Month: June 2018

Having fun doing a “mock-up” of the cover for the Stories of Ned Zine.
I have most of what I need for the content from what people submitted to Ned “Superman” Snyder.

Photo Cred: Vicki Snyder

It’s been ten years since my brother left us suddenly. One evening I was talking to him on the phone, the next evening I got a call from my dad that he was gone. It’s been rough. But, we go forward and we each find ways to commune with him in our daily lives.
My creative kids are helping with this project to commune with Ned through art. Those of you who knew him are invited to be a part of it.  You have one month:

We are looking for stories, drawings, photos, jokes, whatever you would like to submit that could fit into this book, which is really a zine, which will be published and distributed starting August 18, 2018.

You have one month to get your contribution together!

You might create something Ned-inspired. Something that would make him laugh or ponder. Or you might share a story from the life of Ned. Or send in a photo you found. Maybe you could write a letter to Ned about what he means to you in your life. Or you could craft a sci-fi scenario in which you travel to Planet Ned to pay him a visit. What key things would you share with him about life on Earth these past ten years he’s been gone?

Whatever you do, he will love it, since it will have been created through love and will help fill the hole in the hearts of the people who knew him with love. Because that is what it is all about. We hurt so much because of the love. For the love of Ned!
Send an email to wsnyder510@gmail.com if you would like to contribute and I will share with you the Google Doc. Deadline: July 18, 2018

 

Go On Love, by Alison Moncrieff

Over the weekend, I visited my friend Alison Moncrieff‘s open studio art space on both Saturday and Sunday.  I am so grateful for such a friend and also her example of creative dedication and generosity.

(She has two more days of open studios next weekend if you are reading this before June 9th and 10th, 2018 and are anywhere near Oakland, CA)

When he saw me for the second day in a row, her husband laughed and said that I might be a groupie and yes I definitely am one. Her paintings are deep and provocative. They are also gorgeous and hauntingly familiar.  I enjoyed hanging out with her and her paintings and seeing new things emerge.   One idea that Alison threw out there in one of the conversations in her art space was “idea debt.” The topic of conversation changed but that sounded familiar. I think she may have mentioned it to me before.

Over the two visits to her space, I met a few of her friends and another neighbor and we shared thoughts about creativity, inner critics, fear, enneagrams, friendship, and community.  Later, Bun Bun the black rabbit nestled on her 11-year-old daughter’s lap.

Later that night, I looked up “idea debt” and found an explanation by author Jessica Abel:

“Idea Debt is when you spend too much time picturing what a project is going to be like, too much time thinking about how awesome it will be to have this thing done and in the world, too much time imagining how cool you will look, how in demand you’ll be, how much money you’ll make. And way too little time actually making the thing.”

Abel credits the graphic novel author and illustrator Kazu Kibuishi with the idea. I appreciate Kibuishi for taking the time to define a phenomenon I know very well.  I have been equally collecting, birthing and hoarding words and ideas for stories for decades. Yes, I have shared stories and poems written over the years in workshops and classes, birthdays and open mics. But there are unrevised poems and stories stuffed in boxes and drawers. There are piles of journals. Some I’ve relegated to the flames after spending time searching for the best ideas that I could transfer to another journal. Others lay dormant within the confines of Google Docs, NaNoWriMo and Penzo. These abandoned paragraphs, in a Frankensteinian twist, have indebted me,  their creator, to them. I wonder at times how much space and energy they take from me.

And that’s why I love Alison’s art. She made a commitment to it. She’s paying her dues. She built a creative structure for herself and worked it. She writes about that here.  She also writes super cool poetry.

 

 

There’s a hot sultry feeling today of summertime. You can smell it in the lemon flowers and jasmine sweetening the breeze. I feel well today finally after four days of suffering full-on flu symptoms. Relaxing on my front porch, I can breathe more evenly. There’s nothing in particular that I need to attend to. I can just take it all in.

“You always do that,”  my neighbor friend informs me. Her bright blue house faces ours. She is way too observant at times. She often conjectures about our comings and goings, as we do about hers. I love so much though. She gives me plants all the time – seedlings of lettuce, cucumber, tomato and various medicinal flowers and herbs. And sometimes I kill them so I don’t feel like I deserve them. But she keeps giving me them. She also tells me about various political protests and campaigns that she knows that I want to support.  But like I said, she is way too observant that it stings sometimes. But this observation is accurate. “You always do that,” she says. “You go really hard and then you burn out.”

“I’m getting better at bouncing back though,” I say.  And it’s true. I don’t share this out loud, but I suspect that since I’m now what we call middle age,  I’m starting to settle into a larger purpose or vision. And as a result, I feel calmer and more focused in my life pursuits than ever before.

Next door to my neighbor friend’s place, Pacific Union is holding an open house. The homes in our neighborhood were built a hundred years ago and the neighbor friend tells us that they weren’t allowed to build them exactly the same. The one next door to her, the one that is for sale, is identical except that it has a differently shaped facade, ceramic shingles over the garage and has not been painted cobalt blue.

A skinny man in an A’s cap and a shih tzu on his shoulder rolls through the stop sign in a Honda. The neighbor girls skip around the corner. The regulars come by with their dogs big and small.

Later in the afternoon, I will visit my friend’s open studio art show at her place around the corner. She paints whimsical, imaginative, haunting, multi-layered canvases of colors, shapes, words, birds, hearts, and articles of articles of clothing, including a lot of dresses. I’m in awe of her painting and her dedication. Because of these particular neighbors and the neighbors, I’m bound to meet, I love living where we live.

Cars are starting to float through. They are all shiny and newish cars since those are the people who can afford to buy houses in Oakland. I can see a woman getting out of her car with a black t-shirt with the words “Pilates” and “Peace” on the front. A couple exit a white suburban and amble up the steps and look around before they enter, taking a read of the neighborhood by the vibe right outside the front door.

My neighbor across the street greets me again to share a proud moment. When they staged the house next door to her, she tells me, they put some patio and chairs out in the back that faced straight towards her kitchen window. This resulted in an internal “Ah Hell No!” in her and she got to work. She built a decorative barrier with old wood and ceramics and sculpture to provide shelter and sanctuary from her future new neighbor’s life.  She invites me to come over later to peek.

My partner comes out and announces that he will be doing some sweeping because our front yard looks like shit and then comes out to sweep the dead leaves from the sidewalk.

And our house, compared to the others, kind of does look like shit.  I would like to say that we’ve spent more time on the backyard, but so far we’ve been fighting weeds for six years and growing a couple of vegetables given to us by the neighbor friend.

I look up the listing for the house across the street. It’s described as a gardener’s delight and a Spanish style home perched on a gentle upslope with pleasant treetop views. It says something about Bus 47, that rarely used commuter line to Fruitvale BART and a few more sentences about the potential for gardening.

More cars float in and dock and people hop out. A young family with two little kids, several more couples, some same-sex, some interracial.

What a paradox that people have to compete for a place to lay their head on this forsaken Earth. In such an abundant world, why shouldn’t people should have the right to a peaceful home? Why do thousands suffer in a state of homelessness in the midst of unfathomable wealth? In Oakland, entire neighborhoods have been rendered unrecognizable by micro craft breweries and fancy lunch shops. Black working class people, in particular, have been forced out of town by outrageous prices and the need to sell the family home to provide for the family. People don’t remember what was even there before since there a few around now who were there before.

Pretty soon there is a full-on parade of people walking up the steps. Women with infants strapped to them, little kids following behind. People observing, vibing, sniffing, smelling these new surroundings.

I’m sweating on the porch. I need to go back in the house to shower and get ready to go see the paintings, but I’m transfixed by this scene.

I dream about the new neighbors. Will they be cool? Will they become our friends? Will they share plants and stories and protest actions like my neighbor and I do? Will they bring art and creativity to the world like my friend around the corner or my other neighbor on the corner who organizes the Halloween festival every year? Will they hate this system enough to want to help change it?

I don’t know. But I will enjoy this open house from my porch today and dream.