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Back On Track – Well Sort Of

Posted on by Sandy Webster

Walking the trail each morning is a good thing. Here are some scenes from there these past few days.

Bambi, his mom and Thumper having breakfast.

And this morning Thumper with another companion.

And those drawings a day with haiku.

A found wildflower

growing near the storage shed

perfect for drawing.

 

I think it must have

hurt the crow to lose this part

that keeps him aloft.

 

Feathers collected

over the last few daily

walks along the trail.

 

One feather, one leaf

and forty-five short minutes,

they are now captured.

 

I returned to the studio and looked over the mess at the pieces I started last year. Remember Sandy, Printmaker?

I just plain quit on the overly complex Sandy, Traveler. But yesterday it caught my eye and some ideas started formulating. So even though I have not moved it to a work space, I did start some adjusting. And started liking it again. Not just the memories of places traveled but the layering of different mediums to take it further.  It was a good idea to come back.

These two are waiting for me to get the traveler finished so they, too, get a chance at my attention and intentions.

Sandy, Writer and Sandy, Homemaker.

When I finally finish all four I think they should be placed in individual large cloches. I did find a company that carries the large size that would be needed….19″ inside height and 12″ inside diameter.

Then when I get older I will have them lined up on a shelf across from my chair or bed and be able to say, “I used to be….”

And the shelf below them will hold all my travel journals and sketchbooks. And within reach will be, earth pigment watercolors, papers, brushes, pens, pencils, erasers and books and pads with blank pages.  And some cloth and thread and needles. This sets the priorities for clearing things out.

And if I actually am in the final chapter of a really good book, I might as well make the most of it.

Today it is a look on the bright side.

With a keen awareness that some days are just going to be like this.

Til later.

 

A Reckoning

Posted on by Sandy Webster

Warning…..just pretend you are the priest in the next booth or skip this post altogether.

 

What is it like to be surrounded by the physical evidence of memories? Things piled on top of each other, obscuring some other ones. The other ones that are temporarily less important.

Most of them are silent, passive. They have given up on my frenzied passion to bring them up to the surface and push them around – so we can sing together of what mattered. What might still matter in this silence of being lost.

I tried just now to resurrect an artist book – only just started and then put down – waiting for me to come back. My watercolors of place were opened. A soft brush first in water, then in the pigments. Brushing along the edges then further into the surface of each page – the memories come back.

And with them comes the breeze, the smells, the companionship. It is too much.

I put the brush down. Find this yellow legal pad and a waiting pen. I write what I see and how the vision of it all feels.

And you know what it feels like? It feels like the last chapter of a book that had such promise of going on forever.

There are days I should just stay out of the studio.

When I buried so much artwork outside this studio I should have thought to bury what inspired it in the first place. I should have tossed these bits and pieces that were collected, assembled together so as not to forget, and put them in the hole as well.

If I had only filled my head with thoughts of making pieces that looked nice, pretty, appealing to the eye. If I had done that and ignored the cries of work that knocked at my doors. The slightest crack and these thoughts took over by dragging in all the parts that made them come alive.

Those ideas have pushed their way into every crevice of this big, far from empty space I used to love to come into. This space, this big room should have had organized shelves and boxes and drawers of the bits I could assemble into something nice, pretty and maybe even interesting.

I actually did that at times. Made stuff that had no meaning and mattered so little I would rush through it – just to get it over with – get it ready for a show based on sales.

It’s a formula. Black, beige, old scraps of things that look like they might have mattered to somebody. Push them around until there is a nice design – add a bit of indigo blue or dark red – not too much. Put it in a frame or use it as a sample to show workshop students and encourage them to make more of the same.

Making work like that does see things used up. And if you don’t collect more, then eventually the studio space empties – even the memories can slip out the open door.

But this!

This place holds the evidence of an artist reluctant to let go. Holding onto the wispy threads that connect to memories or just plain trail off into an emptiness.

If you have stayed with me this far, thank you.

There is absolutely no one else for me to talk to – you are it and you have been more than kind in your understanding. And most importantly you are there.

It is a reckoning. I am doing a hard calculation of my time left for waiting. Waiting to see if it is another dug hole or simply sorting and putting most of it away.

Something will have to happen to this space before I come back with any intention of making something.

Boxes with lids. The kind you can stack on top of each other. The kind of box that you can write “stuff” on before the stuff is put in.

I will start there.

Til later.

A Holiday Weekend – For Who?

Posted on by Sandy Webster

Lee and Sadie are getting naps. It is Labor Day.  I am trying to hurry this along before Lee wakes up. Earlier today he wanted to go home again. He seems a bit more lost and does not know what to do with himself. I had him sample the goulash and had him dry the pots and pans….then we had lunch. When I went back to reading our book, he dropped off.  Now he is asleep on his porch swing.

Here are the last six days of drawings.

What causes the feathers

to fall from the bird’s body

and settle in our path?

 

This trail collection

was spotted and gathered up

to draw on this page.

 

It is difficult

drawing white trumpet shaped blooms.

Where are the edges?

 

A freshly fallen

pine cone spreading it’s petals

to release it’s seed.

 

Some of these feathers

from Rufus sided Towhee

one from mourning dove.

 

Giant goldenrod

growing along the driveway

are very golden.

 

There was some time to work on the fairy book.

And the acorn brothers collecting frogs.

And this below some root…an opening for hanging laundry.

All for as I need to get this posted….be back in a couple of days.

Tuesdays!

Posted on by Sandy Webster

I was just saying to the caregiver that we are living in a time when every day is Tuesday. Nothing big happens. There is not much in the mailbox. One day just rolls into the next. And almost all of them are less than exciting, less than memorable. There used to be a difference between say, a Sunday, and a Tuesday. Sunday we started with breakfast out and found fun things to do after we got home. Now there is no difference than if it was Tuesday….no breakfast out and little to no mail.

I read memes on facebook that it is up to me to make the most of my day. It is an attitude thing. Well, in all honesty, it is not an attitude thing! A smile on my face is not going to make Trump supporters grow some intelligence. A smile on my face is not going to make me get all the chores done that Lee can no longer do. A smile on my face is not going to make someone call and say, “Can I do something for you?” A smile just is not enough.

So I am reading stories, books to Lee. Both of us can get lost in someone else’s life for as many hours as it takes to get through the book. I just finished reading Diane Setterfield’s The Thirteenth Tale. She tells a good story. Interesting characters, lots of ways to change your voice when you read it aloud…and you can temporarily become anyone of them. Reading aloud is magic. I feel myself becoming my mother. She was so good at taking us away with the classics she read to us. Not those silly Disneyfied Golden Books but big hardbound books with loads and loads of words that chased each other across the pages. Only rarely was there a full colored illustration that more or less fitted into what you had imagined.

I wish I had more time than my blog to write words that I know are just waiting for me to find the time to push from my fingers. Stories are just backing up in the shoe box I keep in my head to store the good stuff. It is full of 3 x 5 cards with pale blue lines full of names and “what ifs”. Sometimes I pop the lid just before going to sleep to put another card in there.

Anyway, there are two more new hardbound books on the table and another one on the way. Lee and I will get lost together in something that makes our endless Tuesdays more worthwhile. When I catch him napping while I read, I wake him and tell him we are getting to the good part and he leans forward and waits. We just need to have books with lots of good parts….easily done. Amazon! “Amazon” is like “abra cadabra” used to be. And there it is in the mailbox….plenty of new .3mm pencil leads, new shoes, fish food, cat litter, new shirts, whatever is truly needed at the time with the luxury of being able to send it back…..but we rarely do. You just have to be honest about how much you really need to have brought to you via the magic of Amazon.

Speaking of magic….isn’t this an inviting image? I altered it just a touch to a vivid warm I think they call it on my IPhone. But it does conjure up something that begs description….a story.

I reminds me in a way of the Eucalyptus trees in Australia that I never get enough of. Someone over there asked me why I found them so irresistible. And I said, “Just look at them! Not one wants to be ignored! They present themselves for your approval! How in the world can you possibly ignore that?” Something about this one seems to be giving me an invitation to come close and listen to what it has to say.

I also found a Howler Fairy in the crape myrtles.

And the last four days of drawings.

The lotus season

has left the tiniest pods

slumped by their own weight.

 

These oak tree leavings

were found along the trail path

this early morning.

I love this feather

that was wet, a bit tattered,

and just left behind.

 

Small messy feathers

and remains of a pine cone

trying to be one.

 

I need to go through drawers, closets, cupboards and throw things away. But I am afraid I might need another responsible adult with me to do it. So much of what we have is no longer needed. And there seems no way to give it away. So much needs sorted. So much are things I don’t even want to look at let alone make decisions about.

I think it would be a good idea to have my kids arrive like they did at Christmas….but not until when things are safe again….say, April next year….after vaccinations. They could lay claim to the things they wanted and we would be left with only what we could see easily. No unwanted bits and pieces hiding away waiting to be important again. I get hard put to remember why they were important in the first place. I should have  been as unsentimental as my mother. She could give something away to the first person who said it was nice or interesting or lovely. She should come back from her place in the beyond and give me a hand here. Wherever she is, she is reading to someone and likely too busy enjoying herself to give me a hand….Somewhere I can hear her saying, “You made the mess, you clean it up.”

Well, yes mom, I am going to get to that. Soon.

Til later.