Re-animate me, please!

It’s been more than 7 years since I started this blog, and only slightly less than that since my attention wandered and I inadvertently abandoned it.   Apparently, my wish for a creative passion burning brightly was an idle one.

But today, Debbie Happy Cohen stumbled upon it and “followed” it.  Now that I have one whole follower, I owe her content!  Yes, that’s how I roll.  I must add, Debbie is not just *any* old follower – she has inspired me more than once in the past 20 years, with her books, in person, and most recently with her Joy-Based Living project.  I admire her so much.

So, like the Tin Man discovered rusted and frozen in time, I will apply some oil to these creaky joints and re-join the fray.

Baby steps

At the beginning of the year, I made a commitment to myself to get busy and discover outlets to fire up my long-disused creativity. I got sidetracked by Life, allowing an annoying health challenge to keep me from signing up for that pottery class I want to take.  Excuses!  I don’ need no steenkin’ pottery class to get me started!

I did actually pick up a paintbrush.  Painting the downstairs bathroom and freshening the household doors and woodwork with Behr’s white semi-gloss was satisfying, but hardly what I had in mind to scratch my creative itch.

One of the happy benefits of living where I do is that it’s a 5-minute drive from my house to West Meadow Beach.  Because of an odd little geological configuration here on the north shore, it faces west, which means that you can watch the sunset over the water.  It is also, in common with most of the Long Island Sound waterfront, very rocky.  Gigantic rock jetties.  Rocks of all shapes, colors and sizes, necessitating that I wear water shoes if I want to go wading or swimming.  Flat rocks, suitable for skipping (my husband’s prowess at this is only one of the reasons I love him).

On a recent walk there, I found myself choosing some of the smoothest, whitest stones and filling the pockets of my windbreaker with them.  I gave them a bath with dishwasher soap, lovingly dried them off and have begun doodling on them with a fine-point Sharpie.  Doodling on rocks with a Sharpie is a creative outlet?  Well, yeah.  The resultant works of art will look great in the bowl I’m going to make on a potter’s wheel.  Baby steps.

Now that Spring is here, it’s possible to sit on our deck and enjoy being outdoors.  Yesterday we were out there and Bob gave me the best idea for my next undertaking.  Look at the shed at the back of our yard.  It’s been great for storing garden tools and the lawn mower and whatever else we have been able to cram in there…but isn’t it just screaming for a little barn art?  I knew you’d agree.  And if we don’t like it?  Paint it over!

 

Stay tuned, folks!

Desperately seeking SOMETHING

OK, maybe I’m not really desperate.  But that sounds so much more dramatic and compelling than “Dilettante Will Dabble”, doesn’t it?  

Part of my ever-so-courageous new endeavor is that I’m actually telling other people about it.  That’s for accountability.  Now I actually have to DO something or I will look like a complete jerk, which is different from simply making a fool of myself.  That doesn’t seem to scare me.

Of course, I still want to become good, nay, excellent at something creative.  Remember, excellence is the standard!  I just read Matt Walsh’s hilariously scathing review of the movie “Les Miserables”. 

Les Miserables Taught Me How to Hate Again.

Holy cow, holy mackerel, holy moly – by all that’s holy, I would give anything to write like that!  Well, no; I would have to draw the line at injuring small animals or selling my soul to the devil.  Still.  A level of entertainment worthy of my aspirations – making people clutch their sides in laughter while reading my blog out loud to others in the room.

I’ve promised myself multiple adventures as I try different media of creative and artistic expression!  My boss has offered to make that a Lucy-and-Ethel experience if I want to try pottery-making (Yes! I do!), because she wants a big new serving bowl.  Something tells me it won’t be that easy to produce beautiful, table-ready crockery, but I’m ready to get up close and personal with potter’s wheel and clay!

It’s sure to stimulate that dormant creative place in my brain.  Gonna shock myself awake!

 

 

 

New Year’s Day

A few weeks ago,  my husband and I were invited to attend a lecture on “Happiness” at a friend’s house.  I have always considered myself to be a happy person – and indeed, as our speaker enumerated the characteristics of happy people,  I confess to feeling a smidgen of smugness as I checked them off:  “Yep…that’s me…uh-huh…right on…What?! WAIT!”  It seems that happy people all have creative outlets!

Well, crap.

I’ve let that aspect of my life stagnate for more years than I’m ready to admit in public.  It’s embarrassing.  I have fabulous, creative friends who are artists, musicians, poets, writers, photographers – amateur and professional.

I read a lot, I make my friends laugh, I’m a facebook maven, I’m a great cook; I am NOT meeting my own standards of cool and well-rounded!

Mind you, I am still a happy person – but now I am a happy person with a mission to stretch my atrophied creative muscles.  Now that I realize how I’ve neglected them, I am pacing my cage while I ponder: “What will be my outlet”?  I’m already contemplating Lucille Ball-esque adventures as I dabble in one medium after another.

Part of my dilemma is that I hate to suck at anything.  Excellence is my standard, anything less…well…YES, I’m scared!  I have a friend who writes a well-crafted poem pretty much every day.  I have another friend who started with a painting a day.  She has been an unwitting inspiration to me because her early attempts were – um – not so hot, but now she is really creating paintings I like to look at!

So today, New Year’s Day 2013, I just wrote my first-ever blog post.  Every journey begins with a first step.