A new hit on Winston.

"Thank you for your attention. All tray tables must be put back and locked and seat backs upright and in position for landing."
I notice that the woman sitting catty corner to me in the aisle seat has her hands making a familiar mudra...index finger and thumb making a circle, eyes closed in meditation. She must be visualizing a safe landing. I'm happy that she's working on it. Since she has that covered I decide to relax and flip through pictures in my iPhone that I just took during my weekend in Portland. I was meeting my first grandchild.

I thought I'd feel transformed and very old having this new descriptor 'grandma' in front of my name...but I just feel elation having this little guy in the world.  Aside from feeling like the same Suzi, I've gotta say it's quite amazing watching my son holding his son...that is crazy beautiful continuity.

George says he looks like Winston Churchill.

Winston Churchill must have been mighty cute.

Oregon was smokey the entire time I was there. Fires from California and Washington blowing over the state made the air gray.  Every morning I'd walk to the corner coffee shop where there would normally be a good view of Mount Tabor park but it was enveloped by a smokey haze.

The coffee shop had the relaxed murmur of people chatting Saturday off from work conversations layering warm waves of sound bubbling up and periodically quieting down as if on cue from an invisible conductor. There was a singer on the overhead speakers and her music laid on top of the talking textures. She sounded like so many popular singers...a whiney almost child like lazy slurred word delivery of every line. Why did this annoy me?

The bounce of the airplane as the wheels hit the ground brought me back to my seat from my day dreaming. I felt my weight move forward until the plane came to a slow taxi.
"We know you have many choices when making travel plans so we thank you for flying Southwest and enjoy your stay in Burbank."

Burbank. In 20 minutes I'd be home in our new southern California abode. I checked in with my gut feeling about that. It was a good feeling. I'm looking forward to getting plugged into life in L.A. writing more music, making new connections and hiking in the mountains.

Change is inspiring and I'm looking forward to all the great things these big changes will bring along the way.

I'll sign off for now!

With much love,

Grandma Suzi

Smelling the roses.

In spite of the lack of rain here in southern California plants seem to be thriving. The street we live on is luscious and green with bizarre looking succulents that have figured out a way to manage the dry hot summers. I'd like to talk to these alien looking botanical wonders and learn the secret of their seemingly content existance on zero water and tons of sun.

Magically, creatively, auspiciously lucky, George scored a perfect sweet little old hobbit-ish house made of white stucco on a beautiful tree lined street in Pasadena. We've been camping out inside of it for a week because our "stuff" doesn't arrive for a few more days.

The mornings are cool enough to sit on the front porch with coffee and toast and call out chatty niceties to people walking by with dogs and babies in strollers.

I'm excited about setting up my studio and getting back to work.  Soon enough! It's always good to take a break from routine and give the well a chance to fill up again...and I'm grateful for this temporary down time of not having any deadlines and to actually be able to stop and smell the roses...although have you noticed that roses don't smell like roses any more?  What's that about? For the past several years I've been on a quest to find roses that smell rosy to little or no avail. I'm actually someone who does stop when I pass by a bush in bloom. It used to bother me that lately roses are for the most part without fragrance, but today on my morning walk through our new hood I bent over to sniff a lovely pink bloom and I realized that even though you may not get to enjoy that memorable scent of rose,  it's still a nice thing to take that moment...a pause...get close to the open petals and really appreciate it even if it only smells like any generic plant these days.

So we all figure out how to keep blooming don't we? The succulents without water...the rose with no scent. Smart plants.

That being said, I miss my sense of community in Austin. I miss the family I left there. But I know I'm going to enjoy this new chapter of our creative life together in a new place.

Onward...and I'll keep you posted on musical things happening very soon.

Much Love,
Suzi