The wind is blowing the birds around and I broke my toe..toes

I forgot my camera.
I'm at the beach
I broke two toes in the first 45 minutes
They don't have real clams
It took me an hour to get the laptop to do what I wanted it to
The weather is perfect, patches of sunshine followed by patches of relieving overcastedness
The ocean is loud and smells sweet and clean and clean
I got my pants wet walking in the cold biting fierce surf and watched the bravest dog in the whole wide world fight through the waves for his most beloved friend
a yellow tennis ball
I have the biggest umbrella in the whole wide world and it took good care of me
when the wind blew me down, the glorious wind clean clean with it's sweet smell
I want to lay on the sand and watch the stars and fall asleep to the quite roar of the god
water
I'm never going home I'm going to live right here in the water on the sand watching stars
until my bones and my soul heal

Exactly what I look like after a long day of shelling

Just checking in to let you know that I have been working a lot in the studio but I am also working on Chapter Three of the "Journey to Heaven" and I will be able to post soon....please don't go away!

This is me after I have glued on 7,482 shells.   I even dream about them.

                                                                           

                       Francesca Woodman, American photographer, gone too soon.


                                                                                         

                                            And the journey shall continue. 
 

Part two...The criminal journey of the stupidest girl on the planet who finally lands in heaven

Thanks for staying tuned to this channel! We now resume our journey.

Ow, ow, ow, I just want to stick this in here because I just found it on Google. It's the living room of that cottage in that Hollywood Hills enclave that I told you about, last chapter.  My head might be in there....  You could only jam about 60 people in there, jam, summer time, you get the idea.  Seriously!, now that I look closer I am sure! that that is my head in the lower right hand corner! My hair was browner than I initially remembered it.  But I do...truly...remember turning around when someone was taking a picture.  And there couldn't have been very many of them taken at that time.  Me...look! Amazing!!  That is the ONLY photo taken of me in that whole time on that incredible trip!
                                                                     

My Guru, as I said, was taking 400 followers back to India with him and if you remember I was not going on that flight, but that one that left about a week later, the illicit and criminal one. (chapter one)  End of August, beginning of September. Dates are fuzzy, a lot of things are fuzzy. There was some smokin' goin' on.....

My illicit flying companions and I went to the airport before their plane left to bid them bon voyage and to join in the festivities of something that was unprecedented for that time. It got a lot of press because I think this was pretty much the beginning of the whole spiritual leader/follower thing.  400 people essentially renting a plane and traipsing after a holy man/kid? 1/2 way around the world.  Yeah, that'll hit the news!
Everybody was gathered around him on his makeshift "throne"..there was always a throne, a whole lota' thrones,  and he was taking questions and just sort of playing the whole thing to the hilt.  After a few rounds, I, unbelievably shy little me, raised my hand and asked a question. Sometimes you get a bolt of something and out it comes. I said, don't laugh, "master, may I have your grace?" That saying has become a touchstone in my life.  Grace was the foundation of the whole thing and it still serves me well.  I'm a bit flippant about all this, but in truth, a lot of it "woke me up" in a  primal way so there is a core of real spiritual growth as a result of all this.

Anyway, he looked at me, slightly smiled and actually poked his right hand Indian companion (they were call Mahatma's) in the arm and they both turned to me and with what seemed to me, an expression like you would give to a child asking an obvious question.  He said, Yes! No matter who he was or what was actually going on here, that was it, one tiny little word and I then never had one single doubt that this trip would be anything but safe and I would be taken care of every step of the way.  And that's the way it was.

                                                 click them for larger..you knew that

This is unbelievable: this journey was taken with one pair of colorfully patched bell bottom jeans, one pair of linen pull-string pants, the blue turtle neck sweater from the Swing Club job, two very hippy tapestry tops, a pair of those little red, embroidered Chinese slippers and a pair of camel suede wedges. That's it!   I didn't own a bra, but I think I must have had underwear...?                                                        

That is how I boarded this plain and took my 1st class seat.  No one blinked an eye.  Rich hippies were doing all kinds of wacky things in those days, spending daddies money, and I think that's the only time in my life when I was mistaken for someone of that ilk, and oddly, in tattered clothes!

Side note:         Think what you may, and you may think this is time to get off the train, but both I and M at one point turned to look out the window over the ocean of clouds ...and saw him.....both of us, sitting on a cloud floating along with the plane.  He smiled, big time, and waved. Of course we waved back, silly. We kept looking away, no,no it's not...no, no! Look out the window again...still t h e r e, cue spooky music or more appropriately - Led Zeppelin Stairway to Heaven.  God, I wish I knew how to embed Youtube videos...but go there, right now, it's so appropriate!
And just so you can think I am a little more wacky than you already do...I've had 4 of this type of experiences in my lifetime...it could happen!
                                                                         

                                                                          
In the picture on right, note bar on lower level in the center of the picture and the winding stairs to top. This is what white glove service was in those days: full menu breakfast, lunch and dinner, some of it cooked in situ, there was a station just behind the bar.  French pastry trays, chocolate and champagne upon arrival, full bar with bar tender, up and downstairs both, seats into warm and comfy beds, warm washcloth's. I could see myself living there. Only one exasperated looked from the stew., we were probably acting like idiots.

                                                                             

All I remember of being in the second story lounge (that's were that winding stairs came in) was spinning around and around in those chairs with a cocktail in my just turned twenty (so I was only as mature as a 16 year old) hand and being so gaga I couldn't stop giggling.

There was a month layover, intentionally planned (you can have it any way you want it with a "lifted" ticket) in London. I could go all through that but it's too long, except to say that now I know what a dale is and that M, my flying companion, lost her sleeping bag so I shared my, single!, sleeping bag with her for 4 months...!  The only saving grace was that she was even smaller than me and didn't snore. Somehow we remained friends through the whole thing...gawd!

Landing, and the wall hits you...the scent of India! Cow/people shit, food! (banana's, they smell and taste totally different there) garbage, incense and that separate unidentifiable, all embracing and exotic scent that is the essence of India. It smelled like home, that's the only way I can describe it, I felt like I had come home. We had to hire a "taxi" (100 mile an hr. tin can) and try to find our way to the camp ground where we would be staying for a week.
400 people divided between two tents. A sea of sleeping bags that looked like a colorful patchwork quilt. No room to walk between them. Quiet and clean and, miraculously, stayed that way. Huge pit latrines with two 5ft. lengths of board for standing or squatting. Never fell in once, folks. Another miracle.
                                                                       

Hard to tell in that photo, but those were the tents, someone got a photo and put up on Google. For about a week we sat in the blazing sun, on the ground listening to Satsang, look it up. The only thing I specifically remember (I wish I could remember the food - that would be fun), was that on an early evening in the midst of that sea of people, (it wasn't just 400 Americans, it was thousands of Indians too)  I turned and saw Baba Ram Das, author of the bible of spiritual hippydom, standing to the side.  My eye had caught him because he was the only person standing. I then got up to go over to talk to him, what the fuck was I thinking? but he was like a magnet I couldn't resist. The people around me yanked me back down because it was taboo to get up when there was a speaker so I never got to ask him, "just how the heck are you doing with the whole acid, LA, India thing?" I'm sure he would have loved to engage........!

Finally, on to the ashram in Hardwar, Prem Nagar, a two story sort of but not really falling down pink elephant (nothing to do with that other pinky guy), which would become my new home for 4 months.  Yippie!
                                                                      

No glass in any of those window. Eyes stung by mosquitoes first week there, so swollen they could not be opened for three days.  I had to be guided to the latrine..again, good times!
                                                                         

  Today - breaks my heart that all the sweetness and simplicity of that time is gone. Life moves on. 

"Catered" meals on banana leafs - slap it down.  I never got sick, until the end where we spent two days in a western style hotel eating "American" food.   Never do that!

We spent, about 4 friends and I,  most of our time in the small, charming places with about a 5 mile radius (big adventures!) like this
                                                                         

this next one is vintage, but it is so much like it was then. Things had not begun to change yet in India, I don't think I would recognize it anymore.
                                     

We just saw typical everyday life there. We weren't interested in all the big tourist places so I did not even know this existed until a few years ago.
                                                                               

It is Ganga Aarti, where people go to bathe in a special ceremony. This kind of thing was not my India.  This was                                          
and you got to these little places by walking down these quiet roads that lead to chaos. The lovely chaos.

*

                               

And I am so glad I got to be there at that time. You can still find places like this but they are so overtaken by tourist's now. I guess it's like they say - "you can never go home".


                             
                                                                            

                          

OK, that's enough. Next chapter: The cockroach train, the Taj and smuggling drugs     !!!


Liv





*all these photos were taken from the web, no copyright infringement is intended 

It's the Lighting ! (the - light)

I don't know whether this is narcissistic, self indulgent, silly, or maybe brave.  But, believe me, it does take a bit of guts. And I been trying to work up those guts for a long time.

So let's see what lighting can do :; (I don't know which one is right, comas so confuse me)

                                                                             

This was me six years ago. I was pretty proud of that picture, I worked really hard to get it, seriously - maybe 20 photos, but I only slightly, slightly thought that anyone else would like it.  I was still a bit agoraphobic at that time and I think I put it up on one of those dating site things - of which I never responded to one single "hello" thing because I simply could not keep that smile up and basically I hated men...for good reason and duh, I wasn't going to leave the house anyway.  So I have no idea why I went on one of them?? (except that my daughter probably told me that I should - it would get me out of the house) I haven't had a date for 26 years....hahahah, I'm quite fine with that :)  I think I could now call myself a virgin.


                                                                      

This is one of my favorite photos of myself. At the time, I thought it was terrible. I was actually a little ashamed of it. It was taken in 2011, 5 years ago, and besides my daughter, I have never shown it to anyone.  I had at least 2x as much hair then as I do now. I loved my hair. I miss it. I was gazing at my garden. I loved my garden. I miss it. I had no desire whatsoever to go anywhere....except out to my garden.

                                                              

This was me yesterday afternoon. The room was a little dark so I used a flash. (and I'm actually trying very hard here to look like I'm "normal") It started out as a pretty good day. And actually, it sort of ended up pretty much that way. Quell suprise !

                                                                          

This was me this morning. Yes! Even I am not stupid enough to think that it's not good. It's like fucking magic!! I am much more comfortable with blurry pictures, I think they help everybody! Somehow everyday I get up and for a little while (before I look in the mirror) I always feel like nothing has ever happened before this day and I'm glad for the chance to start again. I only have mascara and a bit of lip gloss on.  But I am super vain. (that's another word for insecure :) But I've never really worn any more makeup other than that.  And once in a blue moon I will go out with nothing on, although the first time I did that I was petrified. I do have moments now, in my past mid 60's,  finally, where I don't give a shit. I don't really want to know anyone...ha! I don't really want to talk to anyone, except kids and really old people. And, of course! dogs.


                                         Sorry folks, I took it out, I just kept thinking about
                                         it too much.  I think that outweighs the courage to
                                         show it, so we take things in steps and we have to take
                                          care of our mental health, that takes courage too.

                                                                         

Above, good lighting, now bad lighting.  This was about an hour later. I was pretty sure at that point that I was going to write this today..so I was getting kind of scared. And that lump at the bottom of my throat is a nodule on my thyroid as a result of radiation from breast cancer.  It really bugs me.  It looks like a golf ball going up and down when I swallow.

                                                                            

Good lighting. This was my birthday picture. I was going to put it up, but I was too shy. That makes me cry.

                                                            Ditto for this one too.
         I think sometimes I try to prove something to myself at the expense of myself.
                                              It does not actually help the healing.

                                                                        

This is me tonight, early evening. I get weary. I get tired pretty fast. By the very end of the night I will look like I have had a hard time, a hard life, like a lot of bad things have happened before this day and some of them are biting at my heals. I am giving it my damndest to smile. I really don't feel like it. And when I look at this I really miss my hair. As I age, it gets thinner and thinner.   We are all insecure about something, men included. I'm beginning to feel disheartened at about this time of the evening.

 By the time I wake up in the morning I look like my 86 yr. old mom before she died, it truly scars me to see her face in the mirror. The nights just ravage me.  (if I ever come stay overnight at your house you will have to give me lots of support in the morning ) You think I'm exaggerating about that morning face?  do NOT underestimate me!  Someday I'll have a martini  and get the guts to show it but it won't be any time soon. And no, I'm not kidding here - it really disturbs me, it looks very wounded, exhausted with it all.    

A morning martini?? Oh god!

I have been severely criticized for a lot of my life about my looks, so I have always cared very much about how I look. I was told by my mother that I was a wallflower when I was young.  She used to say, "you may be a wallflower, but if you only smile people will like you" - yeah well, that'll do it! And my father, you don't want to know the names my father called me, even though I was his "favorite". I also have been criticized by a lot of boyfriends and two husbands, sometimes in anger but not always, just that little picking apart of who you are, it takes a big chunk out of you.  It might be becoming a bit more clear to you by now why I am writing this.

(In the telling of my stupendous and hard-to-believe (which is absolutely fucking true, every moment of it) memoir of my trip (read the post below) which will be continued after this post,  I want to make it clear that I was obsessed during that trip with thinking that I was that wallflower, plain as mud.  How I could think that in the midst of all the wonderful people, the love and all the incredible experiences I had and why I could not overcome it I do not know.)

My daughter says that I have a bit of body dysmorphia, ugggh.  I'm getting better now that I am approaching the last quarter. But I don't think it will ever really change and that is what makes me fear aging.  Well that and incontinence.

an aside...someday I am going to write a post dedicated to lipstick. I love it.  Women have been wearing lipstick for just about as long as there have been women with lips.  It's fascinating!

Anyway, I've always wanted to write this post. I'm not looking for any compliments, we only see ourselves the way we see our selves so I would not believe them anyway - don't waste ink.  Some of us think about our looks a lot and some of us don't very much, but we all think about it sometimes and we all deal with it in different ways. And we are all just a little bit insecure about it, if we are honest. Now that I have written this post, I will never have to write it again and that is one less thing that I will have to carry.

And by the way, I rarely, so rarely, ever see someone that I don't think is beautiful. I am an artist and there is hardly anything or anyone on this earth that I, truly -  truly, do not think is beautiful - except, sometimes, me.  I think there may be a lot of people like me.

                                                                         

                                                     me six years old, first grade
                                                      this, I know, is beautiful



Love, Liv