Tag: life

100

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Over three months ago I started a project I wanted to try for a long time. Concluding one job and beginning another, getting over being pretty sick, and trying to anchor the beginning of my day with something other than dread and doom-scrolling, I followed some advice about deliberately creating joyful experiences. My method, my medium has been watercolor paint and 4”x6” heavy, cotton paper each morning before breakfast with coffee mug nearby. Painting isn’t a new endeavor for me, but putting these restrictions, or what I prefer to think of as simplifications, gave me enough wind and sail to propel me.

So what did I paint? Abstracts, landscapes, bouquets, trees, produce, and single flowers. I learned that being a beginner is a wide open field of opportunity. Skill and technique really come with practice. I might have learned this lesson better as a ten year old practicing the piano, but I’m a stubborn git and prefer when it’s my idea and not imposed on me. Mom, Dad, just be glad I eventually got there.

I learned that I have a quiet place I can go in my heart and my head that shuts out the noise just for a bit. I learned that the colors you think are right and the colors that make it better are often outside the obvious. I learned that the paper is part of my palette, that water has a mind of its own, and the blow dryer is really handy when you’re running on a tight schedule.

I also re-learned something about myself that apparently I have trouble believing. I’ve got grit and stick-to-it-iveness. I can do the things I set out for myself to do.

If we’re lucky, we get to add 100 more days after this one. Whether we do something or not this time will pass. Why not be a beginner at something? Or why not get better at something you already do? What would you like to be better at? What are you willing to give 20-30 minutes of every day toward? Would you learn something new about yourself?

A Part

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I have this part of me that developed when I was a little girl. She’s the part of me that decided instead of being reactive to unexpected hurt (Mom’s going to the hospital. Mom’s getting an apartment and not coming home. Our parents are splitting. Here’s this new lady Daddy likes and spends time with. Your home is broken. Get used to this new normal, which isn’t.) she was going to be preemptive. Imagine every possible worse case scenario, worry about it, worry about even the most inexplicably random, improbable things because, you just never know. You didn’t think your family would fall apart and it did. Why wouldn’t it be possible that you would be a coked out homeless teenager in New York City–heck even Nancy Reagan was warning you it might happen. It’s very much a child’s logic and yet, that part of me has played a large part in my adult life. It doesn’t help when the worst case scenario is realized as it was with Bryan’s illness. It reinforces that thinking.

But here I am navigating the world as a single adult and doing so with some moderately measurable amounts of success. I open the pickle jars on my own. I changed a lightbulb in the laundry room yesterday evening. I’m having a neighbor build me a fence that has been long overdue. Problems arrive and I tackle them with maybe some frustration occasionally that I have to, but then I do it. Some items on my to-do list have taken longer for me than maybe I’d have preferred, but I did those too. I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m trying to persuade the childlike part of me who deals with heavy big feels and worry that actually my track record in facing hard things as a grown-up is pretty good. And while I appreciate the fierce determination this little person inside has to protect me, it hurts more than my simply dealing with things as they come.

I’m a pretty creative person. I paint and garden and bake and write and I have an imagination that is rich, vivid, and detailed. This is so much fun when it is. And scary as all heck when a childlike skillset utiizes a big, adult brain. Yowza! I’m trying to be soft and appreciative to this part and to let her know I’m the grown-up in the equation now and I’ve got this. It’s okay. You did your job, but I’ve got the wheel.

You

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It is very easy to go dark, dark in thoughts, dark in attitudes, dark in words. The pull is strong. In this place, self-doubt, anxiety, worry, heartache, shame, all bubble up. I’m no stranger to this place. I’ve not just been a tourist there; I’ve taken up residence there. It’s not my favorite place to live. Usually, I fight like hell to get out and stay far away from it. One of the constant refrains on the loudspeaker in this place is the lie that those feelings are deserved, earned. Self-worth is questioned. Purpose is ridiculed. I write this as a love letter to anyone who has been in this place and to myself, too…

One of the things I love most about my time working at a liberal arts college is the emphasis on interdisciplinary learning. How there are things to gather from diverse places to create a more rounded out picture. Its a way of thinking that I dabble in and enjoy quite a bit. Recently, I had dinner with a dear childhood friend. We talked about a number of things not the least of which were our respective preferred art forms–writing for him, painting for me. We all have a voice to share and our internal editors can hamper it. Living in that dark place can also hamper it. I recalled a song from our childhood–“This Little Light of Mine.” As much as the modern world would like to say we’re all the same and not special or unique, I would disagree. Are we better than? No. But do we have things unique to ourselves to offer the world. Absolutely. And I believe the purpose of this life is to connect with others, to weave bonds of life–thought and emotion–and ultimately to love. We do this with our own “little lights.”

My husband was a big fan of Crosby, Stills, and Nash. Their music featured largely in our home. It’s not lost on me the humor and delight that countercultural music from the 1960s would echo a sentiment from my Sabbath School class. “I Almost Cut My Hair” has a line “I feel like letting my freak flag fly” and later “I feel like I owe it to someone.” By being you, you give space for others to be themselves. “Hiding it under a bushell (aka large basket)” serves no one, not you, not the greater world.

Whether you believe in a Divine entity who created us or that we are the product of minute changes over millenia–stardust that has become self-aware–or some combination thereof, the end result is we’re here now and that fact is pretty damned amazing. And that we won’t be for very long means there’s no cutting corners, or skimping, or hiding under a bushel. Your “muchness” (thank you Tim Burton’s 2010 Alice in Wonderland), my “muchness”, are desperately needed, for connection, for the sake of all. You are worthy. You have purpose. Bad things and feelings are just part and parcel to a rich life full of every facet of the human experience. Your little light, your freak flag, your muchness are your superpowers and we need them.