Portrait

 

La Bella Principessa by Leonardo da Vinci

My favorite painting by Leonardo da Vinci surfaced a few years ago and was sold at private auction. It is a picture of a girl, in profile, with beautiful wavy hair. It is believed to be the portrait of a fourteen-year old Italian noblewoman, Bianca Sforza, commissioned for her marriage. She was married and then died just a few months after the portrait was painted, probably from complications from pregnancy.

Such deaths were common then. They are not common now in the developed world, largely because of a network of women's healthcare that includes, but is not limited to, access to abortion for those who require it. 

Bianca Sforza had few human rights. Noblewomen's marriages were arranged. She was, in essence, sold, just as her portrait was sold centuries later. Her father, and then her husband, made the choices about her body that led to her fate.

Many more deaths like hers will now occur, and there is now no da Vinci to immortalize them.   

Ghost Yoga

I want to do a show on the Travel Channel called GHOST YOGA. It will be either:

1) People do yoga at haunted places to see if they can feel the ghostly energy.

2) People do yoga with ghosts.

3). Ghosts do yoga. (Because ghosts are invisible, this one would be a camera pointed at an empty location for an hour.)

March

 March comes in like a penguin and goes out like an irritable penguin. 

Small Sanction

 In support of Ukraine, I have ceased distribution of all my Amazon book titles in Russia. 

Haiku for #CalltoEarth Day

The leaves fall like tears
Raining from the last bright trees
Of the last autumn

#CalltoEarth

On the Occasion of My Fiftieth Birthday

I have a Birthday coming up in a few weeks. I do not want to be this age. I have not accomplished everything I wanted. But looking back, there is so much light and beauty and love.

This past year I have seen things I never thought I would see, and made choices where every option was a bad decision. I do not think I am better or stronger because of these experiences. I am damaged. I am about to turn fifty and there are strands of moonlight in my hair; but then I have always loved the moon. My family is alive, and I am alive, and my trees are green and beautiful, and taller than last year.    

George Floyd Was Murdered

There are things I need to say. These things seem obvious and rational to me. But I am a white woman, and troubled by the concept of "silence is complicity." So I will speak, although these things have already been said, and said better.

George Floyd was murdered.

This was a particularly horrific crime, but it is one in a long legacy of similar crimes both remembered and forgotten. The black community has a right to their rage and grief. We must listen.

We all have the right to peacefully protest.

Some protests have become violent. That is wrong.

Some peaceful protests have been scattered by local, state, and federal authorities by violent means. That is wrong.

No one is above the law.

We must do better as a society. We must vote. We must value everyone the same. We must be kind and respectful.

George Floyd was murdered.