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| April 28, 2011 Coffee Stained Interiors |
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| April 29, 2011 Chasing unicorns... |
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| April 30, 2011 sky moving fast |
Saturday, April 30, 2011
The disorganization of cloud formations and thought patterns: April Drawings' End
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
The vanities of trees and of humans
Head down and being grabbed by her two clenched fists. Each fist grabs and pulls on hair clumps on either side of my head. She holds my head down and growls that she will kill me. Then she kicks my head with her feet all the while grabbing my hair.
The floor smells of bleach. My nose is pressed in so close. I can also smell the sweat coming of the Rico while he tries to pull her off of me. Her growls and his sweat leave little other space in the room. Too crowded. I need out of that space…I am not there. I am elsewhere. I am nowhere…I am in pain. She is kicking in my head and spitting on my face and pulling on my hair.
Horns would grow out of the holes she ripped in my head… would have grown if there was energy left. But there is none. I am defeated. I am enraged and consumed by fear.
She is grabbed from behind by Rico and he holds her. For a moment in his rage and panic he tells me to lay her out. I would love to as I realize the black masses swirling about the floor are what is left of my hair. I would love to pound my fear out onto her but I do not. This rage is too big. My rage is too big for the room and I whisper no and tell Rico to leave the quiet room with me. Leave her there to be quiet. Move the rage out of the space. But she holds her rage and her fear as if it is a blanket that would comfort her. There is no quiet in her mind. She howls and slams her body on the walls and on the door.
Her pounding is met by the other girl who swings at my head for the third time today. Rico tells her no and she slinks away. The other boy is not afraid of Rico an does not back down but stays silent. I have no idea why he doesn’t start swinging at us. He refuses to move from the door until I ask him with please. Please and a freshly balded head and sharp blackened eyes.
That night I dream that my head is cracked open and there is nothing inside except maggots and masses of the hair that she ripped from my head. It forms a seething black and white mass that is open for all to see. I am unable to cover it as it is too painful. I feel shame for my vulnerability and because I wanted to hit her and because I didn’t hit her and because I was capable of that much hate. I am ashamed because of my fear. I am ashamed because my hair is gone…ripped out of my head in violence. I want my hair back and I want to be safe again.
I flinch at every hiss. I comb what is left of my hair over the patches but there is not enough left to fall over the mound of the bruise. I cake makeup on to my face to cover the bruising just by my nose. I am broken and my hair is gone.
She is left in the room to howl. No one will touch her and so she is left to bang her own head onto the corner of the doorframe over and over and over and over. She continues even after the blood from the circle she has banged into her head oozes and then crusts onto her face.
I am fear and she is rage. She is left in the ironic quiet room.
The police tell me to press charges. My supervisor chastises me for doing so. I should have known better than to let her grab my head and kick and punch and pound. The fault is mine as the floor was mine. My fear is not of the girl raging in the quiet room but of the systems and the knowledgeable people that got her to this place.
My fear and her rage are the same cloth turned out on each other. I will wear them both. I will peel the circle she has pounded into her forehead and place it on the cloth. I will wrap the cloth around the bits of my hair swirling on the floor. We will sew a new doll out of the cloth and the hair and the blood. We will pull the bits of her soul away from the raging inside her. We will breathe it into the doll and she will not be locked in the quiet room any longer. She will sit in the sun and be still. She will not be fear. She will not be rage. She will be safe.
The floor smells of bleach. My nose is pressed in so close. I can also smell the sweat coming of the Rico while he tries to pull her off of me. Her growls and his sweat leave little other space in the room. Too crowded. I need out of that space…I am not there. I am elsewhere. I am nowhere…I am in pain. She is kicking in my head and spitting on my face and pulling on my hair.
Horns would grow out of the holes she ripped in my head… would have grown if there was energy left. But there is none. I am defeated. I am enraged and consumed by fear.
She is grabbed from behind by Rico and he holds her. For a moment in his rage and panic he tells me to lay her out. I would love to as I realize the black masses swirling about the floor are what is left of my hair. I would love to pound my fear out onto her but I do not. This rage is too big. My rage is too big for the room and I whisper no and tell Rico to leave the quiet room with me. Leave her there to be quiet. Move the rage out of the space. But she holds her rage and her fear as if it is a blanket that would comfort her. There is no quiet in her mind. She howls and slams her body on the walls and on the door.
Her pounding is met by the other girl who swings at my head for the third time today. Rico tells her no and she slinks away. The other boy is not afraid of Rico an does not back down but stays silent. I have no idea why he doesn’t start swinging at us. He refuses to move from the door until I ask him with please. Please and a freshly balded head and sharp blackened eyes.
That night I dream that my head is cracked open and there is nothing inside except maggots and masses of the hair that she ripped from my head. It forms a seething black and white mass that is open for all to see. I am unable to cover it as it is too painful. I feel shame for my vulnerability and because I wanted to hit her and because I didn’t hit her and because I was capable of that much hate. I am ashamed because of my fear. I am ashamed because my hair is gone…ripped out of my head in violence. I want my hair back and I want to be safe again.
I flinch at every hiss. I comb what is left of my hair over the patches but there is not enough left to fall over the mound of the bruise. I cake makeup on to my face to cover the bruising just by my nose. I am broken and my hair is gone.
She is left in the room to howl. No one will touch her and so she is left to bang her own head onto the corner of the doorframe over and over and over and over. She continues even after the blood from the circle she has banged into her head oozes and then crusts onto her face.
I am fear and she is rage. She is left in the ironic quiet room.
The police tell me to press charges. My supervisor chastises me for doing so. I should have known better than to let her grab my head and kick and punch and pound. The fault is mine as the floor was mine. My fear is not of the girl raging in the quiet room but of the systems and the knowledgeable people that got her to this place.
My fear and her rage are the same cloth turned out on each other. I will wear them both. I will peel the circle she has pounded into her forehead and place it on the cloth. I will wrap the cloth around the bits of my hair swirling on the floor. We will sew a new doll out of the cloth and the hair and the blood. We will pull the bits of her soul away from the raging inside her. We will breathe it into the doll and she will not be locked in the quiet room any longer. She will sit in the sun and be still. She will not be fear. She will not be rage. She will be safe.
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| April 27, 2011 |
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Drawings for April 2011: 25...26...tongues and birdcages
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| April 25, 2011 metaphysical raspberry |
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| April 26, 2011 moving too |
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Drawings 2011: about those birds...
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| April 24, 2011 |
Dreams make sense only during, after they are fragments like the mirror before it is broken...there are images there but compartmented in odd, oblique angles.
Like broken bones.
The cat brought a bird into the house yesterday. An offering. A Thanks. An idea that would no longer fly away, even if startled. My daughter took the bird from the cat and wanted desperately to mend it and help it to fly again. But things so traumatized never fly in the fashion of before. The bird died and my daughter buried it. Now the ideas will remain with us and will no longer fly away.
Or all the buried birds are waiting in a cage deep under the ground, only to fly free when the right well is dug.
Saturday, April 23, 2011
trees and dreams of furniture...
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| April 22, 2011 |
The pool is filled with a substance that eats its way down to the center of the world thereby releasing all the birds that have been sleeping in a giant underground cage. The birds fly up and away, leaving the Earth. This loss of birds, of the soul, is of course my fault. I am told I must make amends.
I continue to add to the pile of furniture and household objects, layering them ever higher. Small sculptures, vases, toys, shoes and flower pots are added to the mound, filling in all the negative spaces. It is no longer just enough for me to choose between all of the objects. This will not undo the bird flight. I must continue to stack everything. Then finally, when there is nothing left, I climb to the top and leap.
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| April 23, 2011 |
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Drawings for April 2011: 19...yesterday's extra bits lead to today
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| Catfish April 18's leftover |
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| April 19, 2011 tabling the turning |
Monday, April 18, 2011
Drawings for April 2011: 18...dream sequences striding across...
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| April 18, 2011 Stride |
We begin to pack the truck and only after the truck is full do we realize there is no engine. We will have to pull the truck ourselves across the country. I ask if there are some horses to help with the pull. I am told there are only goats left in the world and that all the horses are gone.
I pull the truck across the roads and realize that I do not want the stuff in the truck anymore. I pull my sleeping daughter out of the truck cab and move off away from the truck and my books and the three pieces of furniture.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Drawings for April 2011: 16 into 17...
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| April 16, 2011 Devil and the Deep Blue Sea |
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| April 17, 2011 Empty Self Support |
Friday, April 15, 2011
Drawings for April 2011: 14 and 15 brings just little things done quickly...
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| April 14, 2011 Branch Section Upended in Studio |
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| April 15, 2011 Collage with escape |
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Ever since middle school...
So I was at a bar a couple of weeks ago.
(Shocking, I know...The chances of me willingly leaving my house for recreation these days is highly unlikely and what's more the chances of me leaving my house with my husband and our crazy busy schedules and without my child are even more highly unlikely. But, the child had a sleep over on a Friday night and there was a benefit for the radio station the offspring and I do the radio show at...so, the husband and I found ourselves at a bar on Friday night. Shocking.)
So I was at a bar talking to the server who is also showing at the gallery where my artwork cozies itself at. She is graduating from art school in a month or two. I asked her if she was going on to grad school or was there something else. She responded that she always wanted to start an artists' collective and that she had ever since she was in middle school. I told her that sounded cool but in truth I have no opinion about it either way.
Her comment about wanting to do it "ever since middle school" is the thing that stuck in my head. I tried thinking about what I wanted to do "ever since middle school." All I could come up with was to be happy and safe.
I tried to push into my recollections something about being famous...hell yeah! we all wanted to be famous.
But no, not really...that wasn't want I really really wanted "ever since middle school."
I tried pushing in there being a famous artist...but that simply wasn't the case. What I wanted around art was to be able to draw and paint the things in my head and before my eyes....not necessarily the fame bit. Fame would be nice but the reason for making art is something else. The desire to be able to pull images out of the paint, to push to coax to tease the image out is a need like breathing or like dreaming. To have the image on the page match that image in the mind's eye is the desire and the thing sought after. At least for me "ever since middle school."
What I really wanted was to be happy and to be surrounded by people who loved me for me.
What I really wanted as an awkward adolescent chubby and completely odd girl out was to not hate myself.
Sitting in the bar that evening with my husband I realized that I had accomplished quite a bit of what the girl in middle school wished for: I am deeply loved by my husband and partner of 20 years, my house is filled with laughter, I have a job I love, and I have a child who is lovely beyond all my imaginings. There is safety and love here in this life. And that is what I have wanted "ever since middle school."
(Shocking, I know...The chances of me willingly leaving my house for recreation these days is highly unlikely and what's more the chances of me leaving my house with my husband and our crazy busy schedules and without my child are even more highly unlikely. But, the child had a sleep over on a Friday night and there was a benefit for the radio station the offspring and I do the radio show at...so, the husband and I found ourselves at a bar on Friday night. Shocking.)
So I was at a bar talking to the server who is also showing at the gallery where my artwork cozies itself at. She is graduating from art school in a month or two. I asked her if she was going on to grad school or was there something else. She responded that she always wanted to start an artists' collective and that she had ever since she was in middle school. I told her that sounded cool but in truth I have no opinion about it either way.
Her comment about wanting to do it "ever since middle school" is the thing that stuck in my head. I tried thinking about what I wanted to do "ever since middle school." All I could come up with was to be happy and safe.
I tried to push into my recollections something about being famous...hell yeah! we all wanted to be famous.
But no, not really...that wasn't want I really really wanted "ever since middle school."
I tried pushing in there being a famous artist...but that simply wasn't the case. What I wanted around art was to be able to draw and paint the things in my head and before my eyes....not necessarily the fame bit. Fame would be nice but the reason for making art is something else. The desire to be able to pull images out of the paint, to push to coax to tease the image out is a need like breathing or like dreaming. To have the image on the page match that image in the mind's eye is the desire and the thing sought after. At least for me "ever since middle school."
What I really wanted was to be happy and to be surrounded by people who loved me for me.
What I really wanted as an awkward adolescent chubby and completely odd girl out was to not hate myself.
Sitting in the bar that evening with my husband I realized that I had accomplished quite a bit of what the girl in middle school wished for: I am deeply loved by my husband and partner of 20 years, my house is filled with laughter, I have a job I love, and I have a child who is lovely beyond all my imaginings. There is safety and love here in this life. And that is what I have wanted "ever since middle school."
So here's a glass raised to that girl who wished to be safe and loved and to draw the things in your head.
Here's to the girl that wanted to laugh loudly and not care that people would think she is too loud or too odd.
Here's to the girl that held on because life can be very sweet.
And, here is to my loves whom I have wished for "ever since middle school."
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| Family portrait with Golden Plant Lady as stand-in... |
Here's to the next round of "ever since" goals that wedge, root, plant themselves into the soil of our lives. Let's hope that they are as lovely as ever since...
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Monday, April 11, 2011
Making Peep Jerky
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| No one really ever wants to eat peeps that are fresh out of the package. Stale peeps are the only sane kind of peeps to be eating. |
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| But, unfortunately, the company that makes peeps seems to think that they should be squishy. This is not right. |
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| I brought some peeps home from the store the other day and we were sad that we would have to wait at least a month before they became stale enough to eat. |
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| So we popped them in the food dehydrator. |
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| We thought that would speed the process up a little bit. |
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| Fearing a gooey mess, we thought we should be sensible about this whole process. |
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| So, we placed the dehydrator on the lowest setting. |
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| An hour later, the offspring was sad that the peeps were not yet stale. |
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| 2 hours later the offspring was eager to see if the process had completed yet. |
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| So she opened the dehydrator to check the squishiness of the peeps. |
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| Sadly, she found that they were still too squishy. |
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| 5:56...three hours into the process... |
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| The offspring feels that her hopes have been dashed too many times in this process. |
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| Nevertheless, she pokes the peeps. |
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| Dammit! |
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| The chief food dehydrator operator is not exactly sure why they aren't done after three hours. |
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| 6:50 on Sunday evening... |
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| Blood sugar levels are running low and the offspring is getting cranky. |
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| In fact her behavior is quite erratic...but still no peep perfection. |
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| "Why aren't they done YET?!??!?" |
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| "3 more hours yo! Those suckas ain't done yet, child!" |
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| almost 3 hours later and very close to bedtime for the offspring... |
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| She is afraid to look. |
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| A squish test reveals... |
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| "They aren't done yet! I'm going to bed." |
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| The next morning... |
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| We think we have achieved staleness. |
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| The offspring descends the stairs to roost her sleep with a hopefully stale peep |
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| A squish tests confirms... |
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| STALE PEEP. |
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| "It really wasn't a wonderful as you guys lead me to believe it was gonna be." |
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