Celebrating the Light in the Darkness

Last night, Christmas Eve, I went to bed thinking, Christmas is a lie. Jesus was not born on December 25th. Santa is a myth created for children and to enrich people who make and sell useless things. 

It never bothered me before. I loved the pun: Birth of the sun/Son.It seemed totally appropriate to celebrate the birth of one who brought us Light right after the solstice, when the sun returns with her light. We need a celebration in the dark of winter, what ever the excuse. And Santa is a jolly old elf who lives in us all.

This year, the realization of wars--declared and undeclared--that my beloved country is waging with DRONES!! and the damage to civilians this brings, seemed to pull the rug out from under my joy. Plastic santas and snowmen just drove home my sense of falseness.

I did not get a Christmas tree. We just finished hanging evergreen boughs last night. My gift giving this year is uber simple; almost everyone gets a special Christmas tea blend I made up. The one expensive (for me) gift I had made special for my grand daughter was rejected. She did not like it!

Sometime in the night I woke with an awareness that all over the world people are celebrating Christmas. Wishing each other good cheer. Giving each other gifts. And I remembered that one Christmas--was it World War One or World War Two?

The Germans and the Allies faced each other across enemy lines, dug into trenches, guns aimed at each other. Then someone --I think it was the Germans--started singing Silent Night. The Allies joined in. All along the lines, carols were sung in German and in--English? French? Men crossed the battle lines to shake hands. A soccer game was organized. All along the front, enemies played together, sang together, celebrated together. Thousands of men had to be transferred from the front lines because they could no longer buy into the hate stories their leaders told them.

About 4 am I thought about what people were doing all around the world. Would the English have opened presents already and be eating dinner or high tea? My brother in China would be eating lunch on the 26th, I think. In New York, the children would be waking up, excited to open their presents.

If on one day people all over the world can remember One who brought us Hope, who asked us to love our enemies for God's sake! Whose Love still resides in our bones and hearts over 2000 years later, if people all over the world remember this wonderful teacher on this one day---Wow! That is Powerful!!!

May this Christmas bring you the remembrance that Love is the most powerful force in the universe and Love never dies. May this knowing bring you joy this day and all days. 

Love,

suzanna

Why Make Art?

Putting resist on Baochu and the Golden Phoenix

Twice a year, this question comes up for me. Why make art? Why do I make art? Why would anyone

buy art? Why would anyone buy MY art? What do I want my art to accomplish? I write pages in my journal while sailing in the summer with my Love, and again around Christmas time when I review the year.

The dream of supporting myself through my art sales kind of went by the wayside. It is so much easier to dig ditches, clean houses, or teach squirming young children, than to make a living selling my art! Still, the dream won't quite die.

Baochu and the Golden Phoenix

So, Last night I researched selling art. Two different masters at selling art, both passionate about helping artists to succeed, gave me two very different approaches to selling art, based on their different views about the purpose of art. And you know what? Both views--opposite though they are--kind of resonate with me.

Clint Watson, whose articles on selling art appear in his blog Art Marketing and Life, says the purpose of art is to amplify ideas. He advises starting and feeding conversations about art, and using your art to illustrate the conversation. Become the leader of your conversation, he advises. Build a community, a tribe, a clan of people around you who participate in the conversation. Begin with your existing fans and make them feel included in an exclusive group. Read his article, Art Marketing for Artists Who Want to Change the World,  in Fine Art News, for more on this.

Tulips

Jack White writes books on selling art. I bought his book The Mystery of Making It, and began to glean some ideas from him. He says the purpose of art is decorative. If people buy your art because it goes
with their couch, don't knock it. Paint what sells. Of course, that assumes you have sold enough work to tell what people like.

In Love with Stories!

It is Thanksgiving day, and almost every blog I read today and yesterday is some one's list of what they are thankful for. It's getting to be a bit much. So, as some one who is thankful EVERY day, for so much! I won't bore you with my list.

Although, something happened yesterday that really blessed me.

I am showing about 60 of my paintings on silk and watercolors at the Vashon Community Care Center through January 30, 2014.

Looking at the World Through a Heart Shaped Hole

Yesterday I went in to hang a painting in the staff room. After all, the staff need cheering, too. Pam was pushing Kate down the hall in her wheel chair, and we stopped to chat. I think Kate may have had a stroke since I saw her last, as she was barely able to mumble, and her words were hard to understand. Some how, she was able to tell us that she loves one painting in particular. Pam wheeled her down the hall, until she indicated the piece I call "Looking at the World through a Heart Shaped Hole."

I told Kate the story, that this painting is about looking at the world through love, and that makes the world so beautiful! Kate just glowed as I told her!

Love Birds

Shiwa had been turned into a bird, and his beloved, 

Humei, was no where to be found. Finally he heard her

singing. She had been buried in the mountain.  Shiwa dug 

until he opened a hole big enough to go through--and there 

was Humei! She turned into a bird as well, and they flew

happily off, free!

And it gets even better.


On the way home, I stopped for tea at the Vashon Tea Shop. I mentioned to Boo, the proprietor, that I have a show of my paintings at the Care Center. "Oh, you are the artist!" exclaimed a young woman at the next table. "I LOVE those paintings!"

She went on to tell us she has been walking with her 94 year old grandmother down the halls of the Care Center. "My grandma stops at every painting and shows me the details she loves. When we walk by again, she stops and points out different details!"

And that's why I show my work.

Telling our Stories

Building Community through Stories
November 15^th

7:00 PM

Vashon Community Care Center
15333 Vashon Hiway SW
Vashon, Wa 98070

Sail Away and over 50 other paintings

 will be on dispay at Vashon Community Care Center

November - December 2013

Sail Away 

The current runs swiftly through Dodd Narrows in Canada, changing direction with the tide. To get through on a small sailboat, one needs to wait for slack tide, when the tidal current is quiet before it changes direction. Coming into the Narrows, one cannot see what is on the other side. Major changes in life are like that: one needs to choose one's timing carefully, then proceed with faith that there is something good on the other side.

Getting married at age 66 is like that.

Stories connect us. When we know some one's story, that person becomes more than an aquaintance. We have more compassion for our neighbors and feel less alone. We are more able to meet each other's needs and our own needs are more easily met. When we tell each other our stories we are building community.

Paintings tell stories. I tell my stories on silk, in vibrant colors.  My silk paintings (now showing at Vashon Community Care Center) tell stories from China, stories from friends, and some of my own stories. The paintings will be on display November through December.

On November 15^th at 7pm, I will be telling the stories in some of my paintings at Vashon Community Care Center, to celebrate a show of more than 50 of my paintings on silk hanging on the walls there. I will show slides of my paintings and will invite the audience to share short stories of their own experiences and memories which the paintings might bring up.

To tell our own stories—takes courage. Will we be judged? Will our friends cease to be friendly? And yet, we need to be heard. We need understanding, to be known by those who care about us.  Will you join me at the Vashon Community Care Center to hear some stories, and perhaps share some of your own? Or share your stories here on my stories page?

Golden Pathway

We had been sailing together on the boat Sea Change, in the Gulf Islands in July. The weather was perfect; sun for warmth but not too warm, wind for sailing but not too much wind. We had been married seven years, and were still very much in love. Life was perfect. We did not know this would be our last sailing trip together. Bob was diagnosed with lung cancer that winter and died the following July.

This painting has come to mean being someplace I love, being with one I love and being loved, and doing just the right thing in the world.

Do you have a story to share?

She still dances at age 89!

Marj
at our booth at Strawberry Festival
my painting is in the background

Barely 5' tall and 120 pounds soaking wet (she thinks she's overweight!) this young woman is still dancing at age 89! That's my mom! She's set the bar pretty high, don't you think?

And now she plans to be in a play! I don't think she has been in a play since high school! She will be the old lady ("type casting," she says) in A Child's Christmas in Wales, adapted for stage, to be performed Dec 19-26th on Vashon Island.

That's my mom. She does Qi Gung daily, and is working on her 3rd historical novel. She plays the stock market and wins, writes a regular cooking column for a local paper. And she always has an answer when I need a natural remedy for what ails me.  

I would only believe in a God who knew how to dance.

drummer

Friedrich Nietzsche
: Without music, life would be a mistake… I would only believe in a God who knew how to dance.

I have been having such fun at the Dances of Universal Peace! These are circle dances, easy to learn and to sing, from traditions all over the world,  prayers in song and motion. I love this quote from Rumi:

“Dance, when you're broken open. Dance, if you've torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you're perfectly free.”
― Rumi

musicians and dance leaders preparing for the dance

A typical Dance evening might include movements to Ava Maria from the Catholic tradition,  La illa ha il Allah from Muslim worship, a Celtic earth song, a Hindu song, and a Jewish song. Each short song is taught by a trained dance leader, then danced and sung several times until there is an easy synergy flowing among the dancers. The dances are easy to learn. Musicians accompany the dances to keep the beat and the melody.

And they are coming to Vashon! Rifaat and I are organizing for dances every month starting in January. Musicians will come from Seattle, and everyone is invited! Initially we will dance in my living room, and will find a larger venue as needed. 

musicians preparing for the dance

http://dancesofuniversalpeacena.org

Healing Memories in the Forest

A forest trail at Burfoot Park, Olympia, WA
A place of beauty, A place to heal

September 2013: I wrote this several months ago--then felt too vulnerable to print it.

April 2013:  It has been a long day. My head throbs. My stomach is in knots. Ancient sorrows and terrors have begun to surface. I need some green growing...I need some nature.

I am in Olympia training to work with people caught in domestic violence. What ever possessed me? Just because I've had some....um...interesting experiences, like being in what I thought was a common law marriage with someone who insisted on growing marijuana illegally. Like getting busted for said marijuana and nearly losing my children. Like being on and off of welfare until I finally learned to make a decent living for my family-- and now own my home free and clear.

I thought I might have something to offer women who are struggling as single moms through some of the same issues. So I volunteered where my skills might be useful, and found that the greatest need is working with people caught in domestic violence situations.

Trillium growing in the forest

I didn't know the training would bring up those long buried memories. I didn't know how these memories would affect me physically and emotionally. I did not at first know why I am exhausted and my head hurts. I knew only that I need wild, I need green growing things, I need trees.

I drive away from the city, past the house I once lived in, a house that carries some of those memories, past the school where my children went, to the park I remember. Walking down the trail through the woods to the beach, some of my tension eases. The beauty of the woods engulfs me. I touch again that deep joy that lives within me.


Can the beauty of these woods help to heal other people? Might I share this beauty some how, through my paintings, with people who need green as I do? Who need healing from...um....interesting experiences?