In Vienna, the summer patio chairs have been removed from the sidewalks; the air has officially chilled. Wool jackets are donned, boots click-clack down the cobblestone streets, and candle lanterns have begun to light up wine stalls and storefronts. Horse and buggies line up next to the palaces, looking as 21st century fresh today as a Dickens novel. Compare this to my friend Erin’s journey through India, who mentions Mumbai by contrast to elegant Vienna “Mumbai is dirty, smelly, and crazy ;-), and I still love it…” Today the Sun makes it’s annual journey through Libra, and in this pleasant Libra city one can really feel the seasons change, a bustling sociable energy beginning to move indoors and make merry! Libra Sun time is the season to join forces, to team up and celebrate each other’s gifts- because we work better in tandem, than solo right now. Find a person’s praises whom you want to sing, and sing them! That’s why I’m sending out a virtual advertisement for some of my favorite artists. If you read my last blog on the New Bohemia, apropos to global instability, I do believe there’s *no better time* to support the artists.

Why art, now? Art keeps culture alive when the lights dim and uncertainty tries our faith. Artists attend to what the Greeks/Romans called our genius, or daemon spirit – the gifted spirit inside each of us. To birth this gift, is a labor of love.

“For the slow labor of realizing the potential gift the artist must return to those Bohemaias, halfway between the slums and the library where life is not counted by the clock and where the talented may be sure that they will be ignored until that time, if it ever comes, when their gifts are viable enought to be set free and surive in the world.” -Lewis Hyde, writer of artists manifesto “The Gift”

Yet art is generous. When the artist gives (and we partake of their art) we our self become “gifted”. So here are a few of my favorite inspired people who labor to manifest generous works of unique genius for you. I’ve listed what these friends have, sometimes in invisible ways, each gifted me. This Libra season, invoke Libra’s golden rule: give and you shall receive. Receive the gift by giving it. *What is your gift?*

Introducing:
Erin Reese – Intuitive, Travel & Soul Writer, Bindi-Girl
Minouche Graglia – Open hearted, friend of the Grandmothers
Wolff – Painter of Poetry, and Musician of Poetry

Erin,Intuitive, Travel & Soul Writer, Bindi-Girl
“The world has lost enough mystery as it is –
We need our fortune-tellers.”
~ Bruce Springsteen

Erin is a local San Francisco girl who hit the road years ago, fell in love with India, and keeps dishing the love from India in her magnificently mythical and magical column, Bindi Girl. Erin is also a gifted Intutitive-psychic dream tripper who uses Tarot and astrology to plumb the mysteries on behalf of your genius. She serves these soul sessions up via Skype — to anyone in the world. Erin’s gift is *turning impossibility into a gift.*

From Erin…Bindi Girl is about to be reincarnated (!) with a whole new look and feel! Of course, there will still be continuing real-life adventure stories from India – how could there not? That’s Bindi’s om! Only now, we’re taking the tales to another level of creative and cosmic travel, incorporating magical reality* and observations of an American abroad. One day, there could be a post on Ganesha, beloved elephant-Indian god and divine remover of obstacles. The next, there could be a post on magical ways to survive a global recession. Get the point?

*What is Magical Reality?
“In magical realism, the writer confronts reality and tries to untangle it, to discover what is mysterious in things, in life, in human acts.” (from Magical Realism, by Lois Parkinson Zamora)

Find Erin at:
http://bindigirl.blogspot.com
www.erinreese.com

Minouche, Open Hearted, Grandmother Lover

Minouche is my partner in clairvoyant crime – when I’m at home, each week we take turns receiving spirit messages via mental telephony, one another’s consciousness. When Minouche received a spirit message to do a painting for the 13 Indigenous Grandmothers council, I was told my eighty-six year old grandmother has terminal bone cancer. As I’ve watched the grandmothers’ spirit take shape and form in natural earth pigment of Minouche’s studio, my own grandmother’s spirit is preparing to leave this earthly plane. As I’ve been helping my grandmother to maintain a quality of life, to receive blood transfusions to keep her energy up until she chooses to leave, Minouche is harnessing cash energy, the economy’s lifeblood, for a journey to gift this painting to the New York Grandmother gathering, in early October. Minouche is also the director of a coordinated effort in Fairfax called Open Heart Clinic, that offers healings of all kinds to the community by donation only. Minouche’s gift is *honoring the spirit through listening*

Donate to send Minouche to the Grandmother’s here.

Introducing:
Wolff, Poet Painter and Poet Singer

You can find Wolff paintings all over my website (they’re for sale!) in various pockets and corners. He designed the Moonkissd logo and when he emailed me saying he had just cut a CD, I was just thrilled. His music is folksy and nostalgic, and at my first listen I felt I was walking through autumn leaves with a warm heart, my mind un-ravelling. Wolff reminds me that art can only make sense by listening to all of the senses. While reading his bio, I’m unsurprised to learn his artworks are collected by poets and writers – such as Frank McCourt. Wolff’s gift is *using words as the paintbrush, and the paintbrush as words*.
Listen to Wolff’s new music here.

From Wolff’s “press” page:
“The Orphan Trains are stunning. I train psychiatrists to use language to radically and permanently transform their clients’ lives. But even this surgeon of words has a lot to learn from The Orphan Trains. Their lyrics are astounding. Like Leonard Cohen on a roller coaster. Songs that will make you fall in love with life again. You’ve really got to listen. The Orphan Trains songs are poetry with wings.”

Love to all from Vienna!