What are you doing with your creativity?

This question has surfaced several times since I hung up my architect hat three months ago.

I am raising a creative, smart, talented and beautiful teenage daughter. This is one way I am using my creativity. There are others.

Threading words together, writing one piece and sharing bits of my inner world, as well as, the daily living from my perspective on a weekly basis is another.

Remembering and imagining ingredients to cook creative dinners regularly counts. So does combining nutritious, colorful and delicious smoothie concoctions five mornings a week.

Being open to words, insights and creative ideas that surface and then incorporating them into the daily art of living.

Finding my own creative way to serve, work and share within a field that is saturated in our community. How much yoga and wellness does a small town need?

Spreading my wings. I am familiar with working in a saturated market. Design and build had its times. In any field, one must realize the unique value of one's own offering: train, practice, develop, show up, serve and hold nothing back. Create an authentic and unique niche. Do what you love and have absolute faith in its undertaking. This takes time, trust, perseverence, work and above all, creativity.

Creatively thinking and reaching out to friends about the upcoming trip to New Orleans I have bought plane tickets for Paloma and myself. Researching coronovirus. Doing my best to be informed and educated about the reality of a worldwide conversation. If most people are staying home and airports are relatively empty, wouldn't that make it possibly the best time ever to travel?

Frenchmen Street, New Orleans. Picture borrowed from the internet.

Last night, our family was in La Paz at a secundaria watching twelve schools share their creative expression through the art of dance. Four modern dance groups and eight folkloric performances. During one of the modern dances, their music failed. Before our wide and admiring eyes, that group of girls didn't miss a beat! The audience chimed in with rhythmic applauding as they kept dancing. We stayed with them til their last step. I had goose bumps and a lump in my throat the whole time. That is creativity incarnate.

Four hours of standing, walking, sitting on a hard floor, standing on top of a concrete bench to see over the crowd, sitting on that same bench before and after all the dances. Love is participation in community. Sharing uncomfortable moments and range of emotions experienced.

Paloma danced and smiled. I held back the tears as I watched and recorded in absolute awe. The Jalisco traditional dance was animated and full of life. Hard work, hours of preparation, twirling a heavy skirt made of sixteen meters of a fabric to move and dazzle has left her with arms and shoulders of steel.

Our school tied for first place. A dance competition between local municipalities. Winner goes to state. We waited while the judges deliberated. The award ceremony took as long as the twelve schools took to perform. Politics. We were all tired and ready though not looking forward to driving two hours in the dark all the way home to Los Barriles. Finally, we get to to the top three. When second place was announced, we sat still in anticipation. If our school tied for first place and didn't win second, then...another school was awarded first. Our school got none. We sat with wide eyes and I remembered Javier's explanations about politices in these school events. 

We got up and waited for our kids who, like the modern dancers, didn't miss a beat. Two things were certain: they danced like champions and we could now go home.

It was around nine at night and the four of us stopped at a side of the road food stand. Soon, several vehicles pulled up. It was a Los Barriles community party around a food stand in San Pedro, eating hot dogs, super burritos, drinking champurrado - which is like thick hot chocolate - and then saying good night, knowing we would caravan and watch for cows together on the winding road home. 

Creativity is in seeing, experiencing and living.

Creativity this morning was using my nervous energy to clear out and deep clean all the bathroom drawers and cabinets. Nervous about upcoming travel plans. Ollie was at the vet having her teeth cleaned. I reached out to friends who responded regarding current traveling. Warmly and quickly. I did more cleaning, laundry, warmed up split pea soup for lunch. Waiting for the time to pick up our little dog, I stretched out my tired and tense body from the demands of the day and evening before.

Before I picked up Ollie, who now has lovely clean teeth and is taking a nap on an oversized pillow that gets more use from her and Hobbes our cat than any of us, we received news. Two pieces of news that are relative to last night:

Our school will receive second place afterall. Someone didn't remain quiet. How our school tied for first then walked away wondering and today gets second placed. I do not know the details. I shake my head and marvel at the confusing elements of politics and observe my fifteen year old daughter take all this in with a level head on her shoulders. 

This morning, she received a picture of the cake below. A surprise birthday celebration organized by her fellow dancers. With all the excitement and confusion last night, the cake didn't get pulled out as planned.

What happened to the cake? 

Well, we know it got as far as the food stand. We were all standing and eating our dinners. Then, it was forgotten before Paloma ever got to see it in person or taste a bite. As far as we know, the cake was accidentally left there, in San Pedro, just thirty minutes south of La Paz. 

It is possible that one of two things happened to the cake. Maybe, hopefully it was enjoyed by the owner of the food stand and his family. Or, as a fellow parent suggested, perhaps a creative business opportunity surfaced. Maybe the cake was cut into slices and sold to be eated with warm cups of champurrado.

Who knows?! I do know that my grandpa Jimmy would have gotten a kick out of the whole story: dance competitions, politics and a lost birthday cake decorated with a dancing dove!

What am I doing with my creativity? 

Seeing, experiencing and enjoying all the richness, love and humor this life has to offer!