Bioluminescence - The Northern Lights Of The Ocean!

I've been a little bit of an evening hermit lately, with all the sports and stuff happening, spending most nights at home with friends, feeling the onset of what passes for autumn in California. Minneapolis friends came to town last night, though, and you gotta take them out. After a stop at Wabi Sabi, we hit The Townhouse. It was the kind of night you do shots. After a while, my friend needed some air, so we went outside, down to the water. I swear, JUST as I was saying that sometimes at night you'll see the bioluminescent plankton glowing bright blue in the water, and one second later, BAM! Waves of neon blue! It was so exciting!

We ran back to The Townie to get the boys, and drag them back down to the shore with us to see this natural phenomenon. As we raced back down there, our Minneapolis friend revealed that he'd never in his life even seen the ocean! To stand there and watch him watching the absolute beauty that is this sight was just the best ... it really is like seeing the Northern Lights, but in the water instead of the skies. The bioluminescence usually occurs during a red tide event (I looked it up), and usually lasts a few nights at least. It's so SO cool. I've lived here 22 years, and this was only like the third time I've ever seen it, and it was for sure the most spectacular time. If you're near the beach tonight, do yourselves a favor tonight and go down there to check it out. We stood there like we were watching fireworks, oohing and aahing for a long time, and when we finally decided to split, it was still so mesmerizing that we had to walk backwards across the sand to keep watching it.

Mother Nature is awesome. Get out there while we've still got her! And have an excellent weekend.

Beach Walks Help

I like to start my days with a walk on the beach. It helps me think. It helps me to remember what is important. It makes me healthier. It forces you to take time to reflect and appreciate all that you have, and how very beautiful the big, blue sea is. It also makes you want to do all you can to protect it.

I was away from the beach for a month, and though I also love my walks around lakes and alongside rivers, it's not the same. The sheer size of the ocean makes you recognize how little you are, and along with that, how not that important the little things that get you down really are. The whole world seems to have gone crazy at times, with big, bad, awful things ... a walk on the beach helps with all of that too. Trust me on this. You will always, always feel better about things after a beach walk. You just will. 

"The cure for anything is salt water - tears, sweat, or the sea." I've repeated this great Isak Dinesen quote so many times, because it's just straight up true. That trifecta of saltiness is the absolute answer for most anything that ails you ... or at least will make you feel better about it all.

I'm always amazed at how few people are down at the seashore doing the same thing. So surprisingly few that we pretty much all recognize each other and wave, with most only recognizing each other from being there. I've rarely, if ever, seen any of the beach walkers/runners anywhere else in town, and that's kind of cool. It's like our own little nature loving club - with no membership dues! It really has so many benefits, I don't even really think about it as exercise ... though it certainly is.

I recently worked on a show and a woman was there to promote her anti-aging games. She told me that the single most important thing anyone can do for their health and well being was to fit in at least a 30 minute fast walk every day. Everyone can do that - and when you do, it puts of heart disease, stroke, some kind of diabetes, dementia, and over just a short amount of time, makes your pants bigger. Just do it!

 On the way back today, I saw a little needlepoint pillow just lying there on the grass in a yard. "A true friend is a found treasure." I sure have been learning the truth behind that this year ... the value of having someone who is there for you, no matter what, cannot be overstated. The value of finding out who you cannot count on is also way up there ... and sometimes painful and surprising - but awfully good to know.

You true friends - and you know who you are, because you feel it too - are sincerely the wind beneath my wings. May we all soar together!!

A Thanksgiving Prayer

This has been a hard year for a lot of people, in a lot of ways. It has also been an incredibly beautiful year for a lot of people, in a whole lot of ways. Every moment has the potential to be hard or beautiful, and much of that is how you view and act on it. I love so much that all Americans take at least the one day of Thanksgiving to do exactly that ... give enormous thanks, with all the gratitude we have in our hearts, even if that's just a little.

e.e. cummings wrote a Thanksgiving prayer long ago, and I'll share it with you now in its entirety. For this very best American holiday, that's the very best we can do - SHARE.

i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun’s birthday; this is the birth
day of life and love and wings: and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

‡

“next to of course god america i
love you land of the pilgrims’ and so forth oh
say can you see by the dawn’s early my
country ’tis of centuries come and go
and are no more what of it we should worry
in every language even deafanddumb
thy sons acclaim your glorious name by gorry
by jingo by gee by gosh by gum
why talk of beauty what could be more beaut-
iful than these heroic happy dead
who rushed like lions to the roaring slaughter
they did not stop to think they died instead
then shall the voice of liberty be mute?”

He spoke. And drank rapidly a glass of water

‡

when god lets my body be
From each brave eye shall sprout a tree fruit that dangles therefrom
the purpled world will dance upon
Between my lips which did sing
a rose shall beget the spring
that maidens whom passion wastes
will lay between their little breasts
My strong fingers beneath the snow
Into strenuous birds shall go
my love walking in the grass
their wings will touch with her face
and all the while shall my heart be
With the bulge and nuzzle of the sea

‡

when god decided to invent
everything he took one
breath bigger than a circustent
and everything began

when man determined to destroy
himself he picked the was
of shall and finding only why
smashed it into because

‡

love is more thicker than forget
more thinner than recall
more seldom than a wave is wet
more frequent than to fail

it is most mad and moonly
and less it shall unbe
than all the sea which only
is deeper than the sea

love is less always than to win
less never than alive
less bigger than the least begin
less littler than forgive

it is most sane and sunly
and more it cannot die
than all the sky which only
is higher than the sky

‡

love is the every only god

who spoke this earth so glad and big
even a thing all small and sad
man,may his mighty briefness dig

for love beginning means return
seas who could sing so deep and strong

one queerying wave will whitely yearn
from each last shore and home come young

so truly perfectly the skies
by merciful love whispered were,
completes its brightness with your eyes

any illimitable star

Happy Thanksgiving! God bless us EVERYONE.

*Photo (with no filter) was taken during one of my most grateful moments of the year. Just happy to be witnessing that splendor ... Ahhh.

Knitted Branches Of A Community

My birthday was on Monday, and I was pretty slow to rise after festivities the night before (THANK YOU, all my friends at Hatchet Hall!). My head hurt, thanks to very generous friends plying me with very generous drinks (with flowers in them!). When you feel like that, it starts you thinking too, not always in the most positive light. It was not the way I'd pictured my day going, but it was my birthday, so I had to rally.

Each year on my birthday, I have to - have to - immerse myself in a natural body of water for a little dose of rebirth. It can be a lake, river, swimming hole, or the sea, but it just has to be. With that in mind, and knowing that a dip in the ocean always helps with these kinds of mornings, I set off for Playa De Los Amigos, on a perfect blue sky afternoon. Ok, late afternoon.

Several things aligned. My friends at the French Market knew it was my birthday, and hooked me up with the perfect mocha to get my head straight. My friend, Lacey, was also up for a dip, and in fact offered to pick me up so I didn't even have to drag myself there under my own power. Then, if you can imagine, we found a perfect parking spot right on Pacific, right near our spot. Butterflies flitted around us like it was an old Disney movie, perfectly charming.

Then, we crossed (Ok, jay walked) the street to find THIS oasis of pure fun and happiness ... an entire yard with its tree branches dressed up in colorful knitted outfits! We'd already been saying it was a magical day, and then just total icing on my birthday cake of a day.

Some cool people on 24th Avenue get HIGH praise for this colorful creation, that for me, instantly became a metaphor about community. About Venice. About how we're all knitted into this place together. About keeping things fun, interesting, unique, and yes, magical.

A post up the street got in on the action too, and by now, my spirits were so lifted that the dash into the ocean was immediate, and also an absolutely instant reward and remedy. We all know that saltwater is the cure for everything (sweat, tears, and the sea - Emerson), and on this day, nothing was more true. I was BACK! It was perfectly awesome.

As I floated on my back in the warm water, I let the sun warm my body and my friends and town and knitted yarn trees warm my heart. I reflected on the past year's joys and aches and looked forward to my new year's opportunities to knock and examine the ideas I have up my sleeves ... and knew that I'm definitely on the right path ... one with beautiful, fanciful trees!

*And Happy Venice Birthday today to Jenny Everhart!

Weekend Beach House

ALL weekend spent on the beach means you need provisions ... and sometimes shelter.

My beach friends created this awesome set-up to wile away the hours ... they even added decor, like sea shell mobiles a sand castle shovel arrow.

It was one of the most beautiful weekends ever, and a long one at that, so the beach was home the whole time. The water is so warm right now, it was the perfect stay-cation. As hard as it is to be back inside right now ... the absolute glory and appreciation of this Venice beach weekend will carry me through, I know it.

If you by chance got today off too ... you should only be swimming. This only lasts so long. Enjoy!

Venice Oceanarium At The Pier

Two of things I love most in life are the ocean and words. I've kept a quote book pretty much since I first learned to write, so it was with pure delight that on a picture-perfect (but extra windy) Sunday, I saw some of the most beautiful quotes about the sea ever lining the Venice Pier, courtesy of the Venice Oceanarium.

The Oceanarium is a "Museum without walls", and they set up most Sundays at the end of the pier, from 11:30 am to 2:30 pm. They line the stroll down to the end of the pier with the beautiful quotes from the likes of Shakespeare and Neruda and Melville that nearly cause you to swoon over the side into the ocean below.

At the end of the pier they set up an ever-changing display of creatures and plants from the sea, to educate and fascinate ... only this week they were packing up early because the wind was blowing so crazy the tent was threatening to go overboard.

I kind of like that there's nothing really to do attraction-wise on our Venice Pier, that it really is only about the ocean, the view and that feeling that only comes from being on the water - or above it, as it were.

The Venice Oceanarium is another absolute treasure about Venice that we should all appreciate and support. They put on the extra cool and fun events like the annual Grunion Run parties (mark your books for the next, even bigger and more fun one than ever, Friday, May 16th!) , the great annual weekend long reading at the Breakwater of the entire Moby Dick, and the heart-melting quotes and wall-less museum most every Sunday.

It's so beautiful here on days like this that it's hard to put into words ... but they did.

Thank you, Oceanarium!