so my problem is that i think too much ??

 “A thinking woman sleeps with monsters.” 

            ~Adrienne Rich, 










((from “Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law”: http://tpr.ly/12E0BqK.))

 https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151597942270742&set=np.175160322.676742336&type=1&theater&notif_t=notify_me

embracing creativity.....and a Child shall lead them

my dear Embergirl came by today with her mom, visiting at my request because i’d been home sick for the last 2 days. I was showing off the re-organizing i’d been able to do in the few weeks, including a complete overhaul of my “creative desk”: Ember, who is quite a talented artist already at 9 1/2yrs, promptly moved over to the desk, pulled up the chair, and began exploring / playing with my collection of stamps, paints & assorted collage emphemera…
What is so wonderful about watching her work is there’s no hesitation, no censuring herself while creating…just free expression, playing with colours and tools, and creating 2 assemblage pieces for me in about 20-30mins....

I was so tempted to take her picture while her created her art,,,,,but i didnt want to interupt – distract or disturb such freedom of process.

After they’d left, and i was straightening up a few things on the desk, i found myself drawn into creating some of things of my own, tho i hadnt sat down at my own “Wonderfully Organized Creative Desk” in months. And i thoroughly enjoyed myself, experimenting with a few new techniques with gesso and embossing powders.

It’s again one of those things of “Control” vs “Flow”. We always think we have to some huge scheduled time set aside to be create, e.g. ‘I’m Going Be Creative Now’. Or think we have produce some perfected piece of art. I’ve broken thru that kind of walled thinking in my writing; my poetry has strengthened because i am no longer so “careful” about the process before i ever get a word on the page. And i scrawl lines on notepads and in my journals whenever they occur to me…i dont limit myself to set times of “creative writing”. Yes, i go back and polish or develop the ideas / images / structure of those seeds of poetry,,,but i dont shut out those spurts of creatiness with my writing…

I’m still learning how to do this with my collage / altered art pursuits, as i’ve only been actively working with this for the past 3 yrs (as opposed to some 30+ years of writing). And in the Collage / ATC /Assemblage Art group that i organize, it’s been difficult to find those techniques to help others break out of their own “frozen perfectionism”, and just get into some sloppy, free-style Creating—and relish the process, not obsess about results.

How to break thru to that sense of freedom, and how to stay in touch with it? Its both going beyond one’s self-imposed limitations, and returning to Child-Like exploration and freshness…

I may ask Ember to be the Co-Organizer of my collage group. I’m sure she could teach my members a few things about creativity…

test of friendship....

...is someone you can pretend to pass out with, while in halloween costumes, and not feel abit silly

** Sunday * Showdown * Sunday ** !!

'Last show of the season,,,,and i may have not only won the Points championship for Intermediate English, but may have snagged the Reserve Championship for Intermediate Western too...

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well, check one goal off the list for the year -- rhis seems to be the only thing i Can do: win lots of ribbons. Nothing else of this year has worked out

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i've lamented again, to Karen, Dr S, others, that my problems seem to always be the same, i cant ever seem to change the circumstances of my life, only repeat the same series of failures. Maybe its just a proverbial, post-loss-of-job blues. Its just so damn Deja Vu for me, how it always seems to turn out. i dont know anyone who loses so many jobs, has so many repeated financial troubles, winds up in traffic court again and again. All i'd have to do is be hospitalized & lose a baby and this year would not much different than 1984, 1987, 1990, 1992, 2004......

yeesh good lord yeesh....

"...and i want to complicate the hell out of it"

(Some lines from a bad movie...)

he said: We're friends, we have a few laughs... keep it simple.
she said: Well, has it always been simple or has there ever been anyone complicated?

he said : Be reasonable about this. .....Let's not complicate things.
she said: Oh, I forgot, you like things simple.
he said: Yeah.

he said: You're right. My life is too simple. And I wanna complicate the hell out of it...



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...i dont know what it is about dialogue from bad movies that strikes me as so true-------------- for me. Maybe that it's so unsubtle and lacking in nuance -- so that the points being made are right there on the surface. But it's happened now more than several times, so that its becoming downright revelatory.

I've said it on more than a few occasions. I've played my life very safe. People commend me being "smart" not to have bad marriages, unwanted children. But more & more, i find this less and less an accomplishment. Life IS messy. Life SHOULD be complicated. All of my "smart" choices have left me in a desert of disconnection. Yeah, there's lots about my life that i enjoy. But it's embroidery on anything that's really meaningful.

I'm tired of an "embroidery-only" life. One life is all that anyone gets. And i want to complicate the hell out of it

i guess i'll miss the man.....

Explain it if you can...

Some days he wouldn't say
A pleasant word all day
Some days he'd scowl and curse
But there were other days....
....When he was really even worse

Some men are heroes
Some men outshine the sun
Some men are simple, good men
This man wasn't one
And I won't miss his moods
His gloomy solitudes
His blunt abrasive style

But please don't get me wrong
....He was the best to come along

In a long, long while....

a cubicle of One's Own.....

It's Official: i have finally achieved having my own office-cube at the workplace......

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And it's mine, all mine -!!

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(so screw you, Brenda LeMasters!)

Ten Verbs

list of the ten actions (verbs)that

characterize me best (or what I what to tend

toward) in my life.”

1. to create : bring forth, bring about, build, call forth, cause, choreograph, churn out, conjure, construct, create, create by mental act, create from raw material, create from raw stuff, create mentally, create verbally, customize, custom-make, derive, design, develop, direct, distill, do, draw elaborate, elicit, engender, enkindle, establish, evoke, extract, fabricate, film, filmmaking, fire, form, generate, give rise, initiate, institute, invent, invoke, kindle, make over, make up, originate, play, print, procreate, produce, proof, provoke, publish, pulsate, pulse, put forward, put together, realize, recreate, regenerate, reinvent, remake, render, reproduce, scrape together, start, stir, style, substantiate, work, wreak, write, yield



2. to analyze: examine, assay, chew over, consider, estimate, evaluate, figure, figure out, hash, inspect, interpret, investigate, judge, kick around, rehash, resolve, scrutinize, sort out, spell out, study, think through



3. to learn: acquire, attain, be taught, be trained, become able, become versed, drink in, enroll, gain, get, grasp, imbibe, improve mind, major in, master, matriculate, memorize, minor in, peruse, pick up, pore over, prepare, read, receive, review, soak up, specialize in, study, take course, take in, train in, wade through
   



4. to understand: comprehend, accept, appreciate, apprehend, be aware, cognize, conceive, deduce, discern, distinguish, explain, fathom, figure out, find out, follow, grasp, identify with, infer, interpret, know, learn, master, note, penetrate, perceive, read, realize, recognize, register, savvy, see, sense, sympathize, take in, take meaning, tolerate
   



5. _ To Write:
   



6. _ Acquisitive: eager to acquire and possess things especially material possessions or ideas; "an acquisitive mind"; tending to acquire and retain ideas or information;
   "an acquisitive mind" , accumulative, desirious, unsatable, accumulate, amass, compile, garner, gather,



7. _
   



8. _
   



9. _
   



10. _

poetical in review

It’s now been 14+ months since the Poetry Writers group i created really took off, and has continued going strong... So pleased -- we’ve got a good tight group of serious writers, who each bring wonderful qualities to our monthly meet & critique. We.ve created a monthly “challenge” or poetry prompt for everyone to write a poem from,,,,,and i have successfully been meeting that personal challenge each time. Also, having the disipline of ‘1 poem deadline’ each month, it follows that the creative juices are further stimulated, and i often start or complete another 1-3 poems each month, depending. ‘Which is the whole trick of being a writer -To write and write and write, keep that creative muscle limber & Buff...

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All my poems need polishing, but here's

titles of everything i’ve created over the past year:

Quadriga
Never the Night Before
Caesura in my Thirties
Vino Blanco Rapt
The party
Homebound in the Guggenheim
Doorways
A Poetry Reading in Venice
Scenes of Unimportance
and the streetlamp’s still on
Reading in Retrospect
Frames
in my bed…
Peppermint Gates
Fling
the Classics
Stillborn mother father
Sfumato

ruffian.....

is this why i burn so much time playing "Bookworm"..??

Your Dominant Intelligence is Linguistic Intelligence

You are excellent with words and language. You explain yourself well.An elegant speaker, you can converse well with anyone on the fly.You are also good at remembering information and convicing someone of your point of view.A master of creative phrasing and unique words, you enjoy expanding your vocabulary.
You would make a fantastic poet, journalist, writer, teacher, lawyer, politician, or translator.

What Kind of Intelligence Do You Have?

april horsin' around....

...First show of the 2007 WWRC season is over. I did fairly well, mainly due to the fact that no one showed up. It was an incredibly sparsely attended, no competition day. So, all in all, i felt rather dubious for winning my little ribbons....





Nonetheless, i still find showing again tremendously fun, and am so glad i made the decision to re-start riding last summer. Yeah, the expense is a bit with my current debt status,,,,but investments to one's sanity are always a smart move in my view. I so love being back in saddle, as it were....even with getting severely cow-kicked 2 wks ago, and getting tossed off my mount early on show day. (I hadnt heard that due to the weather, all the hiorses had been kept inside for 2 days, and were Extremely Wound!) (oops)


A few photos of me and Speckles and our dubious awards....

no dates, no plans....

....2006 was a pitiful year for me, romance-wise. I went on about 4 blind dates, and absolutely no spark with anyone i met. Whereas my friend C., in only 8 mos of online dating, has dated @ 6 people, some rather promising, seeing each several times or so…. With me, zilch.

I have absolutely no one in any vincinity of my life that i have any interest in. I have no one in my past that i have any “ghosts” or unresolved blocks about. There is nothing to hold me back, except that i never meet any of “my kind of guy”.
i dont what more i can do to positively manifest this goal. I’m honestly stumped as to why i cant make this happen in my life…

People will say “wait”; well, i’m about to be 45yrs old, and turned down about 5 possible marriages over my dating years,,,,so i feel i have waited, plenty. People will say “it’ll happen when youre not looking for it”. Well, i havent “looked” for anything, especially since the last entry, 8 months ago…only continued with my various social events. And still, nothing.
if there’s some way that i’m keeping this from happening, i wish i could figure out how & why & change it.

i also wish i could erase the entry i wrote on 43T inspired by the re-emergence of someone from my romantic past….from 9 years ago. Someone i seriously thought about a marriage with at the time. What ended our relationship was long-distance: we lived in different cities. I wasnt willing to instantly move, & wanted to wait at least a year…but he didnt want to continue a long distance relationship. I heard he got married about 2 yrs after we parted. Then 9 months ago, in one of those synchronistic, fluke of fates that are typical of my life, i found out he was divorced,,,,and had moved back to this city. How i found out was that his “Online Dating Profile” was sent to me as a “Match”. Nice that the universe is sending out emails to let me know when old loves have moved back to town-!
Anyways, he knows i’m still here, & i’m single, and has chosen not to get in touch with me. It did give me a jolt at the time, but has since just proven that we werent meant to be together anyway.

Thus. or Hence. Or anyways. Or at any rate. That is how it goes for me. Or doesnt, it would seem. I’m tired of waiting. I’m twenty-five years into waiting for the time to be right and for myself to be ready. The time is now right and i Am ready. I want my life’s partner, and i want to begin the next part of my life. Now.

Goal: stop collecting art supplies and start creating art

(from my 43T goal list...)


‘made a bit more progress on my “collaged silverware box” at my ‘Open Studio’ last night (usually i find the best way to make time for things is to create or join a group that’s devoted to the purpose (so i created an essentially “stop collecting art supplies and start creating art” support group) [ smile ]

********************************************* I am really enjoy this particular collaging project—it’s my 1st attempt on anything other than paper. ‘Made a few mistakes with paint colour & mangling previous images,,,,but was able to correct them (somewhat) It’s lovely creative learning process…i’m as eager as anyone to see how it turns out...