A Project: Dancing with the Resistance

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I have written about the power of introverts, and solitude being an important aspect of creativity…and in the last several months have realized the necessity of ongoing project to my mental health. Now that the paintings of 100 Hot Flash Women are almost done--the project that got me through the last 3 years of working in health care--I’m ready for another.

And Then She Left: Another History Hanging

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Maturity? I used to think I had to be the Best, in order to make anything I did worthwhile. Now I am more often content to do the best I can at the moment…working on my skills keeps me going. I have learned to overcome my rectitude sufficiently to give lectures to crowds, teach, meet new patients. I can reach a large audience via computer.

Graphic Grannie Journal...family pictures, material for ART.

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I believe that I will do more writing for public consumption, and obviously I am keeping my Brand alive by posting in all these places, but not quite ready yet to do, redo my Doll Making as a Transformative Process book. Maybe I’ll post it a chapter at a time on Barb Kobe’s healing and transformative dolls site. Yes, being asked to do a TED talk is still one of my goals, but I’m not in any hurry to pin down the topic yet…slowly flowing. Brain Pickings today emphasizes how we are never the same person from one moment to the next, as much as we would like to think so, and therefore to plan for our “Golden” years, when we will be different people from when we are working and saving is problematic. 

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-->The end of my health care job has brought a luxury of time. This is the season of Long Light, and I got lost in the book, ANNABELLE, the way one does also in the season of Long Dark. It’s maybe the season of my life, like childhood, with no particular obligations or productivity markers, that allows me to float, until I find my mooring. My own self-directed masters program, is learning visual computer programs and reading work by those I admire. I work small and flat for compact storage, enjoying the Process and not expecting or needing Sales to validate my labor.

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My love for collage and affinity for editing--the act of choosing, arranging, writing, thinking…sitting and sewing and realizing that in the attention I put into the work, the time and sweat and molecules imbue the finished product with bits of my Self…the stories of my life and my family’s. It’s important to trust my instincts wherever they may lead, not pre-limit myself.

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Computers: The frustration of knowing enough to be dangerous, but not enough to be facile…my new course of study. AND I have to start spending my time making things that don’t take up too much space to store or cost too much to make. Making is a part of who I perceive myself to be, and I now have the luxury to follow that path.

The cross-country trip: spend the time, my legacy to myself…mothering myself.

Shown Above: Anne Arthur, my 94th Hot Flash Woman Portrait, Pages from my Graphic Grannie sketchbook, playing with images of my family and me, the just-finished quilt that started as a Mexican Thanksgiving tablecloth and was just quilted by Joyce Duarte...USE THE GOOD STUFF! Treat Yourself Well.