Hrrm, what’s been going on… More of the same.

I’ve been trying to make some small profit off my art, and though I haven’t seen much success yet, I keep working at it.  People keep on asking after it and it hurts me a little bit every time I tell them the starving artist story, but they can laugh along with me and I think they understand.

I help to run my mother’s small business, a gallery out in nowhere-land vermont, which is frequented mostly by extended familiy which covers half the population of Walden.  They often have jobs for me, but these jobs turn into favors, and some degree of (unintentional) emotional blackmail muddies up every deal, as this is my mother’s way of sabotaging any threat of professionalism.  This isn’t about the money, she reminds me.  But I don’t know what it’s about.

This is her dream, I want to help her see it through.  But I need.. I need to get out of here, away from this.  I shouldn’t be getting comfortable.  I shouldn’t be staying home to take care of her dogs and husband, I shouldn’t be playing housewife to everything she’s left behind while she chases her dream.

She accuses me of being selfish and arrogant.   Maybe I am. Maybe that’s what I need to be right now.   But who I am to ask for respect, I can’t afford this attitude, I can’t pay the rent, I don’t have a license, I’m not a ~real person.~  I can dress the part but I’m just a beast masquerading as something more.    A beast who stomps and sighs over selfish wants.

Discontent.  My aimless lashing out can do damage, I’ve learned, so I’ve been keeping to myself mostly, save for my most trusted and forgiving of friends, who get the brunt of it.   I try not to burden them but lean on their words when I’m alone.   Some are wiser because they’ve made less mistakes than I have, and some are wiser because they’ve made more.  I don’t need them to talk me down, I need them to help me see what is real and what is reasonable.  My ‘profession’ has conditioned a certain way of thinking that sometimes isn’t the handiest interface with the world.  I get very distracted by my immediate wants, ideas, visions, I grind away at my frustrations, I’m preyed upon by my anxieties, that misplaced sense of urgency which throbs through everything.

“Perseverative thought processes,” I heard her say. I’ve had those three words stuck in my head all week, and I guess thats ironic.

I try to keep busy, it keeps me out of trouble. I bait myself with small excitements to pass the time.  Small gasps of cartharis. I cleaned out my closet but no one wants my weird old clothes.  Its becoming harder to figure out what to wear: I find myself staring into the remains and seeing who I was, but not knowing who I am at the moment, or how to dress for where I’m heading.  Too much black, and I’m tired of it.  I want sunrise colors.  But I’m still not quite that brave.

I’m taking control of small things, one at a time.  I can get away to the city for awhile, even though I live like a gypsy once I’m out there.  I’ve got all this energy saved up and I hit the town with a vengence that can’t be matched by my tired-out city friends.

I was hoping a new outfit, new hair, and a new pair of shoes would be enough to reinvent me.  Dust off the sobwebs and clear my eyes.  It was a nice try, anyway.  I’m here in the same place looking slightly more fabulous, and it doesn’t do me a hell of a lot of good.

But I’m becoming braver.  I’m feeling a momentum building up inside of me, and I know that things are going to change.  That’s one thing I can count on.

I’ve been trying to set to work on my applications. For school acceptance, for grants, for scholarships- Anything that’s proof that I have some direction.

I need to -focus-. I need a plan, and it needs to be brilliant.
It’s been hard. I’ve been feeling foolish and heavy-hearted. Heavy, crushing down, and I’m so busy trying to squirm out from beneath it. Shrugging it off then stumbling over it.

I don’t think I’m being entirely honest. Maybe that’s what’s weighing on me.
I’ve got a lot to confess. I -always- feel like I’ve got a lot to confess. But I’m worried I’ll get it all wrong.

These aching truths are the place that art comes from. Art can be a confession or a lie and no one knows the difference. It can be all wrong and it can still make them smile, gifts and granted wishes.

But it’s not right, it’s not enough, its a mask, it’s not cutting to the heart of it.
But I need to get this out, and it needs to be ugly. It’s going to be an awful mess, my guts strewn about in some weird self-augury. It’s humiliating, its a wet and naked feeling, and so often its wrong, for shyness or hesitation. I need to keep digging until I get it out.

I go a distance, I get something down, I go back, I scold myself. I feel wrong and ashamed. It sounds too much like despair. That’s not right, that’s not me. They keep on saying its depression, but it’s not like that, its a fire, and I’m glowing with it sometimes, and sometimes its burning me up. It’s a good thing, its beautiful, its a powerful thing.

But I don’t feel like I can trust myself. I want to think there’s some instinct or intuition driving all of this, but after years of feeling lost, years of chasing it, it’s hard. I’m not home yet. I can’t be at home with this sense of urgency still hounding me. I get cornered by it, I break down crying and I don’t know why. I have theories but that’s all. I feel injustice, I get angry and don’t know if I’m right or wrong. Sometimes it is so clear, and then this guilty doubt sneaks up and stabs me in the gut.

It’s hard to find anyone I can trust to ask. Some want to prove their suspicions, others are too quick cosset me, and everyone has their oun motives and none of these have much to do with truth. I need an honest mirror. I need a map.

If there were some sort of pilgramage I could go on, I’d be gone. When I lived in the city, I would spend these hours wandering the streets, new and old, getting lost, feeling like I was hunting for something. Praying for grace to take hold of me.

I can find my grace in art: I can make things happen, sometimes effortlessly. I can kill in a stroke. I can fight forever.

Art can turn me into a machine. That’s why I wanted to go back to school, because they’ll work me raw and I’ll have some assignment to fill every sleepless hour. Something to account for the bruised eyes and cave dweller pallor, something to be a slave to. Something greater than myself. I’ll have less time for this self-indulgent nonsense. Less time to feel so human.