2, 8, 9

the 3 of us have driven from 7pm-1am 4 out of the last 5 days... 6 hour trips to and from phoenix and king's canyon (i feel like i need to find a way to include the numbers 2, 8, 9 in that sentence, too, since the rest of the digits were used somewhere - lol).

first of all, we took the same drive through the desert that i'd taken midweek to go back to "art unraveled" for another art workshop... this one was taught by Patricia Baldwin Seggebruch, the premiere expert in encaustic techniques (to me - in all my playing with this medium, i've had only her book "encaustic art workshop" to go from)... it was great. i got to ask her a bunch of troubleshooting questions about things that have come up in my pieces as i've worked with encaustics, and i mostly just got to play! new techniques i'd never been able to get a good grasp on, like painting with pigmented encaustic paint and image transfers onto the wax, and then just making stuff! very therapeutic... i made more than a dozen "pieces" ranging from a 12x12" piece (the one of jason's face) to 3-dimensional baby food jars and lids... here's some of them!

meanwhile, during my restful and fun day, jason and joey were off having their own adventure - they went off-roading on the Apache Trail, and picnicked by one of the lakes out there.

then we all drove back together into the night again... here's an excerpt from my journal from that drive west on the 10 (and a shot of those amazing towers i talked about before):

"inky blackness broken only by the snaking yellow and red lights along the highway, and the milky way! have never seen so many stars. so little "light pollution" out here. but it's amazing how even the dim glow that headlights emit can darken the dazzling sky. light obscured by light. [insert profound metaphorical insight here.] heading back into the los angeles basin where youre lucky to see the big dipper or orion's belt, i just have to say: if God intended for us to see this many stars all the time... he wouldn't have invented the sun. [note: i think it was getting a little late when i was writing this part... lol]

the sterile coolness of the air conditioning versus the wildness of the wind...

dreaming of ways to turn my "drillbit measuring template" into an actual belt buckle [a byproduct of that found object jewelry class from earlier in the week]; i am suddenly snapped from my reverie by a huge falling star. it is green! and looks as though it must have crashed on the road directly ahead...

the wind becomes twice as brutal, attempting to dislodge my brooch-turned-makeshift-hair-flower, and i realize i'm in that magical place of the wind turbines... harness that energy! so strong and unruly! [the end of my random musings-while-driving :]"

so we drove there saturday night, back sunday night, and then monday night we took off for a camping adventure! we met some friends up in king's canyon (near hume lake/yosemite), and spent two full days hanging out in the forest and by the river, before driving back down wednesday night! we all feel amazingly rested after all that driving and all those escapades!

stream (in the desert) of consciousness

written during the 6-hour drive home from phoenix yesterday (no i was not looking at what i was writing - see picture ;) word-for-word and completely unedited (read: long) --



even the desert can be beautiful at the right time of day. when the shadows are long... when the scorching heat of midday has faded to the gentle arid warmth of evening... the scrubby little bushes dotting the landscape stand taller, highlighted by that last glow of evening sun even as it silhouettes the jagged distant shadowy purple mountains. even 18-wheelers carrying their loads look elegant in this late august sunset.

with coldplay filling the atmosphere inside my car, and blinded as i drive directly west with a grimy windshield, i begin to process the events of my day in phoenix.

i have never been a desert-lover (or even tolerater). so hot and utterly boring. couldn't fathom why anyone would choose to live there, or even think it beautiful. but these faint hues of amber and aubergine have just stirred my soul. or maybe it was the last day and a half of art i've been doing and contemplating.

huh. just had a thought: could it be that art is something i do, rather than make? "make" seems to imply that the goal is the finished piece, or at least some example of a new technique mastered... but doing art - that means that the process is the important part. the focus is on the artist's journey... from beginning to end, or somewhere in between. i often have to pause my artmaking (artdoing henceforth) with all the daily demands of life (and a studio space coexisting in the same room with my husband's office, and my 8-month-old's play area - affectionately referred to as "joey's cage" :) but when you "do art", it really tends to spill over into all sections of life. i become more creative in my cooking, or decorating, or letter-writing (haha when was the last time i sent a handwritten letter?? actually, tuesday :)

i wonder if the desert seems so peaceful to me because of its vast wide openness... in addition to the way all the lights and shadows are playing off each other - silhouetted bridges; all the trucks are orange as they reflect the already-set glow of the sun. the crest of the mountain range - or are those low clouds? mountains. this is the desert - radiant, as though there has been a layer of lava painted across its profile. windows down, the air is still too hot to leave the a/c off; but i can't help it - i love the wind.

i have always been much more drawn to the visual arts in my creative pursuits, and never been much of a wordsmith. but i feel right now that this prose flowing from my soul is a thing of beauty. not contrived. just natural expression through language. new for me! usually i feel that when i journal, it's simply an exercise in forcing my pen to complete thoughts that maybe aren't even important to my heart. or i start trying to process something my heart feels urgently needs to be dealt with, and instead all that comes out are stale words that could not possibly have any connection to the current state of my soul.

a quick note about - what are they called? those noble towers that stand elegant and intricate against the sky, stringing power lines across the barren land... whatever their name, they intrigue me and take my breath away when the last of the daylight steals away the remaining details of the desertscape surrounding me and all that is left are these industrial steel towers, stark and beautiful against the dusky sky. ah...

wonder if it's the spaciousness of the desert that makes it so peaceful (did i already say that?) - just a huge amount of extra soul-space. my heart can expand to fill not only my chest, but all the barely visible boundaries of this wilderness. roam wild and free. ahh.

ha. another love of mine is that barely light sky reflected in a body of water - i just passed some kind of aqueduct, and my breath caught. why is that so beautiful?

soon it will be night, and it will still be hot. the wind will ravage my hair as i open all the windows and just let its power blow over me and my soul... i will still have four hours of driving on into darkness, but this flood of inspiration cannot last. (can it?) so i reflect once more on the past 36 hours or so and revel in the beauty i have seen and been a part of. i never knew there were others so like-minded until yesterday. in a "found object jewelry" class with Keith LoBue, he had us take out a bit of our "stash" so we could start the juices flowing, then had us come to the front of the room for an exercise. and as i walked past other peoples' piles of rusty "stuff" and other junk (treasures), my heart leapt, and i couldn't help but exclaim aloud "there are other people like me in this world!" how very reassuring. there was an almost palpable camaraderie as people began peering at each other's things and proclaiming "junk envy" (while secretly knowing that their stash was really the best, having accumulated it personally over time).


someone ELSE'S pile! i know - you didn't think there were other people like me either!

we spent the whole first evening "making stuff" and i was unstoppable! the juices were definitely flowing. today was more of a learning day, with lots of invaluable lecture and demos (i texted jason at lunchtime that Keith was saving me months of trial and error in things i would have most certainly attempted in the near future). he gave away all his secrets (save one)!

i felt totally overloaded this afternoonm and couldn't really make anything. but now, with all this soul space, i want to get into the studio immediately, and create! use the new skills i learned today (before i go back and look at my notes and wonder "what does 'make a DAP donut' mean??" but first i have to drive home, sleep, take care of my boys, and go to the doctor (followup for that pinched nerve in my back that is MUCH better, thank you...) but we're all coming back to arizona on saturday for an encaustic workshop with patricia seggebruch - can't wait.

to be continued...