Purpose in Lachrymose

This last year didn't involve much travel for work or otherwise. That's when I forget that some of my best thinking happens when I take a drive.

Beginning

I had previous versions of this post that went on too long. The writing was out of focus. I decided to keep it simple but honest on this fourth run at it.

Employment

I got a part time job creating imagery for the recently deceased. Portraits cleaned up and images put together for presentation of lives now at rest. After over one hundred resumes and applications, it was a welcome respite to be hired on in something that felt familiar, yet also hit closer to home than I had anticipated. Every client I do work for, I learn a little something about them. Sometimes it's a bio, always a photo or two, and I spend time working on an image of them that is the last image their families may have of them to see before they are laid to rest.

Cats

I have three indoor cats and one that lives outside as a very tame feral. Out of the blue, I had another little one show up, skittish, fearful, hungry, and as trust was gained and I was able to pick them up to hold them… I felt something in their belly. I small soft kick of an unborn kitten. A race to find a foster, a rescue to help was paramount. A wonderful foster stepped up to help this very young momma cat, by taking her in, and just in time. 

(Left) Clarabelle days before her litter came. (Right) Clarabelle and her little babies just a few weeks later.

No less than a day or so after being taken into foster, a flash of cold weather hit the area, and she gave birth inside. No complications and all the kittens were born safe and sound. I've had the pleasure and happiness of watching them grow and be cared for at the foster's home (where many other felines are cared for and safe until they can be adopted out). On days when I feel like I can't make a difference, when I think few others care enough to help out, I think of this little cat and her babies. 

Death, Dementia, Distance

I lost friends and family this last year. 

Some unexpectedly, some inevitably, all heartbreakingly. Sicknesses permeated some interactions and updates between myself and people I care about.

A few friends left the country. Leaving behind much of what they knew to stay safe.

My mother has lost more and more ground to dementia. My father quit drinking to care for her.

Days became surreal. Every day feels like an effort to wipe the static from my mind.

Funerals and memorials were weights I never wanted to endure. Absences were hammered home by the presence of empty chairs, found belongings, and stories and games left unfinished.

To this day, I feel that the look inwards at my own mortality and place in this world has become more prominent. Time is a gift. One that is limited.

Creation

I started this year being rejected from a slew of art shows.

I had struggled to write, to draw, to imagine. To believe in myself.

Last year, clinical depression and undiagnosed ADHD wreaked havoc upon my efforts, and I felt less and less like myself. 

After getting on Zoloft, I felt like a different person, one jarringly separated from the pall of sadness and other burdens, with chemical balances leveling out,… and leaving me adrift from the familiar waters of my previous inspirations and creative muses.

I’ve had to relearn to concept, to draw in some ways, to tell stories, and have questioned my role as an artist. Was I still an artist? Would I find the drive and passion to push onwards and find myself again? This year may or may not have those answers in waiting.

Building up my media archiving/preservation business started to become something more for me, and have been enjoying the analog nature of working with old cassettes and technology that are considered "dead media". Being able to watch past memories unfold for stories I don't know makes me think of things we've all lost. Not just things. But interactions. Conversation. Community.

Acting chances came about as well, helping bolster my confidence.

I started collecting Wander Club tokens to highlight past times and memories. Not just for posterity, but to stay inspiration and remember good things.

Shows

There are a few shows I am certain I will be doing, so I am working towards being as prepared as possible and have laid out goals for those. I hope to attend any shows, music performances, and gatherings I can. This last year I really enjoyed the handful of musicians I managed to see. 

There has never been a year that I've attended the Renaissance Festival that I didn't find phenomenal musicians performing.

Horizons

As I write this, the world seems to be in a very delicate and damaged place. The shadow of turmoil and the vile corpulence of greed are now the invaders in the minds and homes of many in America. 

Natural places are in danger of being destroyed further and further. Wildlife is changing and disappearing. 

Class warfare has divided communities. Oligarchy and corporations mean to manipulate and own those divisions. 

Lives are forfeit if there is the smallest of reasons to ignore or extinguish them.

The surreal nature of things shows that the very real decline of western civilization is drowning us, and yet, we still need to survive, to pay bills, to find glimmers of hope and reasons to move forward. It is laborious to look to far shores, when the ones we stand upon are defiled.

Cognitive dissonance and the rise of normalization of deviance stand to smother the morality and well being of our lives.

Patience

The first 2/3 of last year was a blur. It took taking up meditation and writing even when I didn't want to journal to establish some boundaries and sense of well being for myself. 

Around October, I started organizing old photos and gazed upon people and places who had been stored in far corners of my mind. I have been going through many things from my childhood, and deciding what will stay and what needs to go.

Life passes by quickly if we don’t make the effort to slow down. To appreciate the good around us. The good that is worth fighting for. That is worth believing in.

Live

I don't know what this year will bring. None of us really do.

But if you’ve made it to this part of my post, I hope things will go well for all of you..

I promised myself I would to reach out to at least one person a day. Keep those connections going. Clear the paths of overgrowth. 

Thank you for reading. May the course of this year reveal safety, decency and hope for you and yours.

It can feel hopeless and overwhelming.

But we are alive at a time of great change. Within us, around us, and everyone has the responsibility to carry the best of us forward, to herald in better days. 

Do not let those who mean to tear down your spirit, succeed.

Live. Remember. Tell stories. I will. I hope you do as well.  

- Mario, the Artisan Rogue