"Hold on world, world hold on ..." / Letting go / Solitary Canada Goose in the morning / Rainbow at the end of the day

Mary Oliver
In Blackwater Woods

Look, the trees are turning their own bodies into pillars   of light, are giving off the rich fragrance of cinnamon and fulfillment,   the long tapers of cattails are bursting and floating away over the blue shoulders   of the ponds, and every pond, no matter what its name is, is   nameless now. Every year everything I have ever learned   in my lifetime leads back to this: the fires and the black river of loss whose other side   is salvation, whose meaning none of us will ever know. To live in this world   you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it   against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go. *
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FOG AT 7 A.M. / 32 DEGREES

Yesterday I completed the emptying of my storage unit. I feel as if I have moved away from a place where I lived longer than I needed to. It's a good feeling. Still have to sort through the last of the possessions that I brought home yesterday, most of which are books, some of which belonged to my mother and father. As I was carrying them into my home I thought, "If I didn't have all these books, it would be much easier to move." I'll be wearing a dust mask as I sort through them, letting go of those that I can't read again anyway because of my sensitivity to book mold. Most of the books were in my storage unit for that reason, but I wasn't ready to let them go completely. I remember how difficult it was to let go of my father's moldy papers from his college days because letting them go felt like a betrayal of him.

A few days ago, while sorting, I found these handknit socks which were a gift from the mother of a former classmate who came from Turkey to study at our local community college in the early 1980s. I love them. They keep my feet warm on this chilly foggy morning.






















Update: A clear sunny day at 11:30 a.m. after the fog burned off. It's 55 degrees out on the porch now. I forgot to say that the fog this morning was filled with the sound of the Canada Geese who arrive here this time of year. The swallows usually arrive within the next week. This is the week my daffodil bulbs will begin to bloom.

I am finding that I am able to let go of approximately half of the books which were in the storage unit. That half will go to "The Friends of the Library" who will sell them, and the money will go to the public library. My delight in the other half of the books is still strong, and I've made room for them.

San Mateo County Coast Painted from Memory (2002)

The shape of the shoreline, vast ocean and sky is something else. There is an unnamable emotion that goes with it that, for me, is made of tears and laughter.

Last night I was painting until about midnight, working on something that was seeming to be a failed effort and which I had been working on for several days. Suddenly, I knew what to do, and the painting came to life.

The previous night I had been warping the inkle loom, only to discover after it was warped that I had made a mistake. The sinking feeling was awful, and I was too tired to remedy the mistake. Instead of trying to fix the mistake, I went to my painting table. Much later, I went to sleep feeling discouraged, with a feeling of failure in both weaving and painting.

Then, last night, I undid part of the warp and rewarped the loom. After weaving a few inches, I could see that there still was something wrong with the warping, but not wrong enough -- maybe even interesting, maybe a good lesson in letting go of expectations.

In the last few days, while I have been painting, I have been listening to an unabridged version of CHRONICLES VOLUME ONE, by Bob Dylan read by Nick Landrum, published in 2005, a version I picked up at the public library. I read the book when it was published in 2004 and have listened to the abridged version from 2004 read by Sean Penn.

Many, if not all, of my earlier paintings and drawings were done while listening to music, frequently Bob Dylan's music. Some time ago, I made a conscious decision to paint without listening to music. Recently, I've been listening to "spoken word" CDs and tapes. Painting while listening to someone speak is working for me now. Painting while listening to Bob Dylan's book evokes in me very different feelings and thoughts than his music does, and I'm glad for the continuing inspiration. He makes me laugh. He makes me ask questions. He helps me trust the creative process.

Person with Helpers (1982-1984)

This clay sculpture was formed sometime between 1982 and 1984 in Santa Cruz, California, at the home of a friend who is a potter and who will remain anonymous. My friend handed me a lump of clay and encouraged me to work with it. I had just spent some time walking and talking with the man from "Middle of the Journey" (see post from yesterday) and was thinking of him as I molded the clay. "Person with Helpers" was the result. 

My friend sent the piece to me a few months later. Although I tried to make adjustments to the photo image to show the true color of the fired clay, my adjustments were unsuccessful. As I look at the image today, I can see it in Jungian terms as an animus image from an earlier time in my life. I no longer have this small sculpture, but I can still see the warm brownish-orange color of the fired clay in my mind. 

As part of a difficult letting-go process in 1999, I placed the sculpture in an inconspicuous location in a city park. Although I had been able to let go of the piece, I felt compelled to return to visit it numerous times until it disappeared. Sometime between 1966 and 1967, I had sculpted a much smaller image of the same man from memory. In 1999, I left that older piece, along with other mementos, at The Moving Wall when it came to a nearby small town.