The Magical Fridge Magnets.

For Christmas this year I set an interesting challenge for myself. The challenge was to paint individual canvases for all of my friends. I bought approximately 500 tiny canvases some were 2" by 2" some were 3"X 3" and some were 2"x 3". Now, I didn't set out to paint individual canvases for everyone I know, that would be insane... just to paint individual canvases for all of my friends, or people I care about to some degree or another.

I went around asking a bunch of people the random question of "what color is your kitchen?" I didn't specify as to what color they accessorize their kitchen with, just what color it was. Those who were smart enough to give me the color of their kitchen accessories - got a matching diptych, triptych, or even a quintych mini-art for their fridge. Those who told me the color of their walls got paintings that matched my impression of them - color-wise.

These magnets are magical in one sense. They gave me a chance to really think about all of the people they were painted for. My family, my friends, my neighbors, some of my co-workers. The thing is, I don't even really care if they liked them - what was important... what was magical to me was the act of painting them while thinking about these people individually. I started months ago a little simple project I thought - which actually turned out to be a huge undertaking.

I managed to do a lot of bad things during the project too. Don't get me wrong, not anything criminal - just ruined a table and might have to sand and refinish the floor.

I have my favorites too. The ones I made for my mother remind me of peacock feathers. The ones I made for my BFF match the backsplash in her kitchen perfectly. The ones I made for my friend Kim C. were made to some very interesting specifications, but I rose to that challenge. The ones I ended up giving to my friend Kelly were by far my absolute favorite as they are the only ones that I changed the M.O. of the artwork for. The funny thing is - I only took pictures of a very small set of them, and now I regret not having pictures of all of them. They are all of course in the homes of friends and family where I can either go visit them and photograph them or ask for pictures of them - but I should have been better at documenting the process.

I think I loved making them so much that I might start a store on ETSY and sell them. Someone might want a little triptych for their fridge... And hey - we can all use a little extra cash. :)

This Poem Came to Me in a Dream

Exsanguination

While waiting for you
I've paced in circles
I've lost my feet
Balancing on the bloody stumps
Feeling the blood drain from me.

Along with my feet, I wore through the hope
Stamping bloody circles in a bloody circle.

I shall continue to pace
Until I can walk no more.
While my legs waste away.

And legless I'll pace in my mind
Until my exsanguination is complete.
Waiting.

That's alls I can stands

Sometimes you have to step outside of yourself for one minute. Sometimes you should listen when others speak to you, even when you don't think what they are saying has any bearing on your life. Often, this is the opposite of the truth. By "this" I mean that what they are saying has no bearing on your life.

Someone recently was telling me about how they are choosing to deal with people in a different way. About how hot-headed they have gotten in the past and how it never worked out. However, they also were saying that being passive-aggressive in nature hadn't worked out all that well either, because they were just bottling things up. Bottle something up long enough and you have a cataclysmic eruption.

I am a bottler. I am a venter. Instead of telling the people who should hear something, I tell my friends. This is the wrong move. This was the message I was getting from someone and I ignored it. It didn't relate to me at all. But oh, it did.

I'd been bottling up something for awhile and "Boom goes the dynamite" eruption. So I'm going to pause and take a break from things for a minute. I'm going to stretch and ponder. I'm going to face the world head-on and listen to the messages from the many mouths of the beast we call humanity. I shall take heed.