In fits and starts

So.. it's Saturday night and I go to the studio. It's been a fortnight, and despite my best dreamt up plans the week before I completely fail to morph some amazing pre-work, just as the sun rises along with the bakers and joggers, regular weekday stint that results in my breezing into the office freshly showered and deinked, with swinging hair and demure office clothes, like some kind of superhero who has mastered the art of the quick change, the being in two places at once, the slide back into daily life and no-one will even notice. Yes, that is exactly what I didn't manage to acheive. So Saturday night I go, a nice blank Saturday night free of plans - and I do monster stencils. Now, just quickly, before I launch into my story (such that it is), let me reasure you that I do not intend to write every time I go to the studio, and share, in minute detail my every pencil sharpening, desk moving, self-conscious, paper shuffling, chair carrying detail. I promise. And soon, I hope, it wont even feel strange and slightly scary, it will feel like a home away from home, and I wont talk about it any more than I talk about, erm, like, work, or the corner cafe, or sweeping leaves in my garden, or whatev. But bear with me for now while it is strange and new, I need extra processing help, and this is where I get that (oh so much cheaper than therapy :). So. Yes, stenciling. But maybe 4 stencil prints in, I get bored. Not of being there, not an 'oh where is the action, take me to a party with fireworks and dancing ponies' kind of bored, but an 'oh but I just printed that and I don't want to do it anymore' kind of bored. So I did some hand painting onto fabric instead, little bird women and sad business men, and accusing hip cats and little machine heads. I figured I could cut them out and hem them, maybe zig zig, and stitch them onto t-shirts instead. It's a lot less wasteful, because you can unpick and reattach a patch when the t-shirt gets old and tatty, and when I print, I'm less likely to f-up a whole garment with an ink blob and have to artfully cover it up, or not use it. Also I was using some very funky old printed sheet fabric, so was recycled. So once I start painting and playing with washes and bleeding (paint not me), and a glass or two of red wine (welll it was Saturday - I know it's not very OH&S but I wasn't using any sharp objects), I happily whiled away 4 or 5 hours. I hoped that by going when it was all quiet and empty I could make a mess and settle in, relax and do what I would have previously done in my kitchen, and then next time it would be that little bit more settled feeling.

I must sound like a giant wimp. I guess I am. I do find the experience of creeping out on a limb and doing something new especially hard when I feel like there is an audience. And having an open space (only 2 walls), being surrounded by other people with stronger conviction, history and idenitification with what they're doing there ("I'm Berryl, I do glass." "I'm Jamie, I paint. My gallery is in melbourne"), is terrifying. Maybe I am more scared of things than most people? Some people?

I have to remind myself that the job I'm in now, when I first started (almost 2 years ago) was terrifying. The people were so nice, and competent, and the work covered such wide ranging areas, some of which I knew nothing much about at all, I felt all at sea for literally months. I felt like I had no reference points, like I had no idea whether I was doing ok or badly, whether I'd managed to get my head around a brand new topic and was asking insightful, useful questions, or whether I was missing the fundamentals. The first time I went OS with work this year, I felt like I had so much new to concentrate on in such a short period of time that I couldn't get my bearings - there were new people with politics and motivations and dynamics to figure out, cultural codes and mores that I was having to guess, heat and noise that made me tired, money that came in denominations so bafflingly large I felt like I was doing complex calculations just to work out how much tiny things cost - etc. ie I was overwhelmed, anxious and self-conscious. Then of course baffled that my colleague wanted me to accompany him again, more than once, and told me how good I was to work with. But it is often like that - I do something new, feeling like I have probably fucked it up or missed something important, worried that maybe I am terribly out of my depth, but battle along anyway, and then later, a lot later, realise I did OK, and eventually, maybe, realise that I did better than OK, and that other people all along thought I was doing really well (and that they thought I was terribly confident because I am oustpoken). So, the actual point to all that was - in a way this history is a good thing, because it gives me hope that this will be the case again. I can say to myself "It's OK, you're just scared because it's new. Eventually it will feel familiar and you'll feel good about the fact that you stuck with it and have progressed. This has happened before, remember?" Judging by my experience in my day/office job, I figure I'm usually about 6-12 months ahead of my self-confidence, so maybe after half a year of turning up and doing it I'll sigh in relief and realise that it's all fine. Or maybe a few more Saturday nights will fast track it for me.

And 'if money was no object' (as per our 'if I won lotto' chat with MMG, as a useful tool to help clarify your priorities)? Would this juggling act stilll be a problem for me? Would I quit my day job and do something else? Likely not I reckon. I would still wonder about the best way to use my hours, for the maximum 'good', whilst being most satisfying also for me, letting me be my most happy and relaxed. I would wonder about 'head' versus 'heart' versus 'hand' and think that maybe I think too much and should do something more passionate instead - and proceed to go ahead and think a lot about thinking too much. I would worry about whether social justice causes are a better use of my time than environmental ones. I'd oscillate from thinking I should just devote my time to spiritual practice to become an amazingly well rounded peaceful, loving, kind person, to thinking I should get involved with a squillion exciting and community projects like doing art classes for women prisoners, or low maintenence native garden rennovations for seniors who want to stay living at home, or tutoring disadvantaged kids out west who are in distance learning, or helping stressed office folk to relax and make things. Or maybe go work on orangutan habitat presevation in Indonesia. Or maybe the workers' and indigenous rights capmaigns in Chiapas. Or maybe being a bepaintsmattered artist, trying to draw out the living pulsing bloody red core of our beings on canvas, Truth and Passion. Or maybe licking the tip of my slender HB and pencilling an elegant, artful, beautiful shadow play of a paper about some whimsical theory or unexpected juxtaposition of ideas as I sit surrrounded by the white and pale of sheaths of manuscripts, and books reclining and surrendering their milky tea pages to me. Or forgetting any concern about big picture helping, and instead figuring out how to help my family, how to help mend broken relationships, make up for lost time, help people feel loved and nurtured who haven't had that. Or pick one of the above to do part time and also be able to play in the sun with my little brother and have my heart feel all happy and wonderfully sad as he says something so earnest and honest and raw as only 3 1/2 year olds can. And maybe grow a lemon tree and feed chickens, and have a house with walls I could paint deep red, or funny light green. I don't think winning lotto would solve any of my big questions, it just means I could muse over them while looking fetching in a Prada jacket if I so desired.