“it’s not healthy to keep eating a whole bunch” I say to Jack. He wants another Klondike cookie sandwich ice cream. They are good. I could eat another one too. It’s hot today. Very Hot! But it’s also National Beer day, I’m drinking a Lagunitas IPA. I had a good day in the studio. Painted like crazy, feel a bit crazy, like manic. Maybe it’s the time of year. The most remarkable things happen on late fall nights. Under a clear sky, stars in view. Inspired by the grey squirrel, jumps from one trunk to another. “Hello squirrel, what are you doing?” I ask. He doesn’t tell me, he keeps going up higher and higher into the trees. I go to my studio, hot from my hike. I stink. I start to paint. I get paint on my good yoga clothes. I am disgusting. I take a shower. Feel better. Paint more. Paint stains on my arm. My hands disgusting. I am disgusting and wonderful. My daughter draws beside me. “Color, color, color color” she says, over and over as she scribbles with a pen. “This is all the water” she says. “with a butt. With a vagina.” A cup of beer and dirty hands. I’m so glad Hugh Hefner is dead. Someone wrote “good bye to the father of Patriarchy” on Facebook. An article said he changed the way we think about sex. When I think of the porn industry and the primping and prepping and sculpting of women. Making us think we need to perform in a certain sexual way, look a certain way, think a certain way, I say Fuck You Hugh Hefner. I thought about how I got mad at a male painter. In his catalogue he talked about his work and how he went to the rain forest for years working on these wonderful paintings and notebooks. He had kids. I wondered how he did it. They stayed home with their mother. I was mad. I said it’s not fair. Then I had kids. I kept working, I kept studio hours. I created. Now I have a book about to be published and an art show coming up at a fine Gallery. I have a vagina and boobs and wrinkles and a crazy old mind. But I keep on working.
Category: Stream of conciousness
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Everything’s All set up. Shelves stocked with cerulean Blue, Anthro blue, green gold, burnt sienna, and more wonderful colors and colors and colors. New colors. Past year been keeping colors basic. Neutrals. Now deep. Deep in it. Officially getting ready for Solo show in the fall. Am excited. Got the supplies. Got the preparatory work started. Almost seven months to dial it in. As well as publish my book of Nap Time writings and paintings. The problem with my book is I want to just keep writing instead of editing and curating. I have to match the photos of my naptime paintings with the corresponding naptime writing that spans two years. Maybe it should be split up year two and year three. That’s a start at least. It feels like a daunting project! I had a wonderful day painting today. I made a supply run this morning, that is a help. I’ve been having vivid, intense dreams and feeling a sense of needing to put self-preservation first. Don’t take any chances, I think. I grab a long stick on the ground as I’m hiking this morning; A trail up high overlooking San Rafael. Its my first time this far up. It’s a spot the homeless camp out on. I walk across someone’s spot. A round circle of grass is flat. The sun is just peering over the eucalyptus trees. There’s a small, tidy bag of garbage. I see a cigarette box. There was a bad fire on the hillside a few years back, during the drought. “It’s the homeless camps” everyone shouted. I would set up camp here. If I were homeless. With some mean dogs to protect me. Billy’s getting old. Her leg isn’t quite healed. She’s feeling her recent injury. Her days. That’s why I Grab this stick. In my dream, I was scared. I ran through tall grass. I ran from a thief. I was scared. This would be a convenient spot for rape, I think. I remember how vulnerable I used to be when I was on the street as a young runaway. I had to line up with guys who would protect me. Even if I had to have sex with them to keep that protection. It was the lesser of two terribles. In my dream I was a teenager again. Sitting in the back of a pickup truck. Trying to figure how to stay alive. I brushed it out of my memory. Buried it down deep like they’re someone else’s stories. I picked up the stick this morning because the alternative, in the event that strange, somewhat in trusty worthy looking man was to come at me. I would have to run through the brambles in the wrong kind of pants, or strike him, hard. The other night I dreamt I was trying to protect myself with a garden tool but I couldn’t swing hard enough. The noise of the fan brings me back into my studio. I only have fifteen minutes left of my break. Tomorrow I am staying the night in the city. I’m going to the MOMA to see the Diebenkorn and Matisse show. It’s going to be the best night ever. I’m going to a Brazilian Steak house. I’m going to eat steak and drink wine.
Dirty Laundry Blog by Jennifer Hynes 