Last Night's Sunset........

Another beautiful New Mexican sunset.

Drawing completed, painting beginning...........

"The Mermaid & the Manatees."

I started this drawing eons ago. Finally finished it about a week ago.

Here we go. Another painting in process!

This Morning's Sunrise.

Here are the sights from our walk this morning. No coyotes, although we really looked for them. I don't think they were up yet!

I hope to eventually get pictures of them.

They are the best.

Sort of weepy................okay, over now. Feel fine.

It's beautiful out today, but I was feeling a little weepy. And as of 20 minutes ago, "over it!"

Just "feeling" I guess. Sometimes I get to thinking too much, moving too fast, and then just lose touch.

I pray for peace of inner spirit today and a willingess to do the work that is in front of me to do.

Thank you Creator.
I now feel rejuvenated.

Welcome to the neighborhood!

Niktia and I discovered this little one this afternoon out in the back yard. He was sunning himself and I almost stepped on him and Nikita almost ate him! Poor little one! But isn't he just as cute as he can be?

Leave me a message please under comments, I love hearing from you.

The Teenager & the Alien!

You know, I did this little drawing as an example for kids that I was teaching in LA on how to put in image form, what they were thinking about regarding school, its' rules, gangs, grades, immigration - the things that students felt uncomfortable & unhappy about. We were experiencing really challenging times at LA High and everybody felt awful.

So, being that I now live in New Mexico - home of Roswell and all other things "ET," I thought, how appropriate!

So, what does your little extra-terrestrial look like?

Yesterday........March 22, 2008

I saw the coyotes today. 3 of them, I think. 2 youngsters and an older, much larger one.
They were in front of the house this morning. One scampered off, the other sauntered up the hill
across the street (in a field). Then, Nikita and I started walking and we ended up following 2 of them
for about 10-15 mins. It was great. They would cross the road from field to field. They kept an eye on us,
but they really weren't too concerned. I'll take my camera out tomorrow. Hopefully I'll see them again.

Saw a roadrunner and a few lizards too! Here's a photo of that roadrunner, leaping off of a house! Everybody is waking up, coming out of their winter slumber.
I too, am coming out of my winter slumber. Nikita and I danced around in the moonlight and explored the backyard on the 21st of March - the full moon, Good Friday and the day after the Vernal Equinox.

I took a little time off from my blog. I was not feeling at the top of my game for a bit but, I'm back!

Happy Spring Everybody!!!

Here's a tiny piece of one of my stories...............

"The Epiphany of Tiffany E. Poh"
by Susan Lowery/copyright 2004

Chapter One:
Tiffany’s Sleepy Day

After 2 hours of putting together puzzles, redressing her dolls, painting rainbow pudding onto her new dress - and licking it off, Tiffany was bored. She’d already done most of the things that she liked to do and it wasn’t even noon. And even though she was tired, she didn’t want to take a nap, and she was getting crabbier by the minute but didn’t know why. She started to sulk, then to throw herself around. It seemed that she couldn’t control herself at all, and worse yet, her horrible behavior felt good! She was having a temper tantrum of the highest order. After doing this for about an hour, she finally became very sleepy, much to her mother’s relief. But before she fell asleep, she dangled herself rather precariously by her knees over the back of the sofa. She looked up and imagined that the floor was the ceiling and that the light fixtures (also hanging down) were her tables. She thought about her feet touching the ceiling and about the ceiling becoming the floor. She always did look at her world a little differently. What a great time it would be to walk around on the ceiling upside down, right side up! She then closed her eyes and began day dreaming. As she did this, she could smell the orange-raspberry cake that Evelyn; her mom, was baking in the kitchen and could hear her whipping up the creamy vanilla frosting with the hand mixer. It was going to be glorious and she could hardly wait to sink her teeth into it tonight for dessert. This made her mouth water in delight.

While day dreaming, she thought how wonderful it would be, to be able to fly. She loved watching the birds outside soaring and then careening straight down from the wires to the ground, and then scooping up at the last second and shooting up to the sun. Oh, how she wanted to be able to do that.

Her mother had left the big windows open in the living room and the wind whipped and tumbled through the room, tousling her hair to and fro. She started to feel a warm, soft breeze against her cheek, and with her eyes closed, she could feel herself start to tumble through soft cotton like clouds, lulling herself to sleep. With this, she also started to experience the cool splash of tiny raindrops gently glazing her skin, and dampening her dress. Have you ever smelled the air after a summer’s rain? To Tiffany the smell was so fresh that it even smelled a little bit like vinegar! Soaring through the clouds, she was ecstatic and care free. She was also very happy to know that since she was flying - although she was daydreaming, she’d remembered to put play shorts on under her dress! Now she could do anything! At this, she turned up her nose to the sky, wrinkled it all up, and smiled toward the heavens.

The next thing she knew, she was doing every kind of loop-dee-loop, spin and dive imaginable. As she caught up with the birds that she’d just been watching diving and careening here and there, she matched them with aerial spins and swoops.

"Try and catch me, round robin! Try and catch me blue, blue bird!" She shouted while her belly bubbled with laughter.

After half a day of this, she finally wore herself out and decided to let herself down to the ground.

"Hew!" She sighed, I never knew flying would make me so tired and hungry."

Instantly, her dress became a brilliantly colored puff parachute filled with air. Slowly, it delivered her to the shake roof of a building. The roof had lots of bumpy places on it, so at first it was hard for her to keep her balance.

"Oh boy, luckily I have lots of bubble gum stuck on the bottoms of my shoes! Hopefully it’ll in turn help me stick to the roof!" She gloated. "And mom said that all my bubble gum did was make me look like a cow chewing her cud..... I sure wish she could see me now!" She had made quite a bit of a habit of talking to herself of late, and yet continued on.

After she gave herself a little bit of time and a few deep breaths to gather her composure and balance, she got down on her hands and knees, crawled to the edge of the roof and looked over the side, to the ground. With the gum still sticking to her shoes, it stretched and stretched and yet, kept her securely attached to the shingles.

"I knew that I chewed Double Bubble for a reason!" she said aloud.

As she leaned out over the shingles, she could see earthworms that had been brought up by the rain from underground.

"Oh Grandma, where are you? I wish you were here! They’re wriggling around everywhere and they look just like live spaghetti!" "They're too amazing to be true."
"I, I think I even see one smiling!" "Oh my gosh, man!"....

This is one of the "sneaky bunnies" from our yard!

He/she was too cute! It was hiding under one of the bushes in the backyard the other day and just looked a little "guilty." Like it was in trouble for doing something silly.

I'm Gonna Be 50 Next Month!!!!!!!! How Time Flies!

Now, it's "ART!"

Not too magnificent of a shot or angle, but oh well, here I am! I'll be 50 in one month and 4 days.

Where has the time gone? Perhaps overhead; like today's migratory cranes. Or, just flying by, like Ms. Prairie Falcon who made her presence known this morning. She was wigging out because of all of the crane overhead flying north. Daring Ms. Raven came gliding by as well - her wing span must have been no less than 5 feet. She was dazzling and enormous.

We have a bird that I believe is nesting on the top of our chimney! I saw her today, she's a round little thing - adorable as can be. I hope to climb up on the roof today to check out the nest as well as look over the roof & stucco itself for cracks & such. The monsoons will be here sooner than we know it and the rains will come pouring down!

Dan started a job a little better than a week ago. He had his first full week, this week. He was tired this morning! We went to breakfast to celebrate his job, and few other things for which we are extremely grateful.

Oh yeah - I got a new hat too! This is it.

I wore out the cowboy hat that Dan got for me in July. It got holes in from being outside so much and from the extreme use! I'm a "yard woman" these days!

Thank you Creator for all of our blessings whether or not we recognize them at the time - thank you.

Namaste.

Total "Chill" on a Saturday Morning

Here's Nikita in her total "relax-o-matic" mode this morning. Both Dan and I are finally working and Nikki is relaxing because of it, I think the stress of not having both of her "parents" at work was wearing on her! She's actually been a good girl the last couple of days while we were away. Prior to the last two days, she'd destroy things wile we were out for any period of time. We just hope this not simply a non-destructive trend, but the turning over a new leaf. She'd become anxiety ridden just before and then after moving here from LA. We are unbelievably grateful for this change.

Bells and Entanglements.................

The bells ring in the new & the ancient, the vines - simply like the spider, the webs we weave - the things we either do or don't pay attention to.......

Five hundred, twenty-five thousand, six hundred minutes.......

In loving memory of Vince Yeo. Vince, I'll miss you.

Brrrrrrrr, it's cold!!!

I haven't entered anything in a while on my Blog, so, when it rains, it pours! Or actually, snows! It's been cold out here today and actually for awhile. We've had a reprieve every so often, but for the most part, there's a big chill goin' on. Here are a few pictures that I snapped this morning before school. In the last two photos, Nikita blends beautifully with the snow - being a Siberian Husky, I suppose that that makes a tremendous amount of sense.

My Friend Andrea!

My friend Andrea and her dear Darius came over today to walk with Nikita and I. Dan made breakfast for us all! We love it when they come over. :)

Winter Morning & the Moon

The moon managed to make herself barely noticable yesterday morning. She was actually quite large and nearly looming.

The sky was beautiful blue, pink & violet.

Little Changes on the Greenberg Portrait.......

I made a few minor changes to this portrait. If you look at Jon, you'll see that I've added a little more color to his face and helped define him a bit more. I think I'll take a few minutes this week to finish it up for good and begin a new "Finnish Fairy" portrait.

Happy mid-month everybody!

Tuesday's Mourning Dove...........

Here's one of our regular little visitors.

He/she's all puffed up for the cold weather. We've had a little precipitation; snow, sleet, rain - but it's mostly frozen outside. The usual desert yummies are few, our birdseed bell is lessening quickly and our birdseed house, is empty. Slim pickin's for hungry birds! Time to go to the store. I've been in bed sick that last few days but hope to be up and around tomorrow as I am to start working again.

Ms. Prarie Falcon makes an unscheduled appearance!

Here is Ms. Prairie Falcon. She came to visit in our neighbor's yard this morning, which happens to be right outside my studio window!

I wish that these pictures were a little clearer than they are, but I am happy to have been able to get them at all. I opened the blind and startled her a little bit, but she held her composure long enough for me to snap a couple of photos.

Alice and Jon, my mother & father-in-law....

Here is portrait which does not do them justice, but is something I recently almost completed just the same. One portrait has a lot less eye definition and color in the faces than the other. I had some corrections to make. So, if you see them either one above the other, or side by side, you can see that there have been adjustments. I will probably further define Jon's face with deeper color & shadow. Check it out, see what you think! It's important to see the products that come out really well, and the ones that have left us challenged. They're all worthy of acknowledgement. Just like in life, things aren't always pretty. It's been said that pain is the touchstone of growth. Painful paintings, drawings, writings, creations - lessons. We learn from them. Others learn from us. The "tooth" of this paper is extreme. Loads of texture; difficult to draw on, therefore, leaving really thick lines - plus I used a heavy stick of graphite. All lessons, all learning. Here's Jon & Alice.

Raven.......(a poem)

Caw-caw raven
Jagged overhead
Teasing me with questions
Where you goin' - where you been?

Seriously laughing
Looming uncomfortably close
Waiting for the shoe to drop
As winds maniacally blow

Gathering her minions
Crows, coyotes & snakes
Not asking for opinion
She corrals ones, others forsake

Eyes keen, beak pert
Messenger from the other side
From a place I can't yet see
Or, recognize

Raven are you callin'?
Callin' me to dream?
Callin' me to cloud filled days
To a shadow read?

Raven are you callin'?
Do I hear a dare?
Daring me to jump the fire,
To take my wings to the air?

Raven are you callin'?
Me, to the other side?
Giving me a ticket to....
Where another world resides?

Tellin' me you care.
Daring me to dare.
Let my ego die.
Callin' me to fly!

Here I am Raven,
Raven, I am here.

Susan Lowery 12/2007

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year Everybody!!!

We had a fabulous time at a beautiful party last night in Corrales. Wonderful people, fun dancing & awesome food! May the light guide us all year long & keep us safe. As my sacred friend Angie stated, "Let it be great in 2008!"

Namaste.....

Sunday Afternoon Images

It was suggested that I take some pictures on my walk or hike today, or where ever I went. So, I did. The one picture with all of the blue is a coven of crow or raven. There were about 20 or so that were flying in a pattern over the neighborhood today. The other birds are local doves. Then of course there is Nikita, and a little bit of back yard grass and rock.

The Simplicity of Zen................

Here are pictures of the corner of our patio. The three white rocks have been gathered from our backyard. I love how bright and beautiful they are. The extremely complex, yet seemingly simple - Julia Campbell would call them "found objects." This picture does not do them justice as they actually glisten. I have found many agates, pieces of obsidian and quartz in the backyard.

Treasures from the Creator. Slow cooling, solid, even semi-precious - volcanic in nature. The more lustre they exhibit, the more slowly they cooled from the original pyroclastic blast.

Merry Christmas from our hearth to yours........

Merry Christmas everybody!
Have a wonderful, joyfilled day.
We're joining our friends Andrea &
Don for a festive meal this afternoon!
Thank you Creator for this time of
plenty, friendship and love.
Also, We've determined that
"Ms. Hawk," is actually
"Ms. Prairie Falcon!"
Peace.

Full Moon Rising

It's the end of the day and the Christmas lights are on both in the front and backyards, and the moon is lighting up the sky, the fields and dirt roads of New Mexico. It's just past the winter solstice, but tonight and the tomorrow night are a Druid & Finnish Shaman's dream. Absolutely beautiful.

Today's Mountain View...............

While walking late this afternoon, this was our view. It was beautiful, cold and clear. About 30 degrees, except when you add in the wind chill factor, then it's a little cooler. Brrrrrrr.
On our earlier walk today we saw, as Linda J. calls him, "Mr. Coyote." He was crossing the road from one field to another, no doubt looking for lunch. Afterall, it was just about 12:00 noon.
Just after that, while I was sitting on the computer in the studio, Ms. Hawk came flying overhead and it looked just like she was looking in my window! She's awesome.

Winter Witches of Years Passed

We are to have snow by nightfall, so goes our forecast. We hope we do. In light of the prediction, I thought it appropriate to uncover & unveil a couple of "Winter Witches" from times past. I hope that these little creatures inspire your curiosity and add a pinch of mysticism and magic into your day.

These two are painted with ink, watercolor and metallics onto rice paper - which acts very much like fabric. It soaks up the medium and feels like cloth.

Dan is in bed with the flu - the first of the season - and has been running a temp pretty consistently since Monday. We're hoping that this passes soon. Nikita seems to have a cold as well. We were expecting company from out of state for the holiday weekend, but had to reschedule due to his illness. So, stay well, drink lots of fluids, exercise to release tension and think plenty of positive and kind thoughts! My hope for you is to enjoy the holiday magic, quietly, peacefully and with deep gratitude. Peace, Love & Miracles.

Last of Totem Animal Painting Phases........ painting complete

It's the 18th of December and it has been really warm today. Almost 60 degrees!

It will be cool this evening, but wow, what a difference. Even the little lizards were out sunbathing this afternoon. I had my first day back in the classroom in sometime yesterday. I'm used to teaching high school and spent 1/2 of a day with 5th graders - holy cow!

It's snowing!!!!

It's snowing this morning and it's beautiful. Going out in the snow with Nikita and Dan for a nice bundled up walk!

Updated Totem Animal Painting.........

Here is the owl and the horse. One day at a time, one critter at a time. I hope to finish this painting today. Oh yeah, this painting is 26" x 40". Most of my pieces are about this size.

Leave Me Note Under any of the Comment Fields.....I Love Hearing From You!

Well, I'm painting again tonight and I'll have an update on tomorrow's post as to the process of the Totem Animals. The hawk came by our place again today, she does everyday now. We both love it. Check out one of my favorite old radio stations. It's a rock station in Portland, Oregon called KGON. The address is www.KGON.com . There's a great interview that Iris Harrison had with Lydia Pense of Cold Blood. Cold Blood one of the rippenist bands out of San Francisco in the 70's. They shared the same horn sections with Tower of Power & Sons of Champlin. They all came out of the Bay area at about the same time. I remember an absolutely incredible show in Portland, way back, when I was in the 8th grade. Our neighbor Tommy Snodgrass drove myself (I was too young to drive), my older sister Linda and his date - (one of the Suniga sisters), to see Cold Blood and Tower of Power. Tower of Power had just come out with "You're Still a Young Man," and Cold Blood had released "You Got Me Hummin' " & "Down to the Bone." Oh man, I loved these songs, (still do!) and I was hooked on both bands and the San Franciso sound for life. Bill Champlin of the Sons of Champlin (another Bay area band - and I believe pretty closely knit with T of P & Cold Blood), eventually ended up joining the band Chicago, and he's still with them today. After becoming a musician myself, I eventually met of few members of the various bands and got to jam with one of them. Heaven, I was in absolute heaven. I loved great players back then, and I still love 'em today.

Totem Animals Painting Progressing.............

Once again, I worked on this a little tonight. The raven is coming to life.

I started a writing project with a very dear friend this evening as well. It is a very dark comedy. I think we're gonna have fun with it. In the meantime, I have many other things to complete: a script, 1 children's novel, several other short stories and getting myself out there again as a singer & songwriter. With all of this, as well as starting to teach again this month, I have absolutely no right to be bored. This is a good thing.

Progression of Painting.... after several days off....

I stepped away from this for a few days. We had company, our good friend & terrific singer/songwriter/producer & sound engineer - Gregg Burns - was in town for just a couple days. It was wonderful. Dan was so happy to see him, and it was so good to see Dan so grateful.
But, here it is again (the painting) - with a couple of additions.
Life is like this. It's all a process and rarely do I finish things when I think I shoulda, woulda, coulda - know what I mean?
But that's why I'm here on earth, in earth school. I wake up, I breath, I learn. I am grateful. Thank you.

Howling Coyote Inn...........

Here's our house, the

"Howling Blue Coyote Inn."

I am far from the only "Diva" here!

It's a good thing too. One needs a pack

to really get a good howlin'!

It's chilly & Overcast Today.............

It's chilly and overcast today, so I need a good warm cup of tea prior to my walk with Nikita!

I hadn't seen a roadrunner in a couple of months, but today, one jumped up on our front wall. I grabbed my camera, but wasn't quick enough to catch 'em. Rats! Oh well. I did see "our" eagle. She cruises the hood regularly now.

It's nice having a warm home with a gentle fire on cold days.

Happy Hanukkah Everybody!

The Drawing and Painting Process.....

It was another incredibly beautiful and clear day today. Went to a good service, met another tremendous keyboard/guitarist/vocalist, had a great workout as well as a wonderful walk and play period outdoors with Nikita. I practiced guitar and worked on a painting that was perplexing me for a period.

This is a painting of my Native American "Totem Animals." They are animals that I need to pay attention to in order to learn from and expand my physical, psychic and spiritual awareness.

My animals are: hummingbird, prairie dog, bat, owl, swan, horse, raven, porcupine & spider. They are all forms of "medicine."

Paintings are funny. They teach me to really be in the moment and problem solve from the hip. One slip of the brush and there's something different and sometimes difficult to overcome.

Sometimes it's a "fix" situation, other times it's a lesson in learning to accept and incorporate the "problem" just as it is. Living life on life's terms with a simple change in/of perspective.