I Love Marbles!
I love large collections of marbles. There is a shop on Broughton Street with a galvanized pail full of marbles. I go in there just so I can sink my hands into the pail. Delicious happiness!
Delicious Happiness
Every time I feel those cool little balls between my fingers the whole world turns into a bright and hopeful place… like the film Amelie… sometimes I even hear the soundtrack.
I’ve decided that in this year of grace, I’d like to surround myself with more of the little things and I have decided to start my own collection of marbles.
Because today is my birthday, I bought 37 marbles at the Pari
s Market and now I’m on the hunt for a really cool container to put them in. Maybe something glass so I can see all the colors.
I’ve never actually owned any more than a few marbles in my life – so this is a little exciting. I’ll keep you posted on my progress. I’m hoping to add marbles from all my favorite places in the world. I feel an actual trip to Paris is in order!!!
What are your favorite little things?
Peace in,
Tami
There are probably a lot of catch phrases that mean thinking outside of the box, but there are none that resonate with me as much as “Extra Chunky”.
In Nashville, because of how close I was to the music industry, everything seemed to revolve around the next big thing. The hit du jour that rose to the top of the charts and could often be defined as the song that made my eyes involuntary cross. To some degree every industry is like that. Businesses trying to perfect this or that – trying to convince us that their perfect product is what we want.
Which brings me to this talk on Spaghetti Sauce that Malcolm Gladwell gave for TED. As an artist using digital media to share my creations, I am always excited to share inspiration I find in unexpected topics.
Peace in,
Tami
Oooh the horror of a blank page… even without writers block the creative soul can become overwhelmed with where and how to start. And it’s not just about cultivating the idea. Most of us create because we want to connect and build a supportive community.
When I get an idea, I try to get a feel for how I want to communicate it. With my art, I tend to let go and see where the idea takes me, but I find it difficult to do that with my writing. Instead, I struggle to control my words and in my fiction work this tends to stifle my characters and closes any opportunity for their growth. Why? Because I often fail to create a full back story for my characters. It is so obvious, yet something I’ve never really done. I’ve thought about what they wear and their favorite things, but I’ve never thought about their beliefs and values, and isn’t that the very thing that dictates how we handle certain situations?
A fun exercise we recently did in my screenwriting class brought the idea of motivations and actions home. Each of us brought in a news article to share with the group. We organized our articles into a story with a beginning, middle and end and fully discussed the motivations of the main character. We started to throw out questions about their state of mind, asking each other what we thought the protagonist’s home life and childhood were like. We were investigating the things that make us human and allowing our imaginations to fill in any number of possibilities. I found it so inspiring!
What was scary to me, is that I realized I had become extremely desensitized to the “news”. I had that feeling a few years ago when I’d watch the news reports about the flooding in Nashville and found myself detached from the reports even though I could see it all around me. Part of it was shock, but I also think that I’m often so busy that I forget that the story doesn’t end when the reporting segment does. We can compartmentalize the news as happening to someone else and yet watch a ripped from the headlines television show or movie and feel connected.
I loved this assignment because it reminded me that we are surrounded by inspiration for stories, songs and screenplays. We are truly a sum of all our parts and layers of experiences and this is the foundation of character development… and not just on the page!
Peace In,
Tami
Jeff and I call November 22 “should have gone fishing day” – as in the day you probably should not show up for work. The world has often wondered what would have happened if President Kennedy just would have gone fishing instead of showing up in that open air motorcade. Well wonder no more.
Stephen King’s 11/22/63 follows Jake Epping through an adventure into the past to change the events of that day. Jake walks into 1958 and builds a life as George Amberson, all with the purpose of rescuing JFK from Oswald. He ages over the 5 years he is in the past with the idea that he will return to the future 2 minutes after he left.
I loved the vivid story line, the characters were interesting and I am always enchanted with stories that investigate our past. Plus Mr. King gave a shout out to Jack Finney and there is not a better time travel book than Time and Again!
My English Composition class gave me the opportunity to understand why I read the way I do. Not only do I love reading about the past, I love reading about actual time travel. The idea is still so romantic to me. Maybe because of the story of my great grandfather — I keep thinking if someone went back into time to change that event, that maybe I wouldn’t even exist. But how many other things would change? Does time ripple or can it create tsunamis? I’m completely fascinated!
Peace In
Tami
Consider The Butterfly was inspired after the death of a family friend. The night he passed a bright luminescent purple butterfly fluttered through a dream and landed in my outstretch palm. I don’t remember anything about the dream except the butterfly and when I woke up I knew I had to create this piece.
Paper collages are a fun art project that I can get Peyton involved in. She helps me cut the paper squares and often paints the canvas board. I like using canvas board because of the texture and strength, especially since I coat the final project with beeswax.
5x7 inch canvas board painted with acrylic.
Butterfly shape created with cut squares of purple paper.
From here I did a little stamping and used a skeleton key for the body of the butterfly. There is something about the juxtaposition of the history associated with a skeleton key and the birth of a butterfly that I love. I included a butterfly quote from American writer, Richard Bach that felt perfect and found its way to me when I needed it. Happy synchronicity…
Consider The Butterfly
Peace in,
Tami
I’ve been looking over the mixed media art work I did over the last year and decided to put together a portfolio reel. Jeff has this song, Carry On Like Larry Jon, that really nurtures the artist in me, so naturally I used it in this reel.
I attended a seminar on creating a CV (curriculum vitae) and plan to add my art commissions and teaching experience before including it on this site. I did not realize that the CV and the resume were two different things. The CV is more like a bio of experience told in point form – should be an interesting experience.
Peace In,
Tami
George Bernard Shaw
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