The Return To Maisie ~ Why I Stopped & Why It’s Finally Time To Begin Again — On Aging, Fear and Starting Over…

[This is a public post sponsored by my dear Patrons at Patreon. Click on the image above to view it there.]

You have no idea how hard it is for me to share the above, unfinished painting. It is SUCH a mess. I don’t know how in the world Maisie’s hair turned out the mucky color it did, nor do I remember what had gone wrong with Maisie’s face that I mucked up trying to fix it, but I was so overwhelmed I just stopped. The idea of starting to work on the book I now realize was, in a larger part than I have wanted to admit, an excuse not to return to this painting. I knew I would have to face it at some point, correct it, fix it, and then finish the whole thing but the truth is I had lost faith in myself in a more serious way than I had at first realized or wanted to admit, and I can tell you that what kept me hanging in and trying to work at all, and what has brought me back to Maisie now, is 100% because you, my dear Patrons, are there supporting me, believing in me, showing me so much love and kindness, that I have continued to try to find a way back. 

You see I was trying to do this painting on the clipboard it is still clipped to when I was in my recliner chair for 3 months recovering from the bad fall I took. The light was bad so it was hard to see what I was doing, the board unsteady — the only set up I could come up with was a big pillow on my lap, my laptop on top of that for a firm base, and then the  clipboard with the painting clipped to it. I had done some smaller things that way but this is one of the big paintings and there was no good way to manuever. I made mistakes I wouldn’t have here at my work table with good light and a steady surface and I finally realized I could not work like that so I set it aside. I got my new painting table set up after the holidays but by then I had become afraid to face the painting and started trying to do the book. 

But you see what brought me to Patreon in the beginning were these Maisie paintings, creating her world in my drawings/paintings, for over 2 years it was Maisie that got me up in the morning, knowing that she was there, working on the current painting which brought me so much joy, and a kind of pride in myself that I had never known. Maisie gave me a sense of hope about how I might be able to do work that mattered and a sense of purpose for whatever time I have left on this planet that I was over the moon in love with her and excited about her. I was terrified to start Patreon. It was Maisie that got me here. But then in October I took that fall.

That fall did not just do serious damage to my foot, ankle, and lower calf, causing more sustained, ongoing pain than I have ever had in my life, but it did something more to me. It made me afraid. I felt like a broken old lady who would never be right again. In fact with it as healed as it’s ever going to be I am much less steady now than I was before the fall and the fear kept building, and a sense of sadness, a terrible sense of loss. There is a time, looking at the calendar, when you realize that you have grown older, but there is, more difficult to handle, the day that comes that you know, in your body, that you have grown old and that there is no way you will ever return to who you were when you were younger, and then it hits you, it really hits you, this age thing, and it changes things inside of you.

Now, mind, I have never feared growing older from an age point of view. It is a fact of life and it is something we will all come to in time. But when the day comes that you realize what that means in terms of physical disability, diminished capacities, and the certain knowledge that certain doors are now closed to you that will never be open to you again (I’m talking here about things you have loved and done in the past, things you always planned to do “some day,” that sort of thing which, because of whatever has physically or mentally changed with age, now renders those things impossible.) it does something to you. It can render you so fearful that you are afraid to try anything at all. What if I fall again? What if I can’t paint Maisie anymore? And these things have caused me to struggle so terribly mentally that, as you all have seen, life has, at times, more than anyone knows, become nearly untenable to me. That fall in October did far more serious damage than just to my foot and ankle, it reft away any confidence that I had in myself. The confidence I had gained doing Maisie for 2 years was gone and I couldn’t find my way back. I have been fighting tooth and nail to do anything at all, I have been in more ways than you know fighting for my life.

But the one thing that Maisie had taught me, that “Maisie’s World” was all about, was the idea that no matter what your limitations, there were still limitless possibilities still available for you. Not, perhaps, in the way you would have once imagined or dreamed of, but there is still more possible for us than perhaps we know. That was to be Maisie’s message all along, what was behind this work and her story, what I wanted to write a book about, and then I fell, and spent 3 months in that chair, crying from the pain every single day, but I fought to keep going, I showed up here at Patreon despite the pain, I did my videos which I did 5x a week at that time, and it was probably why I started the reading videos, to comfort myself as much as anything else. I have only just realized that yes it affected me more seriously than most people or even I myself realized, but I kept going as best I could. And only now, in realizing that, did it spark something in me, a sense of pride, a sense of possibility. I had forgotten about that. And if my message for other people is that no matter what your limitations are you can still do work you love, still achieve dreams, then I’d damned well better get off my duff and get to it. In that moment I picked the above painting of Maisie and the little alien Lolly up and just fell in love with Maisie all over again. I will rescue her, and she will rescue me right back, and I will share the process of recovering and reclaiming this painting, and “Maisie’s World” with all of you here at Patreon in the hopes that if you are afraid or struggling or doubting yourself you, too, might know that there is so much possible for you all. 

I didn’t do a blog post yesterday because I was deep in thought about all of this, and I will share this as a public post today because it is a message I want to share with everyone. I am still afraid, but I am not going to let fear stop me. Maisie and I are holding hands, we will get each other through this, and we are both here holding hands with all of you. As long as I have breath in my body and the physical and mental ability to do so I will keep on working. This is what “Maisie’s World” is all about. I have remembered my purpose, and so, now, back to the painting table. It’s time to make this right.