Complaint Department

Complaining comes naturally to me.

Totally second nature.

A ready default response to all manner of circumstances, no circumstance too small.

Hold that thought, and picture me waiting in the checkout line at Stop & Shop overhearing the following conversation between Louise the checker and the customer ahead of me.

Louise: Hi, how are you? 

Customer: Nothing to complain about.

Graphic-novel-style thought bubble above my head:

SERIOUSLY???

NOTHING???

I CAN HELP YOU!!!

-----

Gratitude/simple pleasures:
• the quiet sifting-down-from-the-sky of just-barely-accumulating snow;
• the reflection on windows above the kitchen sink of metallic decorations from Emmy's 10th birthday party, creating the illusion of flickering colored lights on the leafless pear tree in the back yard; and
• remembering from Camp Takodah days this breakfast-time 200-voice-strong chant—
     ToDAY I'm going to be happy,  
     ToDAY I'm going to be glad,
     ToDAY is the day that's GOing to be,
     The BEST day I ever had!

yet another layer of pasta-pot steam on the window; WIP

Camp Program

When I attended Camp Takodah as a camper, and later as a cabin leader, the programing structure was tight, the rules strict. Infractions tended to be slight, in amusingly inverse proportion to the severity of feared punishment. Sneaking a box of Dunkin Donuts onto camp property after a leaders' night off, for example, was high crime, and we went to great lengths not to get caught.

Lyme Camp is characterized by neither tight structure nor strict rules. And yet I find myself doing some 'sneaking' even here, keeping an eye trained—in this active, busy, be-ready-at-all-times-to-respond-in-the-moment kind of operation that calls for significant presence of mind and availability—for little snippets of time in which I can pick up my paints and a brush without getting 'caught.'

another layer of pasta-pot steam on the window; WIP

What's Cookin'?

You know how pasta boiling on your stovetop expresses itself in steam on your kitchen windows? Its energy and story make themselves known graphically, without words, without sound. And then evaporate, giving a fresh view out the windows.

That's what painting here at Lyme Camp often reminds me of. In about the same amount of time it takes to bring dry orecchiette or linguine to a lovely al dente, my internal energy and story express themselves in paint, without words, without sounds. And then, a day later, or three, dissipate, giving a fresh view as—in this case—a new layer covers a prior one.

today's pasta steam on the window; WIP

WIP

Lyme Camp: work in progress.

One thing.

Another thing.

The next.

one thing

another thing

the next

Evanescence and Consolation

From Ruth Ozeki's novel All Over Creation, which I read seventeen years ago and about which I remember nothing at the moment, this tiny poem posing originally as prose:

Life is evanescent
but left to itself
it rarely fails
to offer
some consolation.

---

Gratitude/simple pleasures:

• the tik tik of expansion as the cast iron wood stove heats up;
• the grace of these words of poetry that found their way to my eyes early this morning—the wind is blowing out of someplace we do not know; and
• ten minutes outdoors, turning my eyes to the encircling Shenandoah, Blue Ridge, Allegheny, and Appalachian mountain ranges.

The Wind Is Blowing Out of Someplace We Do Not Know
metallic latex, acrylic, and oil pastel on a book page
abstract
2020

What Does She DO All Day?

I have a vivid memory of coworker Mary Jane's stopping by the supervisors' office at Landmark School over forty years ago with her weeks-old son. She was the first of my group of colleagues to have a baby. She reported that she couldn't get anything done—could barely get to the bathroom or take a shower or eat. We cooed over her baby's soft skin, took turns holding him, admired his cute little outfit.

Several of us scratched our heads after Mary Jane left, asking each other, "What the heck does she do all day with that baby? How hard can it be?"

hahahahahahaha.

Not only did we find out soon enough on our own what she was talking about, but also …

here I am at Lyme Camp, scratching my head again at how a life situation can turn a previously orderly, intentional, productive, and in-control modus operandi upside down, inside out, and sideways.

Control?

An illusion.

We're never in control.

We just suspend disbelief.

Or forget.

The Thresholds Where Dualities Meet Each Other
acrylic, color sticks, oil pastel, and pencil on a book page
abstract landscape
2020

Siesta

The rules for siesta after lunch at Camp Takodah are as follows: (1) Stay on Your Bunk, and (2) Read, Write, or Snooze.

Here at Lyme Camp we have different rules.

Or, wait, do we even have rules?

I do have a stack of library books to read, and I do read every day, but I also have with me a book whose pages have become my painting canvases. The book is a Children's Classic edition of Little Women published in 1987, with the handwriting and love of my sweet mama—now deceased— captured on the flyleaf. She is with us here—mother to daughter, grandmother to granddaughter, great-grandmother to great-granddaughters—offering comfort during the days of this crazy camp adventure.

work in progress

How We Roll

Polly Berends again (I think)(and maybe paraphrased):

     Do what you need to do 
     until you know what you need to know.

That's how we roll at Lyme Camp.

That's how I roll with painting at Lyme Camp.

They Don't Know Where They're Going and, My Friend, Neither Do I
acrylic, gelato color sticks, pencil, and oil pastel on a book page
abstract landscape
2020

Teeter Totter

Treatment of Lyme disease involves Bad Days and Good Days, with symptoms in constant flux. The symptoms of bad days are often worse than doing nothing to combat your disease symptoms in the first place. They lead you to question your own sanity. But they're worth it, difficult as that is to trust when in an extremely debilitated stage of recovery. What is taking place in your body is the death of spirochetes that don't go without a fight, a fight that is exceedingly clear on bad days.

But I'm not here to talk about bad days.

Bad days? Been there, done that, we have. Just yesterday, in fact. Here at Lyme camp, bad days come with the territory.

As do Good Days. And that, my friends, is the song we sang today.

work in progress—good day

Patience

Chronic neurological Lyme disease can take a lonnng time to respond to treatment. We are given abundant opportunity to practice patience here. Overabundant.

Snippets of conditions in which to paint are hard to come by in my current circumstances where there is little to no predictability. I call on the trust I've always held for the unfolding of my creative life, no matter its pace or form.

All right, all right, all right. I confess: I am impatient.

About painting.

About healing.

Especially and repeatedly and fiercely about wanting healing to manifest.

And so it seems only appropriate that I wish to appropriate the concept and cadence of Pat Schneider's poem The Patience of Ordinary Things.

My version:

It's a kind of love, is it not?
How the brown glass bottle holds the tincture,
How the calendar hangs on the wall, with appointments in squares,
How our phones receive the typing of texts
Or emails. How the muscle of our hearts
Knows what it is supposed to do.
I've been thinking about the patience
Of ordinary things, how silverware
Waits patiently in drawers
And dishes dry quietly on the tea towel on the counter,
And bookmarks keep track
Of what page we will read next.
And the lovely repetition of slats in window blinds.
And what is more generous than a painting in progress?

works in progress

Copy Cat

Lyme disease has earned many names, one of the most common of which is “The Great Imitator” because the condition is so complicated and can often be very difficult to diagnose, mimicking the symptoms of some 350 diseases.

Today at Lyme Camp, I grab at the chance to be a small-peanuts imitator, mimicking someone else's painting because to do so is uncomplicated, because that is how I am able to paint on this day at this time in this place.

The Patience of a Model to Sit Without Moving
acrylic, pencil, and coloring sticks on a book page
study/appropriation of a painting by Michelle Burns
2020

Whole Child, Whole Parent at Lyme Camp Together

Polly Berrien Berends, with whom I first became acquainted decades ago through her book Whole Child, Whole Parent, has provided counsel to me through her writing countless times.

Everything

that happens to you

is your teacher,

     she whispers in my ear here at Lyme Camp.

The secret

is to learn

to sit at the feet

of your own life

and be taught by it.

Lotta learning going on here, Polly. Lotta learning.

Everything That Happens
gelatos coloring sticks, acrylic, and collage on a book page
abstract
2020

The Glorious Impossible

Handpainted paper, scissors, mod podge, and a new day.

Exquisite tension.

The glorious impossible.

The Glorious Impossible
playing with handpainted collage paper on a book page
abstract
2020

Collage Paper?

I like engaging in what I think of as the 'exquisite tension' of working a crossword puzzle or writing a haiku, accepting and embracing the limits and working within them assiduously to bring into bloom what the constraints call for—a six-letter word for prehistoric monument, fourth letter m, for example, or using five + seven + five syllables to express a thought or feeling with tight precision.

Here at Lyme Camp:
• limits—plentiful
• assiduous effort—plentiful
• tension—plentiful
• exquisite—less plentiful, since exquisite is in direct one-to-one correspondence with my acceptance (or lack thereof) of limits!

Two days ago, I worked within the begrudgingly-tolerated limits—cursing them more than once—of a few minutes, a few tubes of paint, an old book, and my finger as a paintbrush.

Collage paper?

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Gratitude/simple pleasures:
• shoveling snow—purposeful, productive, practical exercise! fresh air! beauty every which way!;
• two surprise packages for me in the mail; and
• the grace of Meg's and my laughing in surrender last evening at the day's messy mix of foibles and accomplishments and rough edges and tendernesses and wooziness and failed efforts and vats of soup and indecision and tears and hugs.

Inexquisite Tension
playing with acrylic on a book page
abstract
2020

Keep Me Ready

At Camp Takodah, campers offer up a prayer at breakfast every morning, each one opening his or her heart to keep me ready to help others at some cost to myself and send me chances to do a little good each day.

I wake at Lyme Camp with that prayer in my heart, not knowing how I will be of service but trusting that I will, living in mystery rather than mastery. I set practical intentions to have at the ready should the clouds of overarching unpredictability part to let space open up for them, and then I surrender to the moment-to-moment flow, wholeheartedly doing what life asks of me. 

Gratitude/simple pleasures:

• deep blue fathomless skies, bright sunshine, and just barely enough warmth for just barely enough time in just barely a big enough patch of light to meditate in the shelter offered by the back deck this afternoon;

• readiness to grab the chance to put paint and pencil on paper again today; and

• Meg's eyes, clear and luminous as she sat in a patch of early morning indoor sunshine chatting with me.

Send Me Chances
playing with acrylic and pencils on a book page
abstract
2020

Lyme Camp

You might remember that I went to Takodah Family Camp in August 2015, 2016, and 2017 with my daughter Meg and her family. Now, unexpectedly I have taken up residence with them again, this time at their home in Virginia, for what we are calling Lyme Camp in recognition of Meg's recent diagnosis.

Takodah Family Camp runs for a week. My participation at Lyme Camp began mid-December and doesn't have a set end date. I didn't think Lyme Camp was going to have any kind of arts program but it must have had one in the past because, in poking around, I discovered some basic supplies and materials. I also found an ember of creative energy eager to be fanned.

Gratitude/simple pleasures:

• an unexpected few moments in which to move paint onto a book page with my fingers, in which to grab a cray-pas and a charcoal pencil and a marker to make a few scribbles;

• cubing beef; chopping onions, celery, and carrots; and gathering garlic, thyme, and parsley for an instant-pot stew; and

• a prolonged all-family belly laugh as we lingered at the dinner table last evening.

Whether I Can Unlock the Door Remains to Be Seen
playing with acrylic, marker, charcoal pencil, and cray-pas on a book page
abstract
2020

Here and Now 1 January 2020

Here and now.

Michelle Gives Me a Starting Place
playing with acrylic and pastel on a book page
abstract
2020