i don’t know about any of this. who does? i mean, i’m good, i’m full of joy, i cry easily at the simplest, most beautiful things, and i’m also exhausted. all of it. i woke up early this morning, and sometimes i have to reach to stay one step ahead of my mind, which, given a quiet moment, will drag me as fast as it can into the dark places it likes to go, towards the things that are hardest for me. and the day is easier if i can get ahead of it before that happens. i’m getting better at that, but it gets me sometimes, and drags me down there, and then i have to get myself out. i end up in the studio and i go through the motions, but i don’t feel excited. i try not to identify the nervous feeling, because that will make it bigger, but (i’m whispering) it’s there. so, i write and pull myself together and move forward into a painting, and still i don’t feel it. i think about all the people who say to me (and think without saying), who has time for making things? and i wonder the same. what insanity. but i get closer to not wondering this every time it somehow carries me back to that shifting, tender landscape that feels like home. i keep talking about it, i know. i think that if i keep doing it and re-learning it and saying it out loud then maybe i will land there more often, and not ever wonder how to get back when i am lost in the dark place. 

and (i’m whispering again) . . . it’s working.