This was part of a Nick Cave exhibit of “Sound Suits” that I attended recently. The suits are out of this world, but it was this body suit that I fell in love with. Don’t we all flower and glitter and shine like this inside? What if we looked like that on the outside, too? A second skin that let our dream and visions materialize like a flower garden we’ve been hiding under Wolford black tights or skinny jeans or yoga pants or doctor’s scrubs. That guy you pass every day and dismiss as a jerk because he doesn’t return your hello. The cold fish who has enlarged diamonds rings on her fingers and a Dwell-worthy  house. The homeless guy under the bridge we avert our eyes from. What if they are blooming, too, and it showed on all of us?

I love the app that lets me take an ordinary photo and give it a vintage twist. At the same time, it makes me feel a bit guilty. Instead of waiting for magic-hour light, I used technology to give it a golden patina. In reality, the peonies are falling apart rather unphotogenically and the pot of brushes has been sitting there unused for way too long. I wish there were an app that could give my life this soft glow. Round off the awkward corners, smooth the rough spots, make it look like a series of scenes from an illuminated manuscript. Instead, my life has its fair share of awkward moments — a cluttered counter instead of this peaceful tableau, clean sheets piled on the table waiting to be folded, a dying basil plant. But in my mind’s eye, I see the romantically swooning peonies, old light slanting through the shutters and just-used paintbrushes instead neglected tools. Am I cheating by settling for wanna-be reality? Taking the easy way out? Or maybe it’s okay to try and turn the unremarkable into the rememorable now and then.

Last weekend, I went chasing the moon again, trying to pin it down, catch it with my iPhone camera, freeze in a photo an enchanted moment in time. Silly and futile. Almost full, or was it waning?…I don’t know. Not like this pink one, but a big gold peach, pouting, ready to split open and spill light everywhere. I’d been to a concert earlier and that same longing for the unnameable that certain music evokes in me was reinforced by the moon hunt. I came home elated and restless and started to read John O’Donohue’s Eternal Echoes: Exploring our Yearning to try and figure out why my dreams lately have been all about not belonging, about being on the outside trying to get in. About chasing the ineffable. Maybe we all feel that way, but most of the time we’re trying to satisfy that vague but deep yearning with material things – a new job, more clothes, a better car, the whole bag of chips, exercise, sex, cigarettes, wine, travel, unique experiences, a more powerful computer, parties, shoes and of course money money money. I’m guilty of it all!

Most of the time we say, “How are you?”, “How was your day?”, “Have a great day!”. But what if we asked:

* Are you hurting?

* Do you ever feel lonely?

* What is your greatest disappointment?

* What makes you happy besides work?

* Have I let you down?

* What’s missing from your life?

* Do you feel you can call on me for anything? If not, what do you feel you can call on me for?

* Are you carrying a secret you need to share? Would you trust me with it?

* What is your biggest, most hidden dream?

When I go for a walk, I’m wearing a pedometer and a heart-rate monitor watch, with a Shuffle clipped to my shirt. I power around the neighborhood listening to Jay-Z, Johnny Cash, Juanes or Justin Timberlake. I “shuffle” through my songs trying to find something that will push me to go faster, farther or burn fat. As a result, I don’t pay much attention to my surroundings. I’ve walked my route so often that I think I’ve seen it all. Today, though, I had my Shuffle turned off so I’d be sure to hear my iPhone if it rang, because I was expecting a call from my daughter. I probably walked a little slower, but I think I noticed more. Like the last bit of sun gilding the top of a tree as daylight faded. And the fact that two houses I passed had wood crosses planted in their front yard for Easter, and one had a giant inflatable purple rabbit sagging slightly from post-Easter let-down — all three of which completely freaked me out and made me briefly consider moving. And the poignant heart made of red carnations on the new grave at the cemetery. There was no music, but there was the sound of my shoes on the sidewalk, the whoosh of passing cars, a dog barking in the distance, lungs inhaling, exhaling — the world according to itself instead of Jay-Z or me.

Is there a stage in Buddhism where inner calm is always at war with the thorns of I-ness, the selfish Self, the thisness of the world?  I know I will never be a real Buddhist because I’m too lazy to study and live it, but I’m fascinated by the idea of detaching from wants. Is it really possible?  I live at 721 Shallow Street, but I also aspire to live at 0 Desires Court. Being attached to the things of the world is thorny  and  full of pain — I always want more than I have, I always want to be better than I am (just as much an earthly attachment as a Prada purse) and I always want to be moving on up to Enlightenment Avenue (so presumptuous of me).  But I’m mostly a Libra, snagged by the thorns and  yet yearning for the lotus blossom.

There must be a underground wisteria-wireless tapping out a message in flower code that says “Blooms away!” because you wake up one morning and suddenly every wisteria bush in town has exploded overnight. They’re draped seductively over fences and entwined in trees, their blooms so thick it seems they’ve put everything they’ve got into this massive assault on our senses. I’m tempted to bury my face in every cluster of flowers that I pass and try to inhale their secret. Because I want to find a project to throw myself into just as passionately, to learn to be a bomb of creativity that can’t help detonating itself.