A Burning Ember

Being Born Again and Again

2012-02-12T11:07:00.000-05:00

For my birthday I received a book called "The Artist's Rule" by Christine Valters Painter. It's a 12-week course on nurturing your creative soul with monastic wisdom, meant to be done rather than read.

Almost simultaneously I embarked on my second year of FAWM, February Album Writing Month, which is a challenge to write 14 songs in the 28 days of February. As of this posting I'm off pace with only 4 songs done in 12 days. I've been stopped by the demands of living, the need to slow down, and the realization during a cellular expansion sessions that my heart energy isn't moving.

Enter the book.

When we let go of our desire to be clever or successful or to create beautiful things, we may be open to the sacred truth of our experience as it is, not how we want it to be.

I've been wondering how to activate my heart, because it bothers me that my heart energy is still, right at the point where I hope to be steadily creative. The author refers to the Beginner's Mind and Heart as the starting point, We begin again.

The first week of the 12-week journey is about establishing a creative, contemplative practice. AThomas Merton quote starts the text, "To be born again is not to become somebody else, but to become ourselves."

As someone who has always felt like I'm starting over, or relearning what I used to know, it's nice to feel as if that is a human experience and recognized sacred rite of passage. So, here I am being born again, and again.

I hope that means more songs this month, and a really beautifully performed show this Friday with my band, but I know I must let go of expectation and just be the child. Let the process change me.

40 Reasons

2012-01-21T06:29:00.000-05:00

Today is my birthday, and here are 40 reasons...

1. Because I'm here
2. This place is unbelievable (was staring at a bouquet of purple irises for so long yesterday)
3. Kalamata olives
4. Crows fly towards the sunset in winter every night
5. Great art
6. Guilty pleasures
7. Road trips and car conversations
8. Making songs
9. Microphones
10. Led Zeppelin, Jamiroquai, Bob Marley (if you've gotta clean your house)
11. Mindy Smith, Rebecca Martin, Lizz Wright (if you've gotta update your Quicken)
12. Public Radio
13. Pets...my cats and their expressions of catness give me warm fuzzies every day
14. The science & environment sections of newspapers
15. The human body, in which I dwell, is a constant mystery, a constant conversation
16. Any system -- Enneagram, Feng Shui, Myers-Briggs, Vastu
17. Shaman
18. A really good pen
19. Funny TV (ummm, right now The New Girl is cracking me up every week)
20. Catching people in the act of kindness towards strangers
21. Puttering in the garden with my not-so-green thumb
22. Ikea diplays
23. Foot rubs
24. Pajamas
25. Being aware of how lucky I am
26. God bless probiotics
27. Entire days when there is nothing on my calendar
28. My friends
29. Sunshine, ocean breeze, the smell of cedar and pine trees
30. No matter what, we always have another chance to get it right...no matter if it's the way we expected or not
31. First love
32. There are people on the planet who created Moonstruck, Tout le Matins du Monde, Brokeback Mountain, Girl with a Pearl Earring, Being There, Waitress. Thank you.
33. Researching things....especially geneology, home histories!
34. Mosaics & ornementation
35. Gathering around a fire
36. Erte
37. To fall off the edge of earth into the sea of stars
38. To be bliss
39. To love
40. To surrender

Practicing Surrender

2011-10-30T19:48:00.000-04:00

Sometime we just have to let things be alright. Even if they're not. Even if they are. I've been trying to open up an allow things to be easy of late. It's amazing how hard this is for me. I'm always looking for the angle, for the other shoe. It's not that I don't trust everything will work out, but I have to consciously remind myself to let go of the notion that it must be hard.

I've been trying to apply this to my creative process. It means not forcing the issue, or going after the challenge. Rather, it means doing what's easy, and natural. It means going from little bliss to little bliss, and letting the rest take care of itself.

It's the equivalent of eating your favorite part of dinner first, and then not bothering at all with the thing on the plate that you don't like. And not feeling bad about it.

I can feel myself daily, almost hourly, being sucked into wondering what's wrong, or wondering if I'm doing everything I can. Then I check myself. I find the sweet spot, and turn off the debbie downer switch, and just let it be ok. Even if it isn't. Even if it is.

Side A Starts Now

2011-10-12T19:26:00.001-04:00

Wow, so shamanism. I learned more about the patterns of my life in 30 minutes than I have in years of journaling. From what I understand, it takes a few weeks to integrate what I've been given. While I do that I'll probably stray off-line. See you on the flip side.

The Known and Unknown

2011-10-05T12:21:00.000-04:00

Three things have been on my mind as of late: Irish Music, Shaman truths, and Day Jobs. In an effort to keep my life from becoming stagnant I have accepted a proposal to learn some Irish & Scottish ballads in the hopes that I will be that girl singing every so often with some excellent Irish bands in the area. We'll see. I've been swimming in Irish music for the past month, trying to identify what songs will work with my voice (and, geez, can I do that little trilly thing that all the singers do???). Stay tuned. If this works out, I've just embarked on something new.

Next, Shaman truths. As it turns out, my inner work has led me to all things energetic and spiritual. The futuristic notion of Quantum healing flits at the edges of my consciousness these days. And somehow they compliment so easily the ancient arts that work with spirit and soul. I am both attracted to and freaked out by the prospects of these two worlds, and how they might collide in my life and change my future. I have no idea what this means for who I could become....hopefully something more restorative than I can even possibly imagine. Why explore this? Because it keeps coming up, that's why. It comes out of nowhere and won't get off my front page. Plus I've just had this feeling for a few months that I'm missing something, and it's not a conscious something, it's something else. I will, indeed, be meeting a shaman next week.

Then there are day jobs. God, what a weird concept, no? If I ever start a podcast or something I will interview artists about their creative process, sure, but what most fascinates me is the 'day job.' People that we just assume are working full time as artists, are they really? Or do they have a day job? Or do they have passive income, or are they living with their parents, or do they have a wealthy spouse? Much as I am grateful for the many day jobs I've had over the years, there's something about that model that has made me literally sick. I'm starting to wonder if I should just accept the fact that I don't actually work well with that model, much as I wish I did. But if not this, what?

So I've been ruminated a lot about the known and the unknown. What do I hold on to just because it's known, and where do I get the courage to push beyond that into the unknown? While I mull that over in everywhere but my mind, I shyly reach for shaman truths, and soak in Irish love songs. Maybe someday I'll shed the day job, and be an entirely new kind of snake.

Good Medicine

2011-09-30T16:51:00.002-04:00

Honey cake for Rosh Hashana.

Been thinking about good medicine and how much we need it. Good medicine is what we do to prove we're more than what we thought we were. In my case, it's about cultivating joy. Every day I ask myself, "What is one thing I can do today that will make me ridiculously happy?"

A random list of incidental activities appear: Novels. I love to read novels. I'm reading Eat, Pray, Love, and I'm delighted by the advice of Ketut, the Indonesian healer in the story, who tells the author to "smile in your mind, smile in your liver." I've been imagining my liver smiling for days now. I have been baking foods from religious traditions I know nothing about, from ingredients I can't eat, just because I love the smell of things baking on an early autumn evening. I have been attending random community meetings just to hear people wrestle with the world, and watching episodes of Mad Men for hours, just because the fashion is sharp and the sound of drinks pouring over ice at 11 A.M. is decadent. I've been listening to new albums (Brooke Annibale, PJ Harvey, Irish music).

All of these things are unscheduled, and on a whim. Good medicine, indeed, for a gal who's life has been a strict regimen of medical routines and work, work, work. Can anyone relate?

By chance, a good friend sent me a 20-minute video of Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love author) talking about "having" a genius rather than "being" a genius. I string that happy thought like a bead on my bracelet of delights.

So, even though the adrenal fatigue has returned, I resolve to give myself a break. I resolve to prove I'm more than a herb-popping, couch-slouching woman who must languish through her condition. I resolve to find my joy, and cultivate delight, free my mind, and smile in my liver, savour my prescription of loving life on a lark. I resolve to dally a little.

What do you call good medicine? How do you shift the paradigm, and stretch your imagination? Does it work?

WHAT the---?!?!

2011-09-01T06:27:00.000-04:00

At Googie's Lounge in NYC

Well, I'm totally floored. Two years later and I just did 5 days of travel, 3 nights of work, and more socializing than I usually cram into a month, and I came home completely healthy and non-fatigued.

I think we have a new paradigm.

So on Monday, with my willpower in tact, I started the next phase of getting well -- the dreaded parasite cleanse. I'm using a product called Parastat, tested via applied kinesiology for my correct dosage. Not that I'm done with the heavy metals detox or the modified diet or the mudpacking. Oh, no.

So I'm keeping things low-key. This month shows are casual (radio interview, farmers market, etc.) and I'm planning to take a little break from all things music so I can enjoy the summer garden, finish some house projects, and watch how those parasites wriggle on out. So gross.

This winter my hope is to finish those elusive songs that I want on the next album, and continue my process for finding a producer. It's so nice to be able to make plans. I still don't take that for granted.

Summer Weekend Tour

2011-08-24T08:43:00.000-04:00

Travel isn't as simple as it used to be, pre detox era. Now I've got to spend a half day or more prepping for how I will thrive. I make my little supplement/detox meds packs, mix up my nano vitamins liquids in little dark bottles, get bottles of non-tap water from the store, and make up little snack packs and buy little boxes of rice milk, so I don't starve at rest stops that only serve wheat-wrapped and milk or soy-imbued everything. Even the fries are fried in something other than olive or cocunut oil, I'm sure. But I get those anyway. :-)

I have to eat at religiously regular intervals...before 9 am, again at 10:15 am, at 11:45, then at 2 pm, and fiinally and early dinner by 6. Maybe a snack later and early to bed. Yeah, this is tough when traveling.

Still, a summer weekend music tour is worth it. I get to see the American landscape, which I love, and friends and cities. New York has some amazing eateries where I can eat EVERYTHING. As a foodie this is like a good death where heaven is on the other side.

I rehearsed on a grand piano (Steinway) at the nearby Unitarian church yesterday and re-learned how amazing an acoustic instrument is and how totally unworthy my songs and piano skills are. Lots of my songs don't work on a grand, I found, so I adjusted my set list to more appropriate stuff. And I started writing a new song 'cause the instrument just wants to do certain things. Loud-mouth pianos. They know what they want. Such a beautiful thing

So, I'm packing up today and looking forward to the next 5 days on the road....

Under the Pine

2011-08-10T08:04:00.000-04:00

I just watched Sally Potter's Orlando last night. A few days prior I went to the theater to see The Tree of Life. Both are visually stunning, and somewhat stylized, symbolic and non-linear in their approach. There's lots to love about these two movies, but I think what I love the most is that they use the medium of film to its best advantage. It's like you don't ask a strawberry to be a banana. The strawberry is best as a strawberry. That's how these films are to me. They exploit the power of moving images to affect us, not necessarily to tell an easily understood story by the mind. The mind works, of course, to organize...but often I found myself just letting go of making sense in that way and falling into the world of moving color, design, wonder. It's like what I imagine telepathy might be like -- their vision straight to my head. And the little things became stars -- the way light plays off the planes of a glass building, the way Orlando would gaze suddenly straight at us shattering the lens that separates, or the sounds of trees rustling and insects humming on an otherwise silent summer day. Trees as architecture, or as filterers of light and love, were truly lead characters in The Tree of Life.

It reminds me of a time when Liz, my high school social studies teacher, rather mocked someone she talked with who said to her, "Have you ever really thought about trees?" "Have you ever really hugged a tree?" She thought that was sort of laughable and that the guy certainly must have been stoned. But somehow those questions have stuck with me. Because, no, I never had really thought about trees and I realized at that moment I wanted to.

So, 20 odd years later when I do my mudpacking to detox I have a lawn chair set up faciing a large pine tree in my backyard. For the 10 minutes that the mud is soaking out toxins from whatever part of my body I have it smeared on, I sit there in silence considering the tree. For the 10 minutes afterwards when I must be outside with my feet on the earth to ground myself, I consider the tree. And then for the 10 minutes after that when I soak my feet in salts and clay to draw out any remaining toxins from the session, I consider the tree.

I have to say I really have no words for those 30 minutes of my morning. But The Tree of Life seems to capture how sublime it is. That pine tree will probably be there for another 100 years or more. It'll just be there, in silence, a home to birds and squirrels, moving in the wind, standing in the snow, sending out little bright green shoots on the ends of its branches every spring. And I will have lived all motion and searching, and brief. We are not immortal like Orlando. Nor are we ageless like stones or still and planted like trees. We do not live from age to age. We are that brief burst of color, and longing, and wonder, bearing witness to what we are not.

And through that we learn what we are. The people who help us there are doing amazing, important work. Our consideration is important work.

Open Letter

2011-06-22T10:14:00.000-04:00

I've been reading this really fascinating book called "Spontaneous Evolution". It explores the world of healing and humanity's evolution by recapping our biological, religious, political and scientific histories through a lens that marries spirit and science. The book shares how our commonly held paradigms of "how things work" has been dramatically challenged in the last 100 years by science, and our public perception has yet to catch up. Our modern thought is not so very modern after all. The future, so to speak, is already here but many don't recognize it.

I love books that bend my mind. Because of books like these, and because of my journey with art and healing over the past 2 years, I am starting to wake up and become a little bit more of an activist. I'm less satisfied with stressfully living my own life and more interested in being a part of a movement that wants to illuminate beauty and connection. We live is startling and magnificent times. I will recap some of my favorite 'new facts' in a post next week.

For now, I wanted to share a letter I sent to the Obama Campaign headquarters this month. I'm urging them to consider crafting a new American Myth that lives in balance with this land. I encourage every reader to find a way to raise your voice for one another.

To the Obama Campaign,

I have emailed this letter to your campaign but I also wanted to mail it.  I feel compelled to let you know about an important issue that will decide who I support for president in 2012.

Hydrofracking is taking over my neck of the woods in Pennsylvania and I -- along with a growing group of citizens -- want it to stop. The President's position on natural gas harvesting of the Marcellus Shale is more or less supportive and I think it's worth it to share that he won't get my vote this time around if he touts this fossil fuel as the answer to our energy future or new sustainable jobs. I suspect I’m not alone. This is a tipping point issue.

I have become increasingly concerned with this administration's leadership on environmental stewardship as it relates to energy production; it's not nearly creative or inspiring enough. We as a nation need a vision to embrace when it comes to making these changes, we need an ambitious and seemingly impossible goal to strive towards, we need a new national story or new American myth of living in balance with our resources. I expect fierce and committed leadership on this issue as there is a clock ticking. Employ the youth and children in this endeavor and it will get done. Employ our president to lead the way and it will get done.

I had hoped that when I saw Obama stumping for election last time – when he very clearly said we'd bring about the end of the combustion engine -- that this would be a man who could lead us into a truly visionary future.

I haven't seen this future. I've seen nearly the opposite. Time and time again environmentally sound vision and policy gets woefully compromised. The natural gas drilling via the hydrofracking method is just another example, and I think people who care about this have had enough. We see the planet changing right before our eyes. It’s breaking our hearts.

Pittsburgh has an incredible resource in abundance of water. To use gross amounts of that resource for non-renewable fossil fuel extraction and to risk the pollution of that resource for future use, is doubly reckless in my view. The Obama campaign needs to know that simply getting clever or ‘smart’ about monitoring this type of drilling is not only reckless for the environment and our energy future, it’s also reckless for re-election.

This is a real and very personal issue for me. I have been detoxing from industrial pollutants for the past 2 years and been feeling pretty awful for about 4 years (which suspiciously coincides with the uptick in drilling downwind from where I live).  Environmental illness causes job loss due to fatigue, lack of mental capacity, and frequent infections, and potential financial ruin due to expensive medical treatments that are outside of health insurance coverage. I'm lucky -- I'm recovering slowly but surely from my illness. However, if the environmental assault continues how will I ever become a fully productive member of society again?

I won't be silent if Candidate Obama campaigns on the back of my and my neighbor's health and the dangerous extraction of this region's resource, in exchange for the pollution of our other resources. I will actively campaign against him if there is any alternative to put someone in office who will do right by our planet's energy future, whether that person can win or not.

Don't get me wrong. I want Obama to be the guy, I truly do. I just haven't seen it yet on these issues. The chemical warfare waged by corporations because of the Marcellus Shale is the tipping point.

I don’t presume that one letter will change his mind or your plan of action, but I thought it was worth mentioning so the re-election campaign could consider this new reality coming out of Pennsylvania.

Thank you for your time and for listening. I am open to further conversation if you have any questions.

Best wishes,

Heather Kropf

Singer-songwriter

Pittsburgh, PA

Quiet minds and global surrenders

2011-06-06T07:42:00.004-04:00

It's been months since I've logged on to this blog. I think that's probably a good thing. I started feeling pretty awesome around the time I was songwriting. Then, like a runaway train, I kept on rolling just a bit too amped up, a bit too intent on getting somewhere.

And I crashed.

One of the things I've begun to really care about is the hydrofracking natural gas drilling that's every expression of imbalance, corporate domination, and backward energy-thinking, that's infiltrated the state of Pennsylvania. I kind of started caring a bit too much.

Question #1: How do you become an activist without losing your center?
Answer: I'm thinking it's Buddhist in nature but I don't know what it is.
Answer #2: Love.

My heavy metals detox has progressed pretty well, I think. My second labs show that of the three highest metals, one is now totally gone and the other two are within "reference" range. So, I've got some work to do but nothing is elevated anymore.

My adrenals started acting up and I started getting sick a lot, again. So I'm taking a break from the sauna and the detox for the summer in favor of a few other things.

The other things: I had been on track to start making my 4th album, and on track to begin doing repairs on my house to get the mold remediated and get it ready to sell.

But I crashed, remember?

So I started seeing a new person just for some immune support and adrenal recovery. We found out my entire system is all compromised, so I find myself on a new regimen of products. This time, it's all about getting my body alkaline. And interrupting the interference caused by scars. In my case TB and Small Pox vaccines.

Question #2: How do you know when you're too much on the journey? How do you know when to take a vacation?
Answer: I think it's got something to do with accepting that your timeline isn't really your timeline. My boyfriend reminded me that this is my journey and I'm on it. Although I want to fix up the house and make an album and do all the things that give me pleasure, I'm not done healing. This is my path.
Answer #2: You know when you no longer ask the question.

So, more Netflix movies (been watching all about Ancient Aliens!) and staying home and cooking alkaline meals and juices. Marveling at the wonder of early summer -- my nasturtiums are poking out of the ground. So are the basil seeds and mexican sunflowers.

I started 30 wysteria from seeds and one grew!!! Then the cat noshed on it yesterday and it's looking a little sad. Maja barfed it up and we monitored her pretty closely yesterday to see if the poison was doing more damage. She seems fine.

Meanwhile, I practice being who I want to become; I wait for a time of a quiet mind and a massive global surrender to love.

8 days of beautiful

2011-02-07T07:21:00.001-05:00

I have had 8 straight days of feeling fine. It's been almost 2 years since that has happened and so I'm feeling like the luckiest woman in the world right about now.

One reason might be I'm so obsessed with songwriting that there's no time to obsess over symptoms. I'm doing this thing called February Album Writing Month (FAWM.org) where I am attempted to write 14 songs in 28 days. I've completed 3 songs so far: a pop-rock tune, a pretty folk-country number, and a spacey velvety esoteric song about The Wheel. You can hear demos of songs and read lyrics at my FAWM page.

I forgot how much I love writing songs, but even more than that I love being caught up in something. My brain is at a smorgasbord of sounds, images, words, ideas. Challenging myself to push past my self-perception as a "slow songwriter" has been the perfect way to brighten up perhaps the most depressing month of the year (in Pittsburgh anyway). Not every song needs to be a hit which is a relief, if not a revelation. AND, I can now see how the hit songwriting factories of yesterday happened -- you just get on a roll and then it rolls you along. Finally, being able to write alone but having a community of people doing the same thing is a perfect set-up.

If you're creative at all -- and I believe everyone is creative at something -- then it's worth it to get the environment right. We have to get the details right so that we can fall into who we are. If you know that you can't paint unless the dishes are done or off the counter, buy a dishwasher. If you can't invent without good light, find the right room. Stuff like that.

8 days of awesome is making me a cheerleader. I have a short while before getting my next test to see how I'm moving out the heavy metals. I have to remember that even though I'd rather write a song, I must resolve to stay a little aware of the details of purification, too. I've been relaxing a bit, but it's worth the extra push for 3 more weeks. Anything to stretch these 8 beautiful days into 8 years and beyond!

holding on

2011-01-17T17:57:00.001-05:00

Clearly I've been holding on to something. For weeks I've had that tight feeling all over and I can't relax no matter how many mind games I play, no matter how much deep breathing or how long I sit on the couch "doing nothing." I'm just all wound up and I don't know why. I wonder what it is that I can't let go?

Today I met a man who kind of blew my mind. With simply a look he was able to unwind me. At first I felt a myself relax, then a sensation at the back of my head, and now I'm home making dinner and I still feel unwound. How extraordinary.

It's causing me to rethink everything I've been doing in the past 2 years to approach my chronic junk. What if it's as simple as a look?

In the same way as learning that the healing process might be simple, I'm discovering all this on-line business might be simple too. Applications have developed over the past 5 years to assist artist in ways that just didn't exist a few years ago. I've wanted to explore this but it always overwhelmed me -- too many options, too much time, too much maintenance. I've been doing it these past few weeks and it's SO EASY. I just began to set up my bandcamp page, and I just developed a new music newsletter for my fans. It actually looks like what I want to present to the world.

Poof. More chronic junk gone. Why hold on?

what we can't not listen to

2010-12-11T23:11:00.006-05:00

I have learned this year to sing for spaces, regardless of whether or not people are listening. It's something that helps me stay in the moment. Tonight was tough. The last show of the year and I wasn't into singing to spaces because the people weren't listening. Right there, that's the drama of being a musician. My favorite story was years ago when the literacy council asked me to sing at their valentine's day party. There was a line-up of readers and the room hung on every word. I think poetry readings and my songs fit really well together so I was looking forward doing my set for this audience. I was introduced and wouldn't you know the second I opened my mouth to sing my words, people started gabbing. Like it was intermission. Like my words didn't matter and I wasn't even there. I have to admit that I was pissed.

So here I am again tonight. Part of me says well it's on me to inspire people to pay attention. But that, historically, has taken me down a pretty negative road. So, note to self: ask the booking agent whether or not it's a listening crowd before agreeing to play. Just as a head's up.

In general it's been a rough week health-wise. I am having a lot of uncomfortable symptoms of detoxing. The worst is late at night and the sound of blood wooshing through my ears is deafening. It almost drowns out the ringing. It's entirely possible that the neurological damage of my ringing ears cannot be reversed. But the wooshing and the pounding pounding blood vessels all over my body. It's intense. Someone make that go away.

Hmmmm, talk about a captive listening audience. This is one song I can't not listen to. Noisy bloody music.

now, and now

2010-12-07T16:10:00.001-05:00

So, one of the additions to my house is a far infrared sauna (with a mini trampoline!). I've been warming myself a couple of times a week. It's weird. Sometimes it's like my body craves it, like exercise. Then, other times my head pounds and I can't stand the heat and have to leave the space well before I'm 'supposed' to.

I've been so focused on the health stuff that I've neglected the song I was working on. The muse has flown for now. I hope it won't be one of those cast-away songs because I liked the premise: the idea that in your dreams you see the truth of who someone is, the idea that when your dreams have disappeared you gravitate towards their truth because you have none of your own.

I know a thread of melancholy runs through my music. As much as I'd like it to be a thread of contentment and play, it's not that. These days I have no dreams to speak of. There is nothing that I'd like to do. So I want to write a song to grieve this loss. The gain, I suppose, is learning how to be in the moment more often. My dream -- if you can call it that -- is to feel here. The moment is extraordinary and overwhelms me. I sit in the sauna and watch the temperature light waver and the minutes count down. My only moment is to feel the sweat gather in folds of skin, on the small of my back, under my hair.

I wish I dreamed of tomorrow because that is what Americans are supposed to do. I would lean into it with everything I had, if only I had a picture of what I would do or could be. But I see no threshold to tomorrow. I just see now, and now, and now. A non-dream that will not fade.

One Lap In

2010-11-22T06:55:00.002-05:00

Sports metaphors are a little foreign to me, just like war metaphors, but track & field is a little different. I remember being 11 and running across a field at recess and thinking, "This is what life is. This is free." I wasn't thinking in words back then. As soon as I hit 7th grade, I joined the track team. I was in track until I graduated high school. I wasn't great, but I was ok. I loved the strategy of distance running. Each lap has its own goal. The first lap is about establishing your pace.

I'm one lap in. I've started some things but I'm not yet going full throttle with the detox. I had a mini tour to contend with, which was truly a blast. I tried out some songs that'll make it to my next album and got feedback on them that makes me believe I'm finally finding my voice. Good stuff. The 4 days of travel, performances and socializing took their toll and so I got a week-long head cold as a souvenir. But I was feeling good for the tour which told me I'm doing better than I think.

Six days into the persistent head cold and a little voice in my head said, "Go get acupuncture." I can't describe how happy my body gets when it's got little needles stuck all over it. It just says a big THANK YOU over and over. Again, not in words. Day 7 and the infection sort of just melted away like spring snow in sunshine. Unbelievable.

A couple of things I notice about lap ONE: The body can adapt to probably anything (and this gives me so much hope as we head into the years of intense climate change):

I can drink the juice of a whole lemon in a little bit of water without squishing up my nose anymore.
I can eat a Granny Smith apple without my teeth going fuzzy.
I'm no longer eating meat but I feel as if I have plenty of energy.
My body sometimes craves the heat from sauna session. It's almost like a runner's high.
I don't need to eat as much salt. I virtually eliminated it based on something a doc told me about salt being acidic (the process of detoxing involves alkalizing the body) and now I think my taste buds have changed enough that just a little salt seems like a lot of salt. Weird for the girl who used to down a bag of potato chips because she 'craved salty things'.
I'm starting to feel "normal" and I haven't even started the intense part of the detox yet.

In truth, I suppose it's hard to say whether or not I'm one lap in or have 1 lap to go. Life is not a 1600 meter run. We rarely know when something is over. I guess maybe that's why sports are so satisfying; the ending is known. But I think the point of living is learning to love being in the game. I'm in the game.

California Style

2010-11-11T07:37:00.000-05:00

Ladies and Gents, it's officially begun. Well, sort of. It's a California Style start. I see the starting line and I'm in uniform and I'm backed up a few paces waiting for the gun, and I really need to pee from nerves.

I got my heavy metals detox plan from my doc last Friday, and I've begun a few things: a total organic vegetarian diet with lots of extra qualifiers -- no processed foods, no wheat, no artificial sweeteners, no dairy, etc. I've starting sucking down the juice of one whole organic lemon every morning before I break fast. I've started the vinegar baths and the sauna sessions (felt pretty crappy, but I suppose that's the idea).

Doc said don't start the heavy duty part of this detox until after my travel this weekend. Which is fine, because I don't have any money anyway to purchase said heavy duty items. Hoping to earn a few extra bucks on the road. So, I hold up my tumbler of lemon water and cheers to good performances and generous crowds!

The Lancaster, PA house concert with the charming Joy Ike is sold out. It's nice when 30 folks = sold out. :-) I'm also sharing the stage with Daryl Shawn in two cities: Bryn Mawr, PA and New York City. That's Saturday and Sunday. His acoustic guitar style has the breezes of California and Mexico blowing through, and he loves what he's doing so his performances are kind of undeniable.

I'll get to explore the wonderful world of organic vegan restaurant offerings in Philly, Lancaster and Manhattan. I'm looking forward to that. The only bit of melancholy is that my Harvest & Snow song didn't finish itself, although perhaps on the drive east tomorrow.....? I'm about 5 lines shy of the finish. And a few paces shy of the detox start.

Beginnings, completions. I'm optimistic this fall.

harvest & snow & kate bush & ponies

2010-10-29T07:48:00.000-04:00

So here's the deal: I met with a naturopath who encouraged me to switch the phrasing in my head every time I think about my health. Apparently our bodies don't hear a negative, so a phrase like "I don't want to get sick again" becomes, to the body, "I want to get sick again." Weirdly enough, I have found I talk to myself all the time in phrases using negatives. It's been trippy to catch myself in the act and rephrase. I know this puts me on the path towards dreamy new-age get-your-attitude-right kinds of stuff, but I'll be damned if it hasn't made a little bit of a difference.

I do sort of believe most of our demons are in our minds, so to take the battle there is profound, however you choose to fight. It's only hard if you believe it's hard.

I've finally started messing around with songs again. Yay! Right now I'm on the hunt for a song called "Harvest & Snow". I hope it'll be finished in time for my November shows; it seems like the kind of song that's open to being finished soon. Not like a few others that simply elude me (you know who you are).

I've made a kind of pact with myself to write songs just for myself....again. I find that I have to forget the audience a little bit in order to be honest. After all, I'm not some enormous artistic presence or influence who has thousands of people holding their breath for what I'll say next; the soul I'm saving is mine, really. So I might as well get on with it.

I've been inspired by going back to albums I listened to when I was 17. Kate Bush's "The Sensual World" is high on my list. Holy cats, it puts me there. And so is Joni Mitchell's "Wild Things Run Fast". Yeah, I guess I was a strange 17-year-old. "It takes cheerful resignation, a heart of humility, that's what it takes, a cheerful person told me. Nobody's harder on you than you. Nobody's harder on me than me." Shouldn't I have been listening to "We are living in a material world, and I am a material girl."????

Anyhow, 17 has been on my mind and running through my veins too. I blame reading the Twilight Saga books and watching the movies. This story is like a direct conduit back to the energetic and emotional realities of being 17, even through the average writing. Enough time has passed that feeling all that isn't entirely unpleasant. I wouldn't have been able to say that 10 years ago. It's sort of a sweetly charged melancholy, newly colored by gratitude. And the leaves scrape over the sidewalks in flurries of wind, and the colors go bright to fading fast, the crows flies towards the sunset again, every evening. It's all so perfect.

Time expands. I'm restless and bored with adult living and all the familiar motions. I start my metals detox next Friday. A year of that and then let this pony out to pasture. I'm tired keeping it safe and domestic.

Dumbness of it all

2010-10-11T00:12:00.001-04:00

When I was in high school I happened across a show on PBS that had a character who said something I've never been able to forget or shake: Sometimes we get lost in the dumbness of it all.

I've been trying so hard to listen to what my body needs, to learn about what's going on, and to find the right practitioners to help me on my path towards well-being and health. But there are so many voices and so many paths I could take. How does one know if the path is a direct course or a long and winding road?

Yeah, I stole that phrase. It's a good phrase.

I sit here at my computer at midnight with insomnia, a pounding head and a metal-tasting tongue. I met with an herbalist last week who set me on a path for 30 days to work on reducing inflammation and viruses and fungi and god knows what else. She believes the metals will resolve themselves if my systems are working.

But chicken or egg, man. Which is it? Do metals take hold because of inflammation and fungi and immune suppression, or do they cause it? Can it be both?

Is drinking half a lemon in 4 oz of water helping to move out the crap or is it making it worse (like the metallic tongue) because my body doesn't know how to move out crap right now?

I've got all these questions and no answers. And no sleep. And no food in the house because the fridge stopped working 2 days ago. And no fridge.

So, that phrase popped up in my head tonight. It's not a bouquet of roses or a thank you card or a free trip to Cancun, but it's solace of some kind. Sometimes we get lost in the dumbness of it all. Sometimes knowing we're lost is almost like being found.

We forge on

2010-10-02T14:54:00.000-04:00

Since I've last written, a few promising things have happened. First, I've done some traveling without falling ill afterwards! On the heels of a long weekend to visit family I had another weekend of shows, three in a row. Again, no extreme fatigue! I have to mark this moment because last October at this time I was having a very different experience. It's important to acknowledge progress.

Having said that, by all accounts the metals detoxification process I'm selecting is slow, and hopefully not debilitating, and could easily take the next year of my life. I hadn't anticipated such a long term prognosis for treatment, but again what builds up over a life is not always shed in a day or a month.

I'm aware of thee things as I go forward: first, that I believe I will get better. I am admittedly terrified of the detox process based on past experience -- and metals chelation therapy can be quite dangerous --, but I truly believe this is the next course of action and it's worth it to get to the other side. I'm going to get there. Second, the cost will be substantial. Whether I go the intravenous route or the sauna and supplements route, there's no way around the fact that this process will cost thousands of dollars and consume much of my waking hours. Third, health insurance, by my early research and estimation, doesn't cover a lick of this healing process. I know there are many views on how health care should happen in our nation and I respect that quest. However, I have to say no one should be looking at a bank account statement and weighing that against how they choose to heal. This is the weirdest perversion, and anyone who doesn't understand that has never personally been sick and wondered how they will pay for their course of treatment.

I kid you not, after I've recovered from all of this I will be integrating some component of financial support for wellness into my art. I don't know how yet, but I can say that governments and companies don't have all of the answers, nor should we be held hostage to their indecision and compromises. We forge on with our own lives independent of what's around us. In my case, I will detox metals even though Allegheny County Health Department apparently can offer no help in isolating the source of this metal contamination and Highmark Health Insurance apparently can offer no coverage for my method of treatment.

So it goes.

Metal Pig

2010-09-17T22:11:00.001-04:00

First of all, someone left me flowers at my show last night. So cool! Also, 3 women were there who I swear I've met, but I didn't realize it until they were leaving. If you're reading this, I'm so sorry I didn't say hello.

Now for the health part of this blog: I've got metal toxicity. Looks like this might be at the root of all my misery for the past 2 years. Based on my disastrous detox earlier this year which seemed to bloom an Epstein Barr viral outbreak, I'm beyond nervous about detoxing the heavy metals. What misfortunes will I have to walk through to get to the other side? I know that's a glass-half-empty mentality, but this is where I'm at today. My ears are ringing, I can't take loud noises. Even typing on this keyboard is smacking my right ear like a crashing cymbal.

But detoxing is definitely what comes next, 'cause I can't feel like crap forever.

I'm making good on my Chinese astrological element: metal. Wish me good fortune, friends. Over and out.

The brilliance of smallness

2010-09-07T10:15:00.001-04:00

For all my ranting about technology and what it does to human interaction, I gotta say I've discovered Netflix streaming movies on an ipod are about as close as it gets to reading a book. Since discovering this feature last Friday, I've watched 4, count 'em, 4 movies. It's a great way to keep me on the couch. The drawback is that it wrecks my vision. So, easy does it.

I've done absolutely zero songwriting in the last few weeks. Not even attempts. I had two performances which messed up my jaw pretty good. Something about the way I sit, sing and play really doesn't work from a physical standpoint. Gotta solve that one. Anyhow, here's the deal: there are some incredibly talented people out there that don't do music full time. Martha Jane is one of them.

In the DIY music community a conversation rages about the future of the industry. This has been going on for as long as I've been out there as a singer-songwriter. It's all about the role of technology and labels and stuff and everyone has an interesting and equally valid perspective.

The DIY culture really honors the entrepreneurial artist. It honors the extravert. I believe most artist are entrepreneurs, by the structure of how it works, but I also believe there are artists who have brilliance and are not entrepreneurs. They simply are good at the artist part. And that's where partnership comes it. These folks have a gift and if we're lucky enough to experience it that is in itself enough. There is greatness in smallness and not everyone who is a talented singer or songwriter needs to enter the music biz fray. There is no cultural or personal obligation. I didn't use to think that, but now I do.

The the industry is morphing and I have to agree with some folks who say we've traded quality for quantity. At some level, I think that's true, and I believe there is a deep and sacred part of our culture that's going underground because of this. That's where is makes a lot of sense to have artists partner with entrepreneurs. Like that song from the 80s, "You've got the braun, I've got the brain. Let's make lots of money." I don't mean a partnership quite like that, but some kind of pairing of gifts equals more than the sum of it's parts.

Pittsburgh, by my experience of 15 years, has almost zero support structure for DIY musicians. There's no industry here to speak of, and I think there could be. I think the culture-at-large would benefit from entrepreneurs cultivating true talent. The folks who are truly talented and charismatic are gonna be fine on their own, and I will enjoy them as much as anyone, and smile for their tremendous accomplishments. Perhaps this is the reality of the future of music and maybe I should just jump on that bandwagon without reservation.

But I have reservations, and I have to articulate them. There are gems who are quietly brilliant, who are music incarnate, and who make songwriting and singing look effortless. I'm an incredibly judgmental person when it comes to art, and these folks relax my mind and put me in my heart and I can experience music the way it's intended. In fact, I can experience humanity the way it's intended. You know these people when you see them and hear them. It's an undeniable thing, and it's not always in your face and obvious. This is the paradox, and this is our discovery to make.

Anyhow, I think lots of DIY artists end up saying you gotta embrace the new world or get out. Stop complaining because reality won't wait for you. Stuff like that.

There's a missing piece in a statement like that, and I can't quite figure out what it is. I think it has something do with partnership and discovery and the brilliance of smallness, but I'm not sure. I do know I felt lucky to hear Martha Jane. I also know that I don't think she is required to do any more than what she's doing now. Somehow it's more our job to find the gems or something.

I guess this is an entry in my blog where I open it up to feedback. What do you think?

Thick headed me

2010-08-26T09:45:00.000-04:00

Well, it looks like I've cycled back down to another episode of adrenal exhaustion. My kidneys are killing me, and I just feel like I'm coming down with something. I guess when the remedy is REST, it really means rest. Not quit one of your jobs and exchange it for fixing up the house. Bad idea, bad idea.

I'm hosting friends today and then I swear I'm on the couch, with a pencil and sketch pad in hand whiling away the hours. Since my exhaustion is moderate to severe I am told I can expect 2 years to recovery...and that is if I'm doing everything right. So far, I'm not doing everything right so I guess I'm back to square one, and I'll keep coming back to square one until I learn. I swear I'm learning, although I can't wait for 2012.

Devotions

2010-08-14T10:55:00.000-04:00

I am officially ridiculously into alternative and integrated medicine. I want to convert the world.

I remember when I was in high school (a religious private school) there was a wave of evangelical fervor that swept through, and people were obsessed with speaking in tongues and casting out demons, vicariously causing me all kinds of distress and disgust. Anytime a class would get distracted by demon conversation I just felt an icky darkness descend upon the room, and I wondered why anyone would want to be brainwashed into channeling that crap. My Led Zeppelin albums were considered evil and, yes, I didn't do 'devotions' every day so I was probably not going to be Saved. At one point I was eating lunch in the cafeteria and I could see a group of students ascending the art building across the parking lot. They were climbing to the roof because they thought the rapture was happening over the lunch hour. I saw them later in study hall.

Summer break happened and then by fall all the kids who found Christ kind of calmed down. They were just my classmates and life went on. At that point I realized it's the initial falling in love part and wanting to share it with everyone that was uncomfortable. I was uncomfortable in the face of so much certainty and passion.

Now I realize the value of that. We need to be uncomfortable sometimes. We really do. We need to allow people to be head-over-heels in love with whatever they've just discovered. It doesn't last, after all. It gets tempered by time and by living. Resistance to early expressions of devotion just creates rock-hard human beings, clinging to their truths. This is dangerous business. We must bite our tongues and open our minds and allow people to discover truth on their own. We all have our own path, and our paths enrich one another.

So, I humbly present that I am now that annoying 'Christ' kid who wants the whole world to have pins stuck in their meridians and herbs jammed down their throat, and kale mixed in with their scrambled eggs. It actually messes with my ability to write song lyrics; I guess that's my karma. Certainly, I expect my daily devotion will be tempered and maybe then I'll have words to sing again. The irony, here, is not lost on me. In the meantime, though, I only have words to shout from a mountain top: don't ever settle for band-aids for symptoms when you can discover and treat the causes of your illness. Don't accept your diagnosis at face value. It probably fits a bigger picture. Make sure you're looking for the big picture, that combination of spirit and science. It's worth it! There is that quote, "You don't find by seeking, but only the seeker will find."

Future Imagination

2010-08-03T12:18:00.000-04:00

Doggone it if I'm not feeling kinda good these days. So good I'm forgetting to breathe. (pause for a moment to inhale, exhale). Whew. Much better.

Now, I've booked a few shows out east for November and crossing my fingers I can travel. Also, I'l be doing some music at the Mother Earth News fair this September in central PA. If I may stray off of the art/music/health overlap and jump on my green soapbox, I gotta say, "C'mon USA. Get some freakin' collective imagination." When it comes to energy consumption and technology we are like doddy aunts and uncles, stuck in our 20th century ways with no concept of what this world could be like in 2210. I mean, really, how often do I (do you, dear reader?) think about planet earth in 2210?

Yeah, that's something.

Here we are, these soulful incredible beings, sharing this planet with millions of creatures. We are temporary players in this magical thing called living. Yet every day we feed the machine. We're not machines! Our hearts are warmer, our minds are poetry. We can screw up, yes. The paradox drives me nuts most days. Our collective unconsciousness of our own imagination and our ability to change, our human genius, is fed daily to the machine. I don't mean literal machines, although that's often the case. I mean systems and methods. When everything you have gets taken away, you can realize what you have that cannot be taken away. The heart informs the mind and the mind makes the threshold. And behind the heart is the pulse of life. That pulse is infinite. We are temporary and we are infinite.

So how much of how we live today actually makes any real sense? Because there are doors to walk through and there is no other side. With my illness, I've had an opportunity to see my existence stripped down, and with my continuing recovery (crossing fingers!) I'm able to put my awareness to practice.

And all I am trying to say is that I am happy to play music at things like the Mother Earth News fair. I'm happy to make changes in my life and embrace the grand adventure, road to the unknown. It's all ok, you know. Good and bad, it's all ok. So what if I forget to breathe? I also remember to breathe.

2010-07-23T21:39:00.000-04:00

The heat is getting to me today. But that's not really worth writing about. I have been thinking about performance vs. experience for a day now, another form of heat. For some it is probably not new information that I have a sticky relationship with live performance. Given a choice I'd rather be in the studio, engaged with the process of ideas and music. Live performance is that thing I do to earn some money, and hopefully find some supportive listeners. Not terribly inspiring, is it? it hasn't been for me, either.

Well, last Thursday's performance got me thinking some. It went really well because I was connected to something that was playing through me and it wasn't about me. As a basically shy person I was relieved that I could disappear into music. I have no idea if it was different to a listener, but it was different for me.

At the end of the night I wasn't hungry and drained; I was energized and weirdly happy and social. I talked about this with someone and they pointed out to me that it's the difference between creating an experience and performance.

So now I'm reflecting on The Experience. This is why we go to music - we want an experience. Successful artists have a way of creating experience, of pointing a big arrow to the muse, of embodying things unseen. I have recently witnessed k.d. lang and The Swell Season create such experiences. The musicianship was sublime and precise and tasteful, and the generous luminous quality of the lead performers created something close to church.

At the time I was thrilled to turn off my music critic mind and be swept away by sounds, trusting that all the sounds would be perfect. Sometimes I'd have a mental moment of student to teacher, "how do you do that????" I would ask in my head.

Weeks and months later it occurs to me now that perhaps they weren't performing at all. Rather they were open empty vessels for The Experience. Heat and light. A possession.

I don't know how one does this, but that sounds like a lot of fun. If live performances can somehow become live experiences, I might sign up.

Before I sign out I should share that I think I found a new doctor! I'll be changing a bunch of stuff around and doing yet a few more tests. When pieces fall together it's another good day. Now someone get me a fan and a glass of ice water.

Little Lucky Miracles....

2010-07-15T20:26:00.000-04:00

So much has happened in the past few days. I first thought my CT scan was super duper scary and then it turned out to be more or less minor, I've had drama with doctors, and got wiped out by last Saturday's gigs. I mean, wiped on the floor like wax paste. Then tonight I had a 2 and a half hour performance at a little cabaret bar in downtown Pittsburgh and, lo, it went fabulously. What!@?!? Could it be I might finally have internal energy reserves, after 9 months?

Or maybe all I need to enjoy performance is lots of spaces in between. I improvised endings and fiddled around on the piano with beginnings and did things I've never done before. It's ridiculous to have my last show of summer be so good, and from out of the blue.

In all my apparently unlucky days I stand here in wonder at a lucky one.

There is a poem by Saint John of the Cross, quoted in the book I'm currently reading "The Ecstatic Journey" by Sophy Burnam. I feel like quoting it, too:

Once in the dark of night

when love burned bright with yearning, I arose

(O windfall of delight!)

and how I left none knows --

dead to the world my house, in dull repose;

--------

There in the lucky dark,

in secret, with all sleepers heavy-eyed;

no sign for me to mark,

no other light, no guide

except for my heart -- the fire, the fire inside!

Crossing fingers....

2010-07-08T12:29:00.001-04:00

Just wanted to post that I have two performances this Saturday -- one is live on-air at The Saturday Light Brigade, which may be streaming as well, and one is a short opening set for my friend Keith Hershberger. His songs are emotional and thoughtful and his solo performances are very rare as he's spending more time working as a ceramic artist these days. Crossing fingers that I'll have enough energy for both events, and wanted to share them with you. After that I'm more or less out of commission until I can get wrapped around my chronic illness treatments. Please visit Keith's lovely website to see his graphic design work and pottery: www.keithhershberger.net

Two other plugs, for readers in the Pittsburgh area:

Emily Rodgers writes songs that are, to my ear, like melancholy lullabies. Her lyrics are exquisite and she is playing tonight at Howler's Coyote Cafe. And Saturday, July 24, look for Joy Ike, Brooke Annibale and The Beggar Folk at Istanbul in Lawrenceville. Joy and Brooke are two of the classiest young women singer-songwriters in Pittsburgh, and I've had the pleasure of sharing shows with both of them in the past year. Waves of good art hit the city sand, and Joy and Brooke are on the crest of a wave coming up after my generation of writers. As it is with enjoying my work with gifted healers, I also enjoy being in the presence of gifted songwriters who are also real singers.

Lastly, my energy is up today. Just waiting to get results from a CT scan of a neck lump. Yeah, scary is right. Again, crossing fingers.....

Suns that shine shadows

2010-07-03T15:20:00.002-04:00

In this case, the absence of writing has meant shadows lifting and shifting possibilities. I have found some wonderful people in this process and to honor Independence Day I will name the people who are helping me:

Fawn Chang - Feng Shui consultant. She is a beautiful person and helped me do a space clearing of my home this past week. Weird and cool things happened with my cat Albert. She hooked me up with....

Nora Shofield - Spiritual Response Therapist. Esoteric, I know. I just saw her this morning and maybe I'll write more about this in the coming weeks.

Susan Merenstein - of Murray Avenue Apothecary. She has, I swear, a golden glow around her and makes you feel like your life is Sesame Street.

Michele Bertini - quite possibly the loveliest therapist in this city. I've seen her off and on for a few years and my monthly visits have cleared my mind and opened my heart.

Sydnie Bryant - Acupuncturist and herbalist at Wholistic Acupunture. Yet another Sesame Street person, but only if you cross that with a cool and serene Japanese Garden.

Dr. Kropf - Neuro-energetic Chiropractor. I'll be darned but those little laser lights kinda make me feel better. And he "chuck norrises" my head as good as anyone.

In all, people who do what they are meant to do on the planet and do it with such professional skill and generosity make me happy to be a human being. My suns that shine shadows are being eclipsed by light.

2010-06-24T20:27:00.002-04:00

Summer when the breeze is cool and the humidity is low is about perfect. Add my Pandora Debussy channel and a few cats sleeping on the couch and what more could a person ask for.

Contentment is hard to come by, so I savor moments like this. Today I learned two things to bring this rare state about. The first came from a feng shui practitioner that I hired to evaluate my home. I figured since my illness coincided with my nearly 8 years in this home that perhaps there are things I can do to remedy my health by way of caring for spaces. Thomas Moore has a great book called Care of the Soul, in which he speaks eloquently about spaces as manifestation of personal or societal disease. To care for spaces does as much to care for an individual or a community as actually treating the physical body.

I learned that my home has lots of issues in the health areas, but they are easily remedied. I will heal my home, as my energy allows. Perhaps I'll notice parallels in my body, we'll see.

As a total aside, Feng Shui also has fu dogs, these crosses between dragons and dogs, both male and female. You place them at your entrance to ward of malicious intent. They look fierce, like amped up super heroes or beasts from God's martial fantasy farm. I will get two fu dogs, mostly because I love to say fu dogs. fu dogs.

The second thing I learned today is that even though I think everything I love is being taken away from me by this illness -- my love of singing, of gardening, of walking places, or seeing friends, or simple pleasures like driving or buying food -- that actually it can't take everything I love away from me....because it can't take me away from me. Debussy and a perfect day make me sentimental, I guess. In any event, I'm still here inside and outside this body, stripped of purpose and pursuits perhaps, and a little worse for the wear, but here in essence.

How we live with ourselves is really what it's all about. I'm learning. Fu dogs!!!

Keith Jarrett is my new hero

2010-06-22T19:03:00.001-04:00

I started telling people that I'm chronically ill. I emailed my music newsletter list last week with cancellation news of a show, and I was overwhelmed by the nice responses and resources that people sent to me. I think sometimes I forget that people like me. I don't know what that's about.

One person sent me a link to the Fibromyalgia and Fatigue Center in Pittsburgh. I signed up for a complimentary visit, thinking maybe I've got Chronic Fatigue instead of just a chronic virus. I went today (ironically, the drive across town nearly flattened me) and it turns out I'm probably right. They know how to treat it, though, so I can recover as much of my energy as is possible. You know, the stuff that hasn't been damaged and destroyed for all time.

It'll cost thousands and I'm not sure how I'm going to afford it. But I'm going to do it anyway, and trust that the resources will be provided somehow. What other choice do I have?

After a long nap, I hopped on line this afternoon to see what resources are out there for musicians and health. Found out Cher has Chronic Fatigue due to Epstein Barr virus. I'm in Moonstruck company, baby! And Keith Jarrett has Chronic Fatigue. Ok, he's my new hero, because if you've never heard his double disc of Shostakovich preludes and fugues, you haven't really lived. They are sublime in every way.

I suspect I'll find a lot of new role models and heros on this new adventure. Now that is truly something to look forward to.

A few small victories

2010-06-20T11:51:00.002-04:00

My acupuncturist changed the direction of one of my chakra wheels yesterday. I didn't know chakras had wheels -- I thought they just had colors. I must scour the interwebs for more information on that. Perhaps a future entry I'll tell you what I find.

In the meantime, and in an effort to introduce balance to this blog, I have a few small victories that warrant a short entry:

Small Victory #1: Last night I made it down to Istanbul to hear Eve Goodman & John Caldwell, with Tracy Drach. I didn't last the whole night, but the fact that I made it there and had a nice dinner and heard live music is something indeed.

RAH!

Small Victory #2: I just returned home from a 10 minute walk under blue skies. My lungs and limbs are heavy, but ten minutes anywhere would have been unthinkable on Friday. And no acute symptoms.

YAY!

Small Victory #3: This morning I re-listened to Rick DiClemete's reading of my astrological chart from earlier this Spring and pulled out a sketch pad and made drawings. Doodles really, but doodles with an art pencil on art paper.

YAWP!

A word of hope to all who need it:

"Don't Let the Bastards Get You Down" - Margaret Atwood

Bag full of pills & and viral art direction

2010-06-17T08:23:00.001-04:00

Much as I don't have the midas touch with music marketing and self-promotion, I do sort of love all the details. So, I was really looking forward to a design seminar I was registered to take today for my part-time day job (architecture firm). I thought it'd be useful for the music biz, too. After all, in the end, marketing is marketing is marketing.

Instead? I'm sucking down a bag full of pills for my chronic Epstein Barr virus and trying to make sure I can breath. I am on 4 -- count 'em -- 4 antivirals. I probably take 20 pills with each meal. I only hope they kill all those little bastard viruses that are having way too much fun making my body totally anaerobic.

I'm looking for balance. I can't sing 'cause I get winded. That's not balance.

Back in the early 90s I dropped out of school for a semester due to mono and pneumonia. I was supposed to create and present my senior show, and I had grand ideas that involved large paper mache fruit and mennonite coverings. The mono totally changed my show. It was my new artistic director.

Instead of product I could only focused on process. And the process had to be gentle and small-scale. I moved home and bought myself a little watercolor block. Oils or other art were just too strenuous or chemical. So watercolors it was. I slouched on my folk's cream colored feather futon in the tv room and attempted to make 1 painting a day. Didn't matter what it was. And in the end I thought I'd have stacks of paintings to select from for the senior show, once I got well.

I didn't have stacks, but I had a lot of paintings, and I sold almost every single one of them. I was kind of proud of that. But I was most proud that I gave up the goal. I was delighted to find I became a better painter and more in tune with what watercolor does. It's talking all the time. You could look at the dates at the bottom of the painting and you could see me getting better. You could see me trusting the material more and more. You could see I became a better listener.

Having a hard time breathing is reminding me of this. I don't know how I continue as a singer-songwriter when I can't sing, and practice/songwriting is just too strenuous. Sitting at a computer fatigues me.

I guess maybe my virus is my art director once again. I'll ask a friend to buy me a new little watercolor block. I'll set it beside my bag full of pills. I'll paint again.

Roller coaster ride

2010-06-14T09:48:00.004-04:00

Today it's back to muscle fatigue, fever, headaches, and tight throat. You know there are two things I miss most from this:

1 - I can't travel. A simple 1-day road trip can devastate me. I love to travel, so the prospect of not doing anymore of this upsets me. Plus, there go all hopes of doing music tours.....

2 - I haven't had 2 days in a row of feeling good since last year. And I forget it every day that I feel ok. If I feel good I think "Hey, maybe I'm kicking this" only to find out the next day or maybe later that same day that it's a ferris wheel roller coaster ride and I can't get off. And every time I dip down I have a new fresh wave of despair.

These are the things I miss. I miss the prospect of seeing the world with my own eyes. I miss the expectation of tomorrow and making plans. The Catholics were wrong: purgatory is actually hell.

My mantra these days is "This too shall pass."

Budding evangelist for acupuncture

2010-06-13T08:59:00.003-04:00

Yesterday I could barely drag myself from one position to another. I couldn't speak because of the energy it took. I could barely cry, because it exhausted me. I was clearly losing the battle with my viral friends.

Somehow I managed to drag myself to my car and drive a mile to my acupuncture appointment. One hour later I could walk, I could carry a conversation (brief), I didn't want to cry. I know if I would have stayed at home and rested on my couch all day that I'd feel like a brick, just as sick as ever.

So, even though I'll lose 2 great-paying gigs this week because I've got no stamina, I'm gonna sing small praises to acupuncture. I can make myself a meal at home and answer the phone. Life is good today.

Living means turning

2010-06-11T19:28:00.000-04:00

I had intended for this blog to catalog my art-making, but I'm now discovering that if I blog at all it will probably be about my healing. Yesterday I was diagnosed with Epstein Barr virus, after 9 months of "Why don't I feel better?" It feels good to know something. Beyond that I have no idea. Life is turning me somewhere, and to live peacefully means following down this road. I cannot step off. What this means for songwriting and recording and performing, I don't know. My main hope now is finding the right healers, people who can walk with me and know my needs deeply.

A Letter to My Pittsburgh Peers

2009-12-31T21:00:00.002-05:00

Dear Musicians & Friends,

I just wanted to send you a note of appreciation for all of your creativity this year. Whether I saw you at the Open Stage while hosting, or shared a bill with you, or trotted out to hear one of your shows this year as a listener, I have been inspired by your music and lyrics, your tenacity, and your contribution to the music scene in the city.

I recently ran into a Pittsburgh artist that decided to hang it up, for good reasons. The DIY culture has become a mandate of sorts, leaving many of us less time to create. Sometimes this can inspire you to go harder, and sometimes it can make you feel like you're in a crazy hamster wheel. The stress of having to do it all inspires different responses in different people. This artist decided it was time to leave. I'm on the edge, I guess.

My body crapped out on me in late summer. After some diagnostic efforts we figured a major part of what happened was a little something called Adrenal Fatigue. It took years to develop, I bet, and I had never heard of it before. I suspect, though, that many a DIY artist is especially susceptible to this syndrome. You may or may not be one. I hope you are not.

Anyhow, I'm looking at the world from a different angle. It's pretty freakin' great and it makes me grateful to be alive. It makes me do odd things like turn down First Night gigs on New Year's Eve, and write letters instead just to say I think you're on The Good Road, walking it in your own way.

I look forward to hearing your new songs and your old favorites in 2010.

My best wishes to you,

Heather

Happy Holidays

2009-12-24T07:42:00.001-05:00

Well, it's been quite some time since I've written. I've been thrown into a really intense few months of internal work, healing from some chronic illness, and evaluating my sense of vocation around being an artist. Mostly I'm tired, but lately I do find myself waking up and thinking about songs...which I hope means that I'll be back making music soon.

I heard of the passing of one of the wonderful people who booked me this year. It's amazing how short life is, and how one minute a person can exist physically in the world and then they don't.

In this cycle of life and death and life, I hope you are spending the holiday season with ones you love and who love you. Here's to a fine year in 2010, year of the tiger. I wish you safe and warm darkest days.

NW Tour Cancelled

2009-09-11T22:51:00.000-04:00

Most of you who may follow my musical activities already know I had to cancel my NW performances due to illness. The healing process is taking a really long time, but today I didn't feel worse...so that's a good sign.

2009-08-27T07:39:00.000-04:00

Well, I'm two weeks away from my first tour of the Pacific Northwest. It's been years in coming. So why now?

A number of months ago now, I had a chance encounter with an intuitive astrologer, who rather quickly blew me away with his perceptive interpretation of my chart. His first statement to me was, "So, you're thinking about moving." to which I replied, "I'm always thinking about moving." How did he know?

I had never heard of the concept that some places on the planet are better or worse for individuals, but it makes sense seeing that astrology is all about the placement and relationship of objects. He plugged some numbers into his computer and up popped a cool chart of the USA with lines running over it. The worst U.S. location is the north/south line running through State College, PA (sorry State College), but the best is the Pacific Northwest. And that's where I was born.

I was nearing the completion of my album at the time and promised myself that an album loosely musing about hearth & home deserves some live performance in the best location in country. Maybe somehow the songs will make more sense there, as they often make little sense to me here. And so, here I am and here I go.

2009-04-25T09:17:00.000-04:00

Wrote a new song last week. Here are the lyrics...

Mile Marker

Your gaze is like a tiger lily

I can feel your petals brush my shoulder blades

Feels like youth, like warmer weather

Like all the colors run together

Mile Marker

Stepping stone or hearth stone

We're all on our own

When it comes to making peace

My days, I spend them in cafes

Casual conversation, one more cup of coffee

Keeps me hanging 'round

Wearing your insights like hand-me-downs

Somewhere between here and New York City

I noticed that you had turned away

It's giving me that instantly familiar feeling

Razor blades confetti my reason

I play the mending game

Mile marker...

Is this my stepping stone, my hearth stone?

Either way I never meant to put roots down where I roam

'Cause when you go

They make that tender tearing sound

When you go

They give so easily

'Til there's nothing left to win

There's nothing here but me

Your gaze is a tiger lily

But I bought my bouquet here in this city

And this morning I take my roses

Like I take my chances

Like I take my

Mile Markers

Mile marker....

2009-04-24T21:39:00.000-04:00

A few weekends ago I was visiting family in Chicago. It was a beautiful and unusual warm day with no wind. We went to visit Cloud Gate. This is taken looking up inside the sculpture.

Pittsburgh Places

2009-03-12T07:40:00.000-04:00

I've been starting to carry my camera around with me again as a way to remember to see my environment instead of living in my head.

I took the EBA downtown the other day and got off one stop early. This former train station has always moved me.

Sunstar Women in Music Festival

2009-03-07T15:04:00.000-05:00

I've been really encouraged by the presentations at this festival this weekend. I got to perform on Thursday at the opening mixer with Joy Ike, Boca Chica and Bianca Atterberry, but didn't stick around because I was so moved by some things that LaShonda K. Barnett shared in her talk "Women of Thunder..."

Things to consider: women vocalists aren't "just singers", to be an artist means to be a disciple (discipline is embedded in the word), and the muse will visit those who are practicing and open to it.

Today I was part of a panel on "Strategies for Success". I feel like right now I'm in a weird transition or re-evaluation of who I am as an artist and why, and so it was a humbling experience to be asked to share what I know. The clearest truth that looms in my life right now: love the process, listen to my intuition.

New Album

2009-02-07T19:35:00.001-05:00

After about 2 years of working on this project with Randy, we finally released Hestia. It's been a labor of love, really, and a very personal journey into how much I can strip away without leaving the song too bare.

I was thrilled to work with Vince Camut, Keith Hershberger, Garrett Haines, Dave Brown, Benny Benack, Paul Tebachneck and others.

If you'd like to hear the album (or buy the CD or download songs!) you can visit my CD Baby page.