sunrise August 24th…

Sunday, I kayaked at sunrise for the first time. I’ve never witnessed this beauty from the water. Every direction I turned, the light shifted in awe-inspiring ways.

Cape Cod Bay, Sunday, August 24th, 2025, Sandwich, Mass

After a week of wild waves and wind from Hurricane Erin, the waters finally settled down. Cape Cod Bay felt expansive to me, just like the prairie I was raised roaming in South Dakota.

I could faintly hear fishermen talking across the still water.

The birds were busy. Hurricane Erin brought a lot of baitfish to the bay. The seals would pop up, see me, then dive down. They seemed playful and happy to have some calm waters.

This summer, I started singing Simon and Garfunkel’s Cecilia (Ce-SEAL-ya) to the seals in the morning. In my imagination, they are drawn to and comforted by my singing…Cecilia, you’re breakin’ my heart, you’re shaking my confidence daily.

I guess the day after this experience, I don’t want to put off what I’m longing to do.

“It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are still alive. There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger for them.”George Eliot

looking back at 2022…

In 2013 I titled this blog Spark & Muse. Today I looked back at 2022 to see what provided my spark and muse.

Creatively I’m all over the place right now. I tend to create, photograph, and forget. I really want to land on a project and see it through in 2023. I think I need a deadline. That always helps me. #stickwithanyprojectin2023lisa

A few things are clearer to me now after researching me.

  1. I like to shoot flowers as they fade, they are far more compelling to me than perfection.
  2. I see that I shoot images of things that are somehow out of place.
  3. I collect and catalog my beach finds.
  4. I prefer images with negative space.
  5. Our cat Karen gets photographed a lot.
  6. I like taking photographs of fog and rainy windows.
  7. I shoot a lot of pictures when I’m eating raw oysters.
  8. I like to photograph men I meet on the beach.
  9. Color and motion are a spark to me.

Art is never finished, only abandoned. —Leonardo Da Vinci.

In May we gathered to celebrate with lots of treats the life of Renay Mandel Corren—RIP Renay. We listened to the live-streamed memorial service from a bowling alley in Fayetteville, NC. None of us knew her, but her obituary was one of my true delights of 2022. Reading it will make your day. https://www.fayobserver.com/obituaries/m0028451

Everyone has a creative impulse, and has the right to create, and should. —Patti Smith

More sparks…

I barely have words for what Jeff and I witnessed at the Newport Folk Festival in July. Surprise guests, Paul Simon and Joni Mitchell—one of the absolute privileges of my lifetime. Crying with 10,000 music lovers still gives me goosebumps.

Cheers to whatever provides spark and muse to you!

PS I mean it, read Renay’s obituary, here’s the link again.

https://www.fayobserver.com/obituaries/m0028451

Because she was my mother, the death of zaftig good-time gal Renay Corren at the impossible old age of 84 is newsworthy to me, and I treat it with the same respect and reverence she had for, well, nothing. A more disrespectful, trash-reading, talking and watching woman in NC, FL or TX was not to be found.