The Days, The Hours, The Moments: Day 182 ~ “Sometimes I Have To Hide” and more…

This is how I’ve felt a lot lately. When Maisie feels this way she hides in the old wardrobe with everything she loves and holds precious crowded in around her. I think we all do this in our own way. If you do something similar I’d love it if you would write to me about it in the comments.

As I have been drawing this picture I have been thinking about a comment that a dear friend made a week or so ago, she said that she hoped I wouldn’t show everything I was creating, that there should be some surprises, or something like that. It kind of brought me up short, rubbed me the wrong way, but I couldn’t figure out why, and I’ve been thinking about it ever since. She is a very dear friend and she meant no harm.

First of all in the age of the internet sometimes art is stolen or copied or downloaded and I truly hope that won’t happen. My art is so deeply personal and coming from my own life that it would seem hard for someone to duplicate what I am doing. They could try I suppose but if they are truly artists it might be inspiration but it would come out in a unique way, unique as the one who is drawing it. I hope no one tries to copy what I am doing, but I have no control over that and I have to be okay with that and go on doing my work.

Why do I share it and, more to the point how will I continue to share it?

I share it because I need to. I am 65, I could drop dead tomorrow or live to 103 (I’m betting on the latter!), and the thing is I want to enjoy people’s reaction to my work while I’m alive and doing it. Many comments made about my art have so uplifted me that they kept me going through dark times when I lost confidence in myself. It is so much fun sharing my process and there is something in this. I am, first and foremost, doing this for me, but also, because I am me and this is how I feel about everything, I want to share my process because all my life I have wanted to be an artist but did not have confidence in myself. A very cruel old nun tore up one of my pictures in front of the class laughing at me and the whole class laughed at me and I never tried to draw again… until I was 59. I still never got very far because I couldn’t get things to “look like they were supposed to” until the day I woke up in January to the realization that I could only do what I could do and this is what I can do and I completely fell in love with it and here I am today. And more, most of all, I want other people who have held dreams in their heart and been afraid to try to JUST DO IT! This is what I am doing with what poet Mary Oliver called “my one wild and precious life.” What will you do with yours?

I remember a quote from ages ago that has been a guiding star for me. It was Ralph Waldo Emerson. He wrote, “Do the thing and you will have the power.” I have always believed this to be true, now I know that it is.

Finally, I do see the story I am creating becoming a book, but no one will see that, or see how it is put together until I’ve done it and publish it. Yes, you may have seen many or most of the pictures here or in a venue that I choose to share it in and I will share a few details about the picture simply because it’s fun and I like to do it, it makes me happy, but oh you’ve no idea where this is all going. It is magical and becomes more so in my mind every single day. I have stepped through the looking glass and no one can follow me here.

In the end I am trying to figure out a way to create an income as I work my way along. I have long thought of doing Patreon but been afraid to do it. Very few people make donations on blogs and I completely understand this. Now that I know what I will be getting for social security, and it’s far less than I had hoped, I have to generate income. If people can help support me for a small monthly subscription I could breathe easier. I think this is the way I am going to go.

The thing is while a Patreon page would help support me which I badly need I’d want it to be about more than the art. I think what I want to create is a page about the joys of growing older with grace and joy and making the life that is perfect for you (no matter what anyone else thinks!). The amazing thing to me is that people are not only writing to thank me for inspiring them to make art, to draw and to paint, when they, like me, always wanted to but were afraid, people are writing to tell me that they are making a garden in pots because they’ve been so inspired by what I’m doing. And there are so many other things. I am putting this together in my mind right now, I am open to ideas and suggestions and would love to know what you think.

Right now, in this moment, just before beginning to write this blog post I finished drawing the picture above. I am now going to start painting. There is so very much detail it will take me days to finish painting it but oh, what joy this process is, it is exciting, it is mysterious, and yes, I will share it along the way, because it just makes me so happy to do it.

If you’ve read my blog for years you know that I am very transparent about my life. I believe that we should be. You’ve read a lot about my struggles with mental health and everything else because if, in sharing my truth, I will have helped one other person, and I get emails and comments and letters all the time from people telling me how much I’ve helped them, then I will have done what I feel I was put on this earth to do. Help others by sharing, honestly, my one human life, letting people know that they are not alone. This matters more to me than anything else.

The vagaries and dangers of the internet have made many people become afraid to share their lives, their truth, their work, but we are losing contact with each other. In one way we are more connected than we have ever been, I now have friends all over the world and I love that, but in another way we are less personally connected to people. I don’t want to live like that. And I am agoraphobic, I do live alone, and I am not much out in the world, hence I will share my heart and life and work with all of you. I believe it matters, I hope so, and I shall carry on just as I have been.

Cheerio! Time to paint! Take care of your beautiful selves and tell me, what will you do with your one wild and precious life? I’d love to know…