silent sunday - 03/31/13

a thought in white

as many of us contemplate the nature of white in all its guises along with jude hill in her latest diaries series, what-if diaries, it is amazing to me what a seemingly insignificant thing can spark an entire line of thought that grows wild and free in my mind! while engaged in my own fruitless what-iffing, i had been content to enjoy everyone else's journeys in white until my eyes rested upon an old spool of time-tinted white cotton thread making its nest upon a white fragment of cloth... a panorama of thought and image was born!

now to begin bringing a fragment or two of that new world into form...

namaste'

silent sunday - 03/24/13

some place to let the imagination roam...

not all roads...

"when's all said and done,

all roads lead to the same end.

so it's not so much which 

road you take,

as how you take it."

-charles de lint

i have been spending a lot of time lately communing with my cloth and eco-dyes. music and imagination. opening myself to the possibilities of my work. trying to see where it has all be leading me. this past year has seen many new starts. new directions. new experimentations. and i am quite certain that there are many more to come. will always be too many to contemplate. however, in this moment, this is what comes to mind: each path, whether explored in depth or merely given a cursory glance, seems to be leading me in a myriad of directions. not as easy a journey as the old proverb suggesting that "all roads lead to rome." instead, each road leads me to the next. and the next. and the next after that. each contributing a cobblestone, if you will, to help pave the way to what will come: figure; story; eco-dyes; salvage cloth; re-designed cloth; tattered edges; community; fragments of thought and fiber... but where is it all leading?

at the moment, i am taking a step back. creating some spaciousness wherein i may see more clearly. a task which has lead me to pull out my salvage quilt and begin working once again on its seemingly endless array of mindless machine-stitched seams and hand-stitched allowances. there is a story in this cloth. a story of community. cobbled together from the cast-off garments this town's residents. some known to me. some not. and like all communities, there are layers forming. first, and simplest, are the machined seams holding the fragments of garments together. forming a foundation. second, the hand-stitching to hold the seam allowances down, yes. but also to begin to add texture and a foreshadowing of color and line and direction. once these have been brought to a level where the cloth will reside in strips (or rows) we will begin to see a coming together of community. then will begin the next layer. the continuing of story. figures. thoughts. fragments. stitched in layers upon this foundation. and the next.

it will be a long journey. no community manifests overnight. but it will be an interesting one. full of revelations. of heartbreak. and celebration. a laying down, step by step, fragment by fragment, of the story of this community of residents. human and otherwise. which will create a human wrapping cloth...a haven of fragments of time and memory to warm the body. to hearten the mind...that will allow me to take my town with me when i leave in a couple years. a gift to myself...and to what will eventually become my memory of this place.  amongst its whispers, this cloth has been asked to be re-named: relic, a gathering of lives.

relic is keeping me quite busy tonight...

namaste'

getting somewhere

the first step toward getting somewhere

is to decide that you are not going

to stay where you are...

spring has made several false starts these past weeks. the icy grip of winter always seems to tighten its grasp and chase the warm winds away just as we begin to enjoy their touch. perhaps a little bunny energy will help spring along...

sometimes all it takes is the gumption to make another start. whether it be fresh and brand new or picking up something from before and starting again, it will always propel you in a new direction!

namaste'

stitching of another kind

sometimes i just need to release my mind into other forms of creativity to get back to where i belong...

namaste'

silent sunday - 03/09/13

faulty gears

"happiness does

not depend on

what you have

or

who you are

it solely relies on

what you think"

-buddha

ever drive a stick with a slipping gear? you step on the gas and start out roaring down the road, then shift into that faulty gear and the power slips. the car stalls. the engine revs, trying to find the intended gear. you begin to wonder if you are going to end up on the side of the road waiting for a tow that may takes hours on end to arrive. i've been feeling like this a lot lately.

i will be buzzing along. needles chanting. cloth becoming art. then all of a sudden, something slips and i am left on the wayside. cloth languishing. needles silent. i can see the vision of where i was going slowly fading in the distance. left wondering what happened. how did i end up standing here forgetting where i was headed?

as you may have noticed, these past few weeks have been filled with these moments. hence the noted absence of regular posts. i wish i could sit back. eyes closed. serene smile upon my lips. and dive into an exit strategy. share this gem of wisdom on how to emerge victorious from such blindsided derailments. but i haven't found that gem yet.

in the meantime, i hope you will bear with the random silences. perhaps even empathise. and know that i will find that treasure one day and share it with you. but until that time, i will keep slipping back into lower gears and trudging along at whatever creative speed the vehicle of my imagination will allow...

namaste'