sixty starlings

trilliums, an encounter with a friend and some birds, and lots of leaves.

Mar 22, 2024

Greetings, earthlings.

Hey y’all.

Thank you to everyone ordering things from my shop this week!

Since launching into self-employment last fall my focus has been establishing myself as a creative studio working with nonprofits and small businesses to help them tell their stories. It’s been working! Nothing lights me up more than supporting change-makers by raising awareness about their work and I’m doing a lot of that right now behind the scenes.

Making and selling my own stuff was always part of the plan for self-employment, but I feel more hesitant about it. It’s more work than working with a single client on a single project, and I feel conflicted about making more stuff, and making more noise to sell more stuff.

But this week I was reminded that selling my own work is a connective and inspiring part of my creative practice and business. I’ve connected with people all over the world who are inspired by the same plants, artists, thinkers, and visions and hopes for the future. A handful of folks have reached out simply wanting to connect and be friends because of a sense of alignment and kinship.

I’m feeling much less hesitant, now. Because what the fuck else is the point of being alive to find your people and look at one another and go YOU! HELLO YOU! I SEE AND LOVE YOU!

It’s the best. You’re all the best. Thank you for being here!

Here are three things that filled my cup this week:

1. A thing I read and loved: Anna Brone’s zine, Trillium Watch

Creative Fuel with Anna Brones

The Power of Zines

Thank you so much to paid subscribers for helping to bring this newsletter and community to life. We’re going to do our first Creative Fuel Studio Session next Thursday, March 21, 5-6pm PT, a perk for paid subscribers. I hope that you’ll come join us for this new virtual creative happy hour…

a year ago · 99 likes · 7 comments · Anna Brones

I love Anna Brones, I love Trillium (they’re included in my spring equinox bandana), I love zines, and my brilliant new friend and zine-maker extraordinaire Shay Mirk is heavily featured in this post.

If you’ve ever wondered what defines a zine, how to make zine, or if you want to look for Trillium over the next month or so, this is worth a scan.

2. An interaction/podcast that blew my mind: Memory Palace, Sixty Starlings

I was walking to the coffee shop earlier this week when a cacophony of birds on Strong Street stopped me in my tracks.

I don’t just throw around the word cacophony. The volume–both the density of birds and their decibels–was stunning.

I did a sound ID with Merlin (the recording doesn’t do it justice):

After standing there in awe for a few minutes, I picked my jaw up off the sidewalk, took a few steps, rounded the corner, and nearly ran into my friend, Dov. Dov runs Burlington City and Lake Semester where I was an artist-in-residence last year.

I noted the birdsong and wondered if they were primarily Gackles or Starlings. I didn’t realize Dov is a hardcore birder. He said, “Oh, those are Starlings. Do you know their story? Some rich guy who liked Shakespere wanted to bring every bird named in Shakespere’s work to the United States, so he brought over 100 Starlings in the 1800s and now they’re the most populous bird on the continent and they’ve brought total calamity to our native ecosystems. There’s a podcast about it.” The story is fucking insane. Dov texted it to me with, “Perhaps the most beautiful piece I’ve read/heard about invasive species.“

This story (my story) is about why I love living in Burlington so much: I have a question, and three seconds later I physically run into a brilliant human I love with the answer, and then some. It happens all the time.

3. Some art I was sent: Deerhill Studio’s leaf art

Emily Davis (@peakfoliage) is an artist based in Martha’s Vineyard. We’ve never met, but she DM’d me on Instagram a few months ago to ask if she could make a leaf portrait of me doing my crossing guard duties, and she did:

Emily recently asked for my address and I figured she wanted to send me the portrait. She did, but she also sent me a deluge of her work, including her amazing newspaper, Leaflit, with the portrait on the cover and a little article about my work inside:

Emily also sent me her beautiful Quiet Calendar and some greeting cards. I’m stunned. Her work is beautiful, both the art/design and the quality of her paper products. I want to make my own newspaper now. Thank you for the inspiration and generosity, Emily! What a gift.

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