Gypsy

"I'm a gypsy in spirit only," she confessed. "I travel in gardens and bedrooms, basements and attics, around corners, through doorways and windows, along sidewalks, up stairs, over carpets, down drainpipes, in the sky, with friends, lovers, children and heroes; percieved, remembered, imagined, distorted and clarified." ~ Tom Robbins character "Amanda" from "Another Roadside Attraction"

I've recently realized that even though I currently don't often travel to foreign lands I do go on an adventure with each painting. I love traveling and for many years it was more than just "what" I did, it was a huge part of "who" I was. I now approach my paintings the same way I used to travel. Its so wonderful to journey through colours and lines, shapes and feelings, intuitiveIy feeling my way around. I rarely have a clear destination in mind, although I absolutely must know what my intention is. How wonderful to go on these journeys and find treasures along the way.

Creativity— Their's, Mine and Our's...

Last Monday evening I gave a "creative journaling workshop/ seminar/ caricature" gig at Ric's Grill in Riverbend for Bishop & McKenzie LLP. What a fantastic night! I prepared 11 journals and some collage sheets in advance so that we wouldn't have to spill paint and toxic chemicals at the restaurant. The event began at 4pm with some wine, some snacks and lots of cutting and pasting. I was so impressed with the enthusiasm that everyone had to just jump right in! Once the guests were all on their way with their journals, I took people one at a time to draw their caricatures and then scanned them in. After a delicious dinner, I grouped all the caricatures together into a group picture and printed them off. You could just FEEL the creative energy released in the room.

This was so unlike the energy in the room I entered the next day at the River Cree Resort where there was a "creativity themed" trade show for accountants going on. As I waited to set up my easel in front of the Cognos Booth, the room reminded me of a scene from Ferris Buellar's Day Off—everyone bored out of their minds, waiting for the "teacher" to finish talking so they could go eat lunch. I felt like maybe these people all just needed some scissors and gluesticks!
I did learn one thing from the lecture that I didn't know- have YOU ever scene the arrow in the Fed Ex logo?

Next I (unknowingly) drove through the outskirts of a tornado to my next gig at the Lux for Telus. I can't even begin to tell you about the many "creative" ideas that passed back and forth and through the marketing firm, the event planner and even my wonderful entertainment agent Margie, all having a part and an opinion about this event and what we should draw the caricatures on for Telus. At the end of the day, the attendees were extremely willing and then grateful for their drawings which makes all the other "stuff" worth while. (They didn't even seem to mind being drawn as plants coming out of a pot.)

Tonight I finished a couple caricatures for twin brothers turning the big 60. These gentlemen don't even look like brothers, twins none the less! Mother nature can be pretty amazingly creative herself!

Ideal fluidity


Daniel Bernoulli's principle— "...the only cause of the change in fluid velocity is the difference in balanced pressure on either side of it..."

Wikipedi defines Flow as "the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing, characterized by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity."

So I've chopped apart Bernoulli's principle (taking it completely out of context), mixed it up with the concept of "flow" and I think that I have finally discovered my own new principle of fluidity.
"Having balance on both sides of my life, my "work" life and my "home" life provides a state of constant flow."

You see, before I had children, my life's focus was very simple—it was on traveling and drawing. Back then, living in a constant "state of flow" was easy. We owned nothing except what we absolutely needed. We made every decision and every move based on that focus. That focus was a single beam of light ahead of us. Life just was flow.

Since having kids however, that "flow" has not been so easily achieved. With each child (especially our first), life has had to adjust to a different beat and to a little more "stuff". Suddenly that single beam of white light is not quite so simply followed. Its colours are beautiful but I've struggled with the dispersion as much as I have with all the extra stuff we have accumulated.

What I'm so excited about is that I think that I finally feel fluidity coming back into our lives. This feeling has been achieved by finding and hiring a wonderful assistant into my "home" life side, adding what Thoreau refers to as a "wider margin to my day". She's my "Girl Friday". (Actually, she's my girl "Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and sometimes Saturday" as well). She takes the kids to the playground, she cleans our house, she folds those mounds of laundry, she does anything we have on our Home "To Do" List that we just can't seem to get to.

I'm finally beginning to feel in "Flow" in all areas of my life again, not just in my creative outlets. I even have many moments in my day where I can sit back and enjoy the beauty of the rainbow, of our rainbow.

Who knows, maybe if Bernoulli's principle can be adapted and applied I might actually even be able to fly!