Last night was the first night I heard significant insect sounds flooding the neighborhood. I guess it makes sense since yesterday was the spring equinox. ‘Equalnight’ sounds more exotic to me than the Latin word ‘equinox.’

For anyone who missed it, the breeze and temperature combined to assert the fact that spring has sprung. Walking around all the neighborhoods felt magical in a way that defies description. I’m certain it’s a primeval recognition of things renewed.

I chased the local barn owl around the streets across the railroad tracks. It flew over me three times, its wings flapping like a carpet being whipped in the air. Its hoot was enormous as it echoed and created a Doppler effect as it swooped away.

I stood in the darkness, listening to the insects and the birds that refused to pay attention to our clocks. I did my best to stand absolutely still long enough for my camera to take an exposure and show me what would have been otherwise unseeable. I found a little slice of Narnia.

Before I reluctantly finished my walk, I made a huge loop and came back around to Elm Street. I like listening to the rooster crowing. And imagining the neighbors futilely trying to cover their head and ears with their blankets as it announces the day. But maybe they’ve become accustomed to it, much in the way that the roar of the train as it passes isn’t a nuisance to most of us who experience it. (For married folks, I would compare it to realizing that your spouse has been talking for 10 minutes and you suddenly recognize the buzz of words to be someone actually talking to you.)

Elm Street also has a house with a beautiful multi-colored Christmas tree in the front window. 

Before finishing my walk, I paid a visit to the towering Mimosa tree to check its branches. After living here a few years, experience has taught me that it is the one true barometer of the season. 

Fayetteville has decided that mimosas are invasive, and perhaps they are. I would argue that we are too. The staggering growth of Northwest Arkansas proves it. 

I wrote the lyrics and the music.

Whether you agree with me or not, this is a punch.

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47 Reasons
it’s coming at us rapid pace
angry, loud, in our face

hate disguised as efficiency
love apparently lacks sufficiency

apathy, discontent, unpenitent
camouflaged as money misspent

four-seven reasons to hate each other
while the rich swim in green

we ain’t united that’s quite plain
it takes a gut punch to explain

explosive, argument, false narrative
any to break our collective

instead of looking out for each other
we’re looking for an out, my brother

decomposing, destructive, deleterious
chasing power isn’t mysterious

it seems as if everything’s covered in orange
flame-broiled and full of carnage

everyone’s talking, no one’s listening
pay attention to the fabric ripping

you’re cutting off your nose to spite your face
when what we need is a bit of grace

lying, duplicity, denial of ethnicity

we used to value reason and intelligence

you’re cutting off your nose to spite your face
when what we need is a bit of grace

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#trump

My most complicated solar light so far. Because I used five layers of acrylic, it weighs 12.2 lbs. and required several hours to finish. I filled each layer with jewelry, keepsakes, and interesting things.  It’s quite beautiful. During the hardening process, one of the layers reached 218°. I wasn’t sure if the vase would withstand the heat of the curing process. Had it ruptured, I would have broken the glass off and the result would have been different. Still beautiful. Just different. 

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I’m not judging Oprah Winfrey for being deceptive about the cause of her weight loss. She’s an adult and did what she needed to do.

What bothers me is that several high profile people have said that it’s impossible to lose so much weight so quickly without resorting to drugs or surgery.

That is not true at all.

This week, and old friend reached out to me, saying he needed to lose a lot of weight and his focus was going to be on exercise.

Though I have not written about it much lately, you might remember that I have a different take that most people don’t understand.

At my highest point, I was at 253. I woke up one morning feeling like death was standing behind me. A bell went off in my head.

From that day, I completely flipped my diet and experimented with better quality foods that kept me feeling fuller. 

I ended up losing over 100 lbs. I did not starve myself. But what I did do was realize that I was obviously consuming more calories than I was burning. Despite that, I did not count calories. I didn’t take drugs and I didn’t add any exercise until about 8 months later.

I chose push-ups because I could do them anywhere. The amount of time traveling to and from a gym usually exceeds the amount of time you’re actually working out. Later I added dumbbells for the same reason. 

I consumed a massive amount of vegetables, cooked and seasoned wildly. I ate so-called bad foods too because failing to treat yourself is a guarantee that you’ll fail. 

While I am not at 150 anymore, one thing that came out of the process is that I realize that I can drop to any weight I want simply by putting into action my desire to see it through. It’s true that if you have an underlying medical condition, this process is going to be very chaotic and more difficult. When I talk about my weight loss or anyone wanting to do the same, I’m not including those people in my recommendations. 

If you leverage your body correctly and simply figure out a way and experiment to eat so that you’re not hungry but can also stop consuming so much of the things that you know in your heart are part of the problem, you will lose weight over time. It’s consistency.

The other thing I can’t help but preach about is that you need to be very careful about doing anything you can’t do for the rest of your life. Losing weight is not a sprint or a one-off thing. Because if you change back to old habits, your body is going to start storing calories again if you consume more than you burn. 

I didn’t have any special skills. I still don’t. But I do have a certainty that weight loss can be achieved simply by taking small moves and making them a habit. You don’t need to spend an hour a day in the gym. You can walk, do intense housework, or enjoy moving around in a lot of ways. Building muscle does help keep you healthier overall. The science is clear. But if you are looking to lose weight regardless of your muscle mass, you will always get a bigger bang for your buck by reducing the things that you know aren’t good for your weight. It’s easier said than done, right? 

You have to choose your hard. Food is damn good and always will be. If you take a hard look at what you’re eating and figure out a way to reduce it and trade lesser foods for better ones and keep at it, you will lose weight. 

Being thinner does not equal being more healthy. But let’s be honest. A great number of people need to lose weight so that they will feel like they look better. I don’t judge people for their reasons. We are vain creatures. 

If a billionaire struggles to keep her weight where she wants it, it’s a certainty us mere mortals will struggle too.

And we will continue to struggle until we face the demon and acknowledge that most of us have more weight than we want simply because we don’t understand how many more calories we’re eating than we need. 

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