This, Too.

Words to end the week, from poet Mary Oliver. Stumbled on this by chance and thought it was perfect.

The Uses of Sorrow

(In my sleep I dreamed this poem)

Someone I loved once gave me
a box full of darkness.

It took me years to understand

that this, too, was a gift.

(From Thirst, 2006.)

--

Wishing you a wonderful weekend. Coming next week: Rothko manicures, dangerous women, a new POV.

Words by Mary Oliver. Photos by my friend Emily Johnston. (More on Emily, here.)

Meet the Parents.

For whiling away a Thursday morning, photos from a 1971 issue of LIFE, featuring rock musicians with their moms and dads. Below, from top to bottom: Frank Zappa, Joe Cocker, Eric Clapton, Grace Slick, and Elton John (whose mother was quoted as saying, "We used to put him to bed in the day and get him up at night for parties").

See more at LIFE, here. Photos by John Olson (Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images).

Further reading: hardest-core music fans and a pair of Argentinian bandmates who perform for plastic animals. Read on, rock on.

Attic Antics.

This tiny apartment is located in an attic in Madrid and belongs to a DJ, two facts that should automatically qualify it as the coolest place on Earth. In addition, though, it hosts a multitude of secrets and surprises: trap doors, hidden rooms, movable walls. There's also a swing, a tea room, a hanging table, and a disco ball. "Every house, in its way, is a theater where you perform your everyday life," say the architects. I love that.

Thanks, Fast Company. Visit architecture firm elii's website, here. Images by Miguel de Guzman. 

And speaking of interiors, my newest interview for Freunde von Freunden is up today. It features fashion designers Mike Eckhaus and Zoe Latta, who make clothing out of materials like clear leather and fishing line. My favorite bit from our interview? Zoe's remark about an unfortunate haircut from her younger days: "I looked exactly like David Hockney and no one told me it wasn't okay." See the full feature, with photos by Brian Ferry, here.

Flowers in Flight.

There was a moment yesterday when I swore I could feel spring. I could feel its brightness, its colors. I could smell it. It felt tangible, and so close. Then I remembered it was January, and 35 degrees. That 35 degrees felt like spring because we'd just had nearly a week of weather with temperatures in the teens. Still, I remembered spring. And that made me happy.

While I've always loved the thread-wrapped arrows and silkscreened moon dominoes created by Brooklyn artists Fredericks & Mae, today was my first introduction to the duo's line of spring-like flowered kites, made to commemorate the Roman titan Flora. Says Gabriel Fredericks Cohen, "We're consistently attracted to items that occur in multiple contexts across the globe and throughout history. The arrow shows up in every culture on every continent. So do kites."

Visit Fredericks & Mae, here. Stay warm!

Sweet & Art.

Make the world's most beautiful cookies with cutters by Printmeneer of the Netherlands: Mad Hatters, golden ratios, 1990s Volvo station wagons. You can even make a chocolate bar shaped cookie, as shown here. Just what I've always wanted.

Shop these shapes and more at Printmeneer. 

POV: Changes.

POV ("point of view") is a series that addresses many of the same themes covered in my Equals Record column: growing up, saying yes to adventure, learning to embrace a quarter-life crisis. Each POV entry will include a photograph and a short reflection based on what’s pictured. While my previous column focused largely on ideas, POV focuses on moments - glimpses, glances, tiny stories. 

A few nights into the new year, a group of friends came over and we baked macaroons while a snow storm brewed. When the cookies were done, we drizzled them in chocolate, drank cups of whiskey, and climbed the stairs to the roof where we lay on frozen chaise lounges and turned cartwheels in the snow. Across the street, people turned their lights on and watched us through their windows. We waved. A few waved back. One couple started jumping on their bed.

“This is the best start to the year ever,” someone said, and we all agreed. 

Days later, three friends were jobless, two had ended relationships, nearly all of us were sick, and the city had been plunged into the icy depths of something called a polar vortex.
I looked at Megan from across the table at our favorite coffee shop. “Now what?” I said.

Appetites.

Painter Lee Price's photorealistic self portraits are impressive to begin with, but it was her explanation for choosing to focus on a woman's relationship with food that really got me. She tells Don't Panic: "Often, women are brought up to control their appetites. Not just for food, but in many areas of life. We are taught to be givers, to nurture others at the expense of our own needs (in a way that men are not). I think food, for some reason, is one way we have chosen to give back to ourselves - to attempt to nurture ourselves."

Pancakes, pie, and sugar cereal in the bath; peaches and cherry cheesecake in bed: it's a little funny and a little frightening, a little foreign and a little familiar. 

More from Lee Price, here. Happy Thursday!

Crafted Crops.

"Just think," I found myself saying to my roommate Jamie last night, "In five short months, it'll be summer, and we'll have the windows open, and it'll be so hot we won't know what to do with ourselves."

As it happens, it's six degrees right now in New York City, the streets are blanketed in snow, and our windows are glazed in a thick layer of frost. The world outside is cold and colorless - which is why this handmade paper orchard, comprised of thousands of pieces of paper produce, caught my attention.

I'm a little late to the game (the orchard was built in 2011 by Gloss Creative at Melbourne's GPO); still, this morning, I can't imagine a more welcome sight.

Visit Gloss Creative's website, here. Photos by Sam Ali and Marcel Aucar.

Different Strokes.

Heather Hansen makes art using charcoal and the sweeping gestures of her arms and legs. Looking at her finished drawings, you can almost hear the swish and swing of her limbs, the rustle of paper, her breath as she moves. See more at Heather's website, here. 

My thoughts on movement, letting go, and a favorite poem by Rumi - Dance, when you’re broken open. / Dance, if you’ve torn the bandage off. / Dance in the middle of the fighting. / Dance in your blood. / Dance when you’re perfectly free - here.

POV: The Younger Generation.

POV ("point of view") is a series that addresses many of the same themes covered in my Equals Record column: growing up, saying yes to adventure, learning to embrace a quarter-life crisis. Each POV entry will include a photograph and a short reflection based on what’s pictured. While my previous column focused largely on ideas, POV will focus on moments - glimpses, glances, tiny stories. 

On a recent frigid Monday, I had dinner at a neighborhood restaurant with Jamie and Megan. At the table next to us were two girls, tiny and twig-like, one in a neon orange beanie and braces, the other with a pixie cut and thick swipes of glitter eyeliner. “How old are those girls?” I said, looking over. “Ten?”

As soon as the words left my mouth, I overheard a snippet of their conversation, something about just having graduated college. As they compared notes, a waitress appeared table-side, carrying a tray of enormous coconut milkshakes. Cream spilled over the edges.

I had a sudden, ridiculous thought: Look at those twenty-one year olds, so young, their whole lives ahead of them. I shuddered.

The girl in the neon beanie laughed, flashed her braces, sipped her milkshake.

Solo.

I spent much of yesterday alone, an experience which, after the holidays and a summer and fall of near-constant activity, felt foreign to me. I did mountains of laundry, wrote for an hour or two, shopped for plants, shivered in the cold. I felt alone, but not lonely. The world seemed quiet, but not dead. 

These photos by Martin Vlach capture moments like this perfectly. 

Visit Vlach's website, here. Thanks, My Modern Met.

(Further viewing & reading: "lonely and/or alone men," my friend Samm Blake's Waiting for the What series, and thoughts on solitude as a type of wilderness.)

Jikits.

I'm a happy owner of a Jikits mobile (which I wrote about here), and I've enjoyed following artist Kim Baise's work in the years since, as she's expanded her punchy paint-and-papier-mache repertoire. I love these dreamlike kaleidoscopic ice cream cones, for instance, and her potted cacti, bonsai trees, and twig geos. Says Kim, "I've created Jikits to represent the side of me that enjoys being trapped in my own inner world."

Shop all of Kim Baise's work, here. (Happily, each mobile pictured above is less than $50.)

Foodscapes.

Many thanks to Bekka, who clued me in to these amazing food photographs by Pierre Javelle and Akiko Ida. Cycling on eggshells, golfing on glaze, navigating the blistered terrain of a creme brûlée - it's all mouthwatering magic. See more, here.

In other news, stay dry today, New Yorkers! I'm spending the afternoon indoors, and Lily, Jamie, and I are inviting friends over and attempting to cook dinner. We're thinking about making this. Wish us luck - our track record in the kitchen is questionable.