It’s been very cold for a few days, and today I just didn’t feel like venturing very far from home.
Fortunately, there are plenty of lovely colors right outside our door! The leaves, before they turn to mush, what we call “ leaf jam”, make a mighty pretty carpet.
Our gardeners blew tons of leaves onto the parkway, where they just sit and look great.
And, looking carefully, I caught this perfect leaf perched in a bush. How can we mourn for summer when we have this beauty?
Leading up to the second election of Donald Trump, I was feeling anxious. What would a second Trump term mean for the country? Our foreign policy? Our civil rights? How would we viewed by the rest of the world?
As always, I turned to “making stuff” to cope. I chose this tiny 1948 atlas, which Auntie Bridgett had found in a teeny free library when we first moved to Portland. Now, I saw it as a place to put my anxiety about the.world’s future.
I dug into my collage words box and in an old “French phrase a day” calendar, found just what I needed.
“It’s discouraging.” “You’d think it’s a cult.” “We could go someplace else.” Yes, maybe we could.
I tried to stay in the same color family as the atlas itself, stenciling and stamping, as I created images that expressed my anxiety.
But after a few days of cutting, pasting and realizing who our new President was, I realized that my ‘coping’ mechanism was making me feel worse, by focusing on the awful helplessness. I was in fight or flight mode, and because of family obligations here, we can’t “fly” at the moment. So I needed to think about what I could do to fight, here and now. Again, I found phrases to express myself.
“Calm yourself.” “Don’t cry”.
Of course, the words alone won’t fix anything. I need to, as Mr. Rogers advised, look for the helpers. I can engage with local charities and national groups like the ACLU to make a positive difference in the lives of people who will feel the brunt of Mr. Trump’s announced plans.
And realizing I can do that has been very good for my mental health.
Once the collage bug gets me, I sink in real deep. Besides doing collage with poetry, I have started making postcards again.
I make them pretty quickly, because when my brain is in the mood, the pictures come to hand and go together like lightning.
The only problem is, I can’t always think of who might enjoy the images. Some of them are pretty weird.
For you, dear Liza, I always seem to find some way to “improve” a landscape.
One of these is coming your way, and the other is going to my dear friend Richard in Salinas.
Making art just for the sake of making art, for the joy of laying down color and pattern and the satisfaction it brings, has been such a revelation for me.
Once you get past “Yes, but what’s it FOR?”, life is good.
I have been taking a break from collage for a while, doing embroidery and other things. But this last week, I had a chance the chance to sit in on a poetry meeting with my poet friend, Kitty Petruccelli, and poet January Gill O’Neil.
I knew I’d want to keep my eyes and hands busy while I listened, so I chose some acrylics in colors that seemed to go together. Then I grabbed some pictures and words out of my collage box, mostly just taking what caught my eye.
As January and Kitty talked about Poetry, the American South, and Emmet Till, I laid down some background lines and smudges. I used my old California drivers License to scrape some purple on. As the conversation touched on concerns about life in America under Donald Trump, and my scrapes became a bit more frantic.
I found this woman’s face in the same colors, and liked her half puzzled, half panicked expression.
She needed more contrast, so a Posca paint pen helped out with that. It also helped add some interest to the swoops and corners.
A scrap of singed paper and words of dark times came to hand… “Before the Nazis invaded”.
And as the poetry talk finished up, I laid down the words “Laissez nous tranquille”, which means “Leave us in Peace” and added some tiny splatters.
Thanks, Kitty and January, for a poetic, artsy, emotionally-coping sort of morning.
The election of Donald Trump as President of the U.S. has me worried for many reasons. I worry how a Presidency founded on greed, anger, misogyny, and racism will effect our country.
I worry about how people’s bodily autonomy (their right to be in charge of their own body) will be affected. Will my grandchildren be able to get the health care they need? Or will their rights be taken away because they violate some else’s religious beliefs?
I am also worrying about how these laws will affect my trans friends. Again, this is a matter of bodily autonomy. Do people get to decide with their doctors which medications or surgeries they need to be healthy? Or will their health care be declared illegal?
Talking to my friend Misha, I have learned that many trans people are needing to move from their home states, where this sort of care is under threat, to places where it is available. Trans folks also need legal services to change their names on documents. All this is expensive.
If you are worried too, and want to help but don’t know where to start, Misha works with a group called Outside In. The link to one of their fund raising sites is right here.
Every once in a while, I find a magazine article that doesn’t just speak to me, it calls my name and chases me down. Abbi Henderson, writing for Stylist Magazine, has written such an article. She talked to neuroscientist Nicole Vignola and got some great ideas for helping us feel better on days when peace and happiness feel out of reach.
She calls this list her Dopamine Menu, after the chemical in our brain that gives us joy. Doing these activities releases dopamine and can lead to happier, calmer moods.
I do most of these things, and now that I know WHY they make me feel better and have a convenient list, I can make joy whenever I feel blue, stuck, or just flattened out.
Stretching
Playing with a pet
Enjoying a coffee
Grabbing a snack
Doing a short burst of exercise
Putting clean laundry away
Cooking a meal
Working on a hobby
Exercising
Being creative (painting, drawing, writing, for example)
Listening to music
Listening to a podcast
I have been fortunate to fill my life with Dopamine-enhancing people. Ruthie Inman and Auntie Bridgett Spicer encourage my arts, which gives me courage at my crafts, and everyone loves a walk in Laurelhurst Park!
Maybe people who seem “naturally happy” have, consciously or unconsciously, found their own way to their Dopamine fix. Maybe this list can help you.
We are starting to get ready for our trip to visit you!!
We have dusted off the passports, bought the tickets, and arranged for a sweet cat-sitter for Mouse. We are looking at all our travel books, feeling homesick for dear Paris and three other cities we have never even been to.
With weeks still to go until we leave, I have been channeling all this travel energy into an art-y calendar. This has allowed me to do my worrying in advance, looking at days that will be spent on planes, trains, and bicycle.
Each day has a color that shows what sort of energy I’m expecting in that day. Some days are bound to be more chaotic than others… our first day in Paris (notice the green swoosh of the Seine flowing through those days) and the Sunday when Auntie Katie and the cousins will join us (and you) in Horsens.
Of course, this is all speculation, but it is a harmless place to get my ideas and dreams for the trip down on paper when words escape me.
Having lived most of my life in Southern and Central California, home of evergreen landscaping, I am dumfounded every Fall by our colors. The intense yellows of the ginkoes, gold of the birches, the red of quince and the flaming maples, just knock me out.
Laurelhurst Park, of course, is acres of loveliness. But our neighborhood trees, some of which are a hundred years old, also make me understand why people who move from elsewhere to Southern California say “they miss the seasons”.
I guess I get sort of goofy in the Fall. Summer’s flowers and sunshine are so bright, it is almost blinding. In Fall, it is grayer, darker, and… wetter. The bright leaves are our last hurrah of color until spring, and I don’t want to miss it.
So, while I go walking and leaf-peeping whenever I feel sad or restless, I hope these pictures let you see why I love our Fall so much.
It has been three-plus years since my retirement and it seems that I am just now getting the hang of it. It took a while, certainly, and I still might not have it right. After 40-plus years of working, it has been hard to slow down.
I actually used to get depressed at the end of the school year. I was a teacher, after all. And what is a teacher who isn’t teaching? The idea that we ARE what we DO, that our essential being is defined by work, had gotten into my head.
So I tried to stay equally as busy after I retired. I spent every day at the Historical Society and set a goal of writing a historical children’s story. I loved the research but my results were ….. unsatisfactory.
Then Covid hit, and the rest of the world retired, too. The talk was all about finding peace in idleness, not living to work, and making small happinesses within yourself. It felt right.
Being given permission to be ”lazy”, to not have to change the world all at once, was a gift.
So I can take a whole morning to read Jane Eyre in the park. I can sit by my garden and enjoy the company of the bees. I can think good thoughts and not demand that they funnel into immediate ACTION. I can live just to live, for a while.
I have told you about my old friend Ruth Inman. She is an artist in Illinois and we went to high school together. The art and friendship I re-discovered with her during the Covid lockdown really made my life better.
I have shown you these pieces as I have made them; simple watercolor flowers, silly candy wrapper collages, and layered mixed media pieces. They have all been part of my journey from “I can’t draw” to “Sure, I’ll give that a go!”
Artists’s Bounty!!
And now, Ruthie has sent me another gift! It is a big fat envelope of artsy goodies! There are pure Ruthie artist cards…
Isn’t that pink one amazing?
A delightful postcard of tiny houses…
I could live there!
Some cut outs of cool old photos…
Such characters!
And even a Ruthie Original, this tiny handmade, colorful wallet thingee. Ruthie showed us how to make these last week, and now I am inspired even more!
Of course, I want to use these delightful bits. But I want to use them in a way that does them justice. I will be monkeying around with them for a while, and let you know what comes up.
So I say for the zillionth time, Thanks, Ruthie! Thanks, Art!
Dear Liza 