March Waiting
Some days feel “blobby” – ill defined. I have energy and there are things to do but no one thing is pressuring me to act and react. I have many things to do but no clear plan for when and how to get things done. Still on the tables are mending and patching projects. Every one of these pieces are inching along but there is no clarity about them – their finished state yet. I remember another artist saying her works were never “finished” rather she arrived at pause points with them and when the pause point felt big enough then she would stop working. Sounds about right here.
I did some studio cleaning the last week of winter break between seminary school terms. Into the trash went raw materials and pieces that seemed like false starts. Now there is
6.25″ X 20.25″ Fabric Book Pages, Layout #1 front and back.
space physically and in my mind for other pieces to happen. I loved that clarity of what to remove and what to keep. Mind you the studio is still junky and cluttered overall but, well removed of visual obstacles and open to other pieces growing.
I am grieving my next older brother’s death as of this week. I am not so much thinking about my own death as my living. That is the business of grieving for me – figuring out how to live. Since my siblings are all older it hits me I may outlive them all. I remember my grandmother, who lived with us, was so very sad the day she found out the last of her friends from youth had died. She had no one around who shared her history and age. That has stuck with me all these years. The heartache and worry about being left behind and forgotten about never goes away. It has as much power over me now as it had when I was 2, and 6, and 14, and 20 and every year between.
The Zoom call with my kids the day after we got the news was going to be my time to cry and wail and for receiving love and sympathetic ears. Sure we did the sad-talk thing but what felt healing and soothing was hearing their voices and seeing their faces. It was not what they said, it was being with me for a time. Just that. That was truly enough.
So, I am struggling with what to say and do for/with other family members. It feels “gloppy” and ill-defined too, which is where I started his blog. But I get out my paper and pen or my phone and I share the “glop” of uncertainty – of both what I am doing and of what is going to happen as a result. I connect as best I can and like my kids, I spend a little time with. Let my words and thoughts go out like milkweed feathery and light on the breeze. Far away in time and space it will and grow into itself.