To my colleagues who taught me what it means to create exceptional work, encouraged me to do what I love, and inspired me to do my very best. I’ll see you in the next port. And remember: Make the pie higher!
Today my new life begins. A life without the day job, a job that’s been my home, my sense-of-self, and my security since the beginning of the 21st Century.
The magazine industry is in precarious waters right now, and running heavy ships without good maps. Corporate bean counters are reducing crews, and I was among the group that was most recently set adrift.
But not truly adrift. I’ve spent 15 years working for an exceptional magazine—we won a James Beard award a few years ago, and just last year, an ASME (which is like an Academy Award for the magazine world). During that time, I’ve learned skills enough to float my own boat. And I’ve got a network of others to help me as I chart my own course.
Yes, I’m very sad. I’ll miss the daily schedule. I’ll miss being part of something bigger than myself. I’ll miss the borrowed prestige of working for a large, venerable magazine. I’ll miss the incredible view from the window by my desk. I’ll miss the steady paycheck. And most of all, I’ll miss the people I worked with. After so many years we had become friends.
Things change, and I hate change. But I’m a little excited (and terrified) about this change. I’m not sure where I’ll go from here, but for now, my morning commute is short and beautiful and I’ll have more time to paint. I think this blog will change (or at least become more frequent). I’ve got some ideas. We’ll see where I end up.
I’ve sailed through waters rougher than these.
“Listen, Miss, boats are supposed to float. Even if they break up, they usually still float and show up on a shore somewhere. There have been no reports of wreckage or abandoned boats. At this point, no news is still good news. Don’t worry. It’s too early to worry.” ― Cathy Ostlere, Lost
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I haven’t been blogging, painting, or much of anything else the last few weeks because we’re trying to buy a house. I can’t even write many words about this process. All I can do is draw, heart in (exceedingly) dry mouth, what it feels like. (You can click on the drawing to make it bigger.)
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“Sometimes you just have to jump out the window and grow wings on the way down.” –Ray Bradbury
In less than a month, I’ll be selling my paintings and prints at Silicon Valley Open Studios. I’ve been preparing. I’ve been painting. I’ve been printing. I think I have a nice body of work to show. Everybody in my life, from the fiddler to my day-job boss and colleagues, has been excited and supportive.
And yet…
The first day of Open Studios, May 3, is my own personal “Follow your Fear Day.”
There are days when I’m nearly paralyzed by fear of the Open Studios experience. Fear of selling my work, fear of meeting the public, fear of competing with other artists.
There’s nothing new about these fears nor are they my fears alone. The Skinny Artist has a post that does a good job describing the 5 fears that can destroy an artist, and I have to admit, I suffer from all of them.
What, exactly am I afraid of? Well, it’s sort of a nebulous, nameless fear that involves people sneering at me, total failure, and a recurring nightmare of showing up at prom in curlers and pajamas. So let me break these things down and try to dispel them, if not for you, than at least for me.
Failure is a state of mind
Michael Jordan famously said, “I accept failure…I can’t accept not trying.” But my wonderful fiddler puts it another way:
“There are no failures, only experiments for gathering data in order to learn.”
I can do that. I like science, and although I’m not a scientist, I appreciate the scientific method. So I’m trying to be a dispassionate observer as I work towards May 3. I tell myself, I’m simply gathering data. I’m taking notes on the whole process of setting up a tent, sitting with my work displayed, and meeting people. Watching people’s reactions, learning from other artists, practicing my talking skills. Since, like many artists, I’m shy, meeting and greeting people is the hardest thing for me to do. What will people think?
Who cares what other people think?
Let’s be real here. I do. You do. We all care what our fellow humans think about us; it’s part of the pack mentality. We want to be accepted into the tribe because that’s where our safety rests. And if we don’t belong to the troupe we see coming over the hill,, well, that group of folks may be hostile.
Except I know that most people aren’t hostile. Most people wish others well. And I’m not sure I should care about the ones who don’t wish me well.
Art is a personal choice, and people may not like what I do. That’s fine. That’s got to be fine, because I only can paint like Margaret Sloan (me!) paints. And wherever I am in my particular artistic journey, that’s where I am.
“And then I discovered I was at the dance wearing my pajamas!”
Yes, I’m afraid of forgetting something, of being caught out, of looking stupid. A friend once said to me, “Don’t be afraid of the future. Be prepared for it.” And so I’m spending all my free time getting ready for Open Studios. And when I have those embarrassing dreams, well they’re my dreams; I’m dream-hiring the band Pink Martini to play “Tempo Perdido” while I shake it like there’s no tomorrow. Because damn it, I look pretty good in my pajamas.
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Caveat: I did not paint the above portrait. It was painted by a friend, Kevin McEvoy.
Last week one of my favorite painter/bloggers, Kevin McEvoy, came to town.
I’ve been following his blog for a while, enchanted by his writing about his deep spiritual commitment to painting, his family, and to life. Plus, he plays Irish fiddle.
So when he blogged that he was coming to California, I was eager to meet the person who was at the other end of the keyboard.
Yes, I know, contacting someone off blog and meeting them in person can be a scary thing. But so far the few other bloggers I’ve met have been wonderful. And Kevin’s words and his paintings had an authentic ring to them; after reading this post and seeing this painting, I couldn’t believe he’d be a bad guy.
And he wasn’t! He and his wife and their friends were delightful. It was such a pleasure to meet them, see his paintings in person (they’re wonderful) and have some tunes with Kevin. And then, best of all, he asked the fiddler to pose for a demonstration painting. And he gave us the painting!
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With great sadness I read that of one of my favorite bloggers, Gretel Parker at Middle of Nowhere, has suffered the terrible loss of her long-time partner. I’ve read her blog for years, and have admired her for her strength, talent, and courage. I have gotten to know her lovely needle felting, her charming illustrations, and the bits of her story she shared with the world. My heart is breaking for her loss.
The blogosphere is a strange place. You write about yourself as if you were on a secret desert island and then float your carefully chosen words like messages in a bottle bobbing on the interweb sea. And you find messages from other castaways who have sent out their own words corked in the smokey glass of a blog post.
In this way we build shipping lanes of friendships and acquaintances from messages floating on the digital tide. And we make connections whether or not we know we are making those connections. Gretel’s blog had a way of doing that.
To help Gretel, who is not only suffering from the grief of losing half her heart, but will also be going through some real financial upheavals, two bloggers, Suzanne Houghton and Tara Change, have started a fund raising effort on her behalf called the Gretel Parker Project. If you have enjoyed her blog, I hope that you will be able to help her out.
And my friends, hug your loved ones. Tell them that you love them and hold them close.
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Finding time for reflection on the past year is difficult, smack dab in the middle of several projects I’d like to finish before the week is out. But after reading Rose Welty’s lovely New Year’s post, I thought I’d take a stab at casting a backwards glance over 2011, and peering forward into 2012.
Here’s what I accomplished in the last year:
Entered and won an art competition
Had my first solo gallery show
Painted. A lot
I admit, I’m not good at marking time over the long haul. The concept of time, longer than a few hours, gets away from me. The past, even just a few weeks ago, seems like it happened in another lifetime. As for the future? I never quite believe that next year (heck, tomorrow) will actually show up, hat in hand, at my doorstep and demand to be let into the house. I realize this grasshoppery attitude probably bodes ill for my little-old-lady future, so occasionally I do try to plan.
My goals for next year:
Make an artist website
Blog more often
Make it possible for people to buy my art
Enter a few art competitions
Apply for a residency.
But my main goal? Paint. A lot. Which may supersede all the other goals. Because painting is what makes the long year worth the heavy slog.
The first time I played a recording of Anthony Russell singing a Yiddish song, it was as if thunder rolled through the house. His rich bass voice wraps itself around a song and makes it rattle the windows. I’m very pleased to be involved in the Hungry for Yiddish: a Mitzvah Project with him, and I’m looking forward to hearing him sing in person.
1. How do you know Heather? How did you get involved in this project?
I actually met Heather earlier this year at her “Yiddishe Meydlekh” concert for YIVO in New York. We both attended KlezKanada in Quebec this past summer, and by chance, my partner got a job in the SF Bay Area, where I’m originally from and where Heather lives. So, as soon as I got back from Canada and somewhat settled in California, I met with Heather to figure out what the Bay Area had to offer a Yiddish singer. She said, “Well, I have this program I did last year called ‘Hungry for Yiddish‘,” and the rest, soon, will be history…
2. Tell me a little bit about the songs you’ll be singing at the Hungry for Yiddish event. What are they about?
Yiddish songs are always so complicated, which is why I love them! So I’ll make an attempt. In “Akhris Hayomim“, a young boy describes to his grandfather the wonders of the world to come; in “Der Gemore Nign“, a student in kheder (a traditional elementary school teaching the basics of Judaism and Hebrew) misses his family; in “Lekoved dem Heylikn Shabbes“, a Chasid literally asks his rebbe, “Where’s the beef?”, and in “O Ir Kleyne Likhtelekh“, the lights of a menorah stir memories of the Jewish past and questions about the future.
3. Sometimes language can really influence a piece of music. How do you feel Yiddish shapes a song or a tune?
Having sung in English, Spanish, Italian, French, German, Hungarian, Japanese and Hebrew over the past fifteen years or so, I have found Yiddish to be an unparalleled language for expression. It strikes me as a language that lands softly on the ears (thanks to its vowels and certain “closed” consonants), yet is well-accented with consonant combinations full of descriptive character. Songs in a Yiddish are much the same, possessing a plaintive quality accented with wit, pain, humor and character.
3. You say on your Facebook page that not only were you able to understand a Yiddish speaker, but he could understand you. Impressive! How long have you been studying Yiddish? What kind of personal meaning does Yiddish have for you?
I’ve only been singing in Yiddish for a little less than a year, and my study of the language has been solely for the purpose of improving my understanding and interpretation of my repertoire. For the past few months I’ve been hobbling along by myself through Sheva Zucker’s Yiddish textbook for beginners, but I can tell you upfront I’m a much, much better listener in Yiddish than a speaker.
What I told the Yiddish speaker was my own original well-rehearsed joke about my lack of ability: “Ikh keyn nit redn gantz gut Yiddish; aber, ikh red a besser Yiddish vi alle mentshn in der khumesh,” or “I don’t speak Yiddish very well, but I speak it better than anyone in the Bible.” He laughed for a good long time, and what’s language if you can’t do that?
In contrast to the monumental advent of Hebrew as a language in recent history, Yiddish—for me—is a language that best describes the Jewish experience in the world, in all of its unusual beauty, longing, ambiguity, mystery and quiet, subtle triumph.
4. What is your favorite Yiddish word or phrase?
In the song “Lekoved dem Heylikn Shabbes“, a worried Chasid during Shabbes dinner tells his rebbe, “Rebbe! There’s no challah! There’s no fish! There’s no meat!”, to which the rebbe answers, “‘S’vet zayn!“—”There will be!” Let me tell you, on many levels, I’m saying ” ‘S’vet zayn!” all the time.
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I’ve always been mad for trains. I was born in the wrong century, long past the age of long-distance train travel. I know, unless you were as wealthy as a god, it was uncomfortable, crowded, slow, dirty, hot in the summer and cold in the winter. But still, it was a way to travel West, to see the world, to leave behind an old life and start a new one.
You can see, I’ve built up a lot of romance about train travel. My heart always leaps when I hear our local train blow its whistle.
Unfortunately, commuter train has been all I’ve been able to do (and I still love it!), except for joy rides on the Niles Canyon Railway.
Niles Canyon steam train, my favorite of their collection.
Another Niles Canyon Railway train. I’m not sure if this one ever leaves the yard. More’s the pity if it doesn’t.
Then there is the California State Railroad Museum, one of my favorite museums in all the United States. Below are interior shots of train on display.
And who doesn’t love dials and faucet handles and thing-a-ma-bobs? At the museum, one of the docents told me that there’s practically no man left alive who knows the purposes of all the dials in the old locomotives.
Someday I’ll do a trip on Amtrak , in a private berth please, on the Empire Builder. I sometimes fantasize about hopping a box car—when I was a little kid, I remember a period when I planned on growing up to be a railroad bum—but I know it must remain a fantasy.
So it’s no surprise that I collect train songs. Yesterday Fiona Ritchie played the Poozies singing a song (in exquisite harmony) about trains, and starting over. So many of us, older and wiser yet still young in our hearts and minds, have been deemed by corporatocracy and the world to be redundantly over-the-hill (never mind that there are currently 4 U.S. senators in their 80s that refuse to retire). We are re-starting lives, or even just trying to continue living. This song is for us, I think, and I’m sending this out to my friends and readers who are feeling a little left behind.
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Mockingbirds at midnight 