I was actually able to make some potholders and a streaming piece while at the Adirondack Museum. It was definitely different than usual because of all the people around me. Usually when make a streaming piece I do it uninterrupted and I get into a certain zone in my head. Making this piece I continually stopped to talk to people and sewed as they watched. It was a very different experience. My concentration wasn’t as deep, but I found myself sewing designs and images just for the sake of sewing because I wanted to demonstrate my work. I also found that it worked just as well for the piece.
The words tree after tree Leads Me to Me, came from the ride to the museum. The Adirondacks really is tree after tree. And driving up I was feeling the loneliness that seems to permeate the area as well as the loneliness of not having Jon’s company. As a kid, my family vacationed in the Adirondacks and my ex-husband and I would hike there. I’m very familiar which has certain associations for me and so was assaulted with memories. But I did what I’ve learned to do when it comes to feelings I would rather not feel. I plunged in and let them wash over me, feeling them fully. I drove feeling tree after tree counting off the moments until the memories and the feelings they evoked, faded and all I felt was a solidness in my gut and a straightness in my spine. I wiped my eyes and came back to the person I am today, the person who was always inside of me, even when those memories were my real life.
It seemed a purging of sorts, as if I reclaimed the Adirondacks and was experiencing it for the first time. Without my personal history, the loneliness vanished too, and I could see the Adirondacks for what it is. A vast wilderness with small pockets of people, tree after tree after tree….
Maria, what a wonderful streaming piece with your trees. I loved your description driving through the Adirondaks and the isolation of the roads going through the mountains with pockets of people and civilization here and there. I think for me, it would be the feeling of vulnerability, of being so isolated and so alone in my drive through the mountains which are so majestic and yet, for me, intimidating too and I have no idea why. I thought to of my drive last year through the Alleghanies to meet the dog breeder in the southern part of Pennsylvania and of the pockets of people living in and through the mountainous area. I can’t describe the feeling I had, a mixture of awe at the beauty and the feeling of…how do people live here in the winter, so isolated…with snowstorms and icy roads. Your work came from your soul. It’s wonderful.
SandyP in Canada
That’s just it Sandy. I got the feeling just by reading the word “Alleghanies”.
Thank you for your astute awareness of your memories and the realities of your current persona. It always seems so mysterious when a bit of “someone else” is just what you need as a reminder in your own life. I am grateful for having read your blog today; I was caught up in being lost in the past and giving it more truth than the present. Joy to us all…..
“giving it more truth than the present” is the perfect way to put it Linda. And yes, Joy to you.
Black humor I want to share with you. I visited the surgeon who did my rotator cuff repair a short while ago. I knew he had broken his ankle. He stomped in carefully, plaster boot and two walking canes. He was followed by a nurse– arm in sling and she told me she had sliced her hand so badly that she needed a skin graft from her thigh…then…whining at the door in came his golden retriever, Bailey, who likes to visit with patients. I should mention that Bailey is 3-legged.
We all looked at each other and..couldn’t help it: we burst out laughing. Doctor comments “we are thinking of writing a sit-com: ‘Accidents happen!'”
I am thinking of you all, Especially Minnie.
Thanks for the laugh Erika.
Dear Maria, I’ve never tried plunging in and allowing myself to feel the old feelings deeply, the ones that bring pain. I have always fought them off with bright music, bright colors, bright companions. Maybe this is the way to end their appearance in my mind. Annie
It works for me Annie. And gets easier every time. Less scary too.