Boneyard

"Boneyard". - acrylic on arches 300 lb watercolor paper, 30" x 22".  Available here and at Artfinder.


We all know that fear is a desolate boneyard where our dreams go to desiccate in the hot sun.
- from Big Magic, Elizabeth Gilbert

It is no-fear year for me.

That doesn't mean I won't be afraid (if only!), but it does mean I won't let fear prevent me from doing, dreaming, thinking, feeling or trying anymore.  It tries, that pesky, persistent fear.  Tries to fill me with anxiety, dread, stomach-ache and shallow breath at the thought of attempting something I haven't done before.  But I don't want to live in a desolate boneyard.

Boneyard

And the bones....they keep appearing.  In front of my eyes, at my feet.  I bring them home, reminders and relics.  Wait for them to talk to me.  When Gilbert's quote landed in my lap, just as I'd finished googling "how to clean found bones" (desiccating in the hot sun is the preferred method, by the way), I smiled.  Bone-talk.

If you've followed my journey, dear reader, you know bones are a theme in my life.  That my very bones have taken some hits, been stitched and glued and caged back together and are, well, something to consider when I do anything.  The universe reminds me that those same bones will be here long after my essence is gone.  What do I want them to say to others?

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​About the art:  this, my friends, is a failed painting.  Or rather, a rescued one.  I set out to paint one thing (plan-fully, and as if I were in control in any way) and ended up painting another. Because once I began listening to the paint, it wanted to SING a boneyard of blown-down trees in the forest.  It did not want to play at the beach!  And so the video is how it began.  It went sideways after the camera was off.  This is what happens when I try to control, instead of flow.  Thank goodness for paper that takes a heap load of paint.