Hallowed be this day

Watching them work methodically, I feel a sense of detachment between their tasks and the intention behind them. My hands have never looked so alive. Deep gold from hours of work in the sun, veins hugging my skeleton like determined vines, my precise little tools have quite the developing repertoire. My medium has been gracious enough to tolerate my experiments, frustrations, and questions. She has taken me in and molded my form.

The possibilities are mounting and I find my dreams flowering in wild new directions. I strive for focus tempered by sweetness, and the blood, sweat, and tears become less a thing to struggle through and more a gift to be savored. I want a hiatus of sorts. I can no longer tolerate the destructive, cyclical patterns of thought force fed from birth in these parts. I can no longer tolerate blindness, deceit, or apathy. Mine eyes have seen the nothing and the everything, I have left my Iago trance, and I cannot go back.

How best to strive for greatness now? Part of me is inclined to give up everything as a testament to my ever new awareness. But as my prized possessions and collections cry to me from moldy walls, it seems they are only in need of a new space. Maybe a change in scenery would better serve my ambitions than potpourri daydreams.

My loved ones have been a total treasure to me through this entire process. They have showered me with patience and encouragement. Each of them have played vital roles in critical moments, and I am very grateful for their continued faith in me.

I would like to sanctify this day as hallowed day of possibility, paradox, and potential. My dearest friend, confidant, starpartner Erin, has let me move in. She is a passionate, awe-inspiring painter and a worthy fellow adventurer. I have a new job downtown, and a new plan for my first real raku line. I hope to move soon, I've gotten rid of 95% if the things that I own. I'm now mobile and flight-ready. All I ask of my new home is that it offer a plethora of natural adventures, and a quiet place for study, experimentation, and meditation. I don't think the answer is in others for me right now, but if there must be others, I hope they are serene and loving. I hope to delve completely into my medium, so that I can be honest in my pursuits.

Someone recently entered my life by coincidence, meeting me at the soul with a gentle hello. Since that moment, somehow he has stayed in my thoughts, in my dreams. It's all beautifully peculiar to me. I'm buzzed with thoughts of star-crossed lovers and the body electric. We are separated by a great distance, iron, and rock, but his vibrations still echo in the hollow of my chest.

Staring at my toes at the end of the tub and they start to look like mountains, reflected at their roots into the barely steady water like the black taj.

I found myself standing in a windowless hall of dark closed doors. As though a wind took with the light and the air to close everthing I could peer into. But then vines cracked the mortar in the floor and extended nimble fingers to reclame the darkened space. I find now the whole labrynth of doors I've been constructing and bloodying my knuckles over is falling to rubble. And through the looking glass I find things to be more translucent.


I recently had my first show. Some saintly folk in Virginia had a marvelous brainchild to inject a real bon temps roulee feel into the Bayou Boogaloo Cajun Arts Festival. They graciously shipped work, provided room, board, and boothspace, and hauled the hallowed bodies of 30 or so New Orleans artists. We all piled on a bus at 9:30 at night in NOLA and set off on our thousand mile journey.


The next morning the big black bus, "I heart NOLA" in gold brandishing from its side, pulled into Hardees. The driver made a bee line for the door and then there was a pause. Moments later a fountain of flowing fabrics, professional cameras, and earthy postures came flowing from the door. The ecclectic crowd dispersed to the edges of the parking lot to examine flowers, take portraits of the clouds, and stir up a little tai chi line dance. The island of misfit toys seemed tumped over into the parking lot.





After being a craft fair waif my entire life, I have found new drive through this validating, inspiring event. Suddenly people who I have observed and admired for years are nestling me warmly under their wings, welcoming me as a peer. The path before me has opened up like the morning horizon. Soon my best friend and career/adventure partner and I will hit the road to find a new home and space to totally immerse ourselves into nature, new culture, and our mediums. It is hard to break away from all my current comforts, and all of my fears and insecurities are blazing in my face. However, the time has come. The nest has gotten too warm.