Posts Tagged ‘habit’

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Daylight Savings Time as Timelessness

The clock on the wall of my studio tells me that it is 8:12. A week ago at this time it would have been 7:12. This large clock, that also shows temperature and humidity, is run by a little double A battery and its hands, its hours, its minutes and seconds are not connected to […]

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Showing Up

Sitting across from me in the coffee shop is my 95 year old father reciting lyrics from a song that matters to him today. The song was written 65 years ago but for my dad it could have been released an hour ago. He’s been doing this my whole life. Making the moment shamelessly timeless. […]

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An Artist’s Studio By Any Other Name

I’m on a business trip. I’ve come to Chicago to visit an artist who established an art studio inside a school. I’m pursuing a question that interests me: Is an art studio always an art studio? I think of the now seldom-paraquoted: A rose by any other name is still a rose. The actual quote […]

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Tools

I’m standing in the basement of the Central YMCA in San Francisco staring into a dimly lit closet tucked away behind the boiler room. It is three o’clock in the morning. The year is 1988 and Microsoft released Windows 2.1, NASA scientist James Hansen testified that global warming had begun, Cincinnati Reds pitcher Tom Browning […]

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“Go Outside.”

These are the words I hear walking in through the front door of the house where my big brother lives. I pause with my jacket halfway off. I look at my brother James. He reads the hesitancy in my body language and repeats, “Go outside.” I counter with the already obvious, “But I just came […]

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Matisse

I’m slowly circling around the parking lot at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. I’m stunned by the cherry red Fiat, the cobolt blue Prius, a bright orange Jeep. Where did this stuff come from? Oh, and there is the early autumn rust, like nails left outside, of a half dozen spindly trees. The green above […]

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Gym

This morning at the gym I did something completely unexpected – I took off my headphones. The world came rushing in from all around me and I found myself having a TEDx Moment in multiples. By “TEDx Moment” I’m referring to the moment of bright insight that often accompanies the experience of listening to or […]

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First Run of the Season

Today began a process. A very long process. Today was my first official training run this year. I began running three years ago when I did a triathlon with a friend. I had never done any kind of athletic race before and it seemed like a fun challenge. At the time I couldn’t run a […]