9.14.08 copied from journal entry written at Four Beans Coffeehouse:

no gravity, my conceptual hell reality

no water no air inside my mind
I float through space and time to find
the dark and empty warm of lost
to fill my heart despite the cost
the moon so full my heart so round
it floats and swells upon the sound
of sandy crystals full of time
that fall through cracks inside my mind

can you see my thoughts?

how do i justify the brain train that currently occupies the space in my head? the concurrent strands of spinning spiraling questions that dance across my gray matter and disappear into the distance, if only for a moment, before they reappear transformed and infinitely more complex.
how do i accurately choose the few strands that might give light to the story of intrigue and delight my mind is weaving at any given moment... how do i answer the question, "what are you thinking?"

most of the time, the answer that seems to make the most sense is, "everything and nothing."

this is the truth and yet one might ask how such an answer can even seem to make sense, or if it does... crazy, crazy you say? look inside your own mind, really get in there and truly SEE what is there. then tell me that, "everything and nothing" doesn't make just as much sense to you.

see.

i told you.

No pictures, just words... R.I.P. Digital Camera

this post shall take a sad tone, as i am mourning the loss of my dear departed digital camera. i was celebrating it's life the other evening by taking many interesting and obscure pictures when fate struck my hand and my poor digital camera did slip from my fingers and crash to the floor; lens mangled to pieces beyond recognition.

i realize it's just a camera, a conglomeration of cold metal inter-working electronic parts, but it was also a part of me. an extension of my creative vision and exploration. i wanted to fall to the floor and weep in despair... alas, i had to pull myself together and go to work.

i have 2 weddings to go to this weekend, which i'd love to document, but i can't quite bring myself to purchase a replacement camera, not yet.

i'm funny...

when i don't try and i just let whatever is in my brain flow out, in the moment, i can be pretty damn witty and clever! i think that certain people bring that out in me, which i appreciate because i like that side of myself... it's a total bonus when i make someone else AND myself laugh in the same moment! usually it's just me, chuckling at my own goofy self or laughing at the funnies that scroll across the marquee of my mind.

sometimes people are so serious or sensitive about everything that it's nice to have someone who encourages, even inspires, me to take myself, and well, everything, less seriously. helps to balance me out. and balance, after-all, is what i'm all about in life.

"i just called to make sure you had a good day,"...

he said on the other end of the line and i almost melted into a little puddle.


i have realized recently that when i am able to keep my expectations at bay and not hold people to "secret contracts," as author and psychoanalyst Adam Phillips calls them, i am constantly and pleasantly surprised at how sweet, perceptive, and reliable people are. when i'm not holding someone to a specific and usually unattainable standard that i have created in my silly little head, i can more fully appreciate them, in every respect.

i'm less anxious about things this time around. i have yet to puzzle out whether this is due to maturity and learning through experience on my part, or whether it is due to the calming effect he seems to have on me; i suspect it is a lovely and intoxicating combination of the two. i don't feel the anxious need to talk to or communicate with him every day or even every other day...and when i do think about wanting to call or chat later in the day, he beats me to it and usually within 5-10 minutes of my having had the thought; it's eery. i keep thinking that it's just coincidence... but it keeps happening.


"i just called to make sure you had a good day," he said on the other end of the line and i almost melted into a little puddle.

and the world spins madly on

i love that song by the weepies...

today the world moves rapidly around me...grey clouds press down and squelch my energy. i press on, longing for energetic relief... the comfort of caffeine and mental escape my only solace.

I feel heavy with lethargy... my eyes feel heavy in their sockets, my thoughts heavy in my head. as i move, the contents of my imagination slosh around, thick, inside my brain. the air feels heavy on my skin, my feet feel heavy in my ballet slipper shoes.

this excerpt, from Robert Frost's The Birches, pretty accurately captures the feeling of the day:

"i'd like to get away form earth a while
then come back and begin all over
let no fate willfully misunderstand me
and half grant what i wish and snatch me away not to return
earth's the right place for love
i don't know where it's bound to go better."

i long for a calmer pace to life, but i am forced to operate at the pace of the world around me. it wears me out. it's not quite a "take it or leave it" kind of feeling. there are things that i love about the world and would, if i had the choice, carry certain things with me always. but then, there are things like time that seem like their only purpose is to limit and frustrate me. it wears me out.

part-time lover...full-time creative thinker

i seem to be having a problem making time for creative ventures lately. i've become a part-time lover to myself and my right-brain. it's not that i want to be neglectful of my need for creative outlets, but work has had me in a tailspin for the past 3 or so weeks. spare time that i do manage to find i spend with my friends or the man in my life (don't get me wrong, they are WELL worth my time!)...that, or i work feverishly at keeping my apartment clean so that it doesn't become a disaster in the midst of my busy life, thus blocking up my creative flow even further... i can't work in the midst of a mess. ...figurative or literal, ha.

for now, as i spend time posting instead of actually doing a creative project (since i do have a bit of time but no materials close at hand), i'm going to write about a few ideas that i've had recently: (pictures to come...)

1) i love fabric and tend to collect fabrics that appeal to my eye so that i can have fun fabric whenever the idea for a project, sewing or otherwise, strikes me. i also love painting. i've decided to combine the two. my idea is to stretch fabric (one with a fun or cute print) over stretcher bars like one would a canvas for painting. then i'll prepare just a portion of the "canvas" with gesso...a circle in the bottom right corner, or a rectangle evenly spaced in the middle...and create a painting on the prepared area that jibes with the pattern on the fabric, but is different enough that it stands out. i think it will be fabuous! now i just have to find the time to start...

2) one random craft project that i do is making decoupaged magnets/thumbtacks (pictures to come) out of random magazine clippings and those round glass stones (the 1 in. round ones for magnets, and the 1/2 in. ones for thumbtacks) that you can get at craft stores. my idea is this: instead of making magnets or thumbtacks with them, choose a picture or make a collage, and then apply the glass stones, mosaic style, on top of the picture so that it creates a mosaic like work of art...you could also cut the picture up as it corresponds to the stones and then re-glue it down in order so that it is just the picture under the stones and not between them... it will take some experimenting to see how it looks best.

3) i've taken this community ceramics class for the past several months (spring semester and summer...) and i'm going to take it again this fall. i need to post some pictures of the stuff that i've made, but i've also got some great ideas for new pieces... one of them is a sort of dark but beautiful take off of the Leona Lewis song Bleeding Love... it involves an anatomically correct ceramic representation of a heart... i don't want to spoil the idea, so that'll just have to be a "wait and see"! i think it's the project that i'm the most excited to see come to fruition.

the show

I'm just a little bit
caught in the middle
Life is a maze
and love is a riddle
I don't know where to go
I can't do it alone
(I've tried)
and I don't know why

I am just a little girl
lost in the moment
I'm so scared
but don't show it
I can't figure it out
it's bringing me down
I know
I've got to let it go
and just enjoy the show
-Lenka

"dream catch me...

dream catch me when i fall, or else i won't come back at all."

i am enchanted in this world that i have created for myself. i close my eyes and reach out my hand...,"trust me!" it calls. i'm reluctant, but i push on through a door and then i'm falling like Alice down the rabbit hole; it's comfortable and i feel lightened, free...
i float down like a feather and land in a place that is strange but familiar. it smells like warm milk, rose petal soap, sun kissed skin...the scents of my childhood. "where am i?" i whisper to myself. my words echo strangely inside my own head... inside my own head... inside my own head.

"there's a place i go when i'm alone, do anything i want, be anyone i want to be. but is us i see and i cannot believe i'm falling. that's where i'm going, where are you going? hold it close, won't let this go. dream catch me... dream catch me when i fall, or else i won't come back at all." -Newton Faulkner

wake up and smell the...

i've been absent from the blogging world for the past few weeks due to several reasons...
i work at a school and the end of the year is always busy, busy, busy.
due to my need to be connected via computer for so much of my job, i really wanted to start the summer on a sort of hiatus from my computer etc. i was in need of reconnecting with my inner self; re-learning how to be aware of the world around me instead of retreating into my head.

with that said, as a tool in my personal quest i've been using a wonderful book that i had learned about and then happened upon and purchased while i was visiting my mom in Connecticut. the book is Caffeine For The Creative Mind: 250 Exercises To Wake Up Your Brain by Stefan Mumaw and Wendy Lee Oldfield. the exercises are fun and really get you thinking outside of the box...or in my case, outside of my own head!

i woke up this morning with the phrase, "wake up and smell the_____" (fill in the blank, my thought train didn't go to the usuals...) and as my morning unfolded, i found myself having fun trying to describe the smell of different words that could be inserted in the blank.
for example, while i was in the shower i came up with this one:

wake up and smell the...
crazy:
it's metallic and sinister, cold and just a little bit tangy; the kind of tangy that gets you in the glands right behind your jaw bones, where you can't tell if it hurts or tickles.

i know that's kind of dark, but part of my quest in living outside of my head is to embrace both the dark and the light...i've come to realize that i can be quite a dark person, and i'm ok with that!

A Rainy Wednesday Mosaic

1. MARE FINTO..., 2. Kuwait Water Tower, 3. goshen high school gymnasium, 4. vw, 5. Sri Randal Randal 5/13/08, 6. [imerovigli], 7. New York, New York, 8. Verme, 9. Relax

as inspired by creative kismet

trying to move forward

why is it that when you want to forget about something and move on, that specific thing keeps popping up everywhere? you think that you're making progress and then, "wham!" it pops up out of nowhere annoyingly waving in your face saying, "haha, i'm still here. don't forget about me!"

i got my tarot cards/palm read for my birthday (it was my request and i have AWESOME friends who took me out!).

the recurring theme was that i needed to let go of certain things...people...past relationships and trust myself. i know...my head knows, what i need, what i need to do, where i need to go etc. i know this--most of what she told me just reinforced things that i already "knew"--but recently, it has proven extremely difficult to follow through on some of these things. especially where "letting go" is concerned.

faces, memories, past events pop up in dreams or just in the back of my mind...floating there just in the periphery, never completely out of sight or thought. taunting and tormenting me, haunting my dreams, reminding me... pulling emotions and memories back from times past to the surface of my present life.
she (Caroline, the psychic, tarot card, and palm reader) asked at the end of the reading if i had any questions...i didn't then. but now, now there is a whole host of questions floating around in my head. why is it so hard to let go of certain things/people? what do i need to do to make that process move forward...to get the things that i WANT to let go of out of my head? do i have a hard time letting certain things go because they are significant in some way that i haven't figured out yet? or because i have unfinished business?

mirror, mirror, on the wall...

who's had the crappiest day of them all?


so today was one of those days where, looking back, you regret ever getting out of bed. nothing went right, nothing felt right, i had no energy or drive or motivation, hormones had my memory in a full nelson with no signs of loosening their grip. i'd think to do something and i'd turn around to go do it and have already forgotten what it was that was in my head not 10 seconds ago. re-tracing my steps usually helps, but you can't get very far in a day when you spend the majority of your time backtracking trying to remember what it was that you were just about to do.

the savior to the day is that it's almost over and i got through it. i guess on days like today, that's all you can really ask for. tomorrow will be better, i'm almost certain of it. the fact that i can be certain about anything in my current emotional state is the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel.

i'll go to bed, wake up tomorrow with renewed energy, and, in the words of as smart little fish, "just keep swimming."

Things I've made pt. deux...

ok, so where was i? ah yes...

#4 Re-claimed chairs:



chair number two isn't quite finished yet, but it IS painted. i just need to rough up the paint a little and screw the seat back on. this was a very fun and rewarding project...even though it took me a few months to complete (when i probably could have gotten them done in one good solid day of free time). guess that tells you a lot about the amount of free time i have lately, huh?!

#5 Paintings:

i call this one, "concentric circles of thöt"



i call this one, "blended shades of new"



#6 Collage journal covers:
pictures to come...

i make a new version of one of these each year for the seniors in my wing at work. i put together a little graduation gift for each of them and the collage journal cover that fits the tiny sized composition books is a Sukey original.

Things I've made...

So, in the spirit of getting my handmade crafts out in the public eye, this post will be a collection of pictures and descriptions of all of the things I make or have made recently.

#1 Art supply tool rolls:
This is the roll that I keep all of my "travel" journaling/art supplies in.

It holds a travel watercolor kit, a pair of scissors, various drawing impliments (drawing pencils, felt tip pens, colored pencils, blending sticks, erasers, sharpener), and a few paint brushes.


This is the roll that I keep all of my paint brushes in.


It has a shorter front set of pockets for my short brushes and a higher back set of pockets for my long brushes.



#2 Tote bags:
This tote bag I made for myself. I also made one for my mom that has a light blue lining.



#3 Aprons:
This is an apron I made for my friend Caitlin.


I made one for my mom out of the same fabric as the first art tool roll, but I can't find the picture right now...

So, that's only just a start. It's getting late and I need to get some shut-eye. I'll post more later... I've still got my two re-claimed chairs (finally finished) to post pictures of, and a few paintings I've done.

Ciao!

food creations

sometimes, i indulge in the creative process through collaging, sometimes through painting, through clay, or rearranging my apartment. sometimes, my creativity comes out through the food i make.

this evening, while visiting my mom in Connecticut, i made the yummiest pizza i've made yet. it was a pre-mixed herbed pizza dough from Trader Joe's (baked a bit first, then drizzled with olive oil before adding ingredients), chicken apple sausage, sundried tomatoes, spinach, mixed gourmet mushrooms, fresh garlic, fresh mozzarella, and a light sprinkling of parmesan and romano cheeses (just to give it a kick). made the crust thin and baked it till it was golden on the bottom and the cheese was melty, bubbly, and golden on top.

i should be a pizza chef...that's all i have to say!

a cosmic joke on humankind/a giant universal tennis match

Painting by my brother-in-law Oren Goppert

why is it that, whenever an emotional "snafoo" occurs between two people, being ready to apologize for certain behavior and being able to accept an apology never quite line up? it feels like a big joke that the universe is playing us...like the pain of the ordeal that we originally went through wasn't enough, the universe needs to get that last little jab in once we have come to terms with our own junk and are trying to make peace with the one(s) we hurt. ridiculous i say, just plain ridiculous!

i got to the point where i had grown enough to realize that i needed to apologize, i formulated and executed a sincere and heartfelt apology, and now i have to be ok with simply having said my peace...? no acknowledgment or acceptance from the apologized-to-party? ugh...people are just too confusing; why was i ever interested in psychology?

on the other hand, i keep trying to "let go of" someone from my past, but every time i'm just about to the point where this person stops showing up on my radar, something happens that pulls this person back into focus...an email/a dream/a facebook post.

my friend Sari experienced the same thing recently and this is what she had to say on the matter, "You bounce thoughts out into the universe and eventually it bounces them back to you... It's like a giant universal tennis match."

how ironic that zero points in tennis is called "love."

mood collage

Weird mood song of the moment...

Best of You by the Foo Fighters

i've got another confession to make
i'm your fool
everyone's got their chains to break
holding you
were you born to resist or be abused?
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?

are you gone and on to someone new?
i needed somewhere to hang my head
without your noose
you gave me something that i didn't have
but had no use
i was too weak to give in
too strong to lose
my heart is under arrest again
but i break loose
my head is giving me life or death
but i can' t choose
i swear i'll never give in
i refuse
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
has someone taken your faith?
it's real the pain you feel
you trust, you must confess
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?


has someone taken your faith?
it's real the pain you feel
the life, the love
you'd die to heal
the hope that starts the broken hearts
you trust, you must confess
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?

i've got another confession my friend
i'm no fool
i'm getting tired of starting again
somewhere new
where you born to resist or be abused?
i swear i'll never give in
i refuse
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?

has someone taken your faith?
it's real the pain you feel
you trust, you must confess
is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you?

wireless at "home" is nice/being sick stinks/the road to "normalcy"

it's 1:30 am Indiana time...i just got in for a weekend of family birthday celebrations. we have LOTS of March b-days in our fam...Dad, Mom, big sis, and 3 nephews all with March b-days. now that people are scattered about, we pick a weekend for everyone to come together to celebrate them all. anyhoo, getting in so late is usually a drag bacause i'm a night owl and everyone else goes to bed pretty early. however, dad FINALLY installed a wireless router last time i was home so i can play on my laptop and keep myself entertained until i am ready to go to bed.

this evening i shall back track blog a little...since i've been absent due to sickness.

so i was hella sick for about 5 days before i got to go to the doctor, but god bless antibiotics because, 10 days of amoxicillin and a week of normal sleep later, i'm feeling MUCH better! still not 100% back to "normal"--being gone to a conference for work over a weekend and having to catch up with missed work when you get back will do that to you--but i'm on the road there, which feels GREAT!

other than getting over sickness, i've also been feeling more peppy now that the sun is beginning to shine more frequently. i get to feeling SO moody and gloomy during the winter months that once the sun begins to stick around more in early to mid March...it's almost euphoric. i'm more productive, i have more energy...i'm really beginning to think that i need to move somewhere where the sun has more of a year round presence. location suggestions welcomed.

it's times like this that i dream of going back to Maui. i visited Maui last summer with two of my best girlfriends...it was spectacular! here's a sample of the spectacularness:


nice, huh?!?!

well, it's getting late and i need to get some rest if i'm going to have energy for family time tomorrow.

goodnight moon, goodnight air, goodnight noises everywhere :)