spruce pollen cones have been friends of mine for a very short time. i discovered them hanging like cherries from a row of spring spruces sometime between the beginning of still blog in 2012 and today. they were strangers for almost an entire lifetime, and then suddenly, thanks to this strange new phenomenon of sharing creativity online, they were friends. yesterday, i spent a long, easy, riveting afternoon with two new friends: shannon @_shannongrant, and talin @springfinnandco, who had been strangers for almost an entire lifetime, and who suddenly, thanks to design*sponge and instagram, are friends. and not just friends but, i want to say, mates. women who naturally see the world from a perspective i recognize. so which is it? i don’t know. sometimes, when homework is finished and piano is practiced, i watch the online world reach out and take my son away from me, while he sits in an armchair across the room, and i think that digital media is like a predator on the savannah, separating us one by one from our herd, and eating us alive. and then i take a morning walk and it is the season for spruce pollen cones, and i spend that afternoon in a studio with shannon and talin and no sense of time passing, and it seems as if the online world has strewn the path of the second half of my life with fruitfulness and friendship.

spruce male pollen cone (in early may)

sucker lake regional trail, saint paul, minnesota