How would you design the city of the future?

There’s a town nearby that was bought by an artist. The story goes that he met with some success and started buying up buildings one by one.

He renovated them and rented them out to businesses. He bought all the homes and renovated them and rented them out too.

It’s a fun and beautiful place with a great farmers market and a strong art vibe. Lots of music, galleries and good food.

I love any excuse to visit this town.

If I was going to design a place, it would have to be beautiful and inspiring and fun. Shops and stores to walk to. Plenty of green spaces, parks etc. Lots of emphasis on form with function. Variety, sustainability, culture. Beauty and design, there would have to be a lot of that.

Chester already was a beautiful location. Some fresh historical colored paint, new windows, and some vision goes a long way, it seems.

What motivates you?

I decided to make sauce from our little tomato harvest. Too many came ripe at the same time. All the neighbors are having a similar garden bonanza, so with my friend’s eggplant and zucchini we are having a nice Italian feast tonight.

It’s not a lot of sauce. Not enough to bottle, but enough to feel a little accomplished. I used parsley and basil that I grew and one little carrot, (our first!)

So this got me up early and out into the garden. We set up our make shift kitchen and my sauce has been bubbling away for hours.

Summer has been interesting this year. I’ve watched the arc as it built and now, after a couple of weeks of everything suspended in muggy air, I now see or feel the crest turning downward. Summer’s end has begun.

I remember this late summer, bored, but not wanting the fun to end feeling. I must have felt it growing up. I noticed it every year with my kids and grandkids. Something about a new school year, newness, differentness. Aprehention, but somehow things feel like they might get exciting. What might be next?

I hope for that feeling this year. Could something fun and good be coming?

I hope so…

In the meantime, home grown sauce and eggplant parmigiana. Yum

That got me motivated today.

What are your top ten favorite movies?

There are movies that are great. Like Shawshank and the Godfather, Good Fellows, Forest Gump etc. I wouldn’t turn one of these off if it came on. I’ve watched them so many times. They are timeless and well done. No one should try to remake a truly great movie.

These do make my favorites list, but I have favorites that are more like memories from days gone by when kids were different ages and we had movie nights.

Here are a few of those:

That Thing You Do

Armageddon

Americas Sweetheart (someone gave us this DVD and we watched it many times, it was light, funny, I don’t know, we also had My Best Friends Wedding and watched it a lot)

Little women (the 8Os version). It was Christmas to us, same with Elf, Its a Wonderful Life and the Muppets Christmas Caroll

Legally Blonde

Johnny Cash

The third Lord of the Rings, Return of the King

Princess Bride

My kids quoted these and many more movies all the time. I miss those old movie nights and those clever funny little kids. I was all about exposing them to culture so we watched a lot of Shakespeare and read a lot of classics, so fun movies were just fun. Charle and the Chocolate factory was a favorite movie night movie. Who doesn’t love Gene Wilder? Even the Johnny Dep version was watchable. We all agreed that the book was better!)

I love movies! I didn’t include animation favorites, but of course there were a few! My one son is the age of the boy in Toy Story. So yeah… next topic

What do you enjoy most about writing?

I enjoy the whole process. I think I like blogging because every day there is a finished product. It makes me stay aware of editing and being brief. I like a topic. I never knew I would enjoy this. I miss it when I don’t post.

I don’t feel my own self imposed pressure around writing like I do with art, which I find interesting and refreshing.

So yeah

Thanks for reading, that’s a fun bonus also, all of YOU!

What do you love about where you live?

I love how spring builds slowly into the most summeriness of summer. I enjoyed watching the trees get leaves and everything green up so dramatically. And all the flowering. So many varieties of flowering trees, bushes, clumps.

I also love the water. So many bodies of water! It’s beautiful

What positive emotion do you feel most often?

I haven’t always understood that I have the ability to affect my own emotions. I used to think I was at the mercy of my circumstances.

I wish I had been taught this somehow growing up, but at least I know it now.

I think I came wired with a little extra sensitivity, which I can best describe as feeling deeply and strongly. Which didn’t seem like a gift as a child, but I clearly see it as one now.

I easily pick up on emotion. Mine or anyone’s. I know when there is low vibrational energy or high, before any words are spoken, usually a beat before everyone else. It might take me a bit to figure out where or who it’s coming from or what may have caused it. Or not figure it out.

I can always feel or sense the vibe in a room. If it changes, I feel it immediately. This used to be a weird thing, and I’d look around hoping someone else was noticing. Now I just roll with it.

I actually think everyone can feel energy, we just get trained to ignore or question our initial feelings, so our habits are more around what is seen or accepted.

I was oddly untrainable. My poor parents, they tried, but I was too much.

So here I am, all these years later with a better understanding of what I now see as a super power. (Mavel comics? Hello?)

I know enough now to let the feeling (whatever it is) come all the way up, and to then decide. Do I want to keep it going or let it go. I’ve picked up a whole arsenal of tactics over the years to raise my own emotional vibration.

Energy, man, I never underestimate the power of energy. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that.

So, I choose JOY. If it’s available, I like to feel joy. It’s my favorite.

How do you plan your goals?

Intuitively