Friday, November 4, 2011

It's the weird little details in life....

Today I worked on my art journal.  I didn't really complete any pages.  I prepped a few for creating later.  It involved gel medium gluing paper into my book and then also gessoing over.  I also glued some treat bags that I got out of the bargain bin from Halloween for pockets.  I also made an origami crane and glued it in as well.

But really that isn't the important thing about what I worked on today.

I use my fingers a lot in painting.  I prefer to gesso over my pages using my hands.  I like the patterns my fingers make in the paint.  It gives some depth to the background rather than just being a smooth surface.  It's visceral.  I even made a hand print on one of my heavier pages.  After it was dry I found myself placing my hand into the print again, just to admire how it matched up.

My hands are the most important physical feature of me.

That was the realization from today.  I used to think it was my voice.  I used to think that was my most important tool, but as I get older and I move further away from my youth, I've grown more silent and contemplative.  I appreciate comfortable silences more.  I find myself communicating in text more and with my voice less.  Even then, it is my hands that do the communicating.

I surround myself with people who are like that.  We can sit in a room quietly reading and that comfort speaks volumes.  Jeff and I do that often.  We lay in bed, just enjoying being there.  We sit and read.  Or we sit in the office and both work on our computers, silently, just the tapping of our keys making noise.  Under the desk our toes touch, or feet touch, and the silence between us is comfortable.  Our feet express the love between us.  We don't need words.

I sat with Oblivionrising in Texas, us both knitting, the silence fine between us.  We were both busy creating.  her hands were busily working on the thread and I was editing photos.  Our hands were busy creating.  Our creativity creates and weaves love into the world.  We sat in my hotel room and we were letting light into the world.  That was important to me.  It was one of the most important time between she and I and it did not involve words.  It is why she's my best friend.

I think a lot about the women in my life.  In my teens my step-mom was a very important part of my life.  Her hands were always busy.  They hand paint under the nails and it seemed like she never could get the glue completely off.  We'd sit and make things at the table.  My mother also sat and made things.  We were quiet, though, just the music was in the background, no noise from us.  Our hands making love and light in the world.  It was binding, that silence and that act of creating.

When I'm creating I'm happiest.  I spent years in relationships where I did not create.  It was frowned on.  It was discouraged.  I was unhappy.  The people I was with didn't understand.  I was miserable and depressed and I was not whole.  I never could figure out how to fill that void inside me because I did not get what the void was.  It took another woman, my counselor to remind me why I was so sad.  She said I needed to paint and draw and make.

Make.

Making is important.

It's nice to be whole and it's nice to have people around me who understand how important the act of making is in my life.  I don't need to make masterpieces or get paid amazing amounts of money.  That's not what's important.  It's the creating that is.

My hands keep my mind healthy.  Without them I'd be lost.


2 comments: