Summer's End

Labor Day weekend, 29 more hours until school starts. August 30th – temperature in the 60s(!!!) and heavy showers at times. It just ain’t right, I tell ya!

On the bright side, I am SOOOOOOOOOOOO happy I decided to go to Art in the Pearl YESTERDAY! After looking at the official website, I made a long list of artists and music and food I wanted to see, hear, and taste, then I hopped the MAX, bebopped down the road listening to my tunes, and enjoyed the show. I wanted to take a gazillion pictures, not sure if I could, then a sign posted in one of the booths made it clear: “Please, no photos of artwork!” So I politely refrained. Instead, I’ll just say that you should visit the websites of Jacqueline Hurlbert, whose big flaming heart I wish I could own; Xavier Nuez, whose photos of gritty urban decay are startlingly gorgeous; Gene Flores, master printmaker extraordinaire; Terry McIlrath, creator of multi-textured and brilliantly colored mixed media; and oh so many more – do check out the Art in the Pearl website!

I did snap a photo of one of the art ed booths – how cool is this? Letting kids go wild painting a REAL LIVE CAR!!! Way cool.

The Museum of Contemporary Crafts was having an awesome exhibit, too – international artists who are using manufactured products/materials in fun and funky ways, or using technology to hearken back to old-time craftsmanship with a futuristic vision. My favorite pieces were by Laura Splan, exquisite lace doilies created with the help of a computer program and whose intricate patterns were based on microscope views of deadly viruses. (Ironic how a virus can be such a beautiful thing! Really, check out her website.)

Back home, I was hoping to be all inspired to jump into artwork, but I was pretty exhausted after my daylong art excursion, so I took some quiet time to peruse my AF Fatbook which arrived a couple of days ago, put together by the fabulous Kristie LaRose. Here is just a small sampling of the wonderful contributions, including the cover by Kristie (Dorm 202 group – since I stayed at the hostel I don’t actually know any of these people…),

a page by Michelle Geller,

Cecilia Cordova,

Carol Ragan (back) and Kathy Welsh (front).

The book is full of gems, and I am happy I participated. I saw Judy Wise at Art in the Pearl and got up the nerve to talk with her – she’s so nice, and she’s one of my first choices for AF classes. Dang! WHEN is a million bucks going to fall into my lap!

Let’s see, what else? Oh, here is my Flobberdewotsky-inspired recycled jeans skirt I made. It’s still in progress because I’m not happy with the green section. But I think the black and white embroidered lace I bought at JoAnn’s today might make it better.

I love my front ruffle. I hand-hemmed the pink fabric on the sides. For some reason that felt so satisfying that I went ahead and hand-stitched the whole ruffle and lace onto the front, as well.

While I was at JoAnn’s I also saw a soldering iron, so I bought that, because I want to learn how to solder. And did I mention that last week I bought a little oven and a pasta machine for use with polymer clay? (And Laurie Mika’s book to help me get started with all these goodies!) School starts on Tuesday. Just when do I think I’m going to have time to mess with all this stuff?

Final bit of news: I signed up for another meet-up group that focuses on textiles. I’m hoping that maybe possibly being around others who are stitching and knitting I might be able to one day finish projects like my Mexico quilt that I started 3? 4? years ago! (Hand-embroidered and appliquéd!)
¿Quién sabe?

Open Your Eye

Love Life: Episodio 1,338,967

Part 1:
Life will always have its disappointments. The question for me is: Do I want to keep repeating the same disappointments over and over again, or do I want something to change?

The SoulCollage card above is called I am the One with the UnBlinking Eye Who Sees Things For What They REALLY Are. If we can see things for what they really are instead of for what they once were or what we wish they were, maybe we can make better choices for ourselves.

Part 2:
To deal with my latest disappointment (and anger) I joined a gym on a whim. Today I took the Kwando Strike kick boxing class. I envisioned the object of my anger onto the punching bag, which became the recipient of all my jabs, hooks, upper cuts and roundhouse kicks. He -the punching bag, I mean - took a beating, I tell you.

And now, and now - I have about 24 hours left of summer vacation. What shall I do with these last glorious hours? I think I'd like to do something crafty, a la Flobberdewotsky, such as a skirt made from recycled jeans and the flotsam and jetsam of my heart - I mean, of my closet. Or I could make myself a softie monster doll, 'cuz all the cool kids are doing it. I could make mine a voodoo love doll...

Scenes from Daily Life: El correo

Mini-Post Office at the gas station market: The postal worker waits on en elderly couple. The gentleman has snowy white hair and waits patiently beside his wife who has slender but shapely calves that possibly speak of an adventurous life climbing mountains or leading tour groups through cobblestoned streets of Europe, but she now uses an aluminum cane to move from one place to the next, or even just to stand still. Waiting behind them in line: A chic and well-appointed Cambodian woman with two young children. Her Italian leather handbag matches precisely the mango yellow shade of her blouse. Her daughter, perhaps five years old, is well-behaved and looks longingly for approval with her shiny round chestnut eyes. Her little brother, standing all of two and a half feet tall, has somehow managed to un-pot the fake palm tree standing in the corner of the postal area. Mother juggles her two large boxes to be shipped in one arm while trying to re-pot the fake tree with her other hand. Next, la caurentona dressed in black like una viuda, listening to the soundtrack of her life on an iPod as if she were less than half her age, like one of her own daughters, isolating herself via ear buds but taking it all in through her eyes and her smile. (That would be me.) Behind the viuda, an Eastern European immigrant, perhaps Russian, perhaps Croatian, Ukrainian, Estonian, Latvian, Hungarian, Czech – the observer is not at all versed in Eastern European languages and so there is no real way of knowing unless she were to ask, but she will not ask. She will merely enjoy the sound of the woman’s foreign words as she speaks to her young son who could be the same age as the little Cambodian girl. (The observer, still isolated via iPod, delights in this moment of diversity in our little corner of Beaverton.) The children do not speak one another’s language, but share the common bond of childhood curiosity. They are drawn to each other like magnets, looking at each others’ toys and books that their mothers have wisely allowed them to carry along (because one always has to wait at the post office), but even more drawn to one another’s face, to see the expression there, to ask the question and receive the answer: Will you be my friend?

Beyond the post office, the viuda carries on her rainy summer day adventure, walking just to walk because the air feels so good after three days of stifling heat. She loves the way the iPod shuffles her songs, always coming up with the most clever juxtapositions of musical genres: Django Rhinehart with Stephane Grappelli next to Cake next to Paolo Conte next to Santana with Rob Thomas next to Fiona Apple next to FatBoySlim next to Sabrá Dios next to Leslie Gore next to… The music and the motion of walking energize her. She feels like a combination of Amelie and Ava Gardner and California flip flop girl. She walks to Trader Joe’s not because she needs anything, but just because she wants to keep walking. She buys her good dark chocolate, ginger snaps on a whim, and Tex Mex veggie burgers because even though they might bother her stomach they are SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO tasty! She keeps walking. She sees herself walking past the Trevi Fountain in Rome, beside the steps of the Sacré Coeur de Paris, cheeks glowing magenta beneath her fuchsia umbrella, but in fact she is not the diva of some Fellini film, she is merely la cuarentona walking towards the strip mall. She will go into the bookstore, Barnes and Noble, ever so nobly, for the books, for the journey (and for the restroom).

Art books. Books about photography and journeys and lives she would like to lead. Books about color, colorful houses, they should put my house in a book because it’s so colorful. Where am? Am I lost, have they changed the shelves? I thought I knew where things were. Here they are, arts and crafts. These art dolls look like my old Muse Cat dolls. I wonder if the author saw them or has one, was she in any way influenced by me in my past life? I should make art dolls again, maybe I’ll go home and start sewing. Build your own shrines… You could use foam board, it’s simple, I could do this, I’d make a shrine to Grammie, a shrine to J, maybe a shrine to heal. Look at all these well-known artists who make shrines, and the materials they use, and why can’t I focus on just one thing at a time and get really good at it? She leaves the bookstore, letting her eye catch this book and that calligraphy pen, and this possibility and that fantasy…

The rain makes everything clear and calm again. There is nothing but the umbrella and the click clack of her flip flops as she walks along the concrete, across the parking lot, between the flower stands, around the corner, waiting for the light to change, the music shaping the rhythm of her steps, across the damp green grass, up the lane, and into the courtyard where her wild jungle of dahlias, roses, yellowing spears and straggling strawberries topple over each other to greet her, stems and leaves and ferns slapping her calves and thighs as she walks by. Just before unlocking the front door, she catches her reflection in the window and sees that she is not nearly as beautiful as she thought she was, but she finds the shimmer beneath the surface, hidden from the reflection: this moment of presence in the awareness of happiness.

A veces verdaderamente me gustaría que pudieras estar aquí dentro de mi cabeza para ver que no soy una tabula rasa, que estoy llena de pensamientos e ideas, interesantes o no interesantes pero interesantes en su anchura y su profundidad, o si no sean profundas, a lo mejor toman un rumbo interesante… Luego, entonces - tal vez - me pudieras amar.

The Warrior retreats into the forest to be Nurtured, only to Emerge Again at some later point, Stronger and more Clever than Ever

Yesterday I completed ten SoulCollage cards, and the day before I made four of them. This would seem to be a flurry of creativity, but considering that I had all day to do it (other than my time at Kinko’s) and that they are not all that fancy, it was more like creativity in slow-motion. I’d blame it on the high temperatures we are currently experiencing and the fact that I don’t have air conditioning, just a fan that I sit directly in front of as I work crouched over on the floor. (I know, I know: What was the point of building a work table upstairs if I’m still working on the floor? Answer: It’s too hot upstairs.) So, yes, temperature is a big part of the equation. Decision making skills takes up another 45% of the equation, which gets us to 90%. The last 10% belongs to cutting and gluing. None of this analysis is based on hard data, just a gut feeling that I’m a slow worker when I do art (as opposed to the very fast sandwich maker I was when I worked at the U of O Deli).

None of this led me to contemplate why I do art, but I contemplated it nevertheless. (Vocabulary and sentence structures here are currently being influenced by Everything is Illuminated. Sorry. I do this sort of thing, just like I unconsciously mimic foreign accents when I’m around them. It’s embarrassing. But not terribly. I think it’s kind of fun, actually.) So why do I make art? It is not to make great art. I admit that when I was an art student I did dream of being a “great artist” and having my work shown in galleries and museums, but eventually I came to think of that as being very elitist, art for rich people, etc. (I was too much of a proletariat for that!) (Ha!) So then I thought I would be an illustrator of children’s books, because many people can afford to buy a book, or at least to check one out from the library. Good notion, but ten, fifteen years later I notice I still have never completed an illustration project. Hmm… This does not bode well for a career as an illustrator. I had my art quilt phase, during which I did feel like a serious artist, and my Saturday Market daze, during which I felt like a craft drone, making thousands of little items to make a buck. And then I just stopped. Partly because I had taken up a new hobby, Teaching, but also because the art that I made was collecting dust in the corners, in the closets, under the tables – it was just “stuff” that served no purpose. So I stopped.

Did a part of my soul die from it? Good question. I don’t really know. I am aware, however, that the art I am making now is serving some purpose. It serves me. It allows me to express whatever I need to express. It allows me to search inside and pull things out that may be helpful to me. There are no deadlines, which I used to need to motivate myself to complete something. There are no assigned guidelines - I don’t have to fit my work into somebody else’s chosen theme. There is no intended audience or prospective buyer, except for me. I am the only one I need to please, and I don’t even need to be pleased. I just need to do it, because it is therapeutic and it is helping me heal right now.

This is not to say that I won’t become ambitious again at some point and try to make something amazing. It feels funny to think about this in August 2008 as the Olympics play on and I think about how hard working and accomplished these young athletes are already in their lives, and how UNaccomplished I am by comparison. But maybe, maybe, someday I will take my “gifts” and be less selfish with them, share them with the world to enlighten, illuminate, or perhaps inspire. For now, I need them here with me, to nurture them and let them nurture me. To help Little Linda grow into whomever she was really meant to be. Then maybe one day she will see that she has something worth sharing.

Day of the Octopus

Then I read the af class list. Once again, the class that pulls me closest, the class that screams, “TAKE ME! TAKE ME!” is LK Ludwig’s class about self-exploration, The Poetic Eye. It had a different title last year, but it’s still the class that lures me in. Maybe if I tell them all the 500 reasons why I psychologically and spiritually NEED that class…

Octopus? Oh yes. Today I read that the theme for af this year is Sea Monsters, and Teesha describes her notion of the sea monster through a diving experience with a giant octopus. And then Katherine England, one of the way cool teachers, left a link for her website that just happens to have some octopus art, and THEN, most serendipitous of all, a blogsite I’ve recently been enjoying that has NOTHING to do with ..., Emma McCreary’s CheekyBoots, mentions (Aug. 11th entry that I just read today) an octopus she knitted when she was younger. I love it when the Universe shows you how interconnected your life is!

Speaking of CheekyBoots, I met Emma through the SoulCollage meetup, and once before that when she attended the first session of Crafting Our Voices at the 100th Monkey Studios. I am glad to have met her again. Her art work, her collages, are so fun – this I already had a glimpse of. The great discovery for me is her writing, so fearless and articulate, and her thoughts and experiences so eerily parallel to some of my own. I read her disclaimer about God today (after I read about the octopus) and felt gratitude that there is someone else out there who has a similar understanding of the God concept – and that she can articulate this understanding so clearly. (Yay! Maybe in my solitude I am not so alone.)

Oh, and speaking of SoulCollage, judging by the looks of my coffee table, it is my current obsession.
Which leads to a few more words about obsession. Maybe it’s a good thing that it didn’t work out with H (who has some obsessions of his own which were not to my liking) because that was becoming too much of an obsession with this here keyboard and instant messaging, taking precious time away from art work. And maybe it’s even ok that I return to being obsessed with J again (and always) because he doesn’t have much time for me at all, which not only leaves oodles of time for art but inspires a lot of my art as well. (Oh, yea! Suffering artist – yippee!) (But wouldn’t it be nicer to find real love?) (I wouldn’t really know - I imagine so, but in the meantime, this dysfunctional stuff seems to suit me.) See why I NEED SoulCollage and the Poetic Eye???!

Although I have now used only about half of the arms of the octopus in this multi-tentacled text, I will stop here and bid you good-day, dear invisible, imaginary friend of mine. I will use the rest of the octopus’s squirmy limbs to reach into my psyche via scissors, glue sticks, and imagery. Au revoir.

Trust

This week I joined a SoulCollage meetup group. Not knowing anything about SoulCollage - I just wanted to try out another art group because I seem to like doing collage so much. Good group! We spent a good portion of our time making some some collage cards, then we shared our personal impressions of our own cards and what they said to us, and finally we used our mixed collection of cards to do some readings. It is amazing to me that a small group of relative strangers (I was a complete stranger, being new to the group) can be so open, intuitive, and insightful in each other's presence. It was another one of those happenings that was truly a gift to experience.

Above is one of the cards I made, "I am the one who protects and watches over you." I am feeling a great need for this in my life once again. In the reading segment I asked a question about trust. From the cards I pulled, I got the sense that I need to take care of myself more before I can learn to trust. In a discussion outside of the group, the question came up, "What causes people to lose trust? Have they made their feelings vulnerable, has someone told them what was wrong with them?" For some people, this may be the extent of their mistrust: I gave my heart, but you broke it. I've certainly had plenty of that. Oh, if it were ONLY that! For some of us, the lack of trust runs much deeper than a broken heart. What if your caretakers were unreliable, alcoholic, addictive, abusive, violently angry? What if they abandoned you without a word, leaving you to think it was your fault? What if life threw at you strangers who would hold a knife to your throat, rob you, beat you, push you down and rape you? What if your own self doubt and loathing pushed you to the brink of self-destruction or into destructive relationships where the cycle of abuse and fear could continue and grow? Would you find it hard to trust?(What if it were just horrible enough to read about the atrocities committed against others? Do you trust humanity, life, God?) ... And yet, hope holds out its hand. Finally, I feel I am making progress. I was tested yet again earlier this week, thought I had found something good, but then it was spoiled. The good news is, I recognized my boundaries, and more amazingly, I HONORED them! Maybe I will learn to be that guardian angel watching over myself, or to trust that the angel is there and be willing to hear its voice.

Side note: It is scary to put these things out here, not knowing who will read them, who might I offend. Or, will NO ONE read them, the words floating silently forever gathering dust, dissolving into that dust, unreadable, disintegrated language and emotion? It's lonely here. But I continue the journey.

Playing tourist in Seattle

Last week I took a spontaneous trip to Seattle with the girls. I'd been there before, long ago, when I was a less experienced traveler prone to overreaction (overreaction? try "apoplectic FITS!") if I missed a freeway offramp. Due to that predisposition, I decided that I hated Seattle, its crazy left side offramps, and never wanted to drive there again. Twenty years later, either I have better driving skills or Seattle's traffic flow has greatly improved, because it was the easiest city to drive around in EVER! (Seriously!) (Bonus points: Public transportation was great from our motel to downtown, too!)We began our tourist trek in the University district, in some ways reminiscent of my days at U of O, but with some big city flavor thrown in. (Good phó flavor, too!) The University of Washington campus is quite beautiful - woodsy walkways, formal gardens, and magical kingdom architecture of old. I insisted the girls come in to see the library, just in case they never get to go to a European castle. Oh look! We weren't the only Ducks to invade the Home of the Huskies!

At the end of the day back in our motel I was inspired to use the art supplies I'd grabbed at the university bookstore to do a little collage in my journal: Day 2 we were super touristy, taking in Pike Place Market. Here I display my photos, because I am sure photos such as these have never been seen before (ha ha). This is the place where we bought the creamiest ever hand made jack cheese that we ate for lunch. This is the famously fascinating and disgusting Gum Wall. Here is our humble contribution. (Pass the hand sanitizer, please.)

In the afternoon we drove up to Anacortes to go:Here is the boat we went on:A beautiful sunny day, but still chilly out on deck!This was my best shot of the day. (The rest look like distant views of Jaws circling the boat.) We've decided that next time we want to go on those tiny red rafts that some tour groups use, where the orcas come close enough to capsize your boat! Either that or buy a giant telephoto lens like the one our guide had. Beautiful end to a glorious day! On our third and final day we took the Underground Tour of Pioneer Square. Here you get the low down on the city, low down. These are the interesting history lessons your teacher never taught you. The good parts of the book you WOULD have read, if only they'd been included in those boring old textbooks. You know, the parts about conniving politicians, extremely questionable city engineering decisions, the history of early plumbing and sewage systems, the "seamstress" district of the city...) Our fabulous tour guide Amanda had us under her spell for the duration. Look how easily she could manipulate us!I LOVE Seattle! I love the blend of the old with the new, the history, the "Seattle-ite" sense of self-identity and culture, it's tongue-in-cheekiness. I could live there!Maybe next summer I'll take a touristy tour of Portland, then I could say "I LOVE Portland! I could live there!" :-)