On CNN and Southern Living

Today's CNN.com Travel section offered this article about Marfa, Marathon and Alpine in my region!

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TRAVEL/getaways/01/28/west.texas/index.html

Passing it on

I received this image from Laura, one of the students in the wonderfully talented class I taught at Arrowmont in October. It is her finished piece from our 'storytelling in embroidery' course, based on a photograph of her husband and young son. All the students did fantastic work, and this piece is simply lovely. (Somehow I neglected to blog about this class, which was a pure joy...everyone was engaged and challenged, positive and happy to share....they were a teacher's dream.)

Laura finished her piece sitting with her mom in the hospital this fall. The nurses watched the progress of this tiny embroidery, and Laura's mom, a painter, contributed color ideas even though she was "super-sick and on painkillers."

Laura's mom is home now and feeling better. I know firsthand about the healing and meditative nature of the work, and know it must have helped the stress of that time seem more manageable for all of them. Laura reports, "Working on this piece gave me something to DO when there was nothing I could do to help my Mom get better. So, now this tiny stitching has that much more of a story for me."

Morning Ritual

"I threw your trash," says Junior, the city custodian every morning. "I didn't know if you needed a new plastic bag."

"No," I tell him, "the one I have is still good."

"When you do, I'll make it real nice."

Junior travels to all his cleaning jobs (four) by bicycle, even on icy days like today. I don't know much about Junior, except that he likes coffee, his real name is Fabian, our conversations are pretty much limited to the state of my trash, and he does a good job cleaning the Convention Center. But I like our morning exchange and the fact that he seems to care quite a bit about keeping my wastebasket under control. In a town that often doesn't seem to care about keeping things nice, Junior's attitude keeps my faith in Van Horn alive.