I move slowly through the world because I see beauty, and it cannot be hurried past. Leaves, rocks and acorns fill my pockets. I decorate my home with sticks shaped like people and dried weeds so structurally complex and silently exuberant they feel like messages of love. The fruits of the earth are a wonder I continually explore through slow food, of course, and I’ve discovered the best, easy homemade bread recipe you could ever imagine (no breadmaker needed).
My existence has been steeped in the life-shaping world of architecture, which I consider a great gift. Half of my childhood was spent in a historic home and half in a Frank Lloyd Wright-inspired one just eighty miles from the architect’s estate, Taliesin, in Spring Green, Wisconsin. In my adulthood, I’ve lived in a family of architects, restored several historic homes and worked for two of the nation’s most prominent architectural arts studios. Sacred space—in nature and the built environment—has always been a draw for me and my sometimes niche in the work world. All of the above have been coalescing into the novel, The Pull of the Earth, which is coming soon.
My lifelong love of books, and search for meaning, has taken me through the “Great Books” program at Notre Dame (along with art and architecture studies) and probably produced enough overdue book fines to populate a wing at your local library. I’m passionate about firsthand experience, which at times has meant crossing “No Trespassing” barriers and sleeping open air in the desert. Words I try to live by include: Love thy neighbor. No exceptions. And these from Rainer Maria Rilke: Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves…the point is, to live everything…Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”
Love nature with me—help yourself to photos here