Jodi Hills

So this is who I am – a writer that paints, a painter that writes…

Monthly Archives: November 2024


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Toward the net.

I’m in between at the moment. I recently finished a large painting, and the new panel is built. It waits patiently on the working easel. But I have to be ready. So I turn to my sketchbooks.

It’s good practice. They keep me active. Learning. And it’s never about perfection. But I do get to start and finish something pretty quickly. And that feels good. And I wouldn’t call it a victory, but setting myself up for one.

Maybe it’s because I recently had two setters from my high school volleyball team come for a visit. Every day at 3:15, we would change from our school clothes into our sweats. The energy that remained seated all day, from classroom to classroom was released, bouncing off the smooth hardwood floors. Mrs. Anderson blew her whistle and we sprinted, line by line. We called them crushers. And I suppose that’s what they were designed for – to crush out the demons of the day, the problems unsolved, the warnings of tests approaching, the teasing, the fatigue of numbers divided on blackboards and inside bathroom cliques. After shaking it all out, we lined up at the net. And it was Barbie and Cindy who began setting us up. On firm and gentle fingertips they passed the ball. We raced forward and swung with all of our might. And the ball went into the net. Again and again. But they, Barbie and Cindy, stood there, smiling us through the line, setting us up over and over, each seeming taller with every passing of the ball. Never rolling their eyes, or sighing with puffed out cheeks. They just kept giving us the chance, repeatedly, without judgement.

And that’s what my sketchbooks do — they Barbie and Cindy me through the ordinary days. The in betweens. The 3:15 release of all my creative energy. The letting gos. The trying news. Maybe I would have gotten here on my own, but I’m not sure. There have been so many that set me up through the years. Still. I write of them day by day. I stand a little taller. And because of them I feel a responsibility to do the same for myself. To give myself a chance. Every day. Who would I be if I just let it all slip by? Who would I be if I didn’t even try? You have to try! I see their faces, smiling, and I race toward the net.

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The shape will hold.

Maybe it’s too simple. Maybe I need it to be.

Baking cookies yesterday, I rolled out the dough to make the tester. Just the empty space of one heart. And it occurred to me — maybe we all have to do that from time to time — empty it all — give it all — all of our love, to get to where we want to go, to be who we want to be.

There will always be uncertainty. Waiting. Looking through the glass. Did I add enough butter? Too much? Will the shape hold? The minutes tick by slowly and it’s so stupid, but I think of everything I could do to save the dough if the heart falls apart. I’ve made them before to great success. Last week even. Why do I worry? The needlessly excruciating eight minutes pass and the test cookie is just fine. I smile and finish the bake.

It may surprise you when I say I think I’m getting better at the trying not to worry. Trying to replace it with care. And that’s the trick, I suppose. To care, with all of our hearts, not out of worry, but out of love.

The kitchen still has a sweet scent of sugar. I say to the space in my heart, the shape will hold, give it your all, the shape will ever hold.

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Beyond the Left Bank.

Last week we had the good fortune of revisiting the Musée d’Orsay in Paris.  Located on the Left Bank of the Seine, it houses the largest collection of Impressionist and post-Impressionistmasterpieces in the world. Painters include Claude Monet, Édouard Manet, Degas, Renoir, Cézanne, Seurat, Gauguin, and Van Gogh. It began as a railway station in 1898. By 1939, the short platforms became unsuitable for the newer, longer trains, and some considered it useless. There was even talk of tearing it down. But because of the vision of a select few, it was saved. And it is now one of the most beautiful and visited museums in the world. 
I suppose it’s always been human nature to give up. Supplied with life’s hammer, we have a decision to make, again and again. To build or destroy. Standing on the left bank once again, I know my decision is already made. 
The first thing I see each morning is this painting. The children by the sea. There is wonder. There is joy. This can never change. I put down my hammer, and pick up a brush. There is beauty to be made. Still.

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Learning.

Getting dropped off was always a production. To be separated from my mother seemed unthinkable to me. Even across Van Dyke Road in the gentle peach of Weiss’s house was just too far. The first visits to my grandparents were excruciating (and you know I loved them dearly). I wrapped myself in the telephone cord line, hoping to get the call of return. Even play dates began with tears. As if the little salty pockets of water would form a stream and carry me back to my mother’s arms. I mention it only to put the following in context — I never cried when being dropped off at school. Even in the uncertainty of my first kindergarten day at Washington Elementary, in my polyester dress, white knee high socks and patent leather shoes, I walked up the entry stairs without looking back. Even before it was proven to be true, school always saved me. 

Through the years, I have had the privilege of going across the country, school district to school district, with my books. From coast to coast, we have stood up against bullying with “I am Amazed.” Promoted self-esteem with “Believe.” Encouraged creativity with “Astonish.” Two days ago I got the message that a school in Canada ordered 100 books of “I’m not too busy.” And once again, I am saved.

The answer for me has been the same since I was five years old — keep learning. Through every trial, every heartache, every wave of uncertainty. Today, once again, I pull up my knee highs, straighten my skirt and climb the stairs. No day is ever the same, but everything is going to be ok. I pull open the heavy doors, without turning back. Step onto the terrazzo floors. And begin again.

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Hvezda.

She didn’t want me to bring it, my bicycle. But I begged. There’s no place to ride it, she said. Oh, yes, I’ll find lots of places, I said. Living on a gravel road, my banana seat bike was always dirty. It will ruin the back of the car, she said. I’ll put down a sheet, I said. (I never remember getting new sheets as a kid. I wonder how we always had old ones in the garage.) She finally gave in as I struggled to lay flat the fitted sheet in the back of car.

My grandma was aproned and dishtoweled waiting by the back door. She looked confused when my mother pulled out my bicycle. She simply shrugged her shoulders and shook her head. Balancing it with one handlebar, I waved to my mother as she backed out the driveway.

I jumped onto the back seat, still spinning in my mother’s dust. I road from the barn to the mailbox. The barn to the mailbox. The barn to the mailbox. And then began to wonder what I had begged for. I looked around. There was no sidewalk. No bike path. I wasn’t allowed on the highway. The electric fence gated the field filled with cow pies. Still determined, I laid my bike flat. Grabbed the back ring of the seat. And pulled it under the fence — the handlebar just missing the shock of the wire. I stood it up in the uneven grass. I turned the pedals. Right foot high in the air. I pushed it with all of my weight. The wheels didn’t move. I tipped over. I put it up again. Pushed. Fell. Again. Pushed fell. So distracted by the grass stains forming on my knees, I hadn’t seen grandpa walk up behind me. His hand made stable the seat. I mounted. He lifted the back wheel. The front tire took hold and I was off. I don’t know how far I went before getting stuck again. But he pulled me out. Pushed me off. Again and again. Exhausted, and completely unwilling to admit it, I stopped at the machine shed on the other side of the field. I watched him pick out the tools he needed. I looked back at the house. Then back at him. The thing I remember the most is, he didn’t make me ask. He picked up my bike and secured it on his shoulder. We began walking back to the house.

Do you know what my name means? He asked. Grandpa? No, he said, Hvezda. No, I said. It means Star. That’s nice, I said smiling. Some changed it, he said, when coming to America, they thought it would be easier. It’s easier to spell, I said. He agreed. But you didn’t, I said. Nope, he nodded. I already knew what it meant, he said, and that was enough. I smiled and agreed. Perhaps we both saw the uncertainty (but beauty) of my road ahead.

I don’t know what it is, that makes us choose. That makes us decide on a path. What makes us get up over and over again. Determined, on the uneasiness. But I keep choosing it. Ever hopeful. I guess I know what it means to me. And it does mean something! It means so much! So I will choose it again and again. The silent h and the long v, keep pointing me to the unchartered path. And I still believe.

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Scattered “w”s

I don’t know her name, the woman at the bookstore — the one I told you about the other day. The one who followed Frances McDormand around and out the store last summer. But I know her face. And she knows mine. When we returned a few days ago, I placed my book on the counter to purchase, and held my phone up to show her the photo. I started with “Remember when…” and she looked terrified — the store is filled with international customers daily, so I’m sure she was not prepared for a test. But I continued quickly…”we talked about Frances McDormand?” And she broke into a huge smile. Yes, yes, she remembered this. I told her that I was so inspired that I went home and painted her. I held out my phone displaying the portrait. “Wow!” She claimed, “You are soooo good, wow!”  I beamed. I thanked her in two languages, both of us still grinning. “Because of our conversation…” she repeated, recognizing the part she had played. “Yes!” I said. And we knew we were connected. We spoke a little of paint, and words, and she placed my new book in a sack. I turned around to join Dominque and she said, this time to herself, perhaps to the store, the books that connected us, “Woah! Magnifique!” 

There are no price tags for each day that we live, but we do get paid, in the most glorious of ways. Sometimes it is with a passing smile. A lingered hug that says, “I know,” without words. A wave from an open window. Two wows and a woah! — I have them pocketed still, not to hoard them, but to have them at the ready, to give them freely when the moment arrives. When looked at with the hope of connection, I can scatter my “w”s and form a bond. Wow!

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Taking comfort.

New Orleans was hovering between Christmas and Mardi Gras. Purple and gold decorations spilled from the trees onto the walls. We had just arrived in the city, for the fourth time, (though every time in New Orleans joyfully feels like the first), and Dominque wanted to pick up some maps from the city center. It seemed everyone had questions that day, so we stood in line at the counter. The only three people certain of the reason for their visit stood in front of the fireplace in the lobby. She, barely covered in a white sleeveless mini-dress and high heels. He, in flannel and work boots. The priest all in black.

They pledged “forever” in front of the impermanent purples, and seemed to have no idea of those of us touristing through their life changing moment.

It’s happening all the time. Life. Somewhere in that city, under the same purple and gold, they were saying goodbye to a loved one — completely stunned that the world could keep on turning. Someone was being born. Someone was celebrating. Someone was waiting for a bus (not wanting go), watching us unfold a map with expectation.

We’re all traveling through the randomness of each other’s lives. And isn’t it comforting, knowing that we aren’t alone? Couldn’t we have a little more empathy for each other? Be a little more kind? I smile, wandering within love’s purple and gold.

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Daring the hollow.

Saying goodbye to my friends on their recent visit, left a small empty space in my heart. Perhaps in the shape of a school, I thought. Because that’s where we first met. Where we first started to learn about each other. Behind books, buses and bleachers, we came together, with all of our common Minnesota sayings, and our distant uncommon dreams. (As the song says, we carried each other “from crayons to perfume.”) So when I really think about it, they have left a shape indeed, but it will never be empty. It is filled with all that I have seen of them, and they of me. I suppose that’s the risk of loving — to carve out this space for others, and daring it to be filled.

I mention it because it is the only way to describe how I felt after finishing the most recent book by Elizabeth Strout, “Tell me Everything.” This seemingly “hollow” of the final page, is actually filled with the most glorious flawed and fantastic people. Most will ask, “Well, what was it about?” I could no more answer this than if you asked me, “What is it like to have friends?” It is sweet and sad and funny, oh, so bending at the waist funny, and the same exact motion with tears — both with tears, I suppose, if you’re doing it right. All that tenderness. So still, if you need to know what it’s about — I would have to say about a two inch space carved into my heart, in the shape of Maine.

I place the book up on the shelf and think, “I had such a friend.”

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Gravel’s beauty.

I imagine longing has to stay in the car. And in that moment, that small and courageous step onto the uncertainty of gravel, in the abandonment of longing and the commencement of action, this, I think, is where true hope can begin.

I wanted to capture that moment. Stroke by stroke. As a reminder. To do something. And I’m not saying it’s easy. It can be terrifying to leave the ride — the “well, we’ve always done it this way” — even when you know it’s not taking you where you want to go. But this courage, to drop the baggage of what was, and see what will be, there is beauty in this. I can see it. Maybe you need to see it too.

I step away from the car. I can feel the rocks beneath my feet. It’s not painful. It feels like possibility. And I am not afraid. With each step I hear the words, “She wasn’t where she had been. She wasn’t where she was going, but she was on her way.”

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On fishing.

When he commissioned me to do the portrait, he was explaining how we were connected. The wife of his deceased brother ended up marrying my divorced cousin and living in my grandparent’s house. Did that make us related? Probably not, but somehow there were strands. Strands enough to fill a brush, to collect the paint, to make the portrait of three brothers, fishing at a lake, a lake that I would swim in a few years to come. None of us knowing in the time that this painting captures, all that we would survive. All of the living. All of the love. Never expecting that heartache and difference would be washed clean in the common waters of Lake L’homme Dieu. 

Barefooted and fishing — maybe it’s the metaphor for how we all begin. Innocent and looking. Docked, but never tied down. Hopeful. Curious. Maybe in returning here we can find the hope we so desperately need. The simplicity. The beauty of what really connects us. 

I suppose the words I type are merely a strand on a pole, flung out to open waters, but maybe it’s enough. I pray it’s enough. So I keep writing. I keep painting. I keep hoping. I keep living. I keep loving.

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