NEW START

"The creative adult is the child who survived.”

Quote from Ursula Le Guin

One side of a gessoed signature

Reverse side of gessoed signature
(each signature is folded in the middle and
on the fold you can see in the photo.)

Sitting next to a pile of torn paper, some with marks made with marking pens, fountain pens, and colored inks and others from watercolor failures, I realized that in the last year and a half, I hadn't done much "messy creative" work. Because of our move and all the unpacking and sorting, I had limited myself to watercolor and hand lettering exercises, both techniques that are for me not usually messy, and are more disciplined and intentional than other techniques I've used. My messy art-self felt sleepy and stiff as I looked for ways to apply torn bits of paper, scrawled lines of paint, brushed ink across gessoed paper, and splattered diluted ink across paper. My body was remembering the fun of being messy and the results that occur when I'm not trying to fit letters between two lines or merge one color of paint carefully with another. All of these processes, the careful and the messy, make me a better artist, but I had neglected the fun part for too long.

One side of second signature

Reverse side of second signature

After finishing two online mixed media classes, I combined the techniques from both classes to start an art book. The class that began this combined project was Andrea Chebeleau's Creative Practices Journal. The journal is intended to be made over a year with each signature representing a month's work. My book instead will be finished after four signatures by the end of January. (Once I get going, it is hard to stop.) The first instruction for the journal was to take 12 manila folders and cover them with gesso. When I read that instruction, I realized I would have a hard time covering the 12 pieces. I no longer have the space where I can lay out that much material and roll gesso on all those folders at once. I limited myself to four folders instead. I then used the gessoed folders to paste the mark-making papers that I had created in Crystal Marie's Rust and Alchemy class.

Two complete signatures of my Creative Practices Journal

I returned to making art while we lived in Japan and I took a botanical illustration class. As I washed over the paper with watercolors and pushed the paint to the edges of the flower petals, I realized I could still do the work. The class motivated me to get out my rusty supplies again. 

Botanical illustration in watercolor

Once back in California, I hoped to combine my writing work with my artwork and took a letterpress class at the Center for the Book in San Francisco. Though I loved doing the slow, meditative process of setting up a press to print, inking the press, and rolling sheets of paper through, I wondered how I could set up my own print shop, acquire all the equipment I would need, and find a place that needed my printed results. I also didn't want to limit my art activities just to printmaking. So I changed direction.

Letterpress booklet: "Do You Know Cats?"

I took some classes in mixed media, eco-printing, calligraphy, and watercolor. I found taking classes to be an important part of my process of discovery. Working around other creatives stimulates me in new directions. I've taken online classes from teachers in Uzbekistan and the Netherlands, and from many parts of the United States. These classes have introduced me to ideas that I might not have considered without the exposure to ideas from people from around the world. In the process of taking classes, I've refined what I want to do in art: make art books, paint with watercolor and other water-based media, practice hand lettering, and produce mixed media constructions. I am not one to focus on just one technique so I will never be a master of any. But at this point in my life, I want to have fun with these creative endeavors.

Ikegai: Making your life worthwhile

My one piece of advice for the new year: 

Stretch yourself by taking a class

***************

Watch how to letterpress at Arion Press, San Francisco:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1xKcRrn_i4

Find a calligraphy teacher here:

https://www.friendsofcalligraphy.org

Andrea Chebeleau, mixed media artist:

https://aworkofheart.com/pages/about

Amy Maricle, art therapist and slow drawer:

https://mindfulartstudio.com

Lindsey Bugbee, calligrapher, offers online calligraphy lessons:

https://thepostmansknock.boldermail.com/w/9OJUlEcWYZ763uRwgugadZzw/BvbWS5U7630lcvBgpLldID9w/JZlnihpOEy5OblHAe2obwg

Rachel Hazell, bookbinder:  (I haven't taken her class, but her website is beautiful. She lives in Scotland)

https://www.thetravellingbookbinder.com/2025/11/2026-preview/

Crystal Marie Neubauer, mixed media:

https://crystalneubauer.com/home.html

Ann Miller, calligrapher and mixed media artist:

https://www.pennib.com/teaching

Barbara Shapiro, basketweaving:

https://www.barbarashapiro.com

Mixed media artist, Donna Watson:

https://www.donnawatsonart.com

Sketchbook online class with Liz Steel (Australia):

https://www.lizsteel.com

Online learning from Vintage Page Design: Making books: 

https://vintagepagedesigns.com/5-easy-end-of-year-journal-spreads-for-reflection/?ck_subscriber_id=2585883933&utm_source=convertkit&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=What%20I%20Loved%20Reading%20(and%20Listening%20To)%20This%20Year%20-%2020144172&sh_kit=5b436953d24d1f0632344f3c23c683ac0fde615abf7081f76f87a15eeab984af

Have fun!

FIVE YEARS AGO

The majesty of mountains

Living in a city means that birds are a subtle part of our lives. We notice when we see a bush full of birds, we watch as seagulls soar, and we stop to look for the hawk, whose screech catches our attention. We used to sit in our backyard and watch as flocks of birds gobbled up the seeds at our feeders. We could identify each different species who either stopped on their migratory path or nested in our backyard. In the city, birds are rare in comparison.

Bill and I have made a lot of changes in the last five years. We've downsized and moved from a suburb to a city. We've adapted to the changes and often joke about how everything in our new home needs to be much smaller than in our previous place. An article in the NY Times reminded me how much life on Earth has changed in the same time frame. The article described how the beaks of juncos that live in urban Los Angeles have adapted to the different food, such as bread and pizza, they find in the city instead of the seeds and insects they hunt for in the wild. Juncos are those small birds with white breasts, mottled feathers and a black hood dropped over their heads that flit about in backyards and forests. During the pandemic, their beaks changed back to their natural shape because the urban food sources disappeared. Now researchers have found that the juncos are once again adapting back to urban life and their beaks are changing shape again.

Mt. Shasta with snow

Five years ago, we were just at the start of the COVID pandemic, which disrupted life on Earth. Do you remember the silent, empty streets, the people standing at windows banging drums or singing, the body bags piling up outside of hospitals, and the skies clear of smog? The more natural world changed in response to the lack of human presence. Birds modified the volume of their songs, and animals ventured in places that people had abandoned. All manner of changes occurred. When the vaccines eased the threat of the pandemic and we got back to our normal life, we shoved aside the memories of the pandemic though we are still feeling its effects. Many people hated the isolation and/or the confined space of the pandemic. Their anger has been released in small town gatherings and in our federal government. Our mean streak has been flourishing.

2025 has proved how important the understanding of history can be. We look back and see cycles of progress and retrenchment. Our Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights, which have lain under glass in Washington, D.C. for so long, have become the defining must-read of the year. Some of us carry a copy with us. Some of us have read the documents for the first time. Some of us have re-read the three documents again. Small concerned groups have mushroomed all over the country to protect those documents, their meaning and people protected by them.We worry about how our democracy will survive. I think of the juncos and their ability to adapt and learn and hope we can keep the founding ideas of freedom, equality, justice, and opportunity for all alive in 2026 and beyond.

***************

Changes in juncos' beaks:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/12/15/science/covid-ecology-anthropause-birds.html 

Read the Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights here:

https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs

AN ORDINARY KITCHEN TABLE

How do artists create something extraordinary from something ordinary? What would you do with pieces of wire, felt, plastic netting, zippers, bobbins, pull tabs, flossers, and shells? To create something with these disparate objects needs a combination of discipline and abandon along with being able to seeing something from a different point of view.

Last summer, the Ruth Asawa exhibition at the deYoung Museum in San Francisco (now moved to NYC) provided viewers a showcase of all of Asawa's art interests including her meticulous drawings of natural elements to woven wire sculptures. The exhibit also included examples of her teachings within her community to develop creative thinking in everyone. The exhibit invited us into Asawa's home, which had numerous woven art projects hanging from the rafters while unfinished work lay on a long wood table constructed by her architect husband, Albert Lanier.

The table reminded me of sitting at our kitchen table as a young child, mostly unaware of the world around me. Our table, unlike Asawa's, was one of those linoleum and shiny metal tubing tables popular in the 1950s and 60s and took up most of the space in the kitchen nook. We ate our meals there, saving the maple dining table for Sunday dinners and special events. We watched our mom making Sandbakelses, a Norwegian Christmas cookie, that took her all day to form in small, fluted tin cups. The table became the place where we did homework together, told stories and argued with each other, and answered the phone set on the counter next to the table. My sister and I made paper sculpture ornaments based on origami to hang in the windows and on our Christmas tree. We weren't a family that was allowed to leave stacks of books or collect mounds of stray papers on the table. When not in use for meals or projects, the table was swept clean.

String Art assignment I used to give my students

Ruth Asawa's kitchen table now rests at Ruth's Table, an art class and exhibition space connected to the Bethany Senior Center and Front Porch organization in San Francisco. The center, founded by Lola Fraknoi and supported by Asawa, has an exhibit of basket weavers' work (today is the last day) that uses all the supplies listed in the first paragraph of this post.

Basketweaving is a craft that requires the same meticulous attention to detail that calligraphy and origami need. The baskets on display include a wide range of shapes, including some that test the limits of the word, "Basket." One flat piece is made from woven computer cables and another is made from wire and the horsehair from old violin bows. Another incorporates indigo and persimmon dyed paper into a basket shape made from dyed Japanese Sedori cane.

The two exhibits are also a reminder of our past. Ruth Asawa's family, separated from their father, were sent to our internment camps during WWII. Her retrospective exhibit shows  her resilience during that time and as she said, "...good things come through adversity."

During her stay at the camp, she spent most of her time drawing and painting. She was given a scholarship by the Quaker Japanese American Student Relocation Council that allowed her to leave the camp to attend art school in Wisconsin. She didn't see her family again until the end of WWII. Her words about her time in the camp amaze me,

"I would not be who I am today had it not been for the Internment, and I like who I am."

***************

Visit Ruth's Table near the Mission in San Francisco

https://www.ruthstable.org

https://ruthstable.viewingrooms.com/viewing-room/ 

https://densho.org/learn/introduction/american-concentration-camps/

***************

****************

A shout out to the people of America who stand up for friends nd neighbors:

https://open.substack.com/pub/thebulwark/p/the-americans-who-stood-up-for-immigrants-in-2025?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

MARVELS

A speck, something smaller than a grain of sand, wandered over my grocery list tablet on our kitchen counter. I looked twice to be sure of what I saw. An insect so small that if I hadn't been staring at the paper trying to remember what I needed to add to my grocery list, it would have gone unobserved. I asked myself, "What could be that small and still exist and not be a microbe? Did I really see it?" A couple of days later, the same-sized insect scooted across my paper tablet again. It made me think of all the living things we cannot see or haven't found yet. According to NPR, there are over 2.5 million species on Earth, and many more thousands still undiscovered.

Human beings have long elevated themselves about other creatures on our planet. We have thought we were the only species to use tools, speak in languages, and employ complex problem solving skills. Scientists are finding more and more species who do the same. Crows use tools, other birds weave intricate nests, monkeys give out different warning signals to their group depending on whether danger is coming from the air, a tree, or the ground, and puffer fish inscribe in the sand beautiful 3-dimensional patterns that will become nests for the eggs the female lays and the male tends.

Perhaps one trait we have, our imagination, would be hard to verify in other species. Our imagination has helped us to tell stories and to invent new ways of living. Where else but our imagination would we find creatures such as the trolls in Norse fairy tales and the Lilliputians from Gulliver's Travels or Pokemon or a Kraken? I thought of those mythical creatures while I stood in line at the cafe at the Legion of Honor and looked up at a group of shiny figures above the coffee machines, display cabinets and stacks of china cups on the counters. Each assemblage, called Mimmos by Rosalia Baltazar Shoemaker, their creator, was made from small implements used in a kitchen. Scattered throughout the rest of the room were more of these fanciful creatures constructed from tart tins, colanders, utensils, and shiny stainless steel bowls. I thought of toddlers who love to play with all those kinds of tools, banging on pans, building structures, and cutting shapes from dough. I wondered if at night these figures come out to play. In a museum that showcases the talents and skills of great artists (right now, a comparison of Manet and Morisol), what a treat to find such whimsical beings created from someone's playful imagination of today.

Wikipedia's List of legendary creatures: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_legendary_creatures_by_type

Watch this video to see an amazing task done by a puffer fish:

A pufferfish makes a nest:  https://ca.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/a-pufferfishs-masterpiece/a-pufferfishs-masterpiece/ 

NEW WAYS OF SEEING

I have two sisters and more than a dozen cousins. We share a dry sense of humor, creativity, and curiosity. Recently, two of my relatives said something that made me pause and appreciate them even more. My closest sister Linda answered my question about favorite seasons by saying, "Favorite season? I've had that question before and have never been able to answer. Each season has its goodness and its badness. I think I welcome the change each season brings, not the season itself."

Donna Kaulkin, a writer friend (though I think of her as part of my extended family), answered in the opposite way: "When I lived on the East Coast, it was autumn, the raucous beauty and the nip in the air. Or maybe summer, when I could swim in the ocean and have fun on the boardwalk with friends and where I met my husband. Or maybe winter when we were snowed in, cozy and rosy, until cabin fever swept in. Or spring? Ah, spring--ask the poets." 

I had been so focused on one season as a response that I didn't think in those two different directions. Sure, I always pick autumn as my favorite season, but Linda and Donna offered other perspectives, the time when the seasons change, and the beauty and memories of each season.

"Autumn"  
 a painting made from failed watercolors by Martha Slavin

Janet, a cousin, sent our first card of the holiday season. It was a simple looking email with its edges decorated in nature. She asked, "What books am I grateful for?" the first question of a thoughtful advent calendar she has designed. I was taken aback by the question, just as I had been to the responses from my sister and my friend about the seasons.

I had thought of books that influenced my life, such as Mary Poppins and Jane Eyre for their depiction of strong women, spiritual texts that offered moral guidance, and The Wild Places and Wild Comfort, two books that showed me to look and think deeper about the natural word. My list includes all the original writings, such as Dante's Divine Comedy and Cervantes' Don Quixote, from my college humanities classes that broaden my view of the world, and books about writing by Natalie Goldberg,  Perrine's Sound and Sense and Koch's Wishes, Lies, and Dreams, which I used as a teacher and to develop my own writing. I hadn't thought of the idea of being grateful for those books. I knew their value in shaping my life, but now I can say thank you to those authors who came into my thoughts through their words on a page.

***************

Here's a chance to read some of Donna Kaulkin's stories. You will be better for it!

https://donnatellsstories.com/category/stories/

Other writers that I have mentioned before:

Robert MacFarlane, The Wild Places

Kathleen Dean Moore, Wild Comfort

Dante, Divine Comedy

Cervantes, Don Quixote

Natalie Goldberg, Writing Done the Bones,

Kenneth Koch, Wishes, Lies, and Dreams

Laurence Perrine, Sound and Sense

November's Window View

 

WHAT IS OLD IS NEW AGAIN

Groups of crows circling the city looking for a place to roost
  by Bill Slavin

A block and a half away from us sits South Park, a small park lined with two and three story buildings. It's a surprise to find the park among what was once the industrial side of San Francisco.  Built in 1855, the park was in the middle of a block of mansions and townhouses for the wealthy. It later became the hub of the Japanese American community. After the 1906 earthquake and fire when much of the housing in the area was destroyed, small commercial buildings replaced much of the housing except for the Madrid Hotel, which remains today. Immigrants from other places moved in. In the late 20th century, small tech start-ups, including Twitter, occupied the block-long space. The park's buildings occupancy followed the boom and bust era of tech start-ups and COVID.

While we were looking for a good cup of coffee near our new home in South Beach, we discovered Blue Bottle cafe, a local coffee brand start-up since acquired by Nestle, housed in an old brick building at one end of the park. With our coffees in hand, we wandered down the park, savoring the greenery and tall trees that shaded the block. Many of the windows of the buildings displayed For Lease signs, the result of the COVID pandemic that decimated so many small businesses in San Francisco and elsewhere.

The park is a quiet, peaceful place against the noise of the city. At the other end of the park, children climb the undulating rope structure and hop onto swings. We sat in the park and watched a few people come out of the buildings at lunch to sit together around one of the round metal tables that dot the park. We thought back to our own work life working full time. Bill rarely had time for lunch and worked long hours, and I ate lunch within a crowded, stuffy staff room and played Hearts with other teachers, but spent most of my time in my classroom. Company/school camaraderie came mostly from off-site events such as seminars, yearly picnics, or holiday parties.

Since we first arrived in the neighborhood last spring, we noticed that Blue Bottle now has a line out its solid wooden door and groups of young people emerge from more and more of the buildings, and fewer For Lease signs hang from windows. Trucks with construction equipment park at the curbs and the construction noises can be heard from inside the buildings. The park seems to be coming back to life again.

Knowledge is Golden
By Bill Slavin

We laugh a little when we see the groups of tech bros walking to lunch. They are young and eagerly talk in a tech language we no longer comprehend. They are mostly tech "bros" with maybe one or two women walking in the groups. We wonder about what has changed or not changed that there are so few women as part of these groups. We overheard one group recently complaining that their company is now requiring them to return full time to the office, giving up remote work for the need to develop a company culture and better idea exchange, concepts that were so important when we were working.

We've noticed that some neighborhoods in San Francisco such as the Marina, Chestnut Street, Potrero Hill, and Union Street are thriving. These busy districts are easily accessible by public transportation, have buildings that are one-to-three stories that don't dominate the streets. The streets are narrow enough that traffic doesn't speed through the district, and they are tree-lined. Other parts of the city haven't rebounded as quickly. I look at their empty places and think that we need to find new uses for those first floor rooms. 

Pier 70
by Bill Slavin

Walking along the SF Bay Trail, we are heartened to see the development occurring along the Bay. Around Crane Cove old industrial buildings that used to house shipbuilders have been turned into new work spaces and spaces for restaurants and physical fitness, keeping the inside structures intact. I think about how difficult it would be to plan housing, work spaces, transportation, and other activities in one area. It would be hard to get it right, but the people who built South Park came up with a good solution: a park, a few eateries, trees, and "people-sized" buildings that encourage people to find a place there.

*****************

Something to think about this week:

Andrew Wyeth:

"I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape -- the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn't show."

What is your favorite season and why?

 Martin Luther King, Jr.: 

"People fail to get along because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don't know each other; they don't know each other because they have not communicated with each other."

How hard is it to follow this idea?

CHANGES

The changes in the seasons are minimal in San Francisco. Like in Spring, the weather slips back and forth from the heat of summer to chilly weather with just a taste of autumn in the wind. This year, before the trees turned brilliant fall colors, a strong wind and rainstorm blew most of the leaves down. The brownish leaves skittered across the streets and sidewalks and piled up against the buildings.

We've noticed in our neighborhood that the sun becomes the main indicator of change. The sun has shifted to be more northeast than straight east in the morning. We are getting reflected light from skyscrapers through our windows in the morning that the sun hasn't touched before and we see the long, dark shadows created by the slant of the sun in the afternoon.

One of my aunts kept track of the weather each day. She and my uncle were farmers so that was important information for them. I keep track of other things: what I eat, my weight, books I've read, and movies we've watched. Like my aunt, doing something on a daily basis works for me.  Time and the changes that come with it are threads that run through my art and writing.

This week I decided to take objects from my collection of art supplies and pieces of nature I've picked up and do a drawing or painting each day for 30 days. I want to concentrate on the shadows because the shadows are often the most interesting mix of colors. I am keeping each design simple so that I can complete the painting or drawing in one sitting. Creating a good painting, for me, depends on a good drawing underneath.

Crows live in San Francisco and they also seem to have daily practices. Usually, we see solitary ones perched on light poles or on the railings on the Embarcadero. In the last weeks of October as the sun began to set, masses of crows started circling in a wide aerial path through the city. They landed for a few minutes on the billboard north of us or stood on the edges of roofs. They are more than a murder of crows, more like a dark storm, as they sweep through the spaces between skyscrapers. They are not as disciplined as a murmuration of starlings because they don't follow a leader or a pattern of flight. Our first sighting made both of us anxious as they plunged and cawed near our windows. Was this an invasion?

At 5:30 P.M. they all land for a few moments and then just as mysteriously as they arrived, they are gone. We wonder where they go at night and why they have suddenly started circling the city. As night falls earlier and earlier, we can still see them start to gather and hear their caws, but by 5:30 it is dark and we can't see the crows circle through the city anymore. Time and change are always constant.

***************

If you care about gun safety and violence, you could work on a project to complete 30 origami boxes in 30 days. You will be participating in the Soul Box Project.

See one column of many of the boxes here:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C6IO996Lllb/?hl=en 

or on Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/soulboxproject/