…transformed me from a dull, complacent pupa resigned to the false security of a wedding band and suburban dwelling, into a beautiful butterfly queen, determined to walk by my own light, living and loving deliberately…
-Hänni, Hannihaus.com

Actual recorded message on the cell phone of a woman I had to call for work last week:
“You’ve reached S’s cell phone. If you are calling from a blocked or restricted number, or if I don’t recognize your number, I won’t answer my phone. So I suggest you leave a message, so that I can [...]

It is to the credit of human nature, that, except where its selfishness is brought into play, it loves more readily than it hates.
-Nathaniel Hawthorne,
The Scarlet Letter

Ok. So you might have noticed, this really isn’t a garden. It’s more a play on words. Because, a. my name so conveniently rhymes with “Mary,” the girl from the popular nursery rhyme who possesses an apparent contrary nature and a noticeably green thumb, b. I like to plant and grow and play in [...]

“A SONG of the good green grass! …
A song tasting of new wheat, and of fresh-husk’d maize…
O Earth, that hast no voice, confide to me a voice!…
A verse to seek, to see, to narrate thee.”
-Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
Here are some of my favorite, most informative (past) entries. Some of kerrianne.org’s “good green grass,” if [...]

The last time I saw Petty live, I was hundreds of feet away from him. I couldn’t see the lines of his face, couldn’t tell what kind of guitar he was playing, couldn’t see the color of his jacket. The only reason I knew he was wearing a jacket that particular show was because it [...]

Truth & Beauty: A Friendship
by Ann Patchett
The Lynne Truss Treasury
by Lynne Truss
They Shall Know Our Velocity
by Dave Eggers
Blessing The Boats
poems by Lucille Clifton

Of course.
I was going to, you know.
Or maybe you didn’t.
Already my mouth
gone soft when you
kissed me goodnight
and let me go.
It would’ve been easy.
I could’ve claimed
I was afraid of the dark.
I am, you know.
Afraid I mean.
-Sandra Cisneros, from Why I Didn’t

Today is Sunday. So why am I posting my addition to Stuff Portrait FRIDAY, on today, Sunday?
Well, mostly because I am lazy, and never on time with the SPFage, be it photographically inspired, or the actual placement of the literal SPF that keeps a person’s skin tone from becoming Radish (notice: rhymes with “Ladish,” and [...]

After spending all Sunday afternoon planting my Momma’s flower beds, in what has been the hottest May weekend yet.
“Ooh, Honey, the back of your neck is fried. Yikes. That’s probably going to hurt later.”
“I thought it felt hot. I completely forgot to put sunblock there.”
The strong, intelligent and wonderfully silly woman whose eyes match mine [...]