.perspective.

From the beginning of it, I've been referring to 2014 as "The Year That's Trying to Kill Everyone." For me (and most everyone I know) this has been true. I did start out the year after all, recovering from a car accident, followed by an ongoing sequence of horribleness that seemed to be without end.

Except.
It really hasn't been that bad. Painful, but mostly in a growing and figuring out what's what kind of way (except for the wrist - that fucking hurt. also the car accident, that still hurts.). I figured out a lot of my priorities, my husband is happier as a freelancer, and in a way things are calmer though not less busy at all. I'm not teaching any more, and that's good. For me. And for the other teachers in town, of which there are plenty for my former students to choose from. I'm taking dance classes and getting back in touch with my base technique. I'm drawing and journaling daily, which means a lot less time spent wasted on social media and this is also excellent. I rejoined my gym which is much less awful than I thought it would be and I'm finally starting to feel a little bit balanced.
And perhaps this year I might even finish that mermaid painting...

So perspective - it's a funny thing, and this next half of the year is going to be even crazier than the first.

.sketchbook wednesday.

Found my sketchbook!!!

.and then I started ranting again.

When I was in high school, I got a little obsessed with late 19th Century British poetry. I was not an expert in it, I couldn't rattle on about the themes and how they were effected by the history of the period - I just kind of fell in love with some of it and took to memorizing bits because I was a melodramatic teenager and it seemed like the thing to so.
One of my favorites was and still is "Invictus" by William Ernest Henley, keeping in mind that five minutes ago I couldn't have told you the name of the poem or who wrote it if my life depended of it - but thanks to the interwebs I can type in the lines that are stuck forever in my brain and Whammo! there's the information I was looking for:

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul. 

It's those last two lines that resonate the strongest (as they were probably meant to): I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul. 
Or in my own personal vernacular - Screw you, I'm going to do what I want; and you can go fuck yourself if you think you have any control over that. 
Clearly William's phrasing is way more eloquent, but I never claimed to be a writer, let alone a poet.
(Ok, I did at one point as a teenager claim to be both a writer and a poet, but looking back that was a horrible horrible mistake that my teachers were kind enough to gloss over for me. Mostly I think they were happy that I was trying to do anything at all.)

We live in a fairly autonomous society (sort of). Obviously, there are definite societal taboos, and a few laws that are more than a good idea; but for the most part, you can attempt to do whatever you want with your life. People run away and join the circus, have pet tigers, and paint their houses rainbow colors. Is any of that usual? Not so much. Did their parents and peers endorse any of that? Probably not. And yet...
And here's my really awkward transition.

There are quite a few people in the world posing as teachers who seem to think that because they gave a person a bit of knowledge that they then control anything that student does with it.
And I call bullshit.
Once a piece of knowledge is in your brain or body, it is yours to do with as you please. Is it a good idea? Not necessarily. But this is how our culture and knowledge and science and art have progressed throughout the span of history - a teacher brings an idea, a student takes that idea and makes it their own and builds upon it, and then passes the thing on to the next student who hopefully does the same. And this is where really excellent teaching comes in - with critical thinking skills and history and context and societal views. I do believe that it's important to learn the rules before you start breaking them - but without a little rule breaking and innovation we'd still be in the Dark Ages - and I prefer modern medicine and HBO.
And Doctor Who.

.sketchbook.project.3.

Two more spreads closer to finished...

The 2012 Sketchbook Project has been announced - Limited Edition. I'm so very very tempted, but it's outside of my budget at the moment. Perhaps after the New Year, after this book is finished and submitted, if there's still space in the project I'll join in.

.weekend.goals.

Next weekend, by some fortuitous nock of chance, I have a lovely five day weekend. I would like to spend at least 70% of my waking time with friends, or Finally playing Skyrim. The other 30% of my time will be spent cooking food for Thanksgiving Feast Day!

So I have to get a bunch of stuff done this weekend, mostly things I've been avoiding for the last two weeks....
• Unpack three suitcases - 2 from FaerieCon, 1 from East Meets West
• Finish 2 paintings
• Make a bunch of bindi and other extraneous jewelry
•' Clean the House (which my lovely fiance will be assisting me with)

I like goals.

art, science, and nature

My favorite artist of all time has to be Andy Goldsworthy. A British artist who specializes in collaborations with nature, I first saw his work in an article in Discover magazine way back in the 90's when I was in high school. His work transcends reality - primarily because he exclusively uses natural materials in the area where he found them - that his art quickly reverts back to nature just makes it more beautiful to me. From his own webpage:

At its most successful, my ‘touch’ looks into the heart of nature; most days I don’t even get close. These things are all part of the transient process that I cannot understand unless my touch is also transient—only in this way can the cycle remain unbroken and the process complete. I cannot explain the importance to me of being part of the place, its seasons and changes. Fourteen years ago I made a line of stones in Morecambe Bay. It is still there, buried under the sand, unseen. All my work still exists in some form.

There is an excellent documentary about Mr. Goldsworth, title Rivers and Tides, during which you can watch him constructing an ice sculpture not entirely dissimilar to the one pictured above.

Yesterday afternoon, I was listening to a How Stuff Works: Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast (which I highly recommend) titled This is Your Brain on Art. The podcast was primarily about the relationship between art and neuroscience, but one of the examples that was brought up during the podcast was the curious Courting rituals of the Bowerbirds. I'd heard of Bowerbirds before (who hasn't?) and heard about the Bowers that the males construct to attract females, but listening to the podcast, and being in front of Google, I was finally motivated to look up these constructions.
And they are gorgeous. The birds themselves are gorgeous, particularly the Satin Bowerbird, which has the most amazing blue eyes (a bird with blue eyes - who knew?), but the bowers they construct, without the use of hands or thumbs - I was floored.

from the Birds in Backyards website - of a female Satin Bowerbird

photo by Barry Hatton, via Elmtwig

i

image from ARKive

But these constructions - and you really should look them up and read more (the Satin Bowerbirds actually paint the inside of their bowers with chewed up berries and charcoal), remind me quite a bit of Andy Goldsworthy's work.

If I ever get back into sculpture - this is the kind of work I'd like to do. Now if only creating the kind of art you loved to look at was a guaranteed thing...

.monday.

When I left my house this morning for work - at horrible horrible 6:30am - there was a sleepy honey bee taking a snooze on the door frame. I was a little jealous, of his snoozing, and in awe that I could be so close to him without him rousing.

Decent enough weekend, for having gotten little enough done from my list of things to get done. Fortunately, costume repair was not necessary for my Saturday night shows, and the rest...sometimes naps are more important.

One very important lesson was learned - if you're doing a sword dance, don't plan on balancing the stupid thing on your chin if there's not proper temperature control. Meaning, don't do it if your face has been sweating at all - at best and if you're lucky, you'll end up with a chest balance instead. At worst....you're going to drop your lovely shiny sword on the floor and dent the sword, the floor, or both.

.friday.rambling.

How to begin a brand new shiny blog...

Perhaps with my current state of mind - which is in a fairly horrible in between place. My life and my career are not what I would want them to be, on the other hand, I don't know what I want either.

I'm been mulling it over in my head for over a week - not terribly long I realize - but long enough to know how exactly directionless I have become. I've been working the same day job for almost 8 years, designing high school and college yearbook covers. In this time, I've done so little freelance illustration or design work it's embarrassing. In order to get a better design job, or work at all, I'd need a significant amount of time and money to put into furthering my education, and I'm not really sure the prospects are something I want to do anyhow. I love illustration, less so much design. The idea of working in marketing, or a high powered design firm where I'd be selling useless things to people who probably don't need them makes me a little nauseous.  I'd much rather do work that improves my environment and community, but I really have no idea where to start looking for it, or how to break into it, or what I could even do when there are some many artists out there desperate for anything to stick in a portfolio so that they can go and get a real job.