Fredrick Swan's Blog

 

I saw this seed head today in front of a house from which a man was shouting apparently to the
sky.  I took a chance and waved and getting his attention I asked him if he minded if I took a picture of seed pod.  He stopped shouting and said "Sure, but only one and thanks for asking."  He then looked away from me and back up
at the sky and said, "I'm sorry." The seed pod and the man reminded me of something I once wrote about myself and that I have to keep remembering about the people and the world around
me: 

"There is so much stuffins in all of us that is always on the verge of falling out — so much of our
inside selves always on the verge of getting strewn about in the wind for anyone to see." 

 

                                                       
                                           July 28, 2014

Take 1: Camera rolling.  Pretending to write notes as part of my role.  Might as well make them real.  

 

Cameras being shifted: There are big lights on the set.  Already warm.  Was called for part that required wearing a swim suit.
 Opted for less revealing dress shirt and sport coat. Don't want to become an object and have my film career built on the foundation of my physique; want to recognized for my talent.

 

Take 2: Four  to six hours of filming ahead. This is going to be great fun but starting to remember how hot it was a
hundred years ago when I had to wear a sport coat and a tie at work. 

 

Take 3: Pretty funny script.  Hard not to laugh.  Wonder if my head is
too shiny.  Maybe not. No one has come towards me with a light meter, makeup brush or a cantalope knife.

 

Lights being muted: The man next to me was unlucky.  Took a pen that was offered that doesn’t work. He is pretending to write by
scribbling lines of circles.  He has an incredible head of hair however, so in the fortunes of the universe I figure the pen injustice is a wash.

 

Take 4:  The show's stars Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstien and the guest star are incredibly good at ad libing
humor.  Don’t smile, keep looking serious no matter how funny they have become..  

Porland, the moveable feast.

 

Brief break while director talking with
stars: Having been selected in Hawaii to drive our rental car through a scene of
Barnaby Jones in the late 70’s, our family waited a year to see our 4 second scene in that show. I can now say my television career has spanned 35 years.

 

Take 5: Never realized my inclination to fidget so much. It's good there are these minutes between takes; I can get all my
shifting done.

 

Take 6:  Sport coat is duplicating the effects of a sauna.  I wonder if Robert Redford started this way.

 

Take 7:  I just realized I’ve been listening to the actors exchange lines while affirmatively and continually nodding
my head.  I’m certain the next part that I will be offered will be as a dashboard ornament.

 

Lunch:  We are eating outside together, cast, crew and extras.  It was suggested we “Be considerate and respect
the actor’s privacy.”  This has been easier outside than while washing hands side by side at the sinks in the men's room.  

 

Having a great lunch.  Baked salmon, beef kabobs, spinach ravioli, roasted asparagus, grilled
peppers, cheeses, fruits, apple pie, and ice cream.  

 

In the lunch line another extra - a woman who had been in an earlier scene - told me that when she and
her friend arrived this morning they were so excited because they thought I was John Malkovich doing a cameo appearance , adding "but of course you're not" and then asking  "are you?" and
then saying "No, its just the beard that makes you look like him."  First time anyone has ever given me a present and then taken it away and then kind of given it back before telling they
only gave it to me by mistake in the first place.  

 

15 minutes to write and eat while not wearing the sauna suit.

 

Take 8:  The set has heated up. Have gotten my impulse to fidget and bob my head under control.  However - all
of this inner cellular activity has channeled itself to a tiny patch of unitchable skin on the side of my nose.

 

Take 9: Starred at the large round face of a light on the set a few minutes ago.  Thought for a second what a strange
journey this has been – this coming back  as I have and being able participate in something so improbable as today.

Take 10:  Incredibly warm.  Might have been a mistake not to take the swimsuit role, but at least in this sport
coat the scene I am in might make it through the editing room.

 

Take 11:  Day wrapping up I think.  Happy I signed up for this, so out of the realm of my life. Now tomorrow I
can say that I am an out of work actor.

 

Take 12: Have to stop writing.  Cameras are moving closer and we have to mimic a variety of expressions for editing
options.

 

“I’m ready for my close up Mr. Demille.”  

A little blog deviation today, but the experience was great
fun and educational.  The cast and crew of Portlandia  were wonderfully professional, hard working and very talented. 

 

This week my newsletter
2nd Tuesday will begin.  I hope you will take a look at it and join me in this new adventure by signing up on the top of this page.      

 

Thanks so much, 

 

Fred

 

 

Living a Finished Life © Fredrick Swan,
2014  

NASA, Hubble image

 

It’s late; 11:30 p.m.  It’s still warm.  Lucky and I are back from a long walk.  We walk and jog near midnight
because Lucky has poor social skills and at this hour, though there is the occasional excitement of the unexpected raccoon or coyote, we seldom encounter other dogs.  Other dogs don’t seem
to understand Lucky’s sense of enthusiasm. 

Home and too energized to sleep, I lie on the sprinkler-dampened wood of the deck and look up at the stars.   Ursa Major
- the Great Bear - is lazily walking across the position of Jupiter which at this hour lies thirty degrees above the bareness of my left foot. Lucky, having finished lapping water from his bowl
in the kitchen, grabs a ball and walking out to the deck drops it near my shoulder.  “What are you doing lying here,” he must think; “lying on the deck in the dark when you could be throwing
the ball?”

 

A meteor arrives from the East.  It flares and burns dark somewhere in the atmosphere above Lucky’s expectant expression.
Water drips from Lucky’s chin and onto my face. Eyes filled with stars and blurred by dog-dish water I get up. 

Getting up from the floor or a deck is easier when I am alone because as I have gotten older my muscles work better if I make sounds which I consciously try not to do in front of others. 
Lucky understands this sound-making.  He is going on ten and at 109 pounds he has become, in the act of getting up or lying down, a skilled groaner himself. Given actuary life-spans Lucky
and I are about the same age though he acts far more youthful and enthusiastic than I do when the mail arrives or when friends knock at our door.

  

I have liked this moment here under the stars; lying supine on the cool surface of the deck while listening to  the sound of water dripping into the pond from a fountain and feeling it fall
onto my forehead from  the glistening whiskers of my friend.  I have liked being mindless for a moment; resting in acceptance and knowing I have little control in a universe that throws
constellations, shooting stars and everyday experiences around willy-nilly like a magician with a cape full of confetti. 

 

Standing, I put my hand on the side of Lucky’s  neck and as he and I look out into the night  I feel a sense that things are complete, a sense  that the day is ending and that I am
finishing it with an understanding that this moment is what I have had, the up-to-now has been my opportunity to say and do and experience all of the things that have been on my mind.
 Today has been my opportunity to explore and share and wallow and seek resolution to  the feelings that have been in my heart.  

"The Passage" 30 x 30 Acrylic by Fred Swan

Having been resuscitated and returned to life and brain function four years ago I feel a stewardship of this experience. If there is a purpose to any of the incidences of people’s lives being
spared against all odds it quite possibly is that we remain present as reminders, the universe’s way of saying - one more time - “Listen closely to the unplayed music of your heart.  
Play it loud.  Play it soon. Play it now.”   Though he wasn’t speculating on the lessons of the universe, the French writer Andre Gide perhaps best summarized the brevity with
which we consider the multiple and repetitive miracles we encounter,

 

“Everything that needs to be said has already been said.  But since no one was listening it needs to be said again.”

 

We have an opportunity to strive each day to live a finished life, a life that feels – as within one’s ability - as complete as possible; a life in which our minds and our souls discover
a sense of peace; a life in which we can feel an acceptance that this is what we have – this current day, this present moment.

 

I work on this, this striving to feel a sense of satisfaction and completeness, every day– not in the arena of projects; they will never end – but on the inside stuff, the stuff that whirls
around in my heart and my head waiting to get out, the ideas, the feelings, the hopes, the questions, the fears, the doubts and the wish-I-could-haves; the uncertainties at which I continually
chip away in order to feel a sense of authenticity and completion. 

"My Favorite Day" Watercolor by Fred Swan

 

Stop reading for a moment, shut your eyes, take a deep breath and ask yourself if there is something in your heart and mind
that feels uncompleted today?  

 

If the answer is yes an opportunity waits; a door is opened; an invitation from your soul has been delivered. Play it loud. Play it soon.  Play it now.

  

In the course of the months ahead I’ll explore various realms of living a finished life; a life in any moment - no matter what our histories, resources and circumstance – that feels
resolved, fulfilled and complete.

 

If you are like I am, the first bricks on the road of any new personal journey are engraved with the words "procrastination" and "fear."  I'll start tackling some ideas ideas about
procrastination and its relationship to fear in the next blog -no sense starting anything right now - and in

 

 

 

 

my upcoming August newsletter, 2nd
Tuesday.

 

Lucky, in his curiosity, in the simplicity of his needs, in his willingness to accept sleep and dissappointment, his gratitude
about the most minor of things and the forgiving nature of his heart is a lesson in how to live a life that feels complete – well almost – he has started dreaming and it is causing his feet to
move as if he is running, his spirit I suspect, anticipating the wondrous confetti that will rain down in the potential gift of another tomorrow.

 

Thank you for the honor of your time,

 

                      
Fred Swan July 18, 2014

  

Living a Finished Life © Fredrick Swan,
2014 

 Here's to Jessie Winchester who died this week.  A man who reimagined himself and the American ballad. 

 

“Sham-A-Ling-Ding-Dong” conveys, how inarticulate music can move us, how much emotion it can contain. What a lyric like “sham-a-ling ding-dong” can do. It’s not trivial. You watch him in this
clip, frail but in the moment, reaching back and seizing the past and making the mundane new and relevant in a manner that speaks to the present.

 

We'll miss you Jessie.

 

 

Photograph by Peter Pruzina

Sunday mornings - lazy as they are - roll around pretty rapidly.  It has been a busy week and as I
was thinking about the blog for this morning and the themes and the talents of the people I would like to include in the next several months, a film created by Joshua and
Rebekah Weigel came to my attention. 

 

Give it a moment to download.  It is a short
film that stars thirty  year old Nicholas James "Nick" Vujicic an Australian man born with tetra-amelia syndrome, a rare disorder characterized by the absence of all four
limbs. Nicholas, who heads up the non-profit organization, Life Without Limbs  presents
motivational speeches worldwide which focus on hope and finding meaning in life.

I hope, even if you have seen it, you will watch
The Butterfly Circus again and keep in mind the power that reimagining one's life can have over our
futures.

 

 

Remember we become the things we practice. 

Fred Swan

Reimagining Our Lives © Fredrick Swan, 2014

 

by Florian Pircher

While reading Facebook postings this week I was reminded of the teachings of two
poets. 

 

"Diction," the poet Mary Oliver says, "is the atmosphere created by words" - the
various connotations of words, their relative precision and their sound.  "The atmosphere created by words."   It would be difficult not to think of  the atmosphere that we
create around ourselves by the images and words we post on Faceblook each day.

The English poet, David Whyte observes, "We are here essentially to risk ourselves in
the world, we are a form of invitation to others and to otherness, we are meant to hazard ourselves for the right thing, for the right woman or the right man, for a son or a daughter, for the
right work or for a gift given against all the odds. And in all this continual risking the most profound courage may be found in the simple willingness to allow ourselves to be happy along the
way…"

 

These two thoughts prompt me to  share  some of the 
wonderful images,  words,  thoughts and joy I was honored to see  posted by friends this week.  

...People shared their joy through the images of nature...

Posted by Lisa Hagan

The same afternoon I saw this image of a fox, a terrific sketch titled "Coyote Flower" appeared in my news feed, this nocturnal creature drawn by the talented local artist,
Matt Schlosky.

 

People shared their senses of humor...

Posted by Bridget Benton

...and the wonderful images of their talent.

Painting by Theresa Andreas - O'leary

They posted the poignant photographs of relationships...

Channel 14 news

 ...and their discovery of rain on the white flesh of a calla lily.

Photograph by artist Karl Kaiser

They posted invitations and announcements about the events in their lives.

The announcement for an art exhibit of work done by street youth, P:ear Gallery, Portland, Oregon

People asked for group energy and hope for the health of their friends.

Fred Swan



March 26

 








Asking today for my friends to think of Jake Rogers, artist and courageous man.



Jake 2/25: It's official!!! I'm active status on the transplant list. At any point day or night I have to be ready to travel to Seattle to get new lungs. I can't wait for that first unhindered breath. — feeling hopeful.



Jake 03/26: ...I've been meaning to come meet you, but life keeps on getting in the way. I just had surgery at UWMC in Seattle yesterday to make it so my lung can't collapse again. I
should be all healed up by the book launch though!



Me March 26: Could I put out a message on Facebook for my friends to hold good thoughts for you Jake? 

  









Photo by Fred Swan

Jake answered back...

Jake, 03/26:

Absolutely! I'd appreciate any & all good thoughts at this time.

 

..................................................

 

This morning, March 30, 2014, Jake is still in need of all the positive energy we can send.

 

 

Encaustic by Linda Robertson posted March 28, 2014

 

There were the beautiful images of places and words that our friends shared; places we might not otherwise have seen, thoughts we might not otherwise have heard.

 

 "Some of my favorite people have
been discouraged and hurt. They have had their hearts broken and their hopes dashed. They have missed opportunities, had regrets and made mistakes. Their lives have not always been easy or
perfect; they have endured sadness and worry, and have been confused and alone. And these very same people have gotten up each morning – the good days and the not so good days too, gotten dressed
and asked themselves “Now what?” And the answer to that question has taken them to some beautiful, incredible and wonderful
places."

                                                    from
"Begin With Yes" by Paul Boynton

 

Friends shared their thoughts about the beauty of being alone...

 

                                                                     
a poem by Tanya Davis

 

 

...and sometimes the wisdom they would like us to consider.

Posted by Leslie Wood Kamman

Friends shared the beauty and mystery of places we should maybe explore...

Posted by Jennifer Porter / Outdoorproject.com

...and the images of their haunting and thought provoking art.

New work by EMEK

They shared the effort they put forth despite not feeling well...

Awaking the Dragon / A day of restoring the colors of the dragon boats, by artist Alea Bone

and their work that is often a direct expression of their generousity and spirit.

Artist Jen Berry

And most importantly, people shared themselves, their laughter and the memories of their companionship .

Artists Janet Amundson Splidsboel, Kindra Crick, Kelly Williams, Diane Pinsonualt and Pegguin Pfunninger, People's Gallery March 28, 2014

We and all of our friends create an atmosphere around ourselves.  We do it through our words, our efforts;  the stories that we decide
to share. 

 

"And in all this...the most profound courage may be found in the simple willingness to allow ourselves to be happy along the way…"

 

Today we have - once again - a choice.  What atmosphere will our life create today?  How happy will it allow us - and others -  to
be?

 

 

 

 

Reimagining Our Lives © Fredrick Swan, 2014

I received a call last week from Joanne McCall, a wonderful new friend and publicist.  She said that John Erickson of KEX radio was reading my book and would like to interview me. The interview was aired this morning on John's 7 a.m.
program.  Since I can't imagine many people are up and listening to the radio at 7 Sunday morning, I'll post the interview here.  

JOHN ERICKSON INTERVIEW WITH FRED SWAN (

MP3 Audio File [11.7 MB]

Download

I'm drawn to the idea of a living a finished life, living each day with a sense of closure and satisfaction, a
sense of having been grateful, a sense of having felt and found, even on the tough, hard and sometimes troubling days, a sense of joy and
gratitude. 

 

It was such a terrific week, this past week, filled with incredible moments, sad moments, a week of getting to see my children one more time, to
hold them, to talk with friends, to care enough about people to feel tearful at learning of their losses and to feel fearful for some of their circumstances.  All these people we care about,
their lives, their gifts, the pain they sometimes feel.  That's the great fear sometimes isn't it...that we'll care enough to feel hurt, to feel pain.  But that's the great joy of it,
isn't it, this getting to love, this getting to worry, this getting to feel hurt, this getting the chance to have cared.  

 

 

And this week there was of course the
laughter. Just before the art show last Saturday, I met the handsomest bride in the Brides of March tour.  In front
of the camera of course and apparently announcing our engagement he looked not only artfully tatooed but qenuinely committed.  He did not, however, give me his number and in the week that
has passed - as is always the case in these brief encounters - there followed not a phone call, not a letter.

...but then there are the people who care, the ones who do show up on the days you hope they will be around...

...and the joy of having met someone attending their first art show......

....and those moments of realizing once again that regardless of being unable to understand the passage of time that you can still partially see and you can move and hear and that you and others
wordlessly matter to one another....

...and most importantly, as you finish a day and finish your thoughts, that you have been so lucky to be the one she's
run to see in the evening when the day is through....

First morning at our first apartment 1961, U of O

 

I've been graciously invited to discuss my book and to lead a discussion on Living A Finished Life at The New
Renaissance Bookstore, on May 9, 7 - 8:30.  Pre-registration required.  I hope that some of you will join us.  

I hope also that you will also feel invited to my Book Launch Party on May 18th 1 - 3 p.m. on the third floor of Pioneer Place, 700 SW 5th Ave,,
Portland, Oregon.  Door prizes will include framed prints of my paintings, The Drive and Wings and Hooves, several copies of my book
and.....

The Drive / framed giclee print








Wings and Hooves / framed giclee print

...several copies of Jennifer Warnes album The Well from which the lyrics to Prairie Melancholy appeard in my dream of floating through white light.  

 

Taking it to the French side, on the advise of one of my friends, we'll have warm chocolate croissants, cafe lattes, wine, cheese, fruit and chocolate dipped strawberries. There will be live
music, art from the last ten years of Art Beat and best of all, one more day with each other.  I hope you will join us.   Thanks so much.

 

Fred

 

 

Reimagining Our Lives © Fredrick Swan, 2014 

Recycled grocery bag collage, 9" x 49" titled They Called Them Libraries for upcoming show. 

 

Last week memories of Paris; this week packing up the car with paintings for an art show next Saturday with Kinda Crick, Karl Kaiser, Brian Gray and Nate Duval.  It has been a busy week.

 

If you are in town, please join us for the opening reception at People's Art of Portland in Pioneer, March 15, 2014, 5
- 9 p.m. 

Another of my pieces for the show, 20" x 20" encaustic (melted beeswax and resin) over a watercolor on Chinese tissue paper overlaid with alcohol inks and oil paint.  The piece is titled,
I Feel the Same.  My pal "Lucky" is a white lab and I hope he knows how I feel.

 

The following circular mandula is also made of beeswax inlaid with recycled electronic parts fitted over plaster mixed with ash I saved from the Mt. St. Helen's eruptions.  18" x 18" piece
titled Mother Sky.

I am incuding in the show several Giclee prints of some of my former work. The following
titled Hooves and Wings is a print of the original water color in the collection of Ray and Sarah Mans.

Hope that some of you will join us next Saturday.  The show will run through mid April.  I host People's Gallery every Friday from noon until 3 p.m. (gallery will be closed this coming
Friday the 14th because of the opening the following day).  If you can't make it to the show, come and see me one of the following Fridays.  I always play Glen Miller music and serve tea and chocolate truffles.  Peoples Gallery is located on the 3rd
floor of Pioneer Place in downtown Portland.

30" x 30" titled The Passage, inspired by a very personal journey I once took.

I hope everyone is well and that life is good. 

Although there is a light drizzle beginning tonight and the temperature is dropping below freezing it was warm and sunny on
Friday here in Portland, Oregon and almost everyone I encountered, was smiling.

 

In the midst of the sunshine, the beaming faces and the sight of someone in a nearby restaurant putting daffodils on a
table, there was one young couple however -  looking as if they were imprisoned by the street - who where, despite the beautiful and spring like day,
shouting at one another. As I stood on the curb near them anxiously waiting for the “walk” sign to come to life and free me from the intimacy of their dispute, the young woman stepped in my
direction and for some reason said to me and a woman standing beside me, whom I didn’t know, “and you guys better mind your own GD business.”  

      A few minutes later in the gallery in which I volunteer, one of my favorite local artists
stopped by.  She came in through the sunlit door to a Nina Simone song I was
playing on a CD.  She was wearing one those smiles that makes you happy you are present and after the encounter on the street with the shouting
people, her presence and her specialness made me think of Ernest Hemingway’s words from A Moveable Feast:

 

     “When spring came, even the false spring, there were no problems except where to be happiest. The
only thing that could spoil a day was people and if you could keep from making engagements, each day had no limits. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were
as good as spring itself.”  

  

     Not knowing the truth of Hemingway’s hard days with people but agreeing with his feelings about
glimpses of spring and special people and Paris in the sunshine, I thought for this week's blog I'd share  a partial entry from one of my old journals. 

Journal entry June 12, 1989, 11 p.m.

 

     Our first full day in Paris.  After the two months
of cold damp days in Headington and packing around, the weather has turned wonderful.  Staying at the Troyon with Walt and Dianne, Jim and Pat.
  Pretty small place but terrific location.  Not far fromArc de Triomphe, Gertrude Stein's place and most of the things we want to see before leaving for Switzerland.  

 

      Early this morning, just before dawn, Kathy and I - too excited to sleep - got out of bed and wrapping ourselves in a
blanket huddled together on the tiny narrow balcony that protrudes from our room.  Our predawn view encompassed the edges of roof lines and various
chimney shapes silhouetted against the sky.

 

     Curled up on the balcony and surrounded by the dulled noises of Paris waking up
we could smell coffee being brewed and the aroma of bread being baked.  In a bakery nearby there is a café attached. When we walked by the bakery
later this morning, the windows were lined with not only breads but rows of cakes that were glazed with lemons and berries and what looked like cream.

 

 

     It was a little chilly out on the balcony this morning but with the warmth of the
blanket, the smell of the promise of Paris and knowing our friends were here to share these days with us, crouched on the balcony and being a little bit cold was great.  Couldn’t ask for more than to be in Paris on a sunny day and to be with people that always make us laugh and feel happy...”

 

Watch this live Earthcam of the Effiel Tower and drink a cup of coffee to or tag the people in your life who are so much
"like spring itself" that you would like to be strolling down the Champs de Elysee with them this morning.   In Paris the temperatures are were cool today - about 50*,
but the sun broke through.  Save this link and each day about 9:40 PST you can see the lights of Paris go on. (:

 

 

 

 

 

Last week I suggested that a person could enrich their life by identifying 20 new
things each day that they were grateful for having seen, realized, felt, knew, learned, heard, experienced. 

 

 A week has passed.  It has been
possible to have found, in this past week, one hundred and forty things in our lives that perhaps we hadn’t noticed before.  In my life this practice
of finding twenty things of the current day is a prayer of sorts.  I often recite them in my mind just before sleep,

There is poem by one of my favorite poets, Mary Oliver that holds that the act of attention can be a form of prayer:

 

The Summer Day 

Who made the world? 

Who made the swan, and the black bear? 

Who made the grasshopper? 

This grasshopper, I mean- 

the one who has flung herself out of the grass, 

the one who is eating sugar out of my hand, 

who is grazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes? 

Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face. 

Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away. 

I don’t know exactly what a prayer is. 

I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down 

into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, 

how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, 

which is what I have been doing all day. 

Tell me, what else should I have done? 

Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon? 

Tell me, what is it you plan to do 

with your one wild and precious life?

 

 

 

I know that we are all very busy.  I hope that in the week ahead that everyone will take time
to notice the details of their lives. The memories.  The smiles.  The colors.  The sounds.  The gestures.  The flavors.   The current breath.  The
opportunity of having  “one wild and precious life.”

 

Antarctic base of Dumont D'Urville by Tony Travouillon in 2002.

Read more at http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/antarcticwave.asp#D7fmRhLOkHF59pkr.99



Antarctic base of Dumont D'Urville by Tony Travouillon in 2002.

Read more at http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/antarcticwave.asp#D7fmRhLOkHF59pkr.99



Antarctic base of Dumont D'Urville by Tony Travouillon in 2002.

Read more at http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/antarcticwave.asp#D7fmRhLOkHF59pkr.99

Poem, "The Summer Day" by Mary Oliver, from The Truro Bear and Other Adventures: Poems and Essays. © Beacon Press, 2008.

 

Ice photo: Antartic base of Dumont D'Urville by Tony Travouillon, 2002

 

Reimagining Our Lives © Fredrick Swan, 2014