I woke up this morning feeling lower than a snake’s belly in a wagon-wheel rut and then I got up and sat on my couch with my Earl Grey tea marveling at the manic energy of the house finches and sparrows outside my window mobbing the bird feeder. Their lives are precarious — huge amounts of birds of all species don’t survive their first year. Obviously I think a lot about life cycles these days. And my discomfort in this time of loss is huge. And is nothing in comparison to the catastrophe in Turkey and Syria as those losses are incomprehensible and shocking. Yes, my roof leaked and now I have a new roof and a smaller retirement nest egg. And I have a house. With a roof.  

So, back to my bed (where I do my morning meditation). The conclusion I landed on is to accept what is. No resistance. This calms me and helps me not go down the self-pity rabbit hole.

[You might want to skip this next bit as it may sound preachy.] I recently had a conversation with my lovely niece who also seeks healing and wholeness and self-knowledge (we certainly relate to each other, having grown up in desperately dysfunctional families; her mom, my sister, was severely mentally ill). We talked about the wondrous and mysterious process of a caterpillar that is transmogrified into a butterfly and how, once in the cocoon, it somehow morphs from a little wiggly, crawly thing into goo and then into a glorious creation with painted wings. It’s amazing! From squishy glop! As we talked together about the discomfort of transformation, she noted, “Cocoons are narrow.” So brilliant! As my life feels very confining right now. And my goodness I hope I am changing into a splashy creature that can fly and help make my corner of the world a bit more colorful.

[About this painting — I was rooting around my files for Feather River Art Camp, where I will be teaching a Mixed Media class this June, and found the start of a watercolor of a lily that wasn’t so great so I added pastels and worked it into an abstract.]

7″ x 10″ ink, watercolor, ink, pastel on paper = $90