Singforhope.org-- I love this organization :)

I took a walk yesterday-- the first day out of school!!! Awesome. I'd seen one of the pop-up pianos at Highbridge Park during our 2nd-3rd grade historical field trip, and I wanted to know more!!! Imagine my excitement when I saw a brightly painted piano in my very own beloved Inwood HIlls Park.

I met my neighbor and her cute 2-year-old there yesterday, and we played our best renditions of 'chopsticks' and 'heart and soul', and then we attempted to sight-read a few of the very multicultural songs provided at the piano... We paid homage to Mozart, we made plans to reconvene at the piano for more music soon, and we went on our merry way.

Today: I went for my noon sunshine walk. A cute elementary-school-aged girl and her mother were at the piano, getting ready to play their rendition of 'Lean On Me.' I encouraged this, singing along with my most soulful sound. When they were through, I plopped down and warmed up my fingers with a couple of rusty scales, which, though rusty, still drew a friendly audience. So I dived into "O Solo Mio" at the encouragement of my new tennis playing friend Nosario. We were joined by Rafael, who lent vocals, and soon by a wonderful woman and her 2-year-old charge. After Rafael, an unidentified man with soul (talk about Guantanamera renditions!) and Nosario (Julio Iglesias tunes... wow, who knew there was so much talent around) had given us some tunes, 2-year-old curly boy gave what might have been his first public performance of an original composition and received thunderous applause.

The group made plans to reconvene for more music on Saturday at noon, with volunteers to bring food and strategies for interacting with the adjacent Saturday farmer's market popping out of the woodwork. A community triumph.

Blooming Arts Festival...

Upcoming... the Blooming Arts Festival!!! It's happening at 1815 Riverside Drive and it's free!!! Go on June 25! There will be all kinds of amazing visual art. Then... come that night, for performances beginning at 6 pm... and for the debut of a piece I'm creating entitled "The Olive Tree." More to come...

excerpt from my first novel, The Authoress... circa 2004.

Writing a novel is a great way to improve your language skills!!

Here's an excerpt from my first complete novel, written about 6-7 years ago. Enjoy!

It all started the day they had the assembly at her school with The Author. Helooked normal. He had brown hair, bespectacled eyes, and a beard and moustache. Hewore a suit, smiled, and held a book in his hand. As he looked over the vast group of assembled children, poking at each other, laughing, and looking at him curiously, he smiled in a very relaxed way. He and the principal were having a little conversation and seemed to be good friends...

Then he began to speak. And when he spoke, everyone became quiet. He had a soft voice, but he talked of the most wonderful things. He talked about creating worlds. He talked about creating people. He talked about writing stories.

He said that in your stories, you could decide everything. You could decide whoyou wanted in your story, how tall they were, and what they liked to eat for dinner. You could decide how they dressed, whether they had any pets, and what kind of toothpaste they used. But most importantly, you could decide what happened to them, and how their best dreams came