Dirty Laundry Blog by Jennifer Hynes

Pomegranates and Babies, crayons and book project, sunday no time to be down, action is fluid

November 15th, 2015
“Wait just one minute babies, I’ll be right back”

I return with my two new books I started working on this week.

We were sucking seeds out of a pomegranate when I had to see what the stain of juice would look like on the pages.

“Do you guys want to color??”

I bring out their box of crayola and notebooks, one owl cover one elephant.

I color and smear stain on pages in my books, the babies eat crayon tips between coloring.

“Not in your mouth, we’re not going to be able to color anymore”

I say this but don’t mean it. I don’t want to stop. I woke up late and haven’t had time to work in my studio or write. I need this. I let Jack and Fiona do what they want for five more minutes so I can play in my books. I figure a little crayon never hurt anyone.

My mom duties soon return. I have six minutes before the pasta’s boiled. Jack, Fiona, and Alan are watching an episode of Masha and the Bear. It’s 5:14pm Sunday evening. The sky is getting dark, I sit in a house of safety, love, and comfort. I always get annoyed when people say “be thankful for what you have” but right now I am just that. I don’t know what else I can do, I don’t know how I should feel. I’ve been trying to not worry lately, especially about things I have no control over. I have no control over terrorists or any terrible things humans do to each other. I feel sad for all the people suffering. I don’t do prayer, but I am thinking of the people, hoping for the best.

I forgot to put the timer on and overcooked the pasta!

It’s 5:31 now and pitch dark outside. Time to feed the family, make bottles, and move into the night.

If I did say a prayer it would be Buddhist

“May all beings have happiness and the cause of happiness.
May they be free of suffering and the cause of suffering.
May they never be disassociated from the supreme happiness which is without suffering.
May they remain in the boundless equanimity, free from both attachment to close ones and rejection of others.
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My new routine, revisited and what’s all this talk about Prayer?

November 14th, 2015
6:30am, I’ve been waking up really early this week. Before 7AM I consider “my time” In the past that’s when I’ve been writing, but this week I decided to work in my books, even if it’s just for twenty minutes. Long ago, I lived in a wherehouse space in West Oakland on Union Street. I worked in Berkeley, then the city. I usually had to be at work by 8:00 or 9:00 AM. I would wake up early every morning, have my coffee and toast, listen to music and paint or sculpt. Then frantically ride my bike to work in Berkeley or to BART when I started working in the city. I always just barely made it on time. It feels good to get into the practice of laying down a few marks in the morning. It leaves me feeling connected to my work, myself. I feel more “present” throughout the day. It feels easier to give 100% to the babies, I’m not being pulled as hard to create because I’ve already had an outlet for the day.


This week there were several deadly attacks around the world, lots of people died. I feel like this is going to be a constant thing that happens regularly. Yesterday a few terrorists hit Paris. On Facebook this morning there is post after post saying “pray for Paris” what does that mean? And what will it do? The terrorists said they did the bombing for Syria, where so many people are dying and continue to die and suffer. I fear that this attack will only cause more dying, possibly at the hands of France and the US. Is this the beginning of WW3? If France or the US do retaliate for this attack there will be more innocent lives lost. I don’t think praying will stop it. It makes me mad. And Sad.
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Recycled journal project, letting go

November 13th, 2015
I’m finally starting to see a merging between my old journal pages, paper, and paint. It has been really challenging for me to get a more “literary” feel in my paintings without being too “literal” When I started this week with the old journal pages I got caught up in the words, the memory. When I started attaching the pieces to my paper and adding paint it didn’t make sense. There was no composition and the paint and mark making didn’t jive with the journal pages. I tore a bunch of pages out of my journal and laid them on my studio floor. I added coffee stains then let paint drip on them, I messed them up, I added something from the now. They started to speak to me in a new way, a fresh way. Today I don’t even feel like reading the old entries anymore. Yesterday in our parents group at early start, I told the group what I had been working on and some of the difficulties. The group therapist said “maybe you’re not ready to let go of them yet” I said “maybe” but inside at that moment I felt and knew I was ready, 100% to let go of that story, to those words and the way they were written, the way they make me feel.To only reference it lightly, to turn it into a new story, a new unconfined energy, something in the present. My history will always be with me, inside me, and come out on the page. But I can practice letting go of the constricting stuff.
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