drawer. All that de-cluttering will be good Feng Shui and show up in my writing.

I pick up the boys, get home, fix food, de-clutter the drawer and then take my computer up to my desk for some peace and quiet. My husband’s on the other side of the Japanese screen that divides our desks asking me something. My son’s downstairs making noise about how we don’t have any food and need to go to Walmart.

How am I supposed to write with all this noise going on?

Off to Walmart we go to buy lots of things we don’t really need. And to Goodwill to drop off some of those de-clutter bags. And to Sonic because it’s Happy Hour and strawberry shakes are on sale.

Back home at 8:00 pm, I sit down at my laptop. I rework my first sentence three times. Add a word, take it out, add it, take it out, read both versions to my husband.

I’m exhausted. And, I reason, to start this flow now would really be activating.

Really, I should have some TV time with my hubby. He did, after all, help me on my sentence.

And that, my friends, is the dark side of writing for me. The only caveat is that the next day I wrote ten pages because I was so disgusted with myself. (Good pages, too.)

Thanks, Matthew McConaughey, for the Epiphany

I had an epiphany this week. I think it started when we were watching “True Detectives,” a new HBO series my husband and I can finally sink our teeth into. McConaughey plays the best role I’ve ever seen him play, including his stellar performance in Dallas Buyer’s Club. Something was different about this role. He shines in a way his other picks have not allowed him to shine. The satisfaction he feels playing Detective Rust Cohle is palpable, and it makes watching it so satisfying. The energy comes through.

When I think about the writings I’ve loved, I can feel it when the author is having the same experience as McConaughey in this role. It doesn’t matter whether the writer is a poet, a blogger, a teen writing a paper, or a kid writing a poem for his mom. I can feel it when the person poured themselves into the words and they are not just a mere combination plate of syntax and correct punctuation with a simile and metaphor thrown in on the side. These are the writings that move me.

I can also feel it on the writing side which is why I like blogging so much. I don’t blog for my Ego’s sake, or my web presence, or to show off how to spell big words or just pretty literary quips. If those were my primary motivators, I’d quit in about 5 minutes. I blog because I’m really moved by something and want to put those feelings into language because that’s my playground.

This is also why I have to work on novels I’m passionate about, not ones that follow a formula and fit nicely into a commercial genre in the bookstore. If the feeling isn’t there for this 90% kinesthetic girl, the writing is going to be shit. On this, I’m clear.

This idea seems so basic, yet struck me so profoundly. Thank you, Matthew McConaughey, for the moment of clarity. It’s a good reminder of where my heart needs to stay.

Sacred Space

Some people fantasize about exotic trips around the world. Others crave fame, or recognition for their work, money, or admiration for their educational and professional accomplishments. Here’s what I fantasize about, right here to your left: sacred space.

The idea of sacred space is as old as man. It’s a concept I’ve seen played out by the Native American’s in beautiful ways. When I was young, we had a friend who was the matriarch of a Northern California Native tribe. Her daughter was the tribal shaman for a period of time. The daughter would go up to a mountain top (a place no non-tribal person could ever go) and she would stay there overnight while her mother kept guard on the ledge below doing ceremony. They knew this space would help accelerate the healing that needed to take place between tribe members and they gave it great respect and reverence.

The desert is also one of these places. Once in Sedona, we had a trail guide take us to sacred sites and perform Native rituals intended to help us see the world in a more connected way. He wrapped a native blanket around us and took us through a guided visualization commonly performed in Native traditions. Just being on the top of a mesa, looking out at the stunning valley of red rock and indigenous plants, with an eagle soaring through the lavender-blue sky, accelerated the experience in a way that couldn’t happen in a Safeway parking lot. The Sacred Space cemented the journey.

A friend and I were recently discussing this idea. She and her dying son had taken a sojourn to sacred spaces all across the country before his death. Each morning over coffee, they would share their dreams. Not long after their journey started, they started having the same dreams, and attributed that to the sacred spaces they slept in.

Sacred Space is palpable. N. Scott Momaday said when you’re in this space, “you touch the pulse of the living planet; you feel its breath upon you.” People sense it. They seek it out. They know when they’re in it. And when I’m in it, my creative flow gushes through me in a way it doesn’t show up in other spaces. Building one writing space, for this very reason, is something I crave. (Now, when I write, it’s often on the couch, or at my childhood home where I can get quiet and see the vast green outside, or in some other nomadic location, including my car while waiting to pick up my kids.)

I dream of a place like the one in this picture. A simple place, where I can see out into nature and crack open to that creatively flow. The same space where I can go every day. A place with a desk and a chair and maybe a small bed. I picture Thoreau’s cabin, which we’ve visited on Walden Pond in Boston. (I’ve only recently learned that he and Emerson were friends and Emerson let Thoreau put the cabin on the land as a place to fully commune with nature.) In this phase of my life, I care less about accumulation and more about the simplicity of space, the space that allows me to hear that quiet voice flow through and feeling its breath on my neck.

“If you have been in the vicinity of the sacred – ever brushed against the holy – you retain it more in your bones than in your head; and if you haven’t, no description of the experience will ever be satisfactory.”

― Daniel Taylor, In Search of Sacred Places: Looking for Wisdom on Celtic Holy Islands

Trade Secrets

I’m inspired, intrigued, and aggravated when I listen to other writers discuss how they draft a novel. This is especially true–on all counts–if they’re really experienced and well-published. Somehow, it seems they may hold the keys to the Kingdom of Demystifcation, the magic place writers go to learn how most efficiently to do this whole novel writing thing.

Today, I felt those feelings whip around inside me, a tornado of uncertainty, as I sat and tried to keep an open mind while listening to Simon Wood speak about how he drafts his mystery/suspense/horror novels. He’s a prolific writer, mind you, and in the time it’s taken me to move one novel into the “publisher shopping” phase and start writing a second, he’s published God knows how many books (I’ve lost track), written numerous short stories, has audio books out, you name it. He’s a busy guy and he obviously has some secrets I need to know.

With a mechanical engineering background, he thinks in terms of design which means more of a laid out approach up front. Good idea, I think. Spreadsheets. I need spreadsheets. He gave great techniques, like color-coding scenes to balance protagonist, antagonist and subplot, and identify that you are keeping scene length consistent. Brilliant, I thought (with a charming English accent because that’s how he talks). I must do that straight away.

By the time he was done, I had a whole new approach laid out in my mind. But wait! I tried this last time! I was so organized on my first novel. I had a big master plan and acts and scenes–the whole shebang. In the redraft, I dumped it all on its head completely. The end product didn’t even look like a distant cousin of the first draft.

On my current novel, I have no poster board because I decided I’d just watch the movie unfold. This is more fun for me than the other way and I know the main story well so I figured this wouldn’t be a problem. I like the way my characters evolve and come into themselves in a way I couldn’t have forecasted in an outline. However, detail-wise, I’m floundering, and wishing I had a spreadsheet.

After listening to Simon’s process, I’m inspired to make a few tweaks. I’m grateful it came at this point in my suspense thriller because that’s his genre and he clearly knows his stuff. Hopefully, at some point, I’ll figure out some trade secrets I can share to make the writing process a little less mystifying for other writers.

The Writer’s Ego

Talk true to me. If you knew Baby Goose was just waiting for your stuff, wouldn’t you be piping it out like a rapid-fire machine gun?

It’s hard to be a writer and not be infected by the Writer’s Ego. After all, writing is a form of communication and if nobody’s reading, how are you communicating? Most writers I know write to be read, not just to pile up long strings of paragraphs in their bottom desk drawers to be discovered when they kick it.

When I think about the reasons I kept writing after college when I no longer had to, I come to this conclusion. All along the way people (teachers, professors, peers) stroked my ego by telling me I’m a good writer. I didn’t know that, but I recognized the pattern of that feedback.  I had friends along the way who I thought wrote well, but when the professor would say, “This is just crap,” they never wanted to write again. They were embarrassed. Ego and the dark side of Humility, crawling into the fetal position, and pulling the blankie over their collective head.

And yet so many writers claim to not write for anyone but themselves. Unfortunately, it’s not themselves that works as agent, editor, publishing house, reader, library, bookstore, readers. In the end, we write to be read and we want others to love it…all others–the gatekeepers, the readers, the librarians, the award committees. There’s always somebody to please.

Yet the message you hear over and over again is, “This business is so subjective.” What one person loves, the next reader can outline a list of bullet points about what’s wrong with it. You just can’t please them all, and you want to posture as if you don’t care, but there’s a place inside that wants to please the reader. As I was growing up. I never had anybody tell me anything except, “You’re a great writer.” I’m pretty sure if I had, I would have stopped. I may even resist posting Facebook statuses.

When Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson came to speak with American writers, he told them to find their own voice, that part that is uniquely them. We hear that over and over today from agents and editors at conferences who speak to both new and veteran writers about the elusive “how to get published” conundrum. But to be uniquely you requires not only a knowledge about who you are and how that differs from the rest of the Earth people, but also how that connects with the rest of the world. What I see much more regularly is people getting caught up in meeting the criteria of publishing, which often has little to do with being uniquely who they are.

What’s the Ego’s block then? When too much chatter lords over the creative process, it deadens it. It’s harder to access. When too many rules dictate the flow, the writing feels stale. On the other hand, at least for me, when I sit down to pour out on the fertile landscape of my journals, I see ideas blossom in a way that’s very hard to copy when I work on manuscripts. My current goal is to dismiss my Ego at the bottom ot the stairs, before I go to my office, and write like nobody’s watching.

Sorry, Baby Goose. Right now, it’s not about you.

Creativity Blossoms

I’m mentally back on the creative process and you know what that means.

The creative process is not a thing reserved for a select few who convert their first names to initials and write about wizards. It’s a thing that we all have access to and use in many different ways.

How it blooms depends on each of our unique seeds. Where we plant it, how we water it, how we sun it, how we fertilize it also matter. We can amp it up or turn it down, but it’s there for all of us to play with.

This past weekend I was doing one of those things I love most–talking with people and getting to know some friends of friends. It had been a full weekend in Austin with wedding festivities and touristy things. This was Day 3, Sunday brunch out on a patio overlooking the beautiful Austin hill country with a lake in the distance. We got on the subject of creativity which came after that question you know I always get. Wait for it.

“What books have you written that we can read?” There it is, followed by “I hate writing.”

But then the man talked about a class he and his wife had taken. He was surprised he liked it, but found it a great creative outlet where he didn’t usually get a chance to dabble in his more technical job. The class was called “Painting and Merlot” or something like that and the concept was each person got a canvas, a prompt, and a glass of wine. The man said as they all began to paint their “trees” each very unique painting became more and more beautiful as they drank.

First of all, I want to take this class. Next, I wondered, “What is it about the alcohol (substitute chocolate, food, etc.) that helps the creator become more creative?”

There is obviously a trend here if we look at all our creative types lost to addictions of various types. I remember hearing a guy say the best thing you can do for your art is to drink. I remember another one saying that was a horrible thing to say. I guess my curiosity lies more in the question of the “why.” Why does it take shifting the chemicals in our brain in some way to let the creative process open up?

I think it’s because of the Gremlin. That inner voice that mocks whatever it is that is being created. The one that shouts out, “Really? You just published that blog with all those freakin’ ass mistakes? You used “are” instead of “our?” Pretty ballsy, aren’t you?” or “That’s a tree?”

But here’s the thing. We don’t create to be perfect and put out perfect product. We create because it nurtures our soul. We create because it’s part of our natural process that yearns to be activated. We create because there is something that is so uniquely us that it is meant to be shared with the world.

It’s really just part of our job here to go forth and create.Through this process, we blossom. On that note, if anybody finds that “Paint and Merlot” class, sign me up! I’m in the mood to paint a tree.

What makes “Breaking Bad” So Good?

I’m on a quest to answer this question. It started when at a recent community meeting for the Catalyst Club of Redding, the question was asked, “Who do you want to sit at your table for beer week?”

I knew right away. It was the writing staff of “Breaking Bad.” That was my answer. I wanted to see what went on in those demented writing brains of theirs. How did they get a nation to fall in love with a meth-cooking nerd-ass chemistry teacher from New Mexico who recruited his ex-student to cook with him?

When it was my turn to speak, I couldn’t admit the truth. After all, what’s it say about me that I want to hang out with a bunch of writers whose goal is to create a nation of “Breaking Bad” addicts to the point they’re going to need their own 12-step program right about next Monday after the 75 minute finale?

But as a writer, I have mad respect. They’ve tapped into the balance people seek between their need to watch the sordid drug underworld juxtaposed to the very real demands daily living puts on each of us.

Take Gus for example. On the outside he’s so polite, well-mannered and OCD controlled, always presenting nicely, donating to the DEA, etc. He’s community minded. Very professional. He owns a chain of nice chicken restaurants and is not above wiping down tables and taking orders. Consummate gentleman and mentor, he won’t hesitate to change from his suit (hung neatly) into yellow plastic coveralls, slit a man’s throat without changing his facial expression, and change back into his suit and tie. His goal is to eradicate the Cartel (check) in an act of revenge and take over their business, transporting meth in chicken batter, all the while maintaining his calm, cool collective caution.

And there’s Walt. We give him a pass on his above-average meth making skills (oh–and ruthless killing of anybody and everybody who stands in his way) because after all he’s dying and he’s just doing it for the sake of his family. We feel bad because his years of pouring his knowledge out to future generations has not left his family enough security and the opportunity to make millions on his Grey Matter brainchild was yanked out from under him by his best friend and his lover. We feel sorry for Walt, so we say, “Well of course you need to make meth with only 3 months to live. We get that.”

What is it that makes us love these people? Is it the contradictions that characterize them? Is it that the writers use what former screenplay writer Blake Snyder called the Save the Cat technique in his book by the same name? (ie. Make the bad guys good by showing their compassionate side–like as they run away from killing someone, they reach down to save the cat that’s been hit by a car?)

I don’t know what it is, but this is why I’d sit at their table at beer week. I imagine they have stories to tell. Formulas that are 96% sure to work. Crystal blue strategies for success.

Still, I’m not proud that I’m feeling smug having binge watched all seasons of the show (a late comer to the series) in a synchronistic wrap with live finale episodes. I’m not proud that I’m feeling a little panicky about being in San Francisco for the Avon Breast Cancer Walk next weekend where I may not be able to get to a TV in time to catch the last episode LIVE (God forbid I have to watch the recording.) I’m not proud that my husband and I are walking around semi-dazed saying, “What are we going to do when ‘Breaking Bad’–and subsequently ‘Talking Bad’–are not on anymore after next week?” as if there’s an action item we need to have in place to fill the empty Sunday slots that will be staring us in the faces.

Back to the beer-drinking question. When the circle came to me with the beer week question, I just couldn’t come clean. I felt just a little too pervy for wanting to hang with this clan that has addicted a nation to its stories about really high-grade meth production–and that the writer in me was so impressed by that.

“The Ted Talks people,” I said. “And all of you.”

But deep down, I knew I was lying.

Ode to Max

Even as I type this, I hesitate. Some things just belong in a quiet space, locked up and seen only by the key holder.

Then again, that’s pretty contradictory to all I’m about. I tell my kids to live out loud. I tell my friends to live out loud. I tell my clients to live out loud.  I sure as heck better do it, too.

So I’ll tell you my little secret of the week. I’ve been knee deep in studying metaphysical thinkers, specifically the writings of philosopher Ernest Holmes. Holmes hung out in LA in the 1920s with the likes of Albert Einstein and Ralph Waldo Emerson. He was heavily influenced by Emerson’s writings and thinking. We have that in common because if I could sit and have a glass of Pinot with anybody in the world, it would be Ralph Waldo himself. (Turns out the first guy I kissed–by the same name–is a direct descendant and we used to have long, philosophical discussions back in the 6th grade which he recently reminded me about. Ralph, if you’re reading this, my sister-in-law Susan and I are looking forward to one of those talks Monday after next at Mama’s on Stockton in San Francisco. We owe it to Max.)

I’ve had a passion for original thinkers as long as I can remember. When metaphysics–ie. that which lies beyond what we can see–was introduced to me by Max Fagerquist, I was fascinated. Max was a large man who wore pretty much the same thing every day: a lemon chiffon turtleneck, a brown houndstooth jacket with elbow patches, non-descript slacks, and dusty cowboy boots. Each day he’d twirl a mint with his tongue, his wire rimmed glasses lost in the wildest eyebrows you’ve ever seen. He’d summon us to non-traditional class set ups (circles), with non-traditional questions (“Why ARE we here?” or “Are we really here?”), and challenge our first AP European class ever to explore the meaning of man from a completely unique vantage point. He made a huge impression on me and my friend, Kevin, and I’m sure many other adults who haven’t thought about him for 30 years.

This week, though, he’s very much on my mind. My mom cut out the obituary that said Max had died at age 74 in a care facility. I called the number. There would be no service. I called the high school where he’d taught. Nobody called me back.

In a synchronistic twist, a friend of mine was teaching a class I’ve wanted to take for years. I ran into her at the Ted Talks last week and she said, “I’ve so been thinking about you. I’m teaching this class and I think you’d love it. Come Thursday.”

I went. I had no idea this would be a continuation of AP European history, but there we were. In a circle.  Not teenagers, but 50 (60, 70) somethings.Talking about the meaning of life, metaphysical perspectives, Planet Epistemology. I could feel Max in the room.

The next morning I rose just before dawn and went out back to do my morning meditation. I like to get out there when at least three stars are left in the sky and stay until I can’t see them anymore. It’s my new thing. I closed my eyes and thought about Max–how I wish I’d went to tell him the influence he’d had over my thinking and writing. How I appreciated the risks he took with our class, his belief in us as original thinkers. How he’d encouraged me to find my own way as a writer and not copy others. He taught us how to question, not just accept. He believed we could do it and made us believe it, too.

When I opened my eyes, pink sky had risen above the line of tall oaks at the far back of our property. The stars were still visible. And in front of my face, one foot away was a steely gray hummingbird like the one up above. It reminded me of his eyebrows.

I laughed. “Well hello there.”

My next thought: hummingbirds don’t come out at dawn–do they? I knew it was a Max encounter.

What seemed like 5 minutes passed with fluttering wings just hovering. The sky turned all pink. There was no darting around in normal hummingbird fashion. He just stared at me with beady black eyes.

I listened. Finally he flew away. I felt full of joy.

I told my husband. I told my friend, Kevin. (They may both think I’ve finally lost it, but as I told them both, the older I get, the less I care. I have Max to thank for that.)

Just before I typed this blog (actually during, to be honest) I Googled the meaning of hummingbirds because I wondered, “Why a hummingbird, Max?”

Here’s what I got on my first look:

The hummingbird generally symbolizes joy and playfulness, as well as adaptability. Additional symbolic meanings are:

• Lightness of being, enjoyment of life
• Being more present
• Independence
• Bringing playfulness and joy in your life
• Lifting up negativity
• Swiftness, ability to respond quickly
• Resiliency, being able to travel great distances tirelessly

Now, it’s clear. Thank you, Max, for continuing to be my teacher even now. I can’t wait to see what you have in store for our metaphysics class next week.