I was so thrilled when I saw this big ass book sitting on the shelf of one of the many art stores I foraged through regularly in So. Cal. (can’t remember which one it was that I found it in). I’d been hauling it around with me all summer, in hopes that something I’d see would inspire me to remove the plastic wrapper and get started on something within its pages. Well, the time has finally come; I started on a sketch a few weeks ago in honor of the harvest season and finally began adding colour this weekend. It’s a work in progress but I feel quite triumphant that I put anything down it in, since I’ve not been creating much visual art stuff. *sighing in relief* Maybe it’s like riding a bicycle after all…
I’ve been rather silent lately… no doubt the few readers I had have long since stopped coming by, seeing that there was nothing new, so to speak, going on here, though that certainly couldn’t be farther from the truth as to what has been transpiring in my life.
I am now back in Canada, a few minutes away from Vancouver (well, less than an hour, preferably by train). We’ve had moves to and from storage units… a “lice incident” the day before Gabriel was to start eighth grade (though because of bulging class sizes, we ended up having to wait another week before they could reroute him to another school, which he is very pleased with, so it was all a good thing)… boxes… so many boxes… still. But I have plans, and will slowly make this place our home. We have food in the fridge and cupboards and love in our hearts for each other, and that’s what matters, really, doesn’t it?
April Chapbook Pages
Irvine, California
May 7, 2009
Always a bit slow on the uptake, I’m still working on April pages when the month of May has already begun.
I am again revisiting the “home” theme. I’m not sure why it is such a compelling one to me. I suppose it’s because I have occupied many houses but haven’t felt like I’ve been home in a long while, but rather unanchored, shiftless and somewhat discomfited. I have often wondered about that… what that was all about. Why did I never feel at ease enough to bond with my surroundings or the beings who peopled them?
I think it has much to do with the dynamic of the relationship I’ve been in, in which I’ve never truly felt at ease. It was mutual; or perhaps it was singular, and being sensitive to others’ emotional emanations, I picked up on that and was not able to ease into trust either, knowing that I could not rely on someone who could himself not withstand the vagaries of life. I used to tell my mother that I had married a coward.
Certainly, he has a sense of self-preservation, but he has no sense of community, and during my most difficult and trying times in these sixteen years that have come and gone, I have been left to my own devices to cope; been told to ‘fix’ myself where I was broken, and if I could not achieve this on my own, to go get the appropriate help. Never was there a sense that perhaps he was in need of some fixing himself, and that perhaps he might perceive that part of the problem that festered between us was of his own doing. Never was there a sense that, when the going got tough, that for the lack of knowing what else to do that he would do nothing more than simply listen and just be present. But… this doesn’t matter now, because it shall soon no longer be of consequence, and if I’ve grown as a result of this pairing of spirits, then it will have served its purpose, regardless of the outcome.
Perhaps this obsessive refocusing on the “home” theme is that I am returning, after so many years of being abroad, to a place that is equally strange to me now as my initial trek to California was almost two decades ago… home, indeed.
Home is where the heart is, they say. I am rediscovering my heart, a little bit of it each day. It tells me that it’s okay to feel again; to be wonder- and gratitude-filled; to hope, to love. It tells me that no matter where I am, or where I find myself, it will always be with me and that I will always be “home.”
So I embark on this next journey with an open heart… with a heart that will embrace all that it encounters with a sense of hope and wonder. Perhaps this time I will truly have found my way home.
Love, Adriane x
“Yield and you need not break
Bent you can straighten
Emptied you can hold
Torn you can mend”
(Tao Te Ching)
There has been an influx of moths in my place; sometimes they follow me around. After smooshing several of them, I began to wonder whether they were harbingers of some sort, and smooshing them without acknowledging their message was doing each of us a disservice.
So I researched the mythological implications of moths. These are little white or beige moths, the kind that like to work their way through your wardrobe like a buffet, thoughtfully leaving little holes here and there in your wools and silks. However, I’ve discovered that moths do indeed have stories to tell, or rather, there are stories about moths that seem to fit with my current circumstances, so perhaps their appearance is, after all, not a coincidence.
from the insects.org site:
Beauty of Color, Shape, Pattern, Symmetry
Lo, the bright train their radiant wings unfold!
With silver fringed, and freckled o’er with gold:
On the gay bosom of some fragrant flower
They, idly fluttering, live their little hour;
Their life all pleasure, and their task all play,
All spring their age, and sunshine all their day.
Butterflies and moths are “Nature’s canvases with the gift of flight.” Even in death, their mounted beauty can remain intact for centuries. Nature’s genetic paintbrushes have “painted” hundreds of thousands bilaterally-symmetrical butterfly and moth works of art. When one considers that both the topsides and the undersides of these specimens are “painted” with equal skill, and that smaller, isolated sections of these masterpieces can be viewed apart from the total specimen, one becomes aware of the virtually unlimited number of artworks in this “traveling” art show of the air.
To some artists, the butterfly and moth only symbolize beauty: the beauty of symmetry, pattern, color, shape. These artists don’t require their representations of these creatures to be interpreted. They copy these insects, some as faithfully as the Photo-realists would copy a still life, a figure, a panorama, and only ask the viewer to observe their beauty.
The Abstractive-Naturalists don’t even require the viewers to know their subject is a butterfly or moth. They enlarge small, rectangular sections of wing and present them purely as designs. Examples of this usage are represented in Kjell Sandved’s Butterfly Alphabet Posters.
Ugly and Negative
Shall mortal man be more just than God?
Shall a man be more pure than his Maker?
Behold He put no trust in His servants;
And His angels He charged with folly:
How much less in them that dwell in houses of clay,
Whose foundation is in the dust,
Which are crushed before the moth?
Although fantastically beautiful moths exist, many of them live in the tropics. Uncommon, beautiful moths such as (the Polyphemus, Cecropia, Luna) do reside in the United States, although commonly encountered moths are small and drab brown. Compare this to the many beautiful butterflies easily observed in almost any part of the world.
For this reason the moth always comes out second-best in a “beauty contest-opinion poll” against butterflies. Coupled with the stigma brought on by the misdeeds of the clothes moth, these little denizens of the closet are responsible for the tarnished reputation of moths everywhere. It is little wonder that the moth has become the unwilling symbol for that which is ugly and negative. Some of the other symbols identified with moths (like insanity) have also contributed to the moth’s position of low esteem.
Flame
Ancient Mexicans considered the butterfly important enough to dedicate an entire palace to it at Teotihuacan, just outside Mexico City. This palace is called the Palace of the Mariposa.
Teotihuacan is the oldest metropolis in Meso-America, and is the only one to possess a continuous history, from the archaic through to the purely classical period.
Historians do not agree on who the founders of Teotihuacan were; some say the Olmecs, others the Toltecs, but most agree that it was at one time the capital of a highly civilized culture later conquered by the Aztecs, the foremost of the Nahuatal Tribes.
The butterfly represents flame in the symbolism of this culture. Often pictured with the signs for water, it becomes clear that the “vision of Earth as a paradise is based on the dynamic harmony between water and fire.” The same concept is exemplified by an image of Tlaloc, god of rain, pictured on a vase bearing a butterfly motif. It is interesting to note that the butterfly is used as symbolic representatives of both the fire and rain god.
Finding no information as to why butterflies symbolize flames, Indians might have observed the many butterflies whose wings are red, orange, yellow, or combinations of all three colors. A cloud or “cumulep” of fire-colored butterflies taking off from a mud puddle after drinking, could easily be interpreted as being flame-like.
Mexican Indians might also have witnessed a “magna-cumulep” of millions of orange, monarch butterflies migrating to their over-wintering grounds in the mountains near Mexico City. A “cloud of flame” would definitely have entered their minds. The flapping of the wings would even approximate the flickering of the tongues of flame. The moth has also come to be associated with flames, although not as a symbol of fire.
A small yellowish moth which flies about the fire at night is called ‘tun tawu by the Cherokee Indians– a name implying that it goes in and out of the fire. When it flits too near and falls into the blaze the Cherokee say ‘tun tawu is going to bed.’ Because of its affinity for the fire it is invoked by the Indian doctor in what they call ‘Fire Diseases,’ among which sore eyes and frostbite are included.
Sensuality
It may be somewhat difficult to understand why a moth or butterfly could symbolize sensuality, and the symbol does trace a rather circuitous route. Because a moth is physically attracted to light, and because sensuality involves physical attraction, the moth has come to symbolize sensuality; it physically succumbs to seductive light. Also, because butterflies represents femininity, and females are most often associated with the word sensual, the butterfly has also become associated with the word sensual.
Impermanence, Fragility
A page of the wind in the book of the sky,
the fragile butterfly
Another characteristic of both moths and butterflies is their fragile nature. Their thin wings and antennae, their powdered color that comes off on your fingertips adds to their stature as a symbol of impermanence.
Indian Watcher, Big Boss
In the book, Navaho Indian Ethnoentomology by Wyman and Bailey, contains a paragraph relating to the butterfly (or possibly the moth) as some kind of “Big Brother.”
“Mixed up [as to sex] on them real classy ones, supposed to be the head of all moths, they don’t fly but stay in one place and all moths pile up around him which makes me believe moths have their boss.” The Black Swallowtail “is the big boss, he watches Indian.” The work did not explain in what reference, whether as a god or as an everpresent insect, or just how this butterfly watched Indians. It is possible that the eyespots or “ocelli” present on the wings aided in the impression the Indians had that this butterfly could watch them.
Knowledge
The sorcerers of the Yaqui Indians of Mexico refer to the moth as a symbol of knowledge. In the book Tales of Power by Carlos Castaneda, the moth is such a central figure it is included as the major character on the cover of the book. It is revealed by Don Juan, a Yaqui sorcerer, “knowledge is a moth.” He expresses metaphorically that “the moths are the heralds, or better yet, the guardians of eternity,” for some reason, or for no reason at all, they are the depositories of the gold dust of eternity. He continues, “the moths carry a dust on their wings, a dark gold dust. That dust is the dust of knowledge.” “Knowledge comes floating like specks of gold dust, the same dust that covers the wings of moths.” “The moths have been the intimate friends and helpers of sorcerers from time immemorial.” Don Juan adds, “Moths are the givers of knowledge and the friends and helpers of sorcerers.”
The association of the moth with knowledge coincides with the Blackfoot Indian belief that the butterfly “is a little fellow flying about that is going to bring news to someone tonight.” In addition, the Yaqui associates some danger with the moth and its knowledge. The Navaho Indian also feels that “moths and butterflies, especially moths, are very dangerous.” The Yaqui feels the powder on a moth’s wings is knowledge. The Navaho associates the powder on lepidopteron wings with insanity, the drive to commit incest and the power of an aphrodisiac and the power to run fast. The old adage “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing” is quite applicable here.
From www.theroselabyrinth.com:
THE SILK MOTH: is a multicultural symbol of rebirth and reincarnation. It is also connected with metamorphosis, as it changes from the caterpillar to the moth after a period of silky gestation. Admired more than many common moths for their symmetry of pattern and colour, and the preciousness of their fibres, they are also connected with the night and the flame, creatures of secrets and illumination. The silk worm feeds on the mulberry, so ingests wisdom. However, the continuous fibre that they weave is ultimately to their own doom, as unravelling the thread will kill the insect.
The expression “like a moth to a flame” also tells of a feeling of inner compulsion, the will being powerless to alter what is inherently felt. But the sensual moth, drawn to the heat of the flame, is also identified with the opportunity for transformation. Moths are female in symbolism, less giddy and pretty than butterflies; the silk moth is strongly associated with the Bassano family (see their family website, www.peterbassano.com/shakespeare).
No revolution in outer things is possible without
prior revolution in one’s inner way of being.
Whatever change you aspire to . . . must be
preceded by a change in heart.
~ I Ching Hexagram 49
What inner revolution are you ready to undertake?
Stargazing Tip for April 9
The Moon huddles quite close to the brightest star of Virgo tonight. Spica is a little to the upper left of the Moon as they rise in early evening.
Big Hand for a Little Star
Stardate: April 9, 2009
The tears are flowing this morning, a relentless stream following the inner crease of my eye, along my nose and down my cheeks to be deftly wiped away before they escape. I don’t know why today is any different than yesterday, or tomorrow. Since being let go from my job at the beginning of January, it’s all been like one long flowing day, punctuated with stress here and there, but otherwise rather dull and numbing.
How is it that every time change occurs in my life, it has to be everything all at once? Is it my sense of impatience in general that controls even the manifestations of my higher self? Are we both equally impatient? And yet, I must be patient, for I have been waiting for what seems like an eternity for something to happen that will push me into the place where I will flourish. Perhaps this is it. If only it wasn’t so gut-wrenchingly devastating at the same time. I wish I could muster up more enthusiasm in light of these developments.
Perkily, Steve went apartment hunting yesterday, online, and found a junior one bedroom apartment that he’s put dibs on in Costa Mesa. Funny how the very construct we met upon so many years ago has also facilitated our separation. It’s not as though it happened suddenly, and blind-sided us. It became a wedge, like a curtain drawn between hospital beds, and severed our connection. While there is a fondness between us, we’ve lost our soul connection. I wonder, sometimes, if it was ever really there.
I wonder what the point of our union was in the first place. If it was to get me here to California, it has seemingly failed in its purpose, since I will be leaving to go back to Canada shortly. Of course, that too is my choice. I could stay here, but I have no where to go. Doesn’t seem like much of a choice. I don’t feel safe here. And I’m not sure why I feel any differently about being in Canada, but some things reach me at gut-level and I’ve intuited this as being the best course of action.
I am afraid. I am afraid of being alone for the rest of my life. I am afraid that I will amble from one job to the next as a means of paying my bills without deriving any joy or satisfaction out of my daily work. I fear that I will not be able to support myself and Gabriel to a standard that will match what we are leaving behind. I fear that he will also someday abandon me in favor of living with his father. I fear that I will never figure out what it is that I am here to do on this earth, making it all a pointless exercise in futility, like pounding sand. I fear that I will start off this new segment of my life with so much less than I started with, and that I won’t have the strength, ambition or focus to make it back to good. Sometimes I fear I’ve made such a mess of things that it is too far gone to fix; that it’s irreparably damaged.
I have this sense of diminished worth that I carry like a mantle. Who gave this to me, I wonder? Was it intended to protect me during my meandering through life? Did I put it there to protect myself from undue interest; to not have to measure up to anything because I was running under the radar? How can it be that I have not been able to maintain an intimate relationship with another human being? Am I meant to be alone?
I get these inspirational quotes via email. Today’s is “Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness” attributed to Oliver Wendell Holmes. Some days they inspire me; other days, like today, they merely sound insipid.
Yesterday I worked on a background piece to go behind the text for my March chapbook contribution. I layered fluid acrylic paints on a canvas sheet and, once dry, added some gilding with a Staedtler Hot Foil Pen. I was looking for my other foiling supplies, but do you think I could find them? No… *sigh* time to clean up my sh*t, I’m thinking… sad, really, when one can’t find the supplies one needs. I thought I put it in a specific spot but then I cleaned up my workbench and moved it to somewhere else… must’ve been a really good, safe, spot.
ANYways… today I scanned the canvas so that I could print out these little blocks of sampled parts of it on fabric transfer sheets (which I haven’t yet done), and then cut up the sheet into pieces to share/include with the March pages. While searching for the foiling supplies I went through different drawers and bins and discovered a bunch of stuff that I was hoarding for that “special project” and decided that this one was as good as any, and split the spoils into ten little piles, to be included in (yet another hoarded “cool” thing) these fabric pouches, onto which I’ll be applying the iron-on transfer. My but that was a long-winded discourse.
Apart from that, the day was relatively unproductive. I listened to Scott Blum’s “Summer’s Path” … I love audiobooks, and Audible is a fine purveyor thereof. And I spoke to my friend Cindy, in Chilliwack, whose home I’ll be squatting in after our move up there in a few months and until I get a job and resettled, if there is such a thing. And I also managed to coordinate with someone on a possible temp job, which is great, considering I haven’t worked since the beginning of January… but I hear it’s like riding a bicycle.
Another slow dive into self. Every time I think I’ve embraced my darkness and am ready to re-emerge into light, I go deeper still into the murk. It’s not pretty here. It’s lonely. Frightening, sometimes, but no matter how hard I try to turn away from peering at myself a little more closely, I look again, awestruck, sort of like when you drive by a traffic accident and your head swivels of its own volition. Is there any blood? Any deceased? Curiosity tinged with apprehension, as the eyes survey the scene to take it in… but hurry! You don’t want to hold up the traffic; we’ve been waiting long enough already, stuck in this traffic jam of life.
I envy the “whimsy” art girls. They remind me of the popular girls in high school, dressed in Lacoste shirts with upturned collars, hair flipping just right, Farah Fawcett-like, banding together in their dimpled butter cream frosted cheer. I tried then, to be part of the crowd, but I never did pull it off. I didn’t fit in anywhere, really. Defiantly, I just stopped trying, instead embracing my deviance. But I’m quiet so who could tell? It was a silent revolution.
Why can’t I go there, to the bright and cheery part of the garden, where all is light and airy? I coo with the rest of them at the pinks and oranges, the gingham and flowers, the ribbons and ruffles and swirly things. I just can’t make them. When I try, they look like I tried too hard, and I never quite succeed in getting ‘there’ wherever ‘there’ may be.
That stuff seems like foreign artifacts from another civilization that I just can’t grasp. Like the natives in South America that were surprised to have men from a Spanish armada show up on the beach when the vessel that they traveled in to get there was bobbing offshore in plain sight, but their minds didn’t recognize it as a boat and dismissed it outright, seeing nothing but smooth ocean. They thought these men were gods instead of their impending oppressors. Amazing, the brain… isn’t it?
To me, color has meaning in a visceral sense. It slugs me in the belly, like Alex did, when I was four; he was trying to be a bully and succeeded, since he was already in grade school and whooooshed the wind right out of me. I got to slug him back, in his big fat jelly belly, because our parents ‘talked’ and it was deemed appropriate punishment. Betchya he wasn’t so happy to be slugged in his belly by a little four year old girl, intent on inflicting pain in kind. Call it instant karma. Wind for wind.
Color rattles through me like the wind and carries on conversations with my hands, with or without my intervention. Sometimes, like Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire, I can see colors when I close my eyes; sensations translated into streams of light, swirling through me like vortices. There is a word for it, though I can’t remember what it is. There is a word for everything.
I’ve been working on my March pages of the chapbook project, and was getting ready to heave-ho my printer from the balcony and watch it shatter to pieces down below… but I finally changed what I was using as printing support (switched from satin ’sheets’ to vellum) and will be “free-form” stitching the two together tomorrow with the sewing machine. Initially I was going to print both sheets on the satin but my printer seemed to have an insatiable appetite for satin sheets (hmmm…) but I’m glad that at least the top sheets were successfully printed. I have the writing to work on still, and also the assembly of the February pages to finish up. I’m happy that I am at least making some progress.
I worked some more in my visual journal (or art journal… or whatever you want to call it) this evening. I painted this background by layering GAC 500 diluted Golden fluid acrylics in Interference Oxide Red, Green Gold, Quinacridone Red, and Paynes Gray. I used a salvaged strip from one of the printer-digested satin sheets I mentioned earlier, and pasted it down with my favorite adhesive, ArtQuest’s Perfect Paper Adhesive, and layered some over the top of the image as well, as the printer ink was not set. I am completely enamored with Paynes Gray.
Well… took the paint chips off and instead wrote a Pablo Neruda poem onto the background:
Soliloquy in the Waves
Yes, but here I am alone.
A wave
builds up,
perhaps it says its name, I don’t understand,
it mutters, humps in its load
of movement and foam
and withdraws. Who
can I ask what it said to me?
Who among the waves can I name?
And I wait.
Once again the clearness approached,
the soft numbers
rose in foam
and I didn’t know what to call them.
So they whispered away,
seeped into the mouth of the sand.
Time obliterated all lips
with the patience of shadow and
the orange kiss
of summer.
I stayed alone,
unable to respond to what the world
was obviously offering me,
listening to
that richness spreading itself,
the mysterious grapes
of salt, love unknown,
and in the fading day
only a rumor remained,
further away each time,
until everything that was able to
changed itself into silence.
Maybe I’ll add more “stuff”… dunno yet. Ready to move on to another page in the meantime.
An art journal entry from March 31st, resulting from a group skry I did on Monday night. Not quite successful in translating the experience visually, but it’s close enough. Fuzzy photo courtesy of my iPhone and low lighting. My other camera’s battery ran out of juice just as I was getting ready to shoot some photos. Not sure about leaving the color paint chips on there… my Winsor & Newton watercolor chart was starting to spew forth the color samples, so I thought I’d put them on the pages, but I’m not sure yet… I think I’ll sleep on it.
I wasn’t kidding about reading tea leaves… well, yes I was, but since I had some tea last night and peered into my cup this morning to find this very cool thing, I thought I’d photograph it. Doesn’t it look like an eye… or a sun?
In any case, I think it looks cool. And I’ll go so far to say that I dub it to be a good omen. You tea leaf readers out there are welcome to comment.
I worked in my journal for the first time in several days this morning. I love Howl’s Moving Castle… it’s one of my favorite movies, and Howl is one of my favorite heros… and Miyazaki one of my favorite animators. I loved Dianna Wynne Jones’ book, and felt that the story should have been stuck to, but I still love the movie.
I was inspired to sketch Howl… it’s a work in progress… not sure what I’m going to do with it yet. The left side was “pre-painted” in the class (taught by Kelly Kilmer) when we made the book.
Ösze visza mint pinàn a ször
How am I doing? (I was asked early this morning, with barely half a mug of coffee consumed.) I don’t know… up and down…
My dad had a saying (in response to “how’s it going?”, which was rather crude… who am I kidding… it was immensely crude… but it translates (from Hungarian) to the effect of : “all over the place, like hair on a pussy.” Yes… rather uncouth, but it certainly paints the right picture, as it were. And, alas, now you know where (at least in part) I get my class-less-ness from… LOL…
My friend also told me that I’m sweet… I’m not sweet… sometimes I think I’m completely reckless and demented… I give when I don’t really have because I have this insatiable need to please… myself and others… but whether I do it in the right way is questionable. I have to ask myself why I operate in the way that I do.
At times I feel I am no better than my friend Robert, who I’ve accused of “buying” people’s affections by overwhelming them with gifts. I think I do some of that too. Probably even for the same reasons… although I’d like to think it’s because I’m more altruistic and do it for the betterment of all… but mostly it’s to make me feel good, because I’ve pleased someone. Pleasing someone else pleases me… it’s selfish, really. But at least I make everyone happy in the process, if only momentarily. Happy little earthquakes of pleasure.
As to what is going on right now? I’m playing a waiting game now, really… waiting until time is up on my lease… and on my current life with Steve. It’s weird, really. And then things will change… either by actions I take or of their own accord if I take no action. I’m at a stalemate on whether I should let the river carve its own course or whether I should take part in directing it… seems I’m not a very good director, or I overestimate my ability to direct wisely, so maybe I should just see where it all goes and then work with what transpires. I don’t know. I’m ready to try tea leaves or sniff some ether for some great revelations.
I have issues… but at least I can identify them. Some people (many, in fact) have them and don’t even know they have them… and if they do know about them, they tacitly ignore them, pretending they’re not there, or perhaps hope that by not acknowledging them they’ll go away of their own accord. I’d say I’m a few steps ahead of the lot. I am human… how can I not have any issues? I’m perfect in my imperfection.
And garsh… I really wish I had a boyfriend… or plaything… when they tell you that women peak in midlife, they’re not kidding. *sigh*
So… maybe I should have some more coffee and shut up now while I’m ahead… LOL
It’s been sunny and cool here in Southern California. I spent Saturday with my friend Bonnie in celebration of her birthday, and went to see the Dan Eldon exhibit in Santa Monica. It was small but worth the trip. We had a late lunch at Anisette Brasserie, which was delicious and beautifully appointed. The restaurant was in a renovated bank building, so there were high ceilings, and they’ve imported tiles and different things from France to give it a French “brasserie” feel. We ordered several things off of the menu and shared… everything was delicious… my choice were the mussels, and they were absolutely delicious!
This weekend I picked up a couple of graphic novels… proving once again what a geek I really am. And, proving also that I am consistent in my tastes, I picked up a book that I already had… Rising Stars : Born In Fire (Vol. 1)
Another graphic novel I picked up was The Last One
I’m still working on my February chapbook pages… they’re taking a bit longer to put together as each page has eight eyelets attached (which means hole-punching… attaching and setting each of them) and also five “danglies” per page that also require eyelets (for a total of 13 eyelets per page), which then need to be attached to the page with leather string. Me and my bright ideas…
Each year my friend Bonnie does something special for my birthday. It usually involves some sort of excursion somewhere and good food. This year I’ve decided to pay back in kind and take her to the Dan Eldon traveling exhibit, which is being hosted at the Pete and Susan Barrett Art Gallery in Santa Monica and closes this Saturday. Looks like we’ll be getting there just in the nick of time. Now that I’ve got the excursion part figured out, I have to figure out where a good lunch spot would be. Any suggestions?
I’ve been working on my February Chapbook pages, deciding to use my visit (and photos) to Canada as creative fodder. I took this photo while sitting on one of the boulders edging Chilliwack Lake. I remember being asked by Alex, with an incredulous timbre in his voice… “You take pictures of rocks?” Yep…
The writing intended to accompany this photo:
On Going Home
It has been long. Not so long that all of the details are obscured, just long enough to be fuzzy, like a long-forgotten humbug pulled from the depths of a coat pocket.
I never imagined that I would ever return, especially to this new part, this lush foresty and mountainous richness so close to where the people live. They live differently here than in California.
There is a common sense woven through their spirits, and a prevalent kindness. Here the dirt from the streets and air is regularly ushered away by the rain. Sometimes it drizzles… sometimes it pelts. It leaves behind a fresh scent, like wind-whipped laundry pulled from the clothes line.
It felt good to be home. Different, but good. Cradled. Like slipping my feet into an old pair of long-forgotten slippers. It provided an odd sense of security, though I will be returning to it with only my belongings and my child. My valuables.
Daily I brush off the fear that starts to surface. The discomfort of change seeping out from my middle. But as the tree drops its leaves and reburgeons when the days grow longer and the nights shorter, and the spring grass pokes out from underbrush, so too does my life inevitably alter. It would serve me well to learn from Nature.
This has been yet another forest fire, leaving me charred. Dry and brittle. Pain-filled and longing.
With richer soul, I anticipate a time of gentle regrowth. Renewal. Hope.
Since I can never stop fussing, I played with the background some last night, putting a bunch of rub-ons on it… and I didn’t like it so I ended up covering it up with acrylic paint. I like this much better… but I’m not sure whether it’s done yet.
Well here it is… finished. I colored in the blue line drawing from a few days ago with colored pencils. The quality of the photo isn’t all that great… the line quality of the marks is lost somewhat and it’s difficult to match the color exactly to the original, but this is close enough.
Last night I was feeling restless about not having sketched anything in a couple of days, so I took my journal and Stabilo pencil to bed with me and had a go at it. Several weeks ago I’d contacted someone about some illustration freelancing and she’d asked me to provide a sample of my work, specifically of a mother holding a child.
Well, I don’t have access to live models and so I resort to my only other alternative… I search Google images. Doing that can bear fruit, if you’re looking for something like a leaf, or winter scenes, etc… but when you’re looking for a “mother holding a child” it becomes a bit more iffy. The search yielded some results… most of them miniscule in size… the one I decided to endeavor (see above) was printed out at 150%… this makes everything even fuzzier than it already was in the first place. And, to make matters worse, my vision isn’t the best these days… I have fuzzy built-in.
In any case, this is the best I could do on this run… maybe I’ll try again. I’m going to play some more with this page… where it goes, nobody knows.
I received this morning’s NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory newsletter, which revealed the following…
This aging and expelling process is typical of all stars. As stars age and die, they burn progressively heavier and heavier elements, beginning with hydrogen and ending with iron.
This struck me as funny… perhaps this would explain my inability to metabolize iron… I’m on my last evolutionary legs, perhaps. Now wouldn’t that be refreshing? Maybe I’ve become the symbolic equivalent of a Red Giant, spewing out almost all of my “heavier elements. These elements are the building blocks of all planets, including our own Earth (as well as of human beings and any other life forms that may exist in the universe).”
Failure
“If you have made mistakes, even serious ones, there is always another chance for you. What we call failure is not the falling down, but the staying down.”
-Mary Pickford, (in Reader’s Digest, 1979)Things happen. That’s just the way it is. But at every point in time we have choices to make. We can choose to learn from our mistakes. We can choose to try again. If we were perfect, and never made mistakes, then how could we possibly learn? Our wisdom comes from our own experiences. Like the song says: “pick yourself up, brush yourself off, and start all over again!”
-Lissa Coffey
from today’s WisdomNews from Lissa Coffey
Growing up, particularly during my teens, I was always struck by my mother’s pessimism. If there were two sides to something she would invariably flip to the one whose sheen was tarnished… her glass was always half empty. She seethed with cynicism, though she felt that she was merely being a realist. Perhaps she felt she had earned the right. Born in 1918 in Eastern Europe, she has seen more atrocity over her decades there than most of us will see in our whole lives. And then there were her personal conundrums… more tragedy.
Her tantamount task in life was to burst my bubble… “Stop floating around in the ether… get your feet back down to the ground,” she would reprimand. I, on the other hand, was given the greatest teacher. Essentially, I was shown that no matter what happens in life, we persevere. Somehow we will put one foot in front of the other and make tracks. Or we lay down and die… physically or figuratively. And whether I enjoy the journey (or not) is entirely up to me.
Digitally altered photograph
printed on transparency and backed with aluminum tape
I’ve been working on my January chapbook pages the last couple of days. The 21st of January marked yet another anniversary of my birth. I chose to be inspired by Aerosmith’s lyrics for “Dream On”… and then composed a bit of my own schtuff for the journaling portion…
time… my own little stream of all that I am,
it flows throughout this waking dream
like stars clustered, spilling brilliant in the milky way–
things I remember and more I have yet to vision
equally nascent from this vantage point of now–
this moment, teetered on the was and yet to be
shapeless now, like quantum atoms
but for a glance in either direction,
solidifying, shifting to become something
more than nothing… more than nothing.
(c) Adriane Giberson 2009
I stand at a pivotal point in my life. Starting over… new beginnings, or endings… or perhaps both, really… in soul and work and heart and hearth. It seems everything is being bucked up into the air like dirt when the wild boar roots around for truffles. Maybe I’ll find some truffles. Maybe not. I’m ready for anything… everything and nothing. Certainly something. Whatever is in this wake of upheaval, I hope it is gentle with me. I could use a little tenderness.
Some days I am more hopeful than others. Some days just leave me bereft.
It’s a w-i-p (work in progress)… I’ve worked about as much on it tonight as I want. This is from Kelly Kilmer’s prompt-a-day thingie… the prompt for tomorrow (the 8th)… layering several colors of paint, collaging paper and a couple of focal images… and I painted the center image in acrylic over the pasted down background paper, which had spots of wax on it. If you haven’t checked out Kelly’s Prompt-A-Day online group, I highly recommend it… daily prompts and artsy fartsy how-tos for a month for $25 a month… that’s less than a daily cup of coffee at Starbuck’s… DO IT.
I started this as a pencil sketch last month, after feeling exceedingly elated about getting news of an online project I’d participated in called Artists Interviewing Artists possibly getting converted into a book. I felt like finishing it up with paint today. Fuzzy photo courtesy of my iPhone.
Watercolor worked over gessoed and absorbent ground treated journal page.
Well, here’s the journal entry I started yesterday… I’ve added (and covered up most of the) text, and added some more images and whatnot. I don’t know why I fuss so much about getting it right, when it’s my journal and who cares as long as I get some relief from having worked stuff out on paper, right? Sheesh…
Nothing like a soak in the tub to glue Humpty back together again…
I decided to work in one of my own journals this morning… I’m always so busy doing stuff for everyone else (via collaborative projects) that I often neglect doing things for my self… my own pleasure. So… the above photo is what it looks like at the moment…
Moving along to some other thoughts… I’ve managed to get all tangled up with someone who had no inkling about having gotten entangled (I’m good at that kind of thing)… long distance, no less! And of course, I’m terribly embarrassed about the whole sordid mess… and realizing (with some relief) that it would probably have been disastrous anyway.
I hope to someday find someone who will match me in intellect as well as spiritual-personal depth. In Steve I’d found an intellectual match, but the other part is still under major construction. Man, it’s tough… :^P
So, in the spirit of leaving no stone unturned…
I can’t say enough good things about Chet Day… I’ve been receiving his meditation emails for several years now and they are always incredibly timely in their nature, and always useful. Today’s was…
Chet Day presents
EarthLeaves Meditations
More Musings on Letting Go for Peace of Mind
March 1, 2009
Dear Adriane:
For this week’s meditation, we turn to Chuang Tzu, an
influential 4th century Chinese philosopher, who tells
us…
Flow with whatever may happen and let your
mind be free: Stay centered by accepting
whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate.
Take the usual long, slow deep breaths until you’re
calm and focused.
Now flow with whatever’s going on around you. If it’s
noisy, flow with the noise. If it’s quiet, go deeper
into the quiet.
As you breathe in again, accept everything that’s going
on around you and within you. Hold that breath and
accept it all right now.
Now slowly exhale and let go of everything you just
accepted.
Whoa, that is the ultimate!
Work with this meditation every day this week.
Until next time,
Chet
Chet Day
Editor, EarthLeaves Meditations
http://meditation101.com
————————–————————––
Chet Day
Meditation101.com
P.O. Box 755
Earl, NC 28038-0755
USA
Being in a transitory stage of my life right now -in oh so many ways- (though, truth be told, when are we not, if we are continually evolving as humans? the only constant being *change*…), this was particularly useful to me. Letting go… going with the flow.
I also signed up for Kelly Kilmer’s Prompt-A-Day thingie for March…a prompt to do a daily check-in with myself… just what I need… to unravel the tangled ball of yarn that I am.
It looks like a troop of bridal fairies puked on my workspace… ah well… working with whites makes it hard to avoid using ephemera from the bridal aisle. It may be passé, but I’m still using transparencies on my mixed media stuff. The little bits of extra from the cut sheets of the larger watercolors are being transformed into the extra bits that make this chapbook exchange so much fun for the recipients, and tucked into the bound books. These will be slipped into organza pouches.
If you, as I had prior to this project, have no idea what a chapbook is… here is one that has been bound (covers provided by our very talented ‘hostess’ Gigi Starnes, who binds them as well), and a peek at what it looks like on the inside, once bound.
The last sheet, before it gets cup up into pieces… I needed ten pieces, and each watercolor sheet yields three and some leftover bits. There will probably be some larger chunks left of this one… anyone up for a swap out? Email me…
In the depth of winter I finally learned that there lay within me an invincible summer. – Albert Camus
I decided, this morning, that I needed to create today. I’ve had these materials out since before the holidays, in preparation for the moment when I would feel assailed by creative inspiration. Well, maybe it comes as no surprise that I just haven’t been feeling it lately. I’ve been stuffing it, instead, perhaps waiting for a moment when, after properly incubating, I’ll feel like birthing something.
Actually, I kinda feel like shit today… have been for weeks now, but ever the trooper, I keep trying to make some semblance of cheer (thinking like the rest of the world that if I paste that smile on, that I’ll become convinced that I’m a happy camper), even though I’ve stalled big time on just about everything. A moratorium of feeling… uncomfortably numb.
I’ve felt that if I pulled out my art materials, without getting my other (read: more important) duties done (like the 2007 taxes, for instance) that I’d get major stink-eye. But… fuck it, you know? It’ll all get done sooner or later, and the place is quiet (well, except for some Sarah McLachlin streaming from my iMac), and I’ve burned some incense and smudged the whole blessed place in an effort to get the sticky energy flowing…
So… here’s the start… it’s for my December Chapbook collaboration project. The Camus quote was a sort of springboard, if you will, for the concept of the piece… the return of light amidst the darkness… all that.
The sheets will get cut up into 5.5″ x 8″ ‘pieces’ which I’ll work on some more (read: attach things to… paint some more… and since it’s “wintery” stuff, stick some fake glitter-snow on).
We’ve returned from our exploratory trip to British Columbia. For ten days we stayed with my friend Cindy and her family in her home in Chilliwack. Chilliwack, other than it being a 70’s band’s namesake, also happens to be a beautiful little town in the Fraser River Valley.
Chilliwack is crowned by a ring of snowcapped mountains. Other than the first couple of days, which were rainy, the weather behaved itself quite nicely for most of the rest of our visit, the clouds breaking up to provide bouts of sunshine-y goodness for our enjoyment.
The city center is like many modern day small town centers – always in the process of being re-vitalized but never quite making it back to its former (and rightly due) splendor. We walked up and down along one of the main downtown arteries, Wellington Ave., where many of the town center shots for the television series Eureka are filmed. The filming crew apparently shuts a segment of the street down to vehicular traffic though they allow foot traffic through the set in between shoots. Unfortunately, we were unable to witness the amazing transformation of “Main St.” as they were not filming any episodes during our visit.
We did, however, get acquainted with the wonderful used bookstore The Book Man, and its friendly red tabby cat. The bookstore is purportedly a favorite stop for the cast and crew of Eureka in between takes, and I can certainly understand its appeal. There were aisle upon aisles of books in all manner of disciplines, and a few little nooks and crannies with comfortable seating in which to test drive your finds. Your warm lap is all that’s needed in order to entice the shop’s feline companion to sit a spell with you. While in town during this visit, we also happened upon a hobby stop on Mill Street, where Gabriel picked out a couple of model airplane kits to build. The owner also graciously allowed Gabriel and Christel to drive a couple of slot cars around a most impressive track (that he built himself), which takes center stage in the small shop. There are modest expansion plans in the near future, involving the tearing down of some walls for additional space.
On the Saturday after our arrival, we took a walk down a snowy trail to the shores of Chilliwack Lake, which was partially frozen. The boys found much amusement in tossing rocks, large and small, onto the lake’s frozen surface, as well as breaking off chunks of ice and hurling the pieces onto the lake.
It was cool outside but not terribly so, and with the sun out we were quite comfortable. We drove back along the road some and stopped along a river. Cindy had packed a cooler for a picnic, and after toiling for a while to get a fire going in one of the grates at one of the picnic areas, we finally roasted some hot dogs and marshmallows.
We went home smelling of fresh air and firewood. My mom used to say that if they figured out a way to bottle the scent of coffee, she would wear it as a perfume. I feel much the same way about the smoky scent of a wood fire.
On another visit into the town center, Cindy and I had lunch and tea at Apeldoorn’s on Mill Street. This quaint little tearoom served up a variety of tea brews as well as a three-tiered tower of crustless finger sandwiches and sweet treats. We picked the Vicar’s Blend and Earl Grey Cream for our tea selections… both were delicious. We arrived after noon and it was still bustling with clientele, almost all of the tables were filled as guests took their turns at sampling and sipping the fare.
During this particular visit, Cindy and I also stepped into some of the little gift shops along Wellington St. and I was able to find some souvenirs to bring back for family and friends. Our final stop was at Klassic European Deli, a deli specializing in … you guessed it … European goods. We picked up some coldcuts, breads, specialty chocolates and cookies and a half dozen Kinder Eggs, which apparently American children are too stupid to eat without choking on the small parts, so they don’t sell them here and it is Gabriel’s personal mission to consume as many of them as possible while we visit Canada. We soon discovered that all the meats and breads were very tasty as we made sandwiches using our newly purchased foods for dinner that evening.
Cindy and her husband Alex are both very fortunate to be able to find employment in the job sectors which hire in Chilliwack, and are able to make quite a decent living to boot. Many inhabitants, though, appear to commute to other areas, including all the way to Vancouver. Perhaps as the economy perks up, so will the business opportunities mount in the outlying areas. I went for a job interview into Vancouver and it took us two hours to get to the far end of West Vancouver (by UBC) with access to the carpool lane. I figure it would take another half hour, at the least, to scale that distance driving solo. I personally think that would constitute a form of self-torture… if I find work in Vancouver, we’ll be living a lot closer to the city… or in the city.
On the day of our Vancouver visit, we also stopped at Granville Island, had some clam chowder, salmon burgers and fish ‘n chips for lunch, and walked around a bit.
The market is huuuuuge, not that you would notice it being so from the outside. We were originally planning to visit Stanley Park as well, but it was getting to the middle of the afternoon and we were worried about getting stuck in rush hour traffic, so we decided to leave. We were all feeling a bit under the weather anyway.
We had all sorts of other plans to execute during our visit, but one of Cindy’s kid’s got sick… and then the other… and then I started feeling it and Gabriel as well… and then both Alex and Cindy… so the snowboarding trip that we’d originally planned on with the kids was abandoned, as was the Harrison Hot Springs visit. Ah well… next time.
It felt good to be “home”… I hadn’t set foot on Canadian soil since departing from my mother’s funeral in 2003. It’s been a long time, and I had felt that without my parents being alive anymore, that there wouldn’t be much incentive for me to return to live there. Oddly, I felt at peace there. It did feel like home, even if it wasn’t the same coast that I grew up on. Strangers smile and greet you when you walk by them in the street. Even though there is a limited population, I got to speak French on several occasions, both in Vancouver and in Chilliwack.
This will probably sound like weird “woo-woo” stuff, but I am sensitive to the vibes of the different places that I pass through. Even though I like the feel of L.A. (and it’s immensely different from the vibe here in the O.C., which is where we live), I really liked how Chilliwack and Vancouver felt (they were each, in turn, different). I’m looking forward to the change… to the move… to the new adventure… to coming ’round full circle… to going home.
“Aha-phrodisiacs:
Use Sidney Sheldon’s book title, The Stars Shine Down, as your title for poetry, prose, journal entry, collage, doodling, drawing with your eyes closed, or rambling out loud in a random stream of consciousness…”
from The Awe-Manac: a Daily Dose of Wonder, by Jill Badonsky
Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya
om–O my Lord; namah–my respectful obeisances unto You; bhagavate–unto the Personality of Godhead; vasudevaya–unto Lord Krsna, the son of Vasudeva.
TRANSLATION
O my Lord, the all-pervading Personality of Godhead, I offer my respectful obeisances unto You. (SB: C4:8-54)
While many young people visited India in person, I merely joined an ashram in Montreal midway through my first year of college (hence only completing a quarter of the fine art program). Somehow, at the time, that had sounded like “the right thing to do.” I imagine I would have gotten a whole lot more out of the actual experience of living in India as opposed to being immersed into their philosophies in a culture that thought white women wearing saris had been brainwashed by some cult (while the folks at the ashram thought that 18 year old young women would be safest married off to like-minded young eligible brahmacharyas from the men’s (read: boy’s) ashram). The thought of someone else picking my mate seemed like an anathema to me. Besides… I hadn’t done that yet, and I wanted to do it with someone of my own choosing… someone who I had some kind of chemistry with. Really, I wanted to be a gopi and just be one of Krishna’s consorts. Now Krishna… he was something! I even found his skin color scintillating… ahhh… how I wished I could be his Radha.
As most 18 year olds are wont to do, I left after about 6 months, to pursue the next thing that felt like “the right thing to do.” I took with me, though, some philosophies that remained with me and continue to influence my perception of the world. While most people finished their higher education, found mates and started families, I was busy trying to figure out the purpose of my existence… and humanity’s as a whole, essentially. Can’t say that I’ve definitively figured that one out, but I do feel a whole lot more comfortable with my place in the whole… though that may not be saying much… LOL And I still think that Krishna is hot.
It seems odd to me how after having spent so much time together, that we could be such strangers in the end. All that I’d shared about the nuances of who I am, over the years, you never took notice of. I wonder if you’ll remember the smell of my hair or the texture of my skin – its color and freckled bumps. Will you remember what made me smile and what made me weep… what touched my soul? Will you remember my stories… the ones that made me who I am? The molestations and the rape and the broken relationships and the drugs? Will you remember my relentless search for who I am… searching for the soul within the body you made love to at first and then later fucked, once you didn’t find me worthy of your love? Will you remember your own stories of who I was, the ones deduced as though a story could be understood simply by looking at the dust jacket of a book? The Reader’s Digest condensed version, abbreviated into what my relevant parts are, with you as editor.
Today, as I write this, I will allow myself to indulge in self-pity for a moment or two. It proves that I am still human, I suppose. I weep for all of the times I’ve shared parts of myself that were not cherished… were not even acknowledged. I weep for the sorrow I feel at the realization that I may never trust another with all that I have shared of myself with you. And what a waste it has been… the little pieces of me dropped into the palm of your hand so trustingly, set aside without being examined or treasured… so much junk, cluttering up your space.
Ahh… the eternal question, especially since I’ve been off of work. It’s actually a two-part query… “Have you looked for work?” and “Did you work on the taxes?” But the “What did you do today?” is understood to comprise both of those nuances. Being equally obtuse in my reply, I’ll outline key points of my day, but never being specific. Then the conversation will either continue on to my getting berated for my lackadaisical attitude toward the all important chore of getting the tax papers compiled so that we can give them to the tax guy to prepare the filings, or I’ll just get “the look” which will tell me the same thing without any words, and if I squint through the process, I can sometimes pretend that it wasn’t cast my way.
In the meantime, I look at the passing of time and am both aghast at how quickly it passes, and how difficult it is for me to get much of anything done. I am managing to do things… little things… small steps toward the completion of things. I’m cooking meals almost every night. That takes time and focus… and it ties my attention for long enough to keep from having to think about other things. Cutting, slicing and dicing vegetables becomes a sort of meditation, and gives me moments of zen-like respite from the rest of the chatter that is going on inside my head. For all of the berating I get from external sources, I get an equal if not greater amount from myself.
–stopping to transfer a load of clean clothes from the washer into the dryer–
My son is a boy of absolutes… he speaks in terms of “always” or “never” … there doesn’t seem to be a sense of greyness in his perceptions… it’s either black or white, but never a mixture of both. I wonder if I was that way, and if that develops later on, when we have had some time to experience our own sense of greyness of the Self. For a good stretch, when I was working and spent at the end of the day, and we’d go to eat at restaurants a lot it was “We always eat out…” or “You never cook at home.” And there’s still the “You never do laundry.”
Obviously, that is largely exaggerated… otherwise we’d be running around nekkid, or our clothes would take on lives of their own and walk themselves into the washing machine. I wonder, sometimes, whether he’ll remember how fiercely I love and cherish him, or whether his recollections of his childhood will mostly be focused on my inadequacies as a caretaker, and the fact that he’d have to hoard his (dirty) jeans, weeks at a time, because I didn’t launder them often enough?
Will he remember that I took the time and money to create special excursions for us… to play tourists in the environs… stays at The Roosevelt and The Chateau Marmont in Hollywood… tidepool and shell gathering trips to the beaches… on sketch crawls through the L.A. Zoo and Union Station and Olvera Street… and multitudes of wondrous meals in equally wondrous restaurants, where his fabulously refined palate that I spoke of several weeks ago was honed?
Well… I’ll tell you what I’ve done so far… I’ve laundered several loads of clothes… I’ve sent emails to the school regarding the upcoming Western Canada visit (and Gabriel missing school during that time), and an email to one of his teachers in whose classes (he has two subjects with her) Gabriel got F’s in, asking for some input on current progress and how to remedy the situation. I’ve emptied out the trash bin on the balcony and refurbished it with a new bag. I’ve had breakfast (a shake) and prepared a pot of coffee and drank a cup. I’ve put some sweats on. I’ve sprayed carpet cleaner on the rug where it got stained (so, in regard to my “experiment” from my last post… didn’t stain the mattress, but didn’t quite make it to the bathroom in time, either). I read an article in Cookie Magazine entitled Louder Than Bombs by Susan Gregory Thomas, and cried. I’ve pulled the bag containing the jumble of receipts that need sorting through for tax preparation purposes and have put it on the dining room table.
Well… that’s about it for now. I have other things on my to-do list today. Sign up for the EDD website thingie… drive with Gabriel over to meet Bonnie at the theatre to go see a movie… coordinate some bill payments. Work some more on my chapbook (collaborative project) pages. Meditate for a little bit, if I can manage to shut out the brain chatter for long enough to calm down and find my center… if I can get to my center, which is soft and molten and hurting, and is surrounded by a prickly shell, just before you get to the middle of me.
Many of us try to do our part environmentally. Several years ago I heard of the plight of the South Central Farmers, struggling to maintain their hold on the 14-acre plot of land in the most concrete of jungles, South Central L.A. The 14-acre South Central Farm once was the heart of a poor, mainly Latino community and fed 350+ families, until a developer was allowed to bulldoze it to erect a bunch of storage warehouses.
I continue to be floored by the notion that the United States is looked upon by the world as a leading force in assisting third world countries to develop their own sustainable food sources, while a perfect and operating example of this model within the country is razed in favor of big business. The Garden, a documentary movie chronicling the journey to save the farm, has been nominated for an Academy Award, and the trailer can be viewed here.
Now… on being a Diva… if you are squeamish about “woman’s issues” (and I don’t mean the bra burning kind and groaning about glass ceilings and such), stop reading here, because I’m about to go into some detail about “feminine” products. Earlier this month I decided to see if I could stop supporting the disposable feminine product market, into which (pardon the pun) I flush hundreds of dollars annually… and am still struggling to keep from staining my mattress rather regularly.
SO… with that in mind, I picked up a product that has been around for a while but which I looked at rather skeptically, wondering how its usage could be practically applied to my life. It’s called The Diva Cup… it comes in two sizes… pre- and post-pregnancy. I can tell you that it was a smidgen pricey… about four 20-pack boxes of tampons’ worth pricey… but if it will allow me to sleep through the night without having to worry about accidents, it will, to my mind, be worth the investment. The experiment has begun… I’ll keep you posted…
It’s odd how even though you know that a relationship is over, being in the throes of the last dying vestiges of it are still difficult. There is this immense sense of failure and along with it an equally intense sadness… not for what is ending but for what it could have been… its lost potential. So it is firmly rooted in this emotion that I took down the Christmas tree this morning.
I’d been putting off… not that I don’t normally take forever to do it anyway, but it was a thing that I was ruing even as it was being put up. That moment was poignant in itself, each of the three of us knowing that it was the last time that we would be sharing this type of moment together. In years past, especially the last several, only Gabriel and I participated in decking out the tree with ornaments, so I was somewhat surprised (though pleased) that Steve decided to join in.
It’s been many months of “lasts” since we’d had our discussion about finally and irrevocably ending our relationship. I’m not yet sure whether this whole drawn out process is good or not. As with the deaths of my parents, my mother’s was sudden and my father’s was not (though it was not horribly drawn out, either), in both cases there was still an incredible sense of loss at the end, and a time of mourning, and though the process differed somewhat in both, the end was the same and equally painful and left me bereft. Perhaps this longer mourning period is good. Perhaps the opportunity to say goodbye to each familial habit… to notice it and remember it, in all of its facets, and then let it go… is a good thing.
I haven’t really spoken to Gabriel about this whole digestion process. I don’t know if he’s doing it as well, or whether we will get to the end of our time together and he will find it difficult to cope with the sudden change. Again the sense of failure engulfs me… and an accompanying guilt. I’ve done the best I could to sort out this mess, with little help and support. I often wonder whether Steve’s inaction was something I should have paid attention to a long time ago… whether that was my cue to stop trying too, because no matter what I did after that point, it wouldn’t make a difference in the end result.
I am grateful, though, for the learning process it provided. I’ve learned that I am a lot more tenacious than I thought I was… that I can think on my feet and find solutions to things that seem imponderable… that I really do love myself, even though I’ve spent so many years denying myself my own affections, simply because I thought others deserved them more.
There was a knock on my door a few moments ago, and a package dropped on my doormat. I opened it just now and see that it is a holiday gift from my friend Rita, who I’d not been able to connect with over the holidays but to whom I’d sent by way of Bonnie her gift from me. Again… I am overcome with emotion. Just last night, as I lay in bed contemplating the ache in my neck and shoulders, and feeling needy for a kind and gentle rub on the back (you know… the kind your mom used to give you to comfort you… slow, circular, right over the heart chakra area on your back, and just firm enough to soothe away the aches of the body and the soul), I thought it would be wonderful to get a massage (that I can’t afford right now, and haven’t had in ages). And… as I opened my gift, I saw that it contained a little sachet-ful of body care goodies, and a gift card to a women’s dayspa (where, incidentally, I used to work as a massage therapist before I went back to full-timing it behind a computer screen). I am so very lucky, because even though I can’t seem to maintain a relationship with a man, my friendships are golden.
I know, I know… it sounds nutty as a fruitcake (that’s what I get for living here in California for over a decade and a half)… but I really can feel something… shifting.
It’s not a bad thing… shifts… changes… they are inevitable and essentially good things, if taken in stride. They say that the best way to keep from drowning is to not fight the current but to surrender to its flow.
I got a request the other day from someone I used to work with for a psychic reading, and the query had to do with finding a new job. Funny how that works, seeing that I, too, am currently unemployed, and doing much flailing around in the sense of trying to figure out, once again, what direction to go in, career-wise.
I suggested the following things to her…
The Law of Attraction pulls toward you more of the stuff that you are ‘pinging’ strongly emotionally… so if you are feeling needful/needy, anger and frustration, the universe will give you more of the same. If your greatest emotion is “need” (as in “I need another job NOW”) the situations that will manifest around you will continue to sustain that “needful” state of being.
So… I got this little meditation from one of my weekly “feel-good” subscriptions, and thought that it might help you in turning some of the energy around that you are carrying within you… perhaps by doing so, the universe will conspire to fulfill your heart’s desires…
Chet Day presentsEarthLeaves MeditationsMore Musings on Letting Go for Peace of MindJanuary 24, 2009
For this week’s meditation, as we so often do, we’llagain work with a wonderful Zen saying…
The water a cow laps turns into milk. Thewater a snake licks changes into poison.
Think about this one for a few seconds.
Then take three or four deep breaths, pausing for amoment between inhalations and exhalations.
As soon as you’re centered and focused, breathe inyour innate instinct and ability to be kind toothers.
Hold that kindness for a few seconds before exhaling.Savor it.
Oh, that’s nice. The thought of being kind is so nice.
Now exhale… and as your breath leaves, let go of anypoisonous thoughts or memories you may be holdingonto.
Letting that negativity go is nice, too, isn’t it?
And that’s how you can be like a cow who turns waterinto milk instead of like a snake who turns it intovenom.
Neat, eh?
Until next week,Chet
Chet DayEditor, EarthLeaves Meditations
I can also suggest a “releasing ceremony” to release your old job and make room for something better and more suited to what you want. In gratitude, write down in your own words the things which are good that this job has brought you and then say something like “I am now ready to release this job so it may be replaced with one that provides greater prosperity and _________________ (inserting whatever you wish this new job to bring you–be specific and clear–and be careful what you wish for… LOL!).
Put on some nice quiet/relaxing music. Light a small candle (can be a tealight… preferably white… always in a fire and heat resistant container), have a deep (fireproof) ceramic or cast iron container handy, light a stick of incense, and sit for a while in meditation, starting with some deep belly breaths, nice and slow and deliberate… in through the nose, out through the mouth.
Next, visualize your tailbone extending like a root deep into the center of the earth, and wrapping around its core. Imagine the heat from the core of the earth rising like a beam of white light, up through the roots and into your tailbone area, lovingly nurturing and energizing you as it moves upward through your central core, stopping to clear your perineal area, and moving upward into your pelvic area, then the area just above your belly button, where you would feel butterflies when you are nervous, then your heart area, then your throat, then up to your third eye area on your forehead, just above the area between your two eyes, and finally up through the top of your head… imagine the beam of light going higher and higher up into the universe, until it meets with Source.
Feel this connection, and now imagine a flow of energy from Source, flowing back down this beam of light and bringing with it love and a great sense of peace. Feel the Source energy expand so that it grows to cover all of your body and several feet beyond it, as if you were in a light shower that flows over you and around you and through you, and see it clearing away all of your worries… all of the dis-ease that you may have within your body/mind/spirit, cleansing and clearing as it moves through. Keep breathing deeply, into the belly, in through the nose, out through the mouth, slowly and deliberately.
Finally, focus back on visualizing your release from your old job and see yourself in your new one, doing what you want to be doing, even visualizing your big pay check and how good that makes you feel… safe and secure and confident. After you’ve comfortably secured your visualization in your mind, and feel calm and peaceful, roll up your note and pass it through the candle flame and place it into the fireproof pot or dish. Let the whole thing burn to ash, re-lighting it as necessary until it is all consumed by fire.
Leave the candle to burn until it burns itself out (a couple of hours, probably… make sure not to leave it unattended). Take the cooled ashes and bury them outside in the ground. I hope this helps, in some small way.
To let you know… I did this ceremony months ago, and steady movement has been occurring since… the tipping point was getting let go from my job at the beginning of the month. This has created a space of sorts, and if well orchestrated, will manifest into something that Paolo Coelho calls my Personal Legend. Time to sit down and listen to what the heart says, as we all know that nature abhors a vacuum, and when there is an empty space, it will get filled with something… preferably with something of my own making, as opposed to something random.
My friend Bonnie picked Gabriel and me up today and treated us to a wonderful excursion to a local phenomenon called The Anti-Mall, which is actually a two-part (The Camp and The Lab) outdoor shopping experience separated by a boulevard.
We ate at a restaurant called the Old Vine Café (click on photo above to visit their website), which has a very good lunch menu (and they serve breakfast ’til 3PM!), though we did have to wait for quite a while for a table for three inside. It was worth the wait, though, as the food was delicious. We shared the Baby Spinach Salad (
After sharing a couple of fabulous desserts, a lovely creamy creme brulé (which isn’t listed on their online menu) and the Cheese Mousse Crepe (S
We discovered a cache of shops on the other side, and I found a pair of convertible fingerless-gloves-come-mittens at Urban Outfitters perfect for my upcoming trip to Western Canada. The eco-theme was prevalent here too, making use of the “recycle-reuse” genre, with many found-object amalgamations, including a really cool mosaic divider wall.
After a leisurely walking tour of the place, we left for our final destination, the Mitsuwa Market Place, which is a few blocks away. I was surprised to see such a huge array of Japanese shops inside the nondescript building, which housed everything from a grocery store to stationery and book shops to toy vendors. I marvel, always, at the
Japanese esthetic, and their ability to marry form and function with such poetic sensibility.
My artsy fartsy side was quite thrilled as well as I scored a European style clip dispenser and a box of clip refills, which I’d almost ordered ages ago from an overseas source in Germany, but balked when the shipping cost was going to cost more than the actual items I wanted to purchase. I was thrilled that I could now use those funky little clips pulled off of documents received from some of the foreign associates I’d dealt with over time but couldn’t make use of because I didn’t have the gizmo to attach them with. I left with a bagful of warm, roasted chestnuts for the drive home. Bonnie is my favorite adventuress to go exploring with… I am grateful to have met her through a previous workplace and more grateful still that we are friends.
It’s a mystery to me, this time-space thing. While I can organize my workspace (rather compulsively, I might add) into a masterful example of feng-shui-ness, no matter how much stuff there is to organize, and I can spatially organize the flow of an art piece by tapping into some inherent sixth sense, I can’t seem to find my way around the neighborhood without getting ‘lost’ and the concept of time has never quite sunk in.
You know… like when I wake up in the morning and say that I’ll make breakfast but it’s about two hours later before everyone is munching on their eggs and potatoes, simply because it took me so long to stow the clean dishes from the dishwasher and reload the dirty ones from the sink… wash the pans I need to cook with… clean the coffee filter and rinse out the carafe, pour fresh water into the machine, grind coffee and put it into the rinsed filter and turn the coffee machine on so it can brew a new pot… take out the eggs, potatoes, onion, shallots, parsley, spices and ghee and crack, chop, slice, peel, dice, beat, stir, sauté and fold a meal into submission.
I’ve been uploading book titles onto Shelfari over the last couple of days… Steve remarked that I must really be bored to be wasting my time on such trivialities… you know, it’s just another one of those compulsive urges, see? I have lots of books. So many, in fact, that I’ve lost track of which ones I have and by virtue of this seemingly meaningless exercise have discovered that I have quite a few duplicates (and I’m not even done with the whole lot of them). So far I have 879 books on my virtual bookshelf. My only wish is that I live long enough to read every single one.
Soooo many books, soooo little time. More time now, that I am currently unemployed, and I have certainly been using this time to catch up on my reading. And being terrible with the space-time thing, but quite capable of reading multiple books at the same time, I am currently reading the following books:
And so that leaves… over 870 (and then some) more to go…
I’ve also discovered, by virtue of this uploading and cataloguing on Shelfari, that not only is my taste pretty consistent, it is so much so that I have not once but sometimes twice purchased the same books. I have a few duplicates, which I am thinking of offering up for postage costs… as you may have witnessed from my book shelf, my tastes are rather –er– eclectic. 
Will post the titles later.
Another year on the odometer of my life just clicked today. I spent the day cataloguing my books… avoidance tactics, I’m sure, but pleasing to me nonetheless. I figured I could at least gift myself with time, and to do with it what I wanted to, on this day of non-celebration. Pomodoro cooked tonight… Steve paid.
This image kept popping up on one of the web pages, and I thought it a fitting portrayal of how I feel at the moment. Looking ahead toward a horizon that stretches before me, standing somewhat uncertainly at its shores, but determined to move forward to claim the good that awaits.
