62/365

things I want to remember about january:

tumeric tea
ezra's poem
ava's painting
charades and sleepovers
birthday cake for my mom
birds that flew overhead, en masse
how barry jenkins shows what love looks like, feels like
that one brand new very bright green leaf
mcdonalds, overheard 
golden arms at the high
the plaza theatre with ava
tracy's package
gudrun's laugh
jen's text 
waffle house waffles
toccoa falls and rainbows
paper whites and blood oranges
christmas lights, still

61/365

things I've written about for UPPERCASE magazine, who just turned ten years old and put out their fortieth (fortieth!) magazine:

from the very first column to the most recent:

records and record players
volkwagen buses
bikes
city songs
old brooches
photobooths
hanging laundry
wooden type
watering cans
the making of lists
polaroids
world globes
vintage dresses
the beginning of summer
autumn leaves and the art of paying attention
my mother's home
scent and memory
city collages
office supplies
street art
striped shirts
purple
handwritten letters
my mother's quilts
messes
doilies
making time for making
collaborations
origami
the worth of things
movement as art
city patterns
the building of fires
the magic of yes
handwriting
creative projects
the language of color
lockets
collecting rugs
records and record players

(it has been my great honor and pleasure to write for UPPERCASE magazine for ten years, to have been with them from the very beginning-- thank you, janine-- and thank you, everyone who reads and supports this crazy amazing publication)

60/365

things I'm not interested in:

curated instagram feeds
the excessively pretty
perfection

59/365

three things I'd like to learn how to do:

bake bread
speak italian
play when you were mine on the ukulele

58/365

words I've had to stop and look up in the dictionary this past week:

effulgence
inveigled
infinitesimal
apocryphal
stultify
ineffable

57/365

recently discovered:

a zine shop in the ATL
the lucky day shelf at my library

maple syrup as a substitute for vanilla extract 

a brown plastic butterfly barrette at the bottom of a drawer (this is my new favorite thing)
the sun shining in a particular spot in our bedroom between two and four in the afternoon (this brings me much joy)
a documentary like nothing I have ever seen before
new growth on a plant I thought was surely dead

56/365

things I'm drawn to photograph:

the backs of people
accidental/unintentional/subconscious art
the extraordinary ordinary
people photographing people
street scenes
real life
nostalgia
light
color
hair
people
people, always

55/365

seen on my walk this afternoon:

branches like bones
an empty pack of newports
that same bowl from yesterday, still in the same place, still turned over
two tea bags in the middle of the street, their orange paper tags like tiny flags
the sun through the trees
the sun, like a gold medallion
myself, reflected in a puddle

54/365

seen on my walk this afternoon:

charcoal skies
three birds nests
an empty pack of marlboros
an empty bowl, turned over 
one white glove
one large spring coil
pinecones by the dozens
an entire tree taken over by kudzu
two cars parked nose to nose, as if kissing
a woman closing her shades, possibly because she did not appreciate my peering 
a white plastic bag stuck on a branch
a pile of chopped wood
a dying cactus 
one yellow leaf

I've decided to give january a chance.

53/365

small pleasures, part three:

board games
hanging laundry
yard sales
hot tea
the sunday paper
a perfectly ripe avocado
magic hour

52/365

things I'm doing today:

reading his letter from a birmingham jail
remembering that his life and work were (are) so much more than the quotes we all love to share
thinking about how I can do better, how we can do better

51/365

currently daydreaming about:

buying a house in sicily for a dollar
having coffee and working on sketchbooks with my friend tracy
standing on the balcony of a tiny new york chinatown apartment with ward
writing while riding trains
waking up to snowfall

50/365

things difficult to believe:

that this is the last year of the twenty-teens
that this may, I will have been graduated from high school for thirty years
that this september, I will have been married for twenty-five years
that I am the mother of two teenagers
that I have made fifty lists here
FIFTY

49/365

a list for those of us who loved mary:

on a wild and precious life
on her deep, direct love for the world
on how she helped him to breathe again

48/365

things I'd like to tell my mom, who would have been 73 today:

I miss you
I love you
it's hard without you
and oh my goodness you would be so proud of ava and ezra