so inspired

my space....it's called space for a reason.

a guy just sat down next to me and clearly wanted to talk. chat. he was funny and cool about it, but i was not very funny yet very cool. he said, 'come on let's talk. my kundalini is rising and i don't know what to do about it.' i said, 'i don't want to talk.' and smiled a tiny bit. then he said, 'i don't know why i'm here.' i said, 'i'm sorry man.' he laughed a little. now he is breathing heavily. working through his energy. without me playing along with him. i want space right now. i don't feel bad about saying that and owning it. i actually feel great about how i said i don't want to talk. yay.

i don't even want to write today. but i will for a bit, just for exercise.

my kids are all at school. i am amazed lately at the amount of work involved in just feeding three kids, and their parents. and the cats and chickens. but mostly the humans. there is something about feeding us that is intense for me. i have often been of the mindset that if there was just a pill i could take to fill me up and take away the labor of having to make food, i would choose that. that way i could keep on keepin on with my inspiration. i could avoid slowing down and checking in with my body. kids will put that mindset to rest very very quickly. being pregnant, breastfeeding, and then feeding food to children will have nothing to do with the pill dream. i even dreamt about it last night. i just keep having to put my creative ideas and work aside because more food needs to be prepared. and i am happy to do this mostly. that guy is still breathing hard. oh boy. i'm just minding my own weird business, talking about feeding. i surely don't want to forget how lucky we are to have food so available to us, while i gripe a bit about how much i feel i am in the kitchen. here's a picture of one of my favorite morning foods.

i just learned how to make it david's way this weekend. he is extremely particular. the professional baker in him. i am a very spontaneous kind of chef. i make things according to what feels right most of the time, meaning i don't measure very often. this drives david crazy. so i humored him, and learned every little detail of his method for porridge. we use scottish oats. so good. making food can be fun, when i don't resist it the whole time, and wish i was doing something else. lord knows this girl olive likes it when i'm in the kitchen. she likes to eat something yummy every thirty minutes. so in her body. such a freaking teacher. and she was born in the year of the pig.

he's trying to get me to talk to him again. i am so confident and slightly wicked and slightly funny and very fine with saying 'no talking gonna happen mr.' he said 'any particular reason?' i smiled a little and said 'i just don't feel like it.' aaaaaaah. the beautiful feeling of speaking our truth. and having it honored, at least for 10 minutes at a time. he is like a child. sweet. i wish more people were like children, actually. he is mostly well-behaved. i am not having to evacuate the scene or anything. what am i being like? i am being like a child also. children have no problem, usually, if they feel safe, speaking their truth. that has always been something so inspiring to me about kids. that and the way they are pretty much tripping for most of their first 7 years or so. in max's case, it may go well into the preteen years, or who knows, maybe he'll stay tapped in his whole life. and i say that lovingly and with great admiration and respect for his connection to the mysterious realms. keeping a connection to that trippy part of life is a gift to the world. like this guy beside me. i can see how he is a gift. even if i don't want to engage. he has given me huge gift today with his presence. max does this for the world. david was recently listening to marshall rosenberg, and was inspired to be way more mindful of how he 'shuts max up' when his behavior or his talking to himself becomes annoying. i am so glad.

ok.

time to go use my solo time to create more space. what a long project, that is still totally keeping my interest. for the most part. i do bump into piles of stuff that feel less than inspiring to sort through here and there. but for the most part, i am into the work and the slow evolution that is happening. when i start to get antsy, or annoyed for being interrupted in the process, i am really using the energy that comes up, the bummed feeling that i am being interrupted, to remind me of how slow this process is. how slow i actually want it to be. like a metaphor for life. it will hopefully go on for quite some time. to remember the turtle wisdom....to not feel hurried. hurried energy is not creative. uh-uh. and i am using it to remember what my truest priorities are. loving connection with my kids, my husband and my body. i had a therapist once tell me, that if we change too quickly, we will not be able to remember how we made the change, and then we will not feel rooted in our new self. it will not be settling, but actually unsettling. knowing how we get to new places is important. maybe i will draw a map. like in the wizard of earthsea. oh that sounds beautiful.

slowly like a fat fat bear

i go around. smiling. feeling lighter as i hibernate and digest the load. in my cave, i've gone through the stuff that was weighing down the record player. i can hear music again. i am choosing what i do and don't like. i am blessed with choice. yes.

i am grateful for choice. but to make a choice, i must muster up my bravery. there are so many ways to go, and you can never get a moment back, so it is an act of bravery as i see it, to choose anything. and it is a fucking blessing to be able to choose in so many ways.

we made a grateful~for list. (above)

and we made a desire list. (below)

max wants a weather vane for our house with a rooster on it. and another computer with new games. right! well, maybe some new games, babe.

zhi wants make up. so olive wants make up too. zhi wants a pocket knife too. olive wants a puppy.

i want to feel free. i didn't write that down on that particular list yet, but in this moment, that is what i want. i am working slowly, like the fat bear, to lighten my load. it is so slow this process. so slow and healing. so eye opening to see what it feels like to let things go. it starts to feel so good after a few days. but then i walked into a thrift store yesterday and saw something i had donated, and felt a pang. uh-oh. did i make a mistake? do i have to buy that back? no. but it was a pang. and now that it's been a day, i am sure again of my choice. but i'm just saying it's not easy. and, the feeling of space is starting to show me that this is good for me. i drove around with an old antique kids' rocking chair in the back of the car for days last week. i just couldn't decide if i could let it go. after 4 days or something, i realized, that i had no particular attachment to that rocking chair, and that if, after not having it for a while, i want a kids' rocking chair again, that i could go find one. (must add: my kids have NO attachment to the kids' rocking chair. i am the one that loved it. and i couldn't even sit in it. i just liked seeing it. but i want to feel free more, and have a lot more dancing room!) that made it feel better. i gave it to our neighborhood antique store as a thank you gift, for being in our neighborhood. i love that store. and when i gave it to them, the lady i was speaking with, told me she had just been in our bakery, having soup. we all support each other in small ways and it feels good.

early morning me. look at my bed hair. yikes. going out with my boiled water to melt the chickens' ice water, and some food scraps and feed for them. i like this morning routine. now that i am not breastfeeding in the wee hours all night long, getting barely enough sleep, i can get up at the crack, the absolute first tiny glint, of dawn, and feel good about it.

max loves roosters so much now. there is something serious going on with him and roosters. we are now very sure that we have a rooster. in the past week, one of our not~so~wee~anymore little chickens has learned to cockadoodle and max is so into it. today, max carried around a chicken raising magazine we have, opened to the page of rooster photos. all morning he carried this around. he talked about which rooster he likes best all morning. talked about the idea of having 900 roosters. he then told me he wants to be a policeman when he grows up. he asked me if i would come visit him in his office. i said, yes!, and can i come have lunch with you everyday? he smiled. then olive asked if i'd have lunch with her too. of course! then max said, no, i want to grow roosters. i would personally prefer a rooster farmer to a policeman. but that's not my choice is it? olive said she wants to be a baker in a kitchen, not in a bakery. cute. zhi was with her dad, so we didn't get to hear what her plans are for a career today. last time she thought about it though, she said she wanted to do nothing. like this: 'i want to do nothing, like you do mom.' yep. that's what she thinks it is about. at least she likes what i do enough to want to do the same thing. that's a positive way to look at it, right?

zhi is standing there as the proud builder of that there fort~of~the~day. she's learning the trade, the trade of homemaking, aka doing nothing, very well! the red entry way is so right on!

we had fun with this book this morning.

why is the letter a like a flower?

think on it and i'll tell you at the end of the post.

olive wears the shirt i made her. it is so cute.

and we went to some magical friends' house this week and made cookies. they are delicious. and they turn your tongue colors with all those sprinkles.

look at this hat. it is awesome. totally rad. so her. pattern from this book. olive's and max's coming up next.....

i wander through life, feeling better these days cuz i feel lighter. cuz i am making choices to let go. letting go does not come naturally to me. it typically comes as a form of desperation. like, okay, fine, i~get~it~that~i have~to~let~go~or~i~can't~go~forward~anymore kind of thing. when something does not come naturally to me, and i can see and feel that it would be very good for me to do this unnatural feeling thing, it is usually hard work. hard and rewarding work. like, as i do it, my kids are starting to do it too. that is cool and rewarding. my mom reads this blog, and she said she is doing it too. i know we are fat americans in some sense, fat with belongings, and it is a joke that we are even pondering this dilemma, given many other more important earthly dilemmas worthy of pondering, but you know what, we were born here, in america. innocent beings born into a consumer society, and we learned, very innocently and naively, that acquiring goods is a good thing to do. well, i am unlearning this, teaching myself what it feels like to live simply, or simpler, because my society did not teach me this at all. but i am grateful that i'm having the vision to create more clear free space in our world. i am grateful that i'm strong enough and brave enough to choose to see what it feels like to truly let go. that is really what this is about. slowly, yes, but still. let go. to let go, feel the fear that i might have let go of something that i shouldn't have, and then breathe. i felt afraid the other day because we gave away the playstand. i realized after doing so, that i used it to clip roofs to forts we build a lot. i panicked and thought, what am i going to clip to now? with my cute clips i made. it sucked that feeling. i am just being honest here. it did suck. then, a couple days later, i came up with a new way to clip the fabric roofs to the lines i run across the room. creativity finds its way in. and it actually feels better. but i had to be willing to let go. i had to let go, for the creativity to come. that is one of my favorite things i am learning in this process. how much more freely the creativity flows when i am in this space of letting go. and i have to be brave to take my clutched hands off the once prized loot that is not actually serving me anymore, but growing stale energetically instead. i have to follow this fresh desire for space. not the fear which causes me to hang on.

letting go. not hanging on. oh my god. am i going to learn to fly?

i am grateful for the forest fire that woke this bravery up in me. the fire that made me feel that if 17o families can say good bye to their homes and everything in it in one moment, then i can do this thing, letting go of staleness, in many moments. i can. i am.

and you would probably laugh if you saw what clear space means to me. it's all relative.

because the b comes after it. buzzzzzzzy b.

in other news on the planet

i had to say about 30 times, keep it mellow dude!, don't stir it out of the bowl. it is so hard for him!!! so boring to keep it all in the bowl. why am i such a stickler? i am not all the time, but sometimes, i am, DUDE! you're glad i am your mom, and that i insist you learn to manage yourself and your desires sometimes. and you are glad i am your mom, and i insist we give you space and time to be wild crazy freak a LOT of the time. oh i am glad i am your mom.

from the list last weekend. i got a lot of it done. all things kitchen related anyways. the pie was yummy. and the seeds. and i made a pizza from scratch to boot! david helped a tiny bit with the pizza cuz i was burning out at the end.

some other things on my list were just getting done this weekend. had to wait a whole week to find the nonsense girl in me. pms struck last weekend. i want to go to nonsense school. hello. i live with three little experts in nonsense making. i am all about paying better attention to my little teachers. setting that intention. learn from those crazy freaks. learn no~nonsense mama in me. learn from your children. i am.

this cute child loves to write. it soothes her i think. to just copy words. i used to do that with songs. but not when i was this young. i love watching her write. she is so content. mmmmm.

this is one of the few things i was able to grow last summer. it's a rare kind of squash that i bought as a tiny seedling. i need to go out to the garden and see what the marker says it is. it is nice and heavy. i chose it cause it was rare. gardening hasn't been my thing the past couple years. it was so my thing in the ten years before that. i was always running out to the garden. not sure what changed. maybe i just needed a shift. i do look forward to more passionate gardening seasons though.

olive and i made these little utility clip covers/slips/dresses the other day, for her fort clips. you know those kind with the bright orange handles that carpenters use? i love their strength though, over the fat wooden waldorf clips, but i decided, in a funny moment of caring a lot about the flow of the visual scene in front of me, that they weren't esthetically pleasing enough for our living room one day, and here's what we did. david even commented with no prompting on how cute they are.

in other news, i'm trying really hard to clear my space. my little personal space. it is so hard. i can't stop buying fabric at the thrift shops. i have so much. and i have so little space for it. and i want some empty space now. so i can think. and just sit down and feel spacious when i go to my little corner of the house. but it is taking me so much time and deliberation to clear stuff out. as bad as i want space, i want all the stuff i've collected too. we have a shed. i have already stored lots in it. i think i am just going to pack up most of the rest, and put it in the shed. i find it funny that i can even deliberate over all this, after we just had that devastating fire that almost took it all in a flash. but oh how i want some clear space. and oh. how i'm not gonna give away my collection of fabrics at will right now. i just want to see what it feels like to have my own space feel free and clear and uncluttered and kind of blank. i just want to sit at my desk, and have nothing on it. not even the sewing machine. if i need to sew i will take the machine out of the closet. if i want to write, i will take the paper or the typewriter or the computer and set it on the desk. i will have a big spot near me that is very clear and spacious for olive to play at my side, in an uncluttered space of her own. this means we will be letting go of so much. ha. i still laugh at how hard this is for me. and i don't even have to let it go far. just to our handy dandy storage shed for the stuff i adore and think we will use some day.

see this photo? i just got this loot at the thrift store last week. i bought 69 zippers, old cool metal ones mostly, for 10 cents a piece, and then that fabric for just a few dollars. but i have so much already. so much. SO much. what am i going to do with 69 zippers? ha!!!!!!!! laugh. 69 zippers. and that's added to the 58 or so, i already have from another score a few years ago. i've used maybe 4 of them in the past few years. but it was really nice having the exact zipper i needed on hand. oh my god. i am a crazy squirrel. a super crazy crazy squirrel. i saw a cute squirrel today. i think i am a black squirrel. of course. and a black swan. and a black horse. and a black cat. and a black turtle. and a black fox. and a black dragon. and a black chicken. and a black goldfish. and a black dolphin. are there black dolphins? i am surely a black snake. and an angel with black wings. hmmmmmm. i have a lot of black fabric. black aprons may be in my future. black capes. black bags with cool old funky zippers. black cutie dresses. black skater pants. sigh. i am making myself smile. yay. that's always a nice treat from going into my writing. it's fun to dream. and harmless, right? can i do this? of course i can. it is hilarious that i am even writing about it. and yet, it is hard work. there is something deeper going on here for me. something about trust. and about change. those can be deep deep experiences, even when it looks so surface and superficial from the outside. kind of like a gentle homeopathic dose/experience, that knows how to touch down into something deep and core.....and that takes its time in unfolding and revealing the rare bloom that was having a hard time figuring out how to open. or trusting that it could. that it was safe to bloom. oh this is dreamy soulful stuff. intermittently between many dentist appointments for my boy, where i come away crying, because he has developed a true phobia of the dentist, i am dreaming. i come back to myself and dream. and find the strength to stand up and drive us out to the next dentist. oh i have high hopes for this next one, and her drugs. nitrous didn't cut it. he is strong. some friends just offered to take max to the next appointment. thinking that might change the family dynamic, and the pattern he might be playing out with his parents. i'm really not clear on what it is that is keeping him from trusting that the dentist is actually helping him. it may be just too abstract for him right now. but maybe he could tap into another side of himself, one that isn't as scared, if some good friends took him. a friend who has done her dentist appointments the same way, with a friend by her side instead of her parents.

i wrote most of that bit above the other morning. while olive payed in the sandbox some, and colored beside me some. we chatted a lot too.

now,

it is sunday afternoon. i am at the trident drinking the craziest rooibos tea. it is apricot honey rooibos. i am having it with milk and honey. so good, and inspiring me to be like mma ramostwe.

today i am doing my detective work about a certain case involving a woman and a mysterious

condition she has with hoarding. saving. cramming things into small spaces and filling every bit of floor space. i am laughing, sort-of, because i think of my mom instantly. this particular detective job may not be so difficult. uuuuugh. this is not what i wanted to find. simply a finger pointing at my mom. that is not fun. no offense mom, at all. i just wanted to delve into something more new and interesting. or, i guess i could be really honest and say i do not feel like analyzing myself and how i am like my mother, in this way that i am finding disturbing right now. you know how it can be disturbing to see parts of your parents in you, parts that are not particularly desirable? or what about seeing parts of yourself, that you hoped you had hidden very carefully, and then your child acts it out perfectly and LOUDLY for you to see just how unhidden it all is. it is all unhidden. i am kind-of glad in a way. less haunting. more ability to do something to change the disturbance.

ummmmm. the disturbing mystery. of why? why do i fill up my space? oh my god. all of a sudden it just became very uninteresting, and not because i don't want to trace back in my lineage where this all began, which is very likely a time and place in someone's life, where there was not an adequate, healthy amount of fulfillment going on, either physically with nourishment, emotionally with love and thoughtful care, or some other really important way that humans can feel intense desire because they are not being met in some very core basic way. ooooh, now it got interesting again. instead of tracing it back, like a detective, to determine where in my lineage it comes from, it does sound sort-of fun to see how this semi-absurd action of mine is actually filling me up. is it? maybe it's a phase kind of thing. maybe there are times in my life where i really need to be surrounded by a lot. maybe there are times where space is not comforting. of course. and now i am bumping into stuff and realizing that i am needing, or wanting, space. serious spacious space. but why? what am i going to do with my space, once i make it? and why is it hard to make it? well, i know one of the main reasons i want it is to feel lighter. feel less pressure. uh oh. i am feeling bored with this again.

am i cramming things into my space because i fear there will be a time when i will not be able to get these things? yes. do i have lots of dreams that don't get born and come to fruition? yes. like how there are zillions of sperm in every ejaculation, and how many find that egg and implant and grow to term and get born alive? that is just the nature of things. it is not my fault that i dream a lot, and that i have physical signs of these dreams, and .......nope not on the track i want to be on.

i am in the process of clearing out some kids stuff. our playstand. something i'd never heard of before i had my own kids. and then it was ......not interesting.

what is interesting about this? what is interesting about letting things go, when parts of the house, or parts of myself, start to feel too full? why is it hard?

it is hard because i start to confuse my love for my people, and my self, with my love for these things. sort-of. i feel like i am saying goodbye in a real way to parts of our past when i let go of something we once loved. like i REALLY feel it. so i delay a lot of letting gos. i know i do. sometimes i just want to be really freaking sure that it is time. i am trying to be conscious here. and not make a mistake. but that kills the artist in me. being afraid of mistakes. hoarding to the point of pain....like when it gets so full, i start to feel as if i am sipping air through a straw. not good. not abundant. that is interesting! the more stuff i cram in, the more i create the appearance of abundance around me, with stuff on the floors, and the shelves, and the walls, the less abundant i feel. sometimes anyways. right now anyways. no formulas here. just right now. i am working hard to make space, consciously. but i just watched my husband make some space for himself in this one room of the house that he kind-of claims, and he was just real quick and no~nonsense about it. it took him no time at all. i am still fretting over scraps of fabric and toys. it is slower for me. is that a good thing? who cares!! it just is. i am doing it my way. my slightly neurotic and fearful~of~making~mistakes way combined with my trusting wild artist way. yikes. yay.

here is my first attempt at sauerkraut. doo~do~doo. gotta wait 3 weeks now. and check it a lot for liquid levels and mold. if mold appears, no big deal, just scrape it off, says sandor katz. kyndale, you totally lit the sauerkraut fire under me. my gut is excited.

there's a pot of canned soup. two cans of chicken noodle soup warming up on the stove. i don't think i've ever seen anyone post a photo of their canned soup before. yumm!! thanks for canned soups.

doing some dreaming

i heard from a therapist once, or was it something i read?, that what makes humans unique as afar as life forms in the universe go, is that we can dream. take advantage i say! get your dreaming engines serviced and use them!!

today i want to:

~get my cabbage ready and start the fermenting for sauerkraut.

~make some pumpkin pies. and this pumpkin seed recipe. i tried it last week and burned them. the sugar caramelizes so fast in the skillet. and i am a novice at caramelizing.

i want to play a game with the kids, or something fun and nonsensical.

i would love to finish knitting zhi's hat. she is refusing to wear any hats until i finish this one. such a hardcore child.

~have homework time with the kids be mellow and fun. meaning max. zhi is a homework junkie.

~notice when i get overwhelmed throughout the day, and just sit down. sit down and breathe till it passes.

~bathe all three babes. two down already! just the boy to go. and he's busy working on an alphabet program on the computer, so i will not interrupt.... so cute. he's beginning to really love learning. between his school teachers and his new tutor, oh my god. he's so cute and into it all. they are so great at what they do. i am a happy mama today about this. now let's get his dental work done......he wouldn't open his mouth for the dentist last week. ok, this was just supposed to be about a bath. i would like to have him have a bath today. how long does it go on, till they bathe cause they want to?

~play some records.

~go on a walk.

now, let's see what actually happens.

here's a photo of me and d and our new hats. or his two hats, and one of them i got as a handmedown. the first one that i am wearing was too small for his head. i made them both with this pattern. i didn't do the double thickness though, cuz he thought it would be too hot, so they became rolly at the bottom. and now that it's getting cold, he says he would like a double thickness one too. those are my first two hats ever made!!! now i have three more on the needles for the kids, with patterns from a new book i got.

here's my weekend outfit. cleaned out the closet and found some inspiration to wear some things i haven't in a while. i like it. the little vest i wore last weekend too. i love it!!

food and kittens and yarn and green overalls

so. after a post where i vent and swear and get my stress out....of course, i mean, thankfully this would follow. some pretty stuff. some yummy stuff. some sweet sweet precious delicious lovely cuddly stuff. some dreamy desirable stuff. i am drawn to the pretty for a reason. when the pretty stuff is available, of course we all want it. i think we all do anyways. and when the pretty stuff happens, of course i see it and take photos of it when i have my camera handy. and of course i want to remember it. and share this side of myself too. i have a pretty feminine country southern girl side!!! it is true. and yet, i have my edge all the time. if i ever feel like i've attained the 'place' i want to be, someone pinch me. it doesn't work like that. it all exists all the time every moment. sometimes it's easy to see the beauty. sometimes we have to search for the treasure. sometimes we have to close our eyes and find it inside. and then build up the fire and turn into a lighthouse for others. sometimes we look around cuz we have no kindling and can't seem to make a spark and see we our friend over on the shore beaming and welcoming us, showing us the way this time. we are connected. we are here for each other. this i am surrendering to. and feeling so grateful for my friends who shine their light for me when i am dark.

after school





and hot chocolate on a warm fall day is crazy. crazy treat we love.

a lollipop gotten at a greenhouse nursery we went to wander around in last week while max was getting a literacy lesson. i will say, he likes this new lady teacher. and this lady likes him. i will dare to say she is falling in love with him. it is such a match made in heaven. and he comes out of the lesson emphasizing all kinds of sounds in his speech, because it is on the brain, but more so, in the body. she has a body based way of teaching literacy. mmmmm, yay. it's all worth it. and me and the girls have some fun girly times for 45 minutes while we wait. yesterday it was just a 45 minute knitting/people watching session in the warm car, while olive slept, and zhi wrote love letters. i got one. they are some special special letters she writes.

(slight bummer that i added to much salt. maybe i'll use it on biscuits that i add no salt to. yes. that's a good idea.)

yumm. those red peppers in that little bowl were the spiciest red jalepeño ( i can't believe i just figured out the ˜ !!) ever. had to leave them out just for the parentals. woohoo.

cake made by the man. isn't it beautiful. he's an artist with cakes. and scones. and cookies. and brownies. and gelato. and anything edible basically, but especially the sweeter variety.... i would like to lay a red carpet down for him sometimes. just sometimes, though. hehe.

he brought these savory scones home last week. a new little recipe. i gave them the go ahead! mmm. olive and i had some for lunch one day and smeared so much pesto on them. we couldn't get enough. oh my god they were so good. oh, and yeah, some butter too. i am so crazy over butter lately. ever since i had my blood test in the spring and learned my cholesterol is good, i am not worried about butter anymore. phew. but david can't do that. he inherited blood that likes to turn butterfats into bad cholesterol. he is so good about it though. but if i can enjoy it still, there's no reason not too, right?

david says i have too much time on my hands to be able to blog like i do. whatever! that's what i say. would he rather me be a wrinkly old grump who never did anything besides clean and cook and vent? nonnononono. he would not. but still he teases me. i only get around to posting something usually twice a week, if that. what would he do if i challenged myself to post daily. ha. what would i do? i'd be posting horsefeathers a lot of the time, i'm sure. maybe i need more horsefeathers in my life, in my mind. i'm sure i do.

i posed some yarn. actually, it was functional. this wool yarn i found thrifting smelled like mothballs. so gross. i aired it out here for a few weeks. it went through some crazy windstorms and got really aired out. and it looked so pretty. what will i make? it is the scratchy kind. i'm thinking kitchen towels? coasters? blankets for baby dolls?

like this one i knit up with some other scratchy yarn....it was a project where i just played with a lot of different knitting patterns from barbara walker's knitting treasury book. i loved it. olive loves it for her baby doll.

we had a good weekend day last sunday. got so much done outside. i planted some bulbs. it was such a good day. and now it has snowed. it has snowed. i must change the header picture soon.

portal to love. what is your portal to love?