The words that remain: An invitation

A new community edition of Dandelion Seeds.

Hello there! And welcome to Dandelion Seeds, an illustrated newsletter that is hand-painted and hand-lettered, from my desk to yours.

Over the summer, I had the honor of sharing our first community project — a series called “The Sounds of Home.”

The stories were written by you, illustrated and hand-lettered by me, and made for a true creative collaboration.

I can’t say enough how much I loved working on “The Sounds of Home.” I’m even planning to share more in a future post about what it was that I enjoyed so much about the process — and why it reminded me of some of my favorite projects I’ve been a part of in the past.

But for today, all I want to say is: Let’s do it again, friends.

Will you help me create a new community edition of Dandelion Seeds?

While I was working on my newest illustrated essay, “The Dutch Word for Gift,” there was a certain phrase that struck me the minute I wrote it:

The words that remain.

Here’s where it appears near the end of the story:

The first time I read the essay to Jose, he thought there was something to the phrase as well. “That should be the title of your next community project,” he said.

I wholeheartedly agreed with him, and now I’d love to invite you to be part of it, by leaving a comment here this week:

What is a word that has remained for you?

Perhaps it’s a word or phrase you learned while traveling, or perhaps you learned it in your own hometown, while studying another language or exploring a new cultural district. Maybe it’s even a word from your mother tongue, but the moment in which you learned it is still indelibly fixed in your memory.

And if you have time, I’d love to hear the story behind the word — about where you learned it, the person who shared it with you, or why it means so much to you.

In a time when the world feels especially heavy and dark, my hope is that this new community edition of Dandelion Seeds will highlight how much we have to learn from each other, and how deepening our understanding of other languages and cultures can enrich our own.

Thank you for being here, and I can’t wait to read your stories.

With love,
Candace