Laundry Line Divine

The Kripalu Elm tree looking towards Monument Mountain by SBB

Standing in a circle yesterday morning at Kripalu with 19 women, some of whom were strangers to me until this past Sunday evening at 7:00 pm, I knew that one place I belong is in circles of women.

I love to live and work among and with women.
I love to spend time and work in solitude.
I love to make connections through my work in the world.

None of this to say I don’t love men or like to work with them. I live with 2 fine men I am fervently in love with and am madly in love with a bunch more.

David, JNB and Klemo

I am simply passionate about the particular vulnerable grace that happens when women decide to stop bitching about stuff and do things together.

I have spent the last 4 days making vibrant visionary collages at a yoga and art retreat at the Kripalu Center in Lenox, MA. My collaborator Karen Arp-Sandel leads an extraordinary workshop blending art practices and yoga, Zen philosophy and doodling. We made many collages this week, walked the labyrinth and enjoyed our circle time. From this yoga center, which is formerly a Jesuit monastery so there is a certain cinderblock style that makes me feel like I am back in my Lutheran School again,

only the food is way way better- I can see the top of Monument Mountain which hides my town from view in the valley of the Housatonic River. I was on a retreat within spitting distance of my family, if you can spit 12 miles.

The authors and artists of 'Out of the Mouths of Babes'

When I consider the real and virtual community that is growing up around ‘Out of the Mouths of Babes’, the 15 bloggers we have heard from so far and the 15 I have lined up for this month, the radio interviews with Serene Mastriani & Gabrielle Senza, Jeanne Bassis, the 5 authors, my dear Lynnette Najimy, 2 video people, BFWW producers and presenters, the audience, the artists whose work we shared and Matt Tannenbaum, plus my wider writing community support- we are growing quite a circle around this project.

I could not be here without a few people.

Janet Reich Elsbach by Tina Rahr Lane

One of them in Janet Reich Elsbach. She was walking with me last fall when I shared my idea for ‘Out of the Mouths of Babes: An Evening of Mothers Reading to Others’ and before I had really completed my thoughtful and comprehensive presentation to her as we pumped over dead logs and miles of browning oak leaves, Janet was off and running, leaping tall buildings, making connections to other writers and helping me enflesh my idea with her unique brand of brilliance. And, in the meantime, while I grew ‘Out’, she grew her own blog spot, in fact two blog spots.

Not only has Janet leant momentum and joy to ‘Out’, she contributed her writing. Her blog post on the blog series is quintessential Janet- funny, erudite, contemporary and contemplative. Janet’s piece that she read on March 2 was another piece of her writing about food and the inner and outer politics of being a conscious consumer while also being a full time mom, and a sheep farmer, and a writer. She brought her audience up close and into her inner world of weighing the value of what she does daily with what she sees in the world. She is a force of nature. Stormy at times, but predictable as weather.

I am fortunate to have Janet in my circle of Women. And, my family is fortunate because knowing Janet is to learn the ways of pickled foods you have never tried before, of brownies better than you have ever nibbled and of parties that become events that become family traditions you can hardly live without. Like the weather, our friendship is strong and serene and a condition of being who I am today.

Today’s ‘Out’ post is by Dahpne Cohn, known to many as The Pleasure Nutritionist. Daphne blogs, leads e-courses and teaches about pleasurable eating that leads to things you might like to be led to like weight-loss or improved health. I love her videos because her kids are often there, dropping Brazil nuts in to the mixer for smoothies or shyly tasting her concoctions and attempting to be serious tasters while grinning from ear to ear. Daphne has an enthusiasm for community that just makes my day.

While we made art at Kripalu, we also lingered over well-made meals rich with salads and greens and only one meal with dessert attached. Too bad they did not have Janet’s recipe. (You can have Janet’s recipe if you enter in to the March 30th drawing by subscribing to this website). The laughter and sharing that increased with our hours together, the tears shed as stories were told helped to solidify our circle, stamped our individual fingerprints in to the mosaic of the group. Here is a grouping of the small canvases that we made.

Vibrant Visionary Collage mosaic 3.12

Because I love to sing, I shared this song with the group:

We are a Circle of Women
When we get together it is healing
We raise our voices in gratitude and praise.
We’re open to the wonders of grace
I see the Goddess in your face.
We’re blessed by the miracle of love here.
We’re blessed by the miracle of love here.

While the circle of people gathering around ‘Out of the Mouths of Babes’ stretches through cyber space, our hands still touch as we type our comments, our blog posts, as we press ‘send’ on our offerings of creativity. As women, mothers, or lovers of both, this gathering is laced with the fragrant and potent presence of truth. Surely, there is more to be shared here. There are miles of stories to be witnessed. I have every desire to travel with ‘Out of the Mouths of Babes’ and invite other mother author artists to share stories and inspire audiences as we did on March 2.

And, until I pack my bags with my chicken call and rice pudding, I will be here at the Laundry Line, shaking loose the knotted socks and the colorful tales of my life. Thank you for standing in this circle, both women and men, I am grateful for your presence.

Now I suggest you get in line for that brownie recipe.
xoxoxox Love, S

I’d be fooling you big time if I did not tell you I am having a hard time visualizing my success. I would be fooling you big time if I did not admit to you today that my creative process which so intricately lives within the organism we call Suzi Banks Baum, has led me to a field where I cannot see the way out, I cannot picture my desired outcomes, nor can I see that I am worthy or capable of venturing to the next higher ground.

I am not slipping back in to my own skin- the ‘me’ who was content to assist in other’s success, the ‘me’ that found ultimate satisfaction in being at home and unvoiced.

As my beloved friend Sandy told me on Sunday, there is no going back for me. I am playing bigger and moving to the next level of expression of my work in the world.

So, today, will you just sit with me not knowing what is next for ‘Out of the Mouths of Babes’? Or how that work will escalate the birthing of my book, Laundry Line Divine: A Wild Soul Book for Mothers? Or, how, as a full time Mom I can be present and engaged with my children and speaking in my full voice in the world?

Will you just sit with me here?

I am on retreat with a bevy of amazing women at Kripalu making collages and doing yoga and considering the impact of ‘Moon Salutation’ on my tender heart today.

Here is what I made today.

Tiny visionary collage by Suzi Banks Baum 3.13.12

Karen is sitting with me here, her arm around my shoulder.
I am so well loved and cared for here.
I am completely grateful for my whole life.
And for putting myself in the way of transformation.

Time to get back to class.
Love,
S

The studio is an extension of the sandbox and the kindergarten playroom. It has a dynamic unlike any office or factory. It’s a room at the service of a dreamer on her way to becoming a master. Wandering from project to project, she moves in a private soup kitchen where there’s always something on simmer. With something to get on with–something to finish, something to start–even the tiniest of workrooms has within it the building blocks of talent. Stay out on the streets at your peril.

from Robert Genn‘s newsletter today.

In an hour I am off to the Cape with my husband for a few days of ocean walks and quiet, as we consider this past year and look forward to the next.
I am preparing for the New Year by writing, collaging and being outside in the wind.
I have an important artist date coming up in a week or so with Karen Arp-Sandel.
My art collaborator Karen and I are fervent witnesses to each other’s expressions all year long.
Last year, we began a practice of meeting in the early days of the New Year to take a look at what we have done in this past year, what we have shared and what we hope to receive in this coming year.
We include all our creative work- and this includes our family and personal lives, our well being and our presence in our communities. We did this with our friend Sarah Nicholson, who is an amazing photographer.

Reading Robert Genn today as I tidy up my studio and pack my art supplies for the week, I am struck by his phrase “she moves in a private soup kitchen where there is always something on simmer”.

My life is simmering.
‘Out of the Mouths of Babes’ is taking shape.
My kids are adventuring in Munich.
My husband has launched his new business and slowly the simmer collects in to a boil.

What is simmering in your private soup kitchen today?

Didn’t you love the favorite frames commenters left on yesterday’s post?
Daniel, Karen, Jennifer, Geri and Laura all are actively creative people in their personal and professional lives.
Don’t you wonder what they have simmering?

Here are a few more Favorite Frames of 2011:

1.I loved having our Anna come to live with us. She is here with Catherine under the blueberry bushes. What did I get? An expanded heart and a new daughter.

2.The total joy of collaborating with Karen Arp-Sandel as FeMail and in all the other ways we play together, like assisting her at Kripalu for her Vibrant Visionary Collage and Yoga Immersion, in the collage studio classes that she teaches at IS-183, in our Moon Circle, and all our FeMail travels like the day we spent at PRESS last week with Melanie Mowinski. What did I get? Deepening friendship, articulate collaboration and an immense amount of fun.

3.Seeing Gabrielle Senza work on her temporary installation at the Sanford Smith Fine Art Gallery in Great Barrington. Gabrielle is a daily inspiration and great friend. What do I get from her? A heart warming smile, candor and a high bar of excellence.

4.Seeing our son Ben, DJ at Railroad Street Youth Project and at Berkshire Pulse. He is DJing in the New Year in Munich. What do I get from watching Ben perform this way? So much energy and joy seeing this young man express himself and connect to his audience through music.

5.All the immense amount of fun I have had using the Instagram App on my iPhone. Here are two of my favorite shots from this year. One is up on Mount Greylock where Karen was doing an artist residency and one taken at my favorite nursery, Windy Hill. What do I get? Color and texture play visually and community to share photos. Just plain fun.

How about some more frames from you?
Quoting a line from one of my favorite plays “It’s so eeeeeseee!”.

Love,
S

share 1 (shâr)
n.
1. A part or portion belonging to, distributed to, contributed by, or owed by a person or group.
2. An equitable portion: do one’s share of the work.
3. Any of the equal parts into which the capital stock of a corporation or company is divided.
v. shared, shar·ing, shares
v.tr.
1. To divide and parcel out in shares; apportion.
2. To participate in, use, enjoy, or experience jointly or in turns.
3. To relate (a secret or experience, for example) to another or others.
4. To accord a share in (something) to another or others: shared her chocolate bar with a friend.
v.intr.
1. To have a share or part: shared in the profits.
2. To allow someone to use or enjoy something that one possesses: Being in daycare taught the child to share.
3. To use or enjoy something jointly or in turns: There is only one computer, so we will have to share.
Idiom:
go shares
To be concerned or partake equally or jointly, as in a business venture.

I love to share.
Sharing means so many things. In this post I am using the verb form of share.
To me, share means to spread the wealth of attention, the wealth of pretzels or the wealth of appreciation. To share can also mean, as in number three in the definition above, verb transitive, to offer a story. At the dinner table, we always ask the kids to share one good thing about their day. This can lead to an argument about ‘always being asked to share’ but as long as JNB and I are supplying the butter for the family bread, we get to ask things like this at the kitchen table. “Share One Good Thing About Your Day”. See? It sounds like a movement when I put it in capital letters and quotation marks.

Sharing, on the Internet, can mean linking to or copying an image from one place and using it in another.

I am a long time collaborator with people, really with life, I guess. I love to share what I learn and how others inspire me. If you go to my Face book page you will see many links to sites that capture my eye or speak to a need I know someone else has. The sidebar to your right has links to websites that intrigue me and I bet there is at least one that will intrigue you too.

One good thing about parenting is I have been teaching my kids to share since they were tiny. Looking at the two of them across the dinner table last night, big as anything, I realized that whatever I have taught them about sharing, making connections, of real time offering of some part of themselves, whether it is a story from their day or a pad of college-ruled notebook paper, the teaching time is over. Now, I just have to live it and hope they are noticing.

Living the way I do, paying attention to the subtle and not-so-subtle clues that the Universe gives me on any given day, I can be awash in serendipity.

Just last week I was driving to the grocery store, listening to Joe Donohue on WAMC’s show The Roundtable, I heard Joe interview author Nathaniel Philbrick about his new book “Why Read Moby Dick?”. I tingled with glee. Just days earlier, at the Rhinebeck Sheep and Wool Festival I had met a young knitwear designer, Ann Weaver, who just self-published a collection of her knitted designs inspired by “Moby Dick”. And, to keep the connection even more electrified, I saw that her book “White Whale” was illustrated by mixed media compositions created by artist Matt Kish, who I had also just read about on one of my new favorite websites for culture and news, www.brainpickings.org. Matt has created an illustration for every page of “Moby Dick”. Yes, that door stop sized novel that opens with “Call me Ishmael.”

Is it serendipity that “Moby Dick” shows up in my life four times in one week? I have not even read the whole book. Or that I live not far, like about 20 miles from where Herman Melville lived when he wrote the novel? Or that Joe Donohue, who is one of the best interviewers of artists that I have ever heard, should ask Nathaniel such great questions that I was mesmerized while driving?

You know I started my life, my professional life, as an actor, right?

I learned quickly the importance of attribution, of my bio and credits on a program. I learned from stinging disappointment the heartache of not being mentioned in a program or being omitted somehow from the roster of contributors to a project.

That is one of the reasons you will see lots of links on the Laundry Line. I like you to know where I get my information. I love to share what I have gathered throughout my day, even from my drive to get groceries, or reading a new blog, I love creators to get all the attention they need to affirm in their minds that the world is receiving their work.

Nina Paley, a cartoonist, filmmaker and activist for artist rights created one of the most delightful movies I have ever seen. Here is a trailer for “Sita Sings the Blues”.

My postal art collaborator, Karen Arp-Sandel shared this movie at her yearly Vibrant Visionary Art retreat at The Kripalu Center last year. Nina’s work about the combinational nature of creativity is dynamic and thought provoking. See a great piece on her work on Brain Pickings.

It is beyond the scope of this post to discuss the nuts and bolts of copyright and sharing rights for art in general. What I would love to ask of you my readers is to do what I do and that is to “Link With Love”. If you share something you like here on the Laundry Line, whether it is my art or photography, something I have written or quoted, poems that I post- please give credit where it is due. I just put a “Link With Love” badge here on my sidebar. If you click on it, you will be led to a great site with lots of information about this topic. If attribution and copyrights really call out to you, go to Nina Paley’s website.

And, in terms of what I share on the Laundry Line, these words and photographs and art express my personal experience. I share them with you because it is my life mission to share. My Mom used to tell the story that when I was old enough to use the telephone, a nice heavy black plastic one in a niche in the wall of our Chicago apartment, I would call all my friends on Wolcott Avenue to let them know I was heading outside to play. This was not to boast about my whereabouts, but to call everyone out to play with me. I have always always always loved to share.

“Friendship doubles our joy and divides our grief.”

Mom shared this Swedish proverb with me too.

Fun. Grief. Quince. It is always better shared.

xo S