Cuttings

COVID still sucks. Creativity is still awesome.

When I started this newsletter, I didn’t know what I was doing. I still don’t. I only knew I needed to challenge myself, that I wanted whole-heartedly to write and publish, to create consistently, polish what I created, and set it free into the world. Every word is a bird. Bring it into existence. Set it free. When I tell others I have a Substack, most ask, What’s that? So this is what I tell them. That I am always looking for the magic in the every day - because it’s there, waiting to be found.

I am forcing myself to write to you now in order to honor this contract, before all of July slips by. I’ve been really sick with COVID, but I am clawing my way out of the hole.

Being sick does funny things to the mind and heart. I’ve found myself wondering about the meaning of pretty much everything. I find myself thinking, Why bother? What’s the point? Does anyone really care? But then I told this to a friend, and in telling her I found myself saying that I that I’ve lost myself a little bit, that over the last few weeks I’ve become untethered to what makes me feel like me. It happens. Sometimes you float away from what gives you purpose. You drift aimlessly in a lazy breeze, or maybe you’re beaten against the side of a wall in a storm, or torn across the ocean of something mammoth happening outside of your control. You might feel very far away from your center, but your center will forever call you home.

Everything that makes me feel like me is still there, just waiting, ready to play. The magic never left. It wasn’t even dormant. It was just waiting for my return. Like my dogs. It doesn’t matter if it’s been 5 minutes, 5 hours, or 5 days, they are always equally ready, happy, and excited to greet me, and however I show up is perfect. Bad mood? Fun! Exhausted? Can’t wait to take a nap! Need to punch something? Let’s wrestle! Want to sing and dance? Time to hump your leg! (That’s Pen’s go to move in kitchen concerts - I dance and she humps.)

The morning after I wrote to my friend, I sat down with a cup of coffee and my laptop and wrote something new. The words flowed, with ease and beauty, and with every one, I felt a little more connected to my essence.

I’ve done some other creative things too. I used my sourdough starter discard to make banana bread and pancakes. (I’ve been trying to make bread but so far those disasters have all ended up in the compost bin.) I collected broken grass to glue into a pattern on paper. I picked and pressed Queen Anne’s Lace. And I started cutting flowers out of books.

Our local library has quarterly book sales. I live for these sales! But this time was different. I had an idea, unformed, but it was a moment of giving myself permission to follow my curiosity. I found myself in the gardening section where I filled my arms. Then I started cutting. Flower after flower. Leaf after leaf. Arrangement after arrangement. Each a little excavated jewel. I have an idea of how I might use them, but that is for later. What is for right now is the cutting, the meditation on impulse.

I was cutting last night when this feeling washed over me. I felt like I did as a teen in my childhood bedroom. I was an avid collage maker, collecting massive stacks of magazine from which I trimmed celebrities, animals, flowers, beautiful scenes, objects that moved me, swatches of color - anything that caught my eye. I glued them to boxes, to paper, and used poster putty to attach them to my walls, the collages creating murals that covered whole corners and sections of my bedroom.

I was happy cutting. I was fulfilled, satisfied, immensely creative in those cutting projects. I spent hours arranging the images, rearranging them, adding and subtracting. Holding each cutout was a conversation with that image, the artist that created it, the person whose face and body I held. Despite how much I loved it, I told myself it wasn’t art. It was a hobby, unworthy of any significance. I see it differently now. It was creativity in the raw. A pure pursuit of curiosity. 

So that’s where I’ve decided to be right now. In bed, recovering from COVID, cutting flowers and writing words. I have a date with my sister-in-law to play with clay, and I have so many ideas. Rather than judge them, I’m just going to collect them to share and see what feels right in that future moment. Because this is how I am finding myself, connecting with the Me of me. Want to play? Yes!

Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, however your summer is going, I hope you’re connecting with your core, with what makes You you. Celebrate the little things. Embrace joy. Connect. Savor. Delight.

Happy Summer, friends.

A Few Fun Extras…

What I’ve been drinking…Limonada (Brazilian Lemonade). Perfect for summer porch-sitting. We cut down the sugar to make it more sour. I am obsessed!

What I’ve been baking…Aside from my failed bread, I had decent success with a strawberry pie and this banana bread that uses sourdough starter discard.

What I’ve been watching…2 documentaries have really moved me: Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie and Simone Biles Rising. I highly recommend. I’m also rewatching Stranger Things which is so fun. Eleven is a badass.

What I’ve been reading…unfortunately nothing super exciting. Got ideas? Leave ‘em in the comments!

What I’ve been researching…Pentecostal religions, mythical creatures, and plant care.