CREATIVELY LINKING HEART and SCIENCE through ART: My Love of Australian Mammals

HALLELUJAH PILGRIMS! HALLELUJAH for ALL LIVING CREATURES, especially monotremes and marsupials! Marsupial moms are resourceful mammals, raising their young from embryos to young juveniles outside their wombs in pouches! Envision the comfort of being tucked inside a warm blanket of maternal flesh and fur with an ample supply of milk for sustenance! HALLELUJAH for the CREATIVITY of this DESIGN!

 HALLELUJAH encourages ALL of you PILGRIMS to enthusiastically participate in the ACT of CREATION by SEEING with your own unique vision. Look deep inside objective reality. Penetrate the “obvious” that your physical eyes see. Perhaps, there is a baby marsupial tucked inside! My ART results from SEEING with my own vision, my “inner” eyes acquired from a lifetime of experiences! Right now, I will turn my spirit seeking radar on marsupials and one monotreme to share with you how I creatively envision them.

Here in the United States, where I live, we have one modest marsupial, the opossum. Unfortunately, most of us become acquainted with this shy pinkish gray animal when we see one dead on the roadside. However, other world citizens are more fortunate. On the continents of South America and Australia, there is an abundance of marsupials ranging in size from a mouse to a kangaroo. My Chiboogamoo, who is sitting across the table from me, explains that the occurrence of marsupials on these two continents is a result of their origination on the super continent of Gondwana more than 100 million years ago! Thank you Chiboogamoo! Praise SCIENCE! Praise intelligent SCIENTISTS!

Chiboogamoo, my faithful guide and companion, stops to figure out where we should go next at one of the nature parks in Tasmania!

And Praise how CREATIVITY and SCIENCE (and artists and scientists) inform each other! Look at these endearing Australian marsupials—a BILBY, TASMANIAN DEVIL, QUOLL, and a monotreme—the PLATYPUS—I have depicted here. In reality, these animals have a “fetching” physical appearance. So it was easy to paint images of them that most viewers respond to favorably—often with murmurs of delight, I might add. They are thrilled to be “engaged” with a marsupial or a monotreme! In addition to experiencing curiosity about the natural history of these critters, viewers also express a connection to me! Why? Because of the way I have folded in my perception and feelings based on my experience, viewers get the opportunity to SEE me—HALLELUJAH—simultaneously with the animal! I AM in the ART!

And I believe that the “me” in the art along with my “subject” has POWER. I believe that it is possible that my VISIONARY ART can link world citizens to SCIENCE—in this instance—to the science of marsupials and monotremes and the precariousness of their longevity. We are powerful actors on this world stage when we merge our HEARTs and HEADs.

Here is what I want you to know about the TASMANIAN DEVIL: The Devil, a curious carnivore, lives on the breathtaking mountainous island of Tasmania, south of the Australian continent.  

During our week-long  trip in Tasmania during a cold April day (it is fall in Australia then) in 2006, my Chiboogamoo and I had the good fortune to observe Tasmanian Devils in close proximity at the East Coast Nature World 7 miles north of Bicheno.

Bone crunching and yowling, the TASMANIAN DEVIL is in terrible danger now from tumors mysteriously occurring on its face. These fatal cancerous facial tumors are demolishing huge populations of the Devil. Up until now, this cat-sized black and white beast has kept Tasmanian roads free of road kill, but now as its populations decline, road kill is left unattended or consumed by other animals like birds, which end up getting hit by oncoming traffic!

The BILBY, a grayish pink floppy-eared marsupial, is nocturnal and omnivorous. This “cute” marsupial has been chosen by Australian environmentalists to replace the iconic Easter Bunny for two reasons. First of all, by getting profiled for a holiday celebration, the BILBY, which like the TASMANIAN DEVIL has waning numbers, might become better known to the public.  A chocolate Bilby and wine--perfect for an Easter celebration in Victoria, Australia!

The PUBLIC has the power to take steps to preserve the BILBY. Second, the Bunny Rabbit represents an ecological hazard to the Australian continent. Rabbits brought by the British have thrived and multiplied, causing extensive damage to vegetation and displacing native animals. Has anyone seen the movie, “Rabbit Proof Fence”? Thousands of kilometers of fences crisscross the continent, attempting but failing to stop the rabbit’s invasion. Embrace the BILBY as the new icon for Easter celebrations! A marsupial is worthy symbol for fertility and the promise of new life!

The QUOLL is a very attractive nighttime carnivore. Yet, most of the QUOLLs that I have seen have been stuffed ones in museums of natural history!  Yes, this spotted marsupial is also endangered! 

Loving animals of all kinds, my Chiboogamoo found them alive and dead in museums and parks. Isn't the Quoll an amazing beast!

Although my Chiboogamoo tells me that animals’ disappearing from this earth is the natural order of things (Extinction has been going on for millions of years.), I take in a big breath and emit a sigh. How many more animals will become extinct in my lifetime? Which extinctions are “natural” and which ones are human made? Yet all is not gloom and doom about QUOLLS. I have seen a family of black and white spotted QUOLLS at a nature center in Tasmania! And they were amazing!

Finally, I will celebrate the PLATYPUS, which is only one of two monotremes living today (The echidna is the other existing monotreme.. A monotreme is an egg-bearing mammal). My Chiboogamoo and I were fortunate enough to see some of these furry duckbilled mammals frolicking in their natural environments in Tasmania. We also tracked a male PLATYPUS along a stream in the Healesville Sanctuary, a nature center, in Victoria, with Murrindindi, an Aboriginal tracker. Murrindindi entertained us with the romantic adventures of the particular PLATYPUS we tracked that day, and its image lingers in my imagination today. The PLATYPUS is threatened because of changes in its environment, but it is not endangered.

HALLELUJAH for these magical animals from Australia and for all living creatures! HALLELUJAH wishes that all of you PILGRIMS will travel your JOURNEYS delighting in both your HEART and HEAD! How beautiful is the MYSTICAL and how thrilling the KNOWN! My Chiboogamoo suggests I conclude this blog by reminding ALL of US of our ancient lineage. Whether we are monotremes, marsupials or placentals, we ALL descended from the same source! We are ALL connected!

 

THE PURSUIT OF THE WELL-BELOVED:THE FEMININE IDEAL

The Lure of the FEMININE—how I catch my breath when I see the beauty of her form and that form in movement. I have contemplated the mystery of the FEMININE for most of my life. Haven’t we all? What is it in FEMALENESS both her FORM and BEHAVIOR that is so utterly intriguing?

The FEMININE principle occurs everywhere and at all times. Yet depending on the PERCEIVER, the power of the FEMININE may shift and move. In one of Thomas Hardy’s novels, THE WELL-BELOVED (1897), this kernel of “abstact” femininity shifts constantly from one human woman to another to the chagrin of the main character, a man. Jocelyn Pierston, a sculptor, keeps glimpsing his FEMININE ideal as she appears and disappears in the real women he pursues for “artistic” reasons and through the succession of 3 generations of women he courts from the same family.

Imagine what happens to this Hardy character, this PILGRIM, on a journey to harness the FEMININE ideal! In a reverse Pygmalion fashion, the course of his life and character are carved out as he helplessly strives to capture “HER” not only in his sculptures but also in his domestic life. Decades are spent on his efforts to contain the EPHEMERAL of what is FEMININE. His life story does not end joyously, but like a faithful PILGRIM true to the yearnings of his heart—he pursues his IDEAL failure after failure. (Yes, I never finished my master’s thesis on this topic of “failed idealism” after completing my coursework for an MA in literature at Auburn University.)

In my own life, I too have sought the “obtainment” of the FEMININE ideal—though not as rigorously as Hardy’s sculptor. As a woman, I have fought at times to be a BEAUTY through my wardrobe and achievement of an admirable figure. As an artist, I have fallen absolutely in love with the FEMININE as SHE is expressed all around me in chatter and earnest expressions, flowing or clipped hair, hands holding pencils or dancing in the air, napes of necks, sloping noses and curves of breasts and hips, the selection of cowboy boots or platforms….The FEMININE expresses HERSELF in infinite and diverse imagery! For me, SHE exists in all sizes, shapes, ages, and ethnicities—and this diversity is mysterious and intriguing!

(These FEMININE images with the three breasts are experiments in discovering what form might best express a name of a beer called "Three Nipple Triple." )

Right now, I am teaming up with the Beer Brew Girls to capture a “contemporary” form of the FEMININE. Let me explain. The Beer Brew Girls, a creative duo, started brewing beer at their home and are currently developing this enterprise into something larger and collective—possibly, a future micro-brewery pub in the Decatur area, making beers with names such as “Fallen Angel,” “Bongo,” “Three Nipple Triple,” and “Pumpkin.” Beers with names like these surprised and delighted me last April (2009) when I was invited to a Beer Brew Girls beer tasting party and drank a “Fallen Angel” and other well made beers. I immediately began envisioning the FEMININE images for their beer labels! And told them so--even though I had just met them!

Since then, I have been inviting the BEER BREW GIRLS’ FEMININE forms to emerge from my passionate enthusiasm onto my drawing table. The ephemeral FEMININE is tricky and hesitant to be enticed into the permancy of simple black lines. The BEER BREW GIRLS drawings I show in this blog are works in progress. Let’s see what the future holds as I continue collaborating with the BEER BREW GIRLS and their creative team.

(Here I am, with the Beer Brew Girls. We are holding some of my Beer Brew Girl images. "Fallen Angel" is on my left. I'm holding an image I would like to see go on a stout or blonde ale with a high alcohol content. And the image on my right doesn't have a beer to go with it yet--any ideas? To find out more about the Beer Brew Girls read Scoutmob's article!)

Anyone wanting to taste the BEER BREW GIRLS beer or see my images of the FEMININE in person, there will be another beer tasting event on November 20^th in Decatur. Artists will also be at the event, including me. Write Hallelujah for details!

Meanwhile, Hallelujah praises the FEMININE, the WELL-BELOVED and asks all of you PILGRIMS out there to HONOR HER right now with respect and love—a worthy pursuit! SHE resides right now in our mothers, sisters, friends, daughters, neighbors and colleagues! SHE is EVERYWHERE! Hallelujah!

(This image of "Lady Pants" is the first image I drew for the Beer Brew Girls. As you can see on the label, Kathe brewed the beer for a special occasion. Kimmie, a graphic designer, made the label.)

DARKNESS ENCOUNTERED: BOTH FRIGHTENING AND FERTILE

HALLELUJAH PILGRIMS! Welcome to my ADVENTUROUS ARTFUL JOURNEY! I soulblog with YOU in order to have companionship on my PILGRIMAGE and to learn about YOUR ARTFUL JOURNEY. In this blog, I invite you to the DARKNESS I have been experiencing recently. I have endured a breakdown in confidence and suffered from a writer’s block. DOUBTING oneself can be both FRIGHTENTING and FERTILE.

First, before expounding seriously about FRIGHT and FERTILITY confronted in the DARKNESS, I must proclaim that a pilgrim’s ADVENTURE is not all flashing daring-do in the light of brilliant action—this ADVENTURE also contains periods of stillness and reflection when most everything stops, and there is no apparent LIGHT.

What might a PILGRIM do in the DARK part of the adventurer’s path? Well, for starters, I stopped writing because I became uncertain that I had anything of WORTH to say to YOU, fellow pilgrims. For me, the DARKNESS consists of a lot of physical inaction while contemplating my “perceived” unworthiness. Yes, this uncompassionate examination of myself is maddening and verbally unproductive—a FRIGHT!

However, even though the written words that would comprise a “published blog” hid in these SHADOWY DOUBTS, I have continued to make art daily, a profusion of it—because that is what I have TRAINED myself to do—the daily practice of showing up to the drawing table and draining my heart and soul onto the page (I do not feature this work here today but will show it to you in a future blog.).

During this time, I have also allowed myself to FEEL incredibly flawed. I acknowledge my feelings and make observations. I reflect. By accepting my negative thoughts, I move through them. The stillness turns into action. In the DARKNESS, I am ready to HOWL out my FRIGHT! (My Chiboogamoo is patient and finds a certain musicality to my expressive howls!):

--I am alone (except for Chiboogamoo)!

--Nobody loves me (except for Chiboogamoo)!

--My art is no good!

--Everything I think is cliché!

--I have nothing to contribute!

A fellow pilgrim (Karen Phillips) suggests that I write my blog about this DARKNESS, about THESE howls that lead to the existential question: WHAT IS THE MEANING OF LIFE? You more experienced PILGRIMS are nodding at this particular well-worn question, one you relinquished long ago. This question has no BIG answer—only individual responses.

It is my individual response that brings me FERTILITY from the depths of DARKNESS.What is the meaning of MY life? I live unabashedly to live and breathe SOULFULNESS expressed. I feed myself on AUTHENTICITY and HONESTY served to me in a written word, a vocal utterance, an image, a dance….

The ROBUSTNESS of MYSELF relies on the joy of being present to each and every day. I inhale with anticipation the excitement of what will emerge on the paper before me. I invite you to share your thoughts, drawings, and songs with ME, HALLELUJAH!

HALLELUJAH for TRUTH! Hallelujah for the JOURNEY! Write me, tell me about your journeys into DARKNESS! Blessings to YOU ALL!

THAT SOMETHING OTHER: THE MYSTERY OF THE HIJAB

Hallelujah to each and every one of us! Hallelujah for our differences! In recent years, as a teacher of international students, I have found myself intrigued when I’m in the presence of Muslim women whose faith suggests they wear hijabs. For me, a United States citizen, these head scarves seem exotic and their wearers from Saudi Arabia, Libya, U.A.E., Ethiopia, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Turkey appear mysterious.  Hijab fashion fills me with delight because each scarf expresses the personality of the woman wearing it.

 How is it that a yard or more of fabric intended to cover each woman’s hair, ears, neck and chest, can be expressed in so many different kinds of fabrics and patterns? The silks, cottons, polyesters and denims dazzle the eye in a complex of florals, solids, checks, and stripes.

In addition to choosing the fabric and pattern, each wearer of the hijab determines how the swath of material is negotiated at the forehead, around the ears and pinned at the neck. Some hijabs, which are worn loosely, come undone erratically and require constant supervision. With great periodicity, the wearer must flip the errant scarf back over her shoulder and tug at it unceremoniously under her chin.  Other hijabs are secured firmly in a no-nonsense way, the fabric agrees not to budge. This certainty of placement gives their wearers an aura of serenity and calm control.

 Each day my work culture becomes more entwined with these young women’s cultures.  I know that as women they are like me, but as hijab observing Muslims, they are different. The hijab they wear has become a metaphor for me, representing that which I can’t fathom—that which remains hidden. I do a lot of pausing around these women, leaning into the unknown, wanting to discover what IS there. I greet them. I sit down with them. I ask questions. I wait to see what topics they might nominate. In addition to the cultural and religious differences, the age difference—I am 52, and they are some 20 to 35 years younger—also stalls the conversation.  Instead of understanding the sublime, I am left with the material world and the small things I can observe looming at what feels to me to be the gates of mystery.

 

Occasionally, in the restroom at GT’s Language Institute, I catch a little glimpse, a small part of the woman under the scarf. She removes her hijab and adjusts her hair before pinning the scarf back on. How surprised I have been to see blond, light brown, or brunette hair instead of the black hair I expected to find. Would they be amused at my small curious observations?

 Needless to say, the prospect of what IS IN THE MYSTERY lingers with me. In my morning creations, often a girl in a hijab finds her way into my drawing, speaking to me of what I already know. I stay present to making the image, honoring its desire to emerge before me. This process makes me Hallelujah!

I HONOR MYSELF and EVERY ONE. Hallelujah for our differences. Hallelujah for the MYSTERY and to ART which allows me a way to contemplate the MYSTERY.

 That’s COFFEE WITH HALLELUAJH! Soul blog with me and tell me what is your understanding of the hijab, the mystery of differences and similarities. How will you honor yourself today? Hallelujah loves you!

The SOUL is not in the BODY; The BODY is in the SOUL--Cleaning Out Sally’s Studio Closet

 

When a FRIEND dies right in the middle of things, right in the middle of LIFE—where does it leave those of us who remain? When Sally died on August 22, 2010, it left vast and various communities here in the Atlanta area openly wondering this question. What do we MAKE of our LOVE for Sally and what do make of our LIVES?  Last February at a SPIRITUAL ART PILGRIMS’ meeting Sally quoted to us from Hildegard von Bingen: “The soul is not in the body; the body is in the soul.”

(All of the artwork you see here in this particular blog is Sally's. I am especially fond of the image of the woman's head with the leaf coming out of her mouth. Speaking of nature? Aspiration? The black torso with the head coming out of its side is an image of Sally's that she repeated frequently. For her, it was about the emergence of Eve from Adam's ribs. The little boy figure cut out of pond rubber is one of many pieces Sally left behind. Each fragment tells part of her story.)

Does that mean that once the BODY is gone, that the SOUL is still here, present among us? Certainly for those of us who are artists, we can find evidence of Sally in the art that she left us. Could we change Von Bingen’s words like this: “The soul is not in the art. The art is in the soul.”?

 

 

On Labor Day, Britt, Sally’s husband, invites me into the splendor of the holy objects belonging to his wife, my friend, my collaborator in the refugee community art workshops, and fellow art maker and PILGRIM. Britt asks me into her studio to put away her art supplies. Thank you Britt for giving me this opportunity to be with Sally, as everything about her feels so fleeting, as if she is leaving all of us, escaping into an eco-zone beyond this EARTH. In her studio, I hold her Art—the art-if-facts of Sally Wylde.

(In order to gather Sally's art supplies, I had to gather her "artifacts" that inhabited the shelves amongst all of her paints, tools and papers. I stacked larger pieces of artwork. I put smaller ones in plastic baggies to await her daughters' arrivals and perusal. Some I took out and pinned on the bulletin board you see here to join other work Sally had hanging there. )

Artifacts—half human figures with holes in their torsos, galloping horses, women dancing, half forms of trees and houses, paper after paper hand-sized like a bird nestled in shelves with pieces of brightly colored fabric, remnants of performances—the Lump Journey’s eggs (rattle shakers), tree limbs, branches, pieces of bamboo, honeycomb, grape vines twirled into haloes, words, calendars, numbers, lots and lots of pencils, staplers, pliers, gallons of glue, rubber, boards, larger pieces of paper, important Mark Nepo poems, layers and layers of LIFE, blue, green, red—multicolor expressions, memories incremented on line of fabric, sewn into garments, glued onto paper, holding whispers of yearning….Sally yearned for ever more knowledge, leaning into the feminine, cultivating and anticipating increasing wisdom. Sally was beyond being a nature lover—she was a NATURE BELIEVER and worshiper….

 How many paintbrushes are there? More than it is timely to count. How many paint tubes? Old ones dying or dead, newer ones bigger and fresh. Scissors and jars of paint, carving tools and printmaking inks, needles and pins, and embroidery floss, burlap and canvas, and mesmerizing fabric from exotic places. 

(Jesse, Cecelia, and Lesly met me at Sycamore Place Gallery, where Chiboogamoo and I have just gotten a studio space, to make prints for the parade following Sally's memorial service.  An important member was missing from our printmaking--Robey Tapp.)

The SOUL is not in the ART; the ART is in the SOUL. Sally, your SOUL left us these remnants. A group of us artists decide to open our SOULs and MAKE ART using the block prints you have left behind. It is there that we find you as we print these words on paper: WONDER, FEAR NOT, THANK YOU, ALL WILL BE WELL. We burnish your images in red, orange, green, and blue onto brown and white paper: a girl riding a galloping horse, a sailboat, women dancing, stars, and an angel…. 

(On September 11, minutes away from a sunset, we paraded down the streets of Oakhurst, passing Sally and Britt's house, to get to the community garden. On our way, we saw a rainbow in the sky!)

 

Other friends cut bamboo and cardboard, creating signs to hold these images of OUR UNIFIED SOULs. YOUR ART IS IN OUR SOULS. At your memorial service, the Oakhurst Baptist Church is filled with OUR COLLABORATIVE SOUL SIGNs.  Afterwards, in a joyous parade the community carries these banners to the community garden you started. Drums beat, and we dance holding you amongst us in YOUR images, OUR images now.

 Hallelujah for all of us SOULs—PILGRIMs. Hallelujah for ART being there inside us ALL. ALL WILL BE WELL. FEAR NOT. WONDER. THANKYOU. Hallelujah loves art and community! Hallelujah!

ETERNAL SACRED IMAGES: WE FIND OURSELVES IN NATURE

Hallelujah Pilgrims! My LOVE of NATURE often startles me.  Living on the edge of Atlanta, a city populated by five million humans, I find myself incredibly challenged to HONOR MYSELF in relationship to this great ancient altar: NATURE. Within all that is vegetative and animal is the fabric of bouncing molecular energy. And from this ENERGY flows ETERNAL SACRED IMAGES. But where to FIND this ENERGY and EXPERIENCE these IMAGES?

 In our Decatur townhome, Chiboogamoo and I live amidst concrete roads, pathways, and walls with only north facing windows. Within our shadowy walled enclosure, we harbor parsley plants for the sheer pleasure of seducing butterflies to enter our lives. Our birdfeeders house “peppered” sunflower seeds to attract the local finches and occasional woodpeckers to our windows and successfully discourage the squirrels who visit everyday to shred calcium from the cow’s skull I have hanging on the east garden wall. How my HEART BURST with WONDER this past June when I witnessed baby praying mantises dispersing across the wall above our front door!

 For me, this HEART BURSTING WONDER is magnified a hundred fold when I am visiting along the Georgia coast on one of its numerous barrier islands—Cumberland, Sapelo, Ossabaw, Little St. Simons, and St Catherines—to name a few. These slender finger like islands built from accruing and eroding sands for almost 50,000 years are fortresses of ancient maritime forests towering behind oozing muddy marshes which release their rich organics out into the ocean’s eternal ebb and flow. ENERGY VIBRATES HERE.

(How magical these Georgia barrier islands are. On Christmas Eve 2008, I saw this photograph of a fish crow on a young buck's back displayed on Royce Hayes' fridge in his home on the island of St. Catherine and knew I had to paint it! How surprised I was when he as the island manager picked up the phone and called the island's ornithologist, Jen Hilburn, and asked her to make me a copy! It appeared on our cabin's doorstep that afternoon. Island hospitality!)

I must say here that I am knowledgeable of these Georgia Golden Isles because of my Chiboogamoo.  As he nears the completion of his book, “Life Traces of the Georgia Coast,” we marvel at the beauty that exists a 200-mile drive and ferry ride from our townhome front door. His research and documentation of the thriving wildlife on these everchanging and moving islands has brought us into the caring hospitality of island naturalists such as Jim Bitler, John Crawford, Jen Hilburn, Scott Coleman, and Carol Ruckdeschel.

(Here I am with my Chiboogamoo on Cumberland. Vernon J. Henry and Carol Ruckdeschel took us there to look at a Pleistocene outcrop in December 2008.)

 My sweetheart and brilliant husband Chiboogamoo has had me accompany him on these island adventures as his worthy assistant and sincere LOVER of NATURE. Hallelujah! HALLELUJAH! H A L L E L U J A H ! ! ! Zeroing in on my AUTHENTICITY, I greet all that I see and all of those that I meet as COLLABORATORS in my PILGRIMAGE, my quest to find and document the ETERNAL SACRED IMAGES. The beaches, marshes, forests, and ponds THRIVE with LIFE. Most recently, Gale Bishop has been posting daily photos from St Catherines as baby turtles emerge from their deep sandy nests along the dunes into the endless moving sea—an eternal cycle of life, one for the sea turtles that has been going on for more than 100 million years.

Last week in the middle of September, Carol Ruckdeschel, a naturalist living on Cumberland, was kind enough to send me some images of the black vultures that are part of her daily environment on this southern most Georgia barrier island.  I had asked her for “island” stories in my absence of experiencing island NATURE directly for the past six months. These vulture photos were her response, and they were ENOUGH. Carol’s portrait of a vulture spoke to me profoundly and deeply. I had to paint this greatly misaligned bird, despised by humans because of its carrion feeding ways, in the way that Carol had captured it.

I titled my portrait, “I AM HERE.” I use the verb “to be” in present tense to address the simultaneous presence of LIFE and DEATH that the vulture represents to me. While being very much alive and experiencing hunger, parenthood, the breeze through pine trees, this bird also reminds me that I one day will be carrion but long after its own demise. I AM HERE. Yes, be present to THE NOW. I have a goal in MY PILGRIMAGE, my creative odyssey: to greet TRUTH with a HALLELUJAH! Hence my name—Hallelujah Truth. Hallelujah Black Vulture! Hallelujah NATURE!

I began this blog entry with the question as to how to find and experience the ENERGY of these ETERNAL SACRED IMAGES found in NATURE. My answer is this:

 Fellow Pilgrims, follow your intuition, listening to what you already know. Our spiritual paths are often a rediscovering of what we already know deeply within ourselves. Honor nature and see how its life reflects back your interior.

 This carrion eating bird is essentially me, as much as a sea turtle or American oyster catcher! I AM HERE. YOU ARE HERE. WE ARE NATURE! Hallelujah! 

(I painted this image for Scott Coleman, who is the naturalist on Little St. Simons. He was kind enough to meet us on a cold Saturday morning in March 2010 and take Chiboogamoo and me for our very first time to see this jewel of a Georgia barrier island. His office is located in an old home sitting on the marsh, where Scott frequently watches otters frolicking. Viewers have responding to this image positively. Is it because of how I have made these creatures look very human like?)

JOYFULLY CREATING WITH THE EASE OF A CAT NAPPING: THE RESULT OF CREATIVITY COACHING

What is creativity coaching? Imagine the Dementers in Harry Potter. Dark cloaked figures arrive flying from the sky’s horizon, materializing out of another dimension, something like the Wicked Witch of the West but without a broomstick.  The atmosphere becomes embroiled with a sad heaviness as they hover over their human targets. Then ALL THAT IS PRECIOUS in LIFE is SUCKED OUT of the frail mortals who are left empty human shells incapable of experiencing joy or thought evermore.

Now IMAGINE the opposite—and you have CREATIVITY COACHING. My creativity coach, Lesly Fredman, is more like Peter Pan’s Tinker Bell with the ferocious intuition and intellect of Lily Tomlin, a whale and Leonard Cohen. Often appearing around Metro Atlanta as a SUNFLOWER in the “Dancing Flowers for Peace,” my CREATIVITY COACH follows the THRILLING LIFE FORCE, much in the same way that the sunflower moves synchronously with the sun’s position throughout the day.

(Lesly posing with old work of mine at a Christmas "Hot Grog" sale at her house in 2008. Before creativity coaching, I only worked on wood or found materials from the street. I used only acrylic and latex paints--generally gathered from the curb on garbage day. Since then, I have experimented with a variety of other media, finding my intense love for watercolor pencils shown in my work here on this blog.)

Okay, what would a mortal do with a CREATIVITY COACH? Let’s start with a simple act of imagination. CREATE a list of ALL that you HUNGER to DO to BE to EXPERIENCE to REALIZE—This is the list of YOUR ESSENCE (the kind that the Harry Potter Dementers want to suck out of you and that often remains IN you like an unlit fire!). With the assistance of the CREATIVITY COACH, you might do any of the following imaginative acts:

 1) DANCE each item on your DREAM list, experiencing and savoring each DREAM, bringing it into your body’s muscles, bones, and breath.

 2) PRETEND you are someone else interviewing the REALIZED YOU and finding out the ways you BECAME the DREAM YOU.

 3) PAINT (especially if you are a visual artist like me) aspects of what BEING in this NEW REALITY looks like.

 4) WRITE an “Exquisite Corpse” poem, teasing out fluid verbal images of YOUNESS.

(You have read earlier blogs about the death of my friend, artist colleague, and fellow pilgrim Sally Wylde. In the days following her death, I honored her in my daily creative meditations. I allowed her to be present in the unknown with DEATH. I trusted that together we would find a new way of being in DEATH.)

(The days following Sally's death, I drew each morning, holding the thought of her pilgrimage in the unknown terrain of death and without flesh. I was happy when I began envisioning her physical body returning to the earth.)

 Well, you get the idea. The CREATIVE ACTIVITIES are as INFINITE as the IMAGINATION. Live in the PRESENT and the thoughts and actions that you have and do become NEW WAYS of BEING. My Creativity Coach calls her business “PRESENCE.” We start a session by my answering the question, “What is going on with you right now?” Asked calmly, this question elicits a sweet hushness. We both lean into me to listen to my heart beat, my breath, to determine who I am now….

(We are readying for Sally's memorial service here in Decatur. Her death is with me. Mourning takes time. Sally will be a part of me in the many transformations of her PILGRIMAGE. This painting with death hovering around me is unfinished.)

This method of BEING PRESENT heals and rejuvenates. We, the CREATIVITY COACH and I, begin with WHO I AM--now. No past narratives and no whining about past periods of inactivity. We “light” the fire of Hallelujah. Even thoughLesly is sitting across the table from me, our meeting has the heightened feeling of ME being a performer on a theatrical stage. Didn’t Shakespeare write that all the world is a stage and we are all actors upon it? How FUN to get to TRY NEW WAYS OF BEING ON like a character in a play! Lesly gently directs ME with the skill of an experienced theater director. In fact, Lesly seems to me a most unique CREATIVITY COACH, having managed and been the artistic director of Theatre on the Prowl for almost 25 years.

 After working with Lesly for three years, I am here to tell you that our IMAGINATIONS CREATE REALITY. In our creative work together, I have started my own business, RuthTruth Art; created a new persona—Hallelujah; generated a blog, “Coffee with Hallelujah,” which integrates my creative process with my visual art; signed the lease for a studio at Sycamore Gallery to do collaborative work with my husband, Tony Martin, a paleontologist; given birth to the “Art Factory,” with Robey Tapp and Sally Wylde (who envisioned this art collective) and together completed a year’s art program with adolescent teenage refugees at Global Village School in Decatur. Believe me, there is much more that our creativity coaching has given birth to.  That is the subject of future blogs!

My journey has been both light and dark, buoyant and treacherous--I have been willing to open all of these doors because I am dedicated to being present to my AUTHENTIC SELF, and because of Lesly (and my Chigoogamoo)--I have not been alone!

 What is CREATIVITY COACHING? For me, it is doing my LIFE’S WORK with the JOYFUL EASE of a cat napping! I am happily experiencing every inch of my BEING! Thank you Lesly Fredman, CREATIVITY COACH EXTRAORDINAIRE!

 Hallelujah wants to hear from YOU, FELLOW PILGRIMS! Tell her about your AUTHENTIC SELF. Soul blog with Hallelujah!