Picking Myself Back Up and Daring Greatly

Yesterday I had an emotional crash and burn. I feel double whammied lately with the constant hammering of COVID-19 news and politics. Every day I get up telling myself I’m going to have a good day, but it doesn’t take long before some bit of news sends me crashing.

It’s hard to avoid. It’s everywhere; the little bit of radio I listen to when I first get up, to Facebook postings and headlines, to phone calls, to having donation ads or news updates pop up on TV shows. I can’t even check my weather app without an update on how many people infected in the state and how many deaths! What does that have to do with weather?

Yesterday it all got to me, I crashed, and I couldn't shake it. It was like I was/am being smothered in all the liberal bullshit and hatred and now the constant info about COVID-19. I’m fighting off depression every day now. The more hatred and scaremongering put out for all to see, the more it permeates.

What’s kind of (not) funny is -- if the hatred bandied about these days was towards anyone of color, ethnic group, or religion, people would be screaming prejudice and discrimination. So why is it OK to do it to someone who is white and the PRESIDENT of this country?

What's hard, is I know I'm supposed to be understanding and allow people to have their own opinions, but the hatred and the constant Trump-bashing ... I don't think any president has ever gone through this. It's mean! It's disrespectful ... not only to him, but those who try to work with him, his supporters, his family and friends, AND the country! Going after the President of the United States like they have been for the past four years is dishonoring the USA and what we all stand for!

I find that disgusting, and when I think of the thousands (maybe millions) of dollars spent on this hatred campaign – monies that could have gone into programs to help Americans – it saddens me.

I’m not saying Trump is an angel. Looking back through history, not every president has been great. No leaders ever are, really – they are human, after all. But, with everything we can learn from history, you’d think our leaders should be working together to make this country great! Yes, there will always be disagreements. Compromises need to be made. However, what’s going on now isn’t making our country great, it’s breaking it.

The country is so divided, I can't see how they're getting anything good done. It’s no longer what’s good for the people, but one side against the other side. Personally, I’d rather see my tax dollars going towards programs that will actually work and help Americans.

And what's worse, this whole thing is making me hate them! (And “them” encompasses anyone who tries to harm others – and yes, I now recognize I’m sliding into being intolerant – of those who would do harm.) I wouldn't even be able to sit and have a chat with any of them because I'd get so overwhelmingly upset. Makes me want to get a gun ... and I'm not like that. I am so ashamed how the liberals have been acting ... and the bullshit programs they're pushing through on the pretense of helping people. All the pretty words and meaningless promises, that if you really think about it, are impossible to bring to fruition. Yet people fall for it.

It's making me feel less compassionate towards people. And that they're actually promoting bringing socialism ... To me, socialism is another blindfold to the people giving more power to those in control. It sounds wonderful on paper, but it has never worked in reality.

I'm feeling better about things this morning and I'm working through this. I don't know if I'm getting less tolerant as I get older or if I'm seeing things with more open eyes now. It's definitely making me less tolerant of stupidity and lies and deceit and ... George Orwell's "Animal Farm" and "1984" come to mind and is coming true.

I don't know if I dare write how I feel ... Dare Greatly, right? But I'm always afraid of being slammed for speaking up. But, isn't it time the other side speaks up more? Isn't it time people call them out for their hatemongering? Will I be isolating myself even more if I speak my truth?

But if I think of living wholeheartedly, I need to be comfortable speaking my truth. Living wholeheartedly doesn’t mean I need to be ashamed when I have not-so-good feelings. It means daring greatly to talk about it, to work through it, to understand not only my beliefs, but see where others come from, too. It means daring greatly to climb out on that uncomfortable limb to look at why and admit my struggles.

If we all strived to live wholeheartedly, how might we change some of the negativity? How might we understand one another and learn to work better together? That doesn’t mean we have to like everything others do and say, but when we understand where they are coming from, it might make us a little more tolerant.

A Lesson in Not Being so Hard on Myself

A comment on yesterday’s posting of my progress painting on the HowtoPastel site, led me to a revelation. A woman said I was too hard on myself and I can see what to do different next time.

I thanked her and started to reply, “I don’t expect to be perfect …” I was going to add, “but when I expect a certain look …,” it hit me.

That word, expect, yanked on the reins of my thought process putting a halt on my explaining what I expect when doing a painting. After all, how can I put my full expectations on a painting when I ask the muses and the painting itself for help?

Asking for help and allowing it to happen means giving up some control in what I’m doing. When I open myself to unseen help, the work becomes a collaboration between myself and whatever spirit wants to help, and if this is how I choose to work, I have to stop being so critical of myself and accept maybe this was how the picture is meant to be.

I’ve said before it seems my hands and my logical mind don’t always work together. I believe it’s at these times the other is helping.

This doesn’t mean I can’t make changes. I still have to be satisfied and the painting still needs to be good. “Good” being a flexible word as in good enough … but by whose standards? What does good mean to me?  And if it’s “good enough,” does that mean not quite as good as something else? Maybe I need to just call it “Good!” and not add enough. Yeah, it’s good, period.

There comes a time, too, when I have to stop working, call it done, and move on. I can’t keep trying to make it perfect, which maybe I keep trying to do even when I’m telling myself I don’t. It doesn’t have to look like the photo, because the way I work, it can’t, plus that expected finished look in my mind doesn’t translate out my hands. Walking away also means to stop finding faults. When done, stop performing autopsies on the paintings!

Taking this thinking further, I wonder if my striving for clean sharp lines comes from the types of paintings I like. The way I work, though, and the medium I work in, doesn’t lend itself to that kind of detail (although there are pastel artists who can achieve that look.) However, that’s not my way of working.

When I stop trying to make my paintings perfect, I enjoy what I do. Standing back a few feet, my paintings are beautiful, and I love them, and love my paintings. I will always evolve and get better … better, not perfect. The real goal is to have fun and love what I’m doing. How can I complain when I’m doing that?

Living Alone in a Time of Social Distancing

I love living alone, so why am I struggling with the current situation? This morning, while watching the waters of the brook gushing along with leaps of whitewater as it crashes around and over rocks, I ponder these feelings taking over my well being.

Rain continues to fall soaking everything outside. The birdbaths are full … not that there are any birds around right now. My new under counter lights are turned on, along with the ones on top of the cabinets, which help make my kitchen not so gloomy.

I contemplate my mental melancholy, wondering why I feel this way. I wonder about people who are truly alone. How are they coping? Do they have family checking in on them? What about the older ones who relied on community programs for socializing and companionship?

Then I think, what do I have to complain about, really? Most the time, all I ever want is to write, do my art, take photos, cuddle my lovely Pele-kitty and the handsome Leo-cat, and go out in the yard for gardening in good weather. I have internet and phone, so I have people I can talk to and write to … and there’s TV to watch at night to escape from the every day.

I am fortunate, too, as my neighbor, Andy, comes over every day to check on me and help with things. He recently installed the new lights, put up the new back splash in the kitchen, and installed the new bidet seat on the toilet. He loves to cook and makes sure I eat. (I’m terrible when it comes to cooking and eating.)

So, why do I have these moments of deep sadness?

Part of it is the current events of the world which now affects us here at home. I feel the daily bombardment of the depressing news is a dark cloud smothering the earth. I can’t get away from it. (I’m way too much of an empath!) It’s everywhere and everyone is talking about it and is affected by it. People are panicking, hoarding, and some are preparing for an apocalypse.

We are being pushed farther and farther apart. For the most part, I understand the necessity, but it’s going to be playing havoc on us as human beings. We’re social creatures. We need touch. We need physical hugs. What’s going to happen to us as this continues? Can any of us really know? We can only do the best we can.

I don’t know if there are any real answers. I go back to thinking about living a wholehearted, creative life. For me, it means avoiding news. There are days when I feel I’ve heard too much, and I just want to grab a knife and slit my wrists. Not that I’d really do that. But it makes me understand how/why people reach a breaking point.

So, to prevent me from total meltdown, I won’t listen to news. I hide posts on FB. I won’t watch videos. In the evening, I cover up the corner of the TV where now almost every program is flashing some news about COVID-19 or about donations needed. I play music that brightens my moods … and I write and paint and read. I have a few people I email often and a couple I’ll call on the phone.

One challenge this week will be the need to get groceries. My legs give me problems these days – especially standing any length of time – which means the lines getting into the store and at the cash register will be torture, and I’ll suffer for a couple days afterwards. But I’ll do it, and I’ll get by. (Just hope I can get the items I need/want.)

I may like living alone, but I miss my weekly breakfasts with Nan, standing at the end of the driveway talking to neighbors, and having someone stop in for a quick chat. These little interactions are so important to me and help me not feel lonely.

That all said, I’ll do what I need to do to get by and continue to strive to live a wholehearted, creative life.

Sometimes Living Wholeheartedly is Challenged Big Time

I faced today with an early obstacle – Pandora radio wouldn’t play. It seems every year when my renewal is up, I go through crap with them. And I PAY so I don’t have to listen to commercials! I wasted much time researching and sending messages to resolve the issue.

I finally resorted to looking up Amazon music … which I’ve been listening to today. BUT, I spent years building my Pandora music list. I don’t have it in me to start all over with a new music program. I’m so despondent over starting anew I feel like throwing up.

Pandora got back to me late this afternoon with questions as to my problem. Hello! Don’t they understand English? I pay so I don’t get commercials, so why do I have to turn off my ad blocker so they can play commercials?

Later I couldn’t get online to pay my credit card bill. One of those “due to a high volume” messages and “try back later.” I went back and forth four times and still can’t access to pay my bill.

Little things added up and now, at day’s end, I’m mentally drained. I did get in the studio for a couple of stints today, but with all this other stress … I’m too mentally exhausted to cry.

And lately, my evening stint of escape TV isn’t much of an escape when there are constant pop up ads about the coronavirus and begging for donations. I’m tired. I’m tired of it all being jammed in my face or in my ears. I’m even too fed up to be ornery!

And where’s my living wholeheartedly attitude? At the moment it’s been beaten into the ground. I just want to crawl into bed and pull the blankets over my head and hibernate.

I just have to keep telling myself tomorrow will be better.

Doing What I Need to Get By

I was shown something on Facebook yesterday I really liked. Someone spray painted their flower urns with glow-in-the-dark paint, and after letting them sit in the sun, the pots glowed at night. I want to try that! 

But then I wonder, with the turn of events these days, do I want to be frivolous? Especially with talk of this lasting for months. I don't want to live in fear. I'm not afraid of getting sick. What scares me are the repercussions and the changes this will do to all our lives. 

All we can do is just keep doing the best we can and find little ways to keep our spirits up. Things to make us smile (like the goose photos I got the other day -- she is so funny!)

It's just so weird. I've lived alone for many years and never felt lonely. Now, I'm feeling some loneliness. Which is funny because it's not like I went out with others much ... just the once a week breakfast with Nan and an occasional other lunch. I guess it's one of those things when you CAN'T do it (go out), you want to, ha-ha.

My emotions have been all over the place these past few weeks. One worry is, how much is truth and things we need to know, and how much is scaremongering and media blowing things out of proportion? How much do we need to hear/read day after day, hour after hour? This is what exacerbates the fear and promotes panic. The constant barrage of the horror going on makes people’s emotions escalate which leads to many other problems.

Some people can deal with it and get right in the thick of things, are able to help and get fully involved. And that’s good! We need people who can do that.

But not everyone can handle these situations. It’s important to recognize when to be involved, or even keep up with the latest info, etc., but it’s also important to know when to back off. If you find yourself getting too overwrought, it’s time to back off.

For me, the constant influx of news depresses me to no end and cripples my creativity. Emotionally, I can’t handle all the negativity. I can’t. It makes me just want to cry ... and there have been a couple of days when I’m in tears half the day. I know that about me and accept it. That doesn’t mean I don’t know what’s going on or that I’m not being careful!

 I'm trying to figure out what it is I am feeling. I feel I'm on the edge of a sharp precipice. I don't dare look down to either side; both are equally devastating/depressing and looking can cause me to stumble and fall. All I can do is slowly, painfully, put one foot in front of the other and inch my way across. I can't even see what's ahead. It’s all a blur. I have to watch my footing -- life will (probably) be forever changed and perhaps no one can fully tell how this will all turn out.

I so hope normal life will return, but is that possible after a situation like this? I don't know if we can ever recover to what we were before. And maybe we won't know until this is all over. Can we make future plans when we don't know what this country, this world, will be like in even a couple months?

Oh, we'll get over this obstacle, but how will life be different? Can we ever go back to normal (if there ever was a real normal) after something like this affects the world? History shows people before us went through horrific times (wars, plagues, natural disasters, et.al.) Many survived, some didn't, but life went on. We're resilient. We're strong. We find ways to get by.  But how will (and how has) major world events changed people’s way of life? How will our lives be changed?

And can we even think about it right now? Maybe right now is only about getting by and doing the best we can. Help one another when we can while still being careful.

For me to continue living wholeheartedly, I need to look at what I need get through this. Living wholeheartedly means not allowing myself to fall into a pit of despair and worry which I can too easily do if I listen to all the stuff being yammered at us through the news networks and social media. And, it does get depressing when you listen to it constantly. Maybe for now, it's all about taking one day at a time and doing and being the best I can.

It's kinda funny. I finally reached a point in my life where I like where I am; I like me. (Yes, of course, there’s always room to improve.) My goal this year was to be happy and have more fun doing my writing, art, and gardening. I never thought there’d be this big monkey wrench thrown into life.

I guess I will stick to my mandate of "Creating beauty for myself, creates beauty for others." Plus, creating beauty makes ME feel better! I’ll make the yard look pretty when weather gets a little better, and in the meantime, I’ll continue to paint, write, and post photos on FB.

Dealing with Art Fiascos

“Artist in Residence” has taken on a new meaning, although, I guess I could say I’m always an artist in residence as I work from home. Staying home and trying to avoid the scaremongering news, hours go by normally ... mostly. (Yes, there is a problem, but the hysteria and hoarding just cause things to be worse than what it needs to be.)

So, I do what I do, facing challenges in my work and overcoming them (or giving up on one for a while to do something else.)

This week has had two … well, do I call them both fiascos? Both were unusual and not something I normally encounter. Both entailed firsts for me. One on the type of paper and background, and the other, a still life with a cat and glasses. (Guess there’s a reason I stick to landscapes, ha-ha.)

The first disaster was when I finished my black-eyed Susan painting and took it outside to spray the final fixative (which holds the pastel on the paper). The painting immediately darkened, which it usually does until it dries. I put the painting back on the easel and when I returned to the studio the next morning, the painting was still horribly dark.

Oh noooo! This has never happened before. I started to freak, but there was also a numbness in my mind. I couldn’t even cry, which is what I usually do when stressed. Instead, my hand immediately grabbed a pastel and I started in on the fix. Over and over I picked up colors and layered here and touched-up there. I redefined lines, added more brightness; not sure if any of it would work over the top of a final fixative. Excess pastel dust fell like snow, but enough color remained to allow me to make a recovery.

My mind tried to reason why this happened. I use fixative at the end of every pastel painting. What was different this time? It was cold out when I took the painting outside to spray (the stuff smells horrible and not good to use in the house), but it’s been cold on other days. Did I not shake the can well enough? I thought I did.

Was it because I used a different paper than the BFK Rives print paper I use for its smooth texture? This time I used, for the first time, Art Spectrum Colourfix, which has a lightly sanded surface. Another first was an already colored paper in a dark green tone (which shouldn’t make a difference to a fixative.)

I still don’t have the answer. I called the painting done again and resigned it (because my signature had faded.) But now I don’t know if I dare spray it again to hold the pastel on. This will be a problem with framing because the framers need to move the painting around which causes any loose pastel to come off. The dust then gets on the mat around the painting making the mat look dirty.

The second fiasco was with my “Pele and the Wine Glasses” painting. The sketch to this was done using a Tracer which projected the photo image onto the paper. I didn’t trust myself to freehand my kitty or wine glasses.

Right off the bat, I found tracing didn’t allow the symmetry in glassware. My hand shook and no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t get the five glasses to look the same. May friend, Nan, sent me some info on drawing glassware.

I’ve been putting off that chore until I finished the black-eyed Susan painting. Yesterday, I was ready, but first I decided five wine glasses were too many. I needed to simplify the picture, so I erased two. Uh, oh, there’s a ghostly image of the glasses remaining.

I added pan pastels to the background … first the color I was using for the background, then some shadowing coloring hoping the added textural element would blend all together. Didn’t work. The ghostly glass image still showed, so I added layers of soft pastel. I rubbed. I wiped with both a smooth paper towel and a rough piece. Nothing seemed to work. I felt I was wasting pastel.

I walked away feeling crushed. What I’ve done of Pele so far, I like, so to have do over is heartbreaking. I’m going to have to, though, especially as there are still other glasses to erase in order to learn this new-to-me technique of making glasses symmetrical.

But it does look better with less glasses.

I’ll go on … and this morning in printing a new photo of Pele to work with. I made notes on it on how to make it a better painting.  I also found a photo of a bee and a spider on coneflowers which might be fun to do. I made

Sorting Out my Confusion

Leo on the Edge

Sitting here at the table, I look across the brook and notice the fat limb on the biggest tree over there has a huge crack. Uh oh, that’s going to come down soon. Thankfully it’s not over a building. When it falls, it’ll probably land in the brook.

My gaze shifts lower, distracted by two chipmunks chasing each other along the remaining ice shelf on the opposite banking. In some areas, the tips of long icicles hanging from the shelf are lapped by the rushing water while other areas of the ice shelf extend out above the brook creating lengths of dark, open space between ice and water. It’s intriguing. By afternoon, it’ll look very different.

The wind causes branches to sway and shadows dance on the deck. The movement catches my eye and I look to see if it’s some critter. Nope, fooled again. Time to stop gazing out the window and finish my work. I hope to get in the studio later.

But, right now, I need to make up my mind what to do next. Multiple muses vie for my attention calling me to do things I enjoy doing while my logical brain demands I take care of tedious jobs needing to be done. I’m feeling overwhelmed by it. And I can’t make up my mind which to do. That old want versus should.

Naturally, things pop up stealing my attention, and hours slip away. Next thing I know, it’s lunch time. Jeez, do I need to take time to eat? Too often I choose not. Then it gets way into the afternoon and closer to supper time. And, if I stop to eat now, I’ll lose my train of thought …

However, one thing stands out, for sure: I can’t share my full attention with the creative muses until I settle this other tedious job issue weighing on my brain.

The past two days, when not working my editing job, I made feeble attempts at going through my paper hard copy files. I used to be so meticulous with each categorized folder, in alphabetical order, ready for whatever receipts, pertinent to that folder and in numerical order by date … but that was years ago before I started working from home.

A home business meant more receipts and paperwork, and work/business-related papers needed to be separate from the personal items. It’s keeping two sets of files and two file boxes and a third, larger tote box for yearly files needing to be kept for seven years.

I got lazy, and instead of filing paperwork individually, I tossed receipts in a box until year’s end when I’d sort them, only to put them all in one (or two depending how much) manila folders with the year written on the outside. How much sense does that make?

So, this week, after two afternoons of frustration, I was at my wits’ end. Do I really need to be keeping all this paperwork? And if so, does it matter if it’s not categorized in alpha-numerical order? When was the last time I ever had to look through previous years’ papers?

I got up this morning thinking how much I can reduce the size of paperwork storage. However, even with this decision made, there’s still work to do and work means more time. I have to physically pare down the file box and dispose of paperwork properly. Then what’s left needs to be categorized as there are writings and manuals I want to keep.

The muses whispering in my head are not helping. I’d rather go play in the studio with them, especially as I just got some new pastels.