The exciting part for us though was the opening band, The Paper Raincoats, a duet of Alex Wong and Amber Rubarth (w/
Adam Christgau on drums — I hope that is his name?).  They were incredible.  We bought their new album Safe In The Sound (also available on Itunes).

Ken and I went into the bar of the Triple Door after the show and we couldn’t stop talking about them.  Not only do they have a beautiful turn of phrase in their lyrics, but their harmonies are sweet, joyful, and stay with you long after the show has passed.

They had such an effect on us that we left the show and planned on adding all sorts of texture, bass, drum, and fun to our own music.  I think that is the best compliment any musician can get.

So enough said, check them out.  They are good.  I’m lovin it.

Dominique Gabella was one of those teachers for me, and she might not know it.  During my time as a volunteer director for Seeds of Compassion, I was always a little frazzled.  We were building a movement from scratch — we never had enough money and never enough time.   A project that started as a small three day conference took up momentum and transformed into concerts, stadium events, and five days of activities.  We were asking people to donate their talents as volunteers and trying to use everyone’s amazing skills to capacity.  Needless to say, I was stressed, and often falling into a less than compassionate mindset.

Enter Dominique.

Dominique joined the Seeds of Compassion volunteer team early on.  An accomplished dancer and the expertise of a woman who had run her own company for years wrapped in beautiful long hair and a European disposition.  I came across hundreds of amazing volunteers during my work, but Dominique was uniquely helpful to me.   She would walk right across a buzzing room, look me in the eye, and ask with quiet simplicity — “how can i help you?” At moments it gave me such relief I could cry.  She came in several days a week, and did whatever needed to be done without pretense.  The woman probably should have been doing my job since she was a businesswoman who had run a company for years with mostly volunteers — her skills were so far above the work she would do for me.  She organized my volunteer forms, answered emails I couldn’t get to, researched random tasks I had promised to others but had not yet begun.  Honestly, it was grunt work.

But she would smile, take the project from my hands, and glide across the room to return later with a perfect task completed.  Never a complaint.  Never a critique.  Never a drop of ego.  She went on to run one of our biggest campaign — What Does Compassion Look Like.  Working with students and teachers and hundreds of art pieces.  She would arrive early in the morning to set up the artwork, return late in the night to take it all down.  She held each piece like treasure — delicate and golden.

Recounting her help to the project, is not what made her so special.  First, it is no secret that I love to dance.  In fact, in my next life — I’ll devote myself to it.   So, to just have a professional dancer around was wonderful.  The dance lives throughout a dancer’s entire body –  just watch Dominique pick up a pencil or glide across a room.  She is graceful and strong, and to me, that is a deadly combination.  Sometimes, late in the afternoon, when just a few of us were left, she would tell amazing stories of Switzerland or a past show she had done, or her current project she was working on, and just hearing her talk makes you feel like more of an artist.

Second, she was the embodiment of compassion.  She was not always treated with care.  We were all racing with high expectation and she was given several difficult challenges and high maintenance clients — but she always calm, focused, and joyful.  I don’t know how she did it.  I guess that is why I liked having her around.  You couldn’t help but slow down — her personality emanated the energy — “you are going to be fine”  “we are doing the best we can”  “you know this can actually be fun”.  I wanted so desperately to have that kind of presence in my leadership and management (I think the use of the word “desperately” proves I have not yet mastered the skill). I attribute her style to her European upbringing or a life in the theater, but also to her individual soul.

I haven’t seen her much since our project ended, but got an email this morning with a link to an article about her from KUOW about “Old Masters”.   How lucky we are to have teachers and friends who dance into our lives when they are so needed — making us better just by their presence.

Listen to Dominique’s story and look at some of the amazing photos in the slideshow.

Dominique Gabella, Dancer

Friday, April 10, 2009

Dominique Gabella can’t imagine her world without dance. She said that is “like silk; it’s an ingredient of my life.” Gabella has been a professional dancer for more than 40 years. Unfortunately, the older she gets, the less her body is able to cooperate with her creative spirit. Today we continue our weekly series “Old Masters.” It’s about how art shapes artists, and how age influences their art. KUOW’s Marcie Sillman introduces us to a woman who says age won’t keep her from the artform she loves.

• Slideshow of Photos
• Interview  – Real Audio and MP3
• Next Stage Dance Theater
  

Cheers to the dancer in all of us.

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes.  Art is knowing which ones to keep.

- Scott Adams

There are two things that I love reading, learning, and chatting about with reckless abandon. . .The first is creativity and the second is leadership.  I know, lame right? [insert ego here] Try as I like to dive into fiction and novels, when I have free time my mind races to blogs and articles about creativity and leadership.

In regards to creativity I’m obsessed with all aspects of creation — artistry, the process, the product, the emotion, the success, and just as importantly — the failure (if there is such a thing).  Leadership holds many of the same tenants of my interest.

In the quiet of my heart, my goal is to become a creative person and an inspirational leader.  The frustrating part is that I spend a lot of time reading and thinking about creativity, and not nearly enough time actually creating.

But regardless of all the excuses, even just reading about other artists’ processes gets me a little closer to my own inner leader. So, here are a few of my current favorite inspirations:

Leadership:

• Angels and Ages: A Short Book About Darwin, Lincoln, and Modern Life
• Team of Rivals: The Political Geniue os Abraham Lincoln (are you seeing a pattern yet?)
• White Hot Truth: blog by Danielle LaPorte (honestly, her blog really rests in both Leadership & Creativity)
• Penelope Trunk: Brazen Careerist: blog about leadership in your career
• Leadership by Rudy Guiliani.  I know, I don’t agree with his politics, but he is a student of leadership that is really interesting.

Creativity:

• Christine Kane: Be Creative.  Be Conscious. Be Couragous.
• Highly Sensitive Power (this blog is my current homepage, so the first thing I see is the daily Creative Prompt)
• Inspire Me Thursday: an old favorite that always leaves me feeling arty
• Ready Made Magazine: if you build it they will come.
• My current favorite Ted Talk by Elizabeth Gilbert of Eat, Pray, Love fame

However, in the meantime, I wanted to mention a fantastic blog and book that I’ve been reading lately.  The blog is Carrie and Danielle, two women who own a style consulting company in Vancouver Canada.  The book is called Style Statement.  Basically you survey all aspects of your life to find two words that define your style.  Of course they mean fashion and interior design, but also what you need to create and inspire yourself.  I’m only half way through the book, so I can’t tell you my words yet.  However, it has been a great exercise as I am working on personal branding for my consulting work.

One cool aspect of their blog is their “Daily Question”.   A few times a week I go over and ask myself some of the old questions to try and focus my work and intention.  So I thought I would share some Q&A for fun. . .

Q:  IN THIS VERY MOMENT, WHAT ARE YOU GRATEFUL FOR? (IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER OF THANKS. . .)

A:  In no particular order:

1. Ken — a boyfriend who makes me laugh, and dives into crazy adventures with me!
2. My family — I’ve been missing my parents, grandpa, cousins and sister like crazy, and can’t wait until the holidays.  But my sister in particular is being super brave and moving to Chicago.  It is an inspiration to see her move toward joy.
3. My cats – Lola and Blackjack.  For their companion ship and they keep reminding me to take it easy – a nap fixes everything.
4. My friends. I’ve got a lot of friends who don’t live here in Seattle and I think of them often!
5. Creativity.  I’m trying to view my life with creative energy and building a giant useless 15 ft ghoul to put on the house for Halloween is a good start.  To some it might be a waste of time, but when you hear kids giggle as they go by — it’s all worth it!
6. Lofthouse Cookies - From the supermarket bakery area.  Pure Frosted Goodness.

Q: IN WHAT WAY ARE YOU DELIGHTFULLY CONVENTIONAL?

A: I have a lot of masculine/non-traditional energy in my life.  I’m competitive; I like to lead; and a few times a week I feel the need to physically wrestle with Ken to relieve tension. However, there are true parts of my personality that are terribly conventional.  I love chivalry and romance.  I adore when Ken opens the car door for me, he has to call to order take-out food for us, and I still want him to think I’m pretty.

Q: WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE THING TO WATCH ON TV?

A:  I love TV.  So I have quite a few favorites, but some current favs –  Project Runway, The Office, Inside the Actor’s Studio, So You Think You Can Dance (or any dance show for that matter — even junkie ones with celebrities), and political news.

What is wordle?

Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends.

I love it. The girly quality, the colors, I love it. My guilty online pleasure is racing through a bunch of sites that I have a daily — “cool” or “stylish” item: Mighty Goods, Outblush, Delight, etc. There are tons of them, and I decided that I wanted to hop on the bandwagon. However, for whatever reason, I just couldn’t get it off the ground. My excuses fall into two categories:

1. Blogging daily — even just briefly is a commitment.
2. All I was doing was stealing ideas from blogs I read and gathering them for me. Rather than actually finding new products or styles.

So although, I am still committed to trying to get my new favorite going I know what I need to do:

1. Get a bunch of folks who will post to keep it interesting
2. Front load the system with a bunch of new products
3. Focus my new favorite into one category or topic to be more appealing

But all that said, the reason I got thinking about all of this is because I found my new dream site. So for now, I’ll just pretend like I did this site instead of my own. Enjoy.

Michel Eubank Spruance has a great website with her upcoming Retreats, Classes and Services — Check it out!  I was so grateful for the opportunity and for the first time I feel like I “got” why everyone was so transformed by yoga.  Thanks Michel.

But just as important as the yoga retreat was a poem that was read as we began our early morning meditation walk on the beach. I can literally hear myself reciting certain lines occasionally in my mind. Normally, any poem with the word “God” in it sends me running for the hills, but somehow the humor and joy was too hard to resist.

So I’m trying to move my body a little big more, and trying to learn to bend — physically and spiritually. Enjoy.

You are the Sun in drag.
You are God hiding from yourself.
Remove all the ‘mine’ – that is the veil.
Why ever worry about anything?
Listen to what your friend Hafiz
Knows for certain:
The appearance of this world
Is a Magi’s brilliant trick, though its affairs are
Nothing into nothing.
You are a divine elephant with amnesia
Trying to live in an ant
Hole.
Sweetheart, O sweetheart
You are God in Drag!
from The Gift — Hafiz

article:

“A city board stunned developers, preservationists and Ballard residents Wednesday by voting 6-3 to designate the boarded-up Denny’s Restaurant at Northwest Market Street and 15th Avenue Northwest a landmark — based largely on the visual punch the structure’s Googie-esque roofline delivers to passing motorists.”

I can’t tell if this is a good idea or a bad one. Besides the building having a hint of ‘Googie’ architectural style, there’s very little left to recommend it. The gentleman who renovated the Majestic Bay Theater just down the street thinks the owners don’t have the interest in making the building live a new life. My question is: Why would you designate a building a landmark and leave it’s future to a disgruntled corporation, in this case, the venerable Benaroya Companies? They wanted to to sell the property for condominium development.

I’ll keep you updated if there’s any kind of news…