I’m doing something bad right now. I’m drinking a cup of coffee and eating cookies, it’s 1:00PM in the afternoon. There goes all that hard work on the spin bike, here comes a night of possible insomnia. But it tastes so good, so right. Now I have that rush of warmth, a full belly. One hour into my studio time. Dunce Nation and Dead Moles. Experimental Music, screeching, and hollering in the background. Already gone too far on a piece, want to keep working on it to “fix it” but we all know how that goes. Now, 2:46PM. Good painting session so far, see I told you I would feel differently again. The highs and the lows, the ups and the downs. Now the fan is on and The Bells by Lou Reed. The ambient noise is perfect for quiet awakenings, for R.I.P. Mole, and new beginnings. Perfect for reminiscing about yesterday’s daisies and tomorrows brunch. Do I come back to this moment or do I walk up the stairs to the dog house and the dead mole. “Oh no, the poor thing, Billy killed a mole. Don’t touch it. Should I bury it or throw it over the fence for the hawk or an owl? I should throw it over the fence. Poor thing, Billy killed it, it’s dead.” I tell Jack and Fiona. It’s right here, right in front of us. Happening live, I can’t hide reality. Maybe two’s too young to understand death, understand here today, gone tomorrow. I’ve never got the image of my mom’s mom lying in her casket. I imagine her in a light blue dress with a white lace collar, her casket taupe. My mom said I had to stay home because it wasn’t appropriate for little kids to look inside a casket. I’ve never seen anyone in a casket. I’ve only spread ashes. Felt the bits of bones run through my hands, had the wind blow my ancestors’ through my hair, in my mouth, on my teeth. What brought me here? The dead mole? My job as teacher to Jack and Fiona, reminding me of all my knowledge, all that I know. I had a good day in the studio today.
Tag: memory
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I’m doing something really bad right now, something that I normally wouldn’t do. It’s naptime, 1:28PM and I just made myself a hot cup of joe and it’s good. I never drink coffee after 10:00AM because of insomnia, but I’m so tired from last night, not sleeping well after the Room Opening I said “what the hell, I’ll take my chances for a soothing cup of coffee in the afternoon, the quiet afternoon. Now I want to go paint, but I need to write. Painting writing painting writing shit. It’s easier to drink coffee when I’m writing. But if I don’t paint and the babies get up from their nap and I have an uncontrollable urge to be creative and I start getting resentful of the babies, wait, calm down, I’ll bring some stuff up here and painting can be our afternoon activity. It’s settled then. Me and myself need to have these conversations, we need to run through all the different scenarios, it’s not sane. I wish I was normal. OK back to why I need to write. I should start off by telling you that nothing in my last post, “Anxiety” that I wrote yesterday prior to the opening, about things that I was worried about were worth worrying about.. But just because I know this doesn’t mean I won’t worry again.
The GAP show at Room Gallery looks amazing, all four of my solo works were chosen to be hung, I try to keep my ego out of stuff but here it is. I wanted to show those paintings badly. I received much interest and positivity about my work, but no sale so far. The other solo work hung, by Carl and Verad looks great too, and the collaborative pieces and Dis/locations Book Collection look great. It all looks great.Great.Great.Great. But something else happened last night, there was real interest in what we were all doing, in us as a group of artists connected and working together and apart. It brought an energy to the gallery. Inquisitiveness, the book collection brought the visitors inside the show. It allowed them to interact with the art. It was really great and broke the ice. Visitor participation. The next opening in April I’m hoping we can do an interactive art piece with the visitors. I can’t believe I just drank that whole cup of coffee. And I used the word great five times in the past three sentences.
Last night we walked in to the gallery a little after six, there were already a lot of people at the show. Jack ran in looking at all the people, some familiar faces, some not. Fiona was more reserved and I wondered if it had to do with her hearing aids, the gallery has high ceilings and the volume of conversation was high. They both looked at the art, especially the Dis/locations book collection. The picture on the front of one of the books is the babies’ grandpa. He was my mom’s dad, he died when I was very young. He was adopted and worked as a car salesman. That’s all I know about him. I found the picture in the box of old photos from my mom’s house that I’ve been using to paint from for years, but never actually used physically in a piece. The day Alvaro, Carl, and I met up to work on some collabs I brought the picture. Carl said he wanted to use the picture in something. I was stoked, I think it’s such a cool picture too. So here it is on the front cover of our collab Gap book “Yellow” displayed in the gallery. This is the kind of information I wish I was able to tell people in the gallery at the opening. I find myself being vague and generalizing when talking about the works to visitors. I see that now. It’s hard under pressure to remember these interesting, personal details. Grab onto something personal. An intimate detail and tell the story. Next time.
The babies, Lindsay, and I had gone out dinner and cocktails before the gallery opening. The babies didn’t have cocktails! There was a table beside us with a lady named Jean from Chicago and her Daughter and son-in-law. Jack was taken by Jean. He noticed her right away and called her grandma. He looked at her and covered his hands over his face. She did the same and they started playing Peek-A-Boo. Her hands were worn with age, her body shrunken, her hair grey, her smile beautiful, her eyes and spirit like the warmest spring day. Jack threw her his Blue Blue, with his little tiny baby hands, and his wet, plump, baby face, and his sparkling eyes. Jack and Jean made a connection. Despite their age difference and unusual meeting place. Later Jean and her daughter and son-in-law stopped by the gallery. I had told them about the opening, that was where we were headed. I started talking to Jean outside the Gallery, we made a connection, she told me all about how her daughter wanted her to move out here to California, and how she didn’t want to leave Chicago. That it was a great city and I had to go. Then she started telling me about the babies she met at the restaurant, I said those are my babies, and we started laughing. She hadn’t recognized me from the restaurant. Which is understandable, it’s dark in there and I was sitting with my back to her back, turning to talk only a few times. It was great (this word again) to get out into the world and socialize and get to have Jack and Fiona experience it with me.
I hear the babies waking up now. They didn’t sleep long. Maybe they’ll go back to sleep? I’ll have to end my post now anyhow. I want to write my proposal for “The Peace Book” a part of the GAP Dis/Locations book project. If you’re an artists and you’re interested in participating in this project let me know! I will post the full concept soon, but my vision is that the book circulates all around the world, drawing attention and support for parts of the world suffering from endless wars.
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The red light on the hill flashes in the dark, houselights and street lights trickle down into a muted valley, where people are still sleeping at 6:28 am Sunday morning, US, West Coast time. My coffee is super hot and my peanut butter toast on seeded bread tastes delightful. It’s dark in my house too, babies sleeping, husband sleeping, quiet time to think and write. I woke up with so many questions about Syria. “Who lives there now?” “What is it like for the ones who didn’t flee?” “Is there anywhere that normalcy exists?” “How can I find out more?” In my mind as I still lay in bed I imagine myself getting up and googling “Syria Now” videos. But I wondered if that would even work, if I could get some resemblance of truth? The past several months have been transformational for me. I’ve done so much unintended soul- searching. Who I am and what I think has become increasingly more and more important. The way I talk and act around the babies. One of the big shifts was when I decided not to say “PLEASE SHUT UP” to Fiona when she starts her crazy whining! I learned to have more patience and take deep breaths while she’s carrying on. If I have the energy I re-direct, by doing art with her, picking her up, trying to decode the situation. If I’m too tired I just let her get it out, it’s not easy, but I can do that now without feeling totally stressed. I’ve shifted from getting so upset about things happening in the world and just withdrawing completely and getting depressed to moving past that sticking point, doing more research, getting active. I don’t want to raise apathetic kids, I want them to know about the world, to be involved and passionate about peace and democracy and equal rights and justice. These are good things, important things.
I used to tell my mom, “I don’t want kids, what’s the point in having kids, the world is so overpopulated already” She would say something like, “To bring more good people into the world, intelligent people who care about the world” Those were not her exact words, but that’s how I remember it. She became very apathectic and stopped voting early on. I remember when I was a little kid she hated Regan. I think she felt like when he got elected it was the end, the end of hope? I don’t know. I felt the same way recently with the government shut down. It was so disgusting to me, and the way the corporations have all the power. It’s all so fucked. But maybe there’s something bigger here that we can all work towards. Maybe by starting small, with in ourselves, our towns, our states, and if everyone around the world does that. What if we really think “Globally”? So many people already are, the world is changing and that’s what drives people out of the woodwork, the racists, extremists, ignorant scared people. But there are less of them than there are good people of the world. I’ve moved on from my place of depression over the sad and terrible things that are taking place to action. I think I can finally take action, mostly through my art and the raising of my children and the words I speak.
I am excited about GAP, the Global Art Project, we are doing it. People are involved from all over the world and we are planning a “Peace Book” a collaborative art book that travels all around the world, especially in the Middle East. When I read stories in the news now I’m just going to continue to do research and take action. I made some paintings for Syria the other night. It felt really good, it was therapeutic actually.
It’s two weeks until Christmas now, I was told yesterday “You need to make an effort, I want the kids to have a wonderful Christmas”
“They’re only two years old, they don’t understand, and everyday is Christmas for them!” I said.
But, in the spirit of Democracy I will put on a bit of effort for x-mas. I don’t want to be accused of being a communist. But I would feel better if all the clutter from the past I don’t know how long was gotten rid of or put away before more stuff is brought into the house. It’s overwhelming. Piles of things I’ll get to…… books, papers, clothes, things the babies broke, these things need to be dealt with, my closet, my studio. It’s all a big mess. That’s my main aversion towards Christmas, the extra clutter and mess. See it’s not even political, it has nothing to do with my athiestness.
It’s light outside now and the babies will be up soon. Time to go now.
Dirty Laundry Blog by Jennifer Hynes 