To Infinity and Beyond

Change can take the course of many seasons, not all of which are named "Change" on the timeline of life.  I'm recognizing a lot of seasons of change are actually undefined.

 Change is actually the everyday average.

Change can't be ordered by the church calendars, social calendars or even monthly calendars.  

Life has it's ways and it does what it will.  

My birthday was this week.  

I'm not "there" yet.

I'm 35, but not really.  I don't feel 35 and I don't fit the chart of what 35 is "supposed" to be.  And word is on the streets that a lot of other people out there don't really identify with this number.  Whatever particular number it is they are assigned at any given time.

We aren't numbers.  But we are numbers.  It sometimes feels like we are weights and measures at all times.  

These measures start before birth.  We're categorized before we take our first breath on a myriad of different charts in our modern world...We're supposed to be the size of a pea and then an orange and now an eggplant.  Dear God, what if at our scheduled checkups we're more a cantaloupe?

Where does it end?

Yeah, I know there's logic and reason to it and all these values are sometimes necessary for analyzing and identifying some successes and growth.  And maybe using an in utero example is asking for upset or confusion in the house.  But truly,  expectations of who we are supposed to be and look like at specific given times start at a very early age.  

What about when these measures aren't necessary?

What about when you're 35 but you're not?  Not according to the charts, anyway.

There seem to be charts somewhere for what every age is supposed to look like.  I respect the established theories of human development, but that's not even what I'm really talking about.  I'm talking about the real people inside those charts.

What if the really gifted stay 3 in some ways forever?  Who is to say?  There are some really articulate, skilled, generous 3 year olds out there who are good judges of character with astounding problem-solving skills wrapped in an unassuming, fair delivery!  I'd say I've experienced some pretty educated, yet warped, 65 year olds who consider themselves quite evolved.  

What are these more elusive but strictly governed charts of civilized life?   Maybe the charts are all wrong! 

I don't know.  I'm not a scientist. I'm not a psychologist (you can take a deep breath of relief, and just enjoy now,right?)  I'm not even a philosopher.  I'm nobody really.  I'm just this woman, in transition from one place to another.  Hopefully, I guess.

Does it mean I am striving to achieve an accepted "After" or box to fit into by majority rule?  

Maybe not anymore.

I don't know the way time will change me, or if I will have any impact on time.  I think it will; I think I will.  But I can't assume, these days, even if I strive and strive and strive from now until my last breath in material form.  I have thrown many years of heart and soul into personal advancements, most of which have not yet come to be.

All I know is that this too shall pass.  

And there is so much more to living and to thriving and being successful as a human even if I stay my version of 35 for the rest of my days.

I feel like I live in a world of "before" and "afters."  The internet is filled with them.   They get lots and lots of likes. I never quite find the place I fit. And I always have this feeling I don't really have the approval of people around me.  I never quite land on a reference point. And I feel very alone.   

The idea I encounter is, "If you worked harder you'd be somewhere you're not now."  
"If you only had more focus, more fortitude, more industry....you'd be here or here or here where we expect you to want to be and where we might consider accepting you."

And how does everyone know that's where you want and need to be?  Charts.  

Whose charts are these?  Where did they originate?   If we stop and really think about it do we even know or care where the damn charts are even leading most of the time?  There are more to charts, like the intricacies of the lived experience going on within and around us.  The details matter.   

Instead, success is often viewed through deadlines, appearances, solid locations. Boxes.

Lame gauges.  Nobody is really paying attention.

I feel as if I haven't reached many of the places and measures society seems to expect of me. 

 More organic truth holders exist, perhaps, if we go looking for those groups or those signifiers.  But more middle ground feels scary.  It's not so certain.  Middle ground can go so many different ways and directions.  It's open and unpredictable, left to interpretation.  So we dress ourselves up in Before and Afters, even though we clearly aren't rockin' in.  

Things fit too small or too big.  We cram ourselves into places and positions, or on the flip side, we get lost in the space around us.  Lonely, wandering, in a void.  

We aren't before's and afters, friends!   We're transitioners.  We're changers.  We're journeying. 

It's freaking hard sometimes!  It can be challenging to make "hard/struggle" look good or approachable unless it's " Hollywood." Dressed up.  A little bit removed from the average. Often, real hard stuff has to be gussied and smoothed over to be looked at. And and the world will barely accept hearing about it even from the most academically educated researchers.

So the chances this blog post will make a difference or be heard are slim, but I write it anyway, because it's my birthday (damit)  I'm celebrating!  I put it out there to try connect with and understand life better.  

I think the truth is that what is average is plain hard.   The real average holds a place for what is different.

And I want to own my average proudly.

I want to celebrate my change.

 My Life. My Not Here or There.

The unboxed, unprocessed process of my days.  

The good and the ugly. The beauty and pain of it.  

All I have to offer you is my average and I give you my all.  

Windblown, muddy and a bit tattered from life on the trail.

Sun drenched, sprouting, filled with color off the charts.

It is my life and it is enough.

Forever enough...and beyond.

Where Do We Go From Here?

I walk into my therapist's office and have no problem talking for 2 hours straight.  We barely get past a formal greeting some sessions before I'm ready to dive headlong into the preceding week.  And stories.  I have lots of stories.   They go everywhere and with so many characters in them.  The "regulars" and the people I never saw coming.  Old and new encounters.  Some from my dreams, some from nightmares.  

There's just so much to say!  So much I've experienced and learned and am puzzled by.  Life is overflowing with thoughts and emotions and complexities and simple things I can't grasp and I must speak at least a mid-length novel in a single sitting.

BUT.

There are those sessions that go like this:

"................................................................................................................................................................................................

..............................................hey..........................................hi...............................................................................how's it going?....................................................what's up?.........................what are you feeling?..................................................(nod)............................................(seat squirm).........................................................................( adjustment of a pillow)...............................................................(heavy sigh)......................................................................................(shoulder shrug)...................................."

You get the picture right?

Sometimes it's just so hard to talk.  And not because I don't want to.  More often than not it's because I do want to talk.  Really talk.

There's so much going on.  At those times my head might be bursting at warp speed with 500 responses, or worse, internal static like in the old days with black and white fuzz on the TV screen when a channel wouldn't come in.  That's the worst!  

In a way, opening up here is a little bit like being in a therapy session, for me.  This last season of change I've experienced (and am still profoundly experiencing) has left it hard for me to not reveal myself completely.  And yet, that feels like too much.  

Maybe I'm just part way out of the chrysalis, but eager to start something new and daring.

I'm on the trail.  I show up in my studio and work.  I've been through some major feats in the past, almost three months, since we last "spoke,"  and I've been bursting to share about the process of coming out of my skin.

But it's overwhelming.  

It's scary.

It's vulnerable to open up when you're mid-process.

It seems like it's taking too long.  It's nearly spring!

I feel pressure to make the first thing I say from this place ground breaking! 

 That's just not how it's working out.

I'm changed in mind, body and soul but I still get around on foot.  It turns out not all beings who have spent time wrapped up in chrysalises sprout wings.

 We don't necessarily get to pick the what, where and when of transformation.

 Showing up, being present and vulnerable feels necessary and risky.

I want to reveal the newness within  even if someone turns around and spouts off to me that I'm absurd! 

But this is where I stall out and the awkward silence begins.  

Where do I go from here? 

 I could crawl under a rock and hide.  I have an urge to make like a piece of grass in a meadow and  quietly blend in. Walk on me, sit on me, just don't look at me!   And maybe in the end all this wasting of  precious opportunity to connect won't be failure if it's just like I never existed???  

What!!!??  There's got to be more!

WE ARE GOING SOMEWHERE!

What do you say?  

It doesn't matter if we're off the map now.

The earth carries on and on.  Sometimes you just have to keep walking...and talking it out.  

No matter how long it takes.

Times A'Changin'

There are those moments when you know you're not just being hormonal (and sorry, guys, you have hormones too!) when you feel a deep cry well up from inside an inner cavity within your soul.  It's a well filled with tears of every imaginable kind...and then some.  Actually, it's mostly a cry of unimaginable origin.  You don't even know what's in there.  It's frightening.  For a few breaths you long for restraints because it's so overwhelming.

In the wild, sometimes these moments can turn into seasons.  

All seasons change, but this is the season called Change.

What do we do in this season?  

How is this season defined?

Change can be frantic and bustling and bottom-of-the-pit lonely.

It is the season of everything.  It is the season of nothing.  Both together and apart.

It's the season of answers and of no replies.

The season of Change can seem out of control and also the doorway to order.

Change is filled with dichotomy, or at least the illusion of it.

Actually, change can be filled with illusions, when you really look.

It's crazy, it's only sane.  It's the best of times, it's the worst of times!

This cry for change/of change pulsates within your belly, wells itself up through your esophagus, makes you want to hurl most of the time.

But change makes your appetite insatiable.  

Suddenly there is less and more, more or less.

It's important to keep in mind (and speaking of, this is a great time to explore mindfulness,) that you are enough and are filled with enough-the Light of Change.

It seems like every traditional season in the developed world is filled with requirements to fulfill an expected vision of some culturally prescribed kind, usually for somebody else, often to the exclusion of what you feel or think is "right" or believe is life-giving.  We even adapt who we are in most seasons for the happiness of retail markets, no matter how you try to disguise it.

Listen closely.

The season of Change is different!

The season of Change is about soul.  It's about life and death.

The season of Change is about what really matters.

And maybe change isn't really about dichotomies, after all. 

When you're in the thick of Change, when it's really coming on strong, it's about interconnectedness and interdependence.  

This short video explains life and interdependence better than I ever could.  Give yourself a few minutes to watch it.

Change, which is sometimes synonymous with growth, is your own and it effects everybody.

 You have to observe this season for the sake of yourself, but if you don't celebrate it, everyone suffers.  

So cry, cry, cry!  Let it out! 

Whimper at first if it helps you get going.

Howl at the moon and catch your breath with the sun.

And don't hold yourself back when your Roar comes! 

Forest For the Trees

There are entries here in my mind all the time.  And real paintings are currently being painted. 

I'm uncertain what keeps my blog posts from actually getting written and pictures of my work being taken.   

Things snowball.  I like that term now, given it's cold and nearing winter. 

Time flies by without words actually being written here and it becomes harder and harder.  Something hits super-speed play on the button in my mind that that says it's been too long.  It's over.  That I've failed, I've dropped the ball, I'm alone again.   

But this is a journey.  

What feels like screwing-up is just one fine journey.  Sometimes the journey is finely haphazard on the outside, but my spirit is walking full steam ahead .  Sometimes the trail seems to die out and then seemingly out of nowhere you find where it picks up again.  That happens in life. You show up again.

Reappearing.

Sometimes that says more than a blog post being published every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 9am, on a dime.

Consistency is worth something.  It's worth a lot.  Inconsistency on one plane or sphere of living doesn't necessarily mean there is not consistency throughout.  

We get stuck on what's right in front of us.

Is that the meaning of the idiom Can't See the Forest for the Trees? 

I love trees.  This is a season gathered around trees.

What about when it feels like life has been deforested?  

Then there's only stumps.  

Can't see the Forest for the Stumps?

The whole message could change, but it's really all the same, tree or no tree.  It's easy to get stuck on what is there and what is not there in front of you. 

When you really look up and keep going there is so much more around, surrounding, supporting, sustaining, producing, giving oxygen.

 Helping you breathe.    

Don't you dare ever give up (I tell us both.) 

There's more out there than we know.

I'm sure of it because my heart beats.

I'll get back in the swing again.  

There's a rhythm to footsteps on the trail.  

Sometimes you have to stop a second to pick up on it.

I have to remind even myself sometimes that this is not a paved suburban path.

Life happens on the dirt trail.  Stops and starts, injuries, hunger, exhaustion....

There's also encounters with wild beauty, fireside chats and trail angels.

Enough sunrises and sunsets to help anyone keep the faith.

  Personally, I have to have faith because there seriously is a song already written and recorded somewhere for EVERY blog post that ever makes it here! lol...Enjoy and have a smile.*  :)  

*Songs in blog posts don't necessarily reflect songs currently in my personal playlist, but will certainly never be forgotten by me once found.  

I Have Been

In a world of my own, and maybe a few others.  

 

FREAK OUT!

ThIngs keep happening...like brave boots and THIS!

That's right!  I have been accepted as a painter into the next local Ultimate Painting Competition! For more info on what this entails, have a look here! www.ultimatepainting.com

Please excuse my bedhead reflection.  There was no time for primping when I received  the acceptance email first thing Friday morning, just 3 short days ago!  

I have not been this puking-excited since I faced my last round of childbirth.  

Sorry this note is probably not the most advanced writing I've ever had to offer, but my life has recently revolved around my brain exploding in anticipation.  

Freak Out!

THE COMPETITION IS TOMORROW @ 7PM!!!

“Come along and have a real good time”

— CHIC, Le Freak

When Life Awakens Your Critic(s)

It can be hard to keep feelings of victory and success alive when things get hard.  

The bills pile up.  

Jobs are lost.

Credit cards max out on groceries.

People betray your trust.

 Loved ones pass away. 

Health issues flare.

Cars get totaled.  

Sometimes you can go from feeling on-top-of-the-world to rock bottom seemingly overnight.

Sometimes the daily grind just doesn't feel all that victorious, at least not with a capital "V". 

Sure, we feign positivity through it sometimes, but deep down, when it's really, really hurting the most, the lie of mistimed hope can burn.   

So what do you do?  You keep Being.  

Being what, though?  A Loser?  (Because isn't it so easy to "go there" in times like these?   I only risk saying this here because I've been there so frequently myself.)

My answer to that is, perhaps surprisingly at this point of my oh-so-upbeat post, is a resounding NO.

Someone once dedicated this song to me, and I hated it for the longest time, but after listening to it repeatedly I picked out stuff from it to hold onto.

“What a feeling (I am music now)
Being’s believing (I am rhythm now)
Pictures come alive
You can dance right through your life”

— Flashdance...What a Feeling, Irene Cara

You keep breathing.  You open up.  You cry if you have to, maybe even at the register when your credit card is declined.  

Just don't stop.

  One of the Critic's common survival mechanisms is to put a halt to everything, especially your passions! Critics are not compassionate.

So be super, super-duper nice to yourself! 

 Not in the sense of laying down and going to sleep.  (Though, a nap in stressful times can work wonders, I hear...and I back that.)   

What I'm talking about is Not Giving Up.  

What does "Not Giving Up" look like?

I think  this is where the universal answer becomes personal.  

Not Giving Up is like exercise, and everyone has to find what works for them.  We're all at different places with different sets of circumstances and conditions surrounding us.  

 Even stillness and meditation is movement, in my opinion.   Movement can take so many different forms.

Breathing is movement.

Love is movement, along with the rest of the "fruits of the spirit".

Feeling (as opposed to denying) is movement.

Opening your eyes is movement.

Putting Gesso on a painting surface is movement.

BEING IS MOVEMENT.

And according to Flashdance:

Being is also Believing in who you are and what you're capable of.

Here's an idea: When things feel stuck and insurmountable, one tangible way of beginning to reclaim your Victory is by writing out a list of how many moving things you can do in a day, an hour, a minute...even a second.  And then, practice them. Do not judge them at this point.  Remember, your critic will be eaves dropping!  Even if you think there's no rational way it will make anything good happen.  Let me know how you feel after you write out a list of just how many things are in your power to move because even making that list is movement.  

Sit back and reflect, but don't get too comfortable.

Reflect on your listed movement options long enough to cross out those movements on your list that might not actually be in your long term Victory interest...Movements like popping the top of 30 beers and going on a binge everyday for the next week, perhaps?  Stay true to yourself, but don't go overboard. ;)    

Don't Give up.  Keep moving.

***

I was told  once in my elementary school career that if I kept moving my pencil across the page when I was trying to write a story or come up with an idea, even if I wrote "nonsense"  500 times, that the words of my story or idea would eventually make it's way to the front.  The real stuff, the real work, the stuff that really needed to come out and reveal itself for the success of my assignment would have no other place to go but onto my paper.  

So I think it's a little like that when it comes to success with other things...even something as "big picture" (or small picture, depending on how you look at it) as Life.  Your life.  The lives around you.  Lives Everywhere.  

Don't Give Up.  

That's all you have to do when there's "nothing"  you can do.

*I am not an expert or authority on this or anything else.  But Not Giving Up, so far, has helped me, at least in some way, to be here, alive.

Why the "UP" Competition is my Ultimate, Part 1: Comeback Kid

“So many times it happens too fast.
You trade your passion for glory.
Don’t lose your grip on the dreams of the past.
You must fight just to keep them alive...”

— Eye of the Tiger, Survivor

I'm writing this as an installment of different posts, in part, because there are so many facets to why participating in the upcoming Ultimate Painting Competition is truly ultimate for me.  (Say that 6 times fast ;)

I believe October 14th was the first day I ever laid eyes on a Facebook post by one of my friends leading me to discover the UP competition.  It's being held locally, but it appears to be an international happening, taking place in different locations around the US and Canada, if not more.  I'm just learning about this competition myself, so I apologize for not being sure.  This is just to say, there's a broader community to what I'm about to step into and be a part of.  For more information, see here: http://ultimatepainting.com/about-up/

I am so grateful for this opportunity.  

It's hard to explain why this competition means so much to me, but I can start by saying that, for me personally, it is not so much about the competing aspect or "winning" of it.  If I looked at this opportunity purely for it's competitive aspects I wouldn't have chosen to sign up.  Of course, getting  voted up by my peers would be an awesome experience, but I'm not really in it for that. 

So what am I in it for?  

Part 1: I'm in it to win the battle! 

Wait...didn't I just say that's NOT the reason I signed up?

I can explain.  I haven't lost my mind.  Well...maybe some would argue I have lost my mind, but that was long before now and what I'm attempting to explain here is not a manifestation of this.

***

In recent months I've been separated from my art, creating, and feeling connected.  I've had painters block, potter's block, photographer's block, even writer's block as you can see from my sporadic trail journal entries.  No poetry, no motion.  Everything felt strained and at the breaking point.  I was fighting against hopelessness, worn out and beat up consistently by my inner critic.  

When I first saw the ad for the "UP" Competition, something leapt to life inside me.  It startled the little girl in me who lives and loves to create, but more-so, it was the tiger within my soul whose job it is to protect her artistic heart that experienced the wake-up call.  

It was like someone waving smelling salts under an inner beastly nose, waking me up to myself.  
"I am still here!  All my paints and supplies, all my passion...alive and rearing to go!"  The door had been opened.  

 Even still, I battled within myself to go out and sign up.  After all, I hadn't painted for so many months I couldn't remember how long it had been,  and my hands hadn't touched raw clay since late spring.  Actually, starting this website/blog was a way to try to feed the spirit in me I feared might turn into a zoo attraction with no sense of itself.  I had felt the inner critic army coming before it fully arrived.

When my tiger eyes first opened, after learning about the competition,  I was so excited I immediately went on a hunt for my yellow brave boots that had been lost in the space of several moves.  When I found them I put them on, gussied them up and even took a photo.  

But then...

I don't know what happened.  The evil doubts still found their way in, even through those awesomely thick rubber soles of my coveted Doc Marten's.

So I sat on the opportunity to sign up, knowing that someone else so much better and more deserving than me would fill the spot where otherwise I might be.  A real artist.    This was my thinking, though I don't even subscribe to the idea of anyone else in the world not being capable of being a real artist!  The despair of disconnect reserved only for me,  Bah!   

I let myself go.  I fetched the woken tiger within some sleepy-time treats and went right back into into the cage and my non-moving groove. Yawn, shuffle, snif. 

My feisty inner critic loved this.  Scary to say, my inner critic(s) may be a tad resemblant of Gollum from Lord of the Rings.  

It's late and I might be letting too many metaphors into this post , admittedly, but I won't let it stop me from posting.  

Because in the end the tiger inside me threw up those sleepy-time treats, escaped the confines, quit putting on a free picture show and came to save me from my own flames!   I signed up to participate in a real, live painting competition, forcing me into victory with myself as the painter, sculptor, photo-maker, creator...Real Artist...that I am. 

This competition is about facing some inner demons that try to keep me down and out from feeling free to be myself on this adventure of art and life.  The demons that keep me from seeing color, that slip my brave boots off my feet without me noticing until my feet are raw and bloodied and I'm about to be thrown into the forever pit of Not Good Enough.  

I'm the Comeback Kid!

“Risin’ up straight to the top
Had the guts, got the glory
Went the distance
Now I’m not gonna stop
Just a man and his will to survive”

— Eye of the Tiger, Survivor

BRING. IT. ON!

Laced and Bursting at the Seams!

Recently, this happened!

 The seasons are changing and my brave boots have been unearthed once again.  They've helped me find my way to the studio and I've been painting again with the heart of a little girl.  With my 3 year old daughter beside me, teaching me to let go, I've reconnected with my breath and what's inside.  

Synchronistically, an opportunity to participate in a live painting competition has presented itself, and I just clicked the "submit" button to send my app through!!!  If all the spots for this round are taken I've been told there will be another round early in December.  Wish me luck!  The fire has been lit under my feet and my brave boots are on fire!  I'm so hoping to get in this round, but if not, hot patience is a virtue, right!?    But wow,  my heart is bursting to have a go at it right now!!!  The little girl inside is bursting at the seams of her artistic heart to have a playdate!

Have a look into one of the next anticipated stops on the trail!  You're all invited!

Bust A Move!

Do you ever feel like life would flow just a little bit better if a personal DJ could follow (or lead?) your steps?  

Sometimes I've thought my life would be easier to navigate if I could just find a way to dance along the way.

Last night I was driving home, flipping through XM Radio trying to find something new when R.E.M's song "Stand" came on. A classic time-warp to my "coming of age" years.  (Coming of age, to qualify for what specifically, I'm still not sure.)  While R.E.M has it's share lovers and haters, both categories can't deny their music makes them respond in some way!  

I started to sign and dance, alone in the fading light, fully and freely embracing my dorkdom.  

Here's another one from R.E.M I'm feeling today. 

Get Up!

I dare you to bust a move! :)

I Am All In

What if today I was inspired by one wild, wandering thought that it all really is going to be ok.  

What if it's ok already?

What if all I need to do is get out of my own way.

The trail awaits my heart today to be All In.  

The rain has passed, the sun is soft and kind today.

Change is blowing in fiercely.  

Walnuts fall loudly onto the roof of the RV where I sit contemplating life.

"WAKE UP!  WAKE UP! Get to your studio now while you still have a chance!!" is the sound they make.

Love begs me to  listen.

The world waits, but when I am gone it will go on without me.  

It's time.  Nothing here can get in my way.

Going So Good!

It has rained so much this season it is starting to get to me.

To reach me.

To thaw me.

To trick me into Spring.

The dreams are coming back again.

Mostly of my children.

But of The Trail, too.   This undefined journey.

My children are always with me on the trail.  

They have comprised so much of it.

I can still say I've been a mother nearly half my life, and when I'm really honest about it, I've been a mother all of my life in many ways.  

Lately my dreams revolve around protecting my girls, both in such vulnerable stages of life.

And really, when is life, at it's best, not vulnerable for us all?

This a a recurring theme in my waking, walking thoughts so it's not surprising that it is in my unconscious even stronger.  Racing.

I wake up with my chest pounding, sometimes even yelling, defending, fighting for those so close to my soul.  

Nothing-NOTHING can ever stop me from being a mom.  

So often I find some dark path working to lead me off into feeling worthless for having not produced.  For not having a degree, which in my weird mind seems like it would lend me legitimacy or credibility.  

I feel these two parts of me...First, the mom, and second, the artist in me that wants to hold stories and connect.

But I deny them both when I go on acting as if one is going to be left behind when the truth for me is that they are really a package deal. 

The more I can accept the package of my beautiful, unfolding, synchronistic, mysterious life the more alive my motherhood is, the healthier me and my children are, the more I am inspired to share, the more graceful I become in my frequent fumbles toward ecstasy.  

***

What is this with songs/lyrics making their way into these journal entries?    I swear I do not plan this!  

***

I once had a college professor chastise a paper I wrote for Interpersonal Communications class for sounding too much like it belonged as a monologue for "The Theatre of the Absurd."  And then she referenced Sarah McLachlan's Fumbling Towards's Ecstasy lyrics in her page and half long critique as being a more appropriate example of my efforts..  The assignment had been to write a paper telling about the influences in my life and how I thought I had become who I was. 
 

I remember struggling to write that paper for days: a simple 3 page writing for a community college class that was to be structured more as a journal entry than even a casual essay.  The sort of assignment you couldn't do poorly on, the kind where everybody in the class was given an automatic A+ for turning it in. 

I couldn't find the words.  Nothing made sense.  I couldn't tell about anything.  I hadn't discovered my identity and my life was absurd.  Sadly, even that fact wasn't recognizable as pertaining to me at that time in my very early 20's.  

Somehow, instead of acceptance my paper had triggered some version of contempt in my otherwise laid back teacher.   I was still married to my ex-husband and he had picked me up from school that day.  I remember screaming and crying in confusion all the way home and for days afterward at the response I'd received from that paper.   I was heartbroken.  I'd given it my all.   I didn't understand her reference to Sarah McLachlan's lyrics or how that fit in at all.  Things made even less sense than they had before!

She told me she ought to have me rewrite the paper...in proper form in more accordance to what she wanted.

It was a "journal entry" paper!  How could I redo that!?  

But there are times now, I think I "get it" a little more.  I still think she was a harsh, not very well-read teacher, but in all those years that's the paper I've reflected on the most.  It's one of the only assignments in school that's ever really mattered.  And it wouldn't have been so without her response.    Which luckily I survived.

I never returned to her class.  I dropped that class and took it again about 5 years later and passed with flying colors with a different teacher.  Thank goodness the assignments were different too.

Because it's taken me all this time to get a grip, become friends with the absurdity and not be offended by my own way of speaking.  

"All the fear has left me now.

I'm not frightened anymore.

It's my heart that pounds beneath my flesh.

It's my mouth that pushes out this breath."

Sarah Mclachlan "Fumbling Toward Ecstasy"

***

I got off on a tangent.  It's how it goes with me.  We stop and look around and we're suddenly at a cliff's edge.  How did we get here?  

Don't ask.  I promise (mostly to myself) this is going somewhere it's exactly meant to go.  

This time, it's going to go good.

SO GOOD.  

A++++++++++++ Good.

I love trail life so much.

I began to feel the pull to write as I was snuggling my 3 year old daughter in for her night of sleep as the gentle rain poured on the roof of our RV.  The outside just feels so much nearer in here.

Somewhere in all this there is a tie in.  Even if it takes a while to get there.

Risk to fall with me a while.

There is so much more to see.  

Trust we're falling toward something awesome.

Sweet Dreams.

Wild Hairs

When you're a companion of mine, four-legged or otherwise, it's a good idea to be up for just about anything.  I'm not always the most linearly organized sort of person.  Sometimes I get wild hairs that multiply rapidly, especially the older I get.  I'm rooted in the importance of spontaneity in the name of sanity and life.  A little of the unexpected is good to have around when things get a little crazy.  

"The Yawn" Sammy's version of "The Scream"  by Edvard Munch  

A little more dignified. 

Welcome to the Adventure!

My name is Heather and I'm nervous as heck!   I am a strange mix of introvert with a strong desire to meet and really get to know as many people in my life as possible!  The fact that you took time out of your busy day to be here blows my mind.  It can't get much cooler than this!  I'm truly grateful, and hope we'll get to know each other more.  Please feel free to introduce yourself in the comments section below or shoot an email to me at dirttrailstudio@gmail.com!  I'd love to know your name and a bit about you too!

A little about me, my work and the Dirt Trail:  

First,  the "Dirt Trail"  of my studio name comes from my love of nature, hiking and being somewhere along a dirt path.  Since I can't always be hiking or camping outside, I decided to bring the dirt inside to the studio and walk the trail with my hands, essentially!  While clay isn't exactly dirt, it's a little more refined than that, it's close enough for me!   Of course, there's more, even deeper meaning to it than this, but this is an intro. and I'm nervous (being the introverted extrovert, or extroverted introvert that I am) so we'll start simple.  

Second, I consider what I do (and who I am) to always be a work in progress.  This isn't to say that the things I make are never complete, but that each piece is created with the highest standards of my ability with all my heart and is one-of-a-kind.  The things I make are on a journey along with the rest of me!  One step leads to another place and so on.  At it's best, it is a progression with no regrets.  What I create one day is no lesser than what I create the next day just because it is different.  My goal is to embrace each moment where I am, as I am.  I embrace my work in the same way.  I strive for the relationships in my life to function similarly.   

Trail buddies make the journey what it is!  Thanks for visiting along the way!

Welcome to the Adventure!  Welcome to Dirt Trail Studio!