Tom DiMenna tonight is at City Winery in NYC: 7:30pm Story Songs of the 70s: Music of Jim Croce, John Prine, Leonard Cohen along with all time favorites Cat Stevens, Gordon Lightfoot and Harry Chapin…Tickets still available

Andrea Gibson (1975-2025), Poet Laureate of Colorado

Photo Courtesy Boulder Library Foundation. Click image to read more about them.

So many tributes right now to this obviously incredible person, Andrea Gibson, poet laureate of Colorado, who recently left this planet after living with ovarian cancer for four years. I wish I had known more about them before. In honor of their beautiful poetry and their well-lived life, here is one of their poems that speaks to me and to the content of my newsletter as well:

A List of Things I Love

I love. That could be the end of the sentence, but I love sentences. I love words huddled together like strangers trying to survive a frigid night. I love rock sculptures built in windstorms. I love sandcastles crafted inches from the waves. I love the drama of an 80’s ballad. I love grandparents holding hands in rocking chairs on the porches of old houses in northern Maine. I love penguins, though I’ve never met one. I love how shocked I was when I realized my Superman cape couldn’t lift me into the sky. I love that all these decades later, I can still be that exact same kind of surprised.

I love cucumbers straight from the garden. I love old typewriters even if they don’t work. I love imagining I am a bird who is imagining what it’s like to be human in the dead of winter, wearing an upside-down nest made of yarn atop the head. I love wishing wells and the dreams that fill them.

I love scared rescue dogs who can’t live in homes with small children. I love the kids in junior high talent contests who always forget their lines. I love the nervous love in their parents’ chests. I love mother starlings racing home to their babies’ open and rowdy beaks. I love the perfect smiles of people with crooked teeth. I love daydreaming about the pep talks butterflies give to depressed caterpillars. I love that bumblebees taste with their feet. I love when it’s so cold out I can walk atop the sparkling snow. I love tiny libraries. I love stained glass windows in people’s homes.

I love how my partner takes karaoke far too seriously. I love my very first crush in the 4th grade, wherever he is, whoever he became. I love phone booths in London. I love ketchup chips from Canada. I love Titan, Saturn’s largest moon. I love the six perfect holes in my most worn pair of boots. I love that pigeons can recognize themselves in photographs. I love that laughter is more contagious than the flu. I love thank-you letters mailed to teachers twenty years after they graduate. I love the romance of merge signs.

I love watching people pull over on the side of the road to take pictures of a rainbow. I love that I can fix almost anything with shoelaces or duct tape. I love listening to my partner yell, “Andrea! Where did my shoelaces go this time!?” I love pointing out the window at our singing wind chime.

I love listening for the quietest notes of the loudest songs. I love carnivals in the parking lots of tiny towns. I love paper planes with love notes written inside. I love watching children realize that the seashells on the beach are free. I love the perfect contentment of a kite caught in a tree.

I love coffee shops on Saturday mornings. I love the kind kids who have hard lives. I love the mean kids who haven’t yet learned a better way to survive. I love that after chemotherapy, my straight hair grew back in curls. I love the tiny hurt that makes each pearl. I love trying to jump over puddles and failing.

I love that cows have best friends. I love that fleeting moment of annoyance while deep in writing a poem, someone interrupts to ask me to come look at the sunset. I love the instant that follows, when I recognize that to be a true poet, I must abandon every poem for every pink sky.

I love the pink sky and the sound of my grumpy neighbor opening his door at the same time that I do. I love both of us peeling off the husks of our minds to taste the sweetness of the world’s truth. I love what I have in common with people I have nothing in common with.

I love that my best friends kiss me on the forehead whenever I am sick. I love the baristas in fancy coffee shops who never ever smile. I love old diners with signs that say, “Stay A While.” I love the desert. I love the sea.

I love how much longer this list would be if the sunset were not, in this very second, calling me.

And I love all of you, friends, for caring about what I love. What are you loving today?

Love, Andrea

Debbi DiMaggio Podcast Interview with Me

Debbi DiMaggio Interviews Me: Click image for the whole podcast

Wonderful podcast on much more than real estate with Debbi DiMaggio

I usually don't like sharing this kind of thing because it feels like I am showing off and I get nervous when I do interviews and end up sounding like an idiot. Furthermore I don't usually like the way I look on camera but this time it actually went off without a hitch and I am actually proud of the interview.

I took a pitstop in Portland Maine on my way to New York City and the Press Hotel in Portland Maine was kind enough to let me find a quiet place in their lobby to tape the podcast. Debbi DiMaggio, a client of mine who has become a friend is a great interviewer, aside from being a California real estate broker par excellence. She put me totally at ease, prompted me with good questions and I definitely know the material since it is my life...

Many of you know a lot about me already but if you don't, have a listen--it's a good way of getting to know my background, my approach to my art and some of what I have been up to all these 68 years...

Amazing Grace sung by President Barak Obama

I think we all need to hear this again. Obama sings Amazing Grace.

NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL A PRESIDENT!

Painting of the Week

Metallic Flower Power Series mixed media on paper 44” x 90” $9000

Charity of the Week: Doctors Without Borders

About The Author

New York City based contemporary artist, Pam Smilow, began writing the creative lifestyle blog “things we love” in an effort to foster a sense of community during times of isolation and reflection. To read more about her and her art, visit her website and check out the essay written by Frank Matheis entitled The Sophisticated Innocence of Pam Smilow.