Fostering a new renaissance through creativity, authenticity, spirituality, and art
Polly Castor 
We are fortunate to be part of a shared harvest at a local educational farm and weekly get a box of vegetables and fruit. This week our box included kale, which I have not found a way to care for yet as a sautéed lump on my plate(!), and tatsoi, which is also known … Read more
I wanted to like this film. After all, it had Colin Firth, English aristocratic country homes, and a tango scene; all that made it seem rather compelling. But knowing it was based on a Noel Coward play, I should have had my guard up more about the story-line. I found the whole film a disappointment … Read more
I Am Orange I am orange bright, bold and in your face caution: you can see me from far off… I’m unreserved and free blasting forward, assertive (but safe from being shot at) I make other colors look better. I’m slurpy as a tangerine while dry as a desert sunset blazing; clear, humble, lyrically compassionate … Read more
This is the painting I started in my pastel class. It is the largest pastel I’ve ever done. It has been sitting on my mantel for over a month awaiting completion! I had a great time finishing it. This was done from a photo of mine taken on the Schoodic Peninsula in Acadia National Park, … Read more
The word rhododendron is my favorite choice for stumping someone at hangman on the back of a diner place mat. This practice dates back to childhood when this word would routinely win me the game Probe. We never had rhododendrons then or now, but my aunt in Michigan used to have an awesome one out … Read more
I have really enjoyed this book by Dawn De Vries Sokol and even give it five stars. I bought it in the fall and have savored it slowly and incrementally at bedtime, studying each page thoroughly and carefully before going on to the next. I disciplined myself not to flip forward, and didn’t allow myself … Read more
Irises are fascinating. Ninety-nine percent of these photographs were taken in our yard. My husband is a very good gardener and has received most of our irises as gifts. There are so many pictures of them because I find them endlessly interesting. Enjoy!
This page represents May 27, 2009 through June 7, 2009. I am most gratified that several blog readers have started their own Box-A-Day Art Journal! I know well what enormous blessings are in store for you doing this! See below for some close up photos from this page. Enjoy!
I haven’t been out to the movies in eons so this probably added to my enjoyment of this recently released romantic comedy: My Life In Ruins. We were drawn to see it because it has the same lead as My Big Fat Greek Wedding – Nia Vardalos – who is refreshingly not-Hollywood, and also because … Read more
Let it Be like Atlas carrying the world taking too much responsibility I need a vacation from introspection pressure huge expectation and crippling hope that shrivels and snivels trying to make it all right with too much effort knowing what it could be with too much intensity and too much tenacity why do only … Read more
I love poppies. The audaciously flagrant color, the bristly buds, the stark markings, and the ten armed starfish shaped velour crown on the pregnant seed pod, all strike me as potent, voluptuous and thrilling. Enjoy this year’s photos of them taken just before an untimely rain curtailed prematurely the other stages of their glory…
I read this classic book by Jean Henri-Fabre (France 1823 – 1915) to my homeschooled 6th grader as supplementary science material this year. She gives the book four stars in general, and five stars in the category of “school books.” She would often pick it out of the stack over other ongoing things. Originally published … Read more
On Monday, I was in Bedford, NY taking my 12 year old daughter to a poetry class given by a hip slam poet. The class was near a tiny chapel of a church dating from 1851 and a mill waterfall, both of which you can see below. The weather was pristine, magnificent, and sublimely … Read more
I really enjoyed painting this one in the sun on my front porch, while sitting in one of our white Adirondack chairs and smelling the newly mown grass. Below are photos of the same painting. Which orientation do you like best?
We love this dish so much we just planted a whole bunch of tomato plants to support it. Meanwhile, we already have fresh mint in our garden which is fun to use it in this. (But we also make it year round with grocery store ingredients as well!) It is a Martha Stewart recipe (see … Read more
I had dinner last night with two friends visiting from Maine, at a picturesque spot just a few feet away from the Hudson River. It was a lovely evening. The restaurant was called Half Moon, and it didn’t escape us that there was a half moon in the sky as well. The light was … Read more
Well Fertilized My friend is on the phone: “What’s going on?” “I’m hauling a lot of crap around.” “Oh dear. What’s happened?” “No, really, it’s great. I’m making several trips bringing home free horse manure for my garden.” That’s when she realized that the metaphor applies: all that awful “shit she’s been through” has … Read more