My Studio Tour Video for International Sculpture Day!

What I can do!

The treadmill is gone.  As my energy wanes, I chose to spend what I have on being productive, independent, and creative things.  The treadmill had become a big physical reminder of what I could not do anymore.  However, I will sing its praises as I am certain the hours I spent on it have had a great deal to do with my endurance now!  In its place is this bench that I stained to match (well kind of match, close gets the cigar in my house) Skip’s grandmother Evans wardrobe and the coffee table Skip and I made.  Feels like a uniting of the room and the generations…The pillows have been around for a while, but I did hand paint them and that gets a little color and balance to that side of the room…And I did it myself…well, the staining and the pillows…now it is a reminder of what I can do instead of a big ugly symbol of what I cannot do.

"Shine On"  Eric Bibb

Fishbowl

Yep…It’s Monday…ugh…and It has been a week and then some since I have posted.  It was a weird week!  Two first times in one week.  Holidays-birthdays without him and his birthday around the corner.  There is a fine balance of staying in the “now” and getting pulled back into the past and the “knowing” how this special day will happen.  I get thrown off on those days. These are the days that grieving typically re-emerges and becomes almost as strong and those initial days. These are the days that home becomes my sanctuary, but with the covid 19 stay at home order, sanctuary begins to feel a bit like a fishbowl an I easily lose sight of where I am going and how I should get there.

"Just Don't Think I'll Ever Get Over You"
Colin Hay

Necessary again!

I decided to make a list of things I should do.  Not things that "have" to be done, but should be done.  This way there is no emergency and no self-berating if I just cannot do them…But the mission is to accomplish just one thing a day. Just one thing is enough to make me feel accomplished, even if only a little bit.  There is also the physical act of writing it and erasing it when finished.  My studio door used to serve as my chalk board “where am going and when should I be there” through the art festival season.  It truly was necessary! The studio door chalkboard is proving to be necessary again today to keep me pointed in a meaningful direction.

"Ants Marching"  Dave Matthews Band

Jelly beans? Of course I can!

Another first is coming, and I cringe…He loved jelly beans…Easter may have been his favorite holiday just for the jelly beans.  He had an unbelievable sweet tooth. Jelly beans, chocolate, and jolly ranchers were his “go to” every weekend at the Walgreens and/or Dollar Store around the corner.   It used to make me crazy, I would just look at those things and gain weight.  He ate them like an addict and never gained an ounce!  I still have some of his last Hershey’s chocolate bar in the refrigerator. I know…I know..the day will come…but not today…and today is about jelly beans.

I know friends and family are watching to see if I am recovering.  I am accepting that I never will, but also learning that it is ok. 

I remember our stories – his story, every day. It’s not just a story. It still matters. It still hurts. It is still love.

The truth is, being happy, recovering, living now does not negate the pain of his death. They don’t cancel each other out. I carry both of them. Those two realities share the same space, side by side. They most likely always will.

Last week, I went to the dollar store, and there were jelly beans everywhere! I could not help myself and of course, I bought jelly beans for Skip…and here they sit on the kitchen counter.  This morning Jill (my awesome DIL) texted and asked if I could bring jelly beans for Easter.  Of course I can!

"Don't Give Up"  Peter Gabriel

Busy all of the time...

Just when I think I am doing so well, then there is stay in place, and I feel like I have been losing ground.  All of a sudden this comes across my computer screen and I get what I have been doing.  At first, I worked like a crazy woman, cleaning out closets, cupboards, throwing out and donating bags and bags of stuff, some were Skip’s but not all.  As that began waning, the opportunity to be a part of Nude Nite and another exhibition (that has been canceled) and the studio was wonderfully frantic!

But now…after 3 weeks of confinement…stir crazy is setting in and I find myself not only fighting all that comes with that but also wrestling with the emotions of losing Skip again.  Wondering if I am just plain crazy or even masochistic…maybe this post explains it and this whole virus thing may be a gift that forces me to finally finish this emotional work, acknowledging the sudden death of a loved one is more than just death it is a trauma.  I am not implying that a quick unexpected death is more painful than a death that is expected.  The best analogy I can come up with is, slowly peeling back a band-aid spreading the pain out over time or just ripping it off.  I suspect it is the same amount of pain, just a different experience of it.  My band-aid may still be hanging on.

"Haven't Got Time for the Pain"  Carly Simon

Subversive and revolutionary...

Granted…my subversive activities are now limited to illegally watering my front yard and writing here. Neither are risking more than a finger-wagging scolding so maybe subversive may be a bit of a stronger word.  But in past years, I was pretty good at it. In fact, there were times that I made it my mission to do specifically what they told me I could not do.  It was pretty much a red cape-bull situation.  In full disclosure…it did not always work.  But when a good part of your life is spent on the road doing the art festival circuit and being herded like cattle and organized into 10’ by 10’ squares marked on the street, learning how to covertly “workaround” was necessary for survival.

Writing here has been exposure, I often hold back not wanting to be a whiner, or a baby, or all of the other negative things.  I was terribly ashamed of those feelings. Not understanding has always presented itself as shame in my life.

"Shame on You" Indigo Girls

...it means acknowledging my reality, pain, love and loss.

It is the 5^th…again. And as hard as I try, the memories of that morning roar back into my heart. My head and rational thinking cannot stop or control the grief and pain. I remember it like it was yesterday and am still afraid it will happen again, even though I know it is impossible.

 

Darren called and told me Jill was on her way to pick me up, he was at the hospital, Skip had been brought it by the ambulance.  We arrived and they took us straight back to a small (not patient room). A nurse came in and said Skip appeared to have had an aortic aneurism and they were working hard.  Less than 2 min. later a doctor arrived and told us he did not make it.  I did not understand what “did not make it” meant and asked if we wanted to see him…Of course, I did, I still could not grasp what he meant “did not make it”. I was a normal Monday morning we had had coffee together and I had just waved goodbye when he left for work 2 hours ago.

I still cannot explain that first the look at him, the confusion and devastation of that moment. I see it my dreams every night, but on the 5^th of every month it feels like I re-live it…and it is really hard.  It is the one memory I want desperately to let go of…and I just cannot seem to do it and I do not understand why.

"Won't last a day" Carpenters

I know this is sappy, but sometimes it just is what it is

Here's to the crazy ones!

I expect after this quarantine there will be more of us!  More and more I see TV and the internet extolling the benefits of being creative.  What still bothers me…that is, if anyone really cares, is that as a society we still think of creativity, in general as something to do when there is nothing else to do. It never seems to be what a person would make as a first choice, before laundry, yard work, dishes, etc….Creating is my first choice, does not really matter what kind of creating…well that is not so, cooking is not part of my creative process…that smacks too much of a list of rules (recipe) following process.  Whatever we do, do what you love first just keep 6 feet away!

"Crazy, Crazy, Crazy"  Michael Franti & the Spearheads

her confidence....

I have lost a great deal of my confidence.  Confidence comes from a steady life foundation and when that world that foundation falls apart so does confidence.  You may officially list this one as 32-B on the list of things people do not tell you after the loss of a life partner.  

So, now it is just me and it is all up to me to create my own confidence and my own happiness with this giant hole in my life.  But millions of people do this every day, in fact, all of us will have to do it in one way or another.  I am beginning to feel like it is time to wear my very own confidence.  I had it once, it just has to be in here somewhere!

"This is Me"   Kealy Settle

Ironic

Timing is everything, and for me, that has been an issue my entire life! A day late and a dollar short might be the best way to describe a good part of my life! 

So here we go again! As a chronic unsuccessful overweight dieter, I have lost 8 lbs in 2 weeks.  It was not hard, I am just not hungry.  What??? The easiest diets I have ever been “not” on!  I think this is a “Yay”!

Then to add to this, for the first time in my life I have had carte blanch to do what I want, whenever I want, as long as I feel like it. How many times does that happen in anyone’s life?AND….now we are in a stay at home order. Damn the irony!

"Ironic" Alanis Morrisette