Integration

As I walk, as slowly as possible, toward the end of my life, I find that I long to gather all its memories, passions and learnings in one place. I have decided that rather than use my site solely for paintings, I will expand it to include all the loves in this current adventure in being human. I am committed to the practice of living deeply. I understand that what I create is a co-creation always. I am understanding that each day is extra, a gift to be used carefully. I hope to do my gathering in this space so that I, and anyone who might be interested, can join me.

Years ago I found this Lady’s Slipper on the ridge above my cabin. I brought her with a huge ball of dirt down the hill and placed her just outside my kitchen window. Each April I wait for her, an announcemnt of another year when I am blessed with spring and hope. The Lady’s Slipper will transplant only into familiar soil. When I first came into these mountains, I felt immediately at home. My roots had never gone deep anywhere I was transplanted though there were many beautiful landscapes that I inhabited and loved. I have felt complete here on this little mountain and able to thrive and bloom in the unlikely geography of these ancient spaces. Its seasons are icons, its beauty is eucharist, its every growing inhabitant and every dying one a metaphor and a prayer.

WHAT SUSTAINS

I have begun to deeply understand Beauty as the single spiritual force that draws me through life and propels me, gives me courage, inspires me. I somehow think it should be Love or Truth..making rules as usual. But it is the Beauty in people, places and things that causes Love to arise in me and saturate me. Beauty activates Truth that then compels me to reject the shallow, the illusory and the sentimental. They are not separate forces but aspects of the One. Finally though, it is the longing for and search for Beauty that flows through my being. It is my life force. It is the gift that is given to me in this particular human incarnation. It is Beauty that invites me into the mystery of experience.

WHAT SEEKS US

The light in the bowl of honey

is the perfume in the apple

is the breath in rising bread

is the longing in new wine

is the ache in an autumn leaf

is the bitter taste in wind

is the waiting in winter trees

is the gnarl in the hand reaching

for the deep sweetness

in death.

Crabtree Creek October

HOME

 HOW IT BEGAN... 

I will put on my painting clothes in a few hours and go down the hill to slather oil paint on panels and push it around, scrape through it and see what happens.

I have worked as a serious craft artist for the past twenty years, painting papers and textiles to use in the creation of one of a kind handmade journals. I have loved color and paint as long as I can remember. One incident with my parents when I was in grade school so threatened my need for praise that I refused ever again to paint “pictures”. Two sisters who achieved success as painters further influenced my decisions to write poems, work with people and finally come in by the back door in my other great loves cloth and bookarts thinking I could satisfy my need for the process of painting in other ways. The longing to paint was intentionally pushed under the surface of a busy life.

One morning in March of 2015, I woke with a searing longing to paint, the intuition that I could do it and the imperative to get started. I did. I went to my studio, pulled out some old oil paints and concluded that I needed to do some research before beginning. A friend had begun using oils and cold wax medium on paper, and I was immediately in love with the results she was getting. I researched, bought supplies, reorganized my studio and got started.

My first try was a quick sketch of large girl and the word addiction scrawled across it that showed me clearly that I am NOT the painter. It expresses the pain and shame I felt in active addiction and still do when those demons grab another substance like food or acquiring or gambling with money. It came from some space in my gut. Like poems, the paintings were going to arrive..I was and am simply the conduit and the craftsperson who works with the raw material..a familiar space. Another one came quickly later after I had taken a couple of excruciating classes that brought all my shame about being inadequate and exposed to the surface..it called itself "Burn It Down". It was a strange fiery abstract.  I had to get over the picture of old lady painting bad landscapes for her children to put in the post mortem garage sale. I stuck with it. Paintings began to work. I knew I had found a meaningful practice to dance along with my poetry. 

I have since taken classes, practiced, acquired a mentor and a gallery. The longer I do this, the more joy it gives me and the more I know I have to learn. 

PAINTING AS PRAYER
I smear a forest onto paper
drag yellow light through
cries of scarlet I
rest here in the silence of blue
cut green again in sharp blades
and violet..Oh violet!