First, it’s my birthday today (61 – wow!) and I’m using the occasion to announce a new Kind Living project based on one of my all-time favorites.
Over 81 consecutive weeks, beginning in 2018 and ending in 2020, I adapted the 81 chapters of the Tao Te Ching into kindness verses, one each week, as part of a personal meditation practice. The idea of this project was to consider the ancient wisdom of the Tao through the lens of 21st-century kindness. Find the verses archived here.
In 2024, I discovered Suno, the AI music generator that allows people to make their own music using prompts, including putting their own lyrics to music. I’ve found this to be a tremendously satisfying thing to do and I’m joyfully adapting all 81 of my verses into pop songs.
The one embedded above, “Slow Down (At One With the Divine),” was inspired by Verse 13 of the Tao Te Ching. It’s included in the first of five albums I’ll be making available over the next several months, ultimately having all 81 verses adapted in readily-available pop songs. You’ll be able to find them on pretty much all the usual music streaming services and as free downloads on Bandcamp (links below).
I’ve named the “band” Motte Rouge as a tribute to the city of Nantes, France, where my family lived in 2010-11. This is a specific tribute to Line 2 of the city’s tramway, Motte Rouge being one of the tram stops. Learn more via this blog post I wrote on October 15, 2010.
(Note, all of the photos here are of Ella from our sabbatical in Nantes, France in 2010-11.)
My daughter, Ella, introduced me to the music of Taylor Swift when our family was on sabbatical in France during the 2010-11 school year (I searched my blog for any references to Taylor Swift and found just this one from 2011 when I referenced Ella being a fan, as well as one of Melinda’s and my “projects,” thus providing her time-stamped evidence of her fandom). This, of course, makes her a longtime “Swiftie,” ahead of the curve. I think she should take great pride in this. I know I do, as her father. For instance, I’m a huge fan of Jeremy Messersmith. Haven’t heard of him? Just wait. When you do, I can say that I’ve been listening to his music for years. And then won’t I be cool?!
Okay, maybe not.
Still, Ella is a big Taylor Swift fan and she does take pride in being a fan before her sister, Chloe, who used to tease her about it while we were in France. These days, I think Ella is simply so pleased to be sharing this Swiftie love with her sister that she doesn’t give her too hard of a time about being an early adopter and Chloe catching up later.
Anyway, Taylor Swift recently released a new album, “The Tortured Poets Department.” The initial release had something like 191 songs on it. And then two hours after that dropped, the marketing savvy Swift released something like another 438 songs. Ella’s been in Taylor Swift heaven since. A week or so ago, she told me that some friends of hers asked her to summarize her thoughts about the songs on the album, something she was working on when she dropped by. I asked if she’d share these thoughts with me and for permission to share them here.
So here you have as a guest blogger, my daughter, Ella Shaw, the longtime Swiftie, more than half of her life, in fact, on Taylor Swift’s latest release, “The Tortured Poets Department.” Take it away, Ella!
Taylor Swift TTPD – Ella’s Thoughts
Fortnight
I really like this one. I like that it references a lot of the other songs too. Also Post and her voice go well together. “I loved you it’s ruining my life” favorite line of the song
The Tortured Poets Department
Not my favorite song but I do think it’s an important one for the sound of the album. Favorite line “But I’ve seen this episode and I still love the show”
My boy only breaks his favorite toys
Love this one. Love singing this one in the car. Favorite line “He saw forever, so he smashed it up” also “I felt more when we played pretend. Then with all the Kens” I like this lyric since we know she was writing this album last year when the Barbie movie came out. So it feels like you’ll truly get the lyric if you were there with all of that.
Down bad
I like this one. I like the way she compared being in love with being abducted by aliens. Favorite line “cause f*&! it, I was in love. Cause f*&! it if I can’t have us. Cause f*&! it, I was in love”
So long, London
Track 5!!! LOVE IT! But so sad. I like that it’s a little bit like replacing his name with London. And the way she sings is so angelic but the tempo feels almost manic. Favorite line “how much sad did you think I had. Did I have in me” “and I’m pissed off you let me give you all that youth for free” Honestly almost ever line is my favorite it really feels like a letter being written or a diary entry
But daddy I love him
Like it. Favorite line “I just learned these people just try and save you. Cause they hate you” “I’ll tell you something about my name. It’s mine alone to disgrace”
Fresh out of the slammer
Like this one. Favorite line is when she repeating “fresh out of the slammer” when she’s echoing herself
Florida!!!
LOVE!!! Together they sounds AMAZING! Also one of my favorites to sing alone to. I think she said she wrote this song after watching dateline and everyone seemed to flee to Florida. Favorite lines “My friends all reek of weed or babies” “FLORIDA (drums) is one hell of a drug (drums) FLORIDA (drums) can I use you up”
Guilty as sin
Really like this one. This sound is my favorite kind of her songs. Favorite line “Am I allowed to cry” also like that this song is like her fantasy of this guy she likes
Who’s afraid of little old me
LOVE THIS SONG!!! I keep replaying it all the time. Love singing along. “You don’t get to tell me about sad” “you don’t get to tell me you feel bad” love that these two sentences are similar but just a little changed. “so they tell me everything is not about me. But what if it is? Then they say they didn’t do it to hurt me. But what if they did? This feels like intrusive thoughts. The whole bridge is so good!
I can fix him (no really I can)
Like this one but not my favorite. Kinda reminds me of like a continuation of Cowboy Like Me. The western twang to it is really cool. Favorite line “woah maybe I can’t”
loml
Love this one. Super sad. I like that the acronym stands for love of my life and he keeps calling her love of my life and she calls him loss of my life. When she says “a con man sells a fool a get love quick scheme” I think she’s referencing her Out of the woods music video. Favorite line “Mr. steel your girl then make her cry. You said I’m the love of your life” Again the bridge is just amazing lyrics.
I can do it with a broken heart
LOVE LOVE LOVE!!!! This might be my favorite. I love how upbeat it is but the lyrics are about being so sad and depressed. Best song to sing along to. Favorite line “Cause I’m a real tough kid. I can handle my shit”
The smallest man who ever lived
Like this song. I like that this song refers to the song before it by talking about her sparkling summer. Favorite line “and I’ll forget you, but I’ll never forgive. The smallest man who ever lived” the bridge is also amazing!
The alchemy
Love this song. The two songs before this are talking about her summer and so is this one kinda with it being about her starting to be happy with Travis. Favorite line “Where the trophy. He just comes running over to me” Also her talking about coming back a little like coming back to her roots.
Clara bow
Like this song. I like that she has all of these very famous women in different decades that everyone is being compared to. I also like that she says herself cause that is so true. And with the person being told they’re like her but with edge. Favorite line “You look like Taylor swift. In this light, we’re loving it. You got edge, she never did”
The black dog
Love this song. Another sad song that’s really good lyricly and fun to sing in the car to. Favorite line “And your location, you forgot to turn it off” Like that when she sings “old habits die screaming” then the music gets loud till the last time she says it and it gets quiet
Imgonnagetyouback
Like this one, not my favorite though. Favorite line “Whether I’m gonna be your wife or smash up your bike, I haven’t decided yet. I’m gonna get you back” I like that gonna get you back has a double meaning here.
The albatross
Like this song. Super pretty sounding, her voice is really nice in it. Favorite line “she is the albatross. She’s here to destroy you”
Chloe or sam or Sophia or Marcus
Like this song. Favorite lines “just say ‘I loved you the way you were’ if you want to tear my world apart. Just say you always wondered” “cooler in theory, but not if you force it to be. It just didn’t happen”
How did it end?
So good! Kinda feels like the other end of her song Lover with “we herby” as some wedding imagery like the song Lover does. Also this song is a little bit seems poured at the fans who think they deserve to know what happened between her and her exes but she’s only telling her friends. It seems like there a couple of times in the song reference it’s. “We must know how did it end” and “guess who we ran into the shops? walking in circles she was lost. Don’t you hear? They called it off. One gasp and then how did it end?” Favorite line “sitting in a tree d-y-I-n-g” “I can’t pretend like I understand. How did it end”
So high school
LOVE! It feels like it should be in a 2000s movie. One of my top favorite. Favorite lyric “you know how to ball, I know Aristotle. Brand new, full throttle” “you know what you wanted and, boy you got her”
I hate it here
Might be my favorite song. I loved playing the game where we pick a decade to live and I also would be like without all this and this. Love the escapism of this song. I really relate to it. Favorite line as you can guess is “My friends used to play a game where we would pick a decade.We wished we could live in instead of this. I’d say the 1830s but without all the racists and getting married off for the highest bid. Everyone would look down ’cause it wasn’t fun now. Seems like it was never even fun back then. Nostalgia is a minds trick. If I’d been there, I’d hate it. It was freezing in the palace”
thanK you aIMee
I like it but not my favorite. I do love the pettiness of it if it is about Kim. Favorite line is “and one day, your kid comes home singing a song only us two is gonna know is a about you”
I look in peoples windows
Like this song. Is it from the perspective of Peter Pan? With the song Peter from Wendy’s? Also it seems like it could be from her perspective of being such a big star that she’s looking in on other people having normal lives. Favorite line “I look in peoples windows. Like I’m some derange weirdo”
The prophecy
LOVE LOVE LOVE this song!!! Favorite line “I guess a lesser woman would’ve lost hope. A greater woman wouldn’t beg. But I looked to the sky and said. Please. I’ve been on my knees. Change the prophecy. Don’t want money. Just someone who wants my company. Let it once be me. Who do I have to speak to. About if they can redo the prophecy?” I really like how she says knees with it sounding like she’s begging. And the strumming of the guitar through the whole song is just so so beautiful.
Cassandra
I like this song. I like the use of Greek mythology with also referencing her life, especially the reputation and before era with the “room with snake” and “when its ‘burn the bitch’ they’re shrieking. But when the truth comes out, it’s quite”. My favorite line “so they killed Cassandra first, cause she feared the worst”
Peter
Is this Wendy’s point of view when she’s all grown up? She references the lost boys, fearless leader. “You said you were gonna grown up, then you were gonna come find me”. In Peter Pan I believe he grows up at the end of the story. Favorite line “But the woman who sits at the window has turned out the light” I like this line as it shows that she also grew up.
The bolter
LOVE!!! Love the guitar and like the upbeatness of it. I like that at the end it switches from ‘him calling her a whore’ to ‘her having the best stories’. Favorite line “there’s escape in escaping” it’s funny but also resonates.
Robin
It’s good but not a favorite. I think I’ve heard this is about her co-writers child? Favorite line “you have no room in your dreams for regrets”. The song is a really pretty song about the innocent of childhood.
The manuscript
Love this song! It’s so beautiful!!! It’s a perfect end to the album with her being like these songs are no longer about who I wrote them about/I’ve moved on from it. These songs are yours now. It’s so beautiful with piano in the background. Favorite line is the whole song but having to pick it would be “now and then I reread the manuscript. But the story isn’t mine anymore”
From our first visit to Paris in October, 2010.One of the highlights of my life, of Melinda’s and my marriage, and in our role as parents of Chloe & Ella was the 13 months we spent in France from July 2010 through July 2011. We were granted a sabbatical from our jobs at Puget Sound Community School (PSCS), both as a tribute to the work we had done to get the school going and keep it running since its humble beginnings in 1994 AND to provide the school community an opportunity to know it could exist without its founders being present (ie: the infamous “Pie Truck Scenario” – perhaps I’ll explain that in a future post).
The concept of the sabbatical being a real thing began while Melinda and I were on spring break in 2008. The concept of living in France with our children began as a pipe dream we’d tell each other before we even had children. That this could become a reality is a tribute to a lot of people, most significantly the PSCS board and staff at the time. I can vividly recall the months leading up to our departure like they were last month, not twelve years ago.
Our first family photo taken on July 6, 2010 in our adopted hometown of Nantes.Officially, the sabbatical began with the school’s 2010-11 fiscal year, meaning on July 1, 2010. But we didn’t leave for France until July 4th so we had a few days in Seattle on our own. Because we were renting our house(note, this link takes you a site we created in 2012 to promote the idea of swapping houses with someone for a month that summer) to another family for the year and they moved in on July 1, we were staying at a friend’s. The day of the 1st, Chloe was out with some friends on one of her many goodbye tours and Melinda & Ella were doing some last-minute shopping. I was alone in an unfamiliar house with my laptop for company.
I had recently been reading how a person had documented his life for a full year by posting a daily photograph and some quick comments on a website. The idea appealed to me so that afternoon, alone in the house, I investigated how to do something like it. I knew a tiny bit about WordPress since one of the PSCS teaching staff members had taught the rest of us how to use it to post our class offerings to the students. On a whim, I created a WordPress blog, calling it “frenchsabbatical.”
Outside the Castle of Nantes (Château des ducs de Bretagne)I had promised myself and told others that I wasn’t going to over-commit myself to projects while on sabbatical. I wanted some practice of living more spontaneously, freed from the daily requirements of being a school director. Indeed, Melinda and I would have parenting obligations but beyond that, I wanted a sense of freedom. That the PSCS board had agreed to supply Melinda and me with a monthly stipend helped tremendously with this.
Little did I know that the whim of starting my “frenchsabbatical” blog would propel not just me but many others on a daily adventure, one I never regretted for a minute. Beginning on the 1st of July from the home of our friends, I posted every day until our return (truth be told, I kept posting every day after that for another year or so, all of which you can find here). Conversations emerged, first just among Melinda, Chloe, Ella & me – “You could put that on the blog.” And, “Don’t you dare write about that.” To, “I get to approve any photos you use of me.”
The blog features a lot of silly posts, like my fascination with the sexiness of French fire hydrants.As the months went by, our French friends got in the act. My dear friend Laurent made sure I had a way to post when his family took ours to their cabin in the French Alps that didn’t have an Internet connection. I also learned that part of his morning ritual while we were there was to read what I posted the night before.
Around the corner from our house in Nantes we met the Bertail family, people who have become among our closest friends in the world. There are so many stories to tell about them, from Christine, the mom, twice stopping by to introduce herself to us only find Chloe and Ella at home, to how they helped me celebrate my 48th birthday in style.
Then, of course, there were our friends and family members back in Seattle who used the blog to keep in touch with us. As a writer, I often would picture a member of our family as the audience to what I was writing. Michele, my mother-in-law, my brothers, or one of our nieces were common “targets.” Certainly, my mother was always in mind (she’d regularly send me edits – catching my typos with her usual flair).
To this day, I pay WordPress a fee each year to keep ads from the site and to maintain its unique domain name, meaning you can find it in its entirety at https://frenchsabbatical.com. Two years ago as a holiday present, one of the best I’ve ever received, Chloe & Ella had the blog posts made into a two-volume hardback book set that will forever hold a place of prominence in Melinda’s and my home.
I took up running while in France. Here I am crossing the turf track at the Nantes racetrack to get to the inner trotter track where I regularly ran after dropping off Ella at school.Last week, in order to have all of my personal blog posts in one spot, I copied the content to this site, my ongoing personal blog. So if you’re interested in seeing what we were doing on a given day, you can do so right here. In fact, in the footer you’ll see a pull-down menu on the left for a monthly archive. Choose a month from the sabbatical year, July 2010 – July 2011, and enjoy some reading.
So we’ve been back home for three full days now. I think we’d be an interesting case study for researchers wanting to study human reactions to returning to a very familiar place after many months away. I’ve had a short email exchange with Christine, to whom I put it this way, “It’s very interesting for us to fall so quickly back into the familiar. I find this both settling and unsettling. On one hand, it’s like snuggling with your favorite blanket, one that was put away for some time and now you have back. On the other hand, it makes our year in France feel distant. Standing in the frozen food section of the grocery store (that’s open all day, every day), I didn’t have to try very hard to imagine that France was all a dream or that we hadn’t left yet. It was disconcerting.”
It’s reassuring, too. I mean I know I’m home and I love being home. Everything is so familiar I could walk through the house blindfolded and find my way around. An example of this is in how I walk down the stairs. I always reach for a certain place for support and was surprised, pleasantly, to find myself doing it the first time I came down the stairs. It’s the same for moving about the kitchen, or looking for something in the bathroom. I don’t have to think about it. I just do it.
Switching gears, Melinda and I head in to PSCS tomorrow, the first time there in 13 months. Unto itself that’s an odd feeling. But I have a hunch it won’t take long to kick things into gear. After all, it’s pretty darn familiar.
Oh, today’s picture, a self-portrait, is me in front of our front door. A year ago today, we moved in to our Nantes house and made cheeseburgers for the Boudeaus… Day 31 (31 July 2010) – Move in Day
Last fall, the Boudeaus, Melinda & I talked about the possibility of Romain coming with us to spend several weeks in Seattle when we returned. Not only would he get to practice his English, we’d see about setting it up so he could see some Seattle area businesses in operation. You see, Romain is studying economics in school. He is at a high level, what is called “Prépa” in France. Hooking him up with people we know who work at Microsoft, Amazon, and Boeing would provide him with some incredible learning opportunities. Most significant of these, my brother Scott, a financial advisor/stockbroker of some repute, early on greed to allow Romain to shadow him for several mornings.
As our departure date from France grew nearer, Melinda and I started to realize that having Romain with us would provide our family something that’s a little hard to explain. His presence would literally bring back a human piece of France in our home and keep Melinda, Chloe, Ella & me from mindlessly falling back into our Seattle routines. With him, we’d speak more French, be able to show off our Seattle lives, and otherwise have a Nantes connection. He would be tangible evidence that our year in France was not a dream.
His presence has so far been even more significant that we first imagined.
I’m late posting tonight because we just got back from a late dinner at my brother’s house. That’s Romain with Scott and Sally, Scott’s partner. Also in the picture, two bottles of wine, thank you gifts from the Boudeaus to Scott. Not pictured, Romain’s new Seattle Mariners t-shirt that he picked up at today’s game.
When I was a little kid and my family was on our way home from a vacation, I’d have this crazy image pop into my head. We’d be in the car, having driven for hours, and be nearing the house. I could hardly wait to turn the corner onto our street, sure that the neighbors would have put up signs welcoming us home. They might even be out in their yards, smiling and waving as we drove past.
So imagine my pleasure yesterday when we got home and found this poster up in our Seattle house.
Yes, we are safe and snug back home. Time-wise, from the point leaving the Boudeaus on Thursday morning at 5am (Nantes time) to walking inside our house just before 8pm (Seattle time), we had been traveling for 24 straight hours. With the 9 hour time difference factored in, our Thursday lasted 33 hours.
Graphically, it felt like someone had taken both ends of the day and pulled on them, just like you’d do with some Silly Putty. It got long and thin, and even cracked in a few places. But overall it stayed together.
Note, I am going to continue to post daily here on the blog, sharing about our transition back to Seattle. Look for that to begin tomorrow.
(Note, I created this post in advance and scheduled it to be delivered at 6pm in Nantes, 9am in Seattle. If we are on schedule, we just landed in Reykjavík and will be taking off for Seattle in an hour, a nearly 8 hour flight still in front of us.)
In honor of our return to Seattle today, I thought I’d try something new. I’ve picked four of my favorite posts over the last year and want to encourage you, my beloved blog readers (I’m not saying which is beloved, the blog or the readers) to vote on YOUR favorite from these four: Day 12, Day 121, Day 192, Day 307 (click on the “day” to see each candidate, but vote on one below).
Great photo here, don’t you think? It caps the trilogy of photos and posts from the last three days intended to salute the French families we feel have become part of ours.
Speaking of favorite blog posts, I just don’t seem to get tired reviewing the one from this day last year (or at least looking at the picture)… Day 28 (28 July 2010) – Cheese For Dessert
So yesterday I mentioned the family photo shoot Melinda, Chloe, Ella and I like to do each year. I said we choose the photo we like best and enlarge & frame it, and put it up in our home. We followed the tradition this year in Nantes; in fact, you can see this year’s photo in this post from Day 105, our 100th day in France.
Today’s blog picture comes from our recent photo shoot with the Boudeau family. If you’ve followed the blog for any length of time, you know it was the Boudeaus whose presence in Nantes inspired us to move here. It was the Boudeaus who found our house for us, negotiated with our landlord, found Ella’s school, helped us with our French bank account, etc, etc. Today Frédérique helped us again with our French bank and helped get us checked out of our house. In short, I can’t imagine what our sabbatical would have been like without them.
On our last full day in Nantes, the day we move out of our house (we’re spending the night at the Boudeau’s house tonight and then being taken by them to the train station at 5am tomorrow), I salute the Boudeaus, now permanently part of OUR family.
And speaking of the Boudeaus, on this day last year I wrote about the sexiness of French fire hydrants, an observation of mine that Laurent frequently references… Day 27 (27 July 2010) – Ma Chérie, Bouche d’incendie
Last August, soon after we moved in to our Nantes house, we staged a “photo shoot” for the four of us on the back patio and got this picture. This is something we like to do a few times each year, hoping to capture what we call our “album cover” portrait. Each year we choose our favorite of these pictures, have it blown up big, frame it, and put it up in our house. I referenced this once in a post on the Kind Living blog.
This month, before leaving, we wanted to replicate that August photo shoot but this time include the members of our “French family,” getting photos that include us with the Bertails and others that include us with the Boudeaus. I’ve chosen to feature pictures from those “shoots” today and tomorrow, our last two full days in France, to honor and express our appreciation for these families.
Today’s photo features the Bertails. Meeting them has been one of those experiences that demonstrate one is on the right path. The kindness of their entire family, from Bernard’s stately presence to Claire’s bubbly smile, has been a gift to us of enormous proportions. We are proud to count the Bertails as part of OUR family.
We leave in less than 3 days, meaning we have very little time left to get ready. A big part of this is getting our suitcases packed, and a big challenge to this is keeping them under the 50 lb weight limit. We are each allowed 2 large suitcases to check, plus a small carry-on bag and then a purse or laptop bag (I haven’t yet decided whether to call mine a purse or a laptop bag).
I brought the bathroom scale downstairs in order to place it on a large flat surface for uniforming weighing. I told Chloe that I thought we should try multiple ways/weighs. She didn’t laugh at all; in fact, I think she rolled her eyes. If not that, she just looked aweigh.
Ha!
The most consistent style of weighing was setting each bag on the scale by itself, as opposed to me holding them as illustrated in today’s picture. It’s kind of funny how we fine-tune each bag, moving an item from one into another in order to best make use of our weight allowance. One advantage we have this time around as compared to our trip to France is Romain is coming with us. He has the same baggage allowance but doesn’t have so many things since he is just staying in the US for a month. We’ll be using his second bag.
Andy Smallman 