35 minutes minnehaha off leash dog park 75 degrees
A shorter walk because of the heat and the aggressive energy from other dogs. Lots of very fast running and circling and barking. Two dogs ran by me so close, I could feel their wind on my legs. As we walked, we could hear a chorus of LOUD barks up ahead — one so loud that it was echoing.
dog name: Chief / a big German Shepherd / on a leash, tightly controlled by his owner. Of course Delia teased the dog before we had a chance to stop her. The owner held on tight and managed to keep the dog under control — no chief, no! I wondered to FWA if they had recently adopted an abused dog who needed a lot of help getting socialized to other dogs.
The sand in the floodplain was deep and soft. I could feel it seeping into my sandals. It was cool, which was nice until it got stuck and collected under my covered toes. These are not the shoes to wear here! I declared to FWA. Why did I buy hiking sandals with a closed toe? I remember: they were half off.
Before Chief shifted the energy, FWA was giving a wonderful description of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid 4 animated movie. He’s so skilled at telling stories and conveying the energy of the characters. My favorite part: when he acted out the voice of one of the characters who broke their compass. That’s it. We’re lost.
Even though she was tired and hot, having plopped down in the sand at least once, when Delia saw some bigger dogs up ahead running in circles around a tree and through some grass, she tried to join in. She wasn’t fast enough. When she tried harder, they ignored her. Oh Delia, you’re out of your league. Finally, she gave up.
moment of joy: a tall Dad holding the hand of a very little girl (2 or 3?) as she looked up at him smiling or giggling and hiked down the hill gracefully.
11 Unhinged Energy Things
the moment Chief’s owners noticed us up ahead and prepared themselves for the encounter — the woman took a deep breath and said, it will be okay or get ready or we can do this
that sand! — so soft and deep and slippery — the coolness of it as it poured into my sandal
kerplunk! crash! a very large something thrashing through the water — a big dog, I thought — no, 2 or 3 big dogs
an owner calling to a dog (I can’t remember the dogs name) and the dog running as fast as I’ve ever seen a dog run. Wow!
two big dogs running beside then past me — any closer and they would have taken me out
BARK! BARK! yip yip bark bark ruff ruff — the cacophony of dogs up ahead, playing or fighting or who knows what at the beach at the end of the trail
a strange and loud knocking or clanking sound up above us, in the tree
dog after dog after big dog, flashing past, some barking, some silent — somehow the silent ones felt even more unnerving
dumping sand out of my sandals near the car, feeling something strange and sticky on the bottom of my foot that wouldn’t come off — a bug?! — a slight panic and a frantic waving of my foot– realizing minutes later that I had put a bandaid on last night
FWA driving us back on the river road — a car that was going 12 mph in a 20 mph zone that hardly anyone ever obeys — average speed for most cars here = 30 mph — a growing back-up of cars behind it — FWA turning off of the road at the first available chance with a flourish and declaring, someone needs their license taken away!
encountering a truck on a narrow city street, noticing a low-to-the-ground recumbent bike drafting off it then trying to pass it while the truck was still moving — FWA was so distracted that he pulled out in front of another truck
3.1 miles trestle turn around 69 degrees humidity: 74%
The earliest run I’ve done in some time — 7:30, which is not that early. I liked running earlier. Next time, I’d like to run by 7. Greeted Mr. Morning! for the first time in months. All year, I’ve been running later in the morning or early in the afternoon, so I’ve missed seeing all of the regulars.
The other day I remembered that I had a pair of Saucony Cohesions that I’ve only wore a handful of times because they made one of my toes hurt. I wondered if they would work better (that is, hurt less) than my Brooks’ Ghosts. Yes! Ever since I wore an old pair of Saucony’s to mow the lawn, I’ve been thinking about returning to Saucony’s for my marathon training. Maybe I’ll buy a new pair; they’re less than half the price of the Brooks shoes, and they’re navy with light pink soles.
10 Things
the Welcoming Oaks — tall, green
boom boom — construction noise from across the river
clank clank clank — something banging/being banged below the trestle
the crack just north of the trestle is shifting and growing — what once was a crack became a trench, and now a ledge — orange cones all around it as warning
someone was sitting at the sliding bench
a walker in a bright yellow jacket — were they a rower heading down to the rowing club?
the parkway was buzzing with cars commuting to work
bright headlights from an approaching bike
a lone honk from a goose somewhere below
a man and a dog crossing the path then entering a steep trail down to the river through small hole in the wall of green
later in the day: Watching a video about her life as a pro runner, Lauren Gregory said this: “Consistency isn’t just about showing up when things are going well; it’s about building a life that allows you to keep showing up.” For Gregory, this means routine.
I really like combining Gregory’s idea of life-building practices routines with Des Linden’s famous call to keep showing up:
hike: 50 minutes minnehaha off leash dog park 77 degrees
A warm, but not as warm as I thought it would be, hike. It started with irritation: a guy standing with his dog right in front of the entrance, blocking the way in, barely moving enough to let us by. Why? We both wondered what he was doing and why, out of all of the places he could be waiting, he was standing right in front of the gate.
Most of the rest of the hike was good. FWA reported on all of the theories about Subnautica 2, and discussed how thoughtful the creators of the game are in their early release — hardly any bugs and a well-developed story. When he mentioned that the area where a huge tree lived was called Xanadu, I asked him if the creators of the game named it that as a more general reference to the pop culture idea of Xanadu, or the poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Kubla Kahn. He thought it was possible they were referencing the poem. All I could remember from it was most of the first 2 lines: In Xanadu, did Kubla Kahn —- decree.
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea. So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round; And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills, Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree; And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.
But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover! A savage place! as holy and enchanted As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman wailing for her demon-lover! And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing, A mighty fountain momently was forced: Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher’s flail: And mid these dancing rocks at once and ever It flung up momently the sacred river. Five miles meandering with a mazy motion Through wood and dale the sacred river ran, Then reached the caverns measureless to man, And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean; And ’mid this tumult Kubla heard from far Ancestral voices prophesying war! The shadow of the dome of pleasure Floated midway on the waves; Where was heard the mingled measure From the fountain and the caves. It was a miracle of rare device, A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!
A damsel with a dulcimer In a vision once I saw: It was an Abyssinian maid And on her dulcimer she played, Singing of Mount Abora. Could I revive within me Her symphony and song, To such a deep delight ’twould win me, That with music loud and long, I would build that dome in air, That sunny dome! those caves of ice! And all who heard should see them there, And all should cry, Beware! Beware! His flashing eyes, his floating hair! Weave a circle round him thrice, And close your eyes with holy dread For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise.
dog name: I didn’t hear any dog names directly, but I think I heard a woman, who sounded exasperated, calling to her dog down by the water, Scarlet! Scarlet! Come here!
my 2 favorite sounds: First, the bullfrogs. As we neared the end of the trail, at the beach, I could hear the loud buzz of the frogs. The noise was coming from the other side of the water, where the river turns into a creek that winds through a section of the floodplain forest. Second, Delia’s thundering feet. As Delia ran past me, I could hear her little paws pounding the ground — on sand, then grass, then firmer dirt. I love that sound!
holes / strings
I’m continuing to work on my found poems project, but I’d like to wrap it up so I can spend the summer with water. What I need to do now is document my process so that I can remember what I was doing when I pick it back up in the fall. Will I be able to stop, or will I keep working on it regardless of my intentions? We’ll see.
Before I stop, I’d like to get some orange thread — regular + embroidery — and experiment with incorporating it into my otherwise black and white (and gray) visual poems.
I’d also like to figure out the words for my poem using a NYer essay reviewing memoirs by daughters about their fraught relationships with their mothers. In my version, mother = word, and it’s about my fraught relationship with seeing/reading/making sense of the written word.
a few hours later: As I worked on finding words in the essay, phrases and fragments kept popping up, then an idea came to me: Pick out a few of these phrases, which offer a way to describe my experiences reading, particularly in terms of how words connect me to the world. Pair a phrase with one of the spiders-on-drugs webs that has been inspiring me. Map the words on a panel, create the spider web over it. I love the idea; can I actually make it?
Some of the webs are easier than others; all of them seem too much to try without some sort of help. One of Chuck Close’s grids?! I definitely want to do the caffeine web, but I think I should start with something easier, like marijuana:
drug-induced webs
I also want to do “sleeping pills” — especially since I often fall asleep while I’m reading!
spider on sleeping pills makes web
I think I’ll do 3 or 4. Here are the phrases I want to refine/condense:
1
When the forms are too fuzzy I escape into coordinates
note: I like the idea of this and the linking of coordinates to the grid and mapping and my desire to find concrete ways to locate my vision loss, but I’m not sure it makes enough sense as is. I’ll keep thinking about it.
2
the ordinariness of language lost
3
gaze — an act of creation and of demolition — made hole again
4
nothing, subdued, entangled
5
shadows and absences born certainty died (or ruptured?)
6
kinship between eye, world, word confounded threads twisted, knotted, cut
run: 8 miles around lake nokomis and back 62 degrees humidity: 86%
A long run with Scott. 8 miles this week. It felt easier than the 7 miles last week. The only problem: my feet. About 4 miles in, I noticed my socks were bunching up and under the ball of my feet, which was painful and made me alter my gait. Next time: different socks.
I started the conversation with Alice in Wonderland and the scene with the Cheshire Cat; it’s an inspiration for my found poem about landing in the logic of blur and almost. Scott talked about his YouTube channel — the main one and one of his secondary channels that he jokingly created for one of the gnomes in our backyard. I also talked about shifting my perspective on my unfinished business problem: not trying to avoid it, but learning how to accept and manage it while I’m running. What else did Scott talk about? A lot, I just can’t remember what.
10 Things
the green looked and felt greener, the brown richer and darker after last night’s rain
birds! so much birdsong everywhere and all the time
a mini-ambulance parked on minnehaha parkway, a Ghostbusters logo painted on the side
an older man with a cane calling out to us as we ran around the lake — the birds are attacking me! Just then, a bird swooped down on him
a little dog with a big, fluffy tail, shaking their butt as they walked
the view of the lake from the cedar avenue bridge: completely still, the reflection of ascending plane travelling across it
puddles — most of them on the lake trail
stopping at the port-a-potty near the little beach: no toilet paper in either one
more benches than last year set up around the stage at the falls — Scott guessed that they start out with a lot, but the number dwindles over the course of the summer as the benches get broken, I wondered if people stole them
the view near the bench above the edge of the world is gone until next fall, now it’s a wall of green green green
hike: an hour minnehaha off-leash dog park 61 degrees
The air was cool, but thick down in the floodplain. The ground was soft and firm, in some spots muddy. So many birds! I wish I would have had my phone and recorded them. Hardly anyone was at the park — because of last night’s rain? and today’s humidity? The few cars were all parked on the one side of the parking lot. No one, including FWA, wanted to be the first to park on the other side. The surface of the water was covered in some sort of scum. When we got closer we realized what it was: seeds.
dog names: Dolly (or Ollie), Squirrel, and ? — I can’t remember the name of the Corgi we encountered.
We talked about the social life of birds and Subnautica 2 and delighted in Delia’s joy. I noticed she seemed to be leaping more as she ran; we agreed that it was probably because of the firmer ground.
added the next morning: I forgot to mention the moss, or was it lichen?, that I studied on the side of some big trees down in the floodplain. Very cool — an intense green covering the soft and wet bark on one side, while dry and rough bark was on the other side.
The greens and browns were enchanting. So were the birds. And the quiet — so peaceful and still.
And today, after months of focusing almost exclusively on my “how I read”/ holes poems, here’s a bit of a beautiful poem from Tracy K. Smith:
My son listens into daylight, head tilted, eyes tuned past the range of the seen.
What he seeks to see is vibratory. A butterfly’s itch. The pitch at which a mind
is freed to dart, spark, break into flight. His gaze rakes space. What does his ear see? Beads
of breath rising from the body of a bee. A whiff of rain batting a new green leaf. I watch him—
What does his ear see? I like the images of hearing in this poem.
hole 4b
Yesterday, I spent some more time with my found poem inspired by a specimen board. It’s slowly coming together, but I have more work (thinking, executing) to do with it.
So far, I’ve cut the words out of the essay, leaving holes where they were. I printed out the words — in sizes according to their importance. I also cut out labels for each word, with the poem position and location. I need to figure out how I’d like to put the “board” on the panels — glue the labels directly on the page along with the pinned words OR make this board on a different page to be placed over the existing text. It would be easier (and less risky) to do it on a separate page, but I like the idea of doing it directly on the panels.
I took some pictures to document my progress:
here’s the board with the words arranged by size with their labelsHere are the 4 panels of the essay. The big space where there are no holes is where the “board” will be placedI was inspired by the Manitoba Museum picture I posted the other day to take this one
Today, I began working on it some more, but it is dark outside today and I mostly rely on natural light to see in my studio space, so no more cutting or drawing or pasting for me today. Maybe it isn’t just the light; after my 8 mile run and hour long hike, I’m tired!
hole 3
Before running this morning, I thought a little more about another hole that is in the preliminary stage. The text involves the phrases, land in the logic of blur and almost and glitching just enough to scramble what’s real and imagined. I think the Cheshire Cat could be inspiration for these lines. How? Visually, I’m not quite sure yet, but I’m struck by the cat’s song at the beginning. The words sound like words, and they’re almost English, but they’re not quite. And the cat appears in varying degrees of visibility: just a mouth, a full body, indented footprints in the dirt.
“Most everyone’s mad here. You may have noticed that I’m not all there myself”
The caterpillar scene was about words and language and As, Es, Is, Os, and Us; the Cheshire Cat scene seems to be about finding your way when you’re lost in a world of nonsense and madness (where madness = beyond/outside of logic, upside down). Yes, locating and being located. Reading and language helps locate us and us locate/orient ourselves. I’ll think some more about how the Cheshire scene might inspire me.
53 minutes minnehaha off-leash dog park 67 degrees
What joy to walk with my son and Delia-the-dog through this beautiful stretch of land beside the river. FWA set the tone by singing an awesome Sonic (video game) song about following your rainbow. Then, as we hiked down the hill beside a chainlink fence — the secret back way to the river that avoids the steps and a lot of the people/dog congestion — I was inspired by the dancing shadows to talk about how everything is always moving slightly in my vision. Almost like pixels, but not quite. FWA said that his vision is like that sometimes. Then he added that many people see that way, enough that it’s referenced (visually) in the video game, Tarkov. We talked about the fallibility of vision and the illusion that many people have about vision as seeing what is actually and exactly there, like looking through a camera lens. This led to a discussion of how most/many people struggle to understand or believe that a table can be there and not there, solid and more space than anything else. Which philosopher talked about the table as not existing? I can’t remember. Next: FWA brought up something he had read or watched about humans as quantum computers.
Just before that, as we lamented the fact that people often don’t have the capacity for holding both the there and the not-there of a desk simultaneously, FWA said, everyone thinks in such rigid ways, or something like that. I pointed out that his very statement was rigid by using the absolute word, everyone.
And then, we encountered Thor. Delia must have known, with her insistence on going down closer to the river, that someone special was there today. Or maybe it was FWA, with his willingness to agree and follow her today when he would normally refuse. Whoever knew, or didn’t, today we hiked down to the river sooner that we usually do and were greeted by the cutest, most wonderful, little ball of milk chocolate fur — a feisty little dog that chased Delia around, dragging his little leash through the sand, while his human giggled with delight. She said that this was his first time at the dog park. Somehow I knew to ask, what is your dog’s name?Thor, she said. Thor?! A perfect name, I think. Later I said to FWA, that was all I needed, my day has been made. Thanks Thor.
For the rest of the walk, I enjoyed hearing the birds and admiring the deep contrast between the rich brown of the trunks with the deepening greens of the leaves, all while listening to FWA describe the video game that came out this morning: Subnautica 2. It sounds very cool and FWA does such a great job of describing it. A flash of a thought/feeling: FWA is meant to make (at least one) amazing video game. The task: how to help him get to a place (mentally, physically) where he can do this.
As we left the dog park, I felt gratitude for getting to be at this park this morning with FWA and Delia and Thor, and hardly any bugs!
holes and flowers
I’ve decided I’m not finished with my shredded paper blooms, so I started working on more. I made some with no orange, then one with an orange dot the shape of my working central vision, then one that was all orange with the circle with the word of the poem at its center. Oh — I like this! Could I make an entire meadow of these flowers, mixing in the word blooms with other blooms?
I like these flowers and am excited that I was able to come up with this idea. I like how they look and the idea of the shredded word bloom as metaphor for reading and the relationship between word and meaning — taking the essay and literally shredding it, then constructing something new out of it.
a flash: As I making the blooms, jabbing the pin into the paper shreds, I thought about the collecting of butterflies and other bugs and then pinning them in a box to display. Not sure what to do with that, other than remember it for some possible future Sara.
hole 5a with more flowers
When I showed it to Scott, he liked how the green pin in the center of the white circle looks like an eye. That wasn’t totally intentional, which is very cool. I like how it’s an eye, too!
a playlist?
When RJP came over today, we talked about my blooms and she encouraged me to put together a playlist for the project. Fun! This playlist will be more complicated than past playlists, which have been focused on one, relatively clear, subject. This playlist will involve many subjects. Broadly, Holes is about how I read with a hole in my central vision. Three things echo throughout: 1. playing with words, 2. the hole in my vision visually represented by my blind spot (which I traced by staring at a blank wall), 3. the Amsler grid/lines/threads that map/connect words to meaning to worlds. Tomorrow, I’ll start putting it together.
50 minutes minnehaha off-leash dog park 53 degrees
Spring! Another beautiful dog park morning. Today it was calm and quiet, with a soft breeze. So many birds that I couldn’t identify. Soft sand, still water, no bugs. I talked about how great it would be to spend the entire day hiking then camping somewhere. No time or energy for worrying thoughts. FWA said that that was how band tour had always been for hime.
10 Things
the soft knocking of a woodpecker
a map of the dog park near a chain-link fence
a dog named Rosie whose grandmother was named Rosie
a HUGE tree trunk, stripped bare
green crawling up trunks — new leaves
big dogs suddenly appearing, running silenting through the trees at full speed
a litte dog, also quiet, chasing Delia then running off, then chasing her again
a field full of dandelions
the very strong smell of poop suddenly — FWA and I both checked our shoes to make sure we hadn’t stepped in something
feet sinking into soft sand, almost tripping on little rocks
hole 5a
My found text in the NYer essay, “Mystery Man” — a what is this? feeling grows as text blooms into nonsense — is the inspiration for my visual approach to Hole 5a. Each found word is the white center to a flower bloom made from petals cut out of the essay in the shape of my small, still functioning central vision. Yesterday, I cut out the petals (more practice with scissors! I’m getting better!) and the words. Today I need to figure out how to make the blooms. Here, making = creating an easy process for forming the bloom, gluing it together, arranging it on the pages, and affixing it to those pages. A key consideration: develop a process that is forgiving so that if I screw one bloom up I’m not screwing up the entire, 4 panel, poem.
With my vision, these blooms are much harder to create than I had anticipated. I can only see approximately how the should/could line up. Scott had a great idea: color them. Yes! I’ve decided to color the petals orange, using a colored pencil. Coloring them helps me to see them a little better, but I still need more practice on making them look good enough to use.
2 attempts at orange blooms
top: I had already glued the flower together when Scott suggested coloring them, so I had to color them as one.
bottom: I colored the petals separately, then glued them on a white sheet of paper, then glued on the word and cut the whole thing out.
More practice tomorrow. At first, I was discouraged at how hard it was to do this, and how bad my flowers looked, gut then I remembered I could practice and keep trying and they probably will look better.
I tried looking up “making paper flowers” online, but only YouTube videos came up, and those are almost impossible for me to follow with my bad vision. I’ll have to be more precise with my search. I decided to look up images of paper flowers — it was mostly screen shots from YouTube videos — and then I looked up images of flowers. A thought: My flower should be an easy, approximate shape — what about a circular shape with lots of small petals — this would be less about lining up petals abd more about texture.
Another thought: get inspired by looking up flowers. Find a shape that is visually interesting and that I can do! Yesterday, RJP got me flowers for mother’s day. Do any of these work?
mother’s day flowers
I don’t really think so. I’m excited to be curious about flowers tomorrow morning and find one that works for this project — and my vision!
a quick note: I just remembered how much I love globe thistles because they’re cool looking and because my mom liked them. I liked to try doing something with it! I just remembered that my mother-in-law bought me a wonderful book about garden flowers for mother’s day years ago. The globe thistle is in it, with a great picture!
55 minutes minnehaha off-leash dog park 58 degrees
Dog names: Ollie — a great dog who has been trained on how to interact with smaller dogs + Higsly — yes, Higsly, an owner who gave off douchy vibes + Nora — an enthusiastic, joyful dog
other dog behavior: a Dellia-sized (25-30 lbs) facing off with Delia. They would stand face to face, then dart, then return. After a few rounds, a bigger dog swept in and started humping the other dog.
Everything green, green, green. Only a few bugs, but I bet they’re coming. A gentle breeze, the deep buzz of traffic on the highway less than a mile away. The surface of the water was rough — not choppy, but full of small ripples. Woody-the-Woodpecker was there, as always. Someone was playing music out of a radio, or a phone?, on the beach at the end of the trail. As we neared it, I heard a loud Splash! as a human threw something in the water, or a big dog chased after it.
overheard about Higsley: from his owner, talking to a guy he knew about how Higsley acts when he takes a treat from someone’s hand — the bar at our house is very low. just yesterday I said to Higsley, wow, you didn’t bite any of my fingers! Side note: FWA and I discussed how the two men seemed to be competing with each other. I said they seemed like frenemies and wondered if that term was used with male friendships. FWA said, no, because that’s how most men interact with each other.
In addition to talking about dogs and frenemies, we talked about live-streams — me, the ultra marathon, Cocadona 250, and FWA, the H3 podcast at the celebrity poker tournament. On the way to the dog park, we talked about green as oppressive. On the way back, slang.
Here’s how we got to slang: I said something about how trying to give a dog a clever name is tricky. Usually it involves trying too hard, done by a try-hard. FWA mentioned that that slang was very old. When I asked what has replaced it, he had to think for a minute, then answered, Sweat lords. Love it! I love how his generation is so smart and creative with language! The kids are alright.
55 minutes minnehaha off-leash dog park 59 degrees
More green, less dogs, a lot of wind, loose sand. Delia the dog was in her element — such joy in her body as she ran and leaped and sparred with other dogs. FWA and I talked about a distracted dog owner who failed to recognize that her big dog was overwhelming Delia. We both noticed how the beach was much smaller and the river much larger. Most of the mucky shoreline gone.
As we headed back, there was shouting ahead, then an older woman approached us and asked if she could walk with us. She explained that when she asked a man to get his big dog away from her small dog he called her a cunt and then yelled at her, then he kept harassing her. She didn’t feel safe. When the red-faced man (that is, according to FWA; I couldn’t see his face) paused and denied what happened, FWA successfully de-escalated the situation, saying to the man, just walk away. He did and we walked part of the way with the woman and her dog, Scotchie, short for Butterscotch. Love that name! After we parted ways, FWA and I analyzed our re/actions. I’m proud of FWA and I’m glad the situation was quickly defused.
We heard the pileated woodpecker, black-capped chickadees, and some corvid that didn’t sound like a crow and wasn’t screechy enough to be a blue jay.
grids
Scott and I went to Costco and loaded up on Grapefruit. I noticed a lattice/grid on the bag. Can I use it? It’s red (or orange? or pink?) so I’m not sure, but maybe?
grapefruit bag grid
I placed the grid directly over another holes poem just to see what it would look like. A thought: if this visual poem was in black and white, how would it look?
grapefruit bag grid — black and white
One inspiration for this switch to black and white: a story from Scott about the set on the Adams Family tv show1. While the show was in black and white to make it look more gothic, the actual set was in crazy colors. Nice!
While gathering a few different plastic bags from our Costco shopping to play around with, I thought about how my interest in plastic bags — because they seem to be an effective way to describe the distance between me and words and the world — is giving me a chance to give attention to the (over) use of plastic in packaging. So much plastic. More broadly, my interest in using everyday objects in my visual poetry is helping to give attention to objects that I would otherwise not notice. A door to a new way of being in the world is opening!
I almost forgot about another grid I discovered. Yesterday, RJP and I were at Michaels picking up a few supplies — yarn for her, needles and pins (no, not The Searchers song) for me. Sudden inspiration hit: what about the grids used in latch hook?!2 We asked a very helpful employee and found them. Yes! There is potential, I think, for using this in my Holes 4 poem. I wish I would have bought more than one!
123
1: panel with words of poem cut out 2: panel with bigger words of poem pasted on 3: both panels
I’m wondering what it would look like to play around with thread or yarn woven through the holes?
tomorrow’s plan: weave thread through plastic grid; sew with thread through/on plastic bag; sew with thread through/on printer paper.
Fun fact: I loved watching this show when it was on reruns; I had a crush on Gomez/John Astin. ↩︎
I know about latch hooking from my older sister MLP who loved to do it so much that once she latch hooked a map of China for a school report! ↩︎
hike: 53 minutes minnehaha off leash dog park 40 degrees
At the beginning it was chilly this morning, even with gloves, but by the time we were heading back to the parking lot, it had warned up. More green. Another very LOUD woodpecker. Fun encounters with other dogs. One of them was just a little smaller than Delia and covered in chocolate fur. Something about how they darted around made me think they weren’t dog but some other creature — Thing 1 or Thing 2 popped into my head. More good and difficult conversations with FWA. I’m trying to respect his need to figure things out on his own timeline, but it’s very hard to watch and not say anything.
When we got back to the house, Scott told me that he read an article in the Star Tribune this morning about how they might have to shut the dog park down. It’s sacred Dakota land and some (many? all? — I haven’t read the article; it’s behind a paywall) tribal leaders want it returned to the Dakota people. I would be very sad if this wonderful park closed, but I support the Dakota people and their claims to the sacred land. I hope some sort of compromise can be reached.
run: 4 miles river road, north/south 49 degrees
An afternoon run. A little warmer and much sunnier. So crowded on the river road! Car after car after car. Near the trestle, the cars were backed up — at least 10 cars stopped in a line, extending both ways. The floodplain forest below the tunnel of trees was thick with green — no more river view here.
After climbing out of the tunnel of trees, I heard voices below me in the gorge. Rowers! The rowers are back! A few minutes later, I saw a roller skier. Two wonderful signs of spring. Now it just needs to stay warmer!
strings
This morning, I decided to work on a new poem. Instead of holes, and my blind spot, it’s about strings and threads and the lines that connect/tether me to words and meaning. I created this poem out of words from a favorite NYer essay: “Mystery Man.” I mapped it out, then printed out the words in bigger text, then pinned it up on my cork board, then connected the words with black embroidery thread, making it look like a murder board. Here’s the poem. Each stanza is from a different page.
the strings that tie
eye
to word to world
are un
ravelling.
the strings that tie / eye / to word to world / are un/ ravelling
Is the string/thread dark and thick enough to see clearly, or should I go for thin black yarn?
I like the idea of this resembling a murder board, particularly in relation to my use of the word “unravelling.” Unravelling has two, almost opposing, meanings: 1. to fall part, to undo and 2. to solve a mystery, to make clear, to unknot or disentangle. So, the ties between eye, word, and world, are both coming undone AND are becoming more clear.
55 minutes minnehaha off leash dog park 49 degrees
Cooler today, but sunny with a soft breeze. Wonderful for moving. FWA and I agreed that there was energy in the air, a lifting — of impending storms, oppressive heat, humidity. The dog park vibe today: chill. Dogs moving quickly and quietly.
today’s dog name: Sunny (or Sonny?)
10 Things
glittering water
a small boat, fishing near the end of the trail
the LOUD knocking from a pileated woodpecker
a very big uprooted trunk, almost upright, leaning in the hollow of a living tree
deep, soft sand
the slapping sound of Delia’s water running through the water at the edge of the shore
the soft, thundering thump of Delia’s running feet on the soft dirt
2 HUGE fluffy white dogs
a small (smaller than delia) dog emerging from the woods — first, a flash, then right in front of of us — first they jumped up on me, then FWA, as if to say, hi! hi!
even more green on the trees, on the ground
While we hiked, FWA and I discussed Ariadne (see below). It started with me asking FWA if he was familiar with Ariadne’s thread from his reading of The Odyssey in college, or Percy Jackson in elementary school. He said, sure, but I mostly know it from Tarkov (a Steam video game). Of course. I’m always fascinated by all the stories/history FWA knows from playing video games. A few minutes later,FWA said, I think I also know it from Kaos (a Netflix show about greek mythology starring Jeff Goldblum as Zeus.
holes and strings and words
This morning, I feeling a bit overwhelmed and disoriented by all of my ideas about holes and strings and threads. Instead of trying to think and theorize my way out of it, which is my inclination — I’ve decided to stop trying to figure it out and follow some more trails. These trails may offer some answers, or they may cause me to get even more entangled (ensnared, knotted).
1 — Ariadne’s Thread
In yesterday’s post, Ariadne came up in a quote from the intro to Her Read. I knew the name, but couldn’t remember why. Just as I began typing In yesterday’s post, I remembered! It was mentioned in a poem about Icarus that I posted here on 19 june 2025: Altitude/ Airea D. Matthews. This poem has a favorite line, which I think fits here:
Bliss is a body absconding warp speed toward a dwarf star whispering, Unsee the beheld.
In that 19 june post, I kept thinking about unseeing:
Unsee as different than not-seeing (which I ‘ve thought/written about before). Not seeing is a static thing; you just don’t see it. To unsee is more active and also suggests a process of unravelling which is where my vision is at.
A few minutes later in the walk, I thought about flipping the phrase to, behold the unseen.
I like thinking about to unsee as a verb, an act, a process, a type of prayer? Just as seeing is not a static thing, where you simply see, but a process of light and signals and filtering and guessing by the brain, unseeing is a process of slow (or sporadic) unravelling then adapting — a brain doing mysterious and magical things with the scrambled and limited data it receives, a mind developing new ways to witness/behold without stable and dependable eyes.
Wow. All of this thinking about unseeing the beheld and unraveling vision, returns me to another thread in the book review about Helen Oyeyemi’s new book: swap the dead-eye liturgy of doomed vision for shadow acts wild and improbable. Is there something there to return to?
In my brief searching for Ariadne’s thread, I found a description of it as a method in logic for “solving a problem which has multiple apparent ways to proceed—such as a physical maze, a logic puzzle, or an ethical dilemma—through an exhaustive application of logic to all available routes” (wikipedia).
I found this bit about how Ariadne’s thread differs from “trial and error” interesting:
The terms “Ariadne’s thread” and “trial and error” are often used interchangeably, which is not necessarily correct. They have two distinctive differences:
“Trial and error” implies that each “trial” yields some particular value to be studied and improved upon, removing “errors” from each iteration to enhance the quality of future trials. Ariadne’s thread has no such mechanism, and hence all decisions made are arbitrary. For example, the scientific method is trial and error; puzzle-solving is Ariadne’s thread.
Trial-and-error approaches are rarely concerned with how many solutions may exist to a problem, and indeed often assume only one correct solution exists. Ariadne’s thread makes no such assumption, and is capable of locating all possible solutions to a purely logical problem.
In short, trial and error approaches a desired solution; Ariadne’s thread blindly exhausts the search space completely, finding any and all solutions.
The goal is not the solution/answer, but an exploration of possibilities. I also like the idea of using the thread approach in my erasing of text in a New Yorker article. The key: it’s arbitrary!
With a little more research, I also found this brief description:
The phrase “Ariadne’s Thread” refers to to the problem-solving technique of keeping a meticulous record of each step taken, so that you can always backtrack and try alternatives if your first efforts fail to yield results.
side note: this might be helpful in tracking my creative experiments so I don’t lose some of my initial ideas.
Before I left for the dog park with FWA, I had an exciting idea about how Ariadne’s thread seems to contrast with Alice’s rabbit hole. Here are some notes I jotted down so I wouldn’t forget:
tension = going down a rabbit hole (free fall, untethering, getting lost) versus ariadne’s thread (logic, finding, tethered to the world/meaning/language) — part of the feeling/process/practice of reading — what is the relationship to the word, how do I read? I answer with a mix of phenomenology (describing/showing my mechanics or reading words on a page) and an invitation to a new relationship with words, a new way for meaning and connecting and communicating not based on progression or logic or efficient understanding.
2 — a plastic bag
Some good ideas with the thread, but also too much thinking and theorizing and trying to fit ideas into a concept. I want to be led by the making and experimenting, not some concept. So, I returned to playing around, this time with my ziploc bag again. I like this material as the material for the hole or the effect the hole makes on words. I decided to deconstruct (that is, cut and spread open) the bag, the distress it with a pencil (drawing spirals and lines and zigzags on it). Then I realized it was almost the size of a single page: I can use it as a veil over the entire page!. I decided to create two bag sheets to make the text more difficult to read. Then I put them on 2 stacked pages of an essay — the same page. I found a word, eye, and cut it out of the one page so that you could still see it on the second (same) page. A hole in the page — I like this idea. Unfortunately, this version of it didn’t quite work; I’ll have to play with it more. Running out of time, I decided to write the word in bigger letters just to test out the effect. It needs some work, but it has potential.
a test: 2 sheets of distressed ziploc bag over text with a hole cut out to reveal a poem
For this picture, I held the papers up in front of the window with sun streaming in. I need to distress the plastic more.
same pages/poem, light source on, not through
A thought: as I work on these poems about reading, consider the light source; it strongly impacts how and what I can see. How can I replicate different levels of light, from BRIGHT to dim.
Another thought: more frequently, I’ve been placing holes on the page to erase the text, like my blind spot made out of black netting. I like the idea of experimenting with ways to cover the text, like with this distressed ziploc. I could also use layers of netting and thread grids — ones that are straight and ordered, others that are tangled and slanted.
Her Read
a page from Her Read/ Jennifer Sperry
Wow, this is very cool! I’d like to use this as inspiration. I’ll have to spend some time with this to see if I can read it. I like the color and how the words for the poem are all over the place and the arrows/directions.
60 minutes Minnehaha Off-Leash Dog Park 68 degrees
Another hike with FWA and Delia. So beautiful! Today, FWA shared a realization about something that happened to him in 5th grade that was traumatic and has had a lasting impact. This realization explains so much about him and how he retreated into himself in middle school. My heart aches for that sweet, young boy! Oh, how I wish I would have recognized it when it was happening for what it was! But, I’m not sure I could have; I don’t think he even realized how much it impacted him until now.
dog names overheard: Daphne (a french bulldog); Carly (a standard poodle); and Danny, short for Lt. Dan (from Forest Gump (a corgie — Lt. Dan because he has no/short legs) and Ari (no idea what kind of dog Ari was, I never saw them, just heard their owner irritatingly calling for them ALL the time — Ari! Ari! Aaaaarrrriiii!)
10 Things
a stopped, silent motor boat
thin white foam on lapping the shore
a log floating by, looking like a beaver (at least to me)
more flashes of green
a gaggle of honking geese, first flying then landing somewhere under a bridge
a black puppy with white paws the same size as 10 yr old Delia
a dirty golden retriever jumping on me (I didn’t care)
a sweet mid-sized white dog acting like a cat, approaching then leaning into me (also didn’t care)
a new entrance to the dog park, set farther in and farther from the road
woodpeckers knocking on wood! Once, a deep and very hollow sound — FWA and I guessed it was a big bird and a very hollow piece of wood. Another time, a quicker, softer knocking, sounding like a rattling jawbone to me
Near the end I mentioned hearing a rock bouncing off a hollow spot in the packed dirt, which prompted FWA to start talking about sink holes. There are lots of sink holes all around the river. At one point during this discussion, I thought about my holes project and how our discussion fit. Here’s one way to think about it: as we talked about sink holes I mentioned (or thought, I can’t remember) how freaky the idea of a hole opening up in the ground and swallowing someone or something unsettled me. Why is this so unsettling to me? The idea of being swallowed, of disappearing without a trace, of being trapped without an escape from somewhere deep? Could it also be the falling part too? The dizziness, your stomach dropping, the total loss of control? Possibly. Three thoughts related to my Holes series:
1
Dizziness. Feeling dizzy, like I might pass out, then a soft panic after trying to read for too long, or while trying to read labels at a grocery store. More than once, I’ve stopped and closed my eyes and held onto the grocery cart to ground myself.
2
Disorientation and feeling lost. I can’t read the names of stores or restaurants on the signs outside of buildings, so it can be very hard to get my bearings in a new place.
3
Delight. This morning, I watched the scene from the animated Alice in Wonderland again and marveled (again) at Alice’s reaction to falling down the hole. As she plunges into the darkness, she looks back at her cat standing at the top of the hole, and calls out to them in a delighted and excited voice, Good bye Dinah! Goodbyeeeeeeeee! Alice is not terrified or confused. As she continues to fall, she says something like, Now I will think nothing of falling down stairs!
grids and lines and threads
This morning, a return to thinking through the bigger picture of this series. A reminder from my thoughts from 7 april: the jacked-up spider web experiment in which NASA scientists gave spiders several different substances than studied the webs they created on those substances. A visual inspiration for this series! I’m printing out some images to put at the top of my cork board.
my cork board with the spider webs in the top right corner
Before the hike, I gave myself 3 tasks for today: 1. collect/work on Holes 5a, b, and c, also known as Hole Perspective, Hole Time, and Hole Process. Try to include “strings” or “pull the strings” in one of these poems; 2. draw/shade the dots encasing the words for Holes 3; and 3. work on the poem for Holes 6/Strings 1 — the book review about daughter’s memoirs
Holes 5a, 5b, 5c and Strings 1
Holes 5a
My hole perspective — life on the way to wonderland.
I fall through a what is this? feeling as text bloom into nonsense.
Holes 5b
hole time — measured in word (or words) one word then one then one word
Holes 5c
the hole process — a small island where reading is still possible waits as the large nothing that surrounds it grows
Strings 1
the strings that tie words to the world of meaning have come un done
I like these!
2 — Draw the holes in Hole 3
I did it. And it took much longer than I anticipated, so no third thing today. I drew larger holes and then created an elevated grid over it, first on my wall board and then on a piece of cork board on my desk. I think the holes are too big; they should be dots to match the center dot of the amsler grid and of points mapped on the x and y axis.
grid with big dots
I’d like to plot the small dots on the map of the text and then place the grid over it. I think I need to print the text directly on a graph to plot it properly — or is there another (easier?) way to do this?
