I guess the big question is this. When did I become old enough to be everybody's mother? I got an email today from a complete stranger who was responding to a "Call for Artists" for an event that I am helping publicize. She wanted to know if she should quit her job and become a professional embroidery artist. Of course, a sane person would have put that email into spam or failed to respond, but I trust the universe. If that email came to me, I am supposed to answer. So I did. Of course I immediately wrote, "Do not quit your job", and then I went on to tell her why. Art is not just a business, but really food for the soul. Whether you create or appreciate it, it must move you. I used to think that it was the final product that mattered and for some it is. For me the creative process is my thrill. Once a piece of work is finished I enjoy it for a few weeks, or maybe longer, but the real joy is in the creation of the work. It can pay for food for the body, of course, but this is its ancillary benefit, not its purpose.
I've learned not to be proud of my work, as it is really my Muse - for lack of a better word - who deserves it. Frankly, I start each sculpture or watercolor as an anxious, hyper-critical, self-conscious loser. My brain flashes messages like, "The world is imploding... and you're painting?", or "The front planter is full of weeds and nothing's made for dinner,". Sometimes it isn't the pressing responsibilities that disturb me, but more intimate anxieties. "You're not a real artist." "Your abbreviated career demonstrated you were only an average musician," or the real soul-killer, "Candidly, why bother? You'll never be great."
That last voice actually belongs to my deceased mother. She seems to choose to haunt me whenever I stretch beyond something I've tried before. In fact, I recently added some decoration to my tinfoil hat in the hope it will ward off her evil transmissions once and for all.
In case you got extremely nervous with this last sentence, let me add that I am kidding. Not about the negative thoughts that bubble up... just the tinfoil hat. I am pretty comfortable now that I know my first instinct is to think I am unworthy of my obsession to sing, dance, write, sculpt and, most recently, paint. Fortunately I write for a living, which has been the most amazing blessing of my life for more reasons than I would want to elaborate on here. On the other hand, painting is a way to release my brain from bondage. It feels different. I still hate to draw, though I am getting better.
Once I get to the stage in the piece where I can add color, the adrenalin flows through me as if I were anticipating jumping off a 50 foot cliff into a pool of deep, still water. (Which I foolishly did once and will never do again... and the water was not very clear as it was an old granite pit in New England.) Sometimes I am so invigorated by painting that I have to wait an hour - even if it's two in the morning - before I dare fall asleep.
I wonder that I am both a mother and grandmother because inside me is this young, naive, hopeful person who thinks she can paint. Then I pass a mirror and think, My God! What the hell happened? But as I ponder how lucky I am to be able to feel such enthusiasm and hope for the future, my phone rings. How fortunate. It was a wrong number.
Peace, love and please go green. Oh, and if you are in the arts, you deserve to make a good living.
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