Una Senda Desconocido - A Path Unknown
Taos, 2/2019 - Last night I had a death dream. I was with a group of people who knew they didn't have long to live. One girl stood out and we ended up having a short conversation. She asked only one question. "Are you afraid to die?" My simple answer was an emphatic "No"! After waking I stayed in bed - the house was cold and I pulled the covers around me. Time to ponder my mortality. Gradually I have been waking up out of the cloud of grief that has been my daily companion since the death of my son four years ago. Four years seems like a long time, but it is only a nanosecond in "Mother Time"!
My conclusion is that I am not ready for that Big Easel in the Sky! There are about twelve new oil studies all sketched and underpainted and ready to be completed. From those I have strong feelings that several large pieces will emerge. There is still so much I need to do! What if it is all over? The phone rang and Gabe Abrums from Chimayo Trading called to say that he had just sold a $2500 painting - the previous month he sold one of my major pieces called "Bearers of Light". Wake up! Wake up! And then there was an email from a lady named Valeria Teles who wrote a book called Fit for Joy. She wants me to do a podcast with her. Think about it - life came roaring back at me. Time for a shower!
Death dreams don't scare me. They are more about the death of an old way of life, old ideas, old habits - CHANGE! If you really live your life, take chances - take those empty-handed leaps into the Void, you experience a thousand deaths both large and small. Many times those endings lead to a completely unimagined new way of being - a new life.
Coincidentally 50 years ago this week I received my final divorce papers from the father of my children. The divorce was definitely not something I wanted. I actually grieved my girlish dreams of a happy marriage, happy children...a happy, uneventful life. Again - tell God your plans and He just has a big belly laugh! Naively that Polish/Catholic guilt and shame would haunt me for years! My friend Dan told me that writing this blog would lead me to forgiveness of others, but mostly I might learn to forgive myself! Truth is there is so much more - a deeper understanding of events. Most of all that my husband's questionable choices eventually led me to New Mexico and the life I was meant to live in the first place - there are no accidents!
Am smiling - life has certainly turned around once again since moving back to Taos! Am back at the easel with more ideas for new paintings - head is full of new canvases and colors. Such a gift! My Art Gods have shaken me awake one more time! Thinking about "Fit for Joy" - and all the times I ambled down that dark road looking desperately for Joy and Happiness! That was then. Now my philosophy is more "one day chicken, the next day feathers". Whatever I do, as long as there is breath in my old body (and I can still hold a paintbrush), it's not over....live to paint and blog my adventures another day!
Note: Santa Fe, 1969 - My marriage was over and I was a single mother with three small children. The old judgements of being a divorced mother threatened to hold me back. All the more reason to focus on becoming an artist - put the blinders on, look straight ahead. It was obvious that my secretarial skills would never be enough - art was the open door. The Great Unknown....I didn't know what I didn't know. Sometimes just daily life is all the education one needs - the next three years were my crash course in Art and Life 101 - my New Beginning!!!
