everything is new

.

20 hours of travel, a delayed flight, a diverted flight, sleeping on the floor of SFO as i waited for the first trains to begin running.  it was a long walk home that morning but i didn't mind.  it was the first time i'd put my earbuds in in a month.  i was the first time music had coursed through me in lock step with my fast-beating heart.  it was the first time in a month that i was able to lock in to myself, only myself, like masterbation, no one else, no distractions, no concerns, no muttering in the distance.  i had been outside myself for an entire month.  i had been in the wind, in the sun, within a language that floored me and made me its' servant.  gladly (gerne). i'd been so outside myself for an entire month that it seemed impossible to find myself walking along familiar roads.  a part of me was still in Berlin, crossing the Oberbaum Brucke, not crossing Shattuck Ave in Oakland, California.

as i came closer to my house, a dirty, discarded chair came in to view.  no cushions, abandonned on the side of the road.  "ahhh... a canvas..." i thought.  a canvas.  i didn't know how badly i needed one until i saw one.  i went inside and grabbed my big, black marker.  "yes.  perfection.  the first thing i will do upon arriving in oakland is write on the street", i told myself, "this is the only real beauty.  this is the only gesture i have."  i thought of my beloved bridge in Kreuzbeg and my heart ached something awful.  where had my endless waters gone?  i thought of David Wojnarowicz and his plea that we live life like it actually fucking matters.   i thought of his refrain.  i scrawled it quick in fat print:

yes i will.  i fucking promise.


it's so hard to believe a week has already gone by since i've been home.  there is so much to say...  it will come as it is able.

yesterday evening, i stood in my dark kitchen and watched a man cross the street to take a picture of the abandoned chair.  the sun obscured the image and he kicked the chair in a half circle there on the corner to get it out of the glare.   i watched him the entire time.  it was a moment of quiet happiness.  it was a moment of connection to another human being.  i have no idea what to label the work i do that happens in the street.  i very rarely think of it as ART.  or rather, ART isn't even the consideration.  i think of these things as Signs.  as a Cry.  it was wonderful to be able to witness my cry being heard.  not only heard, but echoed in the heart of another.  i felt unbelievably lucky.

i am happy to stretch out in my white room and see the reflection of my body flash in the armoir mirror.  i am happy to make coffee in my kitchen and spend the first 2 hours of the day scribbling in my diary.  i am happy to have a washer and drier at my disposal.  but i assure you, 3 weeks overseas was definitely not enough.  all my plans have changed. my ideas are totally shattered.  i have no answers and all of my goals have been flung far and wide. 

.

hello again

i've been so busy since the new semester started a few weeks ago.  unbelievably busy.  it seems that suddenly my life has come full circle and i spend the vast majority of my time working and studying, waiting for a free moment that i can give to art-making.  i reel in my desire to stay out late drinking in bars and embrace my time-honored affection for long nights of reading and drawing at home alone on my bedroom floor.  my old, gentle habits return.  my quiet self, my thoughtful self emerges.  it's the right time of year for such a return. 

a few days ago i celebrated my first anniversary of being single.  an entire year has elapsed.  12 solid months. it's so strange;  it seems like it's been so much longer than that.  i've done so much living since the day i walked out the door, taking only my white leather jacket and book bag with me last february.  that moment seems like a dream.  the life that followed on its heels feels real. 

i've been reading back through last year's diary.  it is a surreal experience.  i look at my own handwriting and am boggled by the words on the page.  i stare at the sentences, at the expression of such degraded loneliness and my small squeaks of hope, and wonder how it was ever possible that that life was really mine.  we humans often find ourselves in situations we didn't intend.  the years get away from us so quickly.  our naivety blinds us.  our fear of pain delays decision after decision.  we ache for something better than what we have but we feel guilty for wanting it.  we assume that wanting something other than what we've got means we're bad, wrong, or selfish.  i wasn't leading a bad life, i was simply stuck in a life that wasn't right for me.  i'm thankful to have this level of understanding at my disposal.  it feels good to be able to understand the lives and motivations of others as a result of having had such an experience.  i am more compassionate today that i was a year ago.  i am stronger and more able to give respect, tolerance, and understanding to other people.  i have a greater capacity for love than i have ever had before. 

still, i'm in no rush to couple-up.  i was in a relationship for 7 years.  i'm enjoying all this ME TIME.  it's nice to be able to plan trips and not have to worry if another person approves or not.  it's nice to be able to spend money on whatever the fuck i feel like spending money on without having to worry about what judgement may befall me as a result.  it's nice not to have to cook dinner every night.  it's nice to cook whatever i want for dinner and not have any discussion about it whatsoever.  it's nice to simply be myself.  it really is.  i like who i am.  i like not having to amend my self or argue for my own interests and desires.  i like not being confronted with the "necessity" of concession and compromise.  and i'm hopeful that there are other types of relationships possible in this life aside from what i just described.  i'm hopeful that in the future i'll stumble in to a situation that feels good, feels respectful of who i truly am, and encourages me to be my best. in the meantime, i'm doing a pretty good job of encouraging myself. 

it feels great to return to a deep degree of dedication when it comes to language acquisition and study.  i have two german classes this semester and am currently saving money for a trip to germany in summer.  i come home to my books and my art after work rather than heading off to a bar.  don't get me wrong, i love bars, it's just time to be a bit more measured when it comes to how much time (and money) i spend in them.  i've got dreams to chase and tons of lessons to learn.  this little waiter needs a clear head, an open heart, and money for plane tickets.  and it's amazing to see myself come back around to ideas and interests i had this time last year but that i necessarily had to put on hold while i tended to the very real concern of my own survival and building a life for myself.  it's fantastic to read how excited i was to attend the Francesca Woodman retrospective at SFMOMA last year and relive the profound affinity i felt toward her work.  it's wonderful to read about my budding enthusiasm for photography and streetart and then to realize that now, a year later, i'm participating in both art-forms in a serious manner.  so many things seem to be coming back around to degree zero and i feel refreshed and recharged by that lucky occurrence. 

all this to say, it's nice to be back.  life sure gets good every now and then and there's a hell of a lot to look forward to. 

;)

keep a diary

i started reading my January diary from last year.  it is such an odd experience.  i've been meaning to go back for awhile and read what life used to be like but i somehow couldn't stomach actually doing it until now.  there are no real horrors there (none that i remember anyway), simply a need to stay put in the present.  but ever since the calender changed and a new year sat down coolly on the edge of the bed i've felt a need to return to those ink-flooded pages and get an idea of how much life has truly changed during the last 12 months.  and can i just say: holy shit!

looking at words that are most definitely written in my script but espousing beliefs and attractions i no longer hold is straight up fucking weird.  and it isn't that i've changed so drastically so much as i've flowered.  i've become more myself; a deeper, more honest version of myself.  still, i have a great deal in common with the girl i was a year ago. it is painful to read about the dreams i held then and the massive effort it took to keep them alive inside such a degrading, sterile environment.  it's hard to read about the collapse of a friend's marriage but then be reminded of how that event awoke the strength in me to leave a situation that wasn't right for me.  the people i've met since that time all stare at me wide-eyed when i say i've only been single for a year.  "you've come such a long way!" my roommate tells me and i can't help but think i have so much further to go.  for however far i've come, there is a great distance in front of me.  as i leaf through last year's diary, i am struck by the fact that my primary goals at that time were applying to residencies and undertaking ever bolder art practices.  i was thinking of performance, as spurred on by the creation of the Sweaters of Death, and ways to enact my artistic interests on the street.  i was enamoured of Francesca Woodman and David Wojnarowicz.  i began writing on abandoned couches.  i wrote on stickers and put them on the street.  i'd go home and be lectured about my behavior: a clear sign i was in the wrong place. 

it's funny to think that i've looped back around to certain interests and concerns after a year of living and exploring.  writing on the street, installing pieces outside where they might be enjoyed or sabotaged or taken by other people; how fashion operates on the sidewalk, how words inhabit (and create) a/the world.  but more importantly, exploration itself and discovery itself, adventure and bravery were the big goals of mine then.  i wanted passion in my life.  i wanted to be enveloped by it, ensnared in it, covered in its sweat and saliva.  i am glad that i have allowed myself more than one so-called indiscretion during this time.  i am glad to have spent so many nights dancing and drinking.  i am glad to have met new people and followed them down the street.  i have made some very good friends this year whom i absolutely adore.  i am thankful to have actually, finally lived this passed year.  i have no apologies to make and i'm not embarrassed of anything i've done.  if anything, i feel adorned by the experiences i've had.  i feel more alive and more beautiful now than i did without them.  i feel wiser now and that is a spectacular thing for someone who has often been accused of being naive to feel. 

in some ways, i'm doing it all for the photograph that results.  in some ways, i'm doing it all for the poetry that comes flooding out in to my diary.  in most ways, i'm doing it because i can't help it.  but just like last year, i have no clue what is in store for me next, only that i feel such a deep hunger to find the place i truly belong and to do the bold work i long to do.

i am also afraid but i have to keep moving

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"Each time our hope for a better world is based on a system, this system collapses, due to the corruptibility and imperfection of human beings.  I believe we have to go back and work at the growth of human beings, so they will not need systems, but will know how to rule themselves.  Now you have suffered the shock of disillusion in an ideology which has betrayed its ideals.  It is a good time to return to the creation of yourself, not as a blind number in a group, but as an individual.  Poetry is merely the language of our night-self, in which are imbedded the seeds of all we do and are in the day.  We can only control it by knowing it.  Better to make this journey back to what you had first intended, rather than to die of disillusionment."

The Diary of Anais Nin
Volume 4, page 10 




i live wildly these days.  maybe i'm trying to make it back to a life and self i had once intended.  i return to reading.  everyday, i long for the companionship of my books.  i miss the books that are stowed away in my storage unit.  i want so badly to go rescue them from that cold cell.  it's hard to believe i've gone so long without them. how long has it been now?  10 months?  so much has happened.  so much has changed.  i wind my way back to an earlier idea of myself.  i return to the pages that evoked my rebirth.  Anais Nin's diary.  the healing waters of her words and rhythm.  i scribbled this passage from her diary in to my own.  i read it on the train a few days ago and i've been thinking of it ever since.

i have no answers.  fear is normal but should never be allowed to become King.  change is a scary motherfucker.  especially when the individual is in charge of making change within their own life.  i've been listening to the song posted below for days.  and while my shoulders bounce as i dance alone in my white room, i consider my actions and the wages of all my "sins".  my biggest mistake thus far has been allowing my fears to dictate my actions.  or, rather, my inaction, if i want to be more accurate.  i have stood still when i longed for motion and have remained silent when i longed to speak.  these instances haunt me and torture me and yet, after years of this mode of being, i became so accumstomed to minding the egg shells that, now, when i do otherwise, i am immediately met with stabs of guilt.  i sit and stare at the words i write and wonder if i'm being bad.  i look at the romances i've enjoyed and wonder if i'm immoral.  i look at my late nights of dancing and worry i might be a glutton.  it is the old training kicking in, the instilled fear and implanted guilt of the particular system i was brought up in.  i was taught to fear myself, my own desires and dreams.  i was taught to second-guess my own insticts and to veiw my interests as selfish and wrong.  and i'm not just talking about family or religion but the larger cultural climate in which the spheres of family and religion exist.  the sexism.  the deep hatred of women.  the assumption that desire is evil and must be regulated, must be doled out, defined, prescribed.

i don't know what i'm doing half the time but i know i'm tired of feeling bad for being interested in normal things.  i'm tired of being haunted by the tenents of a religion i am not a member of.  i'm tired of all the alarms going off in my ear; alarms i don't agree with and wish i could silence forever.  as the new year approaches i begin to think again of all the dreams i've held close for so many years.  i begin to think of my "night-self" and who that could be.  especially now after having chosen my freedom, after having chosen to write and to go on writing. 

.....

and then i started drinking with my budddy, ate some mexican food, started thinking about theory and sushi.  we said, "i could do a roll...  " and mean while hip-hop does its thing in the background.  we've been talking all night about art, what it means, what it does, how to make it;  and last night at dinner with my beautiful friend Freya, we talked about life and priorities, how life and priorities change based upon era, the era of one's life.  one feels a certain way in their twenties.  one feels a certain way in their thirties.  one feels a certain way in their forties.  so on and so forth.  and here i am, early 30s, horny as hell, apparently normal (relative in all the worst ways), caring only about music and booze and art.  satisfy me.  and if you can't, at least pay attention to me.  let me pant in your ear.  let my image hang on your wall. let my script dance below your eyelids.  i'll take your beard burn if you attempt to take me seriously.

but is that monolithic?  do i need your faith?  do i need your faithfulness?  are we circling back around to the thing i'm complaining about, the thing that harms me, the thing that hurts you?  we are all subjects.  do you feel compromised?  i do.  how do i reconcile this shit and how do we, as a UNION or COMMUNITY proceed.  seth asks , "but how do we have a non-system?"  how do we inter-relate?  if not based on the systems that have already infected us/informed us...  informed our fear?  my fear?  am i afraid of you?  damn right.  you're a fucking monster born to hurt me.  i'm only just now realizing that i am as well.  i am a monster in my own right, especially if you look at me through a Christian/Muslim/Jewish lens.  please look at me through an artistic lens because i am, in fact, an artist and i govern myself with an artistic criteria.  a criteria i hope you will someday examine yourself with and view yourself through.

and now at 3am, i feel useless, semi-embarrassed but somehow still entirely alive.  could this be a condition of my survival.  my friend eddie said "there's a time to make art and there's a time to live.  you gotta have something to make art about."  i look at the text i've hung on my walls: don't cry.  and all i can think is: cry harder.  could that be the way back to what i once "intended"?

exposure

i spent this grey day at home in my pajamas studying german vocabulary and listening to german music.  i am a bit under the weather today.  my throat is sore and so are my eyes.  the perils of airline travel.  trapped in that recirculated air for 6 hours isn't exactly the best shit to breath.  but it's worth it to have seen the atlantic again.  it's worth it to have seen that distant sky.  my flight in was diverted to Buffalo due to dense fog at JFK.  a gorgeous sunrise met us there.  me and so many strangers walked to the large window with our cups of airport coffee and stood there gazing together at that luscious, unexpected orange. 

and then to come home to 70 degree weather and bright skies.
and then to come home to such ease and warmth.
and then to come home.
in spite of this little chest cold, i feel lucky and light.  i've been to New York twice in 2 1/2 months.

i spent the first 2 hours of my day scribbling leisurely in my notebook, recounting kisses and attempting to identify my newest desires and latest dreams.  life has changed so much this year.  life has changed so much in the last 2 months.  and something has clicked in to place as a result of returning to the scene of certain crimes.  something has healed.  i no longer feel quite so dire as i did before.  i no longer feel like time is quickly running out.  i no longer feel that i need to be wild in order to feel that i have lived.  i enjoy wildness, it's true, but the past few days i've enjoyed a deep, warm sense of calm.  a stillness.  a readiness for something a bit more serious.

after ending a long term relationship at the beginning of this year, i think i needed to take advantage of a very high level of freedom.  i needed to stay out late and dance and drink and have fun.  i needed to be stupid and i needed to be dangerous.  i needed to stop caring about the clock for awhile; expectations and responsibilities and all the things i had allowed to take root in me that choked my ability to blossom and change.  i needed to cut away so many things.  i needed to turn my back on so many things i was taught.  those horrible falsities and all the beautiful lies we are sometimes so eager to believe.  for years i listened to my instincts screaming at me to leave but i was just so fucking afraid of so many things to know how to do it.  i had come to believe that being myself was a selfish thing.  i had been made to believe that every desire of mine was self-serving and, therefore, shameful.  i am finally taking a clean, deep breath.  all these months and years later am i finally able to look at what i tolerated and ask myself why?

when you've been taught from childhood to believe that everything you are is bad and wrong, you become unable to trust your own instincts.  you become unable to act in your own best interest.  you put other people's happiness well before your own because "that's what a good person does".  you tuck your tail and you smile.  you save your tears for the shower.  you become a master of silent crying.  you become a master of self-denial and self-deception.  you stay put because you've been taught so thoroughly to believe that you are somehow deficient.

deficient.
inadequate.
silly.
dirty.
dumb.
ridiculous.
selfish.
childish.
ugly.

and it is only when you are doing what you're told that maybe a bit of affection is thrown your way.  a crumb.  a scrap.  a pat on the head.

as my mother crept ever closer to her death, i began to see so glaringly that i had been chasing scraps of approval my entire life.  so had she.  she was strong in so many beautiful ways but also suffered from such tremendous guilt.  she too believed that everything about her was bad and wrong:  the legacy that is handed down.

shortly after she died i was able to say fuck it.  if i'm bad, i'm bad. so be it.  if i'm selfish, so be it.  shit can't get any goddamn worse.  i feel like dying too.  if this is what being Good gets me, let me test drive Bad.  my life depends on it.

i used to cry almost every day.  in the last 9 months maybe i've cried 9 times.  and i'm being generous in my estimate.  deciding to stop caring about whether or not other people will label me as selfish is the best decision i could have ever made.  my worst fear is hurting other people and that has led quickly to my own undoing, my own site of deep, atrocious pain.  i am so afraid of being a disappointment that i silence myself, i tie myself in knots, i wake up in a panic in the middle of the night afraid that i am the worst person alive and wondering how i can gain forgiveness for the fact of my horrible birth.  i have let other people do horrible things to me.  friends, family members, lovers.  i have tolerated extreme neglect.  i have tolerated viciousness and cruelty.  i have allowed myself to be convinced that i deserved these things.  this is the self-hatred that was instilled in me at the very beginning of my life.

a friend of mine recently passed on a saying to me: we recieve the love we think we deserve.

i've been turning it over and over inside my head.  i've aimed it right at my heart like a gun and i've rolled around in it like a child in tall grass.   i obviously thought i deserved very little;  that love was something i could only aspire to give but not necessarily receive.  during the last few months of my life, i've loved myself in a way i lacked for a very long time.  i decided to attend to my own needs and not leave it up to chance or benevolence.  i've had more fun that i can describe and i've written some of the best prose of my life as a result.  i've met so many interesting people and have had my faith in humanity restored by such seemingly simple things as dancing with strangers in dark clubs and watching the sunrise in a different time-zone.

i walked down market street in san francisco last night to meet a friend for drinks and as i crossed the street, i thought i stand entirely on my own...  god, this feels fantastic. 

signify

the little icon i use as my "picture" here - the severed rope of braided hair - is my hair hung on a lonesome nail. i chopped it off three and a half years ago.

i caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror the other day. my old self. the self i know. the self i remember and feel lonely for. slender from The Almighty Jog, not skinny. and my hair, already grown long and wild with curls again. a fast growth. a fast return. perhaps my hair missed me too. :)

and what a happy glimpse it was. a moment of safety. security. something true. i am returning to myself- ideas i had been discouraged away from, fallen beliefs, poems. they sweep in like dust, like glitter, like hair across the eyes. it is a welcome warmth. a deep quilt full of ink stains and promise.

i know the face in the mirror again. i know the direction of the eyes. i know the lines at the edge of the smile.

i've been crocheting again. making new banners. messages. preparing for winter when i can use my body as a billboard. i will don the signs and signifiers. a quiet(er) performance. a true performance. drape my form in the ideas and modes i cling to. use the structure of skeleton and muscle as if it were a gallery wall. it seems honest. it seems necessary.

and as i twist the yarn through my fingers, over the hook, i return to my previous wide-open definition of ART. i return to the deep knowledge that a painting is no more important than a quilt or poem or necklace. it is all ART. the differences between are just a preference of form. a way to capture the signifiers, harness them, bend them to desire and need.

it is a cold day here. a day for doing the laundry and then returning to bed with my coffee and crochet hook. a day for a quiet(er) happiness.

this road

i ran out of my delicious hazelnut and walked down to the market to buy more. on the way, i saw a hand painted sign in the window of a boarded up (papered up? sheets of white butcher paper on the inside of the windows) storefront that read closed for renovations in quite a lovely, humble, careful script. the letters were a dusty red on a flat white background. it looked like whoever painted it really took their time- no drips, no sloppy edges with the brush. and it reminded me of margaret kilgallen's work- her fascination with the signs people make for their small business, hand-made cultures, the beauty that follows actions of necessity. and i stopped to look at the sign again on my way back home. it's very simple but something in it spoke very loudly to me about my own life and struggle and pursuits at the moment.

closed for renovation.

i guess that's how i feel right now.

especially about oil painting. as a mode, it just seems so final, so serious, so declarative. and i'm not trying to make any declarations whatsoever in my work right now. i'm searching, hunting, excavating, mapping. and these modes are curious, exploratory. definitely not FINAL. not ABSOLUTE. and oil painting feels like that to me right now. maybe it's the history of oil painting flooding over? maybe it's the grand authority of oil? a confrontation with expectation? maybe maybe maybe...

but pencil, paper... their common attributes. humble, easy to access, the materials of map making. these things call me. they encourage me. i reach for these materials and it feels right. it feels authentic and honest. the right tool for the job.

i'm at a new beginning in life in a whole lot of ways.

i am on my own right now in a whole lot of ways.

simultaneously scary and exciting.

but freedom isn't an easy thing and it doesn't quickly line up with "happiness". there is struggle in those fiesty veins. and more and more i think that the work we make decides for us what type of artists we are, what type of life, what type of "career", what type of happiness we come to. my only choice in the matter is to hold on to the things i value and to stand with my ethics when the world breathes its confusion in my face. the only choice i have is to not crumble, to keep digging, to keep running, one day at a time, 15 minutes at a time, further and further down the harrowing highway.

i worry too much about things that are totally out of my control. a common human frailty, for sure. and i'm really trying to release myself from that shit right now. i'm trying very hard to trust The Work, trust The Process, trust The Materials, trust The Impulse. i've been carrying around one of my many Kiki Smith books again for days and days. again and again, i turn to her because she trusts her own work. she doesn't second guess the impulse. she just goes. and i have paired that book with Sylvia Plath's Ariel. they are laying together right now on the floor next to me. two bibles. two hymnals. two treasures. two books of hope and persistence. gems.

i see the mortality that surrounds us. how short, how small a day is.

i want my outsides to mirror my insides. i do not want to "live one way and pray another". i want my expressions to be as honest as possible. i want to whittle away at whatever hypocrisy exists in me.

and so i excavate. i writhe. i push the dirt aside.

i am trying to ignore fear.

i trust the pencil's scratch so completely. i trust it like i trust poetry. i trust it like a mother. i climb in to bed with my papers and all my blankets smell like graphite dust. they smell beautiful. my intimate "renovations".

maybe i'll make my own hand-painted sign? hang it on the wall in the living room. or maybe in the big window.

here i am

hello! good morning! i missed you! :)

i missed the click of the keys below my fingers and this time in the morning to ramble on and on. but it was wonderful to have a friend here. especially daniela. we've been friends since we were 14. we met walking home from school one day and have been close ever since. she brought pictures taken when we were ditching school one day, trying on the clothes in the Scottish Shop. hahaha! kilts and jackets and hats! hilarious! and, though we look the same to each other, we look like total babies in the photographs. and the entire time she was here we laughed hard! just picked right back up from where we left off like not a day had passed since the last time we saw each other. we also had a lot of heart-to-hearts too. though our circumstances are different, we are in the same place of transition- realizing our own adulthood, considering ethics and values and trying to choose a path through life rather than having the path choose us. that stage. that scary, daunting stage full of uncertainty and anxiety. the fear. and so fate brings us together just at the right time when we can talk and explore and wrestle together for a week- laugh at ourselves and help each other along. having my longest friend here in my home all to myself was so encouraging and just plain joyful.

and now- coffee and the early fog and scribbling in my notebook. the meandering of my morning routine. the chill and the quiet. i wrote for a solid 2 hours this morning. my path becoming clearer and clearer. integrity as necessity. ethics as a MUST. courage. courage. courage. and, as elisabeth relayed, "the continual TRY".

all of a sudden, so many people bought work down at the gallery. THANK YOU! i can't even tell you what security you have provided! what encouragement and faith! and right in time! just what i needed, just what i was craving! the grand NUDGE to keep moving forward. ((((HUGE HUG)))) you lend me such bravery.

as my pencil scratches, i become more and more self-assured, more rooted in the relevance of the work, the necessity of my practice. i begin to feel like Kusama- that my work is "art medicine". i need it. i cherish it. i believe in it. i will follow it wherever it leads.

and last week, we just played. i started crocheting a new banner and painted some more little alices that need to be adorned with glitter and stamped out some hearts to be cut out and hung on the wall. :) fun and healing and playful. that stuff is so necessary within my practice- doing something light-hearted gives me strength to continue exploring Loss and what it means, how it effects us, and what benefits it can provide... that ruined landscape is also the site where hope springs... and how to locate that hope, that flowering, that incentive to continue. the grand NUDGE again and again. HOPE as a call to brave, compassionate action.

i'm happy to be back inside the Blackland. happy to ramble on and wrestle. i didn't get on the computer at all really while daniela was here. there's a lot to read and write back about, a lot to catch up on, a lot of research to continue, a lot to learn. but it was wonderful to have a little vacation here at home. i am recharged and resolved and reassured, and i'm very happy to see you! good morning! :)

:)

i have given myself the pleasure of a long easy morning today. i am brewing a half-pot of coffee and cutting out moth shapes from a large beautiful sheet of shiny pewter colored paper. i am very much a crow: attracted to shiny things. :) i am planning on making a huge wreath out of them to hang in the front window. i'll let you know if it works out of not. at any rate, it's fun and joyful and simple. freeing. and the little moths... i think of them as prayers. as hymns. and so i dedicate myself to them like a child: convinced my voice is heard, that my small utterances float off to wherever small utterances float off to- a landscape where such thing plant themselves and grow in to something wild and beautiful.

and also, i am now a free agent.

it feels good to be in a moment where i can just be alone with the work. no plans for it other than to simply do my best and be as honest as possible. the work that's at the gallery now will be there for another week and a half or so before i'm able to pick it up. if there's something you want, please go grab it. i'm going to take a little break from businessy things and not put any pressure on myself to make the work do or be something it is not. financially, i'm taking a pretty big risk right now but it's the right decision to make... the honest decision to make. money shouldn't be allowed to be too big a factor when it comes to doing the right thing. and besides, i'm pretty accustomed to the starving artist lifestyle anyway. :) everything will work out. i have total faith in that. and the gallery believes in me too so i'm feeling very encouraged and hopeful today.

again, the e.e. cummings quote comes in to my head: it takes courage to grow up and be who you really are. the time for courage has most definitely come and i am at an entirely new beginning now. it is scary and exciting at the same time... but i feel very lucky to have this moment. i will enjoy my easy morning and let it morph in to an easy afternoon. there are books i want to curl up with and more moths to cut out.

life is strange and good and crazy, my friends. thank you for returning to this space and listening to me ramble, watching the struggle, and encouraging me to follow my heart. you are absolutely stunning and i appreciate you so much. <3

plug away

i very rarely gaze at the ceiling anymore. this is a major proof that i am no longer 15. i looked at the ceiling a lot when i was 15. but when i was 15, i really had no other place to be or go, so laying in bed, laying in my sadness and anger was the thing to do. music loud and tears and yells (if i was home alone). or laying silently. focused on the small horrors, looking for a way out, making pictures from the ceiling stucco.

yesterday i noticed there were cobwebs up there so i grabbed the broom. and then i cleaned my bedroom. top to bottom. and beautified it.

i would love to become one of those productive people who undertake a massive cleaning rampage when they are feeling upset. i would love that. and i'm thinking that response to Upset has more to do with nurture than nature... but maybe not.

i was a horribly sloppy child and there wasn't much my mom could do to get me to clean my room other than "You're GROUNDED to your bedroom until it's clean!" ha! and of course, i didn't want to be locked inside my room at that age, i wanted to be outside playing, so i'd start cleaning my room and get distracted by a toy and it would take all damn day to get that room clean. i became a bed-shover-under. and i think that is an inborn reaction. no other little child planted that idea of cleaning in my head and i definitely never saw my mother shove the mess under the bed, so imagine my surprise when she poked her head under there and said "what's all this?" i was like how'd she know to look there????? hahahaha!

i didn't shove anything under the bed yesterday. i put everything away and then i re-arranged, hung different paintings on the walls, even washed the walls with windex. i had to lose myself in something and cleaning seemed a much better thing to lose myself to than laying in bed staring at the ceiling. and afterward, i felt so much better. the room is gorgeous again. plus, a friend of mine from back home is coming up on sunday. she'll be here for a week. we've been friends since we were 14, met walking home from junior high. she is my longest friend. we've never even had a fight.

and so of course i want my little home to be as perfect as possible for her. not that she even cares about that sort of thing and, generally, neither do i... but my little cottage is so packed with paintings and big drawings and projects at this point that i must find a way to establish some kind of order. even if it's only a semblance of order.

today i will dust and straighten the bookcase. this is a major undertaking. MAJOR. my bookcase is actually two HUGE bookcases, side by side, taking up an entire wall. and, in some places, the books are two rows deep. sigh. i'll pretend i am 15. or partially 15, and blast some angry music. while the day away in loud guitars and yelling and cleaning. :)



for the 15 year old girl within you:

hello beautiful!

i love the way mornings look and feel out here this time of year. it'll be hot hot hot in a couple hours but, right now, it is cool and bright and beautiful. the heat of summer is arriving and so my day gets rearranged a little bit. The Almighty Jog must be obeyed much earlier if i want to bring inga with me. jogging in a thick black coat isn't fun for her, i'm sure. so we're out the door and off to the vineyard by 8am at the latest these days. it's actually really wonderful to get it done so early. the vineyard is completely empty, totally silent except the for the birds waking up, and i am cured of worry right at the beginning of the day. that alone is a good reason to go run as early as i can.

worry is my biggest saboteur. it stalls me almost entirely when i give in to it and that's LAME. worry doesn't fix anything, it does not provide solutions or resolve or happiness or motivation. in fact, it saps me of those things and obscures my ability to see my own life and goals with clarity and intelligence. worry is a horrible bastard. one i've lived with my entire life.

at the beginning of the year, i decided to try to shake myself lose of its grip and The Almighty Jog (which has now accelerated in to a fun blown run) has been the best antidote i could've hoped for. not only does my body feel good, the work feels good, and the ideas i'm working with get clearer and clear, more and more focused, whittled down to something more cohesive and less chaotic. this is a very good thing since my major resolution for this year is to get an entire body of work together for a solo show. cohesion is extra important.

so today, after a bit more coffee and our morning run, i'll lug a canvas outside and use this beautiful light to my advantage. nothing beats natural light for oil painting. nothing. i can see every color and shade and nuance as it truly is. warm and cool, light and dark, nebulous greys and milky vs. transparent white. the gorgeousness of oil becomes so readily apparent, so beautifully obvious that i can work for hours and not run out of steam. it's wonderful. and if i just focus on that, allow myself to be absorbed in the pleasure and search of the work, all my worries abate- fall away in to tiny piles of nothing. and that's when i can feel myself moving forward. :)



"Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow; it only saps today of its strength."
- A.J. Cronin


the point is to be present, open, and engaged. a hard thing for a lot of artists (and doesn't that seem weird?) but worth the effort. i'm at my best when i stop feeling pressure over The Future and all the things that are entirely out of my control. it's a hamster wheel of bullshit.

good morning!

art (life)

the weather has been odd for months. and so too, maybe, the weather in me.

i see it in other people too. the link between emotion and environment.

i said "it seems like such an odd time in life, lately." to my neighbor and he said "i'm glad i'm not the only one who's noticed that. it is very odd."

the fog is thick and low. on our jog we were covered in mist. everything green and grey and white.

we're all just trying to make sense of the world.

and meaning within our own lives.

what helps and what doesn't seems to be largely contingent on where a person happens to be standing at any given point in time. preference... maybe even necessity... ruled by vantage point. this accounts for all the different art in the world. all the different modes and forms too. it cancels out notions of Good and Bad, replacing those terms with words that are more compassionate: useful, not useful. beneficial, not beneficial. purposeful, not purposeful. and that definition of "purposeful" is malleable. changing and fluid. and maybe it relates to joy and sadness... the pleasure principle... the death of certain expectations. expectations, especially, titled as 'hope' and 'belief'. their death is a hard and painful and frightening thing. but so is forcing something to live that is only suffering.

let it go.

let a new hope show itself. the children's maps no longer work.

there is a fragile green shooting up through the toppled steeple and broken houses. there is a warmth running below the fear- an underground stream.

everything is an act of mining, maybe. everything is excavation.

and if memory originates in the brain, why this pressure in my chest? let's unearth the thing and see. let's brush the dust off. and if we must, let's pin it down by the wings and take a closer look at the mechanism of the thing.

i want to use the tools equally. analysis and emotion, married.

the brain is a body part just like the heart.

hard look

all these things lately- The Catcher in the Rye, The Land of Green Plums, The Triggering Town, A Clockwork Orange, the letter of intent, my practice itself, writing, writing, writing, the list of deadlines for art opportunities sitting to my right, memories, overcoming past hurts, relationships with family members, the big snarling dog painting on my wall...

all these things begin to point, as glaring as a neon sign, toward one thing: figuring out who i am and how i want to live.

i'm sure i must sound like a broken record on this blog sometimes but self-knowledge is a big issue for me at this point in my life. i need to free myself from a wealth of very large and strange expectations of myself that, when i really sit down and look at them, i have no clue where they came from and yet i nevertheless allow them to exact a very hurtful influence on my opinion of myself, my work, my life, my everything.

for the past several weeks, the last sentence i write in my journal each morning before i get rolling on my day is Believe in yourself. every morning for weeks and weeks and weeks, i have written this sentence. it's finally beginning to make sense in a particular way that lets me know i've misunderstood what believing in one's self really is. today, i realized that the big reason i struggle with believing in myself is because i get focused on whether or not other people believe in me too. when i've allowed this to happen i trade my instincts for their preferences and this has only ever been detrimental to my life in a very sweeping, all-encompassing way. and the nuttiest part about it is that it's basically seeking approval from people who traditionally aren't really even capable of giving it to me anyway. never have been. it's a fucked-up brass ring. an accomplishment spurred by masochism. it's stupid. and in addition to being stupid, it's super destructive.

as i read all these books and write all these winding blog posts and come to the end of another page in my slang-filled journal, i come in to confrontation with myself... how fear of being displeasing has sabotaged a great many things in my life and within myself. in short, i've been holding back... and holding back some very good things.

the latest collection of paintings and drawings have given me a taste of what it is to be fearless again and to practice integrity. it has given me a warmth and hope that i had been living without for a long time it seems like... and that it doesn't really matter if other people approve of what i'm doing and who i am, if i'm happy with what i've done. why this has been such a hard understanding to maintain, i don't know. but it's high time to pretty much say fuck it to other people's definitions of success and their expectations for me. i need to begin the self-assured mantra of i don't care.

i think artists wrestle with this issue a lot. not just professionally, but privately as well. feeling misunderstood and unsupported was the state of affairs for most artists i went to school with. i can't tell you how many people i know whose families scoff at their pursuits, find art and poetry to be laughable, think that it's merely some display of ego. sad. and very hard to overcome. it hurts.

The Storialist left this link in the comments stream of one of the posts below and i keep going back to it. it deals with being present and not worrying about whether or not anyone likes you. it helps me and it got me on track with really thinking about the role i play in feeling minimized in certain relationships, professional or otherwise. it comes down to something as big and bad and basic as the ills of approval-seeking behavior. no good, friends. no good. and it takes a lot of acceptance and guts to get beyond that shit, for sure.

hello monday!

it was my sweetie's birthday weekend and it was actually really wonderful to unplug from digital life for two days and just be present in the day with him, in celebration, and our dreams and hopes and happy outlook on the future. it was the big THREE OH. 30 years old. and i'm right behind him. i am not at all nervous or weirded out by it. only that it feels so young. i thought i'd have a lot more answers than this by the time i hit 30. ha! who knew! adults don't have all the answers! hahahaha! but we had a lot of fun and a lot of delicious eats and a lot of laughter too. a lot of snuggles and hugs and deep, wonderful, playful conversation. and also a lot of relaxed down-time. he's earned it. he works hard and never complains and is always so gentle with other people. i've not ever really seen stress get the better of him. he's very solid that way. i really appreciate that. the stability of personality and emotion. there is no chaos that exists in him. no chaos he creates. and i love that. tragedy needs no helping hand in life, that's for sure. it will find each and every one of us. it needs no assistance. i admire his ability to remain positive and calm in the face of even the hardest circumstances. he has found balance and i admire that. a warm balance. i'm very proud of the man he is. i hope he is too. :)

and so it is a rainy monday. a built-in excuse to hole up with my oils and scoot around light and shadow. :) i think i'll watch A Clockwork Orange again today too so i can keep rolling with my essay on its importance. it is eerily timely. totally contemporary. brilliant. and i'm so glad i waited this long to watch the film. i think if i had watched it when i was 14, the message of this work would've been totally lost on me. i would not have caught its significance.

i'm even going back and re-reading books i read as a teenager, knowing that my first go-round with the work was almost completely surface. i'm almost finished with Catcher in the Rye- stunned by how simultaneously funny and sad it is. the heart-break inherent to growing up. the struggle of knowing one's self. of feeling separate from the world and its ways. the crazy-making. the confusion. the desperation. the need for love and to feel understood by another human being. the search that we all participate in and undertake...

art and literature are such good friends. :) what windows they are. such hard beauties. my days glow because of them and i feel so so so lucky.

yes.

Each indecision brings its own delays and days are lost lamenting over lost days... What you can do or think you can do, begin it. For boldness has Magic, Power, and Genius in it.

-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

:)

oh, i am worn out. i'm very glad tomorrow is saturday and i can sleep in a bit.

after finishing the beast yesterday, i started priming another canvas of the same size. i've noticed that doing the grunt work, the prep work, keeps me hungry for the "real" work. the nuts and bolts of a practice are very important- the little things that keep you rolling forward. my shoulder muscle is sore and it feels good.

i haven't enjoyed such a big explosion of creativity in a long time it seems. but i guess (maybe) (possibly) i haven't been myself in a long time either... and these things are linked. chained. padlocked together.

for awhile there, i think i mistook the dreams other people held for me for the dreams i have for myself. i think i got really hung up on what other people expected or wanted and lost sight of what i want to do with my life and time. and i think that happened because for awhile there, the two sets of dreams lined up. they matched. and so i didn't notice right away that my dreams were trying to change. or maybe i did and i got sad about it, resisted it. the death of a dream can be a painful thing.

but it isn't a bad thing. hard, but not bad. and it's actually quite freeing to get to a place in life where trusting my instincts is the right thing to do. to have the ability to trust them is wonderful. a whole new way of seeing comes in to play and i begin to trust myself and trust the work in a deeper way. fearlessness breeds fearlessness. confidence breeds confidence. i feel better and better. i'm being myself. i'm opening up. i'm experiencing a tremendous wealth of new ideas, new interests. and this gives rise to new dreams. amended dreams. some dreams just needed a bit of a tweak and that's happening now.

and reading has been such a large part of that. reading widely, not just sticking to what i know. i actively search for new material, new ideas, contemporary authors and poets and bloggers. and writing every morning in my notebook. first thing. first cup of coffee and the pen in my hand. that practice has been going on for about 2 years now and it has made all the difference.

so today, i'll be mindful of these things. read and write and go jogging with my dog. the sun is up and the sky is dry. i'll do the grunt work and get a healthy sweat going and i will trust that all these things matter because they DO make my life so much better. and i won't worry about a damn thing.

happy friday. ;)

i am growing up.

this morning everything is blue and grey and sometimes green. a new storm is either rolling in or rolling out. it is too early to tell. and yesterday it rained almost all day long. not that it mattered much, me locked up in my oils. i broke away from the canvas during a break in the weather so inga and i could obey The Almighty Jog and half way through it started raining again. not just a sprinkling, a hard rain, and we got pretty soaked. but there was delight even in that. and inga goes all frenzied and undone when her face gets wet, running and bouncing and jumping in all directions at once, a spilling frothing joy.

i hope today is along the same lines.

there is coffee in the pot and hazelnut cream and the scent of oil and rain clung up on all the windows. inga is sleeping next to me. the heater is on. it is a cold morning.

lately i've been feeling a strong need for detachment, for quiet, for distance. and it is not of the tranquil variety. not totally angry either. it is an odd ambivalence that seems to crave a great and impenetrable distance and lots of time spent in thought or allowing distraction to sweep my mind back up in to a pile that can function without becoming clogged with resentment. i am working my way back to the things that i believe in, the things that i think are relevant and important and necessary. i am mapping and collecting and investigating my attractions, my past, my loves, my hates... the card i've been dealt and the avenues i've wandered down and i've returned to a more fiery way of thinking... a rebelliousness of philosophy that does not allow me to let the circumstances of my life or birth dictate my present tense or my goals or accomplishments or dreams. i will not be the person sitting at the kitchen table, bitter beyond belief by way of absolute resignation, offering nothing but the excuse of suffering, nothing but the "it's not my fault" refrain, nothing but the callous insensitivity that seethes out of The Know-It-Alls of the world. i will not be that.

and of course i have compassion for those tortured, bitter souls. but i accept that i have no control over the beliefs and behaviors of others. i accept that i am incapable of becoming a savior. i have tried repeatedly to save people, to give them what they cry out for, what they need need need... and i have failed. failed each and every time and then woke up to see my life in shambles, the things i've undone, unknowingly, all along the way, all in the name of Help and Love and Service. i never stopped to make the judgement of whether or not the person on the other end of this was capable of respecting the sacrifice, of receiving love and help.

and so i am in a private war to not allow myself to become a cynic. it is not the only option. i could instead become a better judge of character. i could instead become more accepting of myself- my own limitations and responsibilities and proclivities and interests. i could instead take a good look in the mirror and ask that face "why are you such a push over?"

i've been asking myself that question for years, actually, but lately i've come across a couple answers. i see what my role in certain situations have been... and i know that i am not blameless. naive maybe, but not blameless.

and this naivety of mine is sly. i don't notice it the majority of the time and it has compromised things that i have worked HARD for. i can't allow it to continue. not now that i see it. and so, for the last several months, i've become more and more my true self, less and less obliged to work toward becoming "acceptable" to others, and the backlash is not fun but it is a necessary part of this particular journey. self-acceptance and self-investigation, evaluation, the private wrestling of belief systems, childhood craziness, desire, the root of desire, wrestling with the deep demons, the shape-shifters, the shadows that turn to monsters... it is hard work but it must be done. and i've been caught in this investigation for the better part of a year now and things are falling in to place, becoming clear, becoming obvious, thrown out in to a harsh, bright, unforgiving light. i see my flaws and faults so clearly. but i also see that not EVERYTHING is my fault. not everything is my responsibility. not everything is mine to fix or apologize for.

these lessons wear a person out. but not down. i have not been worn down. in fact, i feel gratitude for all this wrestling and writhing and strangeness. i think there comes a point in everyone's life, eventually, where this particular struggle becomes paramount. it extends to every area of a person's life. and it improves all those areas too.

i am on fire lately inside all of my interests. it's amazing. it really is. everyday i get up, pour myself a mug of coffee and go scribbling in my notebook for as long as i need to. this morning practice, this "waking ritual" of mine, writing while my brain is still too sleepy to censor, has led me to such a wonderful place of acceptance and honesty. and at the beginning of the year i made the decision to follow my heart, to trust the work completely, to only paint images that i was truly captivated by, and to surround myself with people who understand that, who know how important it is to go your own way, and this decision has made all the difference. i'm no longer afraid of anything. i can't begin to express what a relief that is. and how freeing.

images and words are searing out of me now and it is such a wonderful, painful, ecstatic, elating thing. i'm myself again. i'm happy with who i am and how i've decided to live. i'm not afraid to accept the consequences or responsibility of it. i like my work. i like my paintings. i like my drawings. i like my way.

human

it dawned on me yesterday while i was talking about art with my neighbor that i am currently in a phase of tremendous growth and change, and that it is both elating and PAINFUL. patience has become very very very important. because without it, i begin to place demands upon myself and my practice and my life that are not only unrealistic, but have nothing to do with what i truly want for myself.

i think, during times of rapid change and growth, it is very normal to feel that one's life is in a state of upheaval... and so gentleness becomes a mandatory thing. when i feel the chaos of change i begin to look outside for the cure. well, outside is loaded with ageism and sexism and, in this country, a general disdain for artistic, abstract, philosophic leanings and dispositions. most people seem to think that being an artist is just a whole bunch of happy fun play-time. it isn't. caring about the world, life, humanity, rights, wrongs, ethics... it's tiring to say the least. and it takes a lot of work not to become cynical.

but for the first time in years, i'm beginning to feel proud of myself again. i'm learning the hard way that perfection is not the goal and that i am allowed to make mistakes too without fearing that non-perfection means BAD BAD BAD. i am not a machine and shouldn't be expected to function like one. it's my responsibility to set that expectation down and possibly throw up a big fat middle finger to people who expect me to be a machine: no feelings, no offense, no opinion, just GO GO GO and don't you dare fuck up.

hmmmmmmmm. no thanks.

one of the reasons i like drawing and painting so much is that it is accepting and inclusive of (by its very nature) the inherent flaw of the human hand, the embrace of imperfection, the potential for accident and haphazard gestures. in that respect, there is an air of acceptance and forgiveness in art. and that's something everybody needs, including me. and so i will extend that kind of compassion to myself. i am not a genius and sometimes i get it wrong, sometimes i struggle, sometimes i fall short of my aspirations. but i also get back up again and keep trying. the images i'm working on currently and the writing i'm doing doesn't need to be "perfect" because the work itself is not about perfection. it is about respect though.. so as long as i approach my subjects respectfully and deal them the honor they deserve, the work succeeds. i choose to believe (or trust) that other people will see that quality shining through... that i really do care about the work and that i am giving it my all... my very best. and i will never water it down.

grrrr

i've been working on drawings of icebergs all morning and will leave soon to go obey The Almighty Jog before it starts raining and before i slide too far in to a state of agitation. The Jog is just as much about mind maintenance as body maintenance... maybe more so. all that pounding of my heart and hard breathing usher in such an enthusiastic (and relieving) clarity. and lately i've found myself feeling quietly annoyed and more than a bit irritated. mostly with things outside of my control, but also because i've been feeling a very strong pull to make a more concrete plan for my life. actual paths toward my goals and aspirations and it's hard to know where to start. it always comes back to the work, to working everyday and seeing where i end up, what i've done, what i'd like to do, etc, etc, etc. it's just that sometimes the daily grind starts feeling like non-movement. my impatience begins to rear its stupid, meddlesome head and i notice i'm a bit punchy, a bit on edge, a bit fragile in the feelings department. The Almighty Jog alleviates a lot of this and gets me back to a healthier state of mind where i realize (and accept) that deep changes take time, and that big accomplishments are really just a series of small accomplishments all piled up. the daily grind is important. or rather, it's important to make sure that grind is healthy and true to who you are, true to who you're trying to become. effing growing pains.

and so it goes...

by late afternoon yesterday, i found myself in a fragile mood. a fragile place. and i grabbed the keys to go lose myself in the throng for a little while. i lost myself looking at clothes at macy's for awhile (didn't buy any but tried a whole bunch of stuff on) and then went and looked at curtains and bedroom stuff at Target. Target traps me and i ended up staying there almost until closing time. i left with a curtain rod and 2 pairs of funky socks. funky socks have always made me happy. especially striped ones. and always knee highs. but on the drive home, i found myself getting tearful and feeling like a scared child. these things creep up unexpectedly sometimes... but they are inevitable. for all of us.

it's just the weight of the past, i suppose.

the weight of the past.

there will always be the big WHY. always the mourning for things that never were or things that left too soon or things that should have never been.

the death of an ideal.

the death of an ideal is a grievous thing. the grief is massive and can span years.

but we (i) can create new dreams to take their places. better dreams, better hopes. most of the time, i think i have an idea of how to set about accomplishing that. some days... not so much. yesterday ended up being that kind of day. but this morning i woke feeling so much better. not scared, not so unsure, not so tangled. i am drinking good coffee and i put up the new curtain rod and curtains. a deep plum. maybe eggplant. a deep, dark, dusty color that is warm and gorgeous.

it's nice to know that things can be deep and dark and be warm and gorgeous as well.