I haven’t written a blog or posted an image on social media for quite some time. That part of my life got submerged for a few years.
2021 was a year of debilitating mystery headaches and leg problems for me, a year of unexpected heart surgery for my husband. It was a series of seven hospital stays for my 100 year old mother, and driving and visiting for me.
My mum died early the next year. 2022 was about disposing her possessions, selling her condo, meeting lawyers, more surgery for my husband. It was about taking large doses of steroids after being diagnosed with an inflammatory illness, reorganizing our home so family could live with us until they could move into their new house, and lastly, deciding to sell our home of 35+ years.
2023 was a blur of repairs, renovations, downsizing, packing, and finally, moving.
When I look back at that season, it was a lot. There was overwhelming caretaking and emotional stuff underneath it all and yet I still put a lot of pressure on myself because I wasn’t doing more with “my art”.
I was surprised to discover, that I’d filled over 12 sketchbooks during those three years. A lot of the sketches were completed in hospital rooms or parking lots and doctor’s offices or while grabbing a quick coffee in a cafe, a speedy sketch from the window of the car at the beach, one flower, the apple in my hand, the broken shell my grandson left in the backseat. Through necessity, I’d learned to utilize 10 minute time blocks.
I’d drive to the ocean after a hospital visit and slowly my attention would shift from the lists I had to take care of to being captivated by the shapes of some logs, a dried crab leg, a seagull dropping a clam in hopes of it bursting open. Most of the sketches are done quickly with a pen, no time given for perfection. The sketchbook pages are filled with reflections, ideas, expressions of gratefulness, seizing a memory or jotting down present moment perceptions. Each page was a small gift of joy in the middle of a tumultuous season.
My mother was an accomplished creator in her past, exhibiting her paintings and quilts in galleries. In her later years, my sketches inspired her to try again , which motivated me to have a new one for her for every visit. Even a month before she died, she would attempt to draw a tiny picture in an equally tiny sketchbook she kept by her hospital bed, diverting her attention from her pain filled life. With bent, stiff, arthritic fingers, she would try again to draw the tiny gifts I’d bring her. One leaf, one shell, one twig of blossoms.
Research says the process of drawing has many benefits, that it releases many of the happy hormones. The activity demands that I’m present, my eyes following edges, hands moving at the same speed, feeling the texture of the paper, the pen dragging across it, transporting me from responsibilities to another place. The practice provides a safe place to express myself and any subject is game, a pile of clothes on the floor or colourful seaweed at the beach. I encourage you to give it a try if you’re feeling submerged. Putting a few marks on paper is a cathartic experience. Picasso is quoted to have said, “Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.”
One of my mum’s collages
