Calendar Series: 37th Month / Beloved Ocean with Imaginary Fruit (1988)

Human Being 

Human being - walking in doubt from childhood on: walking a ledge of slippery stone in the world's woods deep-layered with wet leaves - rich or sad: on one side of the path, ecstasy, on the other dull grief. Walking the mind's imperial cities, roofed-over alleys, thoroughfares, wide boulevards that hold evening primrose of sky in steady calipers. Always the mind walking, working, stopping sometimes to kneel in awe of beauty, sometimes leaping, filled with the energy of delight, but never able to pass the wall, the wall of brick that crumbles and is replaced, of twisted iron, of rock, the wall that speaks, saying monotonously: Children and animals who cannot learn anything from suffering, suffer, are tortured, die in incomprehension. This human being, each night nevertheless summoning - with a breath blown at a flame, or hand's touch on the lamp-switch - darkness, silently utters, impelled as if by a need to cup the palms and drink from a river, the words, "Thanks. Thanks for this day, a day of my life.' And wonders. Pulls up the blankets, looking into nowhere, always in doubt. And takes strange pleasure in having repeated once more the childish formula, a pleasure in what is seemly. And drifts to sleep, downstream on murmuring currents of doubt and praise, the wall shadowy, that tomorrow will cast its own familiar, chill, clear-cut shadow into the day's brilliance. 

Denise Levertov

Calendar Series: 36th Month / Freedom with Tears and Laughter (1988)

"Perfectly ordered disorder designed with a helter-skelter magnificence." (Emily Carr, 1871-1945) 

In this second year of my recovery from eating disorders came a new freedom, with tears AND laughter. All my life I had been running away from sorrow, not knowing that I was also running away from joy.

Technical Difficulties

Although I know if I spent some more time, I could figure out how to post the "My Three Sons" clip below the clip of my painting, where I would rather have it, I'm not going to take anymore time on this.

o o

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(_______)

My Three Sons

What a revelation it is to see clips from television programs from the 1960s about families, footage I hadn't seen since I was a child. I know I took this program very seriously, even though it was a situation comedy. I had and still do have a sense of humor, but I don't remember laughing at what I saw on television.

Calendar Series: 35th Month / Morning with Three Suns (1988)

I am not aware of having Finnish ancestors but had heard about a Finnish word "sisu," which I understood to mean "perseverance." 

Thinking about the words from the I-Ching, "perseverance furthers" and about traveling countless times on California Coast Highway 1, I imagined a morning with three suns. There was a physical sun, an emotional sun and a sunlight of the spirit, all shining at once. 

Funny where the mind goes. I wasn't thinking of My Three Sons, although that television show, which debuted in 1960 when I was 10 years old, entered my mind this morning. As I recall, it was a situation comedy about a widower with three sons. There was an older man who took the role of "mother." I can hear the voice announcing the show and see the three sons appearing one by one from behind a wall, followed by the family dog: MY - THREE - SONS - WOOF!

 

When I painted this image, I was a million miles down the road from the 10-year-old girl who sat with her mother and father and two younger sisters in front of a television set and watched people acting out a family which appeared to be very unlike my own.

Evolution of Forgiveness (1988)

The heart forgives when it accepts and acknowledges conflict without blame. 

(From VOICES OF THE HEART, by Ed Young)

Calendar Series: 33rd Month / Watermelon Seeds, Alphabet and Numbers for Richard Brautigan (1988)

To listen to Richard Brautigan read from IN WATERMELON SUGAR, click here. 

Hmmm .... that doesn't work. If still interested, go to: http://brautigan.cybernetic-meadows.net/tiki-index.php?page=The+Watermelon+Sun 

In 1967, during my freshman year of college, I had read TROUT FISHING IN AMERICA. That book, bought at its 1967 price of $1.95, along with IN WATERMELON SUGAR, is still on my bookshelf, one of a handful of books from that period in my life that I still own. I did read his earlier novel, A CONFEDERATE GENERAL FROM BIG SUR and read a few of his later books of poetry but didn't find there what I had found so peculiarly moving in TROUT FISHING IN AMERICA and IN WATERMELON SUGAR. 

I have never forgotten the boy he wrote about who was a "Kool-Aid wino" or what I think of as his "ode to Alcoholics Anonymous" titled "Trout Death by Port Wine" or the places he created which were called "IDEATH" and the "Forgotten Works." I was 17 years old. Richard Brautigan was "older and wiser," an imaginary older brother, much as Bob Dylan seemed to me in those years. I wanted to be as creative as they were. It has been said that there were "girls who wanted to marry a Beatle" and then there were "girls who wanted to BE a Beatle." As a 14-year-old girl, I had wanted to be a female equivalent of a "Beatle," which to me meant using creative energy in a lively and thoughtful way, although I wouldn't have had those words for that longing back then. 

In September of 1984, Richard Brautigan, after suffering from years of alcoholism and depression, shot himself in the head. His body was found a month later at his home in Bolinas, California. I had not thought about him in years and was saddened but not completely surprised at his suicide. His daughter, Ianthe Brautigan, wrote lovingly of her father in You Can't Catch Death, published in May of 2000. 

As a tribute to Richard Brautigan, one of his friends told this story. 

This link doesn't work either. 

If still interested, go to: http://www.brautigan.net/text/anonymous-tributes.html 

There is a poem by Richard Brautigan set into the pavement in San Francisco at Folsom Street and Embarcadero.

In 1989, not long after I painted "Watermelon Seeds, Alphabet and Numbers for Richard Brautigan," a friend of Richard Brautigan, Keith Abbott, published a book of his memories of Richard Brautigan, which he titled, DOWNSTREAM FROM TROUTFISHING IN AMERICA. Keith Abbott read from his book at our local independent bookstore. After the reading, I thanked him for his book about Richard Brautigan and gave him a photo of my painting tribute to Richard Brautigan. He took it and thanked me politely.

Calendar Series: 32nd Month / Reunion of the Calendar Family at New Year's Eve Creek Beach (1988)

In early spring of 1971, on a particularly peaceful day, a friend brought me to Ano Nuevo State Reserve, a beach at the end of what we called New Year's Eve Creek Road, although its correct name was New Year's Creek Road. He and I were almost the only people on that beach, which was soon to become a popular tourist destination because of a growing colony of elephant seals who wintered there. What I remember best about the beach was that there were pebbles embedded with fossilized sea shells. On another visit sometime later with other friends, there were a few elephant seals sleeping on the beach. 

My 11th favorite movie is "Shakespeare In Love." 

On my Zen notepad calendar today was this: Winter solitude-- in a world of one color the sound of wind. BASHO

Calendar Series: 31st Month / Singing Tool with Full Moon Rising (1988)

Try as I might, I was unable to adjust the color of the sky to anything near Payne's Gray. The full moon is rising, hidden by a cloudy Northwest sky. Below is the true sky color. The rest of the colors are fairly true. 

What was it that the tool was singing? The song was written in "code." If I looked at the letters long enough, I would probably remember. Both sides of the tool are singing the same song. The tool was loaned to me by a friend who found it in his parents' garage. It was rusty and beautiful in the way old tools can be. As I recall, it was used in connection with the car his grandfather owned in the 1920s. 

The painter, Jacob Lawrence, having observed carpenters and other builders, said, "It was beautiful to see them use tools as extensions of their hands. I've loved tools ever since. I collect them and I use them as subjects for my paintings." He also said, "Many hand tools haven't changed for centuries. They have such balance and are so functional. The human body is like a tool. Any living thing has this kind of structure." 

In the spring of 1997, there was an exhibit of Jacob Lawrence's work at the Museum of Northwest Art in La Conner, Washington. One of his paintings from his Builders Series, done using gouache on paper and titled "Carpenters," was used on the poster for that exhibit and is one of my favorite paintings in all of art history. 

Lori Witzel from Chatoyance, a lively blog featuring her "pictures, poems and other souvenirs and artifacts," tagged me for my ten favorite movies. Here they are: Cinema Paradiso 400 Blows Smoke Signals The Last Temptation of Christ The Gospel According to St. Matthew (Pier Paolo Pasolini) The Last Waltz Shrek Rabbit Proof Fence Masked and Anonymous Fast Runner I'm not going to tag anyone specifically. Feel free to be tagged for this meme.

Calendar Series: 30th Month / River Dreaming of the Ocean and Sky (1988)

Here I combined images from a solo road trip during which I visited my parents and sister in Northern California in the spring of 1987. This combination of landscape elements exists only in my mind but depicts a place I have visited often. I remember learning as a child that all rivers were heading to the ocean and that at the ocean the water somehow rose into the sky to form clouds which rained into the rivers. 

A few years ago, in the fall, I was sitting alone beside Nooksack Falls in the North Cascade Mountains and remembered about that cycle and began to write the following poem: 

FALL 2002 POEM 

I carried myself to the mountains 

Though the ocean wasn’t there 

I carried the ocean to the mountains 

Though the ocean wasn’t there 

I carried God to the mountains 

Though God wasn’t there 

God carried me to the mountains 

Though I wasn’t there 

God carried God to God 

Though God wasn’t there

Calendar Series: 29th Month / Talking Ocean With Garden (1988)

Looking at this painting today, I noticed that I had painted X = X as part of the spray from the breaking wave and remembered that I had often listened to Laurie Anderson's album, "Big Science", from 1982, as I was painting and drawing. I had forgotten that influence. 

What I see today when I look at this image is a "garden" in an American flag-like arrangement, planted on scorched earth on the west coast of the United States, beginning to show signs of spring. The scorched earth is "speaking" in code, as are the garden and the ocean. 

When I painted the image, I believe I was thinking about Highway 1, the California coast highway, and that the "code" was in the line down the middle of the highway. A garden had been planted in the middle of a highway and was going to thrive. Of course, as in all of my paintings, the image is completely open to interpretation. I wonder what I will see in this painting when I look at it twenty years from now. 

Yesterday, one of my sisters emailed me a photo of spring wildflowers from 2005 in the Temblor Range at the border of San Luis Obispo and Kern Counties in California. Our family lived in the midst of the oilfields near this range between the time I was 5 years old and 7 years old. My sister and I took a trip to Death Valley during the time I was painting the calendars. On that trip, we revisited the region where we had lived as children. I can see how the overlapping shapes of the California hillsides I saw as a young child, and then in my 30s, are repeated again and again in my paintings.

The above photo of the Temblor Range was taken by Frank Kee. I remember my father telling me that when he arrived in California in spring in the late 1930s, having driven alone from Minnesota, he thought that he had never seen anything so beautiful as the vast unpopulated region of the California landscape covered with wildflowers. 

Below is a photo of Oboe, who likes to be nearby as I post entries on this blog.

Calendar Series: 28th Month / Return (The Turning Point) (1988)

Return (The Turning Point) is the 24th hexagram in the I Ching or Book of Changes. 

In the late 1960s, learning that Bob Dylan had been reading the I Ching, I became curious about that book. My college roommate had a copy of the Wilhelm/Baynes translation, the 3rd edition, and she showed me how to consult the I Ching using three pennies. Eventually I bought my own copy. The last time I consulted the I Ching was January 1, 2006. Maybe it's time to consult it again. 

 The following is the Wilhelm/Baynes translation for hexagram 24: 

 24. Fu / Return (The Turning Point) above K'UN THE RECEPTIVE, EARTH below CHêN THE AROUSING, THUNDER The idea of a turning point arises from the fact that after the dark lines have pushed all of the light lines upward and out of the hexagram, another light line enters the hexagram from below. The time of darkness is past. The winter solstice brings the victory of light. This hexagram is linked with the eleventh month, the month of the solstice (December-January). 

 THE JUDGMENT 

RETURN. Success. Going out and coming in without error. Friends come without blame. To and fro goes the way. On the seventh day comes return. It furthers one to have somewhere to go. After a time of decay comes the turning point. The powerful light that has been banished returns. There is movement, but it is not brought about by force. The upper trigram K'un is characterized by devotion; thus the movement is natural, arising spontaneously. For this reason the transformation of the old becomes easy. The old is discarded and the new is introduced. Both measures accord with the time; therefore no harm results. Societies of people sharing the same views are formed. But since these groups come together in full public knowledge and are in harmony with the time, all selfish separatist tendencies are excluded, and no mistake is made. 

The idea of RETURN is based on the course of nature. The movement is cyclic, and the course completes itself. Therefore it is not necessary to hasten anything artificially. Everything comes of itself at the appointed time. This is the meaning of heaven and earth. All movements are accomplished in six stages, and the seventh brings return. Thus the winter solstice, with which the decline of the year begins, comes in the seventh month after the summer solstice; so too sunrise comes in the seventh double hour after sunset. Therefore seven is the number of the young light, and it arises when six, the number of the great darkness, is increased by one. In this way the state of rest gives place to movement.

THE IMAGE Thunder within the earth: The image of THE TURNING POINT. Thus the kings of antiquity closed the passes At the time of solstice. Merchants and strangers did not go about, And the ruler Did not travel through the provinces. The winter solstice has always been celebrated in China as the resting time of the year--a custom that survives in the time of rest observed at the new year. In winter the life energy, symbolized by thunder, the Arousing, is still underground. Movement is just at its beginning; therefore it must be strengthened by rest so that it will not be dissipated by being used prematurely. This principle, i.e., of allowing energy that is renewing itself to be reinforced by rest, applies to all similar situations. The return of health after illness, the return of understanding after an estrangement: everything must be treated tenderly and with care at the beginning, so that the return may lead to a flowering.

Calendar Series: 27th Month / Sleepless Night with Bridge to Morning (1988)

My mother's mother's female ancestors have been traced as far back as 1790 in Drumhecknagh, Kilmore Parish, County Cavan, Ireland. 

In 1836, my great-great grandmother, Jane Bennett, then 9 years old, was working on an embroidered sampler. In 1837, her family left Ireland and settled in Quebec, near New Hampshire. The unfinished sampler was passed down from mother to daughter, from New Hampshire to Boston to St. Paul, Minnesota until it came to me in Washington. 

Because I have no children and no possibility of female nieces in this generation, I have passed it on to a cousin who is my mother's great niece and who lives in California, in hopes that it will continue to be passed down the female line. While working on the Calendar Series, I looked at the 19th century embroidered sampler and felt a distinct kinship with that 9-year-old girl from County Cavan, Ireland. I am fairly sure that I added the alphabet to this painting with the sampler in mind, although when I got to the end of the alphabet, I began to make it into a palindrome and then followed no order. When I tried to upload the image of the sampler, I got error messages. Several further attempts were also unsuccessful, but I will try later today. Am unable to upload the complete image but can upload this detail:

Calendar Series: 26th Month / Fertile Land with Horizon and Bridge (1987)

Calendar Series: 25th Month / Night and Ocean in True Colors (1987)

TRUE COLORS (Cindy Lauper) You with the sad eyes don't be discouraged oh I realize it's hard to take courage in a world full of people you can lose sight of it all and the darkness inside you can make you fell so small But I see your true colors shining through I see your true colors and that's why I love you so don't be afraid to let them show your true colors true colors are beautiful like a rainbow Show me a smile then don't be unhappy, can't remember when I last saw you laughing if this world makes you crazy and you've taken all you can bear you call me up because you know I'll be there And I'll see your true colors shining through I see your true colors and that's why I love you so don't be afraid to let them show your true colors true colors are beautiful like a rainbow

Calendar Series: 24th Month / Virgin Forest, Golden River and Seedlings (1987)

In 1979, Arlo Guthrie recorded an album he called "Outlasting the Blues." On that album was "Sailing Down This Golden River", a song written by Pete Seeger in 1971 as "Sailing Down My Golden River."

Calendar Series: 23rd Month / Beginning in the North Country

Happy Valentine's Day!

Calendar Series: 22nd Month / Sunrise (1987)

Now I am beginning to remember that, over and over again, the ocean scene I was painting in the Calendar Series was from my memories of hours spent walking on the bluffs and beach at Montara on the San Mateo County coast in California, just about 12 miles south of San Francisco but a world away in terms of population and sense of place. 

On my way to the beach, I used to buy a "lunch" of golden raisins at the tiny organic food store (in those days it was called a "natural food" store) in Montara and then spend the afternoon walking and taking in the extraordinary multi-sensorial experience of feeling part of the ocean, clouds, sky, horizon, wind, sun, fog, gulls, killdeer, sanderlings, sandpipers, crows, sea lions, seals, orcas, whales, blue-sailed jellyfish, kelp, sand fleas, broken shells, driftwood, agates, chaparral-covered coast hills to the east, coastal plants growing on the bluffs and in the distinctively golden sand, all not far from eucalyptus groves and straw-flower fields. 

Sometimes when it was sunny but windy and cool, I would dig a bed for myself in the warm sand of that steep-sloped beach and sleep and dream. It would be almost 15 years before this experience of loving and being loved by a place would show itself in paintings. During the time when I lived within weekend afternoon driving distance of Montara Beach, I was not drawing or painting at all but working with brightly colored carpet warp, making small colorful tapestry-like images using a macrame technique.

(the photos are from an online album of splendid photos of the northern California coast by Daniel Wolf-Root that I found while looking for images of Montara)

Calendar Series: 21st Month / Underground River (1987)

Sometime after giving this painting its title, I learned that the 14th century German mystic, Meister Eckhart, had said, "Divinity is an underground river that no one can stop and no one can damn up."

Calendar Series: 20th Month / 222,222

Today it occurred to me again that what I had been trying to do by painting the "calendars" was to reclaim, a month at a time, beginning in January of 1971 when I was 21 years old, those parts of myself and my experiences that I had relinquished while mistakenly thinking that that was what I needed to do to be accepted and loved. 

I am also remembering that while in the process of beginning to paint "calendars," after being alone for almost two years, I had entered a relationship with a recovering alcoholic who gently suggested that I might benefit from an eating disorder support group. He was enthusiastic about my art work. 

As a result, I began making paintings with his acceptance of me in mind as well as my past experiences. He, along with most people I encountered during that time, liked the calendars more than my previous chalk pastel images. 

By using color, symbols, numbers, letters and landscape, I was able to "talk in code." What I was talking about and what was experienced by the viewer were often two different things, but I didn't see that as a problem. For me, "222,222" was a visual depiction of a person's attempt to create meaning when feeling overwhelmed by circumstances beyond that person's, or anyone else's, control. It didn't matter if no one saw what I saw. I wanted to know what other people had seen and experienced. The words that often came up during this time when people commented on my paintings were "beautiful," "healing," and "celebration."