Cross Training in Creativity

I have tried keeping different types of more visual journals before.  Once in the mid-90's, I tried collecting images from magazines and gluing them into a sketchbook.  They were not exactly revelatory--I realized that I wanted a slimmer body, different furnishings, different destinations--but I already knew that.

I've tried keeping a journal of sketches several times through the decades, but it's usually lasted a day or two or three.

What is different this time?  Why have I come back from the Create in Me retreat with not just one, but 2, new journaling disciplines that I'm still keeping 5 weeks later.

I'm still keeping a dream journal.  I'm sketching with colored markers several times a week.  I've also been keeping up with an offline journal that I started during my retreat week.

Part of it is the colored markers that I bought.  A large part, in fact.  I hope that habit will carry me forward once the novelty of the markers wears off.  I think it will.

I worry about my limited time, that time spent sketching means time I'm not writing poems.  But I also know that creativity in one area feeds creativity in other areas--a sort of cross training, if you will.

Yesterday I noticed that I had bought 2 markers that were the same color--I spent several hours feeling bad, since I could have had a different color.  I finally called the store, who said, "Sure.  You can exchange it for a different color."

Last night, I returned to a sketch I started earlier.  I had written some responses to the refrain of the song, which I thought was rather simplistic.  The Spirit often says go, and people refuse to hear.  But I didn't like the rebuttals, so I drew over them.  Then I kept filling in white spaces, and ended up with this:

I still wonder if it's too busy, too frenetic.  But for now, I'm just sketching and trying not to judge.  I worry that I'm repeating the same, basic sets of shapes.  But it's soothing, so I'm not going to second guess myself now.

And at some point in the next day or two, I plan to write both a fiction piece and then rework it into a poem:  I plan to write about the angel Gabriel who is having an identity crisis.  Has he been in the wrong career field?  Is he really a devil trapped in an angel's body, or does he just want different work?  I'll write it up as fiction for our Purgatory project, and then I'll see about the poem possibilities.

 

Is writing in the voice of an angel really so different from writing in the voice of God?  In the voice of an HR director?  Those are voices I've tried on during the course of our Purgatory project.

 

Stay tuned!

Monday Evening with New Markers

Yesterday, instead of taking a lunch break, I went to the art supply store.  I wanted to buy 12 more markers--I have nothing in the red/yellow/orange range.

I may be done buying markers for awhile.  I wanted to buy 12, since they are steeply discounted at that rate--I had trouble finding/choosing the last 2 markers.  I now have a good variety of colors.  My first group of markers that I bought had all dark colors--hard to write words on top of dark colors, and that's been appealing to me.

Last night, we ate our supper on the front porch.  I feel like these days of spectacular weather are numbered and that we should take advantage of them.

My spouse wanted to practice his violin--he's got a lot of songs to practice for Sunday.  I read more of My Life in Middlemarch, and then I wanted to play with my markers.  Here's the final image:

I began by making big swooshes with the new colors.  Then I filled in the swooshes and made a variety of other shapes.  I used all of the Copic markers that I have.

The words are from 2 of the songs that my spouse played.  I love the idea of being a blessed and pilgrim people, although it requires a skill of living with uncertainty that I don't yet have.

I kept filling in the white spaces as darkness fell.  I also had about 10 minutes of sketching with the porch light on at the end--but the porch light makes it much too buggy.

In the end, I'm torn--part of me thinks that the sketch is too busy, and part of me likes the frantic energy.

For more on the sketch that I did on Sunday while our pastor preached his sermon, see this post on my theology blog.

I am interested in the ways that this type of journaling is both similar and different from journaling I've done before and journaling that I do regularly.  It is more symbolic.  When I journal with words, I'm looking to explain, to explore, to tease out meaning.  I may be doing the same with sketching, but it feels more like writing poetry than journaling.

But it's also similar.  It's a way of marking the days. 

It's too early to know if I will go back and remember things I wouldn't ordinarily remember, but I think that visual journaling will have that effect the same way that journaling with words does.

One thing that I do know is that I am enjoying this immensely.  It's similar to painting, but with less mess, less clean up--and thus, I'm more likely to do it, even if I don't have a big expanse of time.

What will I create with these 24 markers?  Stay tuned!

Trans-Angels, Trans-Demons, and Other Notes from a Week-end

Over all, it's been a great week-end, from the Mother-Daughter banquet on Friday night (see this post) to my quilt group gathering on Saturday to a good morning at church yesterday and an afternoon spent finishing up our semesters at the community college--yes, a good week-end.

Let me capture a few details here:

--In our ongoing Purgatory project (see this blog post for background), we had an interesting interchange about trans-angels and trans-demons.  We are having great fun imagining what HR in Purgatory would be.  One friend wrote

"What, no sensitivity training.  Mustn't we be sure to treat equally: angels, demons, trans-angels, trans-demons, and those who have yet to be designated?"

I responded: 

"I am now thinking about angels trapped in the bodies of demons and vice versa.

 

And yes, I realize that some traditions hold that they don't have bodies like we understand bodies."

 

--Yesterday I had a wonderful time sketching during the second church service I attended.  I had Ascension and the Feast Day of Julian of Norwich on the brain (see this post for background); our pastor talked about how God will not leave us stuck, and this sketch emerged:

 

 

 

I am having so much fun with these markers that I might go buy more today.  I love the idea of sneaking away to buy art supplies--or should I say, buying art supplies instead of taking a lunch break.  I will soon need a new sketch book too.

 

--We had time on the porch--we are still having a stretch of lovely days and Saturday evening was so chilly-ish, I had to put on a flannel p.j. top to enjoy the porch.  My spouse tried to pick out a song from Paul Simon's So Beautiful or So What, and yesterday, we played the CD.  I like a week-end that includes music.  As we counted money after church yesterday, the ukulele group composed of friends rehearsed.  It was great.

 

--I sped-read through the last of Jonathan Franzen's Purity, which was interesting at first, and tiresome in the last 100 pages.  Now it is on to our May choice of classic works we're visiting/revisiting:  Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility!

 

And now I must be sensible and get ready for spin class and then work.

My Mom, the Musician

Here's my current favorite picture of me and my mom--with the added bonus of my sister:

Having blogged now for many years, I've written before about the ways my parents shaped me.  I realize that I'm lucky for all the ways they supported me in my youth.

Today I want to write about my mom as an artist, about what I've learned about being an artist from her.  My mom's chosen art form is music:  she sings, and she plays piano and organ.  She's one of those musicians who can transpose music from key to key without thinking about it.  She can improvise in intriguing ways.  She can play by herself or fit in easily with many a musical team.

I've watched her play for many a worship service, and she's the type of team player who keeps an eye on the action and supports and furthers the objectives.  For example, I remember the time I was an acolyte having trouble lighting the Advent wreath that hung high above my head.  The congregation sang the hymn they were supposed to sing, and I still hadn't lit the last candle.  My mom played an improvisational bit and filled in what would have been uncomfortable silence if she had stayed to a strict script.

The most important lesson that my mom taught me as she has lived her life is that you can make your art form a daily part of life, not matter how busy you might be.  True, it will be easier for some of us than others.  She has had a piano most of her life--but she has always reminded us that the voice is the first instrument, the instrument that we carry with us all the time.

If she mourned the years that she spent far away from the nation's cultural centers, we never heard her say it.  We spent a chunk of years in Montgomery, Alabama, and she filled her life with music by way of the church and community groups.  She has since played a Reformation service in the National Cathedral and organized all sorts of impressive concert series--if she had stopped being involved in music in the earlier years, she wouldn't have been ready for those opportunities.

She's also taught me the importance of giving back to our communities.  Her work for the church has been both paid and volunteer.  Lately she has developed a music series for an Alzheimer's unit in a retirement community--in ways, it seems selfless, free of acclaim.  And yet, they are an appreciative group in ways that other groups aren't--another important lesson.

We teach each other lessons in so many ways--but one of the most powerful ways we teach each other is in the way we live our lives.  I feel lucky to have been able to witness my mother who has lived a life in accordance to her values.  I hope I'm doing the same for others.

Course Shells, Creativity, and Social Media Coordination

Yesterday at our new student orientation, part of me was amazed to hear myself waxing eloquent about the benefits of having a Learning Management System for each class.  Our LMS, eCompanion, is quite clunky, but I'm still happy to have it.

I didn't actually use it until the fall 2015 quarter when I returned to teaching onground and had to set up my course shell.  I found myself saying, "This is sort of like blogging."

I see a blog as a compendium--there's new writing, old writing, links to resources that might be important, links to other blogs that have value.  Likewise, an LMS shell.  Happily, a blog doesn't have a gradebook that must be maintained.

The LMS shell was similar to the blog in a different way--I was never sure if anyone was utilizing it in the way I envisioned.  I posted so many good resources and links--did my students ever look at them?  I never knew.

This week, I accepted a new volunteer position that might be similar--or it might be like a full-time job I might want in the future.  I am now a Social Media team captain for the Create in Me retreat planning team.

What does this mean exactly?  That's the beautiful thing--it's new, so I can help create it as I'm living it.

We need someone to do basics, like make posts on Facebook.  Ideally, we might want posts on Instagram and Pinterest.  I already understand how Pinterest works, although I have never created a pin (is that even the lingo?).  I don't even let myself stay on Pinterest sites for very long--I understand how several hours could get sucked away instantly.  We already have a Create in Me Pinterest site, so the next step will be to make a pin or pin a thing there.

We are also going to have Facebook/Pinterest Planning Parties, and I'll help organize those.  These will be times of more intense posting, in the hopes of inspiring the group, in hopes of more posting.  These parties will help with retreat planning, at least in an ideal world.

The goal of the team is to do anything that keeps people engaged with the retreat community - & excited about creating.  That's a job description I like!

I will report back here periodically.  Just like my retreat planning and workshop reporting has been important in later years when I want to know what I did, I anticipate that periodic reports on this new volunteer position might be essential later.

So, I've made some Facebook posts so far, and I just posted a link to our Pinterest page on my own Facebook page and on the FB closed group Create in Me.  Our FB closed group page postings so far consists mostly of images of our various sketchings as we experiment with visual journaling.

This morning, my quilt group comes over.  I'll set out my camera to try to capture images of fabric and needlework to post later.

And speaking of that, I suppose I should sign off now to do the final preparations for a fun day of creating ahead!

"The Wasteland"--then and now

My friend and I have been reading classics since the beginning of the year.  In April, we had planned to read "The Wasteland."  I got a bit behind, but in a way, I'm glad--it gave my friend time to find the Alec Guinness reading of it.

Yesterday at work, I went upstairs for a coffee break with that friend and our fellow English major colleague and friend.  We talked about the works in the past that meant a lot to us--I never had a Kafka phase, but the other two did.  We talked about Eliot, whom I am liking better now that I am older than I did in grad school. 

Afterwards, I was ready to make my way through "The Wasteland."  I cued up the Alec Guinness, and I decided to follow along.  I opened up my ancient Norton anthology, and there, in ghostly handwriting, were notes from when my friend took the Brit Lit survey and borrowed my book, long ago, in the Charleston area where we shared a house so that she could go to school more cheaply and make her VA benefits for schooling stretch.  She wrote in pencil, so that I could erase her notes later if I wanted.

 

She's the friend who died last year of terrible esophageal cancer.

 

I stopped the Alec Guinness recording and then closed the door so that I could cry a bit—how can she be dead?  And then I got a sheet of paper, once I pulled myself together.

 

I left the door shut, and I wrote, following along with the Norton and Alec Guinness.  Some of the lines from Eliot went directly into the poem.  Others I changed.  Others welled up from hearing the poem.

 

I thought of Eliot, writing his poem in the aftermath of World War I.  I have a memory of Gilbert and Gubar's theory that the loss of his friend in World War I prompted the poem, much the way the loss of Tennyson's friend prompted "In Memoriam."  And here I was, writing about/through the same kind of loss.

 

How strange--I started my work day by realizing that I hadn't written my Thursday poem, the way I try to do each week.  And then, Thursday afternoon, I had a poem erupting from me.  It was a very rough draft.

 

At the end of the writing, which came at the end of a crying jag, I felt oddly cleansed--and also  transcendent.  What an experience—reading/hearing Eliot, feeling that mid-life grief, thinking about how my grad school self knew nothing of grief although she thought she did, knowing that my midlife self also doesn’t know about grief the way that I will.

I left a copy of the pages on my friend's desk.  Here's what she wrote back, "You MUST write a Wasteland; the millennium has turned and we need an epic of these times!"

I tend to think of myself as not writing long poems--perhaps it's time to try!

Celebrate Cinco de Mayo Creatively

Today is Cinco de Mayo.  How many of us know how this holiday came to be?  The Writer's Almanac web site tells us, "It commemorates the Mexican victory over the French in the Battle of Puebla in 1862. In a David-and-Goliath confrontation, the 8,000-strong, well-armed French army was routed by 4,000 ill-equipped Mexican soldiers, and though it wasn’t a decisive battle in the course of the war, it became a symbol of Mexican pride. It’s also become a celebration of Mexican heritage and culture in the United States."

For many of us, it's just another excuse to drink, like Saint Patrick's Day.  But what if we looked at this holiday with new eyes?  What if we vowed to be creative today?

Here are some ideas:

--Make Mexican Wedding Cookies.  You can find a recipe here, although I would use pecans instead of almonds.  I realize that these cookies are not traditional Cinco de Mayo fare, but I had them at a Cinco de Mayo wedding, so the two are linked for me (for more on the wedding, see this blog post on my theology blog).

--Create a sketch or painting that has the number 5 at the center of the page/canvas.  Or hide the number 5.  Or use only 5 colors or 5 shades of the same color.

--Write a story in which the character wins a prize against incredible odds.

--Choose five fabrics and create a scarf or other adornment.

--Make wind chimes with 5 strings hung on a stick.  As you make the wind chime from items strung on yarn or string, just remember that they need to hit each other to make sound.  The first time I made a wind chime, I forgot, so mine isn't as melodious.  Wind chimes are a great way to get rid of old hardware and keys that no longer open locks that you own.

--Think about the ways that Mexican heritage has impacted you.  Create a meal to celebrate.

--Send money to support migrant workers, many of whom come from Mexico to pick our fruits and vegetables. I'm impressed with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, which works to protect the migrant workers in the fields of Florida, but you certainly have plenty to choose from.

Of course, I realize that most of us will celebrate Cinco de Mayo by going to work.  I understand the appeal of Cinco de Mayo happy hour.  But even our more mundane activities can become meaningful, if we think about the ways that determined bands of like-minded individuals can change the world.