The OTG Daily #80 Rest Stop

Elmer's Bottle Tree Ranch in California

I drive 300 miles a week and have learned to time my stops to match the gas level in the tank as well as my own need to "use" the Rest Stop.  I have my favorite stops - Madison, CT on I-95 heading south. I even use the same stall in the ladies rooms each week as if it were an old friend.  I know its clean and well tended because the woman who does the job is usually eating her breakfast at one of the tables when I roll in.   When I head north it's usually the ...

 

The OGT Daily #78 New Babies

 There a few things more lovely and hopeful than new babies born in early spring!  As my children are now in their 30s and I have only grand cats, I relish the photos of new babies sent to me by friends.  Two arrived this week, back to back, on Friday and Saturday.  There is nothing more wonderful than seeing photos of a first time mother with her newborn

I am grateful for new life!

The OGT Daily #77 Making a Mess

 It's been a long time and I have been avoiding it, but yesterday I was able to get back into the mess making necessary to the artistic process.  I fear it actually sometimes because there's an internal pressure to produce; make something of value. But that inner pressure and voice settles once I begin to engage the process of mixing the paint, slopping it allover the tables and my hands, having to change into my painting paints and old work shirts.

There's a slouching into this that has to occur, a letting go and part of me does fear this because letting go and cracking open the creative process is an unknown - a risk. It is one thing to have an image in your head of where you might go and you need that of course in order to prepare your studio, your material, mix the colors you might need. But with me that vision tends to morph, shrivel, shift, or disappear entirely once I begin. This leaves a dark uncharted path into nothingness within which you must exert muscles to shape a "something."

Once I learn to trust the actions of mixing and painting and asking myself instinctually "What comes next? What should I do with this shape ot object or color" - then things begin to evolve and move.  It is always a slower process than I anticipate and what comes out might disappoint and exhaust me or may reward and surprise me.

As they say "you can's make an omelette without breaking a few eggs."  Those initial failed attempts may be precious broken eggs or experiments which are the gateway to "seeing" what I feel drawn to express.

Making mess is vitally important - but then there is the flip side: Cleaning my studio of all the clutter and messes!  Where is Marie Kondo?

What kind of mess did you get into today?

The OGT Daily #76 Godfather of Freak Rock

 Yesterday, April 3, 2025, Michael Hurley known as the "Godfather of Freak Rock" died at the age of 83 years old.  

He played his last concert less than a week earlier and never had ambitions for a big musical career, but  was an enormous influence in the folk, rock, and bluegrass world. He said he just liked to goof around and his humor and crazy lyrics and wonderful, lyrical cartoon-like drawings were like none other. When my husband made his first film "Troubled Waters" about a Long Island clam fisherman facing the death of the clamming industry, he contacted Michael to do the music. Michael Hurley agreed. The payment for this service? That he buy the original cover art for Hurley's album Blue Navigator.  

This wonderful painting is now on the wall of our son's apartment.  He is equally inspired by Hurley's music and artwork. Michael Hurley was one of the original members of the band The Holy Modal Rounders whose members also included fiddler Peter Stampfel and actor Sam Shephard who played drums. They were founded in Greenwich Village in NYC in 1963 and were very influential as an underground rock band, that to this day has a cult following.  Music critic Richie Unterberger wrote that they had" twisted weathered folk standards with wobbly vocals, exuberantly strange arrangements, and interpretations that were liberal, to say the least."

Michael Hurley in the middle with the striped shirt.

Even now I can recall the rhythmic driving beat of Hurley's song Blue Navigator and I start stomping my feet.  I'm truly grateful for his influence in this world.  If you want to read more about him check this website: https://bluenavigator.com/

What gets your feet tapping today?

The OGT Daily #75 The Bronx

Seventy-five days!  That's what I'm talkin' about.  Anyway, today I was up early and down the Hutchinson Parkway to a medical appointment before 8 am in the the Bronx - 'da Broncs'. 

The Bronx River flows through the largest and oldest old growth forest in NYC 

Then driving home just before 9 am in the eastern part of the borough, while sitting in a long string of traffic on Eastchester Rd, I looked up through the rain to see the huge entrance and signage of the front of the Jack D. Weiler Pavilion for the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.  A wave of memories flooded through me. 33 years ago I was rushed there by my husband for the birth of our second child.  I pointed up at the rooms where I thought that had occurred almost in a reverie only to have the cars behind, in a hurry to get over to the parkway, honk me onward. 

The Bronx gets a bad wrap for being the poor cousin among the boroughs, but there are many reasons it makes my heart fond and it is my favorite borough by far.  First of all my mother was born there as well as my son. And my mother-in-law Nanette passed away quite peacefully at the famous Calvary Hospital hospice care in 2003 across the street from where my son was born at Albert Einstein.

My mother was born in Clason Point, a jutting section of the South Bronx close to Hunt's Point Market, that is surrounded by the East River. She contracted polio as a small child, they thought from swimming in the river, but survived to have ten children including me.

Then there are the Yankees and the Bronx Zoo. With the Bronx literally a 15 minute drive from our suburban home it was our closest contact with the city. My kids spent many a summer at the Bronx Zoo camp feeding the animals and doing a sleepover on the floor of the camp house on last night. I came to know the zoo like the back of my hand and where to park so I didn't have to pay the fees. 

There was our devotion to the Yankees of the 1990s, Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera. To this day the Botanical Garden has become a yearly destination for me to see the orchid show.

I also credit the Bronx with initiating me in my career as an art therapist with my first internships working in psychiatric facilities like North Central Bronx Hospital and the Ittleson Center for Child Research. Both of these places had me face mental illness, poverty, and social injustice head on and taught me most of what I learned to become a competent clinician. 

The Bronx has a storied history, named after Jonas Bronck - a Swedish immigrant who settled the first European colony there. It is the poorest congressional district in the country but also one of the most culturally rich with immigrants from all over the world and many wonderful places to visit. I'm proud to say the Bronx is part of my history.

What makes you proud today?

The OGT Daily #74 Civil Liberties

 More and more everyday I am grateful for my civil liberties and rights. The privileges I assume because of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights...and yet for the first time I begin to feel that I could me threatened unlawfully for exercising my first amendment right and yet have no recourse. In a government or regime that doesn't tolerate dissent of any form no one is really free, not even a white woman of privilege living in an upper middle class enclave.  

Unlawful deportations are being excused in the name of counteracting terrorism and drug lords when our own homegrown terrorists have been pardoned. We are now living in a society of heightened vigilance and violence where more moderate voices of mediation and the allowance for differing opinions are drowned out by the voice of the mob, self-appointed vigilantes, and the most powerful who fear losing the reigns. 

I am very grateful for the grit and courage of individuals who are speaking out: Corey Booker for his 25 hour marathon address on the senate floor - stating "this is not normal for America."  For Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez who both continue to travel and meet with people in person putting their lives at risk but also lending courage when courage is sorely needed.

What are you grateful for today?

The OTG Daily #73 Baby Steps

 Never have I doubted this advice which I shared as a new therapist with my very first private client  almost twenty years ago.  "Take baby steps towards change and you will be successful." 

These words apply to so many situations.  Right now it's pretty easy to say that many people are in a place of overwhelm due to the sense of being attacked on so many fronts: economic, human rights, civil liberties, justice and law, health care.  How do we even know where to begin? I think it goes back to my original reason for writing this blog; Simple gratitude and the relief that I could still hear myself breath.

We can do what we can in any given day. Have gratitude for what we can do and compassion for what we cannot.  I'm currently working on a large book project and one of our editing team has had to drop out for health reasons. This leaves two of us to cull and refine twenty-four chapters for publishing. It is overwhelming and daunting, but I reminded my remaining editing partner and myself that we just take on one task at a time and do not look down into the yawning canyon of the whole book for now. That way your breath remains steady, you don't lose your balance, and you move forward without spiraling into the abyss.

The same could be said for depression, a diagnosis which often robs you of energy and any motivation to move. Just one foot in front of the other at a time. Don't look up for the finish line just keep those feet moving. Baby steps.

What move you to gratitude today?