IMPERFECT Lady

UBEEU

My granddaughter asked me, "Grandma what is an heirloom?"  We were going through some of her stuff and re-organizing her room.  Our day then was spent looking at all the stuff in our house, with new eyes. 

Heirloom - "a valuable object that has belonged to a family for several generations."

 

She wondered how things became heirlooms, and how others did not.  There are things she sees value in that would not be classified as an heirloom. 

 

The juxtaposition was not lost on me, how one week I am getting rid of family art and the next weekend looking at heirlooms.

 

Homes of couples, usually have two families blending together.  Our pasts flow with us into our present.

Each of us have values we want to pass on, and others we want to cast aside.

 

My focus in the past decade and a half has been to re-cast the pattern that is me.

To do my best not to pass on what was given to me.

My intentions were to create something of value to hand down.

The heirlooms I was most concerned were not things.

I wanted to hand down family values.

Values with real value.

Love that holds truth, honesty, integrity, freedom, authenticity, courage...

Love that has boundaries and limits.

Love that honors who you are, what you feel, and will challenge beliefs that feel wrong.

Love that is deep and ever changing - while being the same in substance.

Love that will hold the difficult moments as well as the beautiful joys.

 

Love that allows each to be true to themselves.

To not have to wear a mask to fit in.

 

I believe the heirlooms will mean more, if they come from a person of substance. Someone who lived their life unapologetically, and remained true to themselves; always.

No matter what life gave them, they did what was true for them.

My heirloom is of emotional intelligence, to know who you are and be that.

Be that in all ways.

 

The saddest life to me, is one where you cannot be yourself.

We all know our own truths, they live within us.  The grandest life, is when you can live out loud.

May my legacy be "You be You" or as my license plates read "UBEEU".

 

 

When our hearts understand.

As I cleaned my living room in preparation for some new to us furniture; I was very cognizant of what I do have in my home. What I am able to not only hang on - but what I love and what brings me good energy.

This was a quick shot of my girls laughing together. I LOVE this picture. 

It is not so much the composition or the frame or the color etc - but the girls in the picture and the joy they have with each other. And, the free and easy connection I have with each of them. My heart is happy with this art.

And I have an artful basket of rocks.  Omars and Yooperlites - rocks my granddaughter and I have gathered as we walked along the shoreline.

 

So, I have come to the conclusion that we are connected not only to the art; but the story and memory and relationship we have with the artist behind the art.

 

I am not so much in my Art; but I am with my art.

I am connected to it.

We are not separated.

 

As I looked around my house, there is joy everywhere. And warm hearted connections to art and the artist behind the art. To gifts and the givers of the gifts.  

 

We travel along with our art. 

Our energy flows in and around what we give, what we do and into each relationship.

As Dr. Jill Bolte-Taylor said, "You are responsible for the energy you bring in the room."

 

I would add, and responsible for what you bring into your home.

 

I love this latest lesson in art and what I choose to have in my home.

Removing the art that carries with it, bad energies will lighten my home in many ways.

And, make room for things that make my heart sing.

 

We let go - when our heart understands.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Keep or discard

I was in a discussion last week with a few artists, and we were talking about doing art; but not Art that would be for sale.

 

I always had this impression that if you did art - the next logical step was to sell Art.

Especially when you did fabulous art.

That doing art would lead to selling art and teaching art.

That the circle of art, when done well, would lead to selling art.

And, some may even believe you are not an artist, until you sell your art.

 

What never occurred to me was that many do art for personal reasons.

It isn't for others, it is something they choose, to add to their lives.

They do so for reasons we can't know.

Art is an additive to their lives.

It brings them something.

 

Art is a land without many rules.

How then did I place so many rules upon it?

 

Art began for me as therapy, and often still is.

 

The pull to the basement and fabric was like a drug.

A calm down drug.

An anti-anxiety drug.

The place where I found the essence of myself.

The lone self - that wasn't tied to anyone and our complicated relationships.

 

Art found Me.

 

The me I was before I joined others.

 

I can see how it would be easy to escape life by being immersed in Art.

And, not really deal  with the choices you have made or failed to make.

I can understand how you could live almost split lives.

Where one is happy and free in their art - and the other is trapped into a life out of control.

Unable or unwilling to course correct, when relationships are toxic.

 

Art for me walked with me as I made course corrections so that the self in Art, and the self in life, both had freedoms.  

My life became like my art, where I had choices.  Where, when with whom, and if I went and if I didn't go. What I said or what I didn't say.  Boundaries and choices created a life I wanted to be in - not one I want to escape.

 

Yesterday I looked at my brother's art and my father's.

Art's legacy is in our family.

It flows through generations.

Wood solidness carved.

Changed.

The simple, and the intricate.

 

It is funny, in a peculiar way, how wood carving was the modality used.

Taking something solid and changing it.

 

I was young when I got these carved hearts from my father.

I cherished them - at the time. A clue to my unawareness.

I think the hearts and spoons were the only gift I ever received from him.

 

They made it from the shelves and into a box.  Now what?  I don't know. 

 

These were the only two things I wanted from my parents and my childhood home.

The plates were my mothers.  

Are the best parts of them in their art and what they cherish.

Is that the best part of me; my Art???

Do we all put ourselves in our art?

More to explore with art and the artist, and what the things we chose to keep or discard.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cleaning Out the Past

As I think of the de-cluttering I have to do in my basement, there are a few items that I struggle with. 

Art.

That was given to me.

By my estranged family.

 

I don't believe there is a way to separate the art from the artist.

It doesn't stand alone.

The art includes the artist.

 

And, can you separate the toxic from the person in art?

 

I am inclined to burn.

The art.

 

And let it go.

 

I also have albums and albums of pictures.

Siblings I haven't seen in so many years.

Memories now tainted.

Can you distill the good from the dysfunction.

The 'normal' from the abuse?

 

I shoved lots of things to the deep recesses of our storage area - not wanting to toss 

and not wanting to see them.  

 

These mementos are not like when you lose someone.

Where you hold on to things - to save the memories.

It is the opposite, or so it seems.

The things now hold the person.

The person you no longer want to be with;

to remember - to know.

 

I feel like a traitor thinking of burning old pictures and art.

An act of savagery against family.

Ripping and tearing it to shreds

And, yet abuse did that.

Not I

 

Abuse destroyed - what I now have left to destroy.

 

Perhaps it is the last vestiges of hope that there was a family there - and a good one.

The last hold out - will be gone.

 

It is not like getting rid of old junk, or things you won't use, or haven't used.

These items are different.

 

The good energy - it seems from them. The good from the bad.

Yet too many bad memories in the items, for me to hold on to them.

 

In the early days of my discovering my sexual abuse.

I often said, "for now".

Not saying forever.

 

I couldn't think of the long empty road of loss being endless.

It has been 16 years now.

 

It is time to let it all go.

 

Reality has changed the value of these treasures.

Just as abuse changed the integrity of our family.

The meaningful turned meaningless.

 

There is sadness in my heart, to know there is nothing there worth holding on to.

Nothing.

"Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose." Janis Joplin

Cleaning out the past!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sisterhood of friends

I have been having cravings for deeper friendships - feeling like I was missing a piece of life - when I realized, what I am actually missing are friend dates.

Times where you can sit and just visit. Whether it is over a cup of tea, a meal or just visiting in person in a home. 

Shared close times with friends - where we could explore many different topics, share our lives and experiences, our dreams.  Getting to know each other in new ways. 

 

During the past many months, I have been able to meet with many outside. We have been able to go on adventures and be together; but there is something about sitting and just being and sharing our lives.

The luxury of time and sacredness of close being.

We can give the bullet points of our lives as we hike along or paddle etc -but we don't get down to the deeper levels of where our souls lie.

Levels where I long to be.

 

While life has slowed and spaces are wide open - but the virus has kept us cautious, apart and in the bullet points in many lives.

I feel we are getting close to the end game - in the last many miles of this marathon - and soon we will go back to living closer to each other.

AND, I will be retiring, and life will really slow down and open up - and I am so eager for friend dates.

In fact, I am going to start this friend dating soon, one on one outside - as the temps warm up.  

 

Friend dating - it is all part of the sisterhood of friends!

 

Courage of Love

As I was falling asleep last night, I thought of the hearts of so many strong women I know. The sheer strength of the love it holds; and more the heartache.

It is remarkable to me how we can walk and breathe and live all the while with a beating broken heart.

And, that beating broken hearts can continue to love and feel joy.

That they dare love, and live on.

 

The longer we live, the more chance there is for experiencing and witnessing the breaking hearts of our family and friends.

 

We fear a broken heart.

I sat with that awhile.

 

Is a broken heart part of the contract of love?

A loving heart becomes a heart of sorrow?

 

It seems more true the heart grows deeper and knows the preciousness of things.

A heart beats wisdom of the fleetingness of it all.

 

My heart broke and it loves in a braver way.

Perhaps it is stronger in its brokenness.

 

And, when you can survive a deep deep sorrow of a broken heart - you gain strength and even carelessness.

You care less about mundane and trivial things and more about what matters.

I am drawn to women who have suffered, survived and now thrive. Who dared to love and live with beating broken hearts. Who are resilient in life. Or perhaps the willingness to live a life of meaning, even with a beating broken heart.

Women whose lives are not defined by their losses; but rather are determined by their ability to live, love and dance with life. To live on.

To live on with colorful lives.

With new adventures.

 

May the newly broken hearted, breathe in hope by the examples of strong women they know.

Beating broken hearts are able to capture life again - as they love what they love.

Maybe the key to living life in all its forms, is to seek what you love.

What you love doing, who you love being with.

Love perhaps, is the only thing that will heal a beating broken heart.

Or make it a heart you can live with. 

The new heart is different than the loving heart without sorrow.

Yet it is a fuller heart; for it knows the costs.

To all the beating broken hearts - my heart is with yours.

We beat with the courage of love.