I walk up the damp, green moss, quiet, trail. Morning, dog by my side. I look at her and am glad today is walk day. My mind is calm at this moment. I see a black widow crawl away, I call her Ruby: mysterious, elegant legs, a large, sturdy frame, and a serious face. She makes her escape, down a hand spun creation, not present one second ago. I am in awe. My heart beats a little quicker as I head up the path, walking by menacing, bare poison oak vines that have been transformed into a palette of thick and thin lines, damp air between, sun shining through the cold, foggy, misty, November dawn. I feel like I am walking through another world, in my peripheral vision I see a meticulous web, so perfect I question ever making another thing when something already exists that surpasses all beauty and innovation that the world has ever or will ever display anywhere ever again. The otherworldness, the quiet places it takes my mind. I see one after another, just as special, just as intimidating. The quiet ground, damp with decay and new life. The Bay trees with their bright green trunks. Just me and Billy the whole walk. Like the perfect paint splatters on my studio wall. Or the painting Jack made last night that I want to frame and save forever. (Which really is not that long) Deep breath. I’ve been practicing my deep breaths. It’s been essential to keep myself from crossing my psychological health boundary; the one that keeps me here and not living with the spiders. From not imaging the creepy little walk they do down my neck, or having them enter my mind as I’m sound asleep, unable to defend myself. I take deep breaths.
Category: art
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Liberation
Coffee; 12:21 Friday afternoon. Cold November night made way for a sunny day. First day able to be in my studio in a while. I stand an empty apple juice container up; Mold has formed along one side. Dark green with bits of brown. I am protected from the cap. I forgot to put a cap on my black acrylic paint the last day the babies took a nap, when I came in my studio to work and saw on my “Never Trump” sign, “Never Give Up” imbedded in my message of Protest. I made it through yesterday: Parents meeting, (I was so grumpy I thought about not going, but it helped me so much). I told the facilitator, “I need to go back to therapy”. I took Jack and Fiona to the park. I let Jack eat Yogurt with his excavator, after he played with it in the sand box. I let Fiona smear yogurt on the ground then draw with her finger like I’ve been teaching her with various substances. I’ve been a great mom. I met a man this morning on the trail walking our dogs, I didn’t even wonder if he voted for Trump. I’ve concluded that it doesn’t matter anymore. With the men that Donald Trump has hired this week for Government jobs, it is crystal clear that this government philosophy, the power and masterminds behind it, has been in the making for years, forever, for as long as America has been America. There has been a strong movement towards peace, civil rights, and the environment, but that side hasn’t won yet. After every traumatic, life altering event I am forever changed. My innocence and optimism concerning the world we live in and the human race changes. The idea of life itself. Sitting in the back yard yesterday with Jack and Fiona, we noticed a green bag that used to house the jumpy house hanging on the fence full. “Is the Jumpy house in there?” asks Jack. “No, remember, the Jumpy house got a hole in it”. I take the bag down and open it revealing forgotten toys. Jack grabs the Fire Truck and the plastic bat. Fiona didn’t run to the toys, she sits and watches me explain things. She asks me questions and repeats what I say. I see a tick on Billys face. Fiona looks close as I explain, “Ticks burrow into the skin and suck blood. They get huge and fall off. They have diseases, I need to get Billy some medicine”. Fiona follows me to the closet, up the step ladder behind me. Telling me about the tick, about putting medicine on Billy. Jack asks me about the bat. He’s noticing the line from the mold. “It’s made in a factory, that’s the mold line” I tell Jack. I wonder if I should show him a picture of children working in a factory in China making plastic baseball bats. A plastic baseball bat that sits in the back yard un-used for most of the time. That will never disintegrate, that bat will be on this Earth for the rest of time. I walk back into the house and pass the children’s easel with a pad and scribbles and crayons, I feel myself coming back. Emerging into my space on Earth. My reality. Glug, Glug, Glug. I just poured myself a glass of red wine. It’s 12:48pm. I have a potential of three hours to work in my studio, if Jack and Fiona take their nap today. I miss sharing my naptime paintings on Facebook, but I am so relieved to be out of that atmosphere. I miss so many people on there too, seeing their up-dates, paintings, but I don’t miss the constant negativity, and look, it did us no good! We influence very few by posting the negative stuff Trump and his cronies do. I am going back to the drawing board. Back to before IPhones and Facebook. I have changed.
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Cold November hands. Dancing in the grocery store. Jack and I bob our heads to Earth wind and fire. People looked annoyed. I’m just acting out, I’m in the fuck it stage of grief. Going into the numb stage. With a pint of fear under my belt. I must keep it together for my kids, to an extent. I’ve been hanging out more at parks and talking to people in person where ever I am, I’ve found a lot of solace finding out everyone’s not an asshole. I still judge them and wonder about them. I wonder if they voted for Trump or if they didn’t vote at all. I wore my Hilary button for a few days, I couldn’t believe how many people came up and talked to me, shared stories of being disappointed and worried about our Government. I wanted people to know I don’t support Trump. Today I realized it doesn’t matter anymore because we’re all in this together. Whatever shit is about to happen; we’ll have to deal with it as a country. Or we are doomed. (and maybe we already are) But I am still alive. I have work to do. I can’t prevent everyone’s suffering. I missed the studio today, I kept jack and Fiona up all day. I woke up at 4:30am and knew I wouldn’t last long tonight. I wanted to make sure they are as tired as me, with the early dark skies it’s a treat to crawl into bed early. Tonight, it’s going to be cold. A cold November night. This weekend I will be meeting with people, I am doing a talk at the Fourth Wall Gallery in Oakland about my Book project. Tomorrow night I am going to a neighborhood meeting I helped start. Fifteen people are attending; I can’t believe it. It all started because I posted “Does anyone know of an anti-Trump rally this weekend”. I was flagged. I was told to “Grow up” and “get over it, I’m just mad because we lost”. Then a ton of people came to my rescue. They said I did nothing wrong. Then this lady asked if we all wanted to start a discussion group to start healing together as a neighborhood. And possibly turn it into some action, helping in our community somehow. The very next day, after the connections were met I deleted my Facebook account and my Nextdoor account. Now I’m on Twitter and Instagram. I feel the need to share my writing and my paintings. But I don’t want to get into the mousetrap of politics on the Internet. (Unless it’s a real news article). But I don’t want to trade comments or constantly be bombarded with all the atrocities in the world. It’s too damn depressing. I’d rather read about it and talk to someone in person. Preferably over a bottle of wine!
Dirty Laundry Blog by Jennifer Hynes 