wild

Notes from the Heart (Email Newsletter, August 25, 2019)

(710 words)

Hello beautiful friends,

These last days of August feel soft. We've had rain.

The light is back today though, constantly changing with small clouds passing over as I write. I feel hints of autumn. They are subtle. Have you noticed how the season shifts before change arrives? Evenings here are shorter now. The air has a different scent. Dahlias and cone flowers are blooming, and there is tall grass.

I am delighted to announce the third volume of Lucia has arrived. It will ship out to subscribers on August 30. We printed a limited quantity, and you (my beautiful Notes from the Heart tribe) have first dibs.

You can find and order it here: Lucia Volume Three : Wild

This gorgeous volume is my favorite one so far. I feel so proud!

I've read Wild oh, probably 50 times now, and still when I sit down to re-read it from cover to cover, I cry.

Fourteen contributors in this issue stun and ground me with their collective--and relatively young--wisdom. These women weave light with dark, flowers with soil, and prose with song until their voices echo a collective message: This is our heroine's journey. Not a trek through an outer landscape to find an elixir and return with a prize, no. Ours is the winding and wild path inward where we discover our courage and find our voice.

Just to call out a few:

• Sarah Anne Childers wrote our cover story, Starling. "I have never been in a murmuration," she writes. She weaves a story that shimmers, riding a bicycle at dusk to find freedom in an anchored life.

• Cicely Andree Conway wrote Bedtime Story, a story for her daughters that reads like an award-winning children's book and carries a meaningful message: where and how to find the "women's treasure" that is our birthright.

• Alisha Sommer wrote A Recipe for Okra Soup, an invitation to remember from whence we came. She whispers of ancestral grandmothers who touched plantation indigo and bring their spirit into her garden, kitchen, and life.

I hope when your copy arrives, you can take some quiet time with it. Pour a cup of inspiration (or a glass of ease) and sit down to soak everything in. This volume is so rich.

a candle for autumnal equinox

As August wanes and September can be sensed, I am feeling the gentle tug of quiet.

"I want to go deeper," is how I described it to my therapist. She nodded with understanding encouragement. I want to listen inward even more, so that I can begin to calibrate the shifts that have taken place in my life this summer, this season, this past year. Autumn always brings change, whether it is welcomed or not.

I wrote some notes on preparing for change and welcoming what comes. I put them into a zine to share with you.

A Candle for Autumnal Equinox has mid-September notes on ritual for writers, artists, dreamers, high-sensitive creatives and other wondrous souls.

If you (like me) wish to invite some woo around the equinox (September 23, 2019) you can order a copy for yourself. I made a few dozen and will ship them between now and mid-September as long as they last.

I'll be hand-mailing these zines from my living room, so you'll also receive a little hello note and some extra love from me in the envelope....encouragement to luxuriate in introversion and listen for your light.

You can find them here: A Candle for Autumnal Equinox

I hope this last week of August is a time of rest and slow joy for you. The bounty of a year's work (or three, in the case of Wild!) is here for the taking.

I encourage you to enjoy it. Care for yourself, breathe deeply, connect with your heart, touch the earth, and be reminded of your own magic.

Your own wild.

Sending so much love,

Laura


P.S. I've been listening to this Spotify channel on repeat for daaaays. Simple wind chimes and Australian nature sounds. I never used to like wind chimes, but lately I'm enamored of them. The good ones, I mean. These sounds have been soothing my body all summer, so I wanted to share them with you.

P.P.S. If you know of a local boutique, letterpress, or creative shop where Lucia would fly off the shelves, will you reply and tell me about them? I'd be grateful to hear about your favorites!

Laura Lowery is the founder, editor and publisher of Lucia. She does her best to lead a creative life. Whether triumphant or stumbling, Laura shares daily notes (that are often weekly) here on luciajournal, including stories, behind-the-scenes happenings, little doses of inspiration, and large quantities of curiosity and heart. She is pleased to meet you.