"I know not how to tell thee who I am. My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself, because it's an enemy to thee."                        - William Shakespeare

My first tomato...adorable!

This morning NPR interviewed Jack White’s wife about her new album. Do you know Jack White? He’s an interesting rocker of White Stripes, but I pictured the lead singer of White Zombie until I googled them just now. Curses! I ruined my morning visualization of the lead singer of White Zombie and a younger version of Carre Otis.

No, I’m going to stick with my original version. Anyway, his wife (whose name I can’t even remember and have learned my lesson about Googling everything) is a model/singer. She didn’t decide to start singing because of her husband’s career, she had been dabbling in it before and during her modeling. She was a cabaret singer, a back up singer for Robert Plant or Palmer… there I go again. Robert Plant sounds more likely, right? I’m working on my auditory processing skills and memorization. She has been harboring songs that she has written. She would release them once in a while around her home. Jack heard her and demanded that she stop being so self-conscious and start recording.

Here is the image that is stuck in my head this morning: She stated that there is an exquisite studio in their garden with musicians of all sorts traipsing in and out all day. I was supposed to be rich. Rich and eclectic. This is my garden. I can see the peacocks that we let roam the premises and smell the fragrant honeysuckles that creep along the vine-covered walls of the studio. I can see the wooden swing that hangs from one of our enormous oak trees. There are also weeping willows whose boughs sweep along our cobblestone paths near our roses and azaleas. One favorite oak tree bows to let my earth-stained children climb. They’re laughing, of course. And on the shaded veranda, on the table where there is a pitcher of lemonade and a bowl of citrus fruits, and a loaf of fresh nutty bread, a worn wooden cutting board, and a dull knife... I write. I have all the time in the world to play with my children, the sounds of the studio as our soundtrack, and to write. Perhaps I would sit there and write about the life of a teacher who lives in the suburbs of San Antonio.

Traipsing. I want to traipse with the artists in our garden.

Monet's Weeping Willow