There is a real difference between paper, canvas and panel. Each one takes the paint in its own way. Likes a different brush stroke, even a different brush. And I don’t like one more or less for it. I’m trying to do the same with people.
I’m not saying it’s easy. But I think just being aware, it helps me fight it less. Sure I still come with all of my seemingly best skills, but they don’t work for everyone. And sometimes I get through my whole wheelhouse — are you paper, canvas, panel? Now what? Then you look at me with all of that leather or lace, that ceramic or stone, and I know I have to try again. I used to think, well, why do I have to change? And the answer is I don’t. None of us do. But if we want to include the people in our lives that provide a challenge, (and I say provide here, because they are giving us an opportunity to grow), if we do want to include them, we may have to thin out the paint a little, and try again. Not giving up on our skills, but enhancing them. Because most likely, they are doing the same, and with any luck, we find a colorful way to be together.
Someone said yesterday, it sounds like a prayer. And maybe it is. I write, not because I have the answers, but because I’m trying to learn them. Day by day. Bit by bit. I have always believed, even when I, we, fail, there is love in the attempt. And if we can see that, we can do anything.
There is a woman at Harvard studying aging. Not looking to turn back time, but how to make the most of it. She brought a group of elderly men to live together. Their only assignment was to live like they did when they were of college age. They ate together. They talked and laughed. They watched the old tv shows. Listened to the music of their time. Within only a week or two, things started to change. Their hearing improved. Their eyesight improved. They weren’t getting younger, but they were living like they were.
And I suppose that’s why I write about cherished memories of youth. Of school and lake. Of playground and gym. Bike rides and friendships. I don’t want to go back. I love the time I’m in. But I want to keep alive the vigor of youth. The curiosity. The hope. The belief in possibility. When will triumphed over expectation. Fun over winning.
I think our hearts and brains are designed like an Apple Computer (I know it’s the reverse direction, but let me make the point.) They are designed to help you make the best choice. Direct you to the option in order to achieve the desired result. Prompt you to the greatest of possibilities. I know this to be true because for the last ten years or so, I have awakened each morning to the same song. It was never my favorite song. I’m not sure I even listened to it that much, and yet it is the prompt in my head and/or heart each morning roll out of the covers. As I’m making the bed the Pointer Sisters are indeed pointing me in the right direction with their song, “I’m so excited, I just can’t hide it…” And it doesn’t matter the day. Without longing or permission. Without ideal health or weather, it is there — telling me to be excited.
I am more optimist than scientist, I suppose, but the facts remain the same. The heart and brain are so powerful. They want us to succeed. So easily we can swap perception from expectation. Choose to live each day.
The sun that shines through the morning window whispers youth, and I truly am excited.
Ernest Hemingway said, “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you…
Now we were not men, nor living in Paris, but my mother never shied us away from a little editing.
Our “Paris” changed from week to week depending on the books we read. We were lucky enough to have library cards, but mostly we were lucky to have each other, and that was always more than enough.
I suppose it was beside her in my twin size bed that I first heard her say, “Isn’t it so me?” I looked at her, her eyes twinkling in some distant light. I knew she was no longer on Van Dyke Road. She was in the book. She was not reading the words, but among them. As one who never wanted to be left behind, I knew I better grab hold of her, a hand, a skirt, anything near her, a participle dangling…as she danced among the paragraphs.
Oh, how we traveled. In clothes we didn’t own. In cities we never walked. In feelings that we knew as sure as the front of our hands. Hands that held the words that carried us, luckless as some may have seen — only viewing the backs, but even tucked under blankets, dreaming before dreams, we stood as tall as any tale could be.
You might think I am lucky to visit Paris now.. And I will agree. But it’s not new, it’s only because, just as Hemingway said, the luck stayed with me all these years. I was taught to keep dreaming, to keep editing, when everyone else said no, when some said only maybe, when other didn’t even bother to respond, my home grown mothered luck said, “Oh, yes, baby girl, you ARE lucky enough! This IS your Paris!”
In the most recent adaptation of “Little Women,” Jo says, “If I was a girl in a book, this would all be so easy.” Which is ironic, because, as we know, she is a girl in a book. And it’s all laid out before her. Page by page.
In the book Bird Song, I write:
“Sometimes I think I’d like to know the future…how it all turns out, you know…as if that would make it easier. Silly I suppose…and the moment passes. I’m ok with now, good actually. Skies are blue and my wings are strong. I feel loved and hopeful. Sure I get scared sometimes…we all do. The blue is filled with those who timidly, nervously, wantfully, stepped out onto a limb…held their breath and took the jump, a leap of faith. And so I love and leap and believe, not needing to be certain all the time…feeling there is more comfort in love than in certainty. And would I step out onto the next limb if I knew?… maybe not. Who wants to be stuck in certainty? I want to soar in the beauty of the unknown. It is there I will grow. It is there I will feel. It is there I will truly live.”
When I painted her yesterday, I could see it…how she was lost in all that certainty. So sure of what was before her, it nearly bent her in half. So blinded by what was, she nearly missed the what could be that perched on her back. I don’t know what lies ahead, but I’d like to think she gives herself a chance to soar. I want that…for me, for you, for all of us, big and small — to fly in the beauty of the unknown.
It didn’t take long for reality to set in. Coming home from shows in New York, I clutched my stack of orders with so much joy, pride, absolute delight with each hand written page. Remembering each call I made to my mom after the order was written. Or even better, standing next to her, trying not to squeal out loud, watching her turn to the corner to gather herself in.
Once home, thumbing through all that joy, it became clear that I was going to have to fill them. Make each piece by hand. And all that joy began to percolate. Before coming to a boil, I would take the smallest order and complete it. Take it to the post office or UPS, and mark it off the list. Then do the next one. Small victories each day. As the stack went down, my confidence went up, and that thing that once seemed too big to handle, had indeed been handled.
I think of it now, as I watch all the fruit ripen on our trees. For the last four days, I have made one batch each afternoon. I used to pick them all at once and struggle. Labor. Almost come to hate that very fruit that I prayed would grow just the spring before. Sometimes it takes a bit to relearn the lessons we’ve already learned, but then it occurred to me that — this was my new New York. So small batches.
Even with all of my self reminders, like painting the birds, one by one in my daily sketchbook — physically creating my own “one at a time,” with my “bird by bird” — I still have to learn, once again, to take it all in small batches. That thing I’m trying to live through, (that you’re trying to live through), won’t be finished today. And that’s ok. All we have to do is get through this tiny little batch. And I can do that. We can do that.
And then one day, after spring’s prayers and summer’s work, you wake up and realize you did indeed bear the unbearable. Batch by batch. The joy of living.
I wasn’t allowed to eat in my bedroom as a little girl, but that didn’t prevent me from making snacks. My mother knew it wasn’t about food when she asked what I was doing. It took a little explanation at first. It was with crayons and paper. I colored in the books. I wrote tiny poems in my Big Chief notebooks. All on the chance that I would need them later. That I would hunger for these little bits of color, these little snacks of hope.
And in later years, when it was she who needed them, I wrote them in spiral notebooks. Painted them on boards. Burned phrases into wood. Typed them on recipe cards. Penned them on yellow sticky notes.
And when we both were fed, strong, I was able to share. She was able to share.
I suppose it’s why I go to the studio each day. Maybe I will need that little bird later. Maybe you will. Sometimes you write in the comments, “this is just what I needed today,” and I know, I know exactly what you mean. We never lose our taste for hope. So I fill the sketchbooks. Because it’s never just a bird. It’s a snack to get us through. Use all of your courage today. All of my hope. Take it. Fly. I, we, will make more tomorrow.
I must have knocked it out when putting on my scarf. I began my walk and noticed my earbud was missing. I retraced my steps in the driveway. Nothing. In the entry. Not there. I looked in the closet. Nothing. I decided to go on my walk and search again when I got home. Off balance for an hour, I returned to search. My phone said it was nearby. It asked me, would I like to ping it. Sure. Ping, ping, ping. I could hear a faint sound, but I couldn’t tell where it was coming from. It led me into the closet. Still nothing on the floor. But it kept pinging. There was a duffle bag sitting there. Surely it hadn’t found its way into the tiniest of slits for the pocket. I picked it up. It kept pinging. I opened each pocket. Rifled my hand through each crease. Shook it. And there it was. What an invention. This pinging! Simply marvelous, my brain shouted. My heart only nodded, smiling, thinking, I already knew.
I feel it each morning. The first thing I see is the painting of my mother dancing. Ping! My grandfather leaning in. Ping! Grandma smiling. Ping! The grandkids at the beach – Ping! Ping! Each leading me to the desired destination. Each leading me home.
They say follow your heart. I believe it’s true. I used to go only by feel, but now I hear it as well! The marvelous ping of my heart!
