…a new website, [deannachristiansen.com] and new journal site [You Are Here!] coming into fruition!
To accompany the publication of my new book, “Plantings”.
Now, in early July, not until now, summer has at last come to a winter-weary New Hampshire, with the mouth-watering potential soon of our own garden tomatoes and chiles, adding to our already burgeoning basil, oregano, sage, and rosemary. Soon there will be chard, and later pole beans. This year we have more flowers, pansies, lavender, a wildflower patch, our first roses. The woods and yard have burst into full green, giving the impression that the trees have closed ranks. Specialty Ice cream shops, open here only April or May through October, have customers in shorts lined up every day for luscious fresh-churned ice cream. Local sweet corn –the best–will be at the farmstands a few weeks from now. No “knee high by the Fourth of July” in New Hampshire. The baby alpaca crias are with their mothers in their fields and pens. (Alpacas are a popular animal here!– raised for their wool–and the young ones are adorable.) We can finally relax for a couple months from the continual labor of heating the house with a woodstove, and, with some days in the 90s, have turned on our central air conditioner.
And, after more than a half-year of concentrated effort and collaborative creativity with my gifted publisher Glen Aubrey–gifted and accomplished musically too–there is a new book in the world, and new music CD: one fruit of cooperation among creatives, accepting God’s invitations to create…
“Plantings~in Poetry, Essay, and Song”, and CD “Plantings” of original orchestrated piano compositions, several pieces composed by Glen in specific response to poems in “Plantings”. A unique publication, it has turned out to be, with even some black and white photography, and lead sheets of Glen’s songs. The book should be in my hands before the end of this finally-summer month.
At some sacrifice, and with significant joy, Investment in life; investment in creativity. Serendipity at the beginning of a distinct natural season.