Adventures Upcoming

These two items are very precious, and they have something in common.

Vienna.

The Venus of Willendorf is something I have admired for much of my life. This small clay sculpture is 30,000 years old. That is 1500 generations worth of the passage of time. One thousand five hundred incarnations of lifetimes have passed since she was molded by hand by someone in the Austrian Alps, which also happens to be where my own very ancient ancestors are probably from. The original is made from a piece of limestone that was tinted with red ochre, and is considered to be a Mother Goddess. It is one of the first human representations known to art history, and is now housed in the Naturhistorisches Museum Wien.

The particular clay version you see in this picture was handed to me by a stranger at a Women's Art festival, with the words:  "I think this should be yours." With no more explanation, I accepted this gift and she has hung above my desk ever since, a reminder of the mystery and the deep connection we have to ancestors, women, hunter-gatherers, humans that came before any recorded time. 

The next object, in some ways, has actually an even more mysterious and unsolvable provenance. My aunt Evie told me many years ago that her mother, my Grandmother, spent her first honeymoon in Vienna. As a young woman, my grandmother was a remarkable person. At age 13 she took an ocean liner alone (steerage class, of course) from the small village of Viznitz in what is now Ukraine, alone, to emigrate to the US. The ship hit an iceberg and sank, she waited 6 weeks in Nova Scotia to get her papers in order, then ended up at Ellis Island. Many mishaps later at the age of 18, she met and married a talented musician and composer, Joseph Peyser, who was affluent enough to take her to Vienna to hear music and enjoy their newly married bliss. This solid sterling silver purse was a wedding present he gave her. She must have felt on top of the world, and that all her troubles were finally over. 

However, her newly wedded bliss was not to last, and we know very little more of this story, because one short year later, back in Brooklyn, her new husband and a newly born infant perished in the influenza epidemic of 1918. Suddenly, she was a 19 year old widow with a one year old baby, my Aunt Evie. She want on to marry Joseph's younger brother, Adolf, and years later had my mom and my uncle George. And she never talked more of the tragedies of her early life.

Ever since my Aunt Evie told me this, I wanted to go to Vienna, to wander the streets, to go to concert venues to hear the classical music she and Joseph probably enjoyed. My grandmother, a poor immigrant who barely could read or write English got to peruse the magnificent concert venues of Vienna with this precious pure silver evening purse, only to have this glamorous life ripped away in one short year.

I have always viewed a trip to Vienna as a pilgrimage to honor her.

AND it turns out the precious Venus of Willendorf is also living now  in Vienna. And the original stone it was carved from is believed to be from eastern Ukraine, exactly where my grandmother started her life before coming to the US.

So, this March, I will go on a pilgrimage. Luckily, my niece Laurel has started an academic job there, so I have someone with whom I can experience some of the wonders of Vienna, in memory of the Venus of 30,000 years ago, and Bella Peyser, of 108 years ago.

 

Art Journaling

I have been listening to the very inspiring book, "We Need Your Art" by Amie McNee. It is a manifesto in how to get your creative flow going without needing approval from the world. She talks about the gate-keepers of art, the way we are discouraged from personal expression unless it produces money or prestige. No one expects you to be a professional tennis player if your hobby is tennis, yet anyone whose hobby is in the creative arts is asked if they sell their work. If you write for fun, you are asked if you have published. If you paint you are asked if your work sells in a gallery. It's as if you need permission to make art, and the permission isn't given easily.

I love her lists of reasons that making art not only saves the maker, but saves the world. I love that when we create, we not only heal ourselves, but give healing to all who witness, are inspired by, or engage with us as creative beings.

I am once again using my art journaling time as a spiritual practice. Since starting ceramics a few years ago, I let my art journaling work slide to the wayside, and it's wonderful to get back into sitting with art journal pages, adding words and watercolor and stickers and decoration, simply to be in a creative flow. Making a product is not the goal; spending time in creative joy is the goal. These pages will only see the light of day here in this blog, they are not created to be in the commerce world, they are designed to be my personal expression of flow and healing in my own creative space.

These pages are not masterpieces or even finished works, they will never sell or be part of anything commercial; but they do give me the joy of being in the creative process. We are entitled to make things just for fun, just for pleasure, just for the freedom of expression. And the beauty is that the act of creation is so healing, so soothing, so uplifting.

Go attend to your mental health by creating something. I give you permission.

Ceramics!

I first took a ceramics class at about age 9 at our Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Bethesda, Maryland. I was entranced with the earthy and messy reality of molding and shaping the clay, and felt like this was the best few hours I had ever spent. I remember making a plaque in clay of the sun and the moon, a bas relief in many colors. I loved that wall hanging, and my mom had it in her house for decades.

But I was only allowed to take the class once, so many other kids were waiting. So I did not get to handle clay for about 5 decades. I tried again once in my 30's at Glen Echo, but with the pressure of 3 kids and many community obligations, I didn't follow up. It was just not the right time.

My creative career chugged along with teaching, art journaling, making art and having some shows, and publishing some books. But nothing felt like the perfect path, so I finally landing on other ways to earn a living with a hodge podge of odd jobs, including book design, tech support, scheduling for a therapy practice, cataloging wildlife, teaching ESL to Chinese students, and even a very long week working as a boy scout leader for inner city kids. My collage work and painting and mixed media was a fulfilling outlet for my creativity, but there was always a sense I needed to achieve, to create fame and fortune from this creative work. I often felt depressed about my lack of sales or achievement. I even got signed with an art agent, that to this day, has had about two licensing sales for me.

Finally, a few years ago, here in Colorado, I had the space in my life to return to ceramics, and I signed up for the Ceramics class at Golden Community Center, where I received excellent instruction form Chris Murphy.  Oh the joy! This was definitely following my bliss.

I sometimes wonder how my life might have been different if I had found ceramics sooner. Neither my high school or the three institutions of higher education I attended offered ceramics classes. 

So finally here I am, at age 63, so totally in the flow of enjoyment of creation that I think I found my calling. When I am at the wheel throwing, or trimming, or at my desk decorating or glazing, time stops, I am in the flow, and even the mishaps and mistakes and misfortunes that accompany ceramics don't deter me.

I have a little pottery shed that I love, and being out there is the best part of my day.

I don't expect to make money doing this, I don't expect fame or accolades. I just know I can spend the last few decades of my creative life doing this thing that fills me with joy.

I wish for everyone this in life: to find the thing that brings you bliss, to follow it with focus and dedication, and to share this joy with others.

What a blessing to have finally landed in a creative endeavor that feels so right, without the pressure to sell or achieve.

 

2025 - Happy Mother's Day!

First post of the year, and it's already one day past Mother's Day!

Crazy politics in the land, and since my husband, one daughter, and two brothers are federal employees, it's been a hand wringer. So far, all is well with those in my sphere. Here is my husband with his newly installed "bionic" shoulder!

I am learning to move my focus to Joy and revelry in Nature whenever this world seems like it's just too much. My Spirit helpers really do support this, and I find it also helps to pay attention to the vibration of those around me, and focus on loving connection in real life, not all the virtual stuff. Real bodies, real nature, real work with my hands, back to basics. Clay. Paint. Pencils. Paper. 

I wish you all joy and peace and to be surrounded by loving energies, inward and outwardly. May all your dreams lead you to joy and fulfillment. 

"It would seem we have been admitted to the spheres of dreams and magic." -Goethe

 

2024

What a year!

I traveled to 5 states (Iowa, New Mexico, New Jersey, Oregon and New York) and 5 countries (France, Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, and Mexico.)

I made lots of ceramics and knitted a bunch of hats, socks and scarves.

I catalogued hundreds of thousands of images of wildlife for camera trap studies in California run by my sister-in-law.

The days seem to go longer and longer but the years seem to go faster and faster. Where does the time go? I moved in Colorado when in my 40's and now I am in my 60's. I often go to bed at 9 and get up at 5. I am feeling my age but also the need for travel and adventure and movement still while I can.

I am ready for 2025, even if the political climate is dismal right now. I move toward JOY.

Working on a series of Wall Altars

Rumi said, "Feel yourself being quietly drawn by the deeper pull of what you truly love".

Reset to find bliss.

 

Hi rare reader - although this blog is something like 15 years old, I know I rarely post and rarely (never?) seem to have readers. So if you are reading this you are super special and I applaud you!

I am in Taos.

I am alone in Taos, subletting a way-out-in-the-middle-of-nowhere house, with a generously provided pottery shed. I am alone in Taos (well, an hour north of Taos in the middle of nowhere) following my bliss. My household where I actually live consists of one grown daughter, my 93 year old mom, a geriatric dog and my long suffering husband. My household is loving, but chaotic and full of conversation and trips to walk the dog, get coffee, buy a last minute grocery item, and constant input. 

This Taos month is a household of only one, me.

I am here to be alone. and it is, actually, quite lonely.

I am here to follow my bliss into a higher level of ceramic skill; I am taking an intermediate throwing class at the Taos Ceramic Center, and vowing to practice every day. Our first week was cylinders. Look at my cylinders! (See above.)

I am here in my own little Eat, Pray, Love retreat to find my happiness and find my focus. At home my mind is all over the place, often not great places; and even though I meditate and walk and shamanic journey and nap and try to eat right and make myself socialize at least once a week, and do all the things, I always have an urge to travel, to leave, to be somewhere else.

Thanks to Liz Gilbert, I know I am not the only one who needs these escapes. Maybe a month was a bit ambitious, I really am missing my family, but it is so good for me to have this reset.

Reset is healthy. Reset is very good for your spirit. Reset is to rethink goals and dreams and ideas. This reset is lonely, but here I am, finding my bliss.

What is your bliss? How do you find it?

#eatpraylove #ceramics #pottery

2*0*2*3

"It would seem we have been admitted to the spheres of dreams and magic."
-Goethe

Another year.

Another set of journal pages, blank and ready to fill.

Another dream journal to be seeded with the urgings of my subconscious.

Another 365 days to make, rest, move, stretch, enjoy, delve, read, push, pull, relax, motivate, splurge, save, laugh, cry, watch, perform, travel, and burrow into my home space.

How about you?

Fifteen Years

Congrats.

To me. 

I wrote my first post here 15 years ago, October 2, 2007. I know this blog did not take off and light fires around the world of creative journaling. I know I don't get many comments. I know that most of the subscribers from years ago aren't that active here. But I have cherished the connection over the years, and the words/images here make a record of me allowing my collage world a small spot in the Universe that is the internet. Forever, I guess, until the whole thing crashes and all that remains are a bunch of paper books that I filled with thoughts and quotes and images and doodles and the detritus of a mind looking inward to keep me going. 

Will the paper books will outlive the dots/dashes? Who knows?

I have no idea what my kids will do with these books when I'm gone. Probably nothing. But maybe somewhere in the digital world, maybe a small blip of my existence will live on.

Diaries and memoirs are my favorite genre, so how could I not share my own? 

My journal shelf:

2009 - a lifetime ago

I just randomly grabbed a journal from my journal shelf (which has journals going back to 1984!)

The year, 2009. This seems like yesterday, and also like a lifetime ago. Before losing jobs and houses and moving to Colorado, before kids going to college, moving out, making their own families.  Before car accidents, job gains and losses, trips to France and England and New Mexico and California.

Before Covid and surgeries and even before diagnosis of celiac disease. 

Turns out a lot happens in 13 years.

"I and me are always too deeply in conversation, how could I endure it if there were not a friend?"  -Nietzsche.

The pages:

 

MuSe

 

Welcome 2022

Oh, to be rid of 2021. It started January 6 with crazies storming our capitol building trying to topple our democratic government. It ended with a catastrophic fire ten miles from where I sit and type this, destroying 1100 homes. Last night a blanket of more than a foot of snow covered everywhere around me, and I am going to go out and rejoice that finally a new year with new beginnings awaits in this clean white world that has fallen from the sky.

This year I:

--learned to do ceramics, a saving grace in a lockdown year

--wrote this in my journal: "It would seem we have been admitted to the spheres of dreams and magic." -Goethe.

--remembered many dreams, and revisited them to learn patterns and teachings from deep in my own subconscious and perhaps from elsewhere as well. Payed a dream shamanic counselor to help me refine the teachings, invaluable.

--welcomed my second adorable grandchild, and got to visit them both on her first birthday. We went to a petting zoo, picked pumpkins, walked to the playground to swing and play, hiked a beautiful Fall New Jersey trail, read books and cuddled on the couch, sang some songs, and I felt it was the best weekend of my life.

--continued my gardening with plant teachers and allies: lots of sage, some rosemary and echinacea, always roses and peonies and hellebore and daffodils. A few hot peppers, not enough to justify the watering I gave them. A first crop of apricots, most of which I got before the squirrels did. A overabundance of apples, plenty for us and all the critters. Only several raspberries (not enough water.) Catnip everywhere. Compost bags from the grocery store which created a food source for rodents, and then visits by owls and hawks. The wheel turned and created food. The teachings of the plants has always been women's work, and time in my garden helped to unbind me from the political realities of this difficult year. Green things rooting, rising, wilting, and falling teaching me that we will continue to expand and contract in order to grow. Joy arriving in the explosion of color in flowers.

--walked my dog on quiet paths, did some yoga, stopped anti-depressants, got a cataract fixed, ate mostly keto then lots of chocolate, started a new job and got a new (to me) car, tried to look forward hopefully instead of backward with despair, read a lot.  Spent lots of time alone: "I and me are always too deeply in conversation, how could I endure it if there were not a friend?"  -Nietzsche.

Observe the wonders as they occur around you.
Don't claim them.
Feel the artistry moving through, and be silent.
-Rumi

Travels

In these strange times, travel is hard to plan, difficult to execute, scary to embark upon. I always have used dreams of travel to alleviate stagnation. I read somewhere that the anticipation of a trip is more of a joy than the actual trip. Making travel journals with photos and notes of where to go and what to do always preceded any big trip I had. Then while on the trip, I would fill in pages of photos and activities. I treasure these travel journals and go back time and again to enjoy those adventures. Memories are preserved and kept alive for things I long ago would have totally forgotten.

After being homebound for two years, we did venture on two short journeys - a birthday trip for a long weekend, and a weekend to New Jersey to see precious grandkids (ages 1 and 2.)

Now with new variants of Covid lurking, new mask wearing restrictions, and inevitable travel plans halted, I am forced to get my fix from books.

Here is one fabulous book I am enjoying: "Eighty Days, Nellie Bly and Elizabeth Bishland's History Making Race Around the World" by Matthew Goodman.

The year is 1889, and two rival newspapers challenged two young women journalists to race around the world in opposite directions, trying to beat Jules Vernes' fictional Phileas Fogg's "Around the World in Eighty Days."

One of the young women got to meet Jules Vernes and he was delighted in her adventure. I was lucky enough to spend time in his hometown of Nantes a few years ago, so I loved that he got to meet someone actually attempting his outrageously ambitious idea of going around the globe in less than three months. 

How is it that in less that 130 years, we have gotten to the point where we expect to hop on a plane and be wherever we want in less than a day?

This book makes me want to book passage on a freighter and leisurely explore the globe. Will that even happen again in this day of viruses?

In the meantime, the book is a great escape.

Here's to future journeys.

Literary whales, from the archives

 

precious soul . . .

 

Become birds, poems.

My mom turns 92 tomorrow.

I found this beautiful poem fragment by our Poet Laureate, Joy Harjo about a friend's 70th birthday:

So, my friend, let’s let that go, for joy, for chocolates made of ashes, mangos, grapefruit, or chili from Oaxaca, for sparkling wine from Spain, for these children who show up in our dreams and want to live at any cost because

we are here to feed them joy. Your soul is so finely woven the silkworms went on strike, said the mulberry tree. We all have mulberry trees in the memory yard. They hold the place for skinned knees earned by small braveries, cousins you love who are gone, a father cutting a

watermelon in the summer on the porch, and a mother so in love that her heart breaks — it will never be the same, yet all memory bends to fit. The heart has uncountable rooms. We turn to leave here, and so will the hedgehog who makes a home next to that porch. We become birds, poems.

C L A Y !

 Let the beauty you love be what you do.   --Rumi

Red Rocks

We did a thing. We went to hear Get the Led Out, and sat outside in Red Rocks Ampitheater with 6000 other people.

Like most of us, it's been a year and a half since we have joined any gathering.

and it felt good. Maybe we are getting back to normal.

God bless Led Zeppelin.

 

If whales could fly . . . .