Life in the Slow Lane

Today marks the winter solstice, the shortest day of our year.

Tomorrow there is a full moon, a symbol that

never ceases to make me pause and ponder

the wonders around us.

It is time to slow way down, take our cues from nature...

No doubt you have guessed this blog is a long way from being about an art technique.  Except that it can be, you decide.

All my life I have moved at breakneck speed: so much to do and learn and so little time in one life.  I could multitask, work with both hands and get in and out of a meeting in record time.  This speed translated to other parts of my life like rapid fire speech, a desire not to "waste" time and a heightened impatience with those that didn't run the same track.  Shame on me.

Lately I have been moving in the slow lane.  Forced there by elective surgery, I am anticipating more of the same.  It takes forever to get out of the car and cross the lot to the mall entrance.  I can't get to the doorbell (or the phone) rapidly and I have lots of time to sit idle in strange places since my schedule is not always in my hands.  And I find that pain causes one to be very cranky. So?

So the view is completely different here.  Totally different.

Slow movers have time to catch the eye of strangers who smile and nod in kindness.  I've had pleasant exchanges with folks in line who were apologizing for holding me up (holding ME up?) and I've come to admire those other slow moving folks who are at least making the effort to get out and about.  God love them.

I've had time to sit and watch the snow...really watch it and to wonder how the trees feel and where the birds are and to see those heros who come out in the worst of times ready to plow the roads.  When I can push the cranky aside I try to appreciate the forced slow down and embrace the lessons I should/could be gleaning from this experience.

So art?  Yes, it has made me think a lot about slowing down the art...taking more time to decide what to paint, why to paint it and then not to be in such a hurry to execute.  I'm not a production center, my next meal thankfully does not depend on my next sale.  Moving slowly has revealed new nuggets of pleasure, maybe painting slowly will deliver its own surprises. We will see.

Enjoy your solstice.  The light will be longer tomorrow, just a little more each day until we can hardly remember this cocoon-like darkness.
Embrace your holiday traditions, share the joy....but as an experiment, even if just for a day (or a week) move on over to the slow lane.  Intentionally walk slowly. Turn off the blinkers and move at a different pace.  You may be as surprised as I am.

Merry Christmas,

Cindy

Festina lente

Festina lente is a classical adage and oxymoron 

meaning "make haste slowly" 

(sometimes rendered in English as "more haste, less speed").

see more in Wikipedia

This phrase was the word I selected last January to be my mantra, goal, musing etc for the coming 365 days.  Little did I know how apropos it would be!  

We gave up writing new year's resolutions a while back as each year they seemed more and more familiar and each year we had to admit little thought was given them past the writing.  So we elected to chose a word to live by.  Then we discovered we tended to forget the word so my husband started tattooing them on his forearm and I took the less drastic step of painting them and hanging where I would see the word first thing every morning.

This was to be a reminder to me to "stop and smell the roses," to slow down and savor the path even if it felt slower than the way I usually moved.  I had come to a point in my art that I needed to work more intentionally, taking time to stop, analyze and think before making the next move.  By moving slowly I would more likely hasten/see a better outcome.  

But I felt it was important to try and make haste slowy in other ways as well.  How many times have I rushed to judgement with only a portion of the facts at hand? How often did I miss an interesting mushroom as I was logging miles on a hike not wonders? And please stop me if I rush through a visit, a meal or a phone conversation with someone just so I can get to the next one.  It was definitely time to slow the pace and thus improve the progress.

This morning before climbing out of bed I looked up as I always do for my word reminder.  And as I sighed loudly I knew that it was especially applicable now that I was rehabbing from knee replacement surgery.  There is no way to rush the process of healing, no way to condense the needed therapy into one or two sessions.  It is slow, painful but steady progress.  And I have to remind myself that the choice to s l o w   w a y   d o w n and have the surgery was made in an effort to be able to make haste painlessly down the road.  

So what does this have to do with art? A lot.  If you get frustrated: slow down.  Counter intuitive I know.  Breath deeply and look closely.  Slow. Slow. Slow....is the path to positive forward movement.

And...why not let a piece of art become your trigger for a change?  A certain painting might remind you to savor the outdoors, a special mug may be the mediative catalyst of your morning, music might bring on a moment of escape or relaxation.  Just as I use my artistic version of a word you might find the reminder in a small mosaic or piece of jewelry.

Sometimes its hard to give up a word that has served me well, but since it is a painting all I have to do is move it over and hang the shiney new one in the place of honor - it works!

Just another way that "art" can serve our lives. 

Hoping that this month will see you making haste slowly as you savor the sights, sounds, and smells of the holiday.  Back to the studio soon!

SLOWLY YOURS,

Cindy

Penland Pilgrimage

"She had a point.  A pilgrimage is not about punishment but

about making an intentional decision to look at the world

with fresh awareness and to consider your place in it. 

A pilgrim defines her own pilgrimage; 

maps are guidelines, not prison sentences."

from What the Psychic Told the Pilgram

by Jane Christmas

I have been researching pilgrimages lately.  I have the itch to challenge myself in some way that reveals a new aspect of the world I live in.  It's probably a sign of my age or my ceaseless curiosity but the whole idea appeals to me. So imagine my surprise when I recently realized that I had been on a pilgrimage and didn't even recognize it.

 Early morning mist at Penland School of Craft

I enrolled for a week at the Penland School of Craft in western North Carolina with my sister. She is developing a passion for pottery and while I don't "do" clay I thought it would be a fun week together learning new things.  I like to think I truly enjoy the process of exposure as I dabble in something out of my field.  I now know I am my own worst enemy when it comes to "dabbling".

 Penland offers so much: gorgeous scenery, experts and equipment in many fields, 3 meals a day, interesting fellow students, time to immerse yourself in learning...the list goes on to include yoga, late night chats, meditative walks and time to sit.  Somewhere I got hung up on the "subject immersion" part.  Without realizing it I found myself rushing through breakfast to get back to the studio to try, try, try again a technique that was totally foreign to me.  I inadvertently cut short my lunch break because the call of a failed piece was all I could hear.  And I would barely clean up for dinner as I was anxious to produce a credible copy of every demonstration we were privy to watch.

As the week went on I became more and more anxious that neither my quantity nor my quality was "measuring up."  The irony was that no one, except I, was doing any measuring.  The gal across from me took a week to make 3 pieces, the far more experienced potters behind me were crushing as many as they kept and the giggles from my sis as she broke pieces and parts were having no positive affect on my drive.  Head down, in a minute I'll be there I said, only to turn and find myself now alone in a darkened room.  Nose to the grindstone...for what?  In hindsight I have no answer.

Kiln opening is always a big deal: a reason to party and laugh and share the big reveal.  Our night was no exception.  Wine in hand we all prepared for the "really big shoe."

happy hands reach into the treasure trove of cooked pots

always a collective inhale as the lid is raised

 we gather our work and give it a closer look

I laid my treasures out at my work station and the grin slowly slid from my face.  "What in the world?" I wanted to say.  "I spent a week making this crap?"  Only to myself would I admit that 9/10ths of all I had attempted were fit for the garbage pile.  Suddenly I felt very, very tired.  Even the excitement of fellow students and their sincere attempts towards encouragement didn't lift my spirits.  And let me be honest: I was the first to admit that I had no idea what I was doing, just an interest in doing it.  What was I expecting?  And to what end?

I packed up my treasures that had now lost their luster and it was 3 weeks before I had an interest in unpacking them.  With time had come a kinder eye and I could see the things I had learned, the areas that failed and where some fun things had mistakenly happened.  Most did end up in the dumpster but I now called them "practice pieces" not "production pieces."  We had a good laugh.  Still...still...I knew there was more to this; processing takes time, mulling needs distance, analysis means stepping back.

the piece I kept - my pilgrim's token

I realize now that the purpose of my pilgrimage to Penland was not about pottery...it was about lifting my head up and partaking of all that is around me.  My lesson had very little to do with wet or dry clay slabs and everything to do with slowing down and breathing in the rarefied air that exists in such a place.  I coulda (shoulda, woulda) come home with one decent piece and enjoyed the yoga, taken long walks, lingered over dinner with the writer and visited the studio next door.  This epiphany was mind blowing and, in a funny way, comforting.  It's easy to espouse what we believe but so much harder to live it.  I wanted a quantitative bang for my buck and my time, I came back with a qualitative one.   

I know this doesn't sound much like an ART blog or even a decent PILGRIMAGE story.  But it was both for me.  Have you ever been on a pilgrimage that you didn't recognize as such?  Have you ever had to learn, the hard way, how to really live what you think (or pretend) to believe?  Please tell me I'm not the only one.

ALWAYS A PILGRIM,

Cindy