From There to wherever Here is...

… what a long, strange trip it’s been.

new journal…. blackberry blossoms… oops

I’ve spent the last few weeks working on a Thing. The Thing has been rolling around in my mind and heart for months and months. I’ve been planning and wondering and hoping and doubting (just a little bit), and I’m super excited about it… but I don’t want to jinx it, so I’m going to hold off on writing about it — for now.

This evening, a bit bleary-eyed from scanning, and worn out from spending significant time in editing mode, I asked myself how did I even GET HERE?

Self, that is an excellent question.

Six or so years ago, I was making a small living by putting my writing talent to work for an educational institution. When I landed that job — by way of some freelancing I’d done — I couldn’t believe my luck. But circumstances (and jobs) being what they are, my enthusiasm turned to burnout — gradually, at first, but later on, like an avalanche. What happened next is still a blur: Medical leave. Enforced rest. Whirling balls of what if…? Then, the Covid Lockdown. The decision to leave the job, sell my condo, and move to the desert Southwest, closer to my dad, farther from the frantic — and painful — treadmill I’d fallen from.

Locked down in a new city, with little to do and zero energy to do it with, I wandered around the internet and happened upon a free, 10-day creativity workshop with a hands-on offering from a different artist each day. Sounded interesting…

You make the path by walking, the saying goes. At that time, very much still in burnout-recovery-mode, I had no concrete plans and no to-do list — just plenty of free time, a cheap watercolor set, and some mixed media sketchbooks. I signed up for the workshop, and a new path appeared.

During those 10 days, I made art — in fits and starts — and found a kind of liberation. Whoa! It’s fun to do creative things I’ve never done before! There’s no obligation, no audience, and no product expected at the end of each session. (Although I’d been poet-ing for many years, I had stayed away from ART-type art, because of some upsetting teenage episodes there’s no need to rehash.)

By the end of that workshop, I had signed up for another series of tutorials, acquired some better supplies (let’s hear it for curbside pickup!), and met — in cyberspace — several creators I am still in touch with today. Those connections led to other connections… A simple creative session with Suzi Banks Baum led me to my first 100-Day Project. A workbook about art journaling, checked out of my barely-reopened library, led to online handmade bookmaking lessons with Vintage Page Designs. A trio of Let’s Make Art subscription boxes (a gift from my beloved friend Esther), led to watercolor tutorials with Kolbie Blume (This Writing Desk) and a love affair with gouache, which led me to ongoing painting lessons with Sarah Burns Studio.

The internet turned out to be the catalyst, and the doorway.

During the lockdown, a friend I’d made during a poetry workshop in 2019 introduced me to a new friend, and the three of us wrote together on Zoom once a week. Another poet friend up in Canada introduced me to her creative support group, where I’m learning gentle ways to tend to my projects. Other folks from creative retreats have kept in touch online, and as our web of connections keeps growing, my creative practice grows, too.

I recognize the enormous amount of privilege that makes all of this possible for me. It is no small thing to have the safety, space, and resources to play and experiment as I do now. Where once I’d struggled to squeeze a line or two of poetry in between work hours and commuting and the therapist’s office, I now have the luxury of time. I’ve found gifted teachers, whom I can afford. I’ve got good friends with whom I can share my rough drafts and sketches and successes and OMG failures — just as they share their work with me. I am grateful every minute of every day for my current circumstances.

I look at the last several years with a kind of wonder. Just when it seemed that there was no way to move forward — when I came to an unwilling full stop — a new path did appear. Not the beginning-to-end path. And certainly not a path free of detours and pitfalls. Still, step by step, turn by turn, this path is working, right here, right now.