Category — Art

Tomorrow I leave for a charming, Atlantic coastal house on the shores of Prince Edward Island to work on my life’s dreams. It’’s an Angela Ritchie ACE (arts, culture and education) camp being hosted by a longtime creative hero of mine, Sabrina Ward Harrison (whose work I was first introduced to by my dear friend Avital.) I’’ve been reading Anne of Green Gables in preparation, and between that and reopening Sabrina’’s book Spilling Open, I am being confronted with an abandoned way of living — Anne’’s insatiable desire for all things romantic and Sabrina’’s altogether raw confession.

Yesterday I was talking with my friend Sara and trying to explain how I felt about this trip. With my tongue uncharacteristically tied in knots, I finally spilled the truth that I was feeling NERVOUS.

I am nervous to go to camp.

Like the nervousness I felt before going to a Calvinettes camp-out when I was eight. Except today it’’s an adult nervous. Like I’’m fooling myself into believing that I can see all of the potential potholes ahead.

I’’m not nervous the girls are going to tease me or the boys won’’t think I’’m pretty. I’’m not worried I’’ll forget to bring my bathing suit or that it will rain all week and we won’’t be able to sing or roast marshmallows around the campfire. I’’m worried that this trip, this camp, this first four-day sojourn without my one-year-old, this meeting of a creative hero, this writing assignment, won’’t be all I desperately hope it will be.

Something deep, DEEP, in me wants to fling myself into this week with the unhindered expectation of a five-year-old. I want to believe with my twenty-year-old-heart (the better, freer, lighter heart) that this will be IT. The marker. The moment. The chapter changer. A time so affecting that I’ll hold it up as my Everest climb. A culmination of so so so much. And something (SOMEONE) tells me it is. And I want to believe it.

Oh god, do I want to believe it.

But my adult self tells me to be careful. To not care too much. To not get too excited. To set my expectations just a little bit lower.

And my five-year-old/twenty-year-old self is telling my thirty-one-year-old head/heart to fuck-off. To ““do what you did at first”” (Revelation 2:5). To BELIEVE.

That my God (the God I am so unsure of, the God who ever clings to me, the God of my youth, the God of the universe) is love. And that he WANTS me to believe this with every single inch of my being. And to not hold back.

And somewhere behind my ribcage, behind my separating bones, screams YES.

The yes of my two-year-old, five-year-old, twenty-year-old, pre-period, pre-heart-smash, pre-confusing-years, pre-church-mess-ups, pre-career-detours, pre-falling-out, pre-self.

Yes.

Yes. It will be.

Yes. I believe it.

Yes. There is love ahead.

Yes. There is more.

Yes. The daring will be worthwhile.

yes. yes. yes.

good. good. good.

love. love. love.

amen. amen. amen.

echoes my thirty-one-year-old heart.

And tomorrow I leave on a jet plane. And all shall be well. And all shall be well. And all manner of things will be well.

Yes. Amen. Let it be.

I am very much looking forward to a stellar night out tomorrow.

Image Journal presents…

An evening of Readings, Music, and Discussion with Musician Miranda Stone and Writers Deborah Joy Corey, Luci Shaw (!!!), and John Terpstra. If you’re in the Toronto area head to the Glenn Gould Studio, 250 Front Street West - April 28, 7pm.

Details here.

Tap, Bowen Island

Bible Belts, husband-and-wife duo Alison Therriault + Chris Alscher (Photo by Ming Wu, Ottawa)

Favourite moment of the day:

Stopped in late morning traffic a block from Main and Hastings, spotting my friend Chris aka Chris-A-Riffic (full-time musician, part-time Radio3 DJ, longtime CiTR host, avid husband) standing on the sidewalk, one hand holding up his bike, another reaching out to a man with a handwritten sign, all the while his not-yet-two-year wedding band (he married his drummer) glistening in the February sun.

Chris is one of those people who has the uncanny ability to make me smile no matter what the circumstance.

Happy Day, Sir Chris. You are one of the most sincere, humble, and unbelievably talented men I have had the good luck of knowing.

One thing I will surely miss, when we depart for Toronto next spring, is our vast living space. We’ve been able to host the Marchioro family (2 parents, 3 kids, a Swiss student,) my island mom’s group (6 moms, 6 babies and room for more) and five friends (plus Michael, Madeleine, Brittany and her boyfriend) last weekend for brunch and a creative afternoon.

A day of peace, was the invitation. I met the ladies at the dock and delivered them, along the twisting cracked-pavement road, then up the dirt driveway to our house nestled deep in the woods. We lunched on warm cinnamon buns, eggs, sausages, bacon, fresh fruit, OJ and Ethical Bean coffee. Then we gathered around the coffee table each lighting a single tealight.

We turned our eyes to the flame as I shared Jesus’ words:

I am the Way, the Truth, the Light.

The weekend before the power in our house went out for more than 13 hours. At 9 o’clock I tiptoed into our bedroom with a lone candle in hand. The tea light cast no path, it simply enveloped my palm, my wrinkled knuckles, in its warm glow.

There was no path. As far as I could tell there was no room. Only the floor. Only the candle. Only me.

I was taken with the thought: God, Jesus, never called himself a path. Never directed us to a path. He called us to himself. He called us to the Light. THERE IS NO PATH. There never was. There is only Him.

Out of this focus on Light, on our Creator and Guide, we took to the bins of paper, the typewriter, the paints, and scissors and canvases. It was a rainless sky day, so I took to the porch and, with the lap of Pacific as my playlist, put the finishing touches on two paintings I’ve had in process for the last month.

Thank you, Steph, Marisa, Sara, Julia and Wendy (a day early!) for coming. I wish all days looked this beautiful.

Three years. We be three. A chord of three strands is not easily broken… With all this in mind, here’s what Michael and I created at Raw Canvas.

“Two are better than one,
because they have a good return for their work:

If one falls down,
his friend can help him up.
But pity the man who falls
and has no one to help him up!

Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm.
But how can one keep warm alone?

Though one may be overpowered,
two can defend themselves.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.”

- Ecclesiastes 4

::::

We are moving in six days. I am a big ball of mixed emotions. This space will be mostly silent as I pack up our life’s belongings. Encouragement welcome. xoxo

Home is asking to be wrapped. Rooms wait ready to spill out door, into arms of strangers, onto trucks, into cardboard, buried in storage, carted on boat. Too many bins and boxes for my little head: what to keep, what to store, what to sell, what to bring to Bowen, what to ship out east, what to give to family, what, where, how, when…

But I know life sits out of hand. In arms a billion star courses wide. And I take her hand, now one-year-old, and walk our path to smiling eyes. Sit in her chair at our coffee house. Visit our park, swing our swings, dip in our wading pool, visit our friends, roll all over green carpet thick, laid out under our trees, eat sushi where they remember our alaska rolls and our names.

Soon, together three, we will light new paths, grieve old ones, sit huddled in front of burning hearth, welcome friends at ferry dock and feed hungry mouths, rest weary heads in our island home. We hear the Voice who’s laid out our mornings, years, seeking Face that tells our story. These six months will set a course, I can feel it.

There is much ahead. Family to forge. Words to write. Poetry to spill. Schooling to ingest. Home to make.

I met a friend while visiting in-laws last week who told me her story. Of her travels to Romania, working with Gypsies, igniting a call to international law. She’s running toward it. This relit my heart to study more: media’s impact on democracy — how our incessant ingesting of information shapes our understanding of citizenship. Perhaps a Masters in Toronto, time and prayer will tell.

Much is afoot in my little writerly life. The book, the one about women who seek Jesus but don’t all look like suburban mammas, edgy, world-changing gals who rock tats, paint up storms, influence politics here and overseas, is out as a proposal… seeking an agent / publisher. I’ll post some pages so you can see. Poetry is being submitted, I’ll share as it makes its way onto pages. I hope to start having others share their poetry here. I’ve been inspired by my friend Emily’s imperfect prose Thursdays.

My sister-in-law, Brittany, and I have a crazy idea of starting a little onesie company, using my husband’s adorable old Scouting badges: Badge of Honour onesies on Etsy. We’re setting up shop as I type.

For now we take the days as they come, living them full, here in our home in Burnaby… Thank you for sharing this adventure with us.

A few of my words appeared in ‘print’ this past week.

A poem: A Prayer in catapult’s Arms are for Hugging issue

An interview: Wax Poetic in Comment

And my first profile in Sweetmama: Overhaul the Coveralls

Also, I entered a full-length poetry manuscript into a 1st book competition on Monday. Fingers and toes crossed. 

Have a happy weekend, Everyone!

Make It Productions has stepped up the craft fair circuit. They’re not alone. The handmade revolution has taken North America by storm in the past five years. They DIYers even wrote a book about it.

I grew up within the walls of a fully operational art gallery. I shared my bathroom with clients perusing oil canvases and iron toilet paper holders. Family trips were spent visiting current and prospective painters and potters, equal parts bonding time and sourcing ventures. At the age of 14 I was on a first name basis with some of Vancouver’s most prominent artisans. (On an aside, my high school boyfriend was often mistaken for an artist in attendance at gallery openings. It was his safety pin earring and five o’clock shadow, I think.)

It’s obvious, then, that buying handmade is second nature to me.

Buying art can be expensive. I have been blessed to have many creative friends (and a gallery owner mother) who have filled my shelves and walls with gifted work, but you don’t need to ‘know someone’ to be surrounded by the same. 

Fairs like Make It bring us affordable, high quality art. They’re in major cities everywhere. At a show last weekend I discovered the stunning work of Calgary-based photographer Amy Victoria Wakefield. I bought an original as a birthday gift for a friend and took home a couple of her prints. At the same show I picked up two hand-stitched journals and a large hand-printed poster by Edmonton-based Bird on Wire, all for under $30. I’ve framed the poster and its clean black and white lines now lean atop my writing desk. I met the women who crafted these pieces. I praised their work. They smiled and told me stories. Now I see their faces in my home.

Art carries memory. 

I have a favourite piece of art. It’s a small painting of the Fathers of Confederation my husband and I chose to take home from our honeymoon in the Maritimes. It hangs in a hallway where you’d likely miss it. It’s not the prettiest picture but, every time I pass by (about two dozen times a day, en route to the baby’s room) I am reminded of this first moment as husband and wife.

Do you have a favourite piece of art? (A clay bowl your child made in art class twenty years ago, perhaps?) If so, what is it? Does it carry meaning? Does it too have a face?

:::::

Posted yesterday on the After Hours blog.

How do you do it all and keep time for creative pursuits? 

This was my first question for an occupational therapist mother-of-two I befriended earlier this week, who also happens to paint professionally. It spurred a half-hour discussion as our six-month-olds happily swung, unaware in the brisk March air, nearby.

My friend Brian Harskamp, Director of Development at the Hamilton-based think tank Cardus, is a brilliant cook. When, I wonder, does he find time between his work, civic involvements and other extracurriculars to peruse St. Lawrence Market and other local grocers for just the right ingredients? 

Me? At this stage it’s a three hour window every second Sunday, sitting in a lakeside arts centre in the company of six others, penning lines of poetry. I usually polish off my bi-weekly creative stint circling the perimeter of the lake on an early evening run. The rest of the time I scribble lines on scraps of paper as they come to me. Post-its. Backs of envelopes. Napkins. At the end of the day I write them in my journal or, more often, paste them in, ready for an article or a piece of yet-to-be-written prose. Sometimes I escape to a coffee shop between 6 and 7am to sit alone and read and journal. The occasional evening, after the dinner dishes are done, my husband is at his laptop and my daughter is tucked in bed, I scribble ideas on canvas (in pastel) for painting at a later date. 

So, dear reader, I’ve been wondering: When do you find (or, more accurately, make) time to create? 

[Adapted from this week's post on the After Hours blog]