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(October 28th) |
(This is what I had to say about the drawings I last posted.) |
I need to remember to be humble. To not be a cat.
This drawing is about a boat, a girl, an anatomically correct heart and possibly a narwhal.
Steer clear; Stay the course.
I’ll ride this boat like a witch’s broom. I won’t really. I don’t like witches much. Cats, yes. Witches, no.
Oh my god – I just realized that we have an extremely creepy house. People who came to the Halloween party didn’t even know I hadn’t decorated much. They nonetheless said it was ‘spooky.’
I have a lot of bones. I’ve always liked them. My dad was a park ranger and museum curator for the NPS. We had a house full of skulls and partial jaws. The teeth of raccoons still sharp, but loose in their sockets. Piles of antlers. Some stained green from the moss that gathered on them where they had fallen and layed, until my father found them. The bones always felt smooth and cool as stones. Dry quiet things that sat dumb to the heat and noise of open windows, south Georgia summer.
Bones have never freaked me out. I think they are beautiful and fascinating. Remarkable studies in curvature.
Really though – do I want to be a Creepy Mom? With an overgrown garden and force-twisted trees?
With a zoo full of creatures all under her roof and curtains hung in doorways? With books piled as high as the bills and the breakers always flipping to cold.
It’s bad enough I have tattooed palms.
They (the children) think I’m marvelously interesting and fun. Now. Just wait til their friends are old enough to articulate, “Dude, your mom is cool. But, man, she’s kinda spooky.”
That’s it. I’m taking down last years Christmas lights. Buying new collars for the cats. Put away the moldering crewel work cloth that hangs over the dining room window. Putting the bones in one coherent place, an exhibit of sorts. Instead of letting them migrate throughout the house. I have a dead but perfectly intact bumblebee in a jar by my make-up in the upstairs bathroom. That’s right, a dead bumblebee. In a jar. It seemed to lovely to through away when I found it, and now I’m just used to it. Things accumulate. I do less active acquisitioning than I do passively accumulating. Oak root fungus that gathers, takes hold.
Gosh, if I’m going to be an uncreepy Mom I need to stop saying stuff like that.
I played banjo at work today. Then I came home and practiced. I reminded myself that maybe my mother-in-law wasn’t completely insane when she said to me, on my wedding day: “Can I give you some advice: sometimes it’s best to just keep it to yourself.”
I don’t want to turn into one of those cute eccentrics that everyone thinks is neat, but that noone can stand to talk to because I’m so blissfully unaware that my cloud nine may be parallel to someone else’s ground zero.
I need to step down.
Keep it to myself.
Be graceful again.
What was I talking about? Oh yeah – drawing everyday. Actually, I wasn’t – but, that’s what this is supposed to be about. This project I imposed on myself back in late July. I was going to draw a picture everyday. I have, for the most part, drawn everyday. Skill develops. Not only technical, but expediency in accessing the immersive quality of making art. That means I can space out when I draw and the pictures form themselves.
A good feeling. A surprise.
This picture is ripe with adolescent symbolism. But, it was super-fun to draw.
Note to Self: do not forget the Patton Home. SuperParty in the bank parking lot. 4317 NE 7th Avenue. The fact that, today, I felt lonely for the first time in a very, very long time. Or maybe the clear early fall day just reminded me of some lonely-feeling day a long, long time ago.
Lonely is a strange feeling. Makes it all seem hollow.
Note to Self: non-creepy moms do not discuss such things.
Goodnight
(later) (November 1st.)
5:30 and the sun is falling. Welcome dark days. This weekend our house became lofty. Very literally. Both children and I now have super-rad loft beds and our rooms look like tree houses, studio apartments. Although a recent drawing may offer the impression that I enjoy napping with dogs, I am quite thankful that they cannot ascend ladders. I sleep alone. Um, except for the fact that my daughter, who can ascend ladders, has already claimed her side of the loft.
Still, sleeping in a loft bed is more fun. I, the grown-up, am especially delighted by it.
I lost my cell phone. Thus, you may note that the content of this posting is lacking a current email to myself. I went ahead and posted the one from a few days ago. On the brink of melancholia.
The loft bed helps. So, does learning “Cash on the Barrelhead” on banjo.
The boy is sick. Red-cheeked and coughing. In his pajamas still. At almost 6pm. He has been downstairs once today. It was all too much for him.
I understand. These first dark days weigh heavy. Thank goodness for dogs and banjos. Loft beds and small hands to hold in the middle of the night.
My excellent room. I will play board games at this table. Take my sewing machine to the repair shop and sit in this corner, fashioning small anatomically correct hearts and satiny placenta’s. They could be used as coin purses. Really, I just like buying old lingerie at the Goodwill. I would never wear it, of course. But, I’m happy to cut up all those cast off high-hopes and turn them into something interesting.
I feel like I am really going to get stuff done in my great new room. If nothing else, I will wake up in a loft bed.
Things of interest: chickens made their first foray into the open areas of their habitat. Ex-husband’s house, two lots down, is almost done. It is my favorite color of green. Actually, that color is no longer my favorite. In fact, I never liked it. Ever.
PROOF OF GOD! ...and other tragedies. 